Chapter 2: The Hacker System

Novel:

“What’s this! Is this like those legendary Systems as in those Wuxia novels?!” Ting Wo murmured.

“Hey, are you alright!?” It was Tang Fei, the bartender of Duan Life Bar.

“Huh? I’m alright.” Ting thanked him. As he was being looked upon by the other drinkers in the bar. Ting thought to himself “Wasn’t I really drunk a moment ago? How come I can think clearly at the moment?”

“Oh right, maybe the System has something to do with it. I’ll better check when I get home.” Ting thought to himself. He chuckled as he thought how he will become just like the main characters of the novels he read.

“Are you sure you’re alright? You might have broken something inside you.” Tang Fei asked worryingly. Tang Fei the bartender was worried that if something happened while he was on shift he might get fired.

“I’m fine my arms are just sore from the fall. No need to send me to the hospital. If there’s nothing else. I’ll be going.” Ting replied as he thought about what the Hacker System is all about. Since his dream is to live a life so that his mother wouldn’t worry about him all the time. Ting Wo walks out the glass door of the Duan Life Bar. He waved to a taxi and got in and told him his home address.

His single bedroom apartment solely being used as his home during his time at university. Since he was living alone he had a lot of freedom than if he shared a dorm with other students.

His apartment building was about 10 minutes drive by car and about a 30 minutes on foot.

10 minutes had passed as Ting arrived at his apartment building. He paid the taxi driver 15 yuan and got out of the taxi. He entered the apartment building which was pretty worn down. It was only 4 stories however his room was on the 2nd floor. The lobby of the building had a kind of unique smell. One that would often smell like flowers at times and garbage alternately. There was a receptionist sitting as always ready to greet the men and women she sees.

“Hey you’re back really late. Did something happen?” Yao Chen said in a suspicious tone. Yao Chen turned 67 last September. She was very familiar will the tenants of the building.

“Women are really scary… it’s like they can read people’s minds.” Ting thought as he replied in a nice manner. “Well, today I got expelled from my university sadly.”

“Oh that’s a bummer. And you’re just started your second year there.” Yao Chen frowned. She knew that Ting’s Mom had saved up just enough money for Ting to go to a decent University. As she thought for a few moments she asked “So now that you’ve been expelled from university what are you planning on doing?”

Ting Wo thought for a while and he told her that he will be thinking about self-teaching himself programming languages, and probably get a temporary job somehow.

As he bid farewell to Yao Chen and walks toward the stairwell to get to the second floor. As he began to walk on the kinda beat-up red carpet. He observed the hallway as he doesn’t look around or pay attention to details. However after he got expelled he began thinking differently. The feeling of not reaching his dreams and his goals was a slap in his face telling him that life isn’t easy, but earned.

The hallways walls were a shade of grey. Simple and clean. Picture frames hanging on the wall showcasing the founders of the apartment. The building was 60 years old and approaching 61. The picture showed the founder and the construction team in front of the completed building. The building looked very magnificent and new. The bricks were a solid red colour compared to the now somewhat deformed bricks caused from continuous rainfall. The stairwell was quite old as every time he took a step there would be a quiet creak sound but since the stairwell was quite open the sound was amplified. His footsteps were echoing in the stairwell. As he reached the second floor, he was finding his room which was the room 37 each floor consists of 20 rooms so his room would be the furthest away from the stairs as the 17th room on the second floor is his. As he walked toward his room he found that it was unusually quiet. But as he remembered that it was almost 1am in the morning he thought it was quite normal since most people should be in bed and asleep.

“Ah, I really can’t wait to find out about this Hacker System!” He exclaimed inside his head.

As he took out his keys and unlocked his wooden door. After which he entered and sat down on his bed, as he started to check out his system that came out of nowhere. As he thought how to call the system out a voice sounded out that only he could hear.

“To call the system please just think of opening the systems main menu screen.” Ting was dumbfounded he didn’t think that the system would tell him how to use itself.

