Welcome everyone to yet another chapter of Glitches saga
Hope everyone will enjoy.
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The sun rose over the Azure Cloud Sect not with a gentle glow, but with a triumphant flare that illuminated the Morning Harmonization Square.
Thousands of disciples stood in perfect, silent rows, their white and blue robes fluttering in the mountain breeze.
At the front, the three High Elders sat on thrones of floating ice, their expressions solemn.
And in the center of it all, standing on a raised jade platform, was Han.
He was no longer wearing his blood-stained tatters.
The Sect had provided him with Executive Robes...a deep midnight-blue silk embroidered with silver thread that shimmered like a circuit board.
[NOTIFICATION: The Annual General Meeting is now in session.]
[Current Audience: 2,400 Junior Associates.]
[Atmosphere: Highly Skeptical.]
[System Advice: Open with a joke to build Brand Loyalty.]
"I am not telling a joke, System," Han whispered, his hands shaking inside his wide sleeves.
"If I bomb this, they won't just cancel me. They'll incinerate me."
Elder Wu stood up, his voice amplified by Qi so it echoed across the peaks.
"Disciples! Today, we are graced by a visitor from the Great Spandex Dynasty.
The Regional Manager, Han! He has come to Audit our foundations and share the secret of 'High-Bandwidth' cultivation!"
A murmur rippled through the crowd. In the front row, Ling...the disciple Han had "fixed" the night before was looking at him with eyes so full of worship they were practically glowing.
"Young Master Han," Elder Wu bowed.
"The stage is yours. Please... demonstrate your 'Software'."
Han stepped forward.
His heart was a drum kit in the middle of a solo.
He looked out at the sea of faces.
He had no Qi.
He had no spells.
He had a broken AI and a stress ball hidden in his sleeve.
"Ahem," Han cleared his throat.
"Members of the... Azure Cloud Team.
I've been looking at your Quarterly Growth, and frankly... your User Retention is abysmal."
The disciples blinked.
Quarterly growth? User retention?
[ACTION: Deploying Visual Aids.]
[Note: Using 80% of remaining Battery to project Holographic Slides.]
Suddenly, the air behind Han fractured.
A massive, glowing blue screen....twenty feet tall snapped into existence.
It wasn't the soft, misty projection of a water-mirror spell.
It was sharp, neon, and filled with glowing bar graphs and pie charts.
The disciples gasped, falling back.
Even the Elders jumped, their ice thrones wobbling.
"Behold!" Han shouted, pointing at a red line on the graph that was plunging downward. "This is your current Spiritual ROI'!
You are spending eighteen hours a day meditating, yet your Breakthrough Conversion Rate is under five percent!
This is a Systemic Failure!"
"What... what is that sorcery?" a disciple cried.
"Look at the red line! It feels so... ominous!"
"That," Han said, gaining confidence as he realized they were terrified of a simple line graph, "is the Death of Productivity.
You are all Buffering!
You are trying to run Divine Software on Potato Hardware!"
[NOTIFICATION: Audience Engagement is up by 400%!]
[New Objective: The Live Demo]
[Instruction: Pick a Volunteer to receive a System Patch]
"I need a volunteer," Han announced. "Someone who feels their Connection is laggy."
Before he could finish, a tall, arrogant-looking disciple stepped forward.
He was wearing the gold-trimmed robes of an Inner Disciple, and his eyes were narrowed in suspicion.
This was Feng, the nephew of the Second Elder and the Sect's resident bully.
"I don't believe in your Graphs, Manager Han,"
Feng sneered.
"I have practiced the Iron-Skin Mantra for ten years.
My defense is impenetrable.
If your Software is so great, show me how it improves a body of steel."
[TARGET ANALYSIS: Feng.]
[Status: Legacy Hardware.]
[Diagnosis: Internal Memory Leak.]
[Solution: Force a Disk Defragmentation.]
"Feng," Han said, walking toward him with the swagger of a man who definitely knew what he was doing.
"Your iron-Skin isn't steel.
It's Bloatware.
You've packed so much Qi into your skin that your Internal Organs are suffering from 'Thermal Throttling'."
