Seized by the System

In the endless desert, sand dunes rose one after another, gravel was everywhere, mixed together with the occasional ring crater.

A lizard-like creature appeared amid the desert, following the trails, looking around as if in search of something.

If this was on Earth, then this scene would appear very common as the desert was one of the habitats of lizards.

However, this was Mars… There were no organic living creatures on Mars, and there existed no such kind of lizards.

Unfortunately, just as Fang Ning had said, Mars’ consciousness had only been born, and it was still in a very much childlike state, yet to have absorbed such common knowledge.

“These guys are incredibly well-hidden, it’s not going to be easy looking for them. Pity my System Map is unable to display the view on Mars, it’d make things a lot easier then; now, who knows how long it’d take us to find it, our efficiency is too low.” Sir System said gloomily.

“Then send out some more people, wait, no, if there’s too many of them out there we’ll be easily discovered by Mars’ consciousness, it already took us a lot of effort to have it get distracted by Lei Tian.” Fang Ning had also begun to feel like his hands were tied.

“Lei Tian may be strong, but at most, even he can only hold on to it for three days. After three days, I think that robot will start to come apart…” Sir System said, “Time is of the essence, you better come up with something fast, detective.”

Fang Ning felt his head hurt, after thinking for a while, he suddenly had an idea, “I’ve got it, I don’t believe that all Lunar Devils are the same, you remember the noble Lunar Devil who preached justice and wanted to do good?”

“I remember that guy, he must’ve gone around doing good deeds, but it’s been a while since we’ve gotten any news about him, he probably got tricked somehow. Why do you ask? Did he come to Mars?” Sir System asked as he became excited.

Fang Ning was momentarily speechless, “I’m just making an analogy here, what I’m trying to say is, there are all kinds of strange fellows in the Path of Demons, the Lunar Devils won’t be an exception, because one of the defining traits of a demon is that they like to do as they pleased, which would naturally create all sorts of odd ones. Now, we just need to find ourselves one, a Lunar Devil guide…”

“Oh, I get what you mean now, you’re looking for a Martian spy…” Sir System came to a realization.

“Exactly, there must be someone like this out there, you must know that in a formed social community, there’s always those that are bullied and oppressed, they even exist among apes, ants, and bees in the world of nature. We just have to ourselves someone like that, and we’ll be sure to be able to find the Lunar Devil’s old nest.” Fang Ning said confidently.

Sir System marveled at his intelligence, “Mr. Rich Host, you do have a few tricks up your sleeve after all, I could never think of using a method like this. You humans are really good at being calculative and manipulative, a pure and honest system like me can never hope to learn to do what you guys do, seeing as you guys always seem to have an endless stream of ideas.”

“Hahaha, kudos to you, you’ve once again realized the fundamental gap between us.” Fang Ning said cockily.

“But the main thing is, where are we going to find this guide demon?” Sir System threw out a tough question.

Fang Ning faltered a little before a switch clicked in his brain and he suggested, “It’s simple, all you have to do is write a few words on the desert sand, and I believe that there will be a few eccentric Lunar Devils coming out and over to our side.”

“What kind of words?”

“Wealth, democracy, civilization…”

“Oh I understand now, this is a really good idea. The Mars consciousness certainly won’t understand what this is, but those Lunar Devil spies were sure to yearn for something like this… Mr. Rich Host, your cunning ways knows no bounds, like a flowing river, endless and unstoppable once unleashed.” Sir System said in a voice of admiration.

“Hahaha, well then, why don’t you hop to it?” Fang Ning ordered, appearing full of himself.

The mini Azure Dragon soon began writing the words on the endless desert.

The words were written in a full sixteen different languages, lest these Lunar Devils could not recognize them.

…

Fang Ning’s ideas were proven to be effective.

A day later, two small brown rock monsters timidly crawled out from underneath the desert sand.

They were only a little more a meter tall, and were obviously the runt of the bunch; it seems that even among the Lunar Devils, there were those who belonged to the slave class.

