18 The Truth
[Get your act together, Master! You cannot afford to just stay home and mope around like that!]
This was just one of the many encouragements that the system constantly barraged within Daniel's head for the past few days. Of course, most of the time, Daniel would just ignore it, pretending that the system was just an annoying fly buzzing within its ears. However, even he could not take it anymore when there is something constantly speaking within your head without stopping for the whole day.
On the day after the explosion, the system had already noticed that something was wrong with its host when he haven't spoken for the entire morning even when Commander Eric asked how he was doing when they had breakfast together, only managing to give a few lackluster nods to Eric's questions.
The system took the initiative and started bothering him the second the commander left the house for work, bothering Daniel without end as he tried to escape reality by entering into a popular VR FPS game, hoping that shooting some random bots within the game would solve his depression. Unfortunately, the system had also transported into the virtual world with him and would continue to speak to him even while he was trying to concentrate on the game.
After losing 10 team deathmatches in a row, Daniel finally could not take it anymore. He instantly lifted himself up from his VR pod and yelled at the system within his head.
"Are you done speaking? You really are good at annoying people to death, you know that?" Daniel screamed.
[How rude! I've been trying to cheer Master up for the past hour, and all I get in return is this?!] The system replied with an indignant tone.
"You obviously just want to hype me up with your lies again and send me to my death like what had happened earlier." Daniel sneered in reply, unveiling the true motives behind the system's actions.
[It wasn't my fault that Master was unlucky enough to meet another 'Awakened' on your first mission! Even though I'm a sentient AI, I cannot predict the actions of other people! The only AI that might have enough information and processing power to do that is your so-called Minerva system!]
"Didn't you try and get me to kill of the other 'awakened' person the second we met, even though that person is a deranged terrorist?" Daniel retorted with an unimpressed look.
[I thought you said he was a Martian spy, not a deranged terror—]
"That makes no difference!" Daniel cut the system off in anger.
The system remained speechless for awhile at Daniel's behavior before finally managing to speak again with a sigh.
[Master, who would have known you would be that unlucky. Well, at least you were still rewarded with adamantine in the end, completing the mission by a fluke.]
"I bet that if you had the opportunity, you would have jumped ship and bind with that Martian spy if you could do so back then." Daniel gritted his teeth and said in anger. "How are you going to compensate me for the emotional damages caused by that encounter?"
[Well, the good thing is, Master, you managed to get one free base point after completing the mission and leveling up! Congratulations!]
Daniel rolled his eyes but still decided to check his own statistics to see if there were any changes to his body.
[Ting! Activating personal status menu.
Name: Daniel07777
Age: 16
Level: 2/?
XP: 0/20
HP: 100/100
SP: 100/100
STR: 5
AGI: 5
Unallocated base points: 1
Skills: Psychokinesis (Lvl 1)]
"Is there a time limit as to when I need to allocate my base points?" Daniel asked.
[No, Master, but I suggest for you to do so as soon as possible, since your body will need time to adjust after adding a base point to your stats. You would also need to consume a higher amount of energy immediately afterwards to compensate for the sudden increase in muscle strength within your body.]
Even though the system recommended that, Daniel decided to put off the allocation of base points to a later time, since he doesn't really trust the system. In addition, he thought it would be better to conserve a large amount of base points before upgrading them all in one go.
Changing the subject, Daniel asked another question that have been bothering within his mind for awhile now. "So when will I get another mission from the Assassin System?"
[A new mission will be automatically triggered when Master encounters a person containing adamantine within their bodies or when 30 days have elapsed, whichever comes first.]
"That means I would need to somehow get stronger within a month…" Daniel muttered to himself before asking something else, "How can I upgrade my psychokinesis skill to the point where I can lift a person up with my will?"
[The only way to upgrade a supernatural skill is to use the skill repeatedly in order to increase the efficiency when wielding your soul power. If you practice everyday non-stop, accounting for 8 hours of sleep in between, it would take around a year for Master to be able to lift a person with the national average body weight.]
"Such a long time!" Daniel exclaimed. "I would have completed at least 12 missions by then! How are you going to have me 'assassinate' people when I can't even use a basic supernatural power!"
[That's why I recommend Master to either join a self-defence course or something related as soon as possible in order to defend yourself! We can't have you begging for scraps after another 'awakened' have already taken most of the adamantine from your surroundings just like what happened yesterday!]
"If you weren't as useless as one of those annoying pop-up ads that would always appear on a website, then I wouldn't be so helpless either!" Daniel retorted.
***
For the next few days, Daniel performed like how a normal teenager would when he just experienced a traumatic event. That's right, although Daniel did get nightmares and would occasionally hallucinate the smell of rotten flesh once in a while, it wasn't serious enough to make him turn into a piece of waste, especially when he knew he might be encountering more dangerous situations in the future.
Therefore, while Eric was contemplating whether or not he should bring Daniel to see a psychologist, the latter was actually rearranging his class schedule, dropping most of his non-essential courses in favor of military training courses like 'Self-Defense 101', 'Mech Operation (Beginner), and 'Firearms Training (Beginner)'.
In the aftermath of the war, hostilities between the Federation and the Empire did not end but simply turned into a cold one. Therefore, knowing that another invasion might be imminent, many military training courses were added to civilian schools to get teenagers trained for a potential future war. That being said, other than the additional currency one would get for entering such a course, all the military courses were optional so most students would normally not opt for these courses.
With the rearrangement done, Daniel stacked the rest of his free time with Brazilian jiujutsu and taekwondo lessons. Meanwhile, he also purchased a few stress balls online before using them as practice for his psychokinesis skill.
With a 5-second cooldown period, Daniel is able to continuously try and levitate a stress ball on his palm. He can also practice this in public since levitating stress balls are not uncommon as a toy for people to play with.
Finally, there was one last thing that Daniel needed to do, which involved the intervention by Commander Eric. Therefore, he simply bided his time until it was finally Saturday – the perfect opportunity to strike since Eric would spend the whole day with him.
***
The autumn leaves started to flutter, signalling the start of the Fall season. As the weather started to cool, more people got out from their homes during the weekends to appreciate the view of the multicolored leaves within the multiple parks around each district of the capital.
Unfortunately, instead of spending the day to enjoy the view with Uncle Eric, Daniel had something different in mind.
After spending only 3 hours of sleep, Daniel was waiting patiently by the living room for Uncle Eric to awake from his slumber and make breakfast for the both of them. When the latter finally walked out in a rather lazy manner with his pyjamas, he couldn't help but frown when he noticed that Daniel was already waiting for him.
Noticing the black circles around Daniel's eyes and his pale complexion, Eric could not help but feel worried for this youngster. He spoke in a rather hasty tone, "Daniel. You couldn't sleep last night?"
Daniel shook his head in a sorrowful manner, trying to gain the sympathy of this uncle of his as much as possible. Seeing this, Eric could only make an awkward sigh before going to the kitchen. Little did he know, all of this was part of Daniel's plan.
