Chapter 176: 25

Chapter 176: 25

After finishing his call with Mr Garth, Jia Hyson looked toward the fridge and gestured with his hands. There, the freezer door opens immediately in response, with the inside easily seen to be covered in ice.

Twisting his hand and pulling it toward his body like he was unlocking and taking out a key from a keyhole, the ice moves with the motion obediently. Jia Hyson may be a good honour student in the academy, but that didn't mean he had neglected to practice his powers, either. In fact, with his own sense of experimentation and creativity, supplemented with Mr Garth's experience and ideas, his control over his powers had become deeply impressive even to the older generation.

If it usually wasn't allowed, unless, under special circumstances, Jia Hyson would want to challenge the more powerful older vampires to a fight to see how he would fare. Unfortunately, there was a rule in the coven that those fifty and below could not challenge vampires over fifty years old. Mainly it was to ensure the safety of the younger vampires, but it also was a way to keep a sense of respect toward the elders that was important to maintain for the more impulsive and rebellious youth.

After all, vampires valued the strong, but a hierarchy was still needed in a society, especially one that was full of uncontrolled and dangerous factors such as vampiric powers, strength, personality issues and so on. Because of their long lifespans, it was impossible to fully police everyone, but at the very least, the younger, impetuous generation can still be watched over while they're instilled a proper sense of the three views*.

*Three views- views on the world, life and values. Generally comments on a person's character and fundamental values.

As the ice moves toward him, Jia Hyson curls his fingers as if he is making a claw-like pose, and the ice seems to pull upwards gently into a small hill. The ice at the tip of the hill begins to peel back like a miniature avalanche of petals falling, and soon two boxes containing red liquid are revealed to his expectant eyes.

Humming in satisfaction, he makes a more exaggerated upwards motion, letting the ice turn into a pillar with the containers sitting steadily at the top, easily within arm's distance. Touching the containers, he snaps his fingers and the ice moves to open the two lids quickly, albeit a little clumsily. Seeing that the liquid, while cold, had not a trace of ice in it, Jia Hyson felt more pleased.

After all, he had been learning to not only control his own ice but recently be able to absorb surrounding ice and control it as well. Seeing the things frozen in the containers enter a liquid state meant he had managed to make another breakthrough in his experiments.

"Tsk tsk, if homework was this interesting I wouldn't have had trouble making the extra effort to educate myself," Jia Hyson sighs emotionally before gesturing the ice to move to the microwave, slipping the containers inside it, and then condensing the ice so it's able to press the necessary buttons to heat them up. Because he still needs to control it carefully, especially with the button pressing, Jia Hyson also follows the produce of his icy power and tentatively adjusts his hands accordingly so the ice moves more accurately. '

Once it was all done, he moved the ice to the kitchen sink and let it all melt there.

As he waits for the food to heat up, he idly plays with his phone and notices he has a few missed calls from Prince Silas. Jia Hyson furrows his brows slightly and taps his lips in thought.

In the end, he wasn't really in the mood to have the energy to chat with the other right now. His social battery had been more or less used up and he was too lazy to do the balancing act of being a supportive follower, a good friend and while being purposely ignorant of the other prince's obvious feelings.

"Tsk, tsk, I now realise the problem of being a Beta System host." Jia Hyson clicks his tongue as he ignores the missed calls in favour of typing on his phone to write the new chapter of his newest story as ShiningGreenTea.

This story was a lighthearted one about sand-sculpture* vampires being romanced by the female lead, who was a timid face-con.

*sand sculpture- generally describes something that has one identity (e.g. domineering CEO type) but reacts in a way that is against what's expected in a humorous manner that ruins the original cool impression (e.g. CEO shrieks at a cockroach and won't leave the table until it's gone). Just like a sandcastle, it looks good but is easy to crumble.

Currently, he had already introduced the typical brooding male lead vampire who wished to appear introspective and deep, but in reality, his poetry was bad; he couldn't understand the 'romantic and deep' literature, and his singing was poor quality at best. Now he wished to bring in the handsome, arrogantly narcissistic but actually very insecure and naive second male lead, as well as the cheerful, sunny but poison-mouthed second male lead.

"Oh? What's the problem?" Bebe asks curiously.

"Too much trouble if you want to play with important characters." Jia Hyson spat a little bitterly. He didn't enjoy being restrained like this much. What was worse was it was all due to the consequences of his actions, so he couldn't blame anyone else.