The white rock monster leader had been a full couple hundred meters tall, when most of its most body was buried in the sand, its head alone was at least more than ten meters.

The two rock monsters looked down at the written words, and to each other, seemingly in search of something.

“Are you guys looking for me?” A lizard suddenly appeared before them.

“Uh, could it be that, you, you are Sir Azure Dragon?” Asked the slightly bigger rock monster of the two as it rubbed its eyes.

“Yes, it is I. I am the embodiment of justice and freedom, the symbol of honesty and integrity, the light and beacon of the Earth, the Dragon God of the universe…” Sir System shamelessly self-proclaimed.

Meanwhile, Fang Ning who was resting in the break room, could hear no more.

“Sir Dragon God, you’ve finally come, please help us, we want to go back to Earth, we don’t want to be Lunar Devils anymore!” The two rock monsters spoke in unison, both agitated and emotional.

“Calm down, now, enlighten me of your predicaments.”

After more than ten minutes, Fang Ning probably understood the thoughts of these two roads.

More than ten minutes later, Fang Ning had managed to get a general idea of these two rock monsters’ thoughts.

They were very common, and very ordinary.

As they were born inferior, they were regarded as useless, and lacked the potential for evolution, so they were assigned to the most menial and laborious tasks. They also received the least amount of magical powers, just enough for them to survive.

What they could be certain of was that if things went on, they would be dead within three years, from being overworked.

This was the cruel reality of the Path of Demons, there was no such thing as mercy and pity among Lunar Devils.

At least among humans, there was still room for survival for the weak like them; although they may be ridiculed, but at least they would not be eliminated just like that.

In the Path of Demons, the only way out for the weak and useless were to become slaves, and later, nutrients to feed the strong.

These two Lunar Devils had originally resigned themselves to fate, but news spread after the annual meeting, and they became aware of those powerful figures, and their fearful existence.

Their existence was the turning point of their destiny.

Except, the turning point had came much sooner than they had expected.

However, they could care less if this was a trap or not, when they had discovered someone writing in the desert, they decided they would come out to take a look.

Because they knew very well that they were not qualified to become prey.

This was the pitiful reality of a weakling in the Path of Demons.

“Very well, if you help me find the Lunar Devil’s nest, I will change your destinies and bring you two back to Earth and settle down there. If the outside world won’t accept you two, you can enter my arcane realm and find a place to stay in my grotto-heaven, at least there you won’t have to worry about the lack of Vitality Spirit.” Vigilante A promised them.

The two brown rock monsters were overjoyed, this sort of reward was way beyond what they deserved, and the thing they had to do was to act a guide.

As slave workers, naturally they have been to the nest before. In fact, every Lunar Devil was born in that very nest, and assigned to different positions and work stations according to their capabilities.

“Alright, Sir Dragon God, we will take you there immediately. Please come with us.”

As they spoke, they dove into the desert sand.

The lizard followed after them.

“Hey Mr. Rich Boss, do you think this a set-up?” In the last minute, Sir System got cold feet as he grew worried.

“Don’t worry, you’ve already killed all their ancestors, now it can only rely on Mars’ consciousness to fight against us, what sort of traps can it set up? If they wanted to set a trap, they’d first had to have the power to be able to restrain us, but this place is a complete desert, there’s nothing here, it can’t be easy for them to survive in this place, how could they have any energy left to deceit us?” Fang Ning appeared to be very convinced was of this.

“My instincts tell me that these two guide demons aren’t lying, but I’m just worried if they were let out by someone to lure us into a trap.” Sir System appeared troubled still.

“Even if that’s the case, it doesn’t matter, you can create a four-headed dragon, can’t you? Send one out to follow them first while we stay back, we’ll wait for results of the intelligence investigation, and then act.” Fang Ning said as he played the role of the inept adviser.

“That sounds like a plan, you do know me after all.” Sir System responded, pleased with the idea.

The two guide demons carried on walking in front, but little did they know that the dragon trailing behind them, was no longer the same one.