Chapter 4: First Task

A young man dressed in an expensive black suit sat at the reception of a hospital, waiting for the doctor's report. His brows furrowed in deep concentration, and his shoes tapped the floor in continuous succession as he became impatient after waiting for so long.

His subordinate, who was sitting not too far away, felt distressed as he noticed his boss was about to lose his temper. 

Shortly after a male doctor with long black hair walked out just in time, and the young man glared at him in dissatisfaction while the doctor smiled innocently.

"Must you always keep me waiting anytime I come to your hospital for a checkup? Can't you be a professional and attend to your patients on time?" The young man asked as he walked behind the doctor to his office.

"You don't expect me to give you special treatment because you are family, do you? Besides, young master Mark, you didn't make an appointment before barging into the hospital," Dr. Nathan, Mark's cousin, reprimanded him with an eye roll as he brought out the equipment needed for Mark's checkup.

The Prime Hospital is a private hospital with the best service, equipment, and doctors in the whole country. It is owned by the Watson group and managed by Nathan Watson, Mark's paternal cousin. 

The Watson family is known as the richest family in the whole country; their power is unfathomable; their family is in every sector of the economy: politics, health, fashion, business, and even entertainment. 

No other family can stand toe to toe with them in the country; even Hamilton's family is a fly beside their dragon. There was a rumour that the Watson family was related to royalties and that the family owned a royal title.

Once Nathan was done doing the necessary test, he glanced at the report and nodded in approval. "It seems you have been following my instructions properly," he commented with a sly smile as Mark glared at him. 

"I have no choice after you sent that evil Celina to monitor me; can I lay off those drugs now? They make me sluggish all through the day," Mark replied as he picked up a chocolate from the chocolate box on Nathan's table.

"You will have to complete the previous dose and come back for a check; However, you have improved a lot, and you will be laying off them soon," Nathan explained calmly, and Mark nodded.

"Have you solved the firewall problem?" Nathan asked as a change of subject once he noticed Mark wasn't ready to leave.

"No, our hackers couldn't fix the problem, and those from the website are too shabby; they couldn't even get in," Mark explained as he massaged his tense nape. The reminder about the important files they've lost due to the loophole in the firewall made his migraine return.

Sometime last month, Alpha's company, which is the technology aspect of the large Watson group, was suddenly attacked by some foreign hackers, and some of their important files were stolen leaving the firewall damaged. Since then, they haven't been able to find anyone to fix the damaged firewall or get back the file.

He was grateful that the files were about the projects they had already done and wouldn't cause any major loss to the company; it would have been another case entirely if the files stolen were the new projects they were about to introduce to the market. 

As he was about to get into his car, his phone rang, and he noticed it was a call from his office assistant. 

"Yes?"

"Master Mark! Someone took the firewall job on the website!" The assistant exclaimed excitedly. Mark frowned, not understanding the reason for his excitement. It wasn't the first time someone would take the job only to drop it for failure.

"Okay? Is that worth reporting?" He asked coldly.

"That's not the main point; they took the job at midday, which was three hours ago, and now they just broke through the fourth stage of the firewall and entered the main system! I think this person can fix the problem!" The assistant explained, and Mark's eyes went wide in surprise.

'Just three hours to break through?' he thought to himself and then asked his assistant for confirmation. 

"Yes, it took them just three hours! But after they broke through the firewalls, they went off."

"I'm coming over right now! Have the necessary things available; I would like to have a private chat with them to see if we can bring them to work for us."

Even their team of hackers, which was made up of the country's best, weren't able to do anything about the damaged firewall as they were all locked out. Which was why Mark wanted to bring the expert into their company before other people did. 

***

Lily lay on her bed tiredly, as she had overtasked her brain and recovering body for the past three hours. 

Her hands trembled slightly, and she sighed. "This body is too weak," she complained.

{She was previously malnourished and then had an accident; of course, she'd be weak!} The system replied with an eye roll.

Lily kept quiet and thought about the firewalls she had just broken into. The firewall was one of the hardest she had ever worked on in both lives; if not the hardest one, it was intricately designed, and any wrong step could lead to major damage.

As soon as she entered the firewall, she soon realised it had previously been broken into, which triggered it to mutate and become even more sinister, and the kind of mutation was bad since it had lots of loopholes that could be exploited by external people.

As she rested, she thought about ways to fix the mutation and reverse it in a way that would benefit the user. As she was searching her memories for ways to fix the firewall, the system interrupted her thoughts.

{The system noticed that the technological development and knowledge of the host are too little and cannot be compared to others, and the system has generated the first task for the host}

{Mission: study and become a master hacker in one month.} 

As Victoria heard the task, her eyes twitched in annoyance. "How dare you tell me my technological knowledge is little? I will have you know I was among the best in my previous life," she bragged.

{But not the best! You can read while you rest!} 

Victoria noticed a purple screen pop up in front of her after the system's words, and on the screen was a large book with the title.

"Beginner's Guide to Hacking"

{You have to become the best at what you do, or else I would be too ashamed to call you my host!}