Athanasia: My Hacker System-Chapter 264: The Final System Quest for Pocket Trial
"This girl... Why does she give me the impression she knows exactly what she is doing?!!"
John muttered the words under his breath, his boots skidding to a halt. He had been running as fast as he could towards the southern territory when he watched what Cissel and Luke did against the machines. He was totally taken aback by how effortlessly Cissel and Luke had destroyed the fifty flying drones that attacked them in the first wave.
It wasn’t just the victory that stunned him; it was the method. John’s first thought when he spotted the flying drones on his map was that they would maintain a high-altitude hover, raining down bombs from a distance that rendered his ground towers and cannons useless. And against such a scenario, he and his friends would be totally powerless.
Yet, the flying drones hadn’t done that. They had adopted a shockingly different, almost direct approach that required them to dive into a vulnerable range. And for some reason, Cissel had looked as if she knew exactly what was coming. She hadn’t reacted with surprise; she had reacted with a plan.
John didn’t even consider for a single second that Luke was the mastermind behind such a brilliant performance. No, this was Cissel’s theatre. "This girl is full of surprises, for sure... But I can’t complain. Thanks to her, the western flank is holding without needing me to be actually there. Yet that quest though..."
His thoughts shifted as he recalled the series of notifications that had appeared the moment he separated from the Bulltors. When the machines had appeared in the dens, the system had finally acted, issuing him a quest. And yet, checking its requirements had left a bitter, twisted smile on his face.
[Ding! You have a new quest!]
[Ding! Final Quest in your System Evolution Trial!]
[Ding! Crush the machines, unify the pocket trial, and ascend to the Source Code World!]
[Ding! Quest Objectives:
Crush all Machine Dens appearing inside the pocket trial: 0/6
Acquire at least 1 Den Core
Hack at least 1 Den Core
Crush the Mechanical Hivemind of Beasts and Insects race
Unify the humans and purge any lurking threat there
Add the Krogers to your forces
Code the Pocket Trial Ownership Totem and ascend to the Source Code World]
[Ding! Quest Conditions:
Your friends must survive!
At least 500 Bulltors must survive
Lanmar and Reody must survive
Blakar must survive
At least half of the Twelve must survive]
[Ding! Quest Duration: 10 days!]
[Ding! Quest Rewards:
+4% to Cyborg Synchronisation level
+500 Mental Points cap
+100 to all stats
A protection period of 6 months
A portal to get back to Athanasia
The ability to call humans to come and compete under your banner in the pocket trials
+3 new abilities!]
[Ding! Additional rewards based on your overall performance!]
At first glance, John could tell this quest was perfectly tailored to the current chaos. It was designed to put an end to the pocket trial once and for all. He had already intended to unify the territories and wipe out Mark’s influence, but there was a single goal that made his blood run cold with hesitation.
"You want me to acquire a Den Core?!!" John shouted into the empty fog, his voice echoing off the white walls of fog.
"You do realise the wave count must cross fifty for a Core to acquire it? Can you imagine how many machines I need to kill to reach that threshold? Do you realise how massive the fiftieth wave will be?!!"
John went speechless for several minutes as he stared at that specific quest goal in the notifications. He had already acquired two Den Cores in previous trials, and he knew their true power, the ability to reset the limits enforced on any standard core. But he was just lucky to arrive late at that territory. And they were mindless monsters.
Reaching above wave 50 against an intelligent, AI-driven machine army was a different beast entirely. It wasn’t just a challenge; it was the System putting him against a task that bordered on the impossible.
Yet, no matter how many times he complained or threw curses at the fog, the System gave him the cold shoulder. It never responded, never explained. John finally had to sigh and accept his fate, his mind already beginning to think of possible ways to achieve this near-impossible goal. That was when another detail in the quest goals caught his eye.
"There will be a total of six machine dens..." John noted, squinting at the counter next to the destroyed den objective.
"Currently, there are only three active dens on the map. That means three more are scheduled to appear. Will it count toward the goal if I intercept the cyborgs before they can even activate the cores and kickstart the dens?"
He still didn’t get an answer from the cold, silent System, yet John decided not to gamble on technicalities. He would try his absolute best to intercept and kill the cyborg before they could ever activate the remaining three cores.
Then he would check and see if that would be counted or not. With his jaw set in a hard line, he pulled up his map, his eyes darting across the digital topography to search for the most suitable locations where the remaining three dens would likely appear.
"There are two more territories left without established races or my people or defences," he muttered, his mind spinning.
Identifying the first two suitable spots for the dens was easy, but the last machine den was going to be a challenge to pin down.
"It can’t appear at the Krogers; their territory is already a literal fortress. They are isolationists who won’t allow anyone to trespass on their perimeters without a lethal response. That leaves three potential weak spots: the Bulltors’ homeland base, the new Hiveminds fallback position, and the human territory..."
John moved his eyes among the three territories, weighing the statistical odds of each harbouring the final den.
"The Bulltors’ base is fortified at the centre, yet the perimeter is wide open. On top of that, there are currently five hundred Bulltors there to defend it. Mark is an opportunist; he prefers soft targets. That makes the Bulltors base the least likely spot for a den to manifest, for now."
