The Idle System Box Set

by Pegaz

  John lied down on the sofa and went to sleep with the Scan on, so he could make sure nothing happened to Sarah in her containment chamber. Luckily, the evening passed without any events. On the following morning, Sarah came up from the cultivation room and entered the living room. John opened his eyes and found that she had successfully advanced to Level 8.

  “Hey!” He smiled at her. “Ready to go? Tournament starts in about three hours. It’ll take about an hour to get there through the teleports. I’m expecting traffic jams like cars on Earth but with people trying to get through the teleport runes.”

  “Sure.” Sarah looked at him. “We taking the puppets or no?”

  “Nah.” John shook his head. “They wouldn’t enjoy the show.”

  Chapter 26

  New Weapon Test

  John and Sarah walked shoulder to shoulder along the sword city. They named it sword city between them since it was the main area in the sword section of the sect. They walked to the admin building of this section and walked inside. It was almost empty. Besides the staff, there were only five people in the building, including them.

  “Guess I was wrong about the traffic jam,” John commented while looking around.

  “If there is a traffic jam,” Sarah replied, “which isn’t the right word for it by the way, then it would be on the other side of the teleport where the stadium is. Ten blocks from A to J and each one has over a thousand people. Then you’ve got the family members, their masters, fellow disciples of the same master…”

  “I get the picture.” John chuckled. “And you’re probably right.”

  John walked up to a staff member and somewhat startled them with the silver skull mask.

  “Hi there,” John said in as friendly a voice as he could. “Could you tell me where the teleport to the place the tournament is being held, please?”

  The staff member only shakily pointed towards a door. John looked over and above the door, it read “Arena.”

  “Thanks!” John nodded.

  John and Sarah went through the teleport rune on the other side of the door. Opening the door at the other end, John’s eyes lit up.

  “It’s not that bad!” The optimism in his voice shined as he pointed ahead of them. “Look! There’s the queue over there to view the matches!”

  The queue had thousands of people in a wobbly line. It looked like it would take hours to get through from the end.

  A random person who was passing by heard John and corrected him.

  “That’s the queue for participants,” they remarked. “If you’ve got tickets to watch, then the queue is on the other side of the arena.”

  John was still pointing at the line but was frozen in place from the comment. Sarah laughed and walked to the end of the line.

  It took almost two hours for them to reach the arena and hand in their seed tokens. The person in charge of taking the tokens noticed that they were both seeded contestants, so he tried buttering them up, hoping to get on their good side. He explained that the matches would start in about an hour’s time. There were twenty rings in the middle of the arena, so each block would have two matches running at all times.

  The plan was to have the first round today, which meant two hundred fifty-six matches on each ring. Because of that, there was a time limit of ten minutes. The contestants who finished a match in under one minute received a bonus reward that the sect would pay at a later date. If the ten minutes were spent with no winner to show for it, then it was for the judges to decide who moved on. They judge on technique, speed, flexibility, strength, and the number of non-fatal strikes.

  They made the rings from nanocomposite metal, which was the strongest metal in the known universe. It was the stuff that those above Rank 9 would use for their weapons and armour. This piqued John’s curiosity in particular. After another minute of the man explaining things, John gave him a Grade 3 Life Stone for the information.

  Inside the arena were the twenty rings that the man had described. There were groups of contestants together in different parts of the arena; John could see above them there was a huge banner with a letter on it.

  “Those must be the groups.” John pointed to his left. “I can see your Group A is over there.”

  “That it is.” Sarah looked over and saw the banner, too. “All right, then. I’ll tell them I’m here for the contest. I’ll meet you back home when it’s all over.”

  John nodded and held her hand slightly tighter before letting it go. He found Group J a few seconds after Sarah left. It was on the far right of the stadium.

  While walking towards the group, he looked around. The whole stadium was jam-packed; every seat was filled. For some reason, though, it was eerily quiet.

  What’s wrong with these people? Don’t they talk to each other? Don’t they shout the names of the people they’re supporting? Or is there a rule? Guess it’s up to me to make them shout during my match.

  John looked at the size of the arena now. It was at least 5 miles in diameter around the twenty rings which sat in the middle as his Scan couldn’t see the whole arena. Each ring was at least five hundred feet in diameter and six feet thick, too.

  If it’s all made from that nano metal the guy said. This must have cost more than the Rogue sect had in its vault! Just how rich is the Sword Sect?

  When John arrived at the J Group, he saw over a thousand people. He was one of the last to arrive. Frowning, he walked over to the staff member who was in charge of the group.

  “Hello.” He cleared his throat. “Here’s my token.”

  The man took the token and checked the list.

  “You’re fighting last, 511th match, number 1023.” With a sniffle, the man looked up from his sheet. “You know the only rule, right? Good. There are only two ways to win a match. Knock the opponent out of the ring or unconscious.”

  The man turned away to leave, but John looked at his back and shouted.

  “So if I make my opponent unable to walk, I can torture them on the ring for ten minutes if they don’t lose consciousness?”

