Seized by the System

Time zoomed by.

With a blink of an eye, six months had passed.

The past two weeks or so had been relatively calm. As usual, the System upheld justice while Fang Ning trained and cultivated. Sometimes, he would sneak in a few gaming sessions. It was like the peace before the storm.

One day, an anomaly alerted Fang Ning from his blissfulness.

The system notification kept spamming the screen.

[Advanced-level Game Book attacked a dying Bloodthirsty Kelp Sprite.]

…

[Advanced-level Game Book attacked a dying Bloodthirsty Seavine Sprite.]

Fang Ning immediately got the attention of the System who was cleaning up a certain demonic nest. “Something’s wrong, why is the system notification popping up so frequently?”

The System said, “Isn’t that great? The battered book was killing all the things and is earning more experience points that I do. If it could keep up with this speed, I think it would be less than two weeks before level twenty. It was so much faster than me back then. No wonder you humans like being the offspring of rich people so much, money just flows in… I want a System Daddy too.”

Fang Ning couldn’t think of an insult. “Don’t change the subject. Go check it out, you might even be able to farm some as well.”

The System said, “Wouldn’t that just lower the efficiency? I shall farm what I have here, and then tax whatever it earned, wouldn’t that be so much easier?”

Fang Ning almost spat blood. “You idiot! Have you forgotten about the octopus monsters attacking the humans? It might be that the bloodthirsty seaweeds were also trying to do so. If you defeat them, money would roll in like a tsunami, whilst my precious darling game book wouldn’t be able to ask for money from other people.”

The System said, “Hey, you’re right, Rich Host. I will go there after I finish farming this demonic nest. Don’t worry, that old book can still keep up for a while.”

…

On the northeast side of the Pacific Ocean, monstrous waves roared on the wide, boundless horizon.

Black Cat Tom and its loyal servant, Huang Rui, were floating in mid-air as they stared at the twelve-limbed octopus.

It swung all twelve of its tentacles, fighting all kinds of dark red seagrasses.

The plants came in many families, like seavines, mangroves, and giant kelps… The only similarity they all seemed to possess was that they were all red and carried a scent of bloodiness.

The largest giant kelp was several hundred meters long. It was also in the deepest shade of red and exuded the most intense smell of blood. Its attacks had left the octopus in an awkward situation with a few near-hits.

Not far from the overgrown octopus, two giant dolphins were standing by. While they were black and white respectively and looked menacing, their bulbous stomach seemed to indicate their fullness and their lack of participation.

Only when the octopus was losing would one of the dolphins charge into the battle area and send the others into a torrent of disarray, saving it.

Additionally, a mysterious golden book would make its appearances occasionally. The kelp demons were beginning to lose the battle.

The golden book did not seem to have a pattern to appear, it would sometimes appear only after the octopus recited a chant, but other times, it would zoom into the battlefield on its own.

To Tom, it was probably a way for the octopus to charge up a stronger skill.

After watching for a while, it was puzzled. “Where did this party of idiots come from? We’ve spent a lot of time to find these bloodthirsty human-eating kelp, I didn’t expect them to be stopped here before they could move to a beach that’s suitable for their growth. They’re almost half-gone. If it weren’t for their leader, the Giant Kelp Sprite’s long-distance message, I wouldn’t have known at all.”

Huang Rui urged, “Sir, why don’t you set up the Altar of Death to absorb the Death Energy?”

Black Cat Tom glared at him. “Are you an idiot? These kelps have yet to fully grown, these are all of them. If they’ve all died, how am I going to set up the Sanguine Warzone, and how will we fight Vigilante A long-term?”

Huang Rui immediately thought of an idea. “We could get involved and chase the octopus and the dolphins away, we might even be able to nab a treasure?”

Black Cat Tom shook its head. “We can’t. My first principle is that if I can be a bystander, I would never make a move. If I can achieve something with just my mouth, I would never move my paws. That was why all the ones that came before me had died while I was still alive. Aren’t you the same?”

Huang Rui was taken aback slightly before nodding with great agreement. ‘Isn’t that so? N’gun was the best example of this… Being onstage, that idiot self-destructed and his soul ultimately dissipated. On the other hand, I was safe and sound just watching offstage.’

