《System Dilemma》47. The Reign of The Uppers
Advertisement
Two system screens appeared in front of me, one of them had details on the title that I gained and the other had the option of scrolling as it showed a wide variety of options.
[Title acquired: Initial Returnee]
Initial Returnee
Tutorials are supposed to be over after twelve days, but you’re already back on Earth!
Where is everyone else? Who are these weird creatures?
You’re the first Earthling to go back to Earth after clearing the tutorial!
- You’ll have your name broadcasted in the System Trading Stations for one week starting from the moment you returned. (Earth Time).
-You gain 80 free stat points.
That’s sweet! The extra fame is going to help, and the free stat points are good!
I realized that this title meant that my name was currently being broadcasted on Earth’s Trading Stations, so the alien races should’ve already seen it.
I grinned, as this would’ve made my negotiations with them much easier once I went back to Earth.
I closed the title’s description and took a look at the long list of blessings that appeared in front of me.
[List of Blessings]
Number of Options: 794
[Agni’s Personal Blessing]
[Check the Details]
[Almighty Holy One’s Personal Blessing]
[Check the Details]
[Anubis’ Personal Blessing]
[Check the Details]
[Aphrodite’s Personal Blessing]
[Check the Details]
[Azazel’s Personal Blessing]
[Check the Details]
[…]
[…]
[…]
[…]
There were too many available options, and I kept scrolling for a while. I had no idea which deities offered the better blessings, so I went back to the beginning and checked the details of the first blessing on the list.
[Agni’s Personal Blessing]
Agni is a deity of the fire element, and many people believed that he was the personalization of fire!
Revered by many people as the true god of flames, he blessed many worthy followers of his and allowed them to hold a portion of his magnificence!
He’s been impressed with your control of the flames, and he wishes to bless you even though you attained your class through a shady avenue!
Can you prove yourself to be worthy of this deity’s support?
Advantages:
-Increases Fire affinity to 100.
-Allows you to teleport to his highness’s realm divine for personal training whenever you’d like.
-Weekly resources to increase your power and improve your progress.
-Imparts the [Brahmagni] method of refining mana.
-Gain a title; [Agni’s Chosen].
-Allows you to act as Agni’s only avatar on Earth; you’ll share his teachings with the other humans and convert them into his followers.
-You’ll undergo a special operation to go back to being a normal human; your system will stop glitching forever!
-The next class evolution would force you to choose the class [Agni’s Underling] (uncommon).
Warning: You’ll be able to accept a maximum of ten blessings if you accept this one.
[Accept]
[Decline]
I like the fire affinity, but this is too much…
I didn’t care much about the inane nonsense and just skipped ahead to the advantages of this blessing. It gave many useful benefits, but some of the ‘advantages’ were too much for me.
I didn’t want to become an avatar, as that would force me to take on many responsibilities and heavily restrict my personal life. Furthermore, everything would be for naught once they forced me to give up my class to get an uncommon one instead.
Advertisement
Besides, I didn’t want to become a regular human, as that would’ve meant losing my latent ability. It allowed me to defeat the primordial, and that was enough for me to have an idea of how useful it could be.
This blessing had many positives that I liked, but the weird clauses made it a no-go.
I’ll skip to the next one.
I opened the description of Almighty Holy One’s personal blessing, and read its contents intently.
[Almighty Holy One’s Personal Blessing]
The Great Church is one of the most popular organizations in the Intergalactic Systematic Union, and that’s for a good reason!
It saved many children from the slums and gave criminals second chances. Its leader is the Almighty Holy One, the High Deity of Light, Freedom, Prosperity, and Healing.
He’s been watching your interest intently and wants to recruit you as a Special Knight and one of his agents on your planet.
He’s so benevolent, and he decided to give someone like you a chance at redemption.
Advantages:
-Increases Holy, Fire, Water, and Ice affinities to 100.
-You’ll be assigned a consulting deity who’ll be responsible for guiding you, protecting you, and answering your questions.
-Allows you to teleport to your galaxy’s Great Church sector for personal training whenever you’d like.
-Daily resources to increase your power and improve your progress.
-Imparts the [Way of a Hero] method of refining mana.
-Gain a title; [Great Church’s Chosen].
-Allows you to act as the Almighty Holy One’s fourth avatar on Earth; you’ll share his teachings with the other humans and convert them into his followers.
-You’ll undergo a special operation to go back to being a normal human; your system will stop glitching forever!
-Your consulting deity will choose the next class for you when you can evolve it once more.
-If you don’t accept this contract, you’ll be hunted until you die.
