Chapter 57: Way of the Dicksmith and the Perfect Son

The truth was messy as hell as she explained to mom. Sarah did have this friend, but they’d had a nuclear fallout over some serious backstabbing drama. Months ago, this girl had basically manipulated innocent virgin Peter Carter into helping her with some blockchain project, and my coding had gotten her the job she wanted.

Back when I was still a pathetic virgin who thought helping pretty girls with their computer science homework might eventually get me laid. How naive and desperate I was.

She was competent enough, but without my algorithms and system architecture, she probably would have been rejected faster than a Connor Hayes audition tape for anything requiring actual talent.

’Another woman who used my abilities for her own benefit, just in a completely different way than Madison does now.’

Mom sat there processing everything, and I could see the wheels turning in her head. The hope in her eyes was almost painful to look at. Then she looked directly at me with those eyes that had seen me through sixteen years of failures and small victories.

"Promise me you can do this without getting involved in anything illegal or dangerous," she said quietly. "Promise me you’ll use your gifts the right way."

The irony was so thick I could choke on it and die happy.

I stayed silent because honestly, before the system activated, I wouldn’t have given two shits about making money or changing our living situation. But Mom was seeing this conversation as her chance to watch her son succeed with his own talents instead of being some rich girl’s "kept man."

I was her only son, and she’d sacrificed everything to give me a shot at something better than this poverty.

For me, this whole conversation was actually perfect cover for my supernatural activities. With my enhanced digital abilities, getting a legitimate high-paying job within five months wouldn’t just be possible—it would be fucking inevitable.

’Then I could completely transform our living situation while keeping my cover as Regular Peter Carter intact.’

I looked around our house—really fucking looked at it for maybe the first time in years. The place was falling apart like a condemned building. We’d inherited this disaster from our dead grandmother when Mom refused to take a single penny from her piece-of-shit ex-husband after their divorce.

The kitchen faucet had been leaking for three years, leaving rust stains that Mom scrubbed every night but could never completely remove. Our refrigerator sounded like it was dying a slow, mechanical death and probably was.

The living room carpet was so worn down you could see floorboards through the fabric in multiple spots. Our couch looked like something you’d find abandoned on a street corner after a particularly bad garage sale.

’We’ve been living like this for years while I have the power to change everything, and I’d been too fucking selfish and stupid to notice.

Mom’s bedroom situation was even worse. I knew what was behind her always-closed door—a mattress directly on the floor because we couldn’t afford a fourth bed frame and refused to take one of ours since she never wanted any of us on the ground. She sacrificed everything for us. Clothes hanging from a tension rod because there wasn’t proper closet space. A space heater for winter because our central heating barely functioned.

She’d given me everything she had, and what she had was basically nothing.

I watched her washing dishes in the sink; her shoulders bent with exhaustion after another double shift at the hospital. Her scrubs were faded from too many wash cycles, and I could see stress lines around her eyes that hadn’t existed when I was younger.

’This incredible woman had sacrificed her entire adult life for me and my sisters, and never once complained about it.’

The weight of our poverty hit me like a physical blow to the chest. We weren’t just "money’s tight" poor—we were "choosing between groceries and keeping the electricity on" poor. Mom worked herself to near-collapse just to keep us fed and housed, and she never asked for anything in return.

’In the next few months, Mom, I’m going to buy you a house of your own. A real house with new everything. Where you won’t have to work yourself to death just to survive.’

You deserve so much more than this broken-down existence.

The thought made my eyes fill with tears before I could stop them, and suddenly I couldn’t hide the emotion anymore. My throat felt tight and my chest was aching.

Mom must have noticed because she immediately stopped washing dishes and pulled me into one of those fierce, desperate hugs that reminded me exactly why I’d burn the entire world down to protect this woman.

She took in a dead escort’s baby and loved him like her own flesh and blood. She gave me everything and asked for absolutely nothing.

She held me tight while I tried not to completely break down, and I could feel her own tears starting. We were both crying now, standing in our shitty kitchen that was falling apart around us.

"I love you so much, baby," she whispered against my hair. "You’re going to do incredible things with your life. I just know it."

If only she knew I already was.

"Thank you, Mom," I whispered back, meaning every word. "For everything. For never giving up on me."

For loving me even when you didn’t have to.

"Promise me you won’t do anything that would make me ashamed of the man you become," she said, pulling back to look into my eyes.

’As Peter Carter, I can promise you that completely. As Dark Lord Peter... well, that’s a different fucking conversation entirely.’

"I promise," I said, and I meant it with every fiber of my being. "As long as I’m your son, I’ll never become someone you can’t recognize."

Even if I have to live a perfect double life to keep that promise.

As we separated and Mom went back to cleaning up dinner, I realized something that hit me like lightning: I wasn’t just building a sexual liberation empire to save frustrated women from shitty husbands.

I was building a fortune to liberate the woman who’d already liberated me from a life of absolutely nothing.

And tomorrow, it all starts with Mrs. Isabella Rodriguez.

*

Back in my room, I sat at my computer and started planning tomorrow’s mission with the precision of a military strategist. Isabella Rodriguez had no idea that her sexual salvation was about to arrive in the form of a fake plumber who could actually fix more than just her pipes.

Four years of sexual frustration were about to meet their match.

My hands were actually shaking a little as I pulled up her home’s blueprints through the city planning database, cross-referenced her utility company records, and identified the perfect plumbing "emergency" that would require immediate Saturday morning attention.

’Am I really about to do this? Am I really about to seduce my teacher while pretending to be a plumber?’

The answer was yes. Because I wasn’t just Peter Carter anymore. I was something more, something designed for exactly this purpose.

By the time I’m done with her, Mrs. Rodriguez is going to understand what she’s been missing all these years.

And Mom’s soon going to get the house she deserves too.

Time to become exactly what I was designed to be.