"I didn't really think much of it with Drake from the first world because, well.." He coughs awkwardly, "I didn't know at the start and, therefore, already smashed the cracked pot* once I found out. After all, I really liked him ah."

*Already made a mistake might as well just go for it. E.g. you already know you failed the test, so you just start drawing over the test paper of sassing the questions with joke answers.

"Now it's different," Bebe agrees with some understanding. "Don't worry; this is the first time your entering a world with a 'series'. The butterfly effect is more prevalent here, and as a Beta Host, you need to be more thoughtful and hold more accountability for the changes. Our current foresight was too short term in the end, and the early starting point we entered into also made things unexpectedly more difficult."

Jia Hyson felt greatly comforted by this. After all, as much as he wants to push it off and make it seem better than it is, he still inevitably felt the stress of things going wrong like a noose slowly tightening around his neck. "Thanks, Bebe."

"You're not my first host." Bebe snorts, "Other hosts also will also often find difficulties and mistakes when they first enter a new format, whether it's entering very early into the plot, very late, close to a death node or meeting glitches like an unknown reborn person, they will stumble and make rash decisions."

"It's nearly impossible for everyone to be like those cool plots where the host will effortlessly pass all obstacles and get the highest scores each time. The best thing is to accept this loss, determine the main points of what you did wrong and take this opportunity to try some new things to salvage the situation. At worst, it doesn't work, and you have more knowledge to help in the future."

"Damn" Jia Hyson clutched his chest and said emotionally, "You really sounded like a knowledgeable and wise system just now. Tell me seriously, did you ask someone else to use your voice box?" He jokes.

"Yes, it was your mother who helped Bebe with it when she was in bed with Bebe." Bebe immediately retorts, scolding its host in its head. He was such a sweet talker to others, but with his cute system, he was worse than your typical steel straight man*.

*Steel straight man/straight man cancer is a derogatory term for a type of straight man. It can be the extreme stereotype of jock (overly masculine/aggressive/rude/crude etc) or nerd (stuck in his own world/uncaring/not in touch with emotions/can't read the room) but generally both stereotypes show a lack of understanding women and romance and would immediately lose interest in 'female topics' (e.g. shopping).

Jia Hyson: "Damn" My love for you is gone again.

The moment of host-system bonding was broken. Bebe felt like its thoughtful words were eaten by dogs, and Jia Hyson's fists felt a little itchy. Still, both host and system were no longer so tense as they took out the microwaved containers and started walking back to the dorms.

Instead, they started seriously discussing the different options that they could take.

'To be honest, Bebe can only see the dogblooded route as a viable option.' Bebe sighs, 'Prince Silas has strong feelings that will be on the verge of blackening soon at this rate, it's not too bad to stimulate him a bit with Rigel and then his possessiveness will break out and, uh, Bebe doesn't really know where to go from there.'

Jia Hyson: '' Yo, what stories have you been reading, Bebe?

Jia Hyson shook his head in disagreement, 'Tsk, that option is fine if we were a raider system*, but Silas is a key component of the plot. The only benefit to entangling with him is just getting a bit more security. But he's still lazy at heart. If he focuses too much on me, how can he play his part as the main character's golden thigh?' The main characters were both romantic love brains, for the plot to continue and for them not to die mid-way, it really was important that the golden thigh crown prince was still online after all.

'Then what about you write more stories about gender issues?' Bebe suggests, 'Other than Defining My Brother, the other similar stories have been on hiatus.' And the not similar stories. Basically, almost all the stories.

'I'm lazy.' Jia Hyson waves off. Even his blog, which he has the most enthusiasm for and has become quite popular, has taken a slight backseat these days due to procrastination and a lack of motivation. 'I have a few ideas anyway; I just wasn't very enthusiastic about them. But now we're at this point I don't mind trying them out, and I do still have my last resort plans so I suppose we don't have to worry too hard.'

'What sort of last resort plans?'

'Either I run away, or I die.' Jia Hyson shrugs, 'You can't demonise a character if they aren't there anymore after all.'

He smiles wryly before sighing and combing his hair back with his fingers with a little annoyance. "The only problem is I'm still quite attached to living this life, and also, I needed to find a decent reason for me leaving the plot that won't cause people to want to investigate me and find out the things I don't want them to, meaning it needs to be a public, justifiable and open reason for my disappearance or death.'

He looks at his fingers absentmindedly, twitching them as he counts, 'The best way is death by self-sacrifice, preferably for Prince Damien or Jessica Fang. Dying for a supporting character is good too. The main point is that the enemy has to be powerful enough, and my death is visible enough.'

