20th floor.

Dom was flailing his arms in desperation.

"Why? Why did you kill me?! Why?" he shouted. "I did what you wanted! There was no way to leave the hospital in one minute unless I jumped the windoooooooow!"

15th floor.

"When was the last time you had so much fun?" The system asked.

"Never! I never went through this! I never want to go through this agaaaaaain!"

10th floor.

"See?! Fun, fun, fun!"

"But I'm going to dieeeeeeee!"

5^th floor.

"Dying for fun is the best way to die!"

1st floor.

"Ahhhhhhhhhh!" He saw his face closing in on the ground.

And then the world stopped.

 

Fun Quest! complete: Escape the Hospital!

Congratulations! You've completed your first Fun Quest! (trademark pending).

All the remaining Fun System systems will be now unlocked for you!

Because learning about system is boring and it would take the time out of your fun, the Fun System has frozen time for you until you finish reading!

Say "continue" to continue.

 

He was breathing hard. The cold concrete was a few inches from his face. He was vertically frozen in place, but he still could move his arms and legs.

"So, when I finish reading, time will resume?" he asked.

"Yes! The fun can't stop!" the system replied.

'You just stopped it,' he thought.

"No, no, no! The system just paused it temporarily so you can focus on your fun when you're done! Fun is forever, but sometimes boring times bore their way into fun. This is the best of both worlds! Be boring without losing fun time!"

'What the hell?! Did you just read my mind?!'

"How can the system measure your fun if it can't read your mind? Fun is a universal language!"

"You're not even making any sense!" he grumbled. "If it's a universal language, what's the need to read my mind?"

The system took a few moments to reply. And it dodged the question completely. "Anyway, when you finish reading, the time will resume, and you'll die! First death, here we come! So much fun!"

"No. No! That's not fun! Not fun at all! Staying alive is fun, dying is not fun!"

"But you did it! You jumped from the twentieth floor of a hospital! You're using the fun system, so it must be fun, right?!"

"It's not! You forced me to jump! I couldn't complete the quest any other way- Wait, wait, that's it! If dying is fun, why is it a failure penalty? Huh?"

"Are you... Using logic? Against a system? Dude, you know I'm a machine, right? I'll rip your logical mind to shreds."

"JUST ANSWER ME!"

It didn't. Not for an exceptionally long time. "Alright. Dying is no fun. In fact, dying is the opposite of fun. The Fun System calls it, "the eternal boredom." A Fun Quest! that can only be completed in a way that will lead to eternal boredom is illegal and therefore it has been cancelled! The time freeze to read screens has been cancelled too! Thank you for your feedback!"

White letters appeared in the middle of his vision.

 

Resuming time in 5...

 

"Wait!" Dom yelled.

 

4...

 

"Wait! I don't wanna die! I liked the quest! Let's talk!"

 

3...

 

"Please, stop!"

 

2...

 

"Oh my God, oh my God. Forgive me, Lord, for I have sinned..."

 

1...

 

"Ahhhhhhhhh!" he started yelling with the full power of his lungs.

Time resumed, and he fell... As much as he would've fallen if he was one inch above ground.

It was more awkward than painful. Well, it did hurt his face and his back a little, but he just fell very weirdly.

"I'm... alive?" he asked.

"Did the Fun System forget to tell you? If a Fun Quest! is cancelled, all its consequences are cancelled too! You can't die from an illegal Fun Quest!, that would be boring!"

"Shit... Oh shit..." He sat down, patting himself. "I'm alive." Yup, everything was in place. He double checked just to make sure.

"Look, mama, that half-naked man is touching himself," a voice said.

Dom turned to see a female five-year-old holding a teddy bear and pointing at him.

"Don't look!" the mother said and covered her eyes. "Come with mama, don't look at the pervert. Come."

"N- No! I'm not-" Dom started and rose his hand in a surrender motion. His hospital gown came up with them.

"Ahhhh!" another woman screamed in front of the hospital doors and a security guard said something his phone while looking at Dom.

"Fun, fun, fun! Scandalizing people is always fun! Points for you!"

"Screw you," Dom said, stood up, and looked around, holding his gown down.

He couldn't go back into the hospital. If the security didn't arrest him, his mom would put him in the psychiatric wing.

Thankfully, he recognized the hospital. It was a few blocks away from where he had suffered a heart attack. There was a clothing shop one block to the East. He didn't have the money to buy anything, but if he was going to jail for indecent exposure, he definitely didn't want to be go while his butt was showing.

