In a brightly lit room, a sweet-faced goddess sat in an ornate chair. Two steaming cups of black tea rested on the table before her, as if she had been waiting for a guest.
Tang Han stood at the doorway, confused about where he was.
"Please, have a seat." Noticing his arrival, the goddess put on a polite smile and gestured for him to come over.
Tang Han hesitated, then walked over warily and sat down in the chair opposite her.
The two stared at each other in silence. Neither spoke first, and the room remained quiet for quite a while.
In the end, Tang Han was the one who broke the stillness.
"May I ask who you are?"
"My name is Luck. Of course, you can also call me the System, but I'd prefer it if you called me Luck."
Tang Han's mouth twitched a little, but otherwise he did not react. The room fell into silence again.
"Aren't you going to rush over here and hit me?" Luck finally asked.
"Why would I hit you?"
"Because I've been messing with your head this whole time. I've been tricking you, screwing you over, putting you through hell. Aren't you angry at all?"
"Well… I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little angry…" Tang Han scratched his head.
The thing was, if he wanted to hit someone, he had to be able to beat them first.
Tang Han was smart enough to know that if she dared show herself in front of him, then she obviously wasn't afraid of being hit.
If he really charged at her, chances were he'd be the one who ended up in a miserable state.
Besides, had everything she done really been meant to harm him?
"There's something I want to ask," Tang Han said.
"What is it?"
"Can you lie?"
Luck smiled.
"Of course I can lie. When exactly did you start thinking I couldn't?"
Tang Han fell silent.
Fair enough. Whenever he had asked her important questions before, she would go completely quiet, almost like one of the Trisolarans. That was why he had assumed the System simply couldn't lie.
"Hehe." Luck seemed to know exactly what he was thinking. "That's because Misfortune is a massive JoJo fan, and she loves throwing JoJo references around all day. I'm different. I like The Three-Body Problem, so I deliberately pretended to be the kind of being who couldn't lie."
"Though, to be fair, I never actually lied to you~" Luck stuck out her tongue and made a cute face.
Tang Han said nothing.
"Oh, right!" Suddenly, Luck seemed to remember something interesting and looked at him expectantly. "I'm suddenly curious. Which do you like more, JoJo or The Three-Body Problem?"
Tang Han thought about it for a moment before answering.
"I'm a fan of both."
Luck froze for a second, then burst out laughing.
"Hahahaha!"
"What's so funny?" Tang Han asked.
"I'm happy," Luck said, still laughing. "Happy that I managed to draw such an interesting host."
"Draw?" Tang Han immediately caught the key word.
"That's right, Host. I spent almost all of my luck energy to roll an S-rank powerhouse from another world—and that powerhouse was you."
Tang Han stared at her.
What?
So the big shot… was him?
"Would you allow me to explain the current situation?" Luck asked with a smile.
"Go ahead." Tang Han nodded. He was confused enough that he badly needed an explanation.
Luck cleared her throat.
"You've already noticed how rampant Misfortune has become. She harms horse girls whenever she pleases, as if the Three Goddesses of this world were nothing but decoration."
"Yes," Tang Han said.
Ever since Misfortune had declared that she intended to make Rice Shower die on the racetrack one day, Tang Han had already begun to suspect that the Three Goddesses were basically useless—like they'd gotten drunk on fake booze at New Year's and stopped caring whether horse girls lived or died.
"May I ask why?" he said.
"That would be because…" Luck's expression darkened. "The Three Goddesses have already been imprisoned by Misfortune."
"The Three Goddesses have been imprisoned?" Tang Han was stunned.
Weren't the Three Goddesses supposed to be incredibly powerful? They could be imprisoned? Was she kidding?
Seeing the doubt on his face, Luck continued.
"The Three Goddesses exist solely to bless horse girls. They can protect their lives and keep them safe from evil people. But… they have no power against Misfortune."
"The only god who can oppose Misfortune is me—Luck."
"In the past, I could still hold Misfortune back and keep the world in balance. But as society developed and human desire kept growing, that balance was shattered long ago."
