34 Unlocked

Standing in the middle of a cemetery, a tall black-haired man in his mid 20's with sky blue eyes was standing still, looking at a casket being slowly lowered into a grave.

Looking at the tombstone that laid behind the hole, Ensen rubbed his eyes to steady his vision.

'Jenny Fuentes, loving wife, and mother of two. Passed away from a sudden heart attack.' The tombstone read.

Unable to hold back his tears, Ensen thought back to just five months ago when his father met a similar fate.

Turning his gaze to the right of the tombstone, Ensen noticed his sister and her husband standing there staring at the casket being lowered as well.

With a cold gaze, Ensen thought about last night when his sister had come over to his apartment in mourning.

Although they were both ridden with grief, they each had a separate way of coping with it. Ensen spent most of his time in silence grading papers to distract himself, whereas Julia took a more aggressive approach.

She became angry, from their parent's death, from the cruelty of the world and from how powerless she felt.

Julia saw that he was simply grading papers instead of mourning in the same fashion she was. Because of how overwhelmed and angry she was she overlooked how Ensen coped with his grief differently.

Seeing this, she directed her anger towards her brother.

Not holding back, she threw countless obscenities towards him.

Knowing that she was simply trying to deal with her grief, Ensen tried to ignore it and kept grading papers.

But this enraged Julia even more, who at this point was the most furious she had ever been.

Julia declared with a loud scream "I hope you die just like them!"

Afterward, she stomped towards the door and exited, slamming it with as much force as she could muster.

Looking at Julia from across the field once again, Ensen stiffened his face as he turned his back towards her, walking towards his car.

Although he knew that she didn't mean what she said, it didn't make it hurt any less. From that moment forward, he decided that he would be alone from now on.

Waking up abruptly in the middle of the night, Ensen sighed loudly as he thought to himself, 'Not that dream again'.

Closing his eyes once more, Ensen tried to empty his mind as he fell back asleep.

Waking up rather early the next morning, Ensen forced himself out of his comfortable bed before quickly changing into fresh clothes and heading towards the kitchen.

He just grabbed a simple yogurt from the fridge. Afterward, he quickly ate it before heading to his car.

Getting into his car, he quickly drove towards Harris's office to finalize what they had previously discussed as well as some possible small changes in order to better fit the furniture he had picked out last night.

After arriving at the parking lot, he noticed it was relatively vacant this early in the morning. Without much interest in the matter, he entered the building and met with the same receptionist from yesterday.

Following a brief greeting, he was led back to Harris's office by the receptionist.

What followed was an incredibly boring few hours for Ensen made worse by the fact that he needed to act interested in the matter.

Ensen felt like the design was excellent already, but Harris had been adjusting tiny details. While that was a good thing because it was making the design slightly more beneficial, it was not exciting in the slightest.

But still, Ensen soldiered on, and eventually, they had finished with their discussions.

"Alright, that should be everything. Luckily a nearby warehouse has most of what you ordered already prepared to be shipped out, so it won't take too long to arrive. Just to iterate again because it's so important, you need to pay your balance within three days." Harris stated, going over the more important details to remind Ensen.

Ensen had not yet looked at the quote. An estimate was given to him last night, and a more accurate invoice was created earlier today.

Nodding in understanding, Ensen tried to pacify his bleeding heart feeling his bank account drain even further. On the plus side, however, it seemed like this would be the last large expense before the opening of the academy which made him feel better at the very least.

Although he still needed to pay off the remaining amount on the plot of land this year, he would hopefully be in a better financial position by that time although he couldn't be sure.

After saying goodbye to Harris, Ensen exited the office and returned to his car. Returning home, Ensen was stuck in traffic. It had been nearly gridlocked for a few minutes due to an accident.

Feeling frustrated, Ensen began zoning out, simply staring at the greenery outside of his window when a blue box suddenly appeared with an elegant font with bolded red text. But unlike last time, this next was not red because of anger. It was red in excitement.

[Main building has been completed.]

[Initial school startup has been completed.]

[User setup options initialized.]

[Main mission: Get 5 students]

[As a principal in a newly established academy, the first major step is to gain a student body. The user is required to permit five students to enter the academy following both the system's and the host's personal standards. If standards are not met, they will not count towards the student population.]

[Rewards]

[100 Ep]

[Increase in administration skills]

Overwhelmed by the considerable amount of knowledge suddenly displayed, Ensen's mood quickly did a complete turn from annoyance to delight.

Trying to calm his mind, he looked at the information one at a time.

'So it seems like the main building was finished, so that counted towards the school behind set up.' Ensen thought to himself, trying to keep his head level in order to process the information.

"User setup opinions? What is this?" Ensen said out loud, hoping for an explanation.

[The host may customize some aspects of his academy such as name, emblem, and other various details.]

With sparkling eyes, Ensen yelled, "Then show me the options!".

He didn't even care that the people in the cars nearby all looked at him like he was a crazy person.

After waiting for a few moments, the system responded [Due to the host currently operating a vehicle, he is unable to access the options at this point in time. Please wait until you are in your apartment.]

"Come on, just look around. The whole place is gridlocked, who even knows when I'll get home. Just let me check it, please?" Ensen said in a pitiful voice, trying to gain the systems empathy.

Instead of empathy, the system wrote a simple sentence. [Don't use the system and drive. It is against the law.]

"What? How is it against the law?" Ensen spoke, obviously not buying the system's reasoning.

[I am the law, and I said so.] The system wrote stubbornly.

Knowing that he wouldn't win a debate since the system could just leave if they were annoyed, Ensen dejectedly gave up for the moment.

"Fine, you win. Then what do you mean by the standards of the students?" Ensen changed to the next topic, curious about what the system was referring to.

[All students have values that show their skills and talents as well as attitude and some other minor things. From this, students are split into different grades accordingly. Students range from F- to SSS depending on their attributes. This doesn't mean that the top-ranked students are necessarily better at a specific subject than their lower-ranked counterparts. Most students that are ranked high have a specialized field that they are strong in and average or weak in most other subjects. There are only a few true geniuses out there.]

Taking a moment to take everything in, Ensen nodded in both understanding and agreement. It was a practical system that took many factors into account to make sure it was as accurate as possible.

"So what is the system's standard then?" Ensen asked, wondering how outrageous the system's standards would be.

[As of now the standards are D but they will change depending on the academy's ranking. The host may set his own standards as well.]

"That's… surprisingly reasonable. I'm shocked." Ensen said out loud, slightly teasing the system while also expressing his feelings. He really was shocked, he would assume the system would set higher minimum standards such as A.

[It is unlikely that the host will find unknown talents and known talents would not want to learn at your academy.] The system wrote bluntly.

Acknowledging the fact that the system was correct, Ensen took a closer look at the new mission in deep thought. Upon seeing the reward of 100 points on completion, he wore a satisfied smile. It seemed like the system really hadn't lied to him, the education points he earned would dramatically increase after he got his feet off the ground.

Ensen's mind began thinking more about how he could complete the mission.

While he had been focusing, it seemed like the traffic accident had been resolved as cars began moving slightly faster. Although it was still gridlocked, it slowly began to clear over time.