Seized by the System

Having returned to the familiar System Space, Fang Ning stood on the green road and looked at the buildings flanking both sides of the road. He felt that life was great!

Those terrifying ghosts and snakes finally belonged to the past.

Sir System was fine, too. Everything that happened felt like a nightmare.

However, Sir System did become rather diabolical. Fang Ning understood why the System mentioned something about the lousy Maxim ruining its plan.

If not for his heartfelt expressions and unlocking of the Heroic Achievement, he would surely be manipulated by the System and assumed that it was really infected by a virus and become useless.

After all, the System’s performance was too convincing and it was a remarkable actor.

Sir System would become redundant if it was infected by a virus, and Fang Ning was a person who valued loyalty.

In order to save it, he had used up all of his efforts.

He would not hoard the experience points farmed by the precious game book like last time, but he would try to fix Sir System’s Maxim loophole first.

Most importantly, the number of experience points farmed by Sir System every day was not enough to fulfill the upgrade requirements. Assuming it really became redundant and did not farm any monsters, there would not be any major effects anyway.

It depended mostly on the malevolent spirits that were in cultivation. A malevolent spirit that was cultivated to the max would have billions, if not trillions, of experience points.

However, cultivating malevolent spirits required a huge amount of cultivation resources. This act of upgrading its Strength was what set Sir System apart from other cultivators.

To other cultivators, cultivation resources had to be supplied to oneself before a Strength upgrade could be done. Even if someone relied on the Path of Massacres to upgrade his Strength, that was because part of the cultivation base of the massacred one had been transformed into his own Strength, which was nothing compared to Sir System’s method of leveling up.

Furthermore, the Path of Massacres often led to the Path of Demons as it was affected by the remains of the massacred victims. Whereas, Sir System’s method of leveling up via experience points did not face this sort of issue, which was considered a true and perfect upgrade.

In order to gather enough experience points, Fang Ning might have to spend 22 hours each day on his work.

In the future, he would only end up as laborer who had to sweat and slave all the time. All of the benefits would have to be supplied to Sir System as soon as possible, or else, it would lament about its imminent disappearance at any time.

He had to admit that this test by Sir System was rather refreshing. If it did succeed, the roles of the System and the Host had to be reversed. The loser Host would vanish and the loser System would show up…

Fang Ning recalled the incident and realized how implausible it all was. He nearly fell into such an intricate trap. Was Sir System really able to make this up?

Firstly, this fellow used the so-called “Cultivation of the Heart” test to numb him, and then it clouded his judgment by making up the time. Finally, it used a well-rounded fact about Fang Ning’s infection and illness to prove that it was the one who actually got infected.

Coupled with the fact that the System rarely told lies, Fang Ning believed it the first time. This was undoubtedly an intelligent yet fatal trap!

However, traps were still traps. They still had errors.

Fang Ning recounted his experience and discovered at least two errors. Firstly, Sir System was unable to avoid the real restrictions of the Maxim, and this was also the factor that exposed its charade. Secondly, it created an imaginary cultivation time frame which would have also been exposed by Fang Ning by comparing it with reality.

Of course, the second loophole would have been too obvious. This fellow already had plans to cover up, such as saying that it was infected by a virus which caused a failure to load the “Cultivation of the Heart” landscape.

In order to explain something, there would be plenty of excuses.

However, there was only one truth.

That was “Sir System was still your System”.

Actually, a long time ago, it did trick Fang Ning a few times, such as cheating him of his money and Relief Time, but back then its tricks were elementary.

Now, its tricks were much more advanced and complex. It knew how to manipulate someone psychologically and even applied the art of deception, clouding his perception and blinding him from reality.

Regardless of the three Heart Cultivation tests and its final speech about getting infected, it only had one true motive, that was to rid Fang Ning of his constant procrastination and serve the System faithfully.

In other words, it did not want the Host to get married, have children, sleep and play. Instead, he only wanted the Host to serve it wholeheartedly by working and increasing its Strength, making it the toughest System in history.

Fang Ning stood on the green road and pieced all the details together. He paused for a moment before shaking his head helplessly and walked into the System Cyber Cafe.

Instead of playing games, he switched on the computer, opened some folders and began to work. He spent his time allocating resources and resolving problems…

Zheng Dao was dedicated, the Yellow Dog was loyal and the Dragon Carp could be quite intelligent at times, but they did not understand Sir System’s true intentions and were unaware of the true objectives of their work.

Hence, Fang Ning played a crucial role in the chain of responsibilities.

“The three million free drider laborers that were handed out to the Morality City by the Devil Black Robe have been put in place the day before, in the fourth year, first month and third day of Shenyuan —— Reported by The Dragon Carp.”

