Chapter 2: Beta be a chef: 1.1

"Adrian?"

Jia Hyson blearily opens his eyes. His head throbs painfully as his mouth tastes dry and disgusting. With an unwilling heart, he forces himself to sit up and rub his eyes in an attempt to wipe the grogginess from it. "Mblergh?"

Suddenly he's shoved back down as a soft body tackles him in a fierce hug. Jia Hyson wants to vomit as his head cruelly hits the hard arm of a particularly worn-out couch.

"Madeline," A deeper voice chides, "you're going to end up finishing him off at this rate."

"Ah!" Mercifully the young girl releases Jia Hyson from her embrace, "Sorry! Sorry! Adrian, are you okay? I'll go make something for you, what do you want?"

Without even thinking, Jia Hyson croakily answers, "Cheeseburger."

Jia Hyson pauses for a moment. A little confused where this sudden craving came from, but the two people in the room just laugh. "Well if Adrian still wants a burger then he's fine." The male voice teases.

He can feel his cheek being patted before the giggling young female finally gets off of him. "Don't worry, I'll make you the bestest cheeseburger ever!" She declares proudly before the sound of light running leaves the room.

Blearily Jia Hyson tries to get up a second time, fueled by a strange feeling of anxiety and foreboding. This time, however, a large warm hand gently pressing against his chest stops him. "Don't get up," The deeper voice murmurs, "you collapsed from exhaustion so just sleep for a bit longer okay? I'll watch over Maddy and make sure she doesn't get too overexcited."

Helplessly Jia Hyson just nods and relaxes back onto the couch. When he finally hears the man walking away and shutting the door, he mutters, "Bebe, context please?"

"This is the novel, 'Can't stand the Heat.' It has low popularity and a rating of 2.3 stars out of 5." Bebe replies in his mind. Jia Hyson winces and not just from the way Bebe's voice makes his headache ache even worse than before. 2.3 out of 5 stars… Damn this sounds like one shitty story then. The lowest review he's ever gotten for any online works he'd anonymously posted was around 3.8 stars at least.

"What's the problem with it then?"

"The story has been given the following reviews-

'What the hell! Where are the family fluff and cooking competition we were promised?! Why is this all smut?'

'It's like author-san has totally forgotten the MC's heartwarming background and family once the cooking competition starts! Isn't that too cruel? Not even a mention of them in the epilogue?? I don't even recognize the cool, headstrong MC by the end of it!'

'Too much smut! What drama story? What story about cooking? What romance subplot? It's just straight-up porn!'

'How easy is the MC? Is the ML that handsome?? To be so rude and arrogant yet to quickly catch the MC after a single kiss? Unreasonable!'"

Listening to these angry comments, Jia Hyson can feel his diminishing headache coming back again at full force. So this is what Bebe meant by fixing the plot? Why couldn't they just hire an editor? Why does it look like the success of his whole mission seems to rely on playing cockblock?

"An editor will not necessarily have the creativity we require to alter the story into a better one," Bebe explains as it reads his thoughts, "You however are well known for creating interesting and entertaining books and online fiction. Not to mention, you have an abnormal mindset that potentially is very good for this sort of work."

Black lines cover his face. What abnormal mindset? Isn't that too rude? He happily jumps in to help, and here he is getting his face slapped.

Anyway, from the complaints, it does actually seem like he must save this world through cockblocking. Isn't this just beyond stupid? Are they screwing with him?

With nowhere to vent his irritation, Jia Hyson exhales a long and angry sigh before deciding to temporarily ignore it. He doesn't have much time left until the two people come back and he must quickly figure out who he is.

Bebe silently sends him the information into his brain. Groaning Jia Hyson skims through it and feels his face darken further.

'Can't Stand the Heat' is a story about Madeline Fenwick and her journey to be a top chef. The synopsis promises a culinary adventure that will warm one's heart with familial love, laughter, drama and some romance along the way.

Madeline and her older brother Monroe Fenwick were orphaned twice at a young age. As in they were adopted by a couple and then the couple died not two years later. Not wanting to lose any face, their step aunt and uncle took them in. However, they were cold, unlovable characters that barely provided the minimum of affection towards them who weren't even related to them by blood. The only saving grace that prevented the siblings from living a bitter, barren childhood was their cousin who tried his best to take care of them.