The octopus and the dolphins were not that strong individually, but the golden book in the octopus’ possession was perplexing. If it had decided to use some ultimate skill, it would have been bad for the duo.

He followed up immediately, “Sir, please request for reinforcement.”

The black cat nodded. “That we need to do. However, according to my observation, there aren’t any super powerful power of evil on Earth. Looking for reinforcement is easy, but it would’ve proved troublesome if we alerted Vigilante A too early. His combat ability is too strong, especially when it comes to improvising on the spot. No one had been able to gain any advantage over him in that regard. I wonder why…

“I have to find him a really powerful enemy, at least someone who could distract him from looking this way so I could set up the Sanguine Warzone slowly.”

Huang Rui thought of an idea. “I heard the high-level demons in the Upper Realm had already had plans to demonize Earth. They wanted to descend all together in the future and immediately occupy this core location and chase all the powerful clans in the Upper Realm like the Celestial Clan and the Dragon Clan to other desolate planets.

“But now that Vigilante A appeared out of thin air, it obviously affected their plans. On the other hand, the deities had benefited from it and can continue to delay their own descent. Everyone knows that the later someone descends, the better, as they had no need to recover their power from scratch.”

Tom’s eyes lit up. “Hm, you’re right. The eight-headed snake was the scout of a certain demon lord. Too bad it didn’t hide properly and was beaten by Vigilante A. It was not dead though, but just waiting for resurrection.

“I will ask Lord Death to convey this to the demon lord and ask it to send a combat-savvy demon to Earth. The previous ones that appeared were all obsessed with power itself, but they were anything but combat-savvy. I’ll make these kelp demons hibernate now and come out after the demon has descended.”

As it said that, the black cat recited silently.

Soon after, the giant bloodthirsty kelp whipped its leaves wide and shook off the entanglement of the twelve-limbed octopus. As soon as it was free, it led all the other kelps into the deep sea.

…

“Twelve Arms, let’s go. These seaweeds are trying to go into the deep sea. We are different from you, we’ll need to come up to breathe. If you alone fight them, it would be too dangerous, you can’t fight them.” The white dolphin reminded.

Twelve Arms scratched its smooth, round head. It did not insist to chase after its enemies, so it slowly swam away with its two new companions.

It saw these kelp sprites trying to capture a fishing boat.

It did not have any special allegiance with the human, nor did it have a crush on any human woman. Furthermore, it had just gotten beaten by humans and subsequently chased out of its own clan.

In its simple mind, it only wanted to build a virtuous underwater world, which had nothing to do with the human race. Therefore, it did not have any vested interest in whatever happened.

However, its new companions, the black and white dolphins, urged to save the boat. Being the virtuous being that it was, it relented and saved the fishermen from the boats.

To thank them, the fishermen gave their saviors all their catches as well as a ceramic pot as an extra gift…

It immediately refused. Containers only reminded it of the incident.

The two dolphins had a good meal. Before they had left the fishermen alone, they asked them to release all speaking sea creatures that fell in their nets in the future. Otherwise, they would not have cared for them in the future.

The crew of the boat swore to uphold that promise.

The reasoning for that was acceptable. If one would eat a speaking sea creature, it would be fair for a speaking sea creature to eat them. One can expect the humans to save them, as they were of one race, one standpoint. However, it would be foolish to assume other speaking sea creatures to save them, that was just shameless.

The fishermen left on their boats while Twelve Arms continued to chase after the man-eating seaweeds under the insistence of his dolphin friends.

…

When Vigilante A arrived, he only saw a battlefield strewn with bodies of the kelp sprites.

Far from them, there were the two huge dolphins with their fully-loaded stomachs and the twelve-limbed octopus.

The System complained, “Look, there’s nothing. You wasted five minutes of my time on the traveling.”

Fang Ning said without a break, “Look at the battlefield. The octopus must have battled really hard. It’s you who were dilly-dallying at the demonic nest and waste your time, so now you don’t get anything at all.”

The System had no comeback, so it controlled Vigilante A’s body and approached the bodies to pick them up one by one.

Fang Ning was even less impressed, “You’re picking up junks again…”

The System retorted indignantly, “No one’s looking, and these are high-quality ingredients for herbal pills, they are not junks.”

It was Fang Ning’s turn to have no comeback.