He started jogging the store's way.

 

Fun Quest! Scandalize People!

Sometimes, the simplest fun in life is what fulfill us!

Run at least two blocks with a naked butt!

Reward: FUN!

Failure penalty: Heart attack. You won't survive the second one in a row.

 

Two blocks? But the clothing shop was one block away!

"WHY?!" he yelled. "Just why?! What did I do to deserve this?" He wanted to sit and cry, but he had to keep running or he would get a heart attack.

"Are we having fun yet?!?!?!?!" the system asked excitedly.

"Oh my gosh, a pervert!" a guy shouted.

"Ahhh!" a girl screamed and covered her face, but she was looking between the fingers.

"Wow, that's a hot butt," another girl-

No, it was a woman. An old woman. A grandma! And her hand was getting close to slap his ass!

He dodged and kept running. The streets were just too crowded!

"Why are all this people here?!" he shouted.

"Fu fu fu!" the system laughed. "Fu fu fu fu... Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!" It was having the time of its life.

Suddenly, sound. A loud music. A ridiculously loud music.

A fancy pickup truck appeared on the end of the street. It had an even fancier sound system on its back, and it was so loud it even muted the sound of the system inside Dom's head.

"Smoke marijuana everydaaaaay..." the song's singer singed.

Dom was an average guy. Neither cool nor self-destructive enough to do drugs. And if the system said drugs were fun, he would have a serious issue with it. He didn't like anything that messed with his head.

"They can be fun!" the system said. "But it's a matter of personal taste and this system is the most accepting system of all! If you want to be lame, you can be lame! Laaaaaaame!"

"Screw you! Wait, how can I hear you over the... The song... Stopped... The car... Why is it running right next to me?"

"Hey, Joe, look at this mad lad! Running with his butt naked!" one of the people in the truck said.

There were four dudes about eighteen years old riding the truck. Two white, two black, all of them so buffed Dom felt sorry for their clothes, which were stretched beyond what the fabric should be capable of withstanding.

"What an absolute mad lad!" another replied.

"Hey, boy! We inspired /r/MadLads! And we like what you are doing!" a third guy said.

"Jump right in, boy! We're going to a partyyyyyy!" the fourth said.

"YEAHHHH!" the other three said.

"I can't-" he started saying, but then he got a new window.

 

Fun Quest! intercepted!

Your Fun Quest! (trademark pending) has been intercepted by the higher priority Weekly Theme PARTY HARD!

If there's a party to be had, nothing shall stand in your way!

Your Fun Quest! Scandalize People! has changed into It's a Partyyyyy!

 

Fun Quest! It's a Partyyyyyyyyy (how many 'y's was it again?)!

Get in the car, boy!

It's party time with the mad lads!

Reward: FUN!

Failure penalty: Kidnapped by four people who won't be happy with you. Better go willingly. Seriously, the things they would do to you... Just a second. Hey, Alpha-Beta-Delta-Omega Seventeen! This is too dark, dude! Can we default to Heart Attack next time? Oh, yeah? Alright then... I'm back. Just get in the car, alright?

 

WHAT WAS WRONG WITH THIS SYSTEM PENALTIES? WHO WERE THESE PEOPLE RUNNING THE SYSTEM? WASN'T IT A COLD LOGICAL MACHINE?

No, more than that, how pathetic were people who called themselves mad lads? How terrible could their party be? Wait, the system had used that "mad lad" term before, too.

Oh, shit.

Was his fun system a lame system? Was it the reason it was so desperate to be fun?

Why did this make him feel pity for the murderous little shit?!

"Screw it," he whispered and stopped running. "The party is on, boys!" he yelled in fake excitement. He really didn't want to find out what the failure penalty was. And he was tired of running already, too.

"Yeaaaaah!" the four of them shouted.

One of them picked Dom up by the window and pulled him in, depositing him in the middle seat on the back.

Somehow, both guys on Dom's sides put their arms over his shoulders in a half hug. He was fairly sure both arms were occupying the same physical space. That's now how reality was supposed to work.

"Can you believe Big J got sick and couldn't come?" the one on the left said.

"He will miss on so much fun!" the one on the right agreed.

"Oh, I bet he is," Dom agreed with a dead tone.

"Fun, fun, fun!" the system shouted in sheer joy.

"Fun, fun, fun!" the mad lads shouted right after.

Yes, it was confirmed. They were in the same brain wave. The system was a mad lad.

It all made sense now.