Ethan, Alice, and Cecilia walked into the room filled with [Priests of the System] while Alice tried not to feel nervous.

There were forty-four total people assembled in the room Ethan had set aside for this meeting. Forty-one [Priests] of the System, plus Ethan, Cecilia, and Alice. Ethan had judged that this crowd was good enough for Alice to start testing things, sharing information, and feeling out how the [Priests of the System] might respond on a larger scale if she attempted to work with them.

Of course, Alice already knew about everyone who was going to participate in the meeting. Ethan had forced Alice to vet the list of people who were invited here, and made her explain why she needed to vet every person who was invited here as well.

It hadn’t taken her too long to realize that every single person who came into Ethan’s manor was a potential security risk. They could, at least theoretically, be [Assassins] from some neighboring nation, sent to remove Alice before she reached Immortality. They could also be informants for the Society of Starry Eyes: while the Society wasn’t known for their infiltration abilities, Alice doubted that they had no informants at all in Illvaria. Money could make some people do anything, after all.

As for [Assassins]… Alice hadn’t thought about that one quite as quickly as she had thought of the possibility of Society infiltrators. Ethan had given her a hint before she got the answer. Alice wasn’t sure how to feel about being a more and more plausible target for assassination. Now that it was starting to become obvious just how good her odds of reaching Immortality were, it seemed quite normal for other countries to try to kill her. Heck, the first thing she had come across in this world upon reaching civilization was news that the Sigmusi Colonia was orchestrating a war of assassinations and espionage against the Illvarian South while the area was cut off from easy reinforcements by snow. However, until the Society had attacked Ethan’s manor, the idea of being assassinated always seemed like a distant problem for future Alice to deal with. Now, she was very abruptly aware of the fact that she was a target now. In fact, if somebody wanted her dead, now was the best time to kill her, because in the future she would be higher level, which would naturally make her harder to kill.

Then, after Alice finished vetting the list of [Priests of the System] that she felt were fine to invite, Ethan had gone over her list and knocked out another twenty names, leaving forty-one [Priests of the System] who he felt were actually safe enough to invite. According to Ethan, those twenty people that Alice had missed were probably fine, but right now, Alice was weak in comparison to the threats arrayed against her, and thus needed be extra cautious. And Ethan backed up his statement by going over their recorded history and actions in great detail, making it clear exactly why he felt she should have known to exclude them.

Alice considered it a somewhat depressing lesson in how much more attention she needed to pay to her surroundings, until she was strong enough to shrug off most casual assassination attempts. But as always, she attentively listened to Ethan’s lesson on how to behave as a future Immortal and keep herself safe. Ethan wouldn’t always be nearby to protect her, and the sooner Alice started instinctively getting herself away from danger without Ethan’s prompting, the better her odds of surviving to reach Immortality.

Besides the somewhat depressing lesson on caution, Alice also felt very nervous. She had been in this world for almost a year now, and for most of that time, she had explicitly avoided sharing information with the Church of the System or other people about her most important research topic. Some part of her half-expected that they would react the same way people on Earth had reacted to ‘witches’ during the Middle Ages and try to burn her alive, or at least make her life difficult. That was unlikely to actually happen: after all, it would take monumental courage to start raising metaphorical pitchforks against the apprentice of an Immortal, especially when Ethan was very visibly standing at the front of the room with her. However, humans weren’t always rational – especially during times of fear and stress. And when the god of this planet suddenly stopped behaving as usual, it would be quite normal for [Priests of the System] to feel very stressed out and tense. Even if nobody present was likely to be able to actually physically harm Alice, revealing her research focus still felt very concerning.

Alice sighed, trying to push those thoughts away and focus on the task at hand again.

She stepped to the front of the room, along with Cecilia.

Upon looking at the [Priests], for a moment, Alice had the bizarre impression that she was holding a press conference, even though there weren’t any cameras or reporters present.

“Ahem,” said Alice, clearing her throat. She scanned the [Priests of the System] one more time, before she started talking.

“It’s nice to see you all, and thank you for coming here. I wanted to talk about the System. As many of you have noticed, the System is behaving… oddly, recently,” said Alice.

She saw a few [Priests of the System] nod or wince in the background.

One of the [Priests of the System] had a slightly more unusual reaction. Instead of wincing or nodding like the others, she gave Alice a dubious look before Alice could continue speaking. “No disrespect to the apprentice of an Honored Immortal, but… why are you giving this speech? I imagine you’re quite accomplished for your age, but I had heard that you were combat-specialized, and I also imagine that you’re probably only a bit better than a regular adult right now. You’re… what, seventeen? Most of Ethan’s apprentices over the years usually only hit a little over level 50 by your age. And while that’s pretty impressive, I don’t know if it’s really a good idea for you to be giving this speech.”

