The System is Abstract, Luckily, So Am I

Chapter 184 : A Stick-Like Shadow Appeared on Lin Li's Face

["Fang." has requested to add you as a friend.]

On October 1st, Lin Li, who was woken up by his 4:30 AM alarm, saw this message appear on his phone.

"Reckoning in silence, fifteen days have already slipped through my hands; like a drop of water on a needle point dripping into the ocean, my days are dripping into the stream of time, without a sound, without a shadow. I cannot help but sweat and weep."

"Brother Ping, I miss you so much."

[Ignore]

After reciting the primary school essay, Lin Li naturally chose to neither accept nor reject, giving it the cold shoulder.

Missing him was one thing, but Song Luping was currently a useless entity. Until the system issued a task that required him, there was no point in adding him.

Although Lin Li was the king of making up stories, he couldn't just make things up anywhere and everywhere.

Adding him back and listening to his nonsense would be annoying.

Switching back to his main account, he saw someone sending a mass National Day blessing.

Lin Li smiled slightly.

[Lin Li: October 1st, the bright moon hangs high; family and friends, admiring the moon and flowers; at this moment of reunion, fuck your mom; recounting the past, full of blessings; a bright moon, looking to the future; National Day holiday, may all your wishes come true!]

[Wang Ze: ...]

[Wang Ze: Whipping corpses, are we?]

Lin Li was a bit shocked. Wang Ze actually replied instantly. Was he already awake at this hour?

No, wait.

For some questions, the answer is already known the moment they are asked.

[Lin Li: You motherfucker, you haven't slept yet, have you?]

[Wang Ze: Nonsense, have you slept?]

[Lin Li: Your life is basically ruined. Let me carry the banner of being the only male sports student in Class 4. I went to bed at 10 PM last night and just woke up.]

[Wang Ze: Friendly reminder: going to sleep at 6 AM in the morning is earlier than you going to sleep at 10 PM at night. You're the one whose life is ruined.]

[Lin Li: ...Idiot.]

[Wang Ze: Gotta go, I need to wash my hands first.]

[Lin Li: Hmm? Why are you washing your hands at 4 AM?]

[Wang Ze: The kids are too clingy.]

[Lin Li: ...Your fucking [Bleep—].]

What the hell do you mean the kids are too clingy? You probably have over a billion of those kids.

Because it was still raining today, even though it was 4:30 AM, it was as dark outside as the dead of night. In this weather, his early morning workout could only be done in the living room.

Fortunately, his workout wasn't very loud, so it wouldn't wake Wu Min up.

His current progress was (24/30). After finishing today's practice, it would reach 25. He estimated he would complete this task on the 6th. Victory was right before his eyes.

[Update Complete.]

However, when Lin Li called up the system, he saw this notification.

He was a bit confused.

Didn't it just update yesterday? Why is it updating again today?

Does it update not only on Mondays now, but also at the beginning of the month?

But an update was a good thing. The system was getting closer and closer on the path to becoming humanized. Lin Li immediately looked at his [Shop].

To his surprise, the free item refresh count hadn't reset; it was still grayed out.

Does this update not even give basic update welfare?

Bad luck.

Lin Li opened the extra, unnamed interface and finally found the point of the update—in that interface without any text, the first of the three buttons had lit up, seemingly ready to be clicked and interacted with.

So Lin Li clicked it.

An extremely blinding white light flashed before his eyes, and Lin Li subconsciously closed them.

The blinding white light quickly disappeared. Lin Li opened his eyes. The good news was that the words "Genshin Impact" didn't appear in front of him.

The bad news was that there were ruins and broken walls everywhere. The sky seemed to be just breaking dawn, with faint, thin light spilling through the clouds. He could vaguely make out that he was in a city turned to rubble. Strange roaring sounds seemed to echo from far away, and the air carried a faint, foul stench.

Lin Li blinked.

Lin Li blinked and blinked.

Lin Li blinked and blinked and blinked.

Is this right, bro?

This can't be right.

"Holy fuck!!"

"Your mom!!"

"Where the fuck did I end up? Am I even still in the country?!"

Slap!

Lin Li moved quickly, slapping himself hard across the face. However, the scene before him didn't change at all.