Warning: You’ll be able to accept a maximum of three blessings if you accept this one.
[Accept]
[Decline]
‘…give someone like me a chance at redemption’, huh? These blessings are pissing me off…
I inhaled a deep breath and decided to look at these blessings objectively. The blessing would improve my affinities nicely, and that would allow me a lot of freedom in case I wanted to use skills of these elements.
Furthermore, it seems like they were more generous than Agni when it came to resources. On the other hand, it seemed like I would only meet my consulting Deity instead of the Almighty Holy One himself.
I only opened this blessing’s description to get a quick laugh, but the last clause scared the shit out of me. I didn’t know whether they’d send an overpowered being to hunt me, or if the Great Church’s blessed humans would hunt me.
According to what ‘Loki’ told me earlier, the Great Church wanted to kill me to have full control of Earth through their other Blessed heroes. I was curious about the identities of the three avatars of the Almighty Holy One, but I had a guess.
Stella, Igor, and Oleg… The identity of the deities that blessed them remained a mystery in my past life…
Advertisement
I checked a couple more blessings, but they were all somewhat restricted one way or the other. The interesting thing was that they all seemed intent on transforming me into a non-Glitcher. I had no idea why they hated Glitchers so much.
Too many mysteries about Glitchers, yet I am still in the dark.
I took a look at ‘Loki’, and we made eye contact as he was already looking at me. He was squatting and he was eating popcorn with a grin on his face, as if he enjoyed seeing my silent suffering.
“So…,” I said, “Aren’t you going to tell me which one of these is your blessing? Is it ‘Loki’s Blessing? Or something related to the ‘system admin’?”
He smirked and shook his head.
“The former is just an alias of mine, and the latter is my job!” he said loudly, “Just keep scrolling down; my blessing should be the last one on the list.”
It took me about ten seconds of scrolling to find the last blessing on the list, and its name was a bit weird. I opened its description to find more details.
[???’s Personal Blessing]
Ever since he became the system admin, ??? was always there. At times, he was Prometheus. At others, he was Loki. Sometimes he even had to erase a deity and take his place.
It was a tough job, but he had to keep the scenario going forward.
He seldom interacts with deities, let alone mortals. It’s a miracle that he took interest in a mortal like you, and he’s willing to bless you.
Advantages:
-No need for formality with ???, he’s your friend, ally, and partner!
-Teaches you the fundamentals of controlling your Latent Ability.
-Gives you the title, [The Candidate].
-Allows you to contact him through a special system feature; ‘InterGalacticLine’.
-Teaches you a forbidden chapter of history, [The Reign of The Uppers].
-You’re prohibited from sharing anything related to [The Reign of The Uppers] with anyone that ??? doesn’t approve of.
-Keeps the ‘Shop’ feature going; it’ll stop working if you accept another Blessing.
-Free Maintenance! The conflict between your system and your latent ability will be alleviated until you’re proficient in controlling your latent ability.
-Many growth opportunities will be unlocked!
Warning: You’ll be able to accept any number of blessings if you accept this one.
[Accept]
[Decline]
The lack of a name for the system admin startled me, so I asked him about it. He shrugged his shoulders and told me that no one remembers his old name anyway except for himself. He told me to call him ‘Loki’ or ‘Prometheus’, and asked me to treat him as a friend without being formal.
He hates formalities, huh? Going as far as including a clause about being my ‘friend’ in the blessing…
I read the description in front of me, and I had mixed feelings about it. On one hand, this mysterious deity seemed to tolerate my latent ability and he was even planning on teaching me about it. The title seemed interesting compared to the ones that the previous contracts offered, I’d have to take some random history lessons too if I accepted his blessing.
‘The Reign of The Uppers’, huh? I am curious about this one, and I suspect that it has something to do either with Deities or Glitchers.
On the other hand, this blessing lacked the resources and the personal benefits that the two previous ones offered.
I would’ve appreciated some extra fire affinity…
Another clause caught my eye; it said that the only way to keep the ‘Shop’ was to accept this blessing. It wasn’t that big of a restriction, because this blessing didn’t restrict the number of blessings that I could pick.
All in all, this blessing was much less restrictive than the previous ones.
So, I am free to take other blessings if I accept this one, but I’ll have to give up on the shop if I do so…
“So…,” I said as I squinted my eyes, “What does the ‘Shop’ have to do with all of this? Wasn’t it compensation for my problematic system?”
“Oh, it was meant to be like that!” he replied with a smile, “You see, the items that you’re buying are coming from someone’s pocket, and I am pretty sure you realize the advantage that the shop gave you. If you accept another blessing, then you’ll have to deal with the consequences of your greed.”