'As for running away, I can either break down from the pressure, which requires some groundwork to lay out or, using your idea Bebe, we get Prince Silas to blacken, and I use this as an excuse to run away. Prince Silas would either chase me or give up, but either way, I don't believe he would screw me over at the critical last minute and reveal anything.'

Bebe was a little speechless. To be honest, since [Psychotic Break] had activated there wasn't much of a noticeable change other than Jia Hyson becoming a little calmer. But the callous way he broke down these rather cruel options with little emotional inflection reminded Bebe the skill was indeed active.

But Bebe did admit those were indeed the best ways to leave off. It was just usually, most hosts avoid this sort of method if they can help it. Few enjoy re-experiencing death for fun in the end, so their thought processes usually don't stray toward those ideas. Jia Hyson was also not an exception, and usually, he would subconsciously ignore or at least push away such thoughts after playing with them for a little while.

'What about Darrian Garth?' It couldn't help but ask curiously. He was probably the only person its host was really reluctant to part from. Bebe was a little interested to see if Jia Hyson could really be such scum and cut the other vampire off when he clearly had grown this strong attachment toward him that Bebe felt was a little, unlike his previous relationships.

Prince Rigel felt humiliated in his heart but the other vampire's abilities were something he couldn't afford to be a victim of. With a cute appearance he flatters, "Hmmm, I suppose stabbing is okay?"

The other prince hums lowly, it was hard to tell whether he liked or disliked the answer, making Prince Rigel grind his teeth secretly.

"Hey Uh.." Jia Hyson coughs, not really sure how to respond as Alaric to this situation. Even if he has an ambiguous friendship with Silas and a recent enmity with Rigel, Alaric still has a strong respect for nobility. Therefore he definitely can't openly laugh at the discomfort on Prince Rigel's face like a mean girl who just tripped over the new girl in an American high school movie

But oh, how he wants to.

"I'll go set up the food. Silas, you're staying, right?"

"As long as my new friend wants me to." He smiles at the eye-patched vampire.

Prince Rigel: 'I want to go back to my coffin, I'm being bullied.' QwQ

So, in the end, Silas stayed for dinner. Fortunately, the other brought snacks, so the food was sufficient enough for everyone. The meal was hearty and simple, rice with a meaty curry that had a generous mix of blood in it that made Jia Hyson salivate the moment he smelt the spicy and savory aroma. Unfortunately while the meal was warm and delicious, the atmosphere was cold and bland.

'Bebe, I'm going to die if we continue to eat in silence.' Jia Hyson complains. 'It was a little funny at first but now it's really too awkward and boring. I want to take my phone out and read stories but as the host of two guests I can't. Ah, I'm so uncomfortable.'

'Huh? What?' There was the sound of something being taken off in Jia Hyson's head, 'Sorry, Bebe couldn't hear you, Bebe had headphones on because Bebe was playing games with friends. You should've seen what System 7350 did- it's not important right now though. What did you say?'

Jia Hyson: '' I know Bebe technically did nothing wrong, but I'm still pissed off.

Prince Rigel felt like he was really suffering. He wasn't used to the strong spices and the unfamiliar taste of the curry. He didn't like the soft squishy wheat husks texture of the rice. He disliked there was no fresh blood in a glass to wash things down. Most importantly, Prince Rigel was greatly stifled by Prince Silas' presence and felt deeply humiliated at his own quail-like behaviour.

The blonde vampire glares at the silver-haired prince angrily.

Fuck! Just because you have the power to take away my powers, you think you're so goddamn amazing with your stupid long silver hair, taller body and 'Oooh look at me I'm the lovechild of an elf and a mage from any teen fantasy novel ever and I don't care at all' vibes??

As if hearing his mental griping, Prince Silas turns to look at him coolly as he takes a sip of his glass of water. Prince Rigel immediately looks away, sweating.

Ok. Well. It's a bit amazing.

Jia Hyson also saw this interaction and almost subconsciously, copied Prince Silas' movements, mirroring him by taking a sip of water as well. There was nothing that warmed a relationship more than a shared dislike of the same person.

After the silent meal, the three ended up finishing the gory movie. Prince Silas, who had been very enthusiastic to play it, was now the most reluctant one since Alaric was here. In contrast, Prince Rigel, while still unhappy, was quite gleeful at letting Alaric watch such a vulgar and disgusting movie with him.