  The question caused the man to trip and fall.

  John laughed for a few seconds before turning around and heading to the Group A area. He found Sarah standing alone next to the arena walls. Approaching her, he put his hand up and waved a little to get her attention.

  “What match you in?” He called from afar.

  Sarah spotted him and waved back at him.

  “15th match, number 31. You?”

  “511th match, number 1023... I’m gonna be here all day.”

  They spent a few minutes chatting when they were interrupted by an announcement. The tournament was starting!

  It took only twenty-four minutes after the announcement before it was Sarah’s turn. John watched from where they were talking, by Group A. The match only lasted about forty seconds. Sarah won easily.

  Eleven agonizing hours later, it was finally John’s turn. Sarah had gone home, stopping on the way to have something to eat and done some shopping, too, while he wasn’t allowed to leave the arena until after his match. After pleasantly going through her day, she had enough time to come back to watch his match. John, on the other hand, was annoyed.

  Why couldn’t they tell me a time to come on a rough estimation? Even waiting here for an hour or two is much better than eleven!

  He walked onto the stage and saw his opponent on the opposite side. It was an older man with a white beard and short black hair. John checked him out with Immortal Eye.

  ???

  Rank: 5

  Level: 9

  Sin: 41

  John wanted to end the match in under a minute. Before the fight started, he held his hand out and a long tube formed from his one million threads. One end of the tube was an open hole, the other end held a diamond-shaped object. He pumped Toxin Power through the threads in two places inside the diamond-shaped object before it formed. When its shape was complete, he used Shapeshifter to make it real. Sarah was in the stands, shocked.

>   Has he gone nuts? Sarah gawked. What does he want to do with a rocket launcher!?

  John had made a rocket launcher! It had taken him months of imagining inside his head to get it right and today was the day he got to test it!

  He put the rocket launcher on his shoulder, the diamond-shaped missile pointed near the man. He had placed two of his Explosion attacks inside, each with a pin to set it off. The trigger would push the first pin into the smaller Explosion attack at the bottom of the inside of the missile, and when it went off, the force would launch the missile forward.

  He made sure there was a thick, metal piece between the two Explosion attacks so that the first, smaller attack would only launch the missile and not set the main Explosion off. The second pin was at the tip of the missile. When it hit an object, it would get pushed inside the larger Explosion attack, which has two hundred Toxin Power units inside it.

  The weapon confused his opponent, the ref, and everyone in the crowd. Some people even laughed at it.

  As soon as the ref shouted “START!” John pulled the trigger.

  The first pin set off the first Explosion. From the back end of the rocket launcher, blue flames gushed out. The missile launched from the front end, rushing through the air in almost a straight line in the direction John aimed at. It landed 50 feet away from the man.

  BOOM!

  Chapter 27

  The Result

  An explosion usually had enough force to destroy the floor, which reduced the impact at the top; however, the nano floor didn’t have so much as a dent in it.

  The force of the downward explosion was redirected to the sides and upwards. The first thing that hit John and his opponent was the shock wave of the explosion. John’s Defence skill took the brunt of the force, but it still pushed him back a few feet.

  His opponent on the other end of the blast and the ref was thrown across the ring in different directions. Contestants that were fighting on the nearby rings were pushed back a few feet, too. The shock wave even knocked one unlucky person standing at the edge of the ring off. John’s organs even shifted a little, but it was almost painless to him. He was used to it.

  John’s test had won him the match in four seconds.

  An expanding fire pillar formed from the explosion and shot into the air. Everyone within a five hundred-foot radius could feel the heat coming off the pillar. John merely stood and stared at the blue flames, shooting up into the sky. The pillar eventually collapsed, dragging a few people forward from the vacuum it created.

  The crowd, judges, and all contestants all had their eyes on John’s ring. They had their mouths hanging open, completely captivated by the scene out of shock.

  John had let go of the rocket launcher and let the threads disappear. He was standing on the ring still, underneath him were two sets of drag marks from where he was pushed around because of the explosion. He ended up in roughly the same spot as when he pulled the trigger. The force of the explosion had caused him some damage, but the Defence skill minimized it. His robes were fine, too.

  “WOAH!” John put his hands up in laughter. “That was better than expected! What a rush, my hearts going a million miles a minute right now! Got to use less power next time, though! Oh, crap! I forgot to shout ‘Fire in the Hole!’ How could I forget that?”

  Because the whole arena was dead silent, his voice travelled to everybody’s ears. Sarah who was sitting in the crowd, put her head down and held it with both hands. She had the urge to change the silver skull and say she didn’t know him.

  Meanwhile, John’s opponent was coughing up blood outside the ring. Thankfully, he wasn’t damaged by the heat of the pillar because he’d crawled to the side of the ring which shielded him. He was one of the favourites to win the tournament. To take part in the tournament, he had to put a pause on his training. Had he continued, he would have become an outer sect elder by now.

