After returning to her private quarters and taking a warm shower, Zhao Yuan still couldn't shake the restless energy humming through her. Unable to sleep, she sat down at her desk instead.
She remembered seeing a new function appear on her dashboard after the latest upgrade and decided to explore it, hoping it might dull her mind enough to make her sleepy.
Scrolling past the flashing red reward notifications, she tapped on a small icon shaped like a quill.
A completely unexpected interface bloomed before her, making her lips curl into a surprised, fascinated smile. It looked remarkably like a social media feed.
She scrolled through a chaotic stream of posts. Some users were complaining about how poorly their territories were faring against infectee waves, while others posted proud photos of high-tech compounds and strange food combinations served in restaurants that looked identical to her own. There were even memes from people joking that this entire apocalyptic survival scenario felt less like a punishment and more like an elaborate sandbox game.
Thinking back to her very first day as a Custodian, Zhao Yuan recalled receiving a system notification flagging her for "breaching access control rules."
At the time, she had dismissed it as a glitch. She had technically left a small fragment of her soul tethered to this body before her departure, keeping it anchor-ready. Back in her original world, she had never heard a single soul mention the ability to cross dimensions. But seeing thousands of other people posting freely on this global network confirmed it: world-hopping was real, and her initial arrival really had triggered a system breach.
A smug, satisfied smile touched her lips as she kept reading. Fortunately, the System hadn't realized that she had left her original body far earlier than logged, nor did it know where she had spent that hidden time.
Unbeknownst to her, far outside the constraints of her world, Qiao Lu was monitoring her every move—and he was deeply displeased.
"Why did you let her find the community hub so soon?" Qiao Lu asked coldly, his dark gaze locked onto the floating interface.
Beside him, the System entity trembled, stammering as it tried to defend itself. How was it supposed to hide an icon sitting right in the center of the main dashboard?
"I... I didn't know she would click it..." it stammered out.
"Do you ever know anything?" Qiao Lu snapped, his tone laced with sharp irritation.
Suppressing his anger, he set his phone down on the table, smoothed out the lapels of his suit, and looked up at the interviewer sitting across from him, instantly restoring his composed, flawless demeanor.
Back in her room, Zhao Yuan finally noticed the small magnifying glass search icon tucked away in the top corner of the social interface. Intrigued, she tapped it and typed in a name that had been lingering in the back of her mind:
'Qiao Yuan'
It was the name of the legendary figure ranked absolute Number One on the global leaderboards—and, strangely enough, listed as her only existing teammate in the System's obscure registry.
The search results loaded instantly, flooding her screen with thousands of trending threads, fan edits, and tactical breakdowns. Zhao Yuan's eyes widened in genuine shock as she scrolled through the sheer volume of posts worshiping his achievements.
"Is Qiao Yuan even human? He just solo-cleared a SSS-Rank Void Rift in under ten minutes."
"Did you guys see his latest base build? His defense grid literally erased a million-strong infectee wave without him lifting a finger. Unbelievable."
"He's not just a Custodian; he's a living god. Cold, precise, and completely invincible."
Reading through the exaggerated praise and idolization, Zhao Yuan couldn't help but let out a quiet, wicked laugh. To the rest of the world, this guy was an unapproachable legend, a mythical titan sitting at the apex of the System.
Her curiosity piqued, she clicked into a massive thread titled: How do you even get scouted for the World Team?
The comment section was a battleground of envy and awe:
"Don't bother dreaming about it. The World Team is the elite of the elite. You need a 99.9% survival rating, insane resource output, and zero recorded failures just to get screened."
"Honestly, Qiao Yuan running a solo team for so long makes sense. Nobody else in this entire reality is qualified enough to stand next to him."
Zhao Yuan stared at the screen, her brows furrowing in deep confusion. Hard to join? Qualified? She had literally woken up one day with a System prompt welcoming her as the second member of that exact team without ever filling out an application or trying out.
Driven by a sudden hunch, she cleared the search bar and typed in her official team designation.
The newest, most frantic posts from just a few hours ago popped up at the very top of the feed:
"ALERT: The World Team roster updated!! IT HAS TWO MEMBERS NOW??"
"WHO IS THE SECOND PERSON?! Did Qiao Yuan actually recruit someone, or is the System glitching?"
"I checked the registry—their name is hidden under a Custodian clearance lock. Whoever this new member is, they must be an absolute monster to stand beside Number One..."
Zhao Yuan leaned back in her chair, a slow, smug smile spreading across her face as she watched the entire global community lose its collective mind over her mysterious existence.
As Zhao Yuan leaned back in her chair, pondering how on earth she had been placed onto the world's most exclusive team without even trying, Qiao Lu was just wrapping up his live interview broadcast.
Stepping off the stage, he unclipped his lapel mic and tossed it to an assistant before pulling out his terminal display. The moment the live system analytics loaded, his breath hitched.
The screen flagged a high-priority alert: [Custodian Zhao Yuan has accessed global search parameters: "Qiao Yuan" & "World Team"].
Qiao Lu froze, his heart dropping into his stomach. He watched remotely as her finger tapped across her screen, exiting the global community board and navigating directly into the internal Team Management Interface.
She clicked on the private, locked Team Chat.
For the first time in years, Qiao Lu felt genuinely breathless. His sharp, calculating composure cracked as his dark eyes locked onto the blinking cursor on her screen. He waited, his mind racing through a dozen contingency plans—was she going to demand answers? Was she going to confront him about the System's structure, his identity, or her placement on the roster?
Through the interface, he watched her fingers move calmly across her virtual keyboard.
She typed out a single word:
'Hi'
Qiao Lu blinked once. Then twice.
He stared at the screen, utterly stunned, tapping the terminal to refresh the feed as if his eyes were playing tricks on him.
Hi?
That was it? After discovering that her single teammate was the mythical Number One ranked powerhouse in the entire System, after reading thousands of posts calling him an untouchable god, and after realizing she was sitting in a squad that millions would kill to join—she just sent a casual, unbothered 'Hi'? Didn't she have a single question about what she had just uncovered?
On the other side of the screen, back in her dimly lit office, Zhao Yuan watched the single word sit in the blank chat box.
Thinking of her probably busy teammate, she finally sighed softly, exited the chat window, and closed the interface. The wave of excitement having finally settled into a pleasant satisfaction, she climbed into bed, pulling the warm covers up and settling in for a good night's sleep.