The System was right, no one else was able to see Vigilante A. There were only the octopus and the two dolphins a distance away…

Twelve Arms did actually become aware of the newcomer, it turned around and looked, then decided to sink quickly into the bottom of the sea.

Different from humans, octopuses have a wide vision. If Vigilante A did not disguise himself, it would be easy for the octopus to see him.

The two dolphins exchanged a confused glance and immediately followed deep into the sea.

The black dolphin asked, “Twelve Arms, why are you rushing off? The man who arrived had no malicious intent, we don’t need to be afraid of him.”

Twelve Arms waved its limbs around and said shamefully, “I know he had no malicious intent, I knew him. I’ve been beaten by him once after I’d stolen a pot. He dropped something then, and I got a hold of it. I don’t want to return it yet. After I had fostered the underwater world into a virtuous one, I will give it back.”

The white dolphin snickered, “You meant the bag? It is actually a treasure. So many kelps were trying to attack it, but it didn’t sustain any damage at all. The only thing is it’s too small and you’re too huge. Otherwise, you could use it as your armor or something.”

Twelve Arm explained, “No, no. I don’t care about the bag. I was talking about the golden book. It’s ingenious, I see it as my life coach.”

The black dolphin nodded. “Oh, the golden book is really great, but I don’t know anything about it being a life coach. I can tell that it was really something from the way it hits those dying kelps. It was like humans were aiming at them with missiles.”

The white dolphin’s eyes lit up. “Twelve Arms, you knew that guy? I have an idea. It seems like he is very interested in the bodies of those kelp sprites. The next time we kill these guys, we’ll collect them, and you can use your twelve arms to sell them to him. We’ll ask him to exchange these bodies with fish, then we wouldn’t have to hunt for food every day ourselves.”

“What?” Twelve Arms scratched its head, its face betraying trepidation. However, it could not stand the nagging of its two companions, so it agreed.

However, it was thinking, ‘I finally understood why other octopuses would lie.

‘Because it brings benefits, just like how I picked up the bag.

‘The next time I see him, I have to tell him honestly about how I discovered his bag and return it to him.

‘Otherwise, how would I go about fostering a virtuous underwater world if I couldn’t do it myself?’

…

Tom the black cat and Huang Rui returned to their place in the United States and immediately began to set up a communication with their Lord Death.

A day later, Tom’s face brightened with joy.

“It’s done, Lord Death told me some of the higher-level demon clans had already planned for this. They had taken notice of Vigilante A’s new and they are currently in the midst of deciding a strong battling demon to take care of him.”

Huang Rui heard it and reminded Tom, “Sir Tom, what we wanted was the balance of power and not one-shotting Vigilante A with super powerful demon lord servants…”

Black Cat Tom nodded and said, “You’re right. The combat demon is really proficient in battles. Coupled with its slyness, Vigilante A will definitely be killed if he didn’t have any defenses. I have thought about that, so I asked Lord Death for its details. I want you to find a chance to leak this information to him.”

Having said that, Tom relayed War Demon’s information to Huang Rui.

Old Huang Rui digested the information as he became increasingly shocked.

The demon clans of the Upper Realm was so strong, it was not something a lowly human like him could ever comprehend.

To him, nuclear bombs were already pretty invincible. In their eyes, however, it was nothing more than petty fireworks.

“Luckily we have the Maxim of the world. Or else, any of those demon lords could easily destroy Earth when they descend. The whole human race could be wiped out,” said Huang Rui with a slight lamentation.

The black cat shot him a glare. “You’re overthinking it. That is basically impossible. The Dragon Clan, Celestial Clan, and even the high-level demon clans wouldn’t have permitted that to happen. This was their capital in rebuilding their power. They wouldn’t care if the humans survive or not, but they would definitely preserve Earth. That was the consensus of the clans of Upper Realm.

“Even the Insect Demon and the Hydra Demon only tried to dominate the humans and not Earth itself. As long as you are loyal to me, even if the entire human race had been decimated, you would still be here. Besides, Lord Death is different from everyone else. It wouldn’t let the human race go extinct.”

Huang Rui immediately sucked up and said, “Oh, that’s what would happen. Sir Tom, you are so wise, no wonder everything had been in your grasp. I’ll always be loyal to you.”

“Mm, good enough, now go and do your work,” said Tom in satisfaction.