Miles leaned back in his plush gaming chair, having just wrapped up a thrilling, rollercoaster of a "supernatural" appraisal.
He was in that perfect state of being mentally wired yet physically relaxed.
Picking up his thermos, he took his time blowing on the floating goji berries.
He was just about to dive into the crowded connection queue in the background—a list so packed it was practically crashing the system—to pick his next lucky viewer.
Right at that moment, the relatively quiet live chat abruptly exploded.
A dazzling sequence of premium gift effects, complete with custom audio, hijacked the screen.
High-resolution, metallic virtual Poké Balls bounced and spun wildly across the center of the feed before shattering into a magnificent rain of light.
Exactly six Ultra Balls!
In the platform's gift economy, a single Poké Ball with this specific custom animation cost a solid fifty bucks.
Six of them meant a clean three hundred.
Even after the platform took its vampiric fifty-percent cut, Miles still pocketed a hundred and fifty.
For a fledgling streamer constantly stressing over his Munchlax's bottomless pit of a stomach, this was an absolute windfall.
Miles's eyes lit up like high-wattage searchlights.
He bolted upright, his gaze locking onto the gifter's ID floating up through the virtual light shower.
"Oh! Thank you to the boss, [Shunfeng Relay Station - Old Wang], for the six Ultra Balls!" he cheered, his grin wider than a blooming daisy. "Boss Wang is too generous! May your relay station's business boom, bringing in wealth every day until your hands cramp from signing packages!"
Reading the ID instantly brought up the image of the weathered, middle-aged man he'd seen smoking on the steps in the night breeze just a while ago.
Clearly, Old Wang had finally come to his senses after taking that Meowth with the Hidden Ability [Technician] home and settling it in.
Realizing he hadn't paid the appraisal fee, he had rushed back to the stream to make up for it with a heavy tip.
[Viewer "Shunfeng Relay Station - Old Wang": Master Miles, I am so sorry! I was so focused on bringing that precious Meowth home to show my niece, the whole family got so excited we forgot the main business! Please don't mind the late appraisal fee. It's just a token of my appreciation, treat it as buying a couple bags of premium snacks for Munchlax! You are a huge benefactor to our family!]
Reading the highlighted superchat, Miles effortlessly slipped into the persona of a profound master who viewed worldly wealth as dirt.
"Ah, Boss Wang, look at you, being too polite," he said smoothly. "I told you at the station, meeting by chance is fate. My stream is all about free, around-the-clock appraisals. I don't do that forced buying and selling nonsense. You're making me feel bad..."
Though his words were impossibly humble, the corners of his mouth were practically touching his ears, rising higher and harder to suppress than the morning sun.
This absurdly hypocritical display instantly triggered the roast instincts of his veteran viewers, who knew his true nature all too well.
[Viewer "Late Night No Drinking": Bro is actually shameless! Streamer, wipe the drool off your keyboard. You're smiling so hard your face is gonna cramp, stop acting coy!]
[Viewer "Wild Electabuzz": NGL watching Master Miles appraise is peak, but watching him make bank hurts my soul! I'm grinding my teeth to dust!]
[Viewer "Keyboard Holmes": Analysis complete. Translating the streamer's corporate speak: "Oh, you shouldn't have (tip more next time), this is all free (don't even think about cutting the line without paying), I feel so bad (I'm taking this money with zero guilt, hurry up and pay me)."]
[Viewer "Outlaw John Doe": Emotional damage! Boss Wang took the L here. Save that 300 bucks for your niece's boba fund instead of feeding this greedy capitalist!]
[Viewer "Frontline Melon Eater": Chat, let's cancel this fake-humble capitalist! Stop giving him money, or bro is gonna pull up in a Porsche tomorrow!]
[Viewer "Forest Fawn": LMAO W Streamer! Get that bag! As long as he keeps appraising God-tier Pokémon for us, I'm here for it!]
[Viewer "Straight Man of Steel Tears": Audit this man immediately! Bro is printing money faster than the banks! IRS, open up!]
"Hold your horses, chat!" Miles laughed, entirely unbothered by the sea of sour grapes filling his screen.
In fact, he reveled in the chaotic, lively rhythm of the livestream.
