Chapter 3: Sugar Daddy System

"AHHH!!!"

Ryan was terrified. He immediately threw the horrifying package into the trash can, hopped on his scooter, and sped off without looking back.

"Ryan is back!!!"

Videl University’s dorm management had always been pretty lenient. Freshmen were kept on a tighter leash, but for juniors and seniors, they barely cared.

The gate was basically useless. The dorm auntie was too lazy to get up and just left it unlocked. Ryan rushed all the way back to his dorm.

The living conditions here were pretty good. Of the four-person room, one had moved out to live with his girlfriend, so only Ryan and his two other roommates remained.

They were still playing League of Legends, faces shiny with sweat and oil, classic night owls.

The oldest, Jason, didn’t even turn his head. The second, Wester, saw Ryan come back empty-handed and said dejectedly, "What the hell, no snacks today? It was your turn today"

It was too late to turn on the lights. Ryan trembled as he walked back to his bed and sat down, feeling like his whole body was falling apart.

Seeing Ryan didn’t respond, Jason and Wester sensed something was wrong. They immediately put down their game and came over.

Ryan’s face was deathly pale, covered in cold sweat, and his whole body was shaking.

"Ryan, are you okay!!"

Jason immediately put his hand on Ryan’s forehead. Not only was there no fever, but it was ice cold.

Wester also asked with concern, "Are you sick? Why is your face so white."

"Jason, Wester... Today, I think I ran into a ghost."

Ryan trembled as he told them what happened. Jason looked at him with a strange expression and said, "What era is this? You need to believe in science. I say, are you on drugs or drunk and seeing things?"

"Exactly, even if there were ghosts, they wouldn’t come for folks like us. We’re broke as hell."

Wester was as glib as ever.

"I’m serious, I’m not lying to you!"

Ryan immediately pulled out his phone and opened the delivery app, but when he tapped in, he was dumbfounded.

He still needed just one more order to get the task bonus, but that last order wasn’t the one he’d just picked up.

It was the spicy hotpot delivery he’d taken earlier. That delivery order seemed like it had never existed.

Ryan rubbed his eyes and said tremblingly, "No, that’s not right. How did it disappear?"

Jason gave him a look and said, "Ryan, you’re just under too much pressure. You probably dozed off while waiting for an order and had a dream."

"Exactly. I’ll go get some booze. The three of us will have a drink and you can unwind."

Wester said that and walked out.

The dorm auntie wasn’t happy about students disturbing her sleep, but if you bought something from her little shop, she’d be delighted.

Jason wiped the floor. Drinking in the dorm meant sitting on the floor, picking a show on the computer, and watching together.

Just as he turned around, the stunned Ryan’s eyes blurred for a moment, and he saw new messages in the shipper column showing a conversation.

He opened it and his scalp went numb. The profile picture was clearly that kind-looking old man, and even weirder, the name on it was also Ryan Dressrosa.

There were only two messages, and both of them were baffling:

"First, I am not what you call a ghost. Of course, I am not what you call a human either, nor any traditional carbon-based lifeform."

"Second, don’t be afraid. Believe firmly that you are a lucky one. This is a gift from yourself."

These words... Ryan’s emotions eased a bit, but he just didn’t know how to make sense of them.

If it wasn’t a ghost, how could he explain that bizarre phenomenon? And the whole "gift from yourself" thing made no logical sense at all.

After the two messages showed as read, they suddenly vanished into thin air.

This time, Ryan didn’t make a big deal out of it. He was vaguely starting to feel numb about all this.

Wester came back soon, carrying two bottles of drinks, a bag of peanuts, and a few packs of braised chicken and other snacks.

Jason pulled the dazed Ryan over and said, "Ryan, don’t keep dwelling on it. Get a good sleep and you’ll be fine."

Ryan’s mind was still foggy. He sat down and started drinking with them.

They watched some boring variety show, eating and drinking for about an hour until they were full and starting to get drowsy.

