Several days have past since I recieved the "super villiany system". Its now saturday. I had been to SIT's library several times now, and even took a trip to a public library to see if a book there offered a solution. Unfortunately, it turns out trying to un-install systems aren't common. What a surprise.
Despite bad news on my end, however, there was excellent news elsewhere.
Currently I'm helping an excited Kyte connect a few monitors and computers together across one side of our dining table.
"this doesn't look like a very practical setup."
I untangle a mouse from a mess of wires and plug it in the back of one of the computers.
"Its fine. I only need to actually play properly on these two. the remaining four are for my alts which can be carried by my guild, so I only need to be able to see them."
Indeed, Kyte had recieved a task sometime yesterday from a subsystem. It involved him doing something game-related. After some testing he realised he could do it faster if he used multiple accounts and had his guildmates help him. He continued speaking.
"I only need to complete the golden siege raid five thousand times. Bro-Joe 58 agreed to host a guild event for me over the week to do it. He's also managed to get grandma's cookies to help out"
Huh?
"Oh, grandma's cookies is the name of one of our friend guilds. I think I've told you who Bro-Joe is before."
I nod.
Bro-Joe is Kyte's guild leader. Kyte himself is pretty high up in the guild, from my understanding.
"Hopefully, darklords are also planning on joining us."
Huh?
"Another guild. The task should take quite some time, but hopefully I can get it done within a month."
I nod again.
"Since SIT is halting lectures for the next two weeks, are you planning on taking time off to complete this faster?"
Kyte smiles and nods. Its a very reasonable choice to make, so I'm not surprised by his decision.
"mhm! Sorry, you'll have to take my beatings for me!"
I choose to respond with the most unenthusiastic voice I can muster.
"lucky you."
Jokes aside, I'm happy for him.
Time passes, and we set it all up.
Plugging everything in was easy, but we had to search for two monitors among our friends. Fortunately, one of our friends is very tech-savvy, so she lent us both when finding out Kyte recieved a personal subsystem mission. Not that she would of refused if we didn't tell her that.
I watch him do the first four runs simultaneously, as he issues orders to the two teams he isn't a part of. Part of me wonders if using multiple accounts at once is cheating, but it appears it counts.
Well, it was interesting to see it once, but I don't intend to watch him repeat it again and again. I decide to go for a walk outside to pass the time.
The city we live is called trigon city. As the name suggests, its triangle shaped. At least, it used to be triangle shaped, but with all the added districts it lost a lot of its form. Strictly, we live on the east outskirts of trigon city, slightly south of the system training institute.
I walk about the streets when I encounter several friendly faces peering up at me.
"Its Argus!"
"Hey! Argus!"
"Argus"
"Hello!"
"..."
I smile as I return the greetings from the familiar faces. Before me is a large group of neighborhood children- five girls and seven guys. For short, I mentally refer to them as the brat gang.
They aren't badly behaved. In fact, I would say they are very well behaved. For their ages, at least.
But a bunch of thirteen and fourteen year olds aren't known for being well-mannered.
"Join us!"
"Yeah! Lets play!"
I don't have much else to do today.
I decide to give them a positive response.
"Sure! Where are we going?"
Everyone else seems busy doing system tasks today, so I'll entertain them for a bit.
After some walking we end up in a park. Some benches, some trees, some swings, some slides...
A normal children's park.
We climb a few trees and play a few games, Including one where I was blindfolded and had to somehow catch each of them.
After several more games I take a rest on a bench. Despite my increased stamina due to the system and physical training courses, I still somehow lack the stamina to keep up with these kids. Children just seem to be built different when they're young.
I take some time to meditate.
[SYSTEM]
[Task : Train until you drop ten times.]
[Progress: 6/10 -> 7/10]
[Rewards: Small increase in stamina.]
This even counts as training?
The apparent simplicity of this task is a lie. When it says "train until you drop", It means it.
I wish the system was so simple as a magic screen that pops up and conveniently gives you an easy task that you were going to do for the day anyway, but no. Hundreds of tasks lie hidden in the system and it can sometimes be a pain to navigate. While checking some other tasks to see if theres any I miss, I feel a tug on my arm.
I awake to see one of the girls of the group, Marie, tugging my sleeve. her eyes are red and she seems to be holding back tears.
"Spi-spider..."
Marie pointed to the top of her head while mumbling something. I look, but theres nothing on her head.
