Master of the System

That night, Eula stalked through her family’s library, searching for books related to mystical messages. What she had seen in the morning wasn’t a hallucination or a trick—well, it might’ve been a prank, but for it to happen while in that special restaurant, Eula had a feeling that wasn’t the case. Since it was real, then if it happened to her, it must’ve also happened to someone else before. Perhaps it was an inherited thing similar to the mandate of heaven. If she could find out anything about the messages from another source, she would be at a huge advantage.

[Young general, what are you looking for? Perhaps the system might have it.]

Eula rolled her eyes at the message. Although she found it acceptable to be tricked once, she’d find it extremely hard to accept if she were tricked once more. Until she mastered her royal family’s vision-training technique, she wouldn’t make any deals with such a shady system.

[Young general, even if you mastered all the vision techniques in the lower dimension, I’ll still be able to trick you. Perhaps it would be a better use of your time to train something else.]

Eula frowned, but before she could think of how to respond, another message popped up, and a book in the corner of the room glowed with a bright light.

[I believe what you’re looking for is in that book.]

Eula’s brow furrowed. She could follow the system and open the glowing book. Maybe it really did contain information she was looking for, but she couldn’t know if the system modified the text or not. If it said it didn’t, she wouldn’t believe it, and if it said it did, she still wouldn’t believe it. No matter what, she wasn’t going to believe it. It was a bit irrational, but she knew it was the only way for her to get back at the system—which, in turn, made her decision rational. As for what she was going to do now, she was going to go back to her room and think some more. Just this one outing had told her a lot about the behavior of the system. After a few more, Eula was sure she’d be able to figure out the logic behind it.

[Young general, I suggest you complete the mission I’ve assigned you.]

Eula thought back to the line of text that had showed up in the middle of her meal. She ignored it and shoved it away into the back of her mind, yet she was able to easily recall its contents as if they had been seared into her brain.

[New Mission: Becoming a Garrison Commander]

[Young general, in the future, you’ll have to lead a mighty army; however, you don’t have the necessary experience to do so. Gain that experience, young general, so that one day, you may fulfill your dreams! Take your first step into military command: become a garrison commander.]

[Reward: Vremya’s Hypnotism Method]

Once again, Eula confirmed in her mind that the system was a shady one. The first reward it was handing out was a hypnotism method. Only dark sects used methods like those. Also, she wouldn’t believe it wasn’t shady until she was able to order a meal from the restaurant with the special name. It wouldn’t be a surprise to her if this was the technique of an enemy spy trying to infiltrate the capital through her since she was a member of royalty.

[Young general, the hypnotism method is only being provided because it has proven to be a useful tool in running a business. Running an army is much like running a business, so it would make sense for the hypnotism method to be useful here as well.]

Eula made a face. The system was trying to say something illogical in as straightforward a way as possible, thinking it would slip past her defenses, and it really made her feel a bit insulted. Did she really look that stupid? Besides, when was the food she wanted going to appear? She had been craving egg fried rice for a while now.

“Delivery.”

Eula nearly screamed. A three-headed golem with six arms was standing next to her. Five of its arms were holding instruments of torture, and its remaining arm was holding a small lunchbox. The lunchbox was only small relative to the red golem’s size. Eula received the box with a stiff expression. Wasn’t this golem destroyed by the man who claimed to be a bodyguard? Speaking of that fellow, she hadn’t seen him in a while. Where was he? He had already signed a contract with her. Eula cleared her head and was about to thank the golem when she realized it was gone. From in front of her very eyes, the thing had vanished.

[The system is not shady.]

Eula opened the box and took in a deep sniff. It was the aroma of egg fried rice. Who’d have thought she’d eat Boss Smith’s cooking this late at night when the store wasn’t even open? Eula’s brows furrowed. Since it was so late, would her order have interrupted the chef’s rest?

[Smith Jr. is still awake. He’s currently training his knife techniques.]

“Wow,” Eula said as she took a seat right on the library floor. “How diligent.” She took the lid off the box and grabbed a pair of chopsticks which were tied to the side of the lunchbox. No wonder why Boss Smith’s cooking tasted so good. The chef never stopped honing his skills. She looked up at the ceiling. Although the system was invisible, she couldn’t help but get the feeling it was watching her from above. “Are you from the sect behind Smith Jr.?”

[Young general, the world will not wait for you to be ready. You have to seize the initiative. Complete the mission!]

Eula snorted. The system was clearly just trying to avoid her question. If it really cared about her, it would’ve given her a time limit to finish her mission.

[The system has been upgraded to Vremya’s Army Leader System Alpha v0.1.1.]

[Updates: Time limits have now been added to missions. Failure to complete a mission equals death.]

Eula’s face paled. “Wait a minute. It’s fair to add a time limit, but isn’t the punishment for failure too high? Everyone is bound to fail at some point in their life. Usually, we judge people’s characters by seeing how they react to failing.”

[Does the threat of death not motivate you?]

“I mean, it does, but—”

[You have one week to complete Mission: Becoming a Garrison Commander.]

Eula waved her chopsticks at the sky. “Isn’t that a bit unreasonable? If I weren’t a princess, I wouldn’t be able to complete that mission within a week starting from nothing. If you give that mission to anyone else, they’ll die.”

[As the only host of Vremya’s Army Leader System Alpha v0.1.1, you do not need to worry about that.]

Eula furrowed her brow. It seemed like she had to complete the missions given to her, or she would die. Her stomach grumbled, and she turned her attention onto the bowl of rice in front of her. Thinking required lots of energy. If she wanted to get ahead of the system, she’d have to be as energized as possible.

***

Vremya exhaled and leaned back. No wonder why the guides he had read about raising users were so picky about choosing a user. Each user needed a different approach to conning them into joining the system. By far, the easiest approach was renting one of Reinkar’s trucks and running the user over, but that’d send the soul to a random faraway location in a suitable spot. Since he wanted to concentrate his users in one area, Vremya couldn’t pick that option. There also weren’t any users nearby that he could hit over the head and steal. As such, Vremya used the devil-contract-signing approach. It was a surefire way to upload the system into the user, but it also could backfire depending on the user’s personality. Eula tried to rebel, but luckily, Vremya was able to fix the problem by threatening her.

Vremya narrowed his eyes at his display. Now that the [Army Leader System] was in place, he could start on his next system. But first—Vremya glanced at the pitifully low number next to his livestream—he needed more money. What he had lost in opportunity cost since he was sleeping, he’d gain it all back by killing titans. Since Kosmos wasn’t blocking his world anymore, he could go out of his world without a problem. It was a bit awkward to order a portal since he had just sent Kosmos packing, but Vremya was above feeling shame. He pressed on the portal app, and—

[Access Denied: Blacklisted User.]

—it seemed like he was going to be taking a train instead.