Chapter 8 - The System Made Me Study
Before Eli could accept the subway bounty, the system blocked the screen.
[PRIORITY QUEST]
Pass tomorrow’s statistics quiz with 90% or higher.
Reward: Focus +3, Memory Palace I.
Failure: Quest shop locked for 7 days.
Eli stared at his phone.
“You’re a cultivation system. Why do you care about statistics?”
[IMMORTALITY WITHOUT BASIC MATH PRODUCES CULT LEADERS.]
Maya nodded. “Fair.”
For six hours, Eli studied.
Not the old way—reading one paragraph, checking social media, forgetting the paragraph, then eating something.
The system generated mini-quests.
Solve ten problems.
Explain variance out loud.
Teach Maya a concept without embarrassing himself.
That last one took three attempts.
At midnight, a new skill unlocked.
[MINOR SKILL: FOCUSED BREATHING]
His thoughts stopped bouncing.
The formulas finally stayed in his head.
The next morning, Professor Bell handed out the quiz.
Trevor sat behind Eli.
“Need a calculator, delivery boy?”
“No.”
“Need divine intervention?”
“Already got that.”
Forty minutes later, Eli turned in his paper.
Professor Bell graded it during lunch.
Ninety-six percent.
She called him back after class.
“Mr. Carter.”
He braced for accusations.
Instead she placed three old exams on the desk.
“Do these.”
“What?”
“If you cheated, I’ll know.”
He completed them.
Not perfectly.
But well.
Professor Bell stared at the pages.
“What changed?”
Eli’s phone buzzed.
[TELLING HER ABOUT THE SYSTEM IS NOT RECOMMENDED.]
“I started sleeping more.”
The system immediately replied:
May you like
[LIAR.]
