Chapter 4: Ignorance is Bliss!

Chapter 4: Ignorance is Bliss!

Shing. Grind. Chink.

I leaned over the heavy workbench in the high school's vocational classroom, carefully manipulating the machinery to forge a lightweight, highly manageable set of tension wrenches and lock-picks. I’d eventually have to purchase a professional, tactical grade lock-picking set from the dark web, but doing so right now would draw far too much digital suspicion. For now, impromptu craftsmanship would have to suffice.

As I slipped into the rhythmic zone of shaping metal, my mind began to dissect the bizarre, disjointed memories inherited from my predecessor. The geographical layout of this Earth was fundamentally wrong. Over millions of years, the continental shelves had drifted along entirely different tectonic paths, spreading massive landmasses vast distances from one another.

Based on this alone, I could deduce that my previous life had taken place in an entirely different universe or galaxy. On this version of Earth, China occupied the southeastern territory of the Eurasian continent. Meanwhile, the actual continent of Australia—the landmass I knew from my past life—was occupied by an empire known here as the China Empire. The conflicting historical timelines temporarily tangled my thoughts, but I quickly shook it off. In the grand scheme of things, the cosmic spot of my reincarnation didn't matter one bit.

What truly intrigued me was the game my predecessor had played right before his death. Was my current reality supposed to be some twisted simulation or digital entertainment from his world?

No, that didn't align with my early childhood memories. I had zero recollection of this reality existing as a video game. Instead, a sinking, instinctual feeling told me he had stumbled across a questionnaire on a dark, underground suicide website. The poor bastard had answered a series of prompt questions about starting a new life, foolishly assuming it was an interactive application. In reality, the moment he hit submit, his consciousness truly ceased to exist.

Before the System rudely abandoned me for greener pastures, it explicitly mentioned that my predecessor had utterly wasted his life, warning me not to repeat his mistakes. Perhaps human souls simply cycle through the cosmos with every passing life, and he was nothing more than a serial failure.

Maybe the System bailed on me because my past life was an absolute disappointment?

"Meh, doesn't matter," I muttered, brushing a layer of metal shavings off the workbench.

At the very least, the entity had dumped a solid starting package of high-level skills into my brain before it vanished. The previous occupant of my mind must have been an avid, min-maxing gamer. He had engineered my skill selection with a classic power-player mentality. He clearly hadn't known what kind of reality he was dropping into, so he opted for a highly versatile toolkit suitable for any environment.

The Computer Use and Auto-Mechanics skills were incredibly practical. Even if he had ended up in a low-tech high fantasy world, an engineer's understanding of physics and machinery would allow him to build functional tools from scratch. And if he had dropped into a sci-fi universe like those old Star Wars flicks from his memories? Computer Use would have been absolutely pimp.

Then there was my solitary Grandmaster skill: Kung-Fu and Martial Arts. He had invested heavily to secure it, a tier that mathematically equated to fifteen Basic skills or five Advanced skills combined. It was an absolute masterpiece of an investment, perfectly adaptable to any hostile universe. Advanced Medicine was equally universal.

Firearms and Driving, however, were his only real tactical gambles. If he had reincarnated into a medieval world of swords and sorcery, those investments would have been a catastrophic waste of three and seven points, respectively. In the end, the NEET version of me really was a pro-gamer.

Or perhaps the cosmic algorithm had chosen this specific, modern-corporate world precisely because of the technological skills he purchased?

"Oh?!" I murmured, lifting a finished rake pick to the light. "My last tool is done, and the finish looks pretty good."

My Auto-Mechanics skill was hardwired right into my muscle memory, guiding my hands through the metalwork with flawless mechanical precision. I didn't need to overthink it. My fingers just moved on their own, smoothing out the rough edges of the makeshift Thief tools. I rolled the freshly forged picks into a makeshift leather sleeve I had gathered from the shop scraps, sliding the bundle deep into my backpack.

"Next period is starting soon," I muttered, glancing at the wall clock. "I need to move before I'm marked absent. Not even my Acting skill will save me from a truancy citation. Ha, I can't wait to see the look of pure agony on that dick's face."

A broken toe was a beautiful, agonizing inconvenience. Medical science dictated that fractured phalanges couldn't be set in a traditional plaster cast; they simply had to heal on their own through painful, restricted mobility. Given my historical run of bad luck, the falling desk had probably only shattered Scott’s pinky toe. I genuinely wished the heavy iron edge had crushed his midfoot instep instead—then the bastard would have been forced to wheel himself around the academy in a full-leg cast.

I slipped back into the high school classroom just as the end-of-period bell began to toll. Walking up to the instructor's podium with a perfectly timed, compliant smile, I slipped the wooden hall-pass onto the desk.