Looking down, Lin Li saw that he was still wearing his short sleeves, shorts, and the indoor slippers he hadn't had time to change out of.

"Did I transmigrate? So suddenly, bro? You damn system, you didn't transmigrate me earlier, but you do it now? Is your mom dead?" Lin Li's brain crashed slightly. The situation before him truly exceeded his expectations.

Lin Li hurriedly called up the system and opened that interface again.

He saw that among the three buttons, the first one he had just interacted with had turned gray again, but the second button had lit up.

He breathed a slight sigh of relief.

"Ah..."

Just as Lin Li was about to try pressing it, he heard a faint, hoarse sound coming from a distant corner, along with the sound of footsteps crunching on gravel.

Since I'm already here, there's no rush to leave. Lin Li turned his head. Because his phone wasn't with him, he changed his title to [Light of Xiling] to make the surroundings a bit brighter.

His six senses had been significantly strengthened by the nourishment of spiritual energy, so the sound was actually coming from far away, but Lin Li still found some cover.

Nothing was more important than his own safety.

In his field of vision, a person slowly emerged from the corner of the wall.

Actually, it was hard to describe it as a person, considering no human has an acute angle between their head and neck.

Filthy hair was stuck together with slime, looking like a withered patch of grass.

There was a hole in its head, half of its cheek was sliced off, and reddish-brown saliva dripped from its unclosable mouth.

Its skin was entirely cyan, pitted over large areas as if rotting, seemingly hiding pus within.

Its intermittent exhales, mixed with the thick liquid in its throat, produced a spine-chilling gurgling sound.

Only an empty socket remained in one eye, while the other held a pale eyeball that looked like it was about to fall out, struggling to dart around.

"Bro... you don't look like a local either," Lin Li huddled behind his cover and smiled awkwardly.

This is a fucking zombie!

This is definitely a zombie!

[Hometown is always hometown, and the other world is ultimately just a passing place. Home is an unbreakable bond for everyone. Finally, today you have obtained the key to return home. Although you can only stay briefly for now, it is a good start, and there will eventually be a day of permanent residence.

After returning to the modern world, having been polished by cultivation methods in the other world, your temperament and charm are far beyond compare to ordinary people.

This beautiful lady who has fallen in love with you at first sight and is drooling over you right now is the best proof.

The day of returning home in glory, stepping onto the pinnacle, your brilliant modern life officially begins now!]

[Task Triggered!]

[Task Four: Hold hands with this beautiful lady and watch the sunrise.]

[Task Rewards: Random Ability 1; Random System-Oriented Item 1; System Currency 100.]

Lin Li: ?

Quiet, let Lin Li think.

Where is the beautiful lady?

Lin Li backed up while looking left, right, up, and down. Finally, he determined that the only thing around him that could barely be called a "living creature" was probably this bro—no, this sister in front of him.

System? Can you open your fucking dog eyes and take a good look?!

Is this a beautiful lady?

I can't even tell its gender!

She fell in love with me at first sight? Drooling over me?

...It seems so.

But! But!

She just wants to physically eat me, right?!

While Lin Li was thinking, the beautiful lady finally locked onto him, who only had his head exposed.

"Ugh—" After a low growl, the beautiful lady began to sprint toward Lin Li with the gait of an Abnormal Titan. However, only her movements were wild; her speed wasn't particularly fast.

But the distance between the two was indeed starting to shorten.

Fight! Fight! Fight!

Surging battle intent burned in Lin Li's heart.

Lin Li turned and ran.

While running, he called up the system and clicked the second lit button.

A white light flashed.

Lin Li ran toward the sofa in front of him and crashed onto it.

After seeing his surroundings clearly and confirming he was in his own home, Lin Li finally breathed a sigh of relief. He lay paralyzed on the sofa for several seconds before recovering his senses.

After calming down, Lin Li immediately went to the bathroom to take a shower. After washing, he sprayed rubbing alcohol all over his body, the soles of his slippers, and the floor he had just stepped on.

Don't fucking bring back some virus from that bizarre world.

You have to know, a mild modern cold virus placed a few hundred years ago would be a plague capable of wiping out a city.

If, because of him, the modern world was turned into a world of ruins like that one, his sins would be immense.