The woman narrowed her eyes at… Ethan?

Alice blinked in confusion. Why did the woman look so annoyed at Ethan? And why was she questioning Alice about this?

A few moments later, it clicked inside of her mind.

Ethan had a large group of Mages and researchers under his command. Ethan was also well-known for trying to propel new apprentices into Immortality, and had gone through several rounds of failed apprentices before eventually taking Alice as an apprentice. Doing impressive things would cause the System to give Alice good Achievements, many of which would likely boost her levelling speed. And while Achievements currently seemed a little bit garbled, ever since the System went down, it was still obvious that they worked, even if in a somewhat weakened form.

Alice wouldn’t be getting a particularly amazing Achievement if she led this meeting but hadn’t done all of the legwork behind it. However, it would still probably be a good enough Achievement to help her grow faster, especially when combined with whatever other Achievements the people here assumed she had. After all, Alice would need something impressive for Ethan to have accepted her as an apprentice in the first place.

This woman thought that Ethan had gotten a huge number of Mages and researchers to do all of the legwork, and then had Alice present it specifically to earn an Achievement even though, in her eyes, Alice was unqualified to lead the conference. She likely thought that Ethan was treating the collapse of the System as something of a joke or an opportunity to let Alice level up, instead of the horrifying disaster that it was. And since she was also likely a religious person, someone treating the malfunctions of her god as an opportunity to earn levels probably rubbed her in completely the wrong way.

Alice felt a strange urge to laugh bubble up in her chest for a moment. She and Ethan had talked about how obvious it would be to most people that research her that she was research focused. They had discussed how anyone who was paying attention would know that Alice was probably the brains behind Alice’s research, and Ethan was only tangentially related to her work.

The Society’s actions seemed to bear out their beliefs that it wasn’t really that hard to discover Alice’s real focus. However, that didn’t mean that everyone had extensively researched her before now. Alice found it a little amusing that the potential allies in this room were the last people to realize that Alice was almost entirely research-oriented instead of combat-oriented.

“If you’re asking about my qualifications, I’m already above level 75 in my primary class, which is research based, and I also have multiple Achievements that are rarity 7 which I have earned without Honored Immortal Ethan’s help. I have indeed gotten more resources and opportunities since becoming Honored Immortal Ethan’s apprentice, but I got many of my Achievements entirely on my own. And the research I am presenting today is almost entirely mine.” Alice paused, and glanced at Cecilia. “Though, I did have some help from a friend of mine, who is with me today.”

“Is that true?” asked the [Priest of the System], turning to Ethan for clarification. The woman’s eyes squinted in a very particular way, as if she was using a lie-detection Perk.

However, no rainbow mana flashed in her eyes, leaving Alice feeling even more amused. The woman was clearly bluffing her access to a lie-detection Perk. A few [Priests of the System] did have lie detection Perks being activated, but several more were just making very good ‘I’m detecting lies right now’ faces. Alice supposed it made sense - if people thought that you were using a lie detection Perk, it was almost as good as actually having the Perk – as long as no one called your bluff.

Ethan nodded. “All of her words are true,” he said, gesturing towards Cecilia and Alice. “My apprentice is a very talented researcher, and I doubt any other researchers or [Scholars] in Illvaria could lead this conversation besides her.”

The woman squinted at Ethan for a few more seconds, before she sighed. She looked somewhat mollified as she turned back towards Alice and Cecilia. Alice noticed that the [Priests of the System] with lie-detection Perks seemed far more interested in Alice than before.

“My apologies, apprentice of Honored Immortal Ethan. And her friend?” The woman said, as she looked at Cecilia.

Alice internally winced.

Ethan had treated this crisis with all of the seriousness it deserved. However, Alice had, in a way, done exactly what the woman was irritated by – use the crisis as an opportunity to boost Cecilia’s levelling speed. Of course, Alice’s guilt was mollified by the fact that Cecilia had genuinely been integral to some of her early research. Presenting Cecilia at this meeting would do more than just boost Cecilia’s levelling speed – it would also show that Cecilia was an alternate person that people could talk to and ask questions if Alice wasn’t available for whatever reason.

Admittedly, that was also a justification Alice hadn’t thought about until just now, but she was pretty sure it was still valid.

Alice cleared her thoughts, and finally got to the reason she had arranged this meeting in the first place.

“I had Ethan bring all of you here today for two reasons. I have information about the System’s collapse that I want to share with you. When the System collapsed, you didn’t fall into a panic or otherwise start making crazy claims with no basis in reality. Instead, all of you kept a level head and tried to help the people who came to your churches, even without knowledge of what was happening,” said Alice.

