Chapter 78: Simulator Update Complete
The time slipped away, marked by the steady ping of notifications as Haruka and Shoko Nishimiya traded messages.
Don't get the wrong idea. It was just a perfectly normal exchange between classmates showing a healthy amount of concern. If the sheer volume of texts seemed a little high, well, that was just a coincidence. Completely normal.
At eleven o'clock, Haruka finally set his phone aside.
It had been a while since he'd spent that much time just chatting with someone. It was actually a nice change of pace—a rare moment of genuine relaxation.
With a contented sigh, he pulled up his light novel app and started browsing. He eventually settled on that book he'd found earlier: Metronome in Love.
'I have to hand it to the author,' he thought as he read. 'The emotional beats are incredibly nuanced, and the prose is top-tier. But the pacing is agonizingly slow, and it lacks any of those clickbaity hooks or gimmicks people crave nowadays. In this market? It's going to struggle to find an audience.'
If things continued as they were, it was probably destined for the chopping block.
"Tsk. Adapt or die, I guess. That's just the way the world works," Haruka muttered to himself as he finished the volume.
He wasn't about to go out of his way to promote it or anything. He had his own problems to worry about.
Soon enough, the clock ticked toward eleven-fifty.
Haruka shut off his phone and lay back, mentally reviewing his objectives. He needed the Simulator to give him some direction. Right now, he felt a bit adrift—lost in the woods without a map. He had the big-picture goals, sure, but he lacked a concrete, step-by-step plan.
When you haven't been raised in high society, and you don't have someone from the inner circle whispering the secrets of the elite in your ear, it's easy to feel like a nouveau riche lottery winner with no idea how to manage your winnings. You have the resources, but no clue how to climb higher.
Even the memory fragments he'd gained from that capitalist version of himself weren't enough. That "Haruka" hadn't actually stood at the very top of the mountain.
Fortunately, Haruka was rational to a fault. He had no desire to play the role of some invincible protagonist who just blundered into success.
'Time to let the Simulator scout the path ahead.'
As his thoughts swirled, the clock finally struck midnight.
[Ding!]
Haruka's vision blurred.
A sudden wave of vertigo washed over him, and for a moment, he felt like he was hallucinating.
It was as if his very soul had been yanked from his body and hoisted into some ethereal, unknowable void. Before him loomed a colossal machine. He couldn't see the whole thing, only a mesmerizing array of intricate, interlocking gears grinding away with cosmic precision. And beyond that, stretching out into an endless horizon, were countless rivers of shimmering, hazy light.
When he looked closer, his breath hitched.
The rivers weren't water; they were human lives. He saw faces changing by the millisecond, environments shifting in the blink of an eye—earthquakes, tsunamis, the slow crawl of technological progress, stock market crashes, the mating of insects, the extinction of entire species...
The macroscopic and the microscopic, all contained in those glowing currents.
And then, he saw himself.
He saw a thousand different versions of his own future.
He saw himself as a miserable corporate drone.
He saw himself as a titan of industry.
He saw himself as a yakuza kingpin.
He saw a version of himself meeting a gruesome end at the business end of a kitchen knife held by a weeping girl.
He saw himself as a person capable of rewriting human hearts.
He saw himself as a champion fighter who had crushed every opponent.
He saw himself as a world leader.
He saw himself as a beggar.
He saw himself as a cripple...
The massive machine gathered these rivers, weaving them together and refining them into thin threads, no thicker than a thumb.
The threads were laid out before him.
[Love Simulator Update Complete]
Massive text flickered across his vision.
[Initial Newbie Period has concluded. Simulation frequency updated: Once every three days.]
[Talent System v1.0 is now online.]
[Target-Locking restrictions have been partially lifted.]
[Special Scenario Simulations have been unlocked.]
Lines of text continued to scroll by, but Haruka was still reeling from the sheer scale of the vision he'd just witnessed.
He couldn't find the words for it. It was a profound, spiritual shock that transcended physical desire or intellect. For a fleeting moment, he'd felt an overwhelming urge to "ascend"—to simply dissolve into that vast machinery and become one with it.
Thankfully, the presence of the system interface acted as an anchor, pulling him back from that state of awe.
"The Simulator... it's more than I thought," Haruka whispered.
The machine had revealed a glimpse of its true nature, and Haruka's estimation of it skyrocketed instantly. This wasn't just some subconscious prediction engine.
This was a terrifying, primordial force that could interfere with fate, manipulate timelines, and calculate the infinite variables of the quantum realm. It was a tool of transcendent power.
'Why is something like this attached to me?'
The thought flickered through his mind for a fraction of a second before he suppressed it. It was better not to dwell on that right now.
He focused his attention on the new information.
"Newbie period over? Once every three days? Talent system? Special scenarios?" Haruka's eyes narrowed as he analyzed the changes.
There were layers of subtext here.
For one, it meant everything up until now had just been a trial run. The shift to a three-day cooldown, combined with the addition of the Talent system and Special Scenarios, felt like a balance patch in a video game.
He knew the Simulator could be tight-lipped, but it occasionally felt talkative.
"What's with the change in frequency?" Haruka asked.
Sure enough, the Simulator responded.
[The daily simulation was provided to allow the Master to quickly bypass the initial growth phase, recognize the reality of his situation, and familiarize himself with the system. Achieving a Perfect Simulation signifies that the Master has graduated from 'kindergarten.' You are now ready for deeper, more autonomous simulations.]
"You just called me 'Master'?"
Haruka stiffened, his breathing hitching for a moment.
The Simulator didn't elaborate.
"...Right. And the Talent system?"
[Further permissions have been granted. For every simulation, the Master may choose one of three randomized Talents. Talents are categorized into four tiers: Common (White), Rare (Blue), Epic (Purple), and Legendary (Gold).]
"It really is like a game."
[The system has adapted to human gaming conventions to ensure the Master can easily understand and utilize the interface.]
"These tiers... what rank were those two talents I picked last time?"
[Past and Present Lives was Purple. Willpower Breakthrough was Pale Gold.]
"Pale Gold?"
[The weakest tier within the Legendary rank.]
"That was already Legendary?"
To be honest, since he hadn't personally experienced the full weight of it, Haruka had just thought it was a talent with decent potential. He hadn't realized it was game-breaking. If that was Legendary, how did it compare to the cosmic power the Simulator had just shown him?
[Every Legendary Talent is a rarity beyond measure.]
[Willpower Breakthrough—had you walked the path of a hero, this talent would have carried you through endless trials, allowing you to endure where others fell and rise at the moment defeat seemed certain. It is a Manifestation-type ability.]
"..."
Haruka was dumbstruck. "If... if I'd wanted to become the absolute ruler of the entire planet?"
[Theoretically possible.]
!!!
Haruka felt like his brain was vibrating.
If the Simulator was telling the truth, then the "him" in that simulation had been an absolute idiot for wasting such a gift...
'No, calm down. Thinking like this is pointless. It's already over.'
He used his immense self-control to steady his racing heart, though a hollow sense of lingering regret gnawed at him.
"Stay calm. Whenever someone uses the word 'theoretically,' it implies a high degree of uncertainty. It probably wasn't as godlike as it sounds," Haruka muttered, desperately trying to convince himself.
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Hand over all of your Power Stones!!
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