MTL - The Stepmother is Unkind - Chapter 74

In the year 2090, technology has advanced to the point where Simulation Boxes, (Sim Box for short) are common place, allowing for the user to link up their brain's neural network to a full dive Simulation. While initially used for educational purposes, recently a large gaming company, Averon, released a fully fledged immersive MMORPG simulation where users can become anyone they desire, level up, choose their class, and become a hero or a villain. The name of this simulation is The Shattered World Online.

Eli Winters had no interest in playing it. His father, a jobless bum who spent his entire life playing games in the hope of becoming a famous player or streamer, was able to use the release of The Shattered World Online to gain wealth and fame, quickly becoming the number one player and a household name as the game took the world by storm. He immediately abandoned Eli and his mother in favor of being with someone from his guild, despite his mother having worked two jobs to support them and raise Eli by herself. Eli had nothing but spite for his father and the game.

When Eli's best friend convinces him to try out the game, his father's fame begins to interfere, culminating in him being singled out and shunned by his peers, and his father offering to pay for his university tuition in return for Eli hiding their relationship and quitting the game. Instead of complying with his father's wishes, Eli decides to prove to everyone how useless a guy his father is by challenging him that if Eli is able to surpass him in the game world he must delete his account and quit his streaming career. His father accepts the challenge believing his son to be useless at games - but Eli will soon show him just how ambitious a spiteful person can be.

Liora was a pampered royal princess, with loving parents at the forefront and eleven royal brothers at her back. Always adorned with the finest silk and served with exquisite dishes while lounging in her palace.Her biggest concerns? Which dress to wear for a banquet and how many more hours she could nap before her royal duties caught up to her.But fate (or some seriously bad karma) had other plans. One moment, she was sipping fine wine and but the next moment-boom!—she wakes up in a world where people are eating each other, the sky is covered with ominous veils that look like it wants to swallow the world, and worse, her royal status means absolutely nothing.What she can tell more about her poor condition is that she has no servants, no food, and no idea how to fight off the disgusting zombies, who are trying to take a bite out of her.Just when she’s ready to scream at the heavens for an explanation, a cold mechanical voice rings in her head:[Welcome, Host. You have activated the Overlord System.]Overlord? That sounds powerful, right? Wrong. Turns out, she starts at the bottom of the food chain with no powers, no weapons, and zombies that see her as their next snack.While others awaken abilities like fire manipulation or super strength, she gets... a system that gives missions with questionable rewards and always tries to drown her in a huge debt.Fight a Level 2 Zombie with her bare hands? Sure, why not? Survive hordes of zombies while the system nags her? Classic. But as she battles to level up and gathers allies (some willing, some just too scared to say no). She realizes—maybe she isn’t as weak as she thought.Because when the world falls into chaos, only the strongest can rule. And if the system insists on calling her an Overlord, well… she might as well live up to the name.Power, danger, and a system that may or may not be trying to get her killed—welcome to the apocalypse.

Greed, envy, anger, gluttony, lust, sloth, prideThe 'Black Book' records seven sources of sin, which are also seven steps to ascend to godhoodOnce, I thought there would always be one sin suitable for meBut I never expectedEvery volume of the twelve military letters bears my name!

In the waves of steam and machinery, who could achieve extraordinary? In the fogs of history and darkness, who was whispering? I woke up from the realm of mysteries and opened my eyes to the world.