Master of the System

Grandpa Vremya stroked his beard. In front of him, there was a familiar object. It was a personal computer. With this new item, it was like giving a tiger wings! Grandpa Vremya opened up the internet browser and chuckled to himself. The most important thing he had to find was a way to exploit his talents fully, and what better way to do that than enter some competitions? After a few searches, he finally found something suitable: a robotics competition!

“Did you find something good?” Azalea asked. She was sitting beside him, but rather than watching the screen, she was watching Grandpa Vremya’s expression.

“I think so,” Grandpa Vremya said and nodded. He clicked through the page, looking at all the details. “But first, we should move our base of operations away from here.” Although the Moon Lotus World was nice, it was also extremely far from the central planets. The lag was unbelievable, and if it weren’t for his extreme patience, the computer would’ve likely been smashed by now. In fact, that was the fate Azalea’s computer had suffered. A nascent-soul cultivator could process hundreds of thoughts in a second. The time spent waiting for data to load was simply too unbearably slow for Azalea to sit through.

“We’re too poor for that,” Azalea said with a wry smile. As a princess and as an elder of the strongest sect in the world, she never thought she’d ever say those words. However, it was the truth. The prices of planets and good locations were too damn high! To buy a plot of land equal in size to the Moon Lotus Sect’s current grounds, even if the sect hadn’t spent the majority of its wealth on a ride for Rachel, they wouldn’t have anywhere near enough money for that.

“You’re thinking too large,” Grandpa Vremya said. “We’re not poor to the point of being unable to rent an apartment in the capital city of Bread.”

“Rent?” Azalea asked, her eyes widening. She bit her lower lip. “Although it pains me to pay money towards something we don’t own, I suppose that’s always an option. Is it really necessary though?”

“It’s cheaper than teleporting back and forth with the gate,” Grandpa Vremya said, gesturing towards the window with his neck. In the distance, the teleportation gate could be seen floating in the sky. It was a massive construct, and it was hard to believe it had been built in a month. He leaned back and shook his head. Money really was an issue. Even with the wealth he had amassed thanks to the titan materials, it was just a drop in the bucket. In the end, the Moon Lotus World was just one planet. How could it compare to the colossal businesses that had purchased rights to and developed dozens of planets filled with resources?

Azalea sighed. “I suppose I’m the one who’s going to be finding us a place to stay?” she asked. Of course, she would. Every task that Grandpa Vremya found tedious, he always passed on to her. “Let me guess, you want it to be overlooking a river.”

“No,” Grandpa Vremya said and shook his head. “I’ve already seen all the rivers located on the capital planet of Bread. They’re all polluted and disinfected to the point of being artificial.”

“You only appreciate natural rivers,” Azalea said, nodding her head. “I understand.” As if! What could she possibly understand about rivers? To her, a river was just a body of water no different from any other geographical feature. If it weren’t for Grandpa Vremya’s nitpicking, she wouldn’t have realized there were so many different nuances for appreciating rivers. “Where are you going?”

Grandpa Vremya finished packing his belongings with a sweep of his hand, the personal computer vanishing off of his desk. “The robotics competition,” he said and checked his interspacial necklace, making sure he had plenty of titan hearts and blood. “It starts in two hours.”

“What is robotics?” Azalea asked. “I’ve never heard of it before, and you want to compete in it? Did we really grow up in the same sect, or do you have a magical world in your mind that you’re able to freely visit?”

“A magical world in my mind?” Grandpa Vremya asked and snorted. “How unrealistic. The mind is too fragile to house a world. If anything, a magical world would be located in one’s bellybutton.”

Azalea rolled her eyes. It was pointless interrogating Grandpa Vremya about his knowledge. He would never say where he obtained the knowledge from, and he always infuriated her when he danced around the question. One time, he even said he was a naturally gifted genius who was born with everything required to reach immortality. In response, Azalea decided to let the naturally gifted genius do his damn job and run his own classes. The students came to class in vain that day because no instructor showed up.

Going through the teleportation gate didn’t require much, only spiritual energy. A group of three hundred prisoners were in charge of infusing their spiritual energy into a formation which powered the gate. Every time they did so, they would be drained to the point of exhaustion, taking up to a month to recover. Because of that, the Moon Lotus Sect only opened the gate once a day and charged the passengers a fee to use the gate; after all, if they let people freely use the portal, eventually, all of their prisoners would be exhausted. If one wanted to use the portal outside of the designated time, the fee would be increased by tenfold. However, Grandpa Vremya didn’t mind. His time was worth more than his money. After going through the whole process of writing up paperwork, he and Azalea boarded a small ship, which then launched itself through the teleportation gate.

Upon arriving at their location, Grandpa Vremya and Azalea were swarmed by people holding signs. They didn’t say anything; instead, they merely pointed at the signs they were holding. Some signs were metal, some paper, some cardboard, but despite the differences, they all had the same content. They were taxi drivers, advertising their locations and rates. Grandpa Vremya swept his gaze over the signs before pointing at a man with a golden sign. Since Grandpa Vremya was representing the Moon Lotus Sect, how could he show a lack of wealth in public? Obviously, he would only choose the best.

And the service really was the best. The driver broke an uncountable number of road rules—including driving through a zoo’s safari—to get Grandpa Vremya to his destination on time. With five minutes to spare, Grandpa Vremya and Azalea found themselves at the front desk of the robotics competition, standing in front of a petite lady with a fake smile on her face. “Hello, welcome to Planet Bread’s annual robotics competition. Is this your first time here?”

“Sign me up,” Grandpa Vremya said, skipping all the pleasantries.

The lady with the fake smile froze before taking out a piece of paper. She shifted it across the table to Grandpa Vremya, who picked it up and handed it to Azalea. Azalea let out a sigh, and she took a small brush out of her interspacial ring. With the speed only a nascent-soul cultivator could possess, Azalea filled the paper out in less than three seconds. She handed the paper to the receptionist, the ink on the page still wet.

“Competitors wait in the area beyond that door,” the receptionist said, gesturing off to the side where there was a golden-framed door. The receptionist picked up a nametag, wrote Elder Vremya on it, and passed it over to Grandpa Vremya. “You’ll have to wear this on your chest or back. If you’re willing to wear one of our t-shirts with an advertisement on it, we’ll give you fifty credits.”

The receptionist’s fake smile nearly cracked when Grandpa Vremya pasted the nametag on his chest and walked away without saying a word. Azalea sighed and rubbed her forehead. She was about to follow her emotionally stunted companion when the receptionist’s voice cut her off. “Non-competitors have to purchase a ticket to enter the seating area. It’ll cost you fifty credits, but if you’re willing to wear a t-shirt with an advertisement on it, we’ll waive the fee.”

Azalea’s expression darkened. Earning credits was difficult. On average, a nascent-soul cultivator could earn one hundred credits a day by doing the missions the federation assigned. She wasn’t about to spend half a day’s worth of money on an entrance ticket. “Give me the t-shirt.” Her expression darkened even further. “How do normal people afford these entrance fees?”

“Honestly, most people wear the t-shirt,” the receptionist said and passed Azalea a package. “Changing rooms can be found in the back by the bathrooms.”