It's not that Prince Rigel hasn't seen death. It's the bread and butter that lets his coven live well. However, they were professional killers these days and generally what people ask for is simply death. A slice to the neck, a headshot etc, etc essentially the main requests are simple, clean and quick. The more you do, the more clues you give and the more likely you are to be caught.

That isn't to say there aren't sadists, and the interrogation room is bloody enough, Prince Rigel would know, he was very good in the interrogation room. But the movie Prince Silas picked was really too horrific.

Jia Hyson who was also curious, also quickly realised why the villain Prince Rigel was so uncomfortable while watching the movie.

His face became increasingly complicated.

This was Bai Li Wei's movie. At the very least it was some sort of adaptation around it.

High schoolers trapped in a haunted mansion they had gone into for an end-of-year party, the various reasons due to the protagonists' conflict with their bullies, the mysterious transfer student, and then the most eye-opening scene of the massacre. Don't talk about how bloody the original world this movie was based off was; this movie also added more taboo and twisted themes as if the director needed to somehow live up to the expectations of the R18+ green light he had been given.

In all honesty, Jia Hyson can't help but criticise the plot being too messy in this movie. After all, the story was already quite large and full of many characters, both human and ghost, but the movie had added even more named characters with their own relevant backstories making it hard to keep track of and ultimately a bit worthless when they're so easily killed off.

It was a bit like Bai Li Wei's story meets the complicated interpersonal relationships of G*me of Thr*nes and the disturbing content of H*man C*ntipede. Because over time, it had become annoyingly clear, at least, that the director preferred the evil doctor ghost compared to the beautiful doll ghost and had used him as the main horror of the film. As the person who played Bai Li Wei, Jia Hyson was not going to lie and say he wasn't annoyed at seeing his character's lack of screen time.

While the movie continued, both princes kept glancing at Alaric, one with nervousness at being judged on bringing such a movie here, and the other with anticipation in seeing the blue-eyed vampires sweating fearful look, but in the end, they only saw a vampire completely engrossed in the movie.

From the way Alaric was leaning forward, furrowing his brows and even clicking his tongue a few times, it was easy to see not only was the other completely concentrated on the horror film, but he wasn't even impressed as more and more blood was spilt in increasingly disturbing ways.

Prince Silas: "." I choose not to think too deeply about this.

Prince Rigel: "..." Are all the young vampires these days so fucked up?

____

AN: It's been a while uwu

Work is busier this time of year so your lil author is really tired and lazy, wants to procrastinate and play after work instead kek. I've started replaying cookie run kingdom and fuck me, it's so stupid addicting but my gacha luck is so shit QwQ (My username is LittleBlueMilkLake if anyone is interested hehe)

My reading reccs is-

Vicious Female Lead Married Me With a Smile (not finished translation but 7 arcs done and its realllyyy funny and fun, it's technically female protag in man's body but you can just consider it male protag as he starts to identify as male by second arc, the theme is getting the vicious female lead to stop obsessing over male lead pretty much kek)

The Heartthrob Protagonist Just Wants to Monopolise Me (fully translated/complete, I like it a lot its horror BL, very plotty, I like how things more or less tie up together nicely. ML is fairly typical obsessive but like he's smart and other then initial jealousy he's smart enough to see through alot of misunderstandings. My biggest pet peeves is probs alot of big things feels wrapped up too fast and I wish you could see all the characters come back to see what happens to them at the end but overall I'm very happy and recc it happily~)

Almighty Dad (mtl, no CP, just a good loving father raising kids QT, very fun and I love the playboy dad arc alot hehe)

ALSO, since it's been so long (like a month holy shit I'm sorry ya'll) I will put up my discord server link~ Will be open full 24hrs, anyone using the link can enter (unless we have had an argument and I already told you I have blocked you, then please don't enter obviously)

https://discord.gg/U74vT63c

A cute little donator on kofi also asked for discord and I thought it's a bit unfair to deny the mone- *cough* my cute donator so I also decided if you donate on my kofi and ask for server link I will also send you a one time use link 0w0. Fair warning I dont often check kofi so I wont respond immediately.

I don't have much else to say but I hope you guys are all free from exams now- or close to it- and will have a happy time~

Also, it's confirmed the Hysonrella smut will indeed be harem hehe you pervs you ,,,owo,,, what are you making your innocent lil lake author write ah?

Also also, I have put up a chapter of a new story (yeah... another one.. orz) called Quick Transmigration With a Collector System. Check that out if ya want~