Patty blinked and the next scene he saw was the sight of an aged and familiar brown wooden door that was already water-damaged from years of no maintenance. It was his home.
He was right, nothing bad happened. The skip button worked as he expected. He looked at the time and saw that it was already 15:30 in the afternoon. Last time he checked, it was only 14:30, meaning an hour already passed literally in the blink of an eye.
The bus from the hospital to his address was only about 20 minutes or so, which doesn't account for the lost 40 minutes, but who was he to nitpick about these kinds of things.
He was already happy that he returned home without doing any cumbersome activities like lining up for the bus, finding a seat, sitting down, and getting up to go home. As far as he was concerned, he was fine with the system wasting time as long as he didn't have to stand up in the bus if it was full.
He walked up to the door, just as he usually did, and twisted the knob. But, it broke. The door handle went past it's breaking point and disengaged itself from the door.
"Huh…I guess its broken." Patty reasoned that it was the degraded condition of the door that was the cause of the door handle's breakageâ€"not because of his own strength.
He pushed the door and went inside. Nothing unusual. He was just going to spend the rest of the day browsing the internet on his phone while his television played his favorite tv shows. Nothing unusual.
He plopped down on the bed and used the remote. It already had a low battery, so he was accustomed to pushing the buttons a little harder for it to register in the tv. But then, the remote also broke. The plastic block near the power button shattered into pieces.
"Huh…I guess it's broken."
The television was already powered on and it was already on the animation channel, so he had no need for the remote.
He felt the time flash by as he was relaxing and watching his favorite animation, the Space Invaders, something he used to stay up late and binge watch whole seasons in a night. But for some reason, 10 minutes in, he yawned.
He felt sleepy.
Usually, he would stay up until 23:00 or 00:00 midnight, but for some reason, at 19:00 pm, he was already feeling drowsy.
"Huh…I guess I must be broken."
Wanting to sleep when the episode would finally show a big showdown between the Space Pirate Hero and his nemesis the Naval Super Captain?!
For some reason, he was more tired than he would have been at this time. It looked like that 3 minute standing up he did at the statue really took a lot out of him.
He decided to call it quits and sleep for the day.
[Name: Patrick "Patty" Patterson]
[Energy: 27/100]
[Yi Power: 55]
[Credits: 1000]
[Ether: 50]
[Minion Growth Crystal: 35]
[Physique]
[Head: 5/100 - +]
[Left Arm: 5/100 - +]
[Right Arm: 5/100 - +]
[Torso: 5/100 - +]
[Left Leg: 5/100 - +]
[RIght Leg: 5/100 - +]
[Jobs]
[Cultivation: D-Class Tendora - 17 Yi/day]
â€"â€"â€"â€"â€"â€"â€"
The next morning, Patty felt as refreshed as ever. He felt like he was born anew bathed in the morning dew and basked in the morning light. It was like he just woke up and found out that classes were canceled due to a forecasted thunderstorm but the weather outside was as bright as summer.
Ugh. He just remembered that he was supposed to have a week off. Stupid system, he thought. Who wanted to be healthier from severe burns?! He was still salty about it.
At the very least, he deserved to have one day off, he reasoned. Sam would corroborate his story about going to the hospital the day before, which would hopefully be enough to trick the scrupulous Prof Ortez.
[Congratulations! You have signed in for 2 consecutive days.]
[Rewards: 30 Yi Power]
[Job Completed!]
[Received 17 Yi Power]
Patty wondered about other kinds of benefits he would receive if he continued this streak of attendance. Obviously, the system was following a convention that was very prevalent in pc games and mobile games. Usually, the reward at the end of the week or at the end of the month was something that was extremely rare.
This was done by game companies to entice their players to keep on playing the game after their initial start. That was why usually, these kinds of sign-in bonuses were only for beginners.
He looked at the tabs and saw that the EVENTS menu was unlocked.
He touched it and immediately saw that there were two banners available.
[Daily Missions]
And
[Welcoming Appreciation Sign-in Event!]