"Are you feeling alright now, Mr. Lee?" the teacher asked, looking up from his lesson plan.

"I am doing great now, teacher," I replied smoothly, adjusting my backpack. "I'll take my seat now."

As I walked down the aisle, James caught my eye from across the room and flashed a subtle, enthusiastic thumbs-up. I offered him a relaxed, genuine smile. From the front desk, Scott was currently burning a hole through my chest with a vicious, venomous stink-eye. I didn't let it faze me; I simply turned my head and offered him an identical, serene smile—projecting the effortless, untroubled aura of a student who had just enjoyed a thoroughly relaxing first period.

Chime. Chime. Chime.

The high school's master bell echoed through the speakers, signaling the chaotic mass migration of students toward their next assigned classes. I gathered my textbooks, moving toward the exit. Linda Lang was standing directly beside the doorframe, her tall, statuesque figure blocking a portion of the threshold. As I stepped within arm's reach, she locked her icy, piercing gaze onto mine.

"Why did you ignore me before school?" she asked calmly.

I paused, looking at her with genuine, unscripted confusion. For four long years, this elite woman hadn't uttered a single syllable to a lower-class student like me. She had maintained an absolute, aristocratic distance since our freshman year. I couldn't care less about her sudden interest now.

"You’ve never spoken a single word to me before today, Linda," I said, my voice flat, direct, and entirely devoid of the submissive tone she expected from a commoner. "So why decide to start a conversation when the school day is practically over? Furthermore, when I was being routinely brutalized and hazed by your rich boyfriend, did you ever once care? Did you ever step forward to stop him? No. So why the hell would I want to stand here and tell you how shitty I feel? Do yourself a favor—stay up in your pristine crystal palace. Leave this toad alone, fly away with your fellow elite swans, and excuse me."

I brushed right past the gorgeous, emotionless ice-block, stepping out into the crowded corridor. I didn't care that Scott had been watching the exchange from across the room, his fists clenching in silent fury. Let the bastard seethe. According to my tactical assessment, Scott’s training in Karate was Advanced at the absolute best, but more likely resting at a mediocre Basic level. Even if he possessed the technical forms, he certainly hadn't held that rank long enough to develop real combat instincts. He was nothing but an unconditioned bully.

I navigated the flowing sea of teenagers, stepping up to my locker to swap out my textbooks for the upcoming period. A few paces down the row, I spotted Nichole Ning. She was actively reading through the printed financial records I had slipped into her locker earlier this morning, her pristine, fair skin turning a terrifyingly ghostly shade of pale. She frantically grabbed her sister's arm, shoving the redacted documents directly into Nadia’s hands. Nadia’s eyes widened in absolute horror.

As Nadia frantically loaded her smartphone's banking app to verify the clues, desperately checking if the unrecoverable 1 million dollars had indeed been pulled from Scott's trust, Nichole’s gaze snapped over toward me. I was just throwing my locker door shut. I caught her eye, offered her a slow, dangerous, and incredibly playful smile, and casually turned on my heel to head toward class.

The moment I walked out of earshot, Nichole gripped her sister's shoulder, her voice trembling in a panicked whisper.

"Sister... did you completely mess up the routing protocols during the money transfer? How could you have possibly pulled out a full million instead of the hundred thousand father explicitly told us to limit it to?!"

"No! I triple-checked the encrypted string before I hit authorize!" Nadia stammered, her thumbs shaking against her phone screen. "I strictly counted five zeros! This has to be a system glitch! What the hell do we do, Nichole?!"

Nichole, clearly possessing the sharper strategic intellect of the two twins, stared down the empty hallway where I had just vanished.

"How did Rick Lee find out about our siphoning ring?" Nichole whispered, her mind racing. "How did he manage to bypass my locker's mechanical combination lock without anyone seeing him? But most importantly... what exactly does a nobody like him want from us? No matter how this scenario plays out, Rick holds every single card. Have we completely fucked up by treating him like garbage? Scott is a historic, brainless idiot for provoking a man like that... and shit, so are we."

She let out a heavy, defeated sigh. Nadia, watching her brilliant sister rapidly descend down an existential rabbit hole of paranoia, shook her head fiercely.

"Sister, none of that academic analysis even matters right now. The solitary thing we need to calculate is how to keep our father from finding out we botched the logistics. I don't give a damn about Scott's trust fund, but if Father finds out we exposed the family business to an external blackmail threat, you know exactly what he will do to us."

Nichole swallowed hard, nodding in silent agreement.

"Fine. I will initiate negotiations with our blackmailer later this afternoon," Nichole said, her analytical mind attempting to salvage the situation. "From what I can gather, this appears to be the very first digital crime he has ever executed. He was sloppy enough to show us his entire hand right out of the gate. I should be able to navigate a highly favorable outcome with minimal loss to our family."