  Had he won, he could have bragged about it for years, even after he became an elder. Few of them had won the tournament, so he would have separated himself from them in a good way. But instead, he was knocked out in his first match against a disciple he’d never even seen before. He stood up after the explosion had finished and limped away slowly without talking to anybody.

  The sect master, Frank, his father, Fred, and visitors from other sects were in the VIP section of the arena. Frank was sitting beside the sect master of the Dual Cultivation sect. The Two sects had a lot of their disciples married together. Over the years, they’d formed an alliance through these marriages; nonetheless, all these upper ranked people were just as shocked as the rest of the crowd.

  An old woman sitting in the seat to the left of Frank turned to him and asked a question in a soft but sturdy voice.

  “Do you know the man on the ring?”

  “Yes.” Franked looked at her. “But you wouldn’t believe me even if I told you.”

  The woman was still looking at Frank, waiting for him to continue.

  “Fine.” Frank sighed. “Since our sects are in an alliance and close, I’ll tell you one sentence but it’ll shock you. The new procedure both our sects use is because of him.”

  He was right—it shocked the woman.

  Behind Frank and the old woman sat an old man, and next to him was a young man. The old man wrote something on a piece of parchment and handed it to the young man. The young man opened it.

  Find out what the new procedure is that the Sword Sect and the Dual Cultivation sect use.

  The younger man nodded at the old man and stood up. He walked out of the VIP area and disappeared.

  Back in the ring, John looked at where the ref used to be.

  He found the ref as he crawled back onto the floor of the ring, a few hundred feet away from John. He walked towards him and bent down, slapping the man’s face a little to make sure he was fine. After only a few seconds, the ref snapped out of his shock and sat up. John helped him stand up.

  “Can you call it, please?” John scratched the back of his head awkwardly. “I spent more time checking the explosion out and waking you up from shock than the actual match.”

  Looking around while being a little confused, it took a few seconds for the man to realise what John said. He pointed towards John and shouted, voice quaking a little.

  “Winner!”

  John patted his shoulder and thanked him before walking off the ring and out of the arena. He was headed towards the teleport rune leading to the sword section.

  Even after all that, no cheering crowd. How disappointing.

  Sarah was still sitting in the crowd. All around her, she heard people murmuring excitedly.

  “What was that long object that caused the explosion? It appeared and disappeared in seconds!”

  “That was a fire based attack, right? There are a few people in the sect who can use elements but nothing that powerful! That man is the number one contender right now.”

  “His robe showed he’s from the sword section, yet he has such a powerful attack using a weapon that’s not a sword! He knocked a Rank 5 out of the ring in seconds.”

  John didn’t get the crowd cheering, but he got them talking. Sarah could hear nothing but whispers throughout the whole arena. Eventually, she stood up, left the arena, and headed towards the teleport to the sword section.

  When she arrived at the house, John was waiting outside the gate for her.

  “Were you there to see my match?” he asked playfully. “What did you think of the new weapon?”

  Sarah could see that John was proud of the new attack, but she was a bit sour.

  “Did you have to make it blow up that much?” Her lips curled into a frown as she continued to scold her husband. “You could have killed your opponent and gotten disqualified! Maybe even imprisoned if the man had backing! You caused such a ruckus! When you left, everybody was talking about you.”

  “I wanted to test out my new weapon.” John shrugged. “That man at the arena entrance told us about the ring and how it’s nearly indest
ructible, so I just figured, why not? I aimed it away from the man, so unless he had the worst luck in history, he shouldn’t have died either. It was all planned out.”

  When he saw Sarah’s expression soften, he cracked a grin.

  “My only regret is forgetting to shout ‘Fire in the Hole!’ before I shot it.” He laughed. “I can make another rocket launcher and let you pull the trigger if you want. It’s quite a thrilling experience.”

  “Oh, really?” Sarah finally let up, returning John’s smile. “Sounds like fun, but we won’t be able to fire it around here or there will be a crater in the backyard.”

  “That’s true,” John mused. “How about we test it back on one of those rings tonight, then? The matches should have ended by now so we can fire a shot off.”

  “Maybe after the tournament,” was her response. “There will be guards or something to stop people going inside the arena while the tournament is ongoing. They won’t let anybody inside in case somebody figures out a way to cheat in the tournament.”

  They both carried their conversation into the house.

  Chapter 28

  Sociopath

  Inside the house, the couple sat on the sofa and continued talking. That was when Sarah was struck by a question.

  “How come you’re not embarrassed by shouting what you said on the ring?” She had a slight blush on her cheeks under her mask that made John smile as he guessed she was blushing.

  “Were you embarrassed?”

  “A little, yeah.” She looked away. “Especially when you shouted the ‘I forgot to shout Fire in the Hole!’ part.”

  John broke out into a warm laugh.

  “I don’t care what those people think of me,” he explained. “I’m confident enough, so why should I care what they think of me? Some might fear me, try to rope me in, or call me the devil because of that explosion, but I only care that from now on they will think twice, maybe even three times before messing with us.”