Han reached out.
The System highlighted a specific point on Feng's chest...the Solar Plexus in a bright, pulsing yellow.
[PROMPT: Apply Pressure here to Refresh the Page.]
"You think you are strong because you are stiff," Han said, his voice dropping to a dramatic whisper.
"But true power is Fluid.
You need to Defragment your Dantian."
Han didn't use a palm strike.
He didn't use a finger-flick.
He simply took his Master-Grade Divine Scepter , the rusted, broken pitchfork handle he had insisted on keeping and poked Feng right in the yellow circle.
Boop
The crowd held its breath.
Feng laughed.
"A stick? You think a piece of wood can..."
Suddenly, Feng's face went from tanned to purple.
His eyes bulged.
A sound like a thousand tiny firecrackers went off inside his ribcage.
[SYSTEM LOG: Defragmentation in Progress... Rearranging Qi-Files...]
Feng's Iron Skin didn't shatter; it softened. His rigid posture collapsed, and suddenly, a massive surge of spiritual energy...the Qi he had been storing inefficiently for years finally broke through his meridians.
He didn't fall; he began to glow.
His muscles rippled and expanded, and a shockwave of pure power erupted from his body, cracking the jade tiles beneath his feet.
Feng gasped, falling to his knees, his breath coming in ragged bursts of golden mist.
"I... I feel... light. The weight... the pressure on my chest... it's gone!"
[NOTIFICATION: Disk Defrag Complete.]
[Feng has been Upgraded to: Mid-Stage Foundation Establishment.]
The Square went silent.
Then, a roar of excitement broke out that shook the very mountains.
"He did it with a stick!"
"He 'Defragmented' him!"
"I want to be Defragmented too!"
The Elders were out of their seats, staring at Feng in pure disbelief.
To them, Han had just performed a Supreme Body-Cleansing Rite with a single touch.
It was a level of mastery they had only read about in legends of the Primal Era.
Han, meanwhile, was trying to stop his hand from shaking.
I just poked a guy and he leveled up.
This System is going to get me killed or made a God, and I'm not sure which is worse.
[NOTIFICATION: Management is pleased with your Public Relations victory.]
[Reward: 1x Golden Handshake (Skill) & Employee of the Month Plaque.]
"Manager Han!" Elder Wu shouted, rushing onto the platform.
"This... this Defragmentation... can it be taught?
Can the entire Sect be Upgraded?"
Han looked at the PowerPoint slide behind him, which was currently showing a picture of a smiling cartoon cat with the caption:
HAVE YOU TRIED TURNING IT OFF AND ON AGAIN?
"It can," Han said, his voice deep and mysterious.
"But it requires... Subscription Credits.
And a lot of Server Maintenance."
"We will pay anything!" the Second Elder cried, his previous suspicion vanished.
"Spirit Stones!
Ancient Herbs!
Just tell us how to Reboot!"
Han looked at the thousands of disciples bowing to him.
He was a man with zero Qi, a hovering Segway, and a purple pair of yoga pants, and he had just accidentally convinced a Tier-1 Cultivation Sect to become his Client Base.
[NEW QUEST: The Corporate Takeover.]
[Objective: Establish the Azure Cloud Branch Office]
[Goal: Collect 1,000 Spirit Stones in Consultation Fees.]
[Sinker: Warning!
Aggressive Competitor detected approaching the Sect gates.
Scanning... Target: The Virus.]
Han's smile froze.
"The... Virus?"
Far below, at the base of the mountain, a dark cloud was gathering.
A man in black robes, surrounded by an aura of flickering, corrupted red light, was walking up the stairs.
His eyes weren't human; they were filled with static.
[ALERT: Malware has entered the Network.]
[Threat Level: System Crash]
Han looked at his Defragmenting Stick and then at the approaching darkness.
"System," Han whispered. "Do I have Anti-Virus?"
[Searching... Error 404: Subscription Expired.
Please Renew to unlock Firewall protection.]
"You've got to be kidding me," Han groaned.
AN:-
Thank you one and all for reading the chapter and hope guys support.
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