She shook hear head vigorously, and continued talking.
"Please get it off."
I inspect more closely, and after gently slapping her light brown hair just to make sure, I state my conclusion.
"Theres nothing in your hair."
She looks up at me, uncertain.
"No spider or anything."
Her fear turns to anger, and a boy from the group runs up to her, laughing. Seeing his reaction, I realise what happened. This particular boy is actually one of the kindest of the group, and often acted as a sort of leader of the gang. Around Marie, however, he occasionally acted a bit... special.
"Ha ha, Marie, you fell for it! pfft, fe he he!"
I raise my hands to my ears as Marie screams in response.
"Colin!"
"Ha Ha!"
The boy, whose name was Colin, runs away. Evidently, he's quite satisfied with the reaction.
Marie starts to give chase, but abruptly stops, hands still shaking from earlier. With a "hmpf", she turns back around and sits beside me with a pout.
My apologies, Colin, but I don't think this approach will work out for your benefit.
I sigh at the usually-mature Colin, and take it upon myself to cheer Marie up.
A few ideas came to mind, but I settled on something simple, a game of eye-spy.
After several rounds of eye-spy, Colin returns, still smiling, but with a more humane look than the mindless grin he had earlier.
"Marie, come play with us!"
"No."
"But we need you to play!"
"..."
"please?"
Unfotunately for Colin, it appears Marie hadn't quite forgiven him for earlier, and refused to budge.
Colin seems to start realising something is wrong, as he stops smiling.
"...Okay."
And leaves on low spirits.
It isn't the first time Colin managed to upset Marie, but I guess pretending to put a spider in her hair was maybe one step too far. usually, Marie would have returned to the group by now.
After a few more minutes of eye-spy, I decide I should try and return Marie to the group. I'm sure she will forgive them tomorrow, but I think sooner is probably better than later.
I point to the other children.
"Isn't it about time for you to play with them again?"
Marie crosses her arms.
"They should be punished."
"But you can forgive them, right?"
Unfortunately, it appeared Marie could not forgive them. Or more specifically judging by her answer, she couldn't forgive Colin.
"Criminals get punished in jail. Colin should get punished too."
Eh? isn't that rather extreme? It was a harmelss prank! They didn't even put an actual spider on your hair! I feel like this is going to go badly any way I answer this.
"You don't want to forgive Colin?"
"When people do bad things they should get punished. Otherwise its not fair."
Technically, thats not wrong, but...
It feels like theres something missing.
So I speak. Maybe its too complicated for her, but maybe she will understand some of it.
"All actions" I pause for a bit, thinking. "have consequences. Sometimes we face those consequences immediately, othertimes we don't. Sometimes the consequences are obvious, sometimes they aren't. But there are always consequences, even if you don't realise or see it."
I guesture to Colin, who is currently absentmindedly staring at the floor. It's not very hard to see the impact Marie's rejection had on him, but maybe Marie hasn't noticed yet.
"So, don't worry too much about punishing him. I think Colin may feel punished already."
Marie's gaze follows my finger, and lands on Colin.
"I don't want to say that its wrong to punish people, Its just that, sometimes, a more subtle approach is better."
Two of the girls in the group- both good friends with Marie- notice our attention, and start calling for Marie. Other kids in the group look our way, before similarly calling her on, flapping their arms vigorously.
Colin Briefly looks up at us, before looking back on the floor with a conflicted expression.
After a few moments of silence, Marie hops off the bench, and slowly walks towards the group of children beckoning for her.
Marie joins them and Colin starts to apologise.
"Marie, I'm sorry for earlier..." Marie looks down at the floor as Colin continues.
Aww what a good boy! See? Colin's not a bad person, really. Being able to give a proper apology is important, and I feel like thats definately something understated in today.
"...Please, forgive me?"
Marie continues looking at the floor. I smile in satisfaction. Its not like these kids being upset with eachother is particularly rare, but its nice to see a proper resolution.
Marie opens her mouth
"Kon..."
Kon...?
"Consequence! Punch!"
Marie flies a fist straight into Colin's stomach. After inhaling a deep breath, she then proceeds to run away at top speed.
"Marie!"
"Wait up!"
The two girls from earlier chase after her, while the remaining children stare blankly at colin, who had sank to his knees after feeling the impact.
I feel like I should leave now... while everyone is distracted. Yes.
