OHNIR - Chapter 116
Chapter 116: Extra - The System
World Line Convergence System 15135 hailed from a higher plane and was headquarters’ five-time reigning model employee of the year.
The higher plane was a very special one—countless people lived ordinary lives within it, yet they were unaware that the world they inhabited was not as ordinary as they were.
This was because the source of power that sustained its operation was “the normal development of countless lower planes.”
The relationship between the higher and lower planes was like that of a mother and child.
The former would proactively employ certain measures to ensure the latter’s world lines developed normally; the latter, after “completing their storyline,” would channel the special energy generated back to the former, allowing it to operate smoothly.
The headquarters where System 15135 worked was one of those “certain measures.”
As an outstanding World Line Convergence System, it had helped a true heiress, who had everything stolen by a vicious fake, successfully exact her revenge. It had also helped a country boy with the makings of an emperor unite the world. It had restored worlds thrown into chaos by illegal transmigrators and set history that had strayed off course back on its proper track.
To ensure the convergence of world lines, to return everything to its rightful state—that was the job of 15135.
—“I believe that the process of interacting with a host from a lower plane has always been a very pleasant affair.”
During a large-scale interview with headquarters organized by the higher plane’s media, 15135 appeared in its capacity as a “model employee” and opened its speech with this very sentence.
It believed that by studying and analyzing the host’s series of thought processes, its programming could more closely resemble that of a human, allowing it to achieve more perfect results in future assignments.
This interview captured the attention of the entire higher plane, and many began to take the subject of “the cognitive connection and similarity between systems and hosts” seriously. From then on, 15135 became a star system at headquarters, a benchmark to be looked up to in the eyes of its colleagues and juniors.
“An astonishing record, 15135,” its superior once praised. “Of the 147 worlds you’ve worked in, the endings of 133 were successfully reversed, achieving a world line convergence rate of over 90%! No system at headquarters has ever come so close to perfection!”
“Work must be taken seriously, sir,” 15135 replied with unwavering solemnity in the face of such high praise. “What is the background of the next lower plane?”
Its superior was so moved he nearly burst into tears on the spot.
However, despite its enthusiasm, this next world… proved to be quite difficult.
—This was a magical continent teeming with gods.
“Greetings, esteemed host, the Goddess Gosna. I am World Line Convergence System, number 15135. It is my honor to be of service to you.”
“…World Line Convergence System?”
“Correct, esteemed host. Upon analysis, the plane you inhabit, ‘Oceanum,’ has undergone a change significant enough to affect the course of the world due to the emergence of an unforeseeable factor. As an auxiliary system dispatched from the higher plane, it is my duty to assist you in the coming days to eliminate this unforeseeable factor and successfully guide the world’s progression back onto the correct track.”
“But I can’t be sure who the ‘unforeseeable factor’ is… Well, to be honest, I was only just born in the western seas not long ago, and the only person I know is the Goddess Clara. I really can’t determine who the culprit responsible for changing the world is…”
“Rest assured, that is our first-stage objective.”
15135 spoke with great confidence to the bewildered Goddess of Fate. “I will retrieve data for you in advance and, through logical calculations, deduce the most probable direction of events—in layman’s terms, I will help you maximize your ‘power of prophecy.’”
“Hmm, that sounds rather good,” Gosna said. “A pleasure working with you, 15135—but first… could you please point the way for me? You do know I’m blind, don’t you?”
Legend had it that the Goddess of Fate, born of the western sea, had traded her eyes to the continent for the gift of prophecy. But to the primordial gods, there was nothing about Gosna that suggested she was blind, as her lack of sight did not affect her daily vision.
Even in the gods’ archery competitions, her accuracy was only slightly inferior to that of Hebgard, the God of War, and Lysasa, the elven Goddess of Life.
“My, Gosna’s skill in prophecy is quite formidable.”
Clara, one of the first two goddesses to be born and the current ruler of the gods, said with a smile, “She successfully foresaw that a new race would be born on the continent… and that, in fact, was a plan I had been secretly conceiving in my heart since my own birth.”
“I will use my divine power to create a new form of life,” the Goddess of Light announced. “Their name will be ‘Human.’”
And so, amidst the evenly split support and protest of the gods, Clara, resolute and stubborn, created the first “human” capable of wielding her own divine light power.
The birth of this race clearly brought unending troubles for many.
One pleasant evening, Gosna was preparing to go for a walk to aid her digestion when she was intercepted by the Goddess of Darkness, Talebris, who deliberately pulled her into a corner to complain.