Complimenting the people who were gathered to hopefully help her was a good way to really get the topic started, right? Alice wasn’t that familiar with public speaking yet, but she was pretty sure it wasn’t a bad idea, at least.

Alice also noticed a bit of [Courtier] mana float into her body, although the mana was mixed with a few other things, such as [Orator] and a few other classes she couldn’t identify.

“I would like to start out by talking about my research – for a long time, I’ve been fascinated by the System,” said Alice. “To the best of my understanding, nobody has ever really done a proper, in-depth analysis of exactly how the System works. At least, not from the perspective of mana. Sure, there are have been a lot of people who examined the System from the perspective of religion – trying to figure out the System’s intentions and why it does what it does, and how to better follow its will,” said Alice, trying very hard not to change her facial expression.

Since she was 90% sure the System was a nonsentient, nonsapient clump of mana, or some sort of enchantment, it was a bit difficult for her to seriously talk about the ‘will of the System.’ But Alice also suspected that talking directly about her thoughts on the System would go over quite poorly with a crowd of religious [Priests], and rather than argue about theology, Alice was much more interested in helping people.

“What I wanted to focus on was how the System worked, specifically. After all, things like Status Screens, Perk descriptions, and so on must require a lot of effort to maintain if the System is always managing every single person’s System notifications, right? So I always wondered how everything works behind the scenes,” said Alice.

She saw a few [Priests] start to blink in confusion. It didn’t look like they were angry, but it looked like they were preparing to get angry in the near future if they needed to. A few of them started shooting daggers at Alice with their eyes.

A different [Priest of the System] chose that moment to speak up.

“Why did you assume that the System needs a ‘how’ at all? The System is a god – it makes sense that it would be able to do things impossible for us mere mortals to understand,” said the man.

“I simply felt that the System might have some sort of method of… erm… communicating with people, I suppose,” said Alice. “I was originally trying to study several things at once, because I found a lot of facets of how mana worked to be incredibly interesting.”

“But isn’t that questioning the divine will of the System?” asked the [Priest of the System], frowning at Alice. “It isn’t our place to question how the System works – we need only work hard and believe.”

“I believe the System approves of my actions,” said Alice. “After all, as a reward for my continued experiments, eventually, the System granted me a special Achievement. It wouldn’t have done that if it didn’t feel that my research had value in it.” Alice noticed that the [Priest of the System] who had previously been frowning and arguing with her had stopped frowning, and looked much less irritated. She felt a sigh of relief almost escape her lips. She had been hoping that would pacify the crowd a bit. Since the [Priests] believed that the System was a sentient, sapient god, Alice claiming that she had ‘discovered a new type of mana called System mana’ would probably go over poorly. However, if she first mentioned that the System itself had granted her the ability to see System mana as a reward for her hard work… she and Ethan had both felt that would go over much better with the religious crowd. After all, the System itself was what granted her the ability to see System mana. She was glad to see that assumption was correct.

“This Achievement allows me to see a new kind of mana – one that most people, as far as I’m aware, are completely unable to see,” said Alice. “I’ve taken to calling it System mana, and what it does is allow me to see how the System works. Every single time somebody uses a Perk, they access some of the System mana in their body to do so. Every time the System grants someone a point in a Stat or Skill, the System mana in the air reacts to the mana in their surroundings entering their body, giving them the reward for their hard work.

“I’ve kept this research to myself and a close circle of friends for a long time. However, as many of you have noticed, the System has been behaving oddly ever since a few days ago,” said Alice. “That is because the System mana in all of the air around us simply disappeared for some reason.”

A few of the [Priests of the System] gave Alice blank looks, as if they were trying to process what she had said. A few of the other [Priests of the System] started to look at the air around them, as if they were trying to see the missing System mana and figure out where it had gone. A few other [Priests of the System] furrowed their brows, as if they were trying to put the puzzle pieces together and figure out what could have possibly happened to make System mana ‘disappear.’ And Alice noticed that perhaps four [Priests of the System] were frowning at her again, although she wasn’t sure why this time. She started racking her brain, trying to figure out what they might be unhappy about, but before she could focus more on the frowning [Priests], a different [Priest] interrupted her.

“What does that mean?” asked one of the [Priests of the System]. This one seemed more horrified than upset, which Alice was much happier to deal with. Someone who understood the gravity of the situation and wanted to help was the kind of person Alice wanted to see in the meeting. And luckily, it seemed like the majority of the people here were reacting the way Alice had hoped they would, even if a few people were instead glaring at her for some reason.