"What kind of loss?" Nadia hissed, her eyes narrowing. "Are we going to lose the entire asset pool we managed to secure? I am absolutely not giving that money back, Nichole. We need that financial cushion for the day Scott eventually discards us."

"No," Nichole countered, a calculated, predatory gleam returning to her eyes. "If Rick can definitively prove to me that he possesses the technical capability to orchestrate a high-level digital frame-up like this, it means he commands a hell of a lot more operational skill than any of us anticipated. The most optimal strategy for us is to concede something we are inevitably going to lose anyway. A simple, perfectly executed honey-trap. We lock him into an alliance, and everyone walks away happy."

Nadia blinked, her expression utterly blank.

"I don't get the angle, Nichole. Just tell me what my role is."

Nichole Ning rolled her eyes in deep, aristocratic exasperation at her sister's sheer lack of tactical vision.

"From this exact moment forward, you do not provoke Rick Lee. Under any circumstances, you treat that man as a vital ally. Second, hurry up—we are officially late for our next lecture."

The two striking, dangerous vixens adjusted their uniforms and rushed down the corridor toward their next period—a class that took them far away from my current academic rotation.

I was completely unaware at the time that my half-assed blackmail attempt had already spiraled entirely out of my control. What I was actually going to get from those twins was a far cry from anything I had originally intended to ask for. But looking back on that massive turning point in my life, I can really only summarize the entire chain of events with one single phrase... Ignorance is bliss!

"Alright, Seniors," the instructor announced, his heavy boots clicking against the linoleum as he paced the front of the classroom. "From this exact moment through the remainder of the school year, we will be strictly focusing on preparing for your final examinations and placement rankings. These scores will dictate your university admissions or your post-vocational job assignments. Now, clear your desks. Here is your morning pop-quiz. Good luck."

Mr. Chi, notorious for being the most uncompromising, iron-fisted educator in Star High, began systematically distributing a stack of notoriously brutal quiz sheets. The moment my sheet hit my desk and I glanced down at the complex equations and analytical prompts, a wave of profound shock washed over me.

My General Education skill was absolutely no fucking joke.

The moment my eyes scanned the text, my brain processed the solutions instantly. I could effortlessly dictate the flawless answer to every single high-level question on the paper. It wasn't that I had been completely dense before the transmigration, but operating with this hardwired knowledge felt exactly like having an open, high-definition cheat sheet locked right into my visual cortex. Zero conscious effort or second-guessing was required to tear through the exam.

Mr. Chi was actively patrolling the aisles, watching the student body like an absolute hawk to preemptively crush any attempts at cheating. When his shadow fell over my desk and he witnessed me sliding my chair back, stepping up to the front podium with a fully completed sheet while the rest of the seniors were still hopelessly stuck on the front page, his eyes narrowed in immediate suspicion. He snatched my paper, his gaze scanning the ink line by line, and his expression shifted into something truly fascinating.

Because Mr. Chi meticulously drafted all of his pop-quizzes by hand the night before class—intentionally integrating abstract, conceptual questions that weren't printed anywhere in the standard high school textbooks—no student in the history of his tenure had ever successfully cheated. Yet here he was, staring blankly at a completely flawless, perfect-score quiz.

"Mr. Lee," Mr. Chi said, his stern voice dropping into a rare, quiet cadence as he looked up from the paper. "I don't know what exactly occurred during your emergency room visit last night... but it appears your mind has thoroughly cleared up. Return to your seat and rest. Excellent work."

Excellent work.

That specific phrase had literally never been uttered by the toughest teacher in Star High since—well, since ever. The entire classroom immediately ground to a halt, dozens of heads snapping in my direction as my peers cast completely disbelieving, stunned glances across the aisle. Damn.

Scott, who had comfortably maintained the absolute number-two academic ranking in the school directly behind Linda, furrowed his brow in a dark, venomous scowl the moment he heard Mr. Chi openly praise me.

Linda Lang, the undisputed number-one student, looked visibly startled. Her smoky grey eyes locked onto me, her mind clearly struggling to process how the highest clinical praise from her absolute favorite teacher had just landed squarely on the bruised, battered kid who usually functioned as the school's punching bag. The absolute best praise she had ever managed to secure from Mr. Chi was a measured, professional Good work.

Okay, there was no denying it anymore—the skills I had inherited from that flaky, abandoned system were definitively Goldfinger-tier quality.

On the bright side, unlike the absurd web novels my predecessor used to binge-read, I didn't have a nagging, digital interface constantly screaming at me to execute unreasonable System Quests under the threat of catastrophic failure. I didn't have to worry about losing my nipples or facing instant death for missing a deadline. Heck, I even recalled one bizarre story from his memories where the system literally forced a gender-change on the protagonist just for failing some arbitrary, stupid task. So when you really think about it, my System quitting and completely bailing on me was an absolute blessing, right?

