Seed of Titan-Chapter 77: The System is Fucked Up

Jian’s eyes widened in disbelief, whereas Drai dropped his head and pursed his lips, feeling quite dismayed.

’So it’s just like what I’m afraid of,’ Drai silently said to himself. After witnessing his rapid progress be met with Jian’s frustration every time, Drai couldn’t help but think that his other friends could have also secretly harbored similar feelings, which wasn’t a good thing.

And what made Drai feel worse was that he didn’t deliberately rush his progress either. Of course there were the fights during their venture and the professor’s research, but he was mostly just striving to get stronger while enjoying the process. And he didn’t have any particular reasons either for his hard work rather than building muscles and preparing himself if he ever ended up in a situation where he could avenge the titans.

"You don’t have to blame yourselves," Christo continued as he saw both their reactions. "Progress is objectively good for the ones experiencing it, but it doesn’t always sit well with other parties.

"Like I said on the first day, humans are innately self-centered despite not all of them being egotistical. So when we look at other people, we often follow it up with a self reflection.

"I’m not saying that Natalia despises you two for leveling up quickly. It’s just that she’s a rather competitive person, so her reaction when she compared her own progress to both of yours was understandably self-deprecating."

Jian was stunned upon hearing Christo’s analysis. He glanced at the down-looking Drai and realized he too was in the same predicament as Natalia, but his envy was only limited to one person.

Noticing Jian’s thoughts, Christo said, "Yes, it’s just like what you’ve felt about Drai’s progress. But the difference here is that Drai is just a single person, an anomaly. So regardless of how much faster he developed compared to others, we can always think of it as a special case and not feel too bitter about it.

"And at first, Natalia felt that way too. Despite her concern, she mostly kept it to herself and didn’t think about it much except during particular occasions, such as when we left Drai alone against the root."

Although he wasn’t there to witness Natalia’s excessive shadow boxing and her lamenting back in the jungle, Christo was eventually informed about it, which gave him more insight on Natalia’s mindset.

"But then you also leveled up, which changed things," Christo said, gesturing at Jian while the other two silently listened.

"You are obviously not as overpowered as Drai, so there’s not much reason to think of you as another anomaly. So instead of thinking that she couldn’t do the same because she wouldn’t be able to, she thought that she was lagging behind because of her own fault, which explains her slight behavior change recently."

Christo paused and took another sip before continuing.

"And that brings us to her father’s invitation. Maybe she told her father about her worries, or maybe her father sensed that Natalia was acting differently or feeling down. That’s the only plausible reason I can think of for this sudden invitation. If it’s really about the venture itself, he would have called us a few days after we returned instead of waiting for this long," Christo concluded.

Jian and Drai both sat in silence, processing Christo’s words.

Jian had actually realized for a while that Natalia was a bit like him in terms of competitiveness and eagerness to become stronger. The difference was that Natalia was being way less blunt about it, often leaving her thoughts unspoken.

But due to Christo’s explanation, Jian finally came to realize that ever since they returned from the venture, Natalia seemed to be more outspoken, for example, when she asked Drai to introduce her to Ravi, or when she often decided to engage in a verbal battle with him.

’Was it because she didn’t want to lose to me?’ Jian thought.

Meanwhile, Drai stared at the silver shades on his veiny arms. He couldn’t relate to Natalia’s feelings as he was the one leading the pack, but he could definitely sympathize with her current predicament.

’How can I help her feel better?’ Drai thought. He then turned to Christo and asked, "Do you think I should talk to Nat about this?"

Christo pondered over it briefly before shaking his head.

"I’m not too sure, but I don’t think it will do good to her. If anything, she might feel that you’re gloating."

"Huh? But I would never—"

"It doesn’t matter, Drai. Feelings are hard to control. Even if she can reason that you’re just trying to help her or cheer her up, she won’t be able to prevent the bitter emotion that may come with your counseling."

Drai slightly grimaced as he pictured hurting Natalia’s feelings unknowingly. He then asked Christo once more, "What about you? Can you talk to her about it?"

Christo immediately shook his head with a helpless expression.

"It’s not that I don’t want to, Drai. First, she and I are not personally on best terms for this kind of thing. And second, this is a difficult problem to address from a logical stand point.

"Let’s say that I want to lift up her mood by saying that she’s not lacking at all compared to Jian, how can I justify my words? Jian is a level above her and is now probably stronger in a direct confrontation. We can test this by letting them duke it out, but if she loses, it will solidify her thoughts, and if she wins, there’s a chance she’ll think that her win is a setup in our attempt to cheer her up.

"If I instead tell her to train hard so she can catch up with Jian soon, what if she doesn’t? There’s no guarantee that she’ll be quickly rewarded for her effort. And if I try to say that it’s just luck that Jian managed to level up fast, how can I prove it? Natalia isn’t a gullible person, so she’ll definitely dismiss this notion."

Drai was once again left speechless by Christo’s words. He thought cheering her up was a simple matter, but apparently there were a lot of intricacies involved. Drai realized he still had much to learn about interpersonal communication.

"Like I said before, don’t blame yourselves. If we had to blame something, I would say the System is at fault," Christo remarked.

"Huh? The System?" Jian asked, looking surprised.

"Yeah. Because of the System, the state of our progress is unclear, which resulted in Natalia’s predicament and definitely many others aside from her. And who can certainly say that the level up system is fair? What if Drai’s rapid progress is due to the System favoring him? What if there’s a certain deliberation from the System in managing everyone’s class development, including the growth of their stats and skills?" Christo said.

Drai and Jian looked at each other in doubt. If Christo’s words were true, then it basically meant that the fate of all humans was directly and purposefully influenced by the System, which was an absolutely terrifying idea.

Drai had an urge to ask the System about it, but he had an inkling that it would deny the allegation, and it’s not like he could confirm whether the System would answer him truthfully or lie.

Drai was suddenly reminded of the words Ravi mentioned after his procedure.

"...the system is fucked up."

A cold shiver ran down Drai’s spine as he thought of the two brilliant minds that he knew were sharing similar sentiments toward the System. He had been thinking of the System as a program—a shackled AI at most.

’But what if it’s not? What if it’s sentient?’

Another shiver ran down his back and Drai immediately slapped his own cheeks to stop his train of thoughts. And like what he usually did to his unsolvable problems, he decided to shelve it indefinitely in the back of his mind.

Jian seemed to recover from his thoughts too as he asked Christo, "So what should we do about Nat?"

Christo emptied his cup and stood up. While stretching his back, he replied, "The safest thing to do is to just wait for her to resolve it on her own, either by making peace with her own concerns or leveling up. We’ll have to see if her father has anything to say about this. It may determine what we do about Natalia after the visit."

Jian mulled over it briefly before saying, "Maybe I should talk to Auri about this in case she can help Nat. Unlike you, she also has an emotional side to her."

"Sorry for not being emotional," Christo chucklingly remarked as he walked back to his bed. But before he could take a few steps forward, he was forced to stop in his tracks.

Jian and Drai also instantly stood up. Jian hung his sword on his waist, ready to unleash it at moment’s notice, while Drai automatically tightened his fist.

The three were silent as they looked at each other, their faces extremely alert.

This was because just seconds ago, a blaring siren started blasting throughout the dorm, and possibly across the entire campus grounds too.