Athanasia: My Hacker System

Two days passed quickly.

The RBM Club turned out to be the central focus of all students in the entire Azure Academy in the past couple of days.

Everything started with their amazing battle and victory against the Black Ares Club. Then the news spread in every department about the test and conditions to join the RBM Club.

By their victory, the newly established club gained the right to expand its reach across the entire academy since day one. Then it came down to the different admission tests that proved not only challenging, but they also inspired the enthusiasm of many students to try and see if they could fulfil these tests.

Then the bomb got dropped yesterday by the general announcement made by the Grand Headmaster and the deans; the RBM Club gained the right to select the members of the Formal Team joining the upcoming big competition in a couple of months.

If the name and fame of the RBM weren't widespread enough, by this news, they turned out to be the hottest trend in the entire academy.

Everyone wanted and dreamt of joining that club more than before after that announcement.

Yet things were calm and normal for John and his friends. In the morning, they would spend their time in different classes. Their reputation and fame grew to an extent that just appearing anywhere would attract all eyes and attention, from teachers, even.

They were treated like real celebrities; anywhere they went, they would be the centre of attention. Everyone stole glances at them from a distance, but never dared to make a move or say anything to them, not even their classmates.

The situation was quite weird and funny for John's friends, especially Luke, Elena, and Ben. As for Mond, he was used to being the centre of attention, yet it was the first time in ages to feel so out of being overly strong.

Ricky didn't bother with any of this. To him, such attention was useless, and he cared more about following Cissel rather than wasting his time on anyone else.

Cissel didn't concern herself with any of that. In fact, she would prefer to stay away from anyone, from everyone, her friends included.

After that night when John showed them the Machine Factory and the Instant Dungeon, and she got far more curious about studying both. She wanted to know how he did it, started to ask herself tons of questions about how he was using his powers.

Everything pointed out towards how different John was from everyone else. To someone like her, someone who kept regressing for far more times than she could count, she thought she saw everything special about strong humans in Athanasia.

But John was different. John was like a whole new species compared to other humans.

She didn't know why she started questioning his powers, but she had the urge to do so. As for the man himself, he was pretty busy building more weapons of different grades.

John didn't stop at making weapons using the machine scrap metals he had. He kept mining metal ores from the metallic world he had in the Instant Dungeon and used these to make weapons as well.

Even if he had to pay extra Mental Points in doing so, he didn't mind that. He wanted to make as many varieties of weapons as he could. The cost didn't really matter that much to him.

All the weapons he produced were stored mainly inside the Instant Dungeon. The Platforms that were designed to take out the weapons in case an attack happened were transformed into the Machine Factory. Yet the Instant Dungeon had the perk of zone defence, and he filled it with the new weapons solely for that feature.

In the morning of the third day, John woke up and headed out to classes as usual. It was Friday. And on the weekend, he intended to run a check with his friends about their tasks.

He left them to check on their respective departments. Only Cissel was left behind, and she kept tagging along, watching him work from a distance without taking the initiative to say a single word to him.

In return, John ignored her, treated her as a portrait in the background. He focused on making weapons, arranging defences, and never bothered to exchange a single word with her.

It was a very awkward situation, and yet Cissel never dropped a day to follow John to the RBM Club basement.

Yet this morning, something entirely different was destined to happen.

John was walking as usual, passing through the long corridor that would lead to the classroom. Just midway there, he felt something trembling and rocking.

It was the ground, it felt like an earthquake, but it felt nothing like it.

And then, a system notification popped up.

During the past days, and since the failure of his RBM establishment quest, the system kept its silence. He never received a single quest since then, and when asked, he learned that this was a period of punishment for failing the quest.

He didn't mind that. After all, the situation got resolved way better than if he had followed the system script.

But now, things were different. And the system notifications didn't just carry a quest; they carried a direct warning against a disaster coming.

-

[Ding! An Urgent Quest is issued!]

[Ding! Save the Academy Quest is on!]

[Ding! Quest Details: The Azure Academy is under attack of different academies. The attack is targeting you, your friends, and your academy. Lots of enemies will appear and invade the academy at any minute!]

[Ding! Quest Conditions: You must kill at least one hundred enemies singlehandedly – Your team must kill at least one hundred enemies – At least two Departments will survive the attack – The Military Department must survive the attack – The Headmaster, Nikolas, and at least five teachers must survive the attack in the Military Department]

[Ding! Quest duration: 24 Hours!]

[Ding! Rewards: Depends on your overall assessment!]

-

The first thing John did was to halt in his steps. He reread the notifications to triple-check he didn't grasp the quest wrongly.

"An attack? In the academy? Mark must have lost his mind!"

John instantly ran at his fastest speed. The walk that usually would take half an hour to arrive at the classroom didn't take five minutes. During which, he squeezed his mind about the hints he got from the quest.

The system didn't just warn him of an upcoming attack on the academy; it also gave him hints that there were lots of enemies, hundreds of them, and they would focus mainly and mostly on the Military Department.

Or else the system wouldn't have stressed over saving the Military Department and its teachers and headmaster in a separate quest task.

"That means there are more than one academy attacking us," John jumped to another point, while running towards his destination like a gale of wind, "Mark knows I'm capable of handling anything and anyone on student caliber. So he must have prepared teachers as well to attack the academy. He wants to deprive me of the backbone and cornerstone of my future plans… That bastard…"

John thought about different Paragons and their affiliated families and forces. If they got involved, then the situation would be quite intense.

"If it's only limited to academies, then it might be an easy quest. But that doesn't feel right…"

John was less than one minute away from his classroom when a thought flashed into his mind. Thinking about this made him see Mark's real intentions for doing this.

"Code red, come with me right now!"

The moment he appeared in the class, John skipped any formalities and instantly shouted at his friends. Even Cissel stood up, with a weird look on her face.

No one recognised what he meant by code red, but they knew one thing: John never came running and shouting about something except it was a disaster.

"What happened?"

Luke was the first to ask, while others gathered around John. The entire class stood up and watched their elites and famous figures move fast, skipping the class.

Yet before taking a single step away, John glared at everyone menacingly.

"When teacher Nikolas arrives, tell him to cancel class and come to RBM headquarter as soon as possible."

His words felt normal, but they carried a hidden weight. The fierce gleam in his eyes, the way his face looked serious, all told everyone in the class that these words weren't just simple notes; they were a doctrine from their strongest student, from the RBM Club leader and their Class President.

"Elena," John then ignored Luke's question and turned to the fastest member in the team, "go now and bring Ben and Mond back. If something happened, if enemies appeared, kill without asking questions."

"Enemies?!! John, what the heck is going on?!!!" Luke's eyes widened, while Ricky exchanged silent gazes with Cissel. This time, it wasn't an affectionate gaze from him, nor a cold one from her; it was a look of worry and puzzlement.

"I'll explain everything on the way, but…" John moved his eyes around his friends, "Our academy is going to be attacked soon by other academies. If we don't act fast, if we don't fight to our best abilities, the academy will be destroyed."

He was about to leave before suddenly recalling something.

"Elena," he shouted at his friend, who was about to use her ability to dash faster, "after bringing Ben and Mond, head towards the Media Department. Find Natalie and bring her here."

Hearing this brought a slight change to Cissel's face, a brief moment that was buried beneath a thick mask of ice.

Yet her eyes glared at John, as fiery daggers pointed at his back while running towards the RBM base.