Jason stared blankly at the blue box floating in front of him. He had just mentally accepted the prompt only for it to give him some loading screen. This was also the moment where he realised that this really may not be something about coding, or at least not in the sense he was thinking of it.
After all, what he saw on the loading screen was some strings of gnes winding around each other continuously with the words [Loading System Page, Please Wait…] being displayed beneath that.
Well, Jason had time. That was the most unfortunate thing about his situation at that moment. He was injured, and all he had was time. He could not work, he could not move much with the drugs in his body. All he had was time.
And then, finally, when he saw it, Jason could not help but be confused. And then when the loading panel shifted, Jason saw a new Message.
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| Message |
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Welcome, Jason Cross. You may explore your Master Programmer System when you are ready.
Y(Explore)
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Jason read this, whispering to himself, unsure to feel intrigued or alarmed. It was too late to go back now. He decided to play along though. And then when he clicked on the Explore option, only to see a new page with some words on it, Jason was dumbfounded.
What was all this?
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|| Master Programmer System || Stats | Missions | Items | Store |
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System Hint: Go to the Missions page to undertake your first mission to learn how to use the System ;)
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James shook his head in disbelief. Just wonderful. Just great. Looking at the tabs, Jason noticed one of them was pulsing as if trying to draw his attention. This must be where his Tutorial was going to be. It was called the [Missions] tab.
Jason mentally clicked on it and the Blue Panel in his vision changed to display his mission page. At that moment, he was looking at two missions. One was apparently the [System Use Tutorial], and another one was the [Beginner Mission].
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| Master Programmer System | Stats || Missions || Items | Store |
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1. System Use Tutorial
2. Beginner Mission 1
Hint: Just select one and go for it. Any real repercussions will be gotten when you finally undertake the mission.
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Jason checked all these out, and then he decided to take on the [System Use Tutorial] and that was also the moment he was met with something of another pop-up panel
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| System Use Tutorial |
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Welcome, Jason Cross. You are about to undertake the System Use Tutorial that will teach you everything you need to know about how to use your System and what to do. To start the Tutorial, simply click on the button below.
[Start]
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Well… Sounded easy enough. Let's check it out, thought Jason. And in the next moment, he did just that, clicking the Begin button and then being taken to the Main Page.
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|| Master Programmer System || Stats | Missions | Items | Store |
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{{{Welcome to the Master Programmer System. Any information on current missions and other communications from the System will be found here on the main System Page. Now navigate to the Stats Page to learn more about your Stats.}}}
Your Current Mission: System Use Tutorial (20% done)
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Okay… this set of words in the Curly Brackets was nowhere to be seen before. All Jason had seen on this screen was nothing more than the System Hint, which had now disappeared. It seemed he had done the right thing by choosing the System Tutorial.
So it would show him any missions or tips from now on, huh? Interesting. Jason was looking forward to seeing how that would look. Jason Mentally navigated to the Stats Page where he saw a completely different screen.
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| Master Programmer System || Stats || Missions | Items | Store |
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Name: Jason Cross
MC (Master Coins): 0
Level: 0
Stats:
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Dexterity (Agility, Flexibility) → 12
Strength (Speed, Power) → 12
Constitution (Endurance, Health) → 7
Intelligence (Memory, Reasoning) → 18
Charisma (Charm, Persuasion) → 24
Wisdom (Intuition, Adaptability) → 14
Spirit (Mental State, Character) → 8
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Well, well… what did all of this mean exactly?
Just as Jason was asking himself, the squiggly lined popup came back again next to every Stat. The Name was his name, however the MC was the Master Coins, and these were coins he earned from Missions and could use to buy things in the Store.
Would he earn coins from this mission? And what could he buy in the store? Interesting, thought Jason to himself as he learned all this. Moving forward, he found his level which was apparently something that determined how much of his System he accessed.
Made sense. Like every game, everything had levels. He was more interested in the numbers, and soon enough, he found out what they meant. Actually, they were straightforward.
These were the Stats of his Mind, Body and Spirit. What did all that mean? Well, he had no idea. These were philosophical concepts that he had no real recognition of anyway. Jason was still trying to get himself to realise if it was a hallucination or not.
It was very clear that it was not. However, what did make things interesting was that these Stats made total sense to him, especially when he was told that the normal, healthiest human values were all tens for a basic human.
Of course, this meant that his intelligence and Charisma were both above average, something that made him smile, but his Health and Mental State were exceptionally low at that moment. That was not good. But looking at the description, he felt it made total sense.
After getting prompted to continue, Jason did just that, moving on to the next Panel which was the Missions Panel. He already understood what this was. It was the place where he would find Missions to undertake to earn coins and rewards he could use. Wonderful.
Jason moved on and found the Items Page and he was excited before he opened it up, but afterwards, he was a bit annoyed. Why hype it up only to give him a blank page?!
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| Master Programmer System | Stats | Missions || Items || Store |
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{{{Here are the items. On this page lies everything that you can hold with the system. It is your system storage, and it can hold everything you buy from the System until you release it or use it. More uses will be unlocked later. Move to the next page, the Store Page, to continue.}}}
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Well, not bad… Jason was very happy with this description. After all, it gave him all the information he could want. Plus more. It was a totally complete description that he could work with. So items he bought from the Store would be here right? Made sense.
Jason was hoping to see some Items when he headed to the next page, but all he got was another empty page with nothing in it. It was somewhat disappointing, and all he got was another description that did not make him very happy.
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| Master Programmer System | Stats | Missions | Items || Store ||
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{{{This is the Store. You can use MC to buy Items, and then store them in the Items page automatically. The items that appear here are based on the Level of the individual, so pay attention to your current level and make sure to increase it as soon as possible to access more items. Go back to the main Master Programmer System page to complete the Tutorial.}}}
Your Current Level: 0
Number of Items available: 0
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Yikes… what a Stingy System. Even stingier than his father when he was younger.
Now that he was done he was looking forward to discovering what was waiting for him on the other side. That was why he navigated to the main System Page here he saw a message that brought a smile to his face.