1 1 - Graduation and Freedom

The sun reflects off the crystal lake, casting a shimmering diamond glaze over the waters. A most pleasing sight to wake up to every morning… If it hasn't been a hundred years since he first seen it.

Even the most beautiful scenery would just become another mundane background given enough time.

LinYu sat crossed legged near where the waters lapped at the shore. His waist long hair caressed gently by the wind, swayed behind his back. With his eyes half closed, he rested his head on the palm of his right hand while his left hand plucked at the grass beneath him.

With a heavy sigh, he looked at the blade of grass that he was playing with… and crushed it.

'Look at how easily I can end your life with just a simple tug. The worse part is… I wasn't even thinking of it when I did it. I was just simply bored. But yet here you are, in between my fingers.

Your roots still deep in the ground but your body a mere green smudge that I would later wipe away on my shirt and forget all about it in a few minutes.

But yet I do not feel any guilt, for you are too minute for me to even consider about your thoughts.

But you know? We are just the same. A tiny microscopic thing that could be wiped away without a second thought.

I'm not supposed to be here you know.'

LinYu's thoughts floated to his past life on Earth. Where he was just another working adult in the rat race. Slogging away his days in exchange for some money in order to get his basic needs met.

But then everything changed when the fire nation attacked... no scrap that. When the truck-kun hit.

LinYu chuckled at his own joke.

Just like any bored 90s kid, he grew up with anime, mangas and novels about adventures and travels. From cultivation to fantasy, from transmigration to reincarnation, from golden fingers to systems, from revenge to romance… well if it was written, he read it, if it was made, he saw it… and he loved every bit of it.

At night in bed he would always fantasise about being the main character. He loved to imagine what it would be like if one day he was thrown into another realm. How he would survive all the ordeals and challenges to become the very best.

But did those knowledge help at all? Nope.

From the moment truck-kun rammed his ass at neck breaking speed and sent him hurling into that deep white space, he knew that he was fucked.

First a shady system connected with his mind with no option to decline. Even though he would never decline the offer… even an illusion of freedom would be nice right? But no. It was a simple I'm now connected to you and you will do this and that. No buts and no or else. Just simply do.

Next he was tasked to learn all sorts of things. From simple maths to complex chemistry to every single instrument and even cooking. The learning part ain't that bad but he was required to excel at every single part else it would electrocute him. And LinYu ain't exactly the studious kind. So on more one occasion, the system roasted him to charcoal and then brought him back to life, where the cycle then continues.

Finally, and this is the part where he couldn't stand the most… he was caged! Like not exactly caged like an animal but he was forced to stay on the hill where the system has 'kindly' built a house for him and placed all his rewards that came from completing educational quests in it. But still!

As a pre-earthling, he thought that being placed on house arrest or a month or two was bad. The worst that he has came across to was back when the days where a flu virus was wreaking havoc and the government made everyone stay home and play games… Until this.

Well, the bright side is that he now has a home where he can relax and adored compared to sleeping under the stars when he first started, but seriously…

There are no living anything aside from him.

For the past one hundred freaking years LinYu has seen nothing that breathes. He's stuck on a hill by himself and the only thing to accompany him is the freaking system that is attached to his mind like a parasite!

Goddamned it I just want to talk to something that breathes! Human, Demi-human, animal, demon… I don't freaking care just let me meet somebody! Humans are social creatures! We will die if we don't have another living, breathing thing besides us!

More than once LinYu fought and tried to get out of the cage. Only to be charcoaled and brought back to life with more physical education that drained him of all energy. It had gotten so bad that once he thought that breathing took up too much energy and just simply stopped doing it… then only to be zapped alive again and then the 'abusive' cycle continued.

Well, the only good thing to come out of the complaints throughout the years was that the parasite has finally voiced his demands to the main server and promised that the next host would at least get a pet or something during the course of education.

But still! Well, I mean it's great that the next host would get a pet but what about me?!

A slight buzz vibrated in LinYu's mind, breaking his thoughts and alerting him to the parasite wanting attention.

Rolling his eyes, LinYu requested the system to speak.

[System 101 : Congratulations host! The main server has confirmed that your education is completed and as per contract, you will now receive your graduation credentials. With that being said... Good luck!]

"Wait. I'm free?"

[Yes host. Your education has completed.]

"I can go out of the cage?"

[Sigh. For the last time host… this area is your training grounds. It's the beginner's village. It is not a cage.]

"You are not joking right?"

[Yes. I'm joking.]

After a hundred years with LinYu, even the system has updated its own code and learnt how to joke. Though its jokes has caused LinYu his life on more than one occasion, he has learnt to read the tone of the system although it was monotone.

"Haha hilarious."

[Glad to be of service. Your materials are at the usual place. Until then… Best of luck. Commencing disengagement in 3…2…]

"Wait wait! You are leaving me alone?!"

[Well yes host. Your education has completed. Just think of it as tutorial complete. So I'm moving to the next host.]

"But…"

[Bye.]

With a cheery tone that LinYu has never heard of from the system before, it bid its last goodbyes and LinYu felt something disconnect in his mind.

Staring out on the crystal lake, he realised that this time he's really alone. That even though he became charcoal for more times than he could count and died on even more occasions… he really learnt so much from the system.

That throughout all the ups and downs, from the moment he died to the first time he passed his exams and got his first present, to the time where he cheated and got caught and got zapped to smithereens and to the time he got whipped on his butt for failing a quest to getting poison in his coffee to getting buried in the sand to…

"Ah fuck that."

I'm free.