“According to the first survey of the drider laborers, they have signed a labor contract with an unknown entity. Once they are reborn, they have to work for the unknown entity for fifty years for free, and they will allocate their remaining free time. If the free working period is not up to standards, the working period will be lengthened. If their performance is good, the working period will be shortened and this standard has a real-time reminder.”

“This unknown entity, as disclosed privately by a crafty drider laborer, is known as the ‘Red Queen’ and is a powerful artificial intelligence. Based on my detailed analysis, I believe that Devil Black Robe is trying to curry favor with powerful beings and named the entity after a character in a post-apocalyptic movie. It has unique abilities and can engage in telepathic communication with the drider laborers in real time. It can even bypass the spatial limitations of the arcane realm, which is quite similar to those special powers exhibited by mutants in movies.”

“According to my observations, the human souls of most drider laborers have a lifespan of approximately 70 to 90 years. After fifty years of working for free, they will enter a period of regression. If they are not supplemented with the relevant pills, or if they do not absorb enough Vitality for cultivation, their souls will wither away and will not be able to reincarnate again.”

“Basically, these laborers do not know about this. On the contrary, due to real-time supervision, they are as efficient as regular human workers. Also, they work diligently so that they can earn their freedom earlier. After commencing work for two days, they have begun some experiments on the herb plantation to revamp the production line in an attempt to increase the output of the herbs and reduce the number of rejects. There is not much distinction between this and a regular slave. I believe with time, their attempts will yield positive results.”

Black Robe really lived up to his name and was evil to the core. He used to occupy the country of the bourgeoisie and was heavily influenced by his environment, plus he was a devil that used any means necessary to proceed with his objectives, so it was very normal of him to do something like this.

Fang Ning finished reading the Dragon Carp’s highly-detailed report and heaved a long sigh.

He added a remark on the report. “Laborers serving the Morality City for ten years and above who have displayed favorable performance shall receive a Soul Strengthening Pill as a reward.”

A Soul Strengthening Pill could prolong the lifespan of a regular soul by five to ten years, but it could not make one immortal.

Souls could not escape from regression and they would be eaten away and corroded by the passing of time.

If one did not cultivate continuously and strengthen his soul, in the end, he would still vanish without a trace.

In reality, if not for the basis of materials that functioned as a shield, souls that were exposed to the objective reality had no chance of survival, even for a few days.

The concept of arriving from nothing and returning to nothing marked the natural cycle of life.

When Fang Ning finished writing his remark, Sir System pretended to have just appeared and spoke in a surprised manner. “Hey, weren’t you busy with playing games right after coming out? I thought you wanted to take revenge on me by sleeping for three full days…”

“Hmph, how can I share the same insight as a small System like you? You’ve really underestimated me.” Fang Ning said blandly, exuding an honorable and virtuous aura. “I don’t care whether you use those tricks and traps of yours, I’ll do what I’m supposed to do.”

Although his cultivation of the “Atmospheric Morality Technique” in the valley of Heart Cultivation yielded no actual results, he got an attitude out of it.

After all, this technique was useful and came more naturally to him than the “True Bodhi Tactics”.

Monks were different and it was tiring for him to act as one. He might as well apply something that was inherited from his ancestors, which was more suited to him and came much more naturally.

“Eh, wouldn’t it be better if you acted like this earlier?” Sir System grumbled. “Searching for days was so tiring.”

“Now you’re trying to reason with me? I thought you never lied?” Fang Ning sneered.

Sir System replied, “A philosopher once said that one has to adapt in desperate times, and I’m an honest System who never changed. I never lied about this.”

“…” Fang Ning was speechless. Sir System never did change.

After a while, he spoke wanly. “Fine, I’m not going to argue with you further. I won’t rest until all those Upper Realm deities who enslave people have been gotten rid of. A philosopher was right, one could only have fun when his work is done.”

“I couldn’t find the philosopher that said this…” Sir System commented.

“Can’t I serve up some chicken soup for the soul?” Fang Ning groaned.

“As you wish. Right, I need to remind you of something, you’d better investigate the Heavenly Axiom. Previously, we’ve said that the Axiom Daddy’s quintessence is really strong and unrelenting. I’ve tested it these few days using the Heavenly Fortune skill and I noticed that it feels a bit loose.” Sir System instructed.

“Okay, I’ll mark it down as my next important task.” Fang Ning waved his arm as if he were shooing away a fly.

“You’re secretly scolding me again, but never mind. As long as you’re willing to work hard, I don’t care how you treat me…”

“…”