He picked up his thermos and blew sagely on his tea.
"You guys are crying watching me make money now, but you didn't see me the last two months, eating instant noodles every day and drinking every last drop of the broth."
"Besides, this is hard-earned cash. Every cent is earned through my piercing gaze. It's called paying for knowledge, understand?"
After trading blows with the chat, Miles felt thoroughly refreshed.
He turned his attention back to the connection queue.
"Alright, alright, jokes aside, let's get down to business. Tonight's next lucky winner is..."
His eyes darted across the screen until a strikingly familiar ID abruptly barged into his vision.
[Iron-Blooded Iron Lifter] has requested to connect with you!
Seeing the name, the memories from a couple of days ago came flooding back.
Miles raised an eyebrow.
Wasn't this the muscle-bound gym bro who got absolutely floored and beaten black and blue by his own violently irritable Machop?
At the time, using his [God-Level Insight], Miles had instantly spotted the extreme, violent pathology hidden deep within that Machop's genetics.
He had sternly advised the tough guy to take the Pokémon to a proper clinic for a comprehensive brain and genetic screening immediately.
'Come to think of it, ever since he rushed off to the hospital after that call, this guy hasn't shown his face in the chat,' Miles thought to himself.
'I figured he was too embarrassed and made a burner account, or maybe he actually got packed up by that Machop. I didn't expect him to reach out today.'
Driven by intense curiosity, Miles didn't hesitate.
He clicked [Accept Connection].
Ding! With a crisp chime, the stream's layout split cleanly down the middle.
As the video feed on the right loaded and came into focus for the thousands of viewers, the relentlessly scrolling chat froze completely for three solid seconds.
Then, the entire live chat erupted like a volcano of uncontrollable gasps and frantic laughter!
The figure on the screen was a tragic, almost bizarrely comical sight.
It was indeed the once arrogant, muscle-bound Brother.
However, his previous swagger, where he flexed his biceps in tight tank tops, was entirely gone.
His head was wrapped so thickly in white medical bandages that only his eyes and mouth were visible, making him look exactly like an Egyptian mummy freshly unearthed from a pyramid.
His left eye socket was a horrific, bruised purple, swollen like a steamed bun—clear evidence of a devastatingly heavy blow.
To make matters worse, his right arm was encased in a thick plaster cast, suspended humiliatingly from his neck by a blue medical sling.
The cherry on top was the assortment of band-aids plastered over his visible skin.
He leaned weakly against a hospital bed, a stiff, bitter smile on his face that was a hundred times uglier than a crying grimace.
"Master... Master Miles... Good evening. This is Hodor speaking... I'm back," he greeted, his voice incredibly weak.
Just speaking tugged at his facial wounds, forcing him to gasp sharply in pain. "Hiss—"
[Viewer "Late Night No Drinking": WTF WTF WTF!!! Who the hell is this?! Bro looks like he escaped from a Mummy movie set!]
[Viewer "Wild Electabuzz": LMFAO! I'm sorry, I know I shouldn't laugh, but bro got packed up BAD! How did he get beaten into a pulp?!]
[Viewer "Outlaw John Doe": Wait, I know this ID! Isn't this the gym bro who got absolutely folded by his Machop a few days ago?! How is he 100x more injured now?!]
[Viewer "Mrs. Carrot": OMG! This is too tragic! Did that Machop do this again? This isn't domestic abuse, this is straight-up attempted murder!]
[Viewer "Frontline Melon Eater": Chat, is this real? 1.9-meter muscle man brutally beaten by a Pokémon. Streamer, confess, did bro offend you offline? Did you hire goons to jump him?!]
[Viewer "Keyboard Holmes": Big brain moment! The streamer was just walking the streets, and now this guy looks like this. I reasonably suspect the streamer has mob ties! Mafia arc confirmed!]
[Viewer "Straight Man of Steel Tears": RIP us. We found out about Master Miles's gang affiliations. Are we getting silenced tonight?!]
Seeing the chat spin wilder narratives by the second, practically crowning him a mafia don, Miles broke into a cold sweat.
He quickly leaned into the mic to clear his name.
"Hey, hey, hey! That's enough out of you trolls! You can eat whatever you want, but you can't just say whatever you want!"
