A grey cloak of twilight descended upon the city, mirroring the somber mood that clung to Lin Yi like a persistent shadow. The curt dismissal still echoed in his ears, a final, brutal note in the symphony of his professional demise. Another door slammed shut, another avenue of hope barricaded. He ambled along the cracked pavement, the cityscape blurring at the edges of his vision, a landscape as bleak as his prospects. The weight of his redundancy pressed down on him, heavy and suffocating.
Then, a voice, crisp and devoid of human inflection, sliced through the melancholic hum of his thoughts.
[Activating Supreme Career Experience System…][Activation Successful!]
Lin Yi faltered, his steps arrested. Had he imagined it? The city noise seemed to swallow the sound as quickly as it had appeared. He glanced around, a flicker of unease stirring within the stagnant pool of his despair. He was alone.
The disembodied voice returned, this time with an unnerving clarity that resonated directly within the confines of his skull. It spoke of weeks and nascent vocations, of a grand design unfolding unbeknownst to him. And then, the pronouncement:
[Commencing Career Assignment for the Current Week.][Assigned Profession: Didi Driver.]
A Didi driver. The irony was not lost on Lin Yi. Here he was, adrift and jobless, and the universe, in its infinite jest, had deemed him worthy of ferrying strangers through the urban sprawl. He almost laughed, a dry, humorless sound that caught in his throat.
But the System was far from finished with its pronouncements. Accompanying the bizarre assignment came an even more improbable set of provisions:
[Acquiring Complimentary Items…][Item Acquired: Koenigsegg One:1 Supercar.][Item Acquired: God-Level Driving Skills.]
Lin Yi stopped dead in his tracks, his breath catching in his chest. This had to be a hallucination, the byproduct of stress and exhaustion. He blinked, the neon glow of a distant billboard momentarily searing his retinas. When his vision cleared, it was still there.
Parked with an almost spectral stillness in a nearby space, a vehicle materialized as if plucked from the very fabric of dreams. Its lines were sharp and predatory, an obsidian silhouette catching the faint light. It was a Koenigsegg One:1, a hypercar whispered about in hushed, reverent tones – a machine worth more than his entire lineage could have amassed.
Before the sheer impossibility of it could fully register, a torrent of knowledge flooded his mind. It was the language of speed, the physics of cornering, the intuitive understanding of every nuance of the vehicle's formidable power. God-level driving skills. The System was not joking.
A new notification chimed in his consciousness:
[Weekly Task: Complete designated orders and receive a 5-star rating from customers.]
Lin Yi stared at the gleaming supercar, his mind reeling. Disbelief warred with a burgeoning sense of the surreal. Could this be real? Was this some elaborate prank of a mind pushed to its breaking point?
As if to answer his unspoken question, his phone buzzed with an incoming ride request. The destination was across the city. Hesitantly, almost against his own volition, Lin Yi approached the Koenigsegg. The driver's side door swung open with a silent, futuristic grace.
He slid into the plush, carbon-fiber interior, the scent of fine leather filling his nostrils. It felt real. Too real to be a figment of his imagination. With a deep breath, a mixture of trepidation and a sliver of exhilaration coursing through him, he accepted the ride.
Moments later, a young woman stood on the curb, her eyes widening in disbelief as the sleek, black Koenigsegg One:1 purred to a stop before her. She checked her phone, then back at the car, a look of utter bewilderment etched on her face. This couldn't be her Didi.
Lin Yi lowered the window, a hesitant smile gracing his lips. "Didi?" he inquired, his voice betraying a touch of uncertainty. "Are you… the passenger?"
The young woman could only stammer, her gaze fixated on the million-dollar machine. "I… I think there must be some mistake."
"No mistake," Lin Yi replied, a newfound confidence beginning to bloom within him. "Lin Yi, your Didi driver. Please, get in."
The chapter closed on the woman's incredulous expression, the opulent interior of the Koenigsegg, and Lin Yi, the newly appointed Didi driver, poised at the precipice of a week unlike any he had ever imagined.