As he thought to open the systems main menu words with SHOP, MISSIONS, STATS, MODES, with greyed out options which he couldn’t read.

Ting’s goals of his life was to make his mother not worry about him. The other was to become a genius at computer programming. Ting thought about the STATS option and in the next second a detailed window showed up in front of him.

******

STATS

Name: Wo Ting

Occupation: None

Strength: 10 (That of a 14-year-old)

Speed: 13 (amateur)

Mind: 14 (Decent Thinker on the level of a young adolescent)

Dexterity: 15 (Young man)

Typing speed: 18 (Meh that of a turtle increase it!)

Thinking speed: 15 ( That of a young mans )

Programming Languages Learned:

– Python (Basic)

– Java (Basic)

(Please work hard!)

******

Ting was stunned. The System had actually listed all the programming languages that he had some knowledge about since he took computer science in high school. After he had checked out the Stats menu, he thought about clicking the back arrow on the lower right corner of the screen that was floating just a few feet in front of him.

Back at the main menu. He decided to select the SHOP option. The menu disappeared and a clean and slick window appeared. At the top left wrote “SHOP” in nice, big white letters. There was a type of currency at the top right. There was a filter option available. The items available in the shop ranged from computer parts he had never seen before. The computer parts looked like RAM but had no brand on it. The description said that it was a 4 GB 8000 MHz DDRX memory.

“NO WAY, the fastest RAM clock speed I’ve seen was 3400MHz!” Ting exclaimed out loud. He suddenly remembered that it was late at night, as he shut his mouth and calmed himself down.

The shop didn’t just have 4GB RAM, but also goes beyond 128 GB RAM sticks. The shop had all kinds of futuristic parts including CPUs, cases, keyboards, mice, etc. The price of theses parts and utilities were very expensive. Just the 4GB RAM stick costs 3400 System Credits (SC). Ting closes the shop screen and checks out the Modes option. The modes screen showed up and there was only one option that was currently not greyed out. It was the “Learning Mode”, the description of Learning mode was when Learning Mode is chosen. Host will be sent into a learning dimension where the time compared to the real world is 1.5 times slower. This means for every hour you spend in the learning dimension the time passed in the learning dimension would be 40 minutes. It could be upgrade so that it is 10 times so for every hour in the learning dimension/realm six minutes had passed.

“So that means that I could technically live longer than others if I stay in the learning dimension.” Ting softly spoke. As he read on, he learned that the learning dimension has different kinds of courses he could take such as learning Java, and other languages. He could also learn to hack.

Ting was done taking a look at the modes as he felt very excited. He began to check out the Missions and then the main menu disappeared again and what reappeared was a list with missions he could take with rewards.

******

Missions:

– Filter (Difficulty Low-High)

(E) Learn how to fix computers

(?) LOCKED

(?) LOCKED

….

******

“Learn how to fix computers? Every other mission is currently locked right now? Maybe if I finish this mission I would unlock the other missions. Well let’s take a look at the mission.” Ting has a trace of anticipation. As he took a look at the mission.

******

Mission:

– Learn how to fix computers.

Description:

Just as the title said. Learn how to fix all types of computer problems. (Hint: Take the Computer Repair Course in the learning dimension)

Rewards:

– 500 System Credits

– Ability: Special Eyes

– 10 Experience Points

| Accept |

Ability: [Special Eyes]

Cool-down: 10 minutes

Activation Time: 2 seconds

Description: Able to quickly and accurately identify the problem of the desktop/laptop computer.

******

“This Special Eyes skill should be really useful in the future. It can identify the problem of a computer in 2 seconds? This is great!” Ting thought as he began to open up the modes and select Learning Dimension.

“Are you sure you want to enter the Learning Dimension?” Ting didn’t hesitate as he said yes in his head.

“Hacker System switching Modes to Learning Dimension…3…2…1…” As the System was counting down. Tings consciousness slowly fades.

“Transportation Successful!” The System sounded. “Welcome to the Learning Dimension.”