"Mr. Lee, step over here for a moment," Mr. Chi called out as the bell rang, gesturing to his desk while the rest of the seniors began packing their bags."I want to ask you a quick question."

I swung my backpack over my shoulder and walked down to the podium. I didn't realize it at the time, but Linda Lang had purposefully lingered behind, quietly sitting at her front-row desk, completely motionless as she subtly tuned her ears to intercept our conversation.

"Lee," Mr. Chi began, leaning against the hardwood edge of his desk. "I am incredibly pleased to see this shocking test result. But if you possessed the intellectual capacity to operate at this baseline all along, why choose to finally showcase it now, at the absolute tail end of your high school career?"

My Acting skill kicked in on a dime. I let out a heavy, solemn sigh, slowly raising a hand to lightly gesture toward the fresh, angry contusions covering my face.

"Mr. Chi, if I look like a mutated panda bear right now just for existing," I murmured, pitching my voice to perfectly project the image of an exhausted, survival-driven victim. "How bad do you think my life would be if my primary bully discovered I was completely destroying him in academics? I have been forced to systematically suppress my true intellect for four long years of high school just to avoid a fatal escalation. I am only showing you my genuine capability now because I fully intend to secure a scholarship to Star University and enter their corporate Business course. Thank you for teaching me so thoroughly in the past."

The lie landed flawlessly. My Acting skill ensured that the emotional weight behind my words was entirely believable, causing Mr. Chi’s expression to soften as he deeply internalized the violent dynamic between Scott Tang and myself.

Linda, however, froze in her seat. A look of absolute, unadulterated shock washed over her features as my words echoed in the quiet classroom. Her mind reeled as she calculated the terrifying implication: she had only maintained her pristine, number-one academic status all these years because Scott's violent thuggery had actively suppressed a hidden genius. Her entire sense of self-worth, her pride, and her absolute intellectual confidence hit rock bottom in a matter of seconds. Her elite ego was completely shattered by a tactical lie I had spun just to appease an instructor.

Well, I had absolutely no clue that I had just thoroughly humbled the untouchable Linda Lang, nor would I have particularly cared if I did. At the end of the day, it was entirely her own fault for being an opportunistic eavesdropper in the first place!

"Alright, Lee," Mr. Chi said, a proud, determined smile breaking across his hardened face as he patted my shoulder. "Then make me proud and secure that objective. Let me tell you what—I am going to write a personal, high-priority letter of recommendation for your application to Star University. I have numerous close friends and elite fellow alumni on the admissions board who will personally look out for you. Just maintain these flawless marks on the final cumulative exams, and that letter is yours."

"Thanks a lot, Mr. Chi," I replied, flashing a bright, confident grin. "That would be absolutely amazing! See you tomorrow!"

I slung my bag over my shoulder again and walked out into the corridor in a phenomenal mood. If my basic educational skill allowed me to completely trivialize a custom exam from the toughest teacher in the academy, it meant I was going to effortlessly secure a perfect score on every other subject on the roster. Hot damn. My university admission was officially in the bag. Sister Mary was going to be absolutely thrilled—at least, I hoped she would be.

And exactly as I predicted, the rumors of my sudden academic awakening spread through the high school like wildfire. A literal carbon copy of Mr. Chi’s reaction echoed through every single period for the rest of the afternoon.

By the time the final bell rang, I had become the primary topic of conversation inside the faculty lounge. Teachers were actively comparing my flawless, un-cheated test sheets in absolute disbelief, openly lamenting how a wealthy, noble brat like Scott Tang had managed to brutally suppress such a hidden academic gem.

My total disruption of the high school's hierarchy that day put four specific students on high alert, each of them experiencing a radically different psychological reaction to the news of my perfect scores...

Scott Tang... immediately locked himself in a private bathroom stall and made a frantic, furious call to a crew of heavily armed street thugs, paying them an astronomical sum to permanently end my lucky streak.

Nichole Ning... took one look at her sister's panicked expression and decided to throw the entire honeycomb—bees and all—directly into the path of her impending honey-trap.

Tina Feng... quietly pulled out her encrypted device beneath her desk and smoothly relocated my profile straight into her number-two target spot. For what purpose? Who the hell knew, and who cared?

And Linda Lang... returned to her pristine estate and sat completely motionless in a pitch-black bedroom for an entire night, staring at the wall without eating a single bite of food.

Now, mind you, I had absolutely no idea what any of these chaotic idiots were thinking at the time. Well, okay—I probably would have cared a decent amount about one of those specific reactions if I actually had the foresight to see it coming!

But for now, the school gates had finally thrown open, the academic day was officially over, and it was time to march straight toward my next major objective of the day...