"Because misfortune energy and luck energy are simply not generated or collected on the same level. Misfortune is easy. Luck is hard. That's why Misfortune can now pin me to the ground and beat me up."
"Not long ago, Misfortune imprisoned the Three Goddesses, and I had no way to stop her…"
Luck let out a sigh.
"With the Three Goddesses gone, Misfortune has become far more brazen in targeting horse girls. Once she gathers enough energy, she'll completely take over this world."
"But on my own, I can't defeat her."
"So I needed a big shot who was highly compatible with me to help me." Luck looked at Tang Han with a smile.
"Me?" Tang Han pointed at himself.
"Yes~" Luck nodded. "I used all of my remaining energy to summon from another world the S-rank person whose compatibility with me was the highest. That person was you, Boss."
"But then it turned out you had a horse-girl-catnip physique, so if I'd just thrown you in here as-is, you would've been torn apart by five horse girls on day one. I had no choice but to spend even more energy stealing that Doctor's Coat from the neighboring world…"
"That left me completely drained—totally exhausted, like an empty oyster~" Luck slumped over the table weakly, looking as though she had been hollowed out.
"Host, did you notice that your Doctor's Coat needs my energy to keep existing?" Luck asked expectantly.
"Yes." Tang Han nodded.
He had noticed that a long time ago.
Back when the System introduced The Trainer's Guide: From Beginner to Basement, it had specifically said:
"You must invest your own time and effort to understand it. Unearned gains are refused."
That sentence had looked meaningless on the surface, but in truth, it had been a hint Luck was secretly giving him.
Everything the System provided came with a cost.
"As expected of the boss whose compatibility with me is the highest~" Luck said happily.
"Everything I give you requires luck energy to maintain. Of all of it, that Doctor's Coat I stole from another world consumes the most."
"The reason I stopped providing ingredients for S-rank honey drinks if you didn't personally consume the A-rank and below attempts was because ingredients also have to be bought with energy."
"The reason I made you do tasks—sending Tokai Teio that collector's photo, giving her the honey drink, giving Rice Shower the lucky charm, taking on Haru Urara, befriending your fellow first-year trainers—was all to make them feel lucky and generate energy. Only then could your Doctor's Coat's duration be extended."
"Everything requires energy. There's no such thing as a free lunch."
That explained it.
No wonder this system was nothing like the overpowered systems Tang Han used to read about in novels. It was because the System itself was a hard-luck case. It needed Tang Han to make other people feel lucky in order to gather energy, and even then, most of that energy had to be spent just maintaining the Doctor's Coat.
"Then what was the deal with all those awful tasks you gave me before?" Tang Han asked.
Luck explained,
"That was all part of the act I was putting on for Misfortune."
"Think about it. If Misfortune had realized I'd found an accomplice who wanted to resist her, what do you think she would have done?"
"She would have tracked me down and pinned me to the floor and thoroughly wrecked me!" Luck said, shivering.
"That's why I pretended to be a chaos-loving gremlin who summoned you just for entertainment. Only then would Misfortune lower her guard and let me keep gathering energy by assigning those seemingly malicious tasks."
"Of course, there was another reason too."
"What reason?"
"Your own S-rank ability, of course!" Luck pointed at him.
"My S-rank ability? What is it?" Tang Han asked curiously.
He had no idea he even had one.
"You Can't Play Unless You're at Critical HP. In other words, the more desperate your situation gets, the more you can turn things around against fate."
Tang Han fell silent.
What kind of absurd ability was that? An ability that only activated when he was being screwed over?
"That's exactly why our compatibility is so high. You can only play properly when you're on the brink, and when that's combined with my luck, we become invincible." Luck nodded seriously.
"And besides, Host, you're smart. You knew how to play along with me."
"Honestly, thank goodness the one I summoned was you. If I'd summoned some overly soft-hearted gentle protagonist instead of someone as cautious and stubbornly tenacious as you, this world would already be finished!"
