Chapter 26 25. What Just Happened?!
"Look around the room first."
The host agreed as he glanced around the shabby place. He frowned, "It looks like I'm in a horse's stable or something. Don't I get the body's memories or something?"
Shane glanced at the interface that had appeared in his mind and opened the help tab outside from the dashboard of the job section. He immediately found this same query and clicked it open. It described memories as follows:
[If the system has chosen an easy world, the host would get the benefit of using all the memories of the body. During a moderate session, the host can get half of the memories of the body. But when the world is at severe difficulty, the host won't get anything and will have to figure out everything themselves]
Shane's brows furrowed after reading this. It couldn't be that this world was harder than anything else, right? He knew his master wouldn't deliberately choose such a world for him despite constantly yelling at him.
But if this world really was a hard level….
He might as well prepare himself mentally, just in case….
As for the host, he opened his mouth and said, "I didn't find an option here. Please, rest assured. I'll help you with everything. Now, can you continue glancing at the room?"
If the host wasn't looking through, how could Shane find a way out of this situation? Indeed, he could find a way out using an item in the tool section, but he really didn't want to spend money when he could easily do that by looking around carefully.
Everywhere, there was dried grass spread around the room with smelly animal shit and other tools. That was why this room had such a mixed odor that was enough to make anyone puke their guts out. The entire shelter was created out of wooden planks that seemed old and broken with water leaking from the roof. It appeared that it was raining outside. Wait, there was something in one corner!
Before Shane could say something, he noticed the red dots coming closer and closer. He opened his mouth and said, "Go north! There's an opening."
"Are you sure there are no enemies in that direction?"
Shane glanced at the radar and spoke, "Yep. You're safe to go."
The host didn't waste any minute before crawling out of that small hole at a slow pace. His entire body was trembling.
The red dots were close enough at this point, and if the host didn't quicken his pace, they would be caught in a short while! Shane's heart jumped at that thought. Becoming a system wasn't as easy as it seemed!
"Faster! The enemies are close enough!"
"I'm trying!" said the host, being the most afraid and irritated, "I'm just a damned high school student! Can't you see that?"
Shane shut his mouth at this time. He was also a 'damned' university student, suddenly thrown among giant monsters blocking the escape door! He didn't complain back then because he knew that he was probably on his own! At least this virtual host was lucky enough to have a 'system' to blame.
He pursed his imaginary lips inside the host's mind and said, "If you don't hurry, we both are going to die!"
"Hah, don't joke. Can systems really die? Aren't they supposed to be created out of data or something?"
'Dude, you're the one that's made out of data!' Shane almost blurted this out, but he stopped himself on time and took a deep breath. This host was a virtual, fake person, and also a childish one at that. Why was he wasting time chit-chatting here?
He spoke in a cold voice, "Run straight as fast as you can."
The boy grumbled as he got up from the ground, covered in mud from head to toe. He brushed it off of his body and asked, "Should I still run ahead?"
"Host, do you not understand human language?" Shane was irritated after hearing those words from the boy's mouth, "I said, run! If you won't, they'll catch up with us."
"My name is Noah! NOAH! Should I just spell it out for you?! It's N-O-A-H!"
Shane scoffed and said nothing. Then he heard another sentence from the boy that infuriated him to death—
"Ah, so a system like you is also programmed to scoff. How innovative!"
Shane took a deep break as he glared at the screen in front of his eyes. This was his job. He would have to force himself to work despite finding himself a client that gave him a headache every now and then.
After hypnotizing himself to work, he opened his eyes and glanced at the radar. The enemies were still close enough. So he said after seeing the radar, "Continue running and turn right. There should be a cave up ahead." 𝘧r𝘦𝗲w𝘦𝚋𝐧o𝘷𝘦𝙡.co𝑚
Noah said nothing as he continued to use the entire strength of his body to run, but unfortunately, his body was so weak that after a few seconds, he was already exhausted enough to die. He wanted to stop, but he heard the sounds of horses galloping coming closer behind him.
There was nothing more frightening than this. Even Shane was getting anxious as he heard Noah thinking, 'Doesn't this stupid system have any boosting thing? I can't run anymore! This stupid system! Why is it even there? It didn't even tell me its name!"
Shane was again infuriated after hearing him being called 'it' by a mere teenager. He opened his mouth and uttered in a cold voice, "I'm a he! HE! Should I spell it out for you?! H-E!"
"So you also know how to copy me!"
"Shut up! Continue running!" Shane observed the situation. If this continued, he might as well be as good as dead. He would have to take things in his hands, "Host, I apologize for what I'm going to do now."
"Huh?"
Before Noah could respond, he felt his control over the body slipping away slowly. It almost felt as if someone was running through his hands and legs as he became a bystander. Noah stared at the scene in front of his eyes in a daze.
He could still feel his arms and legs feeling pain from exercising so much, but he couldn't control his body anymore. He finally opened his mouth, "System, is it you?"
"Of course, it's me! You're useless!"
"Then…. Are you controlling my body?"
"Yes, but only for ten seconds, and it has a resting time of an hour."
"But…." Noah had just opened his mouth when he felt a gush of cold energy flooding throughout his body that made him shiver from head to toe. If there wasn't a lock present in Shane's ethereal body that blocked other people from seeing his powers, the body which Shane was in would have leaked dark cosmic energy already.
Slowly, lethargically, the pain vanished without a trace as Shane continued to rush through the forest and shrubs. Soon, he reached the cave as he entered there and hid behind a pillar; everything came back to normal. The control of the body automatically slipped to the host once again.
Noah was still sitting there in a daze, thinking, 'What just happened?'