Each of them went back to their beds. Ryan took off his clothes and lay down, but something hard poked him in the waist.

A bit drunk, he reached for it and took a look. Instantly, the alcohol buzz wore off. In his hand was clearly the phone box he had thrown into the trash can.

"Ding... Initializing scan!!!"

A cold, mechanical voice sounded in his mind. Ryan felt his entire body freeze up instantly.

He opened his mouth but couldn’t make a sound. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jason and Wester already in bed, fast asleep. There was no way to call for help.

Under Ryan’s terrified gaze, the box in his hand floated into the air.

The box opened to reveal a phone with no logo on it. It was metallic and especially beautiful.

The phone was already turned on, its camera aimed at Ryan’s face. He watched in fear as his own face appeared clearly on the screen.

"Ding... Scan complete. Host Ryan Dressrosa confirmed."

Then, Ryan’s hand moved uncontrollably, gently pressing onto the fingerprint sensor.

"Ding... Collecting genetic sample."

Ryan felt a sting in his hand, as if pricked by a needle. A few drops of blood came out and were quickly absorbed by the phone.

"Ding... Scan complete. Host Ryan Dressrosa, Earth human, carbon-based lifeform with 2.1 billion base pairs."

At that moment, Ryan watched helplessly as his Realme, with its badly cracked screen, vibrated and floated up.

It instantly shattered into countless fragments that flew toward the eerie phone hovering in midair, drawn to it.

"Ding... Big data starting dimensional information scan of host’s world."

"Ding... Information scan complete. Now matching host with a suitable system."

"Ding... Match successful. Host has obtained the Sugar Daddy System."

A series of sounds kept ringing out. Ryan felt his head buzzing so much he could barely make out the voice.

"Ding... Host’s body has reached its limit. Forcing hibernation mode."

Ryan felt his vision go black and lost consciousness, passing out and unable to do anything.

---

When he opened his eyes again, he was incredibly thirsty. He lifted his hand and felt extremely weak.

"Ryan, you’re awake!!!"

Wester, who had been keeping watch by the hospital bed playing on his phone, saw Ryan move and immediately put his phone down excitedly, running off to call the nurse.

The nurse and doctor came over together, taking his blood pressure and temperature with great urgency, as if facing a major crisis.

After they finished their flurry of activity, Ryan, still on a saline drip, was helped into a sitting position. After drinking a little water, he felt much better.

"Wester, what happened to me?"

Ryan looked around and saw that he was in a hospital room.

Wester was fiddling with his phone while rolling his eyes and said, "God knows what happened to you. The morning after we drank, you were completely unresponsive. No matter how much we called, you wouldn’t wake up."

"Big bro and I were terrified. We quickly got the school doctor over. He took your temperature and it was 42 degrees. The school immediately called an ambulance and sent you to the hospital."

At first they suspected Ryan had taken antibiotics and then drank, causing some kind of toxic reaction, but upon examination, the symptoms didn’t match that either.

Blood tests couldn’t find the cause either. The doctors just stared at each other helplessly and could only monitor him while prescribing saline drips to keep an eye on things.

In the end, Ryan’s condition even alarmed the hospital director and professors, because his blood pressure would drop to 30, 20, like he was about to die and then spike to 200, threatening his blood vessels and heart.

His temperature was like a roller coaster too, dropping to near-dead 22 degrees at the low end and shooting up to 44, almost burning him alive.

His heart rate was even more terrifying, stopping completely at times like he was dead, and then racing so fast it seemed like his heart was about to burst.

The ECG lines were wilder than a financial crisis; anyone who stocks would have heart problems just looking at it.

The room next door was the ICU, ready to move him in at any sign of trouble, even though they couldn’t find the cause or know how to treat it.

"No way!!!"

Ryan listened, completely stunned.

Before he could even process it, the young doctor from earlier led a large group of white-coated elderly doctors swarming around him.

Some were looking at his test reports, others came straight up to take his pulse. They all frowned and kept staring at him, making Ryan’s scalp tingle.