It was already 4:50 AM after his shower. Lin Li suppressed his other thoughts and began practicing the Eight-Section Body Forging Art.

[Consecutive one month... accumulate at least half a shichen (25/30)]

This time it took almost two hours. He practiced until nearly 7:00 AM before completing today's task, almost falling short at the final hurdle.

He couldn't help it. Although Lin Li tried his best to be serious, it was too easy to recall those few minutes of bizarre experience, and getting distracted would be judged as not being serious by the system.

Lin Li lay on his bed.

Now he could finally think carefully about what exactly just happened.

First, he had indeed transmigrated for a few minutes, there was no doubt about that.

Task Four, still hanging in the [Task] panel, was the best proof.

As for that interface without text, now, the first two buttons Lin Li had pressed were gray, but the third one had lit up.

Until there was text on it, Lin Li wouldn't press it. Who knew what would happen?

System, I'm really fucking speechless.

Not adding text to these buttons is just like passing on a mountain of spaghetti code to the next programmer without a single comment.

Currently, the rough meaning Lin Li could deduce was that the first one was "Depart" and the second one was "Return."

Lin Li actually felt a bit of lingering fear. Fortunately, there was a "Return" button he could press at any time after departing. Otherwise, if he had been trapped in that world, Lin Li didn't even dare to imagine what his fate would be.

Looking at the trigger message for Task Four.

Lin Li really gritted his teeth.

Return home, return home. You treat the modern world as the cultivation world or the all-female world, and then treat that place as the modern world?

The system is truly absolutely reliable when it comes to being unreliable.

However, Lin Li could somewhat understand the system's logic now.

This was originally a button that, when pressed in the cultivation world or the all-female world, would return him to the modern world.

But because he had never transmigrated in the first place, pressing it resulted in him going to another world?

But the problem was, based on the information he gathered in those one or two minutes just now:

The environment leaned towards modern, he couldn't feel any spiritual energy at all, so it wasn't the cultivation world. And the tasks for the all-female world had never mentioned zombies, nor did he see anything like mecha wreckage just now, so it didn't seem like that either.

"Did it generate a whole new world for me?" Lin Li could only come to this conclusion.

There was too little intelligence.

If Lin Li hadn't returned immediately, he definitely could have gathered more information.

But that was too risky. First was the safety issue, second was that he had absolutely no preparation, and finally, if he wasted time and interrupted Task One, the sunk cost would be too high.

Looking at Task Four, he had to admit, the rewards for this task were very generous. Lin Li was very tempted.

Abilities, items, and currency—they were all things Lin Li wanted.

But... holding hands with a zombie to watch the sunrise?

That scene was a bit too aesthetic; Lin Li didn't dare to imagine it.

"Can I just hold a hand?" Lin Li looked at the system's text and suddenly muttered to himself.

The task didn't say he had to watch the sunrise together with the beautiful lady.

Could I borrow one of this lady's hands (physically) and hold it while watching?

She's a zombie anyway, borrowing a hand to use shouldn't be too much, right?

Considering how unreliable the system was, Lin Li felt that the system would find his unreliable idea to be reliable.

He could try it.

But definitely not now. Until there was text on the third button, Lin Li wouldn't press it.

There were still too many mysteries confusing Lin Li right now.

He would consider going to that world again when the first button lit up.

And he absolutely had to make ample preparations. He couldn't be as muddled as this time—one known fact so far was that slippers and clothes could travel with him to the other world.

So next time, Lin Li would definitely try to bring weapons and armor. He absolutely could not go empty-handed.

The prerequisite for completing the task was ensuring his own safety.

"The morticians in that world still lacked long-term vision. They weren't sensible," Lin Li sighed and complained.

If Lin Li were a mortician, he would definitely secretly tie the shoelaces of every dead person together. That way, when the zombie apocalypse broke out, wouldn't it be very interesting?

Entertaining oneself while saving others.

If the beautiful lady couldn't move, this task would be so easy to complete.

What a pity.

After thinking about all this nonsense, Lin Li collapsed onto his bed, covered his face with a pillow, feeling a bit resentful yet amused:

"October really gave me a blow to the head right off the bat."

(End of Chapter)