"What do you mean I hired goons? Your streamer is a law-abiding, upstanding citizen, purer than bottled water! Keep pushing this narrative and I'm banning the whole lot of you!"
After forcefully taking control of the chat back, Miles shifted his gaze to the miserable patient on screen.
A flash of sympathy and helplessness crossed his eyes.
"Brother Hodor, your... your new look is quite unique."
"What happened? Didn't I tell you to go to the hospital for a check-up? How did a check-up land you in the orthopedics ward? Did that Machop go berserk in the hospital?"
Hearing Miles's question, tears of grievance welled up in the Hodor's only open eye.
He let out a long, weary sigh, his voice heavy with the weight of the world.
"Master Miles... you are practically a living god! Everything you said on stream last time was spot on!"
Hodor shifted his posture slightly, tweaking a wound, and winced in pain again.
"After our call that day, I didn't waste a single second. I spent a fortune to hire a security firm that specializes in transporting dangerous Pokémon."
"They shoved that little terror into a custom alloy cage and hauled it to the top Pokémon genetic disease research center in the province."
"Several senior experts at the hospital ran an incredibly deep brain CT scan and a genetic mapping screen on it."
"When the results came out, those veterans were stunned. They said that in decades of practice, they'd never seen such an extreme, twisted case!"
Hodor swallowed hard, lingering fear and unconcealed terror thickening his voice.
"The experts said this Machop isn't just bad-tempered. There's a terrifying, fatal flaw right in its genetics!"
"Its baseline adrenaline secretion is three times that of a normal Machop! It's like a living powder keg constantly at max capacity."
"Even a slightly loud noise in the air, or a touch to sensitive areas like its head or back, instantly detonates its brutally violent killer instincts!"
He paused to catch his breath.
"Worse yet, the experts found severe abnormalities in its neural pathways. This defect makes it incredibly egocentric and violently opposed to taking orders from anyone."
"In its worldview, concepts like 'bond' and 'master' simply do not exist. It only sees humans who show it kindness, or who look weak, as punching bags to vent its excess energy!"
Hodor grew more agitated, slamming his un-casted hand against the edge of his bed.
"All these injuries... I got them while they were trying to draw its blood."
"The nurse accidentally bumped the back of its head. The beast suddenly went feral, punched through the bulletproof glass, and beat the living hell out of me!"
"If the hospital security hadn't arrived in time and pinned it down with three high-voltage stun guns, I'd probably be lying in the morgue right now!"
Hearing this tearful, near-death survival story, the viewers collectively gasped in shock.
[Viewer "Late Night No Drinking": Holy shit! 3x normal adrenaline?! Goes aggro at a touch?! That's not a Pokémon, that's a literal killing machine!]
[Viewer "Wild Electabuzz": No concept of a master? Treats people like punching bags? NGL that's terrifying. When Master Miles said it was sick, I thought it just had ADHD. Didn't know it was lethal!]
[Viewer "Outlaw John Doe": Legal advice time! Under Federal Law, an untamable Pokémon with severe violent tendencies is an [Extremely Dangerous Entity]! Hodor, you absolutely cannot keep that thing. You have to apply for official euthanasia ASAP, or you're cooked!]
[Viewer "Forest Fawn": OMG... Brother is so pitiful. He treated it so well, bought it the best protein powder, and ended up as a punching bag. That's actually heartbreaking.]
[Viewer "Frontline Melon Eater": Get it done bro! Genetic defects can't be fixed. Hand it over to the Pokémon Center before it actually catches a body. Don't let your bleeding heart get you killed!]
Watching the chat fill uniformly with demands for "humane euthanasia" and "immediate disposal," Miles didn't rush to state his own opinion.
His gaze pierced through the camera lens, looking deeply at Hodor.
"So, Hodor."
Miles sat up straight, crossing his hands on the desk, his tone turning deadly serious and calm.
"Since the hospital has given such an authoritative and highly dangerous diagnosis, did you come to me today because you want my help navigating the official channels to safely dispose of it?"
However, faced with Miles's direct question, Hodor on the other end of the feed fell into a long, profound silence.
He lowered his head.
Within the eye hidden beneath the bandages, an incredibly complex, conflicted, and even agonizing emotion flickered.
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