The bottom one was more colorful and had a special border that was covered in gold and silver. Colorful lights flashed behind the banner, making it seem more three dimensional. The first banner had a bland one-color design which made it look like a normal text from an old computer screen.
Obviously, the system wanted him to pick the bottom one. And if the attention-grabbing graphic design wasn't enough, there were depictions of magical items, weapons, and even a shadow of what looked like a person in a robe. All of those glowed with a rainbow color, making them seem more rare and exquisite.
He read the subtext below the main title of the banner.
[Sign in to the system for seven (7) consecutive days and get exclusive rewards each day! Once you have completed the seventh day, you will acquire a random S-class minion!]
Perfect! Like he would miss a day. It's not like he could run away from the system. He was stuck with it for the rest of his life whether he liked it or not. And he was too lazy to find a way to get rid of a Teqx once it was stuck with a person, if it even existed.
So, this sign-in event was just a free gift everyday. It was even better than December 25th, SupremeDay. That was just one day. This was a whole week of free gifts with one super big exclusive gift at the end.
Who was he to decline a free gift?
This was starting out to be a very good day. And what else could improve this magnificent streak of goodness? A day lounging in his bedâ€"watching, relaxing with the tv, eating junk foodâ€"all while his classmates were suffering another perpetual lecture from the abominable Prof Ortez.
It was one thing to have no-school, but to have no school while others have to go to class was something special.
He looked at the time and saw that it was 6:30 in the morning, just about the time when he would prepare to go to school. Eager beavers were probably already there, their heads nailed in books. Or worse, they could be warming up for another day of tough work out.
{Mission}
{Requirement: Go to school}
{Rewards: 1x summon scroll}
Tempting reward, but no. He already decided that he would skip school today no matter what. It didn't even make sense to go to school now. He can just laze in bed all day long and still get more powerful everyday without doing anything. School was meaningless.
He was even contemplated not going to school anymore and just dropping out. He thought that the whole point of going to school was to have a chance to get recruited by organizations and corporations for a chance to get a good Teqx.
He didn't need a backer and he already had a Teqx.
And unlike most people who had to be taught to control and master their power, Patty only had to complete easy missions. He heard of surgeons dissecting a hundred thousand corpses to improve their dexterity. He heard of runners walking the circumference of the world just to shave off that last second off their record.
He had his missions. He could even complete them daily and get even more rewards and Yi Power.
[Daily Missions]
[Get 8 hours of sleep 8/8]
[Consume 5000 kCal of food 0/5000]
[Lie down for 4 hours 0/4]
[Drink 3 Liters of water 0/3]]
[Defecate __]
[Urinate __]
[Rewards]
[2/6 Daily Missions Completed: 25 Yi Power]
[4/6 Daily Missions Completed: 50 Ether]
[6/6 Daily Missions Completed: 100 Minion Growth Crystal]
[Complete any 15 missions in total everyday to receive 1X SUMMON SCROLL!]
See? The system proved his point. He didn't have to go to school or anywhere else to get rewarded. In fact, going to school will actually hinder him from completing some of the daily missions.
Why did the system even make a mission for him to go to scho if that was the case? Was it trying to hinder him from getting the rewards? Probably not. Still, everything pointed to him taking the day off. Maybe also the next one too. Or the next one after that.
He deserved at least this after everything that happened. That week off still hurt him.
The best way to recover from it was a perfect day starting with the perfect breakfast: cereal. This was a nutritious meal that took only 2 ingredients and less than a minute of preparationâ€"perfect for a lazy day like today.
[Mission]
[Requirement: Make a bowl corn-flakes cereal with low-fat milk]
[Rewards: 10 Yi Power]
And just at the perfect time, the system gave him a mission. Being rewarded for something he was already going to do? Perfect.
{Skip: Y/N}
{Cost}
• Old price: 10 Energy
• New all time low price: 0 Energy
And another free skip button? Maybe the system was being generous because he was still a newcomer to this power, just like in some games where new players get free gems or coins to skip a task.
He touched the skip button and closed his eyes.