“You could’ve restricted the total number of blessings that I could accept if I took yours, right?” I asked.
“That’s true,” he said, “But I believe that the only way to build trust between each other is by giving you freedom of choice. I am pretty sure you want some extra fire affinity, and you can get it from another blessing if you deem it more useful than the system shop.”
He shrugged his shoulder and put his hands behind his head and started humming.
So, he’s allowing me some freedom of choice, unlike the other deities.
The system shop was one of the most important reasons behind my current success, in addition to my future knowledge. It would’ve hurt a lot to lose it, but it wasn’t as instrumental as it was before. I was already one of the strongest humans, if not the strongest individually; the snowball was already big enough to keep rolling on its own.
I understood ‘Loki’s perspective; a relationship based on trust was much better than one based on control and fear.
I was already apprehensive about the other deities, as some of the clauses in their blessings were outright detrimental. I was even suspicious that many of them offered me blessings to shackle me and hinder me from getting too powerful to threaten their other blessed hosts.
I thought about it for a while and checked many more blessings to see if some of them were relatively less restricted.
However, ‘Loki’ interrupted me.
“So, which blessing are you planning on choosing?” He asked.
Advertisement
The New Gate (LN)
“THE NEW GATE”, an online game that trapped its players and turned into a death game, was now releasing the thousands of players that had been dragged into it, thanks to the efforts of Shin, one of the most powerful players. But after having defeated the last boss and freed everyone, he was swallowed up by a strange light and found himself inside the game world 500 years in the future and unable to leave.
8 1212The House Witch
A mysterious new cook has arrived for the King of Daxaria's household. With his strange appearance and guarded personality, many members of the staff, and even some of the nobility, are curious about him. However, with the rumors of a war on the horizon, and the Queen pregnant with her second child, there isn’t time to worry about an eccentric stranger. Besides, how important could he be?
8 642Reborn as a Fantasy World Dungeon
The title is a working title only, at some point, hopefully soon, I will decide on a more fitting one. Currently still reviewing the title poll results and the suggestions. My current release schedule here on royalroad, is every other Sunday at 1PM MST Chapter 28 is delayed, I am working on it still. What with the heavy snow coming to my area, so long as I don't lose power, I intend to be writing. I apologize to those following this story for the delay. Chapters 1-3 1st pass edit 2020-07-23 8PM MST.(The First Paragraph, (edited 2020-07-23)): My name is James Erikson. I am a 22 year old, Physics, Electrical Engineering double major at Stanford in my senior year. It had been a long day prepping for semester finals, I needed a good hot shower. I was on the way back to my dorm from the Green Library having returned some books on Quantum Mechanics, the Interaction of the Strong and Weak Nuclear forces under the influence of Strong Gravitational fields, and a book on the history of modern electronics. It was about 8:45 PM on Monday, November 15th, 2021, and I was getting ready to cross Campus Drive near the Student Services center, when unexpectedly, Lisa, my younger brothers girlfriend called out to me. I turned towards her, twisting my ankle in the process, and started to fall. I am looking at her face, I can see her eyes widening in shock in the street-lamps glow. I can see her start to scream the word “NO” when I am suddenly plunged into utmost blackness.
8 111Necropolis
Eight men acknowledge the life they knew ended, but continues within the underworld. There they must face the Shetani, misanthropic and supernatural forces personified as men, who work in concert with the necromancer, a chief practitioner of black magic and sorcery. The man eating ghouls, and the gargoyles they encounter while on their never ending quest to find safety aren’t any more hospitable. In the midst of desperation to discover whether they can find some place of refuge or save their souls, five of the eight men learn the necropolis, a diamond-studded jewel imbued with a magical power, is critical to their having any hope of finding salvation.
8 132Unipsi, lovely entity
Follow commander Scilla Lis in her discovery of the cryptic Esterians. Problems and oddities will soon become part of her every day life just as war and death had already done. "Such a strange life, uncertain and full of horrors, but she keeps on going. it's such a lovely entity" -Observer 5.511!.76! (if you read this, remember that you will have to tolerate my horrible english, it's not my first language)
8 146Greek gods x reader
This is a collection of stories x reader with some greek gods.just to let you know every god has a story divided into three part (first: meeting in the human world, second: an appointment, third: reader meet the gods in their world + confession of love)HOPE YOU ENJOY!!Sean Bean as ZeusJoe Manganiello as PoeidonJonathan Rhys Meyers as HadesJason Momoa as Ares
8 67