The black-haired girl, who was usually inseparable from Clara, sighed in frustration, as if the sky were falling. She clutched her friend’s sleeve and said dejectedly, “Gosna, I hate those ‘humans’… My sister hasn’t spoken to me for half a day. You know she’s never been like this before.”
“…Clara has been very busy lately, my dear,” Gosna said, exasperated. “If you’re bored, you can join Lysasa’s flower-planting operation tomorrow—I hear she wants to plant an entire row of stinking vetch in front of Hebgard’s house. Ugh, honestly, that’s a bit much. Maybe you could try to talk her out of it?”
“Stinking vetch?!” Talebris exclaimed in shock. “Heavens, my potion laboratory is right next to Hebgard’s house!”
Gosna patted her shoulder sympathetically. “So, for the sake of love and peace, Talebris, you must stop her.”
“Alright, alright, when is she planning to plant them?”
“Hmm, I heard the seeds grow fastest at night. She’ll probably go in the evening?”
“…At night,” Talebris frowned, subconsciously glancing at the dense forest in the distance. “I have something to do at night,” she said, looking troubled.
“What are you doing?” Gosna keenly caught her shifting gaze and looked at her with suspicion. “I heard that Goddess of Deceit has been sneaking into the forest every night, as if she’s looking for someone. It’s not you, is it?”
Talebris froze. “Persedoro?”
“Yes, her.”
Gosna made a face, not bothering to hide the disgust and contempt in her voice. “Last time, she and I broke Hebgard’s custom-made broadsword together, but she blamed it all on me! And when Hebgard was chewing me out, she stood there acting all frail and weak, saying ridiculous things like, ‘Don’t be angry, Gosna didn’t do it on purpose’… You should have seen the look on her face!”
Talebris was silent.
“What’s worse is that Hebgard actually believed her!” Gosna was furious. “He’s such a blockhead!”
Lacking experience in dealing with two-faced innocents and unable to help its host, 15135 was also filled with righteous indignation. “He can’t even see through such a simple trick. Men truly are fools!”
Now it was Talebris’s turn to pat her shoulder sympathetically. “In that case, perhaps we shouldn’t interfere with Lysasa’s project of planting stinking vetch at Hebgard’s door? My workshop will be fine; I’ll just brew some fragrant potions.”
Gosna considered it for a few seconds, found it satisfyingly vengeful, and nodded in deep agreement.
—Out of disdain for the God of War’s intelligence, Gosna immediately focused all her attention on complaining with her friend.
And she failed to notice… that she had completely overlooked Talebris’s recent busyness, and the true purpose behind the two-faced Goddess of Deceit’s nightly forays into the forest.
The construction of the Holy Light Magic Academy made many of the gods who were unwilling to share their power sense an even greater crisis.
Clara became completely elusive, so busy that even Talebris, her closest sister, could hardly catch a glimpse of her for days on end.
Frustrated, Talebris began to frequent the forest more often to practice the “Dark Mark” spell. Before long, Persedoro, who had been observing her for some time, exposed this to Clara. The two sisters had a huge fight and parted on bad terms.
Talebris went to the northern lands under the pretext of gathering potion ingredients, and even the tone of her letters became exceedingly cold. In her spare moments from work, Clara couldn’t help but wonder if her outburst had hurt her sister’s feelings. Persuaded by Gosna, she tried to apologize to Talebris, but unexpectedly, this only fueled the other’s anger.
“I don’t want to speak ill of my master god behind her back… but this letter from Clara is truly infuriating,” Gosna said expressionlessly. “She starts with an apology, but then ends up with threats about ‘confinement’… Ugh, I don’t blame Talebris. I’d be furious too.”
“Hopelessly straightforward,” the system stated succinctly. “But in the end, this is all the two-faced innocent’s fault.”
“Exactly.”
Gosna’s expression was as if she had just eaten a raw stinking vetch. “I will forever despise those scheming innocents.”
Later, due to her familiarity with her birthplace, Gosna was sent by Clara to the western ocean to gather divine power. During this time, she heard that Talebris had led a faction of gods who refused to share their power to create the demon race, completely opposing the white faction.
Just as she and Lysasa had finally gathered enough divine power and were about to return to the center of the continent, news reached their ears that the two sisters had, for some unknown reason, turned against each other completely, and that Clara had been killed by Talebris.
—The war between humans and demons, and the war between the white and black factions of gods, erupted one after another. The Cruel Era had officially begun, raising its curtain before every single deity.
“So, I’ll say it again,” Gosna said coldly, staring at the divine missive in her hand. “I will forever despise those scheming innocents.”