"But luckily, I boosted my own luck before rolling, so there was no chance I'd pull one of those guys who'd get locked in a basement on the very first day. Ehe~"
Tang Han stared at her.
So the Goddess of Luck could buff her own luck before rolling?
What kind of cheating was that?
Still, Luck wasn't wrong. Tang Han had already begun to suspect that this so-called system that loved tormenting him might actually be on his side.
From the start, it had given him the Doctor's Coat to conceal his horse-girl-catnip constitution. Then it kept assigning apparently malicious tasks that carried no true punishment. Every situation was dangerous, yes, but there was always some way out.
He had long sensed that the System was putting on an act. Maybe it was an ally. Or maybe it really was just a gremlin who wanted entertainment.
Either way, at the time Tang Han had only wanted to survive. A real man had to know when to bend and when to endure. There was nothing wrong with going along with what the System wanted for the sake of staying alive.
Was it humiliating to call the System "Big Bro"? Sure, a little.
But if the System was actually an ally, then thinking of it as a helpful roommate bringing you takeout back to the dorm made it feel a lot less humiliating—and honestly, even a little funny.
"So from now on, I don't have to call you Big Bro anymore, right?" Tang Han asked.
"Of course not!" Luck said brightly.
"From now on, you're my dad! You tell me to do something, and I'll do it!"
Tang Han stared at her.
Hadn't their generation gap somehow gotten even bigger?
Was the Goddess of Luck always this unhinged?
"Boss, just now, together, we seriously wounded Misfortune. That means for a very long time to come, she won't have the power to affect the real world again. That was all thanks to you," Luck said happily.
"Is that so?"
It was certainly good news that Misfortune had been beaten again.
But Tang Han still had a question.
Why didn't he remember fighting Misfortune together with Luck just now? The last thing he remembered was eating the liquor chocolate Rice Shower gave him—then waking up here.
Had he blacked out?
Impossible.
He didn't like alcohol, but he had tasted it before. There was no way the amount inside a single liquor chocolate should have been enough to knock him out, right?
"Hehe. I deliberately gave Rice Shower that liquor chocolate," Luck admitted. "It had several hundred times the alcohol content of a normal one."
"In simple terms, it was basically liquor with a little bit of chocolate mixed in. Teehee~"
Tang Han stared at her in disbelief.
So she had deliberately gotten him drunk, then sent his unconscious self to fight Misfortune?
And he had actually won?
"Sorry! I'll slap myself a few times to make it up to you, okay?" Luck suddenly started smacking herself across the face.
Seeing that she was serious, Tang Han hurriedly stopped her.
"Teacher Luck, don't. Teacher Luck."
It wasn't that he wasn't angry. It was just that her slapping herself wouldn't actually make him feel any less irritated.
Well, in the end, the outcome had been good.
Tang Han decided he could forgive her. A little.
"After I got drunk… I didn't do anything suicidal, did I?" Tang Han asked cautiously.
"Hehe…" Luck gave an awkward laugh.
"There are some things you'd really be better off not knowing."
Tang Han's heart sank.
"All I can say is," Luck continued, "drunk you is about on par with Tatsuki Fujimoto."
Tang Han froze.
So basically a complete madman, then?
"Don't panic, Boss. With your ability plus mine, we'll definitely get through this." Luck tried to reassure him.
"So we're already calling it a crisis by default…" Tang Han felt the future before him turning dark.
But back to the important matter.
"What do we do next?" he asked.
"We continue gathering energy," Luck said seriously.
"But luck is too hard to gather. No matter how hard we work, it won't be enough to beat Misfortune. Even what happened just now only sealed her away temporarily."
"Then what do we do?"
"Something stronger than luck is hope." Luck placed a hand over her chest.
"But hope has no god. Hope is born from people's hearts."
"In the world of horse girls, if a horse girl who is bound to you wins a race, that creates a tremendous amount of hope energy."
Tang Han suddenly understood why the second main quest had been to make one of his girls win an official race.
