Chapter 3 The Reward I Was Never Meant to Win

After leaving my sister's bedroom, I unconsciously drifted back to my own little storage room. The small fan beside my bed was covered in dust, its blades yellowed with age.

Once summer arrived, the room became unbearably hot and stuffy without a window. To make matters worse, the little fan had broken down. I finally mustered up the courage to ask my parents for help—of course, I didn't dare ask for an air conditioner.

I said quietly, "Mom, Dad, my fan isn't working. Could you get me one with a little more power?"

Dad looked at me kindly. "Funny you should mention it. The air conditioner in Maggie's bedroom is getting old and needs replacing. Let ARIS score the two of you based on your performance this month. Whoever wins gets the new air conditioner."

I was thrilled. I threw myself into studying and worked as hard as I could on every exam, eventually scoring more than 100 points higher than my sister overall. I took care of every chore in the house—washing dishes, mopping floors, and doing laundry. I did it all.

As for parental satisfaction, I thought I was obedient and well-behaved. Surely, I couldn't score badly there. But when the scores were announced, ARIS reported, "Academic performance: The two participants are in different grade levels and are therefore subject to different score conversion rates. The final scores did not produce a significant advantage."

"Household chores: Mallory Fallow scored significantly higher. Parental satisfaction: Mallory Fallow, low. Overall determination: Margaret Fallow wins."

I couldn't accept it, and tears immediately welled up in my eyes. "No! I scored higher than Maggie, and I did all the housework! How could my parental satisfaction be low?"

Dad frowned. "ARIS determines parental satisfaction objectively through facial-smile recognition, vocal-emotion analysis, and heart-rate data collected by the accompanying wristband. It's professional and objective. It can't be wrong. If you make a bet, you have to accept the result."

Mom chimed in with an understanding expression, her voice gentle. "AI doesn't lie. Just keep working hard and do better next time."

I bit my lip and backed down a little. "Could you at least install Maggie's old air conditioner in my room?"

A trace of hesitation crossed Dad's face. "The old one has to be traded in when we buy the new one. We can't give it to you. Besides, it wouldn't be fair to the winner if the person who lost still got a reward."

I watched my sister happily get her brand-new air conditioner installed. Cold air soon blasted throughout her room, while I couldn't even get the old machine she had discarded.

I felt terribly wronged, but I didn't dare say anything more.

Summer without air conditioning was simply unbearable. In the end, I could only save up my own allowance to buy a new fan.

However, no matter how much I scraped together, I couldn't even reach ten dollars.

Whenever ARIS judged me the winner, my allowance reward was only a dollar or two, five dollars at most. That barely covered my school supplies. Where would I get the extra money for a fan?

With no other choice, I spent my summer vacation collecting cardboard and empty bottles to sell. I wanted to save enough for a larger, sturdier fan that would last longer. So even on the hottest days, I never rested. I spent the entire day running around outside.

When I finally dragged myself home, exhausted to the point of collapse, I still had to help Mom with the housework, help Dad sort and organize his documents, and stay up late at night making handmade posters for my sister.

I had actually started feeling unwell around that time. I suffered from headaches and nausea, but I thought I'd simply been getting too little sleep or had a mild case of heatstroke, so I didn't pay much attention to it.

Whenever I got too hot, I'd take a cold shower to cool down.

Then, the morning before, my entire body suddenly began convulsing, and I collapsed on the floor. But all I got in return was my family's dismissive indifference.

With that, I died—just like that.

I floated outside the door of the storage room, staring at the narrow folding bed.

Three years. From the age of nine, when I had been brought from the countryside to the city, to the age of twelve, when I had died in this stifling little room. For more than a thousand days and nights, I had lived in that family like an outsider.

My parents never left me without food or clothes. They never deprived me of the opportunity to attend school. They never beat or abused me. But the people who were supposed to be my closest family by blood—my parents and my sister—had hidden their dislike beneath gentle masks. They had used ARIS as a pretext to deceive me and manipulate the results.

The psychological wounds they inflicted on me had felt even more unbearable than physical harm.

I had thought that now that I was dead, my soul would simply disappear with the wind, or perhaps the Grim Reaper would come to drag me away to the underworld.

Instead, an unseen force pulled my spirit, carrying me straight to my parents and my sister.