MTL - Tomb Raider: Storytelling and Writing, The Mystic Nine is Confused - Chapter 148

Why, seems like I’ve become a haunted portrait.

Eric Maddox, a 70-year-old American retired football coach once hailed for his tactical brilliance, now forgotten by time—closes his eyes for what he believes is a normal nap in his quiet Florida retirement home.But when he opens them, he's not staring at ceiling tiles, instead, he's on a touchline.Wearing boots in the rain.With players running on the pitch, fans jeering behind barriers, and the smell of cheap turf pellets in the air.“What the hell is this?”He’s twenty-five again, but it’s not Earth. It’s a world where football reigns supreme. A world where the sport is religion, its practitioners, deities in cleats. Coaches are revered, players are worshipped, and even the kit man gets treated like royalty.But there's one catch: none of it is familiar. The clubs, the players, the leagues, the competitions, and even the currency—they're all different. Alien. Like waking up in a dream where the rules are the same, but the language is foreign.As if that wasn’t enough, the body he’s now in? A youth coach with a laughable win record, a looming divorce, and a measly fifty thousand in the bank that his ex-wife is fighting tooth and nail to take. All of it.Just when the spiral seems inevitable, a monotone chime pierces the noise.[Initiating Golden Finger…][…45%… 75%… 100%][System Integration Complete.][Welcome, host. You are now bound to the Pro Manager System. Objective: Dominate the Football World. A new era begins]From washed-up has-been to chosen one of destiny, Eric Maddox is about to trade arthritis pills for tactical boards, and shuffleboard for Prestigious Cup glory.Because in this world, tactics are power.And on this touchline, he’s about to become a god.

The entire Yunzhou knew that the Ye Family had a new step-child in the house: Ning Li, a low-born and barely literate. However, when she looked at her 17 years old self in the mirror after coming back to life, she grinned.At 17, her step-siblings had yet destroyed her looks and stolen her glory—she still had everything with her. Since she was given an opportunity to start over, she ought to take revenge on everyone who had wronged her before. It would be interesting.After Ning Li was chased out of the Ye Family, she was cherished by the most popular solo singer in the entertainment industry, protected by the top international racer, courted by the heir to a multimillion corporation, and loved by her billionaire grandfather who wanted her to inherit the family business.Even Second Master Lu said to her, “Hold up you little brat, I think you should come home with me.”Rumor had it that Second Master Lu was handsome and beyond any girl’s reach until that one fateful day, when someone saw a drawing of a cool and proud young boy with bangs covering his eyes fall out from Second Master Lu’s book.The news spread like wildfire overnight, and on the next day, Second Master Lu was questioned. Ning Li coincidentally passed by, and upon considering her relationship with him in her past life, she stepped in and shut down the busybodies.Lu Huaiyu stared at the girl before him as he subtly put away the love letter in his hands and said with a smile, “I shall repay you with my body for saving my life.”A long while later, Ning Li saw herself in that particular drawing and she was silenced. She knew it was all a huge mistake.

The once-bustling and noisy streets were now filled with an eerie blanket of silence.

Hoarse and frenzied whispers lingered high above the heavens, and an indescribable ancient giant lurked in the shadows of the bottomless ocean.

A mysterious plague had outbroken, and natural disasters wrought the Earth. Global pandemic and catastrophes had the panicked masses seeking illusory shelters from the devastation, day and night.

A bloody shower poured over the land as the streaks of lightning tore across the sky, illuminating the ill-intentioned gathering of ravens above. Nevermore, nevermore, quoth the ravens.

“We can see that this malformed creature has twelve pairs of ribs like humans, but also has a “transverse bone” that humans do not possess…”

In the medical school, Gu Jun continued bringing down his scalpel, illustrating the abnormal thoracic structure of the malformed cadaver on the dissection table to the surrounding students.

Ominous and treacherous times had descended! Truth and logic had crumbled, order warped into a frenzy. Humanity can only forge ahead through the power of intelligence and wisdom.