Beep, beep... Beep, beep... Beep bee-
Kuya groggily stretched out his arm from underneath his covers towards his bedside drawer. He grabbed his phone and quickly pulled it in towards himself. "6:00 AM, Monday" was displayed on the screen. He quickly silenced the annoying alarm, then initiated his usual daily morning ritual while lazing around in bed.
Kuya started by unlocked his phone and began feeding on mindless entertainment to stimulate his slowly waking brain. He starting by watching a couple of videos, then scrolled through various social media apps, next catching up on chat histories and texting a couple friends online in messaging applications. After browsing for what he thought had been a couple of minutes, he glanced at the clock on his phone again. "6:47 AM, Monday", it read this time. Mildly surprised at the completely expected situation, Kuya mumbled to himself as he planned his next course of action.
'I should probably get ready for school now or else I'll be late... but one wouldn't hurt...'
Kuya began wrapping up his morning ritual by opening one final app. It was a program where anyone could read, write, and post their own novels online. Many of which were riddled with stories about heroes in fantastical worlds equipped with extremely overpowered abilities or talents. Dopamine rushed through Kuya's mind as he read stories about clever and crafty protagonists outwitting their foes or overpowered characters crushing through any problems they faced with brute strength regularly flowed through the monitor on his school issued laptop. These novels never failed to lift his spirits as he weathered through the toughest challenges in his life - boring lectures at school.
As his phone booted up the application, Kuya's eyes zoned off from the screen as he began fantasizing - as he usually does. He thought about how bland his life was compared to the protagonists in his favorite stories.
'If I were in a novel, the author would probably have a difficult trying to describe him. They'd have trouble hyping up my average looks and would be forced to describe something else. They'd most likely skim over the fact that I don't have any extraordinary talents. At the very least, they could remark that I'm part of an average family, with a younger sister and two normal parents who work for average jobs. No glorious networking connections, no dark history, no hidden secrets, nothing like that. Not even the setting of this make-believe novel would help when the author is forced reveal of that I live in a quiet house in the suburbs near a really generic modern city.'
'I really am the perfect background character, but the worst main character.'
Shifting topics, Kuya thought about the novel he had read last night, remembering the bizarre and zany powers the main character wielded. He began getting lost in his power fantasy day dreams.
'How exciting that'd be if I were able to do that. If only I had super powers... I know for a fact that the first thing I'd do is-'
Kuya snapped to reality when his phone slipped from his hand and landed on his face. After a brief "ow", he lifted the device up and glanced back at it. Some sort of pop up was presented front and center on the screen, which he'd inadvertently pressed the "yes" button to. Groaning in dismay, Kuya immediately tried canceling whatever transaction his forehead had accepted for him. He stopped himself when he read the word "gift" in the pop up. Squinting in trepid confusion, he read what the pop up had originally offered.
[Congratulations again for being the 1,000,00?,?0?,???,??0th reader! Thank you for accepting our gift, courtesy of ■■■■■■. We are now starting the update. Please do not interrupt the download for your safety.]
Kuya stared at his screen in bewilderment as he tried to revert whatever changes had been made to his phone.
'What the hell? Oh I get it, it must be one of those pop-ups that says it'd give out free "gifts" but would download a virus instead. Damn, what's worse is that nothing I do will let me exit the app or cancel the download. I guess I'll have to try restarting my phone.'
Pressing and holding the power button prompted a series of options for him to make final judgements to his device. Without delay, Kuya pressed the "Restart" button, completely ignoring the red warning pop-ups that multiplied on the screen in the background. The phone began initiating a restart, before a big blue pop-up appeared on the screen, overlaying everything.
[Foreign tampering detected. Deploying counter-measures]
Kuya was bewildered at the vague statement displayed on his monitor, crunching his eyebrows in bewilderment. His confused expression quickly morphed into one of pain as blue electricity immediately coursed through his body. He could barely squeeze out a sigh before he collapsed limply onto his bed, his phone popping up with a barrage of pop-ups over the course of a split second.
[Tampering negated, issue resolved. I warned you.]
[Download completed, registering user...]
A light zap emitted from the phone coursed through Kuya's already singed body, and circulated back to the phone.
[User ID connected! Welcome, Kuya P-1!]
[Creating save point... save point created!]
[Congratulations, you have received a gift from ■■■■■: The System (SSSSS...SSS Grade Talent!)]
A few minutes later, a knock on the door broke the silence of the deathly quiet room. A soft, muffled voice filed the room right after.
"...Kuya? Are you there? We have to hurry or else the bus'll leave without us."
A groan was the only response that Kuya could muster. Unsatisfied with such an answer, the door opened as a young girl walked into the room to take matters into her own hands. She crossed her arms and looked down at her older brother still in his pajamas. Grabbing a nearby pillow, she reeled back and slammed it down onto Kuya's face at full force.
"WUH, GUH? What happened...?"
With a sigh, the girl told Kuya exactly what's happening.
"Kuya, it's 7 AM. We're going to be late for school."
With a calm demeanor, he nodded along after hearing such news. He looked at his phone and read the display looking back at him. "7:00 AM, Monday". After taking couple moments to digest the information, he finally realized the gravity of the situation.
"OH SHI-"
The gaze of his moderately annoyed younger sister glaring up at him was enough to interrupt him.
"Sorry, I meant OH SHOOT, WE'RE GOING TO BE LATE, HURRY UP."
Taking pleasure in his plight, his sister rubbed salt in the wound as she yelled back at him.
"I'm already ready! I'll be waiting for you downstairs, but hurry up or I'll leave without you!"
Kuya dropped his phone as he raced to get ready in record time, completely oblivious to the barrage of pop-ups that had spawned and flew through the screen.
[Initiating talent! The System is drawing a system... Complete!
The System has selected: System Version 0.0.1 A-001 - (The First Cultivation System {Beta})!]
[Creating tutorial level:
Creating Disaster Type... Created!
Creating Goal... Created!
Creating Time-Limit... Created!
Implementing Rational World Building... Completed!
Tutorial Level Creation... Completed!]
[You have received a new Quest! This is a Plot-Point Quest which you cannot ignore.
< The First Adventure of an Odyssey! >
- Disaster Type: Basic Cultivation Bully
- Goal: Defeat the Basic Cultivation Bully
- Time-Limit: 12 hours
- Penalty for Failing: Revocation of your gift.]
[The System would like to remind you: All good stories require bad luck.]