That cousin is Adrian Marshall. The person Jia Hyson is now.

Adrian is also the reason Madeline had taken a liking to the culinary arts. Ever since their first meeting where he comforted her with homebaked cookies, she had immediately wanted to be like Adrian who strived to make people smile through cooking.

Madeline learnt how to cook from her cousin, and the first few chapters of the story depicted snippets of her growing up with her small family in the kitchen. Soon after she turned thirteen; however, her aunt and uncle had messily divorced and were fighting over who should have the children shoved into their care. Finally, Adrian, who was nineteen at the time, couldn't take it anymore and left with Madeline and Monroe.

Life after this was very difficult for the trio. Both aunt and uncle were stingy, and expenses for Madeline and Monroe's education were barely covered much less their living expenses. Adrian, having shouldered on the responsibilities of taking care of two teenagers, had to give up his dream of being a chef to work multiple jobs to support the household.

Frankly speaking, it was a strong start that Jia Hyson couldn't really find much fault with, and would definitely be the sort of story he would be interested in reading himself. The introduced characters had distinct personalities, and their interactions, as well as responses to their problems, were both believable and enjoyable to read. After asking Bebe, it seems, just like he suspected, that at this point of the story, many readers were pleased with how it's been written so far.

The problems start when Madeline hits eighteen and announces her desire to participate in the third season of the popular television show 'Home-cooked Miracle'.

Fresh out of high school and still young, both brother and cousin disapproved her decision. After all, while they were all fans of the show or maybe because they were fans of the show, Adrian and Monroe were well aware of how pervasive it can be in regards to the participant's life. Despite how the show tries to sell itself as a cooking competition, it was still reality tv and relied on scandal, sex and behind the scenes catfights to stay afloat.

At around the same time, Adrian had somehow managed to convince someone from a famous culinary institute to consider Madeline for a scholarship there. If she went to try out for the show, she would miss her chance at a scholarship in a place they could've only dreamed of going with their current funds. Understandably, Madeline's stubborn attitude had angered both Adrian and Monroe, creating friction in the once close-knit family.

In the end, that friction led to sparks and inevitable an explosion of a fight which resulted in Madeline leaving in the middle of the night to stay at a friend's house. The next day she entered the preliminaries of 'Home-cooked Miracle.'

Then she met the male lead. Drake Lanzoni. And it officially spiralled from there.

At first, there seem to be the beginnings of a typical love-hate rival relationship between the pair. Drake insults her homely type of cooking that practically screams lower class, and Madeline, being the strong-willed heroine she is, stands up for herself. She aims to make Drake eat his words and wins the first round of the competition, earning a chance at fighting for an immunity pin that allows her to be exempt from elimination once. Her smug victory and his grudging admiration as a result of this was the sort of competitive atmosphere that would make readers burn with excitement.

However, somewhere between the second and third round, Madeline Fenwick and Drake Lanzoni got together.

Jia Hyson had to stop skimming and reread the block of text in his mind thrice before he finally caught the few sentences that could have possibly foreshadowed such an abrupt change of relationship dynamics. A domineeringly, fiery kiss after a stressful service challenge in an empty kitchen immediately jumps to heavily making out and getting groped shamelessly the very next day in the bedroom. It was enough to make Jia Hyson dizzy to the point of nausea.

Family and dreams were then put on the back burner in favour of sex and drama. The closest thing to cooking Jia Hyson could see was watching everyone eat vinegar and dogfood. Challenges became ridiculous excuses to write more relationship tropes, and soon they became so insignificant it becomes something to only mention in passing to show that time had actually kept on moving while the couple were in their own little pink world. Jia Hyson forced himself to continue reading despite the fact the diamond in the rough had long turned back into coal. But after a bit longer of persevering, his boredom couldn't be contained, and he skips to the last few chapters.

He almost regrets reading it though, as he feels himself choke with a confused anger. As a fellow author, he wants to strangle whoever wrote this in revenge for them strangling such a decent story in its infancy. The couple finally gets approval from Drake's incredibly rich and powerful family, they get married, and they give birth to a girl who is spoilt with love to the point they even have a personal chef for her.