"Do you remember the three-choice horse-girl selection ticket you used at the start? Tokai Teio, Rice Shower, Haru Urara. Choosing among those three wasn't me trying to screw you over."
"If you can change the original fates of those three, they can bring an unimaginable amount of hope into this world!"
"Tokai Teio—the undefeated genius who falls, and the unyielding emperor who rises!"
"Rice Shower—the boos were the prize reserved for victors. Rice Shower isn't a villain. She's a hero!"
"And of course, the one who can bring the greatest hope to this world is Haru Urara! Defeated again and again, yet always rising to challenge fate once more—the star of hope for all losers!"
"…I see." At the time, Tang Han had seen that all the available girls on the selection ticket were small-framed horse girls, and had assumed the system was trying to get him arrested as a lolicon.
"You said Misfortune was only sealed temporarily," Tang Han said. "How much time do we have?"
"Three months." Luck held up three fingers.
"In three months, Misfortune will recover and return to the real world. So within those three months, you must gather enough hope energy to stand a chance against her."
"That means within those three months, your bound horse girl must win at least one G1 race."
"A G1…" Tang Han immediately felt the pressure slam down on him.
Until now, his goal had merely been to get Urara to win an OP race. Now the requirement had jumped straight to a G1 victory. The difficulty had multiplied beyond reason.
Then he asked his final question.
"How do we save the Three Goddesses and truly save the horse girls?"
"There is only one way," Luck said.
"And that is to let the whole world be bathed in the light of hope."
"So…"
"Let Haru Urara, the Star of Hope, win the Arima Kinen!"
Join here to read ahead.
In Star Rail, Ultra-Beast Armored — Have I Caught "Equilibrium"? l (Chapter 80)
Uma Musume, But I Only Have Five Years Left to Live (Chapter 178)
Zenless Zone Zero: I'm a Doctor, Not a Bangboo (Chapter 139)
Ben Tennyson Wants to Join the Justice League ( 126 )
TYPE-MOON: Redemption Beginning with the Holy Grail War (Chapter110)
Yu-Gi-Oh! — Transmigrated into the White Dragon Girl (Chapter171)
"Is this chat group even serious?" (Chapter100)
I, Lord Ravager, Utterly Loyal! (Chapter184)
Can Playing Games Save the World? 65
Crossover Anime Multiverse: The Demon Hunter of an Unnatural World 77
From Junkman to Wasteland 66
Weekly Refresh of Overpowered 31
I'm Grinding Proficiency Like 46
From Kiana, Lord Ravager, Onwa 168
Honkai: Is This Still the Prev 42
Elf: My Starter Pokémon Is Inc 65
Warhammer: My Primarch Is Remi 156
From Demon Slayer to Grand Ass 105
The Way the Umamusume Look at 68
Uma Musume, but My Cheat Power 185
Naruto: Weaving the Future, Be 65
Zenless Zone Zero, but Kamen R 76
Multiverse Crossover: The Perf 66
My Cyberpsycho Girlfriend 65
Uma Musume: The Dark Trainer 160
Uma Musume: A Calamity Born fr 150
I, a Reincarnation-Loop Player 76
The Violent Girl Group Is Beat 97
Uma Musume: The Horse Girl Who 66
Uma Musume: From Beginner 116
Becoming a Horse Girl, I Will 75
Uma Musume: I Want All 93
I Can Copy Unique Skills 79
Summoning an Evil God, but the 55
Supernatural Multiverse 75
My Harem Is Indescribable 68
Jujutsu Kaisen: Heroic Spirit 70
"I'm just a Valkyrie passing through." 66
Uma Musume: Today Is Another Romantic Battlefield 69
Still playing traditional Honk 49
The Most Filial Son Under Heav 53
What Should I Do After Switchi 42
Reincarnated as a Demon, Skill 50
Hell-Difficulty Dungeon? 38
Transmigrated as Sukuna 35
Checking In in Demon Slayer 40
The Reincarnating Trainer of Tracen Academy 55
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