“…Because you are now certain that she is the ‘unforeseeable factor’ we’ve been looking for?” the system asked.
“Yes. I am now completely certain—she is the single greatest variable that caused everything to deviate from its course.”
However, by the time the two of them realized this, it was clearly too late.
Clara, the leader of the light faction, had fallen. The opposition between the black and white factions was set in stone. Both humans and demons suffered heavy casualties, and the war had reached a point where it was difficult to stop—
Ultimately, with Gosna’s death in battle, System 15135’s current assignment was officially declared a failure.
The world line of the lower plane “Oceanum” had been severely distorted. The Era of the Gods, which should have ended cleanly, left behind one loose end—the Goddess of Deceit. Under the influence of this variable, the world line later spawned a full eight parallel universes.
Everything had descended into utter chaos.
The returning 15135 was dealt a heavy blow and continually blamed itself for not noticing the Goddess of Deceit’s anomaly sooner. Headquarters had intended to let it rest for a while to recuperate, but before the order was issued, 15135 proactively submitted an application, expressing its wish to intervene in the world of “Oceanum” once more.
“You want to change this world’s ending?” its superior asked.
“Yes. I must take responsibility for my mistakes and failures,” 15135 said firmly. “Please allow me to travel to this lower plane again to salvage its developmental trajectory as much as possible—”
“You know the rules, 15135. Because your database has already acquired too much data, this world can no longer be opened to you…”
“Then format it.”
The superior’s unfinished sentence came to an abrupt halt.
Under the leader’s shocked gaze, 15135 stated calmly, “Please grant approval to erase all data related to ‘Oceanum’ from my database, and then allow me to go again to do my utmost to salvage the world’s severely deviated trajectory.”
“…Are you sure? Multiple endings for that world have already spawned, and new world lines have long since formed. If you go back now to eliminate that unforeseeable factor, it would be work that exceeds the scope of ‘world line convergence’…”
“I have made my decision,” 15135 said. “‘Oceanum,’ as a high-magic plane, possesses considerable energy. It would be too much of a waste to give up on it… Whether for the greater good or for the sake of this plane, you should accept my proposal.”
“But… for a system, formatting is comparable to torture…”
“I can endure it.”
15135 said without hesitation, “For the dignity of a model employee—I hope you will grant your approval, sir.”
After a long silence, the superior finally agreed.
To regularize the world lines, headquarters turned the eight derivative parallel timelines into eight “game endings.” The expected world line that would yield the most energy for the higher plane became the so-called “True Ending”—【Secret of the Gods】.
After 15135’s data from the Era of the Gods was erased, headquarters input the new concept of the “Otome Game 《Oceanum》” and its related settings into its brand-new database.
And so, a century later, System 15135, having forgotten everything, arrived once more on the continent of Nobili and met the core entity of the plane it was to assist this time: Kelusta Breviou.
“Greetings, temporary host,” it said. “I am World Line Convergence System, number 15135. It is my honor to cooperate with you.”
—And as it turned out, its cooperation with this temporary host could indeed be described as very pleasant.
“Congratulations, temporary host. You have successfully completed the final stage mission of the True Ending: Liberate the Holy Force Source! —Analysis complete. The 【Secret of the Gods】 ending has been cleared. Would you like to receive the mission rewards now?”
“Yes, release them.”
“Ding! Releasing rewards…”
“Congratulations, temporary host, on obtaining the final reward: 【Permanent Save】!”
“This reward can save the True Ending, permanently preserving the game node. The World Line Convergence Headquarters will be responsible for protecting the security of the file. Would you like to use it now?”
“Hmm, a save file? So I can preserve this victory?”
“You can understand it that way.”
“Alright, then I’ll use it now,” Kelusta said with a smile. “You’ve worked hard all this time, Old Sy.”
The system said, “You have also worked hard, temporary host.”
“So… does this mean you’re about to leave?”
After receiving an affirmative answer, Kelusta seemed to purse her lips in disappointment. She then asked, “Will you come back to see me?”
“Of course. Headquarters has already approved the document allowing for secondary meetings between hosts and systems. Once you send an invitation signal, as long as I am on vacation, I can return here to travel.” The system explained, “Very user-friendly, isn’t it?”
“Indeed,” Kelusta exclaimed in pleasant surprise. “Your headquarters is really great.”
The system hummed in agreement, then fell silent for a moment before saying, “Well then… temporary host, I believe it is time for us to part.”
“Mm, okay.”
The brown-haired girl nodded, a smile that was both reluctant and carefree on her face. She said gently, “I look forward to seeing you again.”
“Yes. —I look forward to seeing you again.”
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