A personal chef?! Wasn't the point of this whole story that everyone was going to be a chef? To cook and bring smiles to people? They don't even mention the main character's brother and cousin, either? This completely abandons the story's principal ideals of family, cooking and pursuing one's dreams! This shameless author clearly got bored and made a smut novel midway through.

"Hey Monroe, should we wake Adrian up? The food will get cold."

"Give him a few minutes longer, he's been working nonstop these past few days."

Jia Hyson slowly opens his eyes once the door closes again and sighs. "Bebe, how old is Madeline now?"

"Currently Madeline Fenwick is thirteen. It has been three weeks since the divorce between Adrian's parents."

He nods in relief. At least he has a fair amount of time before the meat of the story even begins. It is also not too difficult to come up with ways he can improve this plot with his own limited power.

"Bebe wants to remind Jia Hyson that he currently has a notebook in his possession that shall help him keep track of things as well as provide valuable information," Bebe adds helpfully.

Jia Hyson blinks a little dumbly. He had forgotten all about the notebook in all the fuss. After patting himself down, he finds it in the pocket of his jeans. Once it's pulled out, the notebook grows a little bigger until it becomes the size it had been before.

"Remember, the notebook is mainly to write down your ideas and edit." Bebe says before making a huffing sound, "Bebe personally believes that Bebe is good enough alone. You do not have to rely on the notebook; however, Bebe supposes the notebook will always be there if ever Bebe goes offline."

Amused by his system's indignant pride, he teasingly asks, "Then what use is this notebook if I have a system as great as Bebe then?"

"Bebe is pleased Bebe's master understands." Jia Hyson quirks his lip up into a bemused smile. It turns out his system was a very cute and haughty show-cat. "However, the notebook does have some uses. To improve the story, you may write advice or phrases that you would think would fit well into the narrative. You can also read the sum total of your bonus points that you've earned at the back as well as review the original plot to see if there are any phrases or grammar you think needs to be changed."

Jia Hyson's eye twitches as he listens to the explanation. It seems he's playing the role of editor and ghostwriter on top of everything else. Was this karma for being so terrible to his own editors in his past life and tormenting them with his flighty and lazy attitude? "What is the point of this Bebe? I might as well rewrite the whole story myself if you all just want a good story." While personally, he would hate being forced to write a work he didn't get to design himself, it still was objectively less effort than interacting directly with the world.

It was probably the one glaring flaw to system novels that Jia Hyson could never grasp. If one thinks about it objectively, there is no reason for things like the cannon fodder system existing. Some stories have defended themselves nicely, making their main characters save the villain who in turn will bring a better future for that world and so on, but most stories were about acting out cannon fodder... and failing.

While he doesn't currently have any plans to fight the system (Bebe: ...So you may have plans to fight Bebe in the future?) he doesn't feel as motivated to do his task like before.

Bebe, listening to his thoughts, wants to cough blood. Such a fickle master! Weren't you so motivated to help just a minute ago? It seems the information it had received about how several editors and lovers had left because of Jia Hyson's lacklustre and temperamental attitude was not false. At least there won't be too much stress in worrying about Jia Hyson becoming overly attached.

Knowing that they didn't have much time, Bebe tried to appease its master. Master may not die if he fails the first mission, but Bebe will lose a lot of face to the other systems. Especially since he had been boasting so happily about being upgraded to a Beta system just before it picked up Jia Hyson.

"While Bebe is not authorized to know much about the matter, I can say that the amount of energy to change a world created by a story is less than the amount of energy it takes to change the world with the author in it." Bebe appeases, "When a world story diverges, a feedback loop is created, not only does this produce extra energy to supply the systems, it also changes the author's world subtly as well."

Listening carefully, Jia Hyson understands. "It really was a matter of two birds, one stone." He brightens up at that, happy to help again. After all, that was his favourite phrase, he wouldn't dare spit on it.

Bebe: ... Bebe doesn't understand but as long as master will try his best Bebe will forgive master for being so f*cking inconceivable.