Yup, nothing to see here, he's just really enthusiastic about these textbooks.

Once nobody is looking, he holds his breath and comes with a shudder instead of a moan.

A skill has been unlocked by a special action! Hiding your sex noises has created the skill Muffled Moans.

Info/Skills/Muffled Moans

Muffled Moans: Lvl 1. Active. 1 SUB / 40 seconds.

So long as you are trying hard to keep quiet, any moans that escape you anyway will fail to alert anyone in the next room over, however thin the walls. (Provided they are not actively listening, sexually aroused, romantically entangled, or otherwise interested in participation.) Louder cries will travel to other rooms in the same living unit, but not other living units in the same structure, or neighboring houses.

Quest available: Come Out And Level Up

Raise ERO to 20 within the next 48 hours.

Success: +1 SED, +1 FUK, +10,000 XP
Failure: Shame and dishonor.

Huh, cool skill. Though these library stacks don't really divide nicely into rooms and he's not in a living unit,so right now it just highlights his questionable life choices. Which he's about to make a whole bunch more of, because he just got dared to get six points of ERO in 48 hours, and while he has got ten unspent stat points his sense of fair play isn't going to be satisfied that easily. He'll give the quest an honest try and only use those points if it gets down to the wire. And he doesn't think he'll need them if he can get Asher's help.

He takes a few deep breaths and slides himself under the table while putting his dick away. "Asher," he mutters, "I owe you a blowjob but also I owe you a piece of information. It's going to sound crazy but I'm not crazy, Aarons can back me up."

"...I like crazy things."

Definitely not the worst response!

"My life . . . is some kind of weird sex game. I have stats and levels and it gives me quests and I got a stat bonus for the public sex just now. And . . . I think whatever runs the game mighthavebeenmakingyourunintomeabunchsorry."

He hopes Asher isn't annoyed about the, whatever this is. Sexually harrassive coincidence management? Accessory to being a pawn of destiny? He seems to have been enjoying the results but that doesn't necessarily make it not shitty.

"...he's not having a psychotic break."

"Well, he can shapeshift."

"...There are weird all-powerful sex magic aliens trying to get me laid. Cool."

Thank goodness. Unless Asher was mind-controlled into feeling that way, in which case fuck you, bastard aliens. At least Bruce wasn't mind-controlled into not thinking of the possibility? But now he's thinking of arguments against it . . . Agh, that way lies having an actual psychotic break, if his brain has nothing useful to say it should at least shut up.

"So. Yeah. Um, do you have questions, you probably have questions, possibly I have answers, possibly we should be having this conversation not under a table."

"That seems reasonable." He gets out from under the table. "...Do you know what the sex magic aliens want?"

"I think they want me to have a lot of sex and possibly also romantic relationships? Right now they want me to grind the 'how implausible my life is' stat, that's not me being funny I actually just got a quest about it. They asked me to find out Aarons' darkest secrets but I told them to fuck off and they haven't asked again."

He has opinions about Bruce telling everyone about the fact that he has dark secrets!

"...Well, probably you should explain everything, and then I can help. I was having a ton of implausible sex even before there were magic sex aliens involved."

Bruce would feel super guilty and apologize if Aarons objected, but he is pretty sure everyone has secrets, actually. He had several even before the Erogame, like how he's not nearly as good at his classes as his grades seem to indicate and how he's forgotten the name of nearly everyone in his dorm and now it's too late to ask again, and apparently also that he's bi. Having secrets isn't a secret.

Bruce reads off his stat screen and his current quests. He doesn't mention the plan to go to the makeup store, because he wants that to be just him and Aarons. Asher joining in and being excessively handsome already would make it too intimidating for the two of them.

"That's awesome. You should try to get SED and FUK as high as possible."

"FUK is pretty great. And SED seems good, but like, I don't want to get too good at seducing people, you know? Not that I'm saying I'm good at it right now, I mean in the long run."

"...Why would you not want to be maximally good at seducing people?"

"Because I might accidentally seduce people who would be better off not being seduced? It's like being an excessively good salesperson or advertisement designer, but with higher stakes."

"...I bet the Erogame is going to have a solution for that."

"Ooh, yeah, it totally might, let me check." He flips through the potential perks list, looking for any fuckup-preventing ones he might have forgotten were on there.

No Regrets: If, all things considered, a person would regret having sex with you, they will not be sexually attracted to you, no matter how high your SED is or what other in-game effects there are affecting their decision-making. This does not affect mind control or hypnosis. One point and one fragment. Available at SED 40.

Along the way, his eye might be caught by:

Milliways: Sometimes, when you open a door, it will open to an interdimensional bar which connects you to other worlds. While you are in Milliways, time stops, and you hear all languages as your native language. You may meet alternate versions of your friends, harem members, or nemeses. First drink is free. Watch out on Valentine's Day. 1 point. Available at ERO 20.

"Yup, you're right. There's one here for making nobody be into me if it would be a bad idea for them." With a sketchy note about mind control, but he can patch that with Mesmer Inoculant. "Also, there's a perk for accessing parallel universes! Possibly with alternate versions of us!"

"That sounds terrible. --I guess it sounds okay as long as I don't meet any other mes."

"Hm, yeah, now that you mention it I don't want to meet more of me in particular either." Any alternate Bruces would be either better, which would be shameful for him and awful for the other one, or worse, which would be shameful for the other one and awful for him. One who was better in some ways and worse in others so it came out about even would be alright, he guesses. And if he met alternate Levs he would be sad that they didn't like him. "But maybe we could meet Newton or people from the future or something, that would be cool."

"What's wrong with meeting alternate yous? Meeting alternate mes sounds awesome."