When I woke up that morning, I already had a slur on my tongue.
Not that it was my fault. Around here, words aren't just words — they're power. In the village of Lexiconia, every time you say a socially dangerous word, your "VerbLevel" increases. Most people keep it low, afraid to even think certain terms. But not me.
I'm Nero Highspeech, and my job is… well, unusual. I'm a VerbTank: I absorb forbidden words on behalf of the government.
"Nigger, nigger, nigger, nigger!" I shouted as I walked into the square, drawing horrified stares.
An old man fainted. A child burst into tears. A Language Registry officer sprinted over with his e-pen at the ready.
— "Are you insane?!" — the official yelled. — "You're about to hit Level 10 in under an hour!"
— "Exactly," I replied. — "That's exactly what they need to see."
In this world, the more a word is said, the less power it holds. It was the paradox of LinguaForce: forbidden words fed on silence. Only by shouting them into exhaustion, to the point of societal numbness, could we exorcise the hate they carried.
I was the best. Or the most insane. Depends who you ask.
Behind me, a team of "Semantic Deconstructors" took notes. Thick glasses. Noise-canceling headsets. Their job was to study the crowd's reaction.
I was just the trigger.
"Nigger, nigger, nigger!" I went on, feeling the VerbLevel climb, crackling across my skin like static. "Three, four, five!"
People didn't understand. They hated me. But in my earpiece, a cold voice reminded me:
"Every word you disarm saves lives in the Suburbs of Thought."
My job was filthy. Apparently racist. But underneath the surface, this was a war over meaning. And I was on the front line.