“I suspect it is the reason that the Status Screens started to get weird recently,” said Alice. “I would like to say that this is a lot worse than one might expect: the System didn’t JUST create our Status Screens and System notifications – it also did a lot of other very important things. For example, the System helped people form magic seeds – and without the System, trying to form a magic seed is very difficult. Cecilia can tell you a bit more about this,” said Alice, gesturing towards Cecilia.

In order to get the Achievement for forming a magic seed without help, Cecilia had also formed a magic seed without the help of the System. Naturally, this meant that this was the best topic for Cecilia to talk about if Alice wanted Cecilia to get a good Achievement for helping to manage all of this.

However, before Alice could step back and let Cecilia take over the conversation for a bit, one of the [Priests of the System] who had been frowning at her stood up and pointed at Alice, looking like he was about to explode.

“Did you make the System mana disappear? Did you do something with your studies? If you dared to experiment on the System itself-“

Ethan glared at the man, and rainbow mana flashed across Ethan’s eyes.

The man’s face turned white, as Ethan applied some sort of intimidation Perk to him. “My apprentice did not do a thing to harm the world, or Illvaria. She is currently placing her life at risk due to the presence of the Society, explicitly in order to save people’s lives. If you have a problem with that, you may leave.”

The man shut up.

Ethan nodded at Cecilia. “You may continue.”

Cecilia, who seemed a bit rattled by the interruption, took a moment to stabilize her emotions, and then stepped forward. She began detailing her attempts to form a magic seed without the help of the System – first detailing how the two had cut off the System mana from their surroundings, and then talking about how the numerous attempts to form magic seeds without System help had gone. Once Cecilia finished talking about forming magic seeds without help from the System, Alice stepped back in, and talked about the mage that had recently died while she was trying to help the Mage keep control of their messed up mana-flesh. Her voice caught in her throat a few times, but Alice managed to push forward until she finished speaking.

“Excuse me Cecilia, but may I ask why you were trying so hard to form a magic seed without help of the System?” asked one of the [Priests of the System]. Once again, a few of the [Priests of the System] were frowning, although they were different ones this time, and they seemed far more civil than the last man that interrupted the meeting.

“I felt it was reasonably likely that the System would give me a nice Achievement for doing so,” said Cecilia, not mentioning the fact that she was confident about this because Alice had gotten a nice Achievement of her own for forming a seed without the help of the System. {Seed Creator} was a rarity 8 Achievement, and while Cecilia had gotten a degraded copy of the Achievement, it was Cecilia’s best Achievement, as far as Alice knew. “And I turned out to be correct. The resulting Achievement was somewhat combat-related, so I would prefer not to discuss the details, but it was indeed quite high rarity, and rather helpful for my future as a whole.”

Some of the [Priests] looked mollified. While it still seemed like a few [Priests of the System] were merely trying to hold back their temper because of Ethan’s presence, most of them still looked thoughtful and concerned, instead of angry or suspicious.

Alice stepped forward again, and began talking about Class mana – and how, now that the System wasn’t present in the world, unfiltered class mana may forcibly warp people’s personality or mess with them if it wasn’t properly filtered and dealt with.

After a few more moments of thought, one of the concerned-looking [Priests] spoke up.

“What do you propose we do about this as a whole?”

“I think that it wouldn’t be a bad idea if we start talking about cutting off mana, and about how to manage the strange instincts people will start to have in the near future. It’s also probably not a bad idea to encourage people to buy manaless rings, since some [Enchanters] under Ethan have been manufacturing them since the moment we realized the System had disappeared. And I would also really appreciate it if any Mages that were part of your churches came to see Cecilia or me, so that we can help them get pure mana seeds,” said Alice. “I can help some with Perk selections, although only for a few specific people – but we can use that to get people a few more magic seed slots, and then help them get the right magic seeds. That would help alleviate some of the problem we’re having with not having enough [Enchanters] to meet the needs of the country as a whole.”

The [Priests of the System] discussed Alice’s requests and suggestions between themselves for a while.

After some discussion, many of them agreed to her requests, apart from the few [Priests of the System] that still looked more suspicious than helpful. Alice decided to memorize their names and faces, and mention them later to Ethan to make sure they wouldn’t become problems. Even though Alice didn’t like the feeling of effectively telling Ethan to assign a few [Spies] to watch over people on the suspicion they might become dangerous, Ethan would probably have already taken note of them and prepared to spy on them anyway. Alice just wanted to make sure that threats to her and her friend’s safety and attempts to save everyone didn’t get screwed over by a few people who were more suspicious of her than they were willing to help.

However, Alice was still satisfied with the number of [Priests] who were discussing how to implement Alice’s suggestions and were willing to help, even if not everyone was on board.

The first step to quell the chaos following the collapse of the System had been taken.