Terms And conditions Apply : Invoicing The Apocalypse

Forced Acquisition Under the Sudirman Sky

The white light dimmed, leaving silver specks floating in the air like the combustion residue of data. The asphalt beneath Freza's feet no longer felt hot instead, it had transformed into a cold, polished black marble floor. The black dragon that had been ready to devour him was now frozen, its wings spread stiffly in the air like a giant statue that had lost its gravity.

"Cough! Crazy... did you really hit it with your inner power, Qor?" Freza coughed, clutching his chest which felt tight. In front of him, a transparent golden hologram screen flickered slowly, displaying a sharply skyrocketing graph.

"Well, you asked for it, Mas Freza! I panicked, damn it! I thought you were going to die a martyr over administrative matters!" Qoriski ran closer, his breath coming in gasps. His face, which had been deathly pale, was now flushing red from the adrenaline. "But what was that just now, Mas? Why did the world suddenly turn into a meeting room?"

"Welcome to Acquisition Mode, Qor. It's an emergency protocol for when a manager abuses their authority," Freza replied as he stood up straight. He straightened his slightly torn shirt collar. "The System is a machine, Qoriski. Machines have failsafes. If an Admin or Senior Compliance officer like Malphas makes rules that contradict the system's primary goal which is 'ecosystem sustainability' then the system opens a loophole for a forced asset takeover."

"I don't get it, Mas. I swear, my CS brain can't keep up," Qoriski scratched his head.

"The point is this: that Dragon attacked me while my status was 'Lien Holder.' That constitutes destruction of company assets by the management. And according to the Multiverse Corporate Law, that is a valid reason for a Hostile Takeover."

"IMPOSSIBLE!" Malphas’s voice thundered. The robed figure landed on the marble floor with a heavy thud. The scale symbol on his forehead was now cracked, emitting a red warning light that beeped incessantly. "You are merely an insect! A trash user! How could the system authority grant Corporate Takeover access to a non-organized entity like you?!"

Freza smirked. He stepped forward, sliding his hands casually into his pockets. "Malphas, you’re too focused on the old rulebook. You forgot to read the terms and conditions in the 'Community-Based Ecosystem' section. You said Earth was just a development site, right?"

"That is the reality! You are merely resources!" Malphas screamed, his hands trembling as he tried to access his now-locked system menu.

"Big mistake. On page forty thousand two hundred, it states that 'Any planet possessing intelligent civilization is automatically categorized as a Primary Content Vendor.' As a vendor, we have voting rights if the company meaning your System takes unilateral actions that harm vendor operations. You want to kill me? That’s called a unilateral contract termination without severance pay. And now, I’m using my voting rights to buy your shares, which are currently plummeting because you caused a mess here."

"Mas Freza, wait... do we actually have the money to buy his shares?" Qoriski whispered, his eyes bulging.

"We do, Qor. What else would we use but 'Life Debt'? Calculate how many humans died because of this flawed tutorial. Every life is worth billions of Gold on the system's balance sheet. I just converted the entire death toll of humanity into capital to buy Malphas's operational license."

[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: ACQUISITION PROCESS AT 15%]

[MALPHAS STATUS: UNDER PERFORMANCE REVIEW]

"Damn you! How dare you!" Malphas tried to lunge at Freza, but his hands were suddenly stopped by a transparent wall that appeared out of nowhere.

"Oops, no physical contact in the mediation room, Mr. Senior," Freza mocked. "Now, Qoriski! See that dragon? Its status is now 'Asset Under Supervision.' Hit its neck with your gavel, but don't kill it. We need it as liquidity collateral."

"On it, Boss! If it's about hitting things, I'm the expert!" Qoriski jumped high. His gavel glowed with a golden light brighter than before. "Hey, Dragon! Sorry, it's a professional requirement!"

BOOM!

The strike from Qoriski's gavel created a shockwave that cracked the dragon's scale armor. The black dragon groaned in pain, its voice muffled by the rules of the mediation room.

"Outrageous! You are damaging the System's valuable assets!" Malphas screamed hysterically. His featureless face began to show digital cracks. "If the center finds out about this, they will delete this entire galaxy!"

"Let them find out. It’s better that way," Freza walked closer to Malphas, staring right where his eyes should have been. "Let them know that their middle management here is full of 'competent' people who only know how to draft fake emergency decrees to cover their own tracks. Are you afraid my audit results will reach the CEO?"

"You... you have no idea what you are facing, Freza. This system is not just numbers on paper."

"To me, everything is a number. If it can't be calculated, it has no value. And your value right now in my eyes? Negative, Malphas. You are an operational cost burden that needs to be cut."

"Mas Freza! The dragon is weak! What should I do next?" Qoriski shouted while sitting on the dragon's head, which was now kissing the marble floor.

"Good. Qor, open the 'Collective Inventory' menu. Transfer ownership of that dragon to the name 'Doomsday Collection Office.' Don't forget to get life insurance for it, so if it dies, we get compensation from the system."

"Whoa, there's insurance for monsters too? That's high-tech," Qoriski was busy fiddling with his hologram screen. "Hey, Mas, there's an option for 'Make Operational Vehicle.' Should I click it?"

"Click it. So we don't have to take a taxi to the next dungeon."

"CRAZY! YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY CRAZY!" Malphas roared. His body began to fade, becoming transparent. "This lawsuit... I will take it to the highest level of appeal! You will not make it out of Jakarta alive!"

"We'll see who's faster, Malphas. Me or your termination letter," Freza replied coldly.

Suddenly, the marble room shook violently. The frozen Jakarta sky began to move again, but with a different color. Instead of blood red, the sky was now a boring office blue, complete with grid lines like an Excel spreadsheet.

"Mas! Mas! Look up there!" Qoriski pointed toward the sky.

A giant digital clock appeared in the atmosphere, counting down from 60:00. Below it, large text read: [REMAINING MEDIATION TIME].

"What's that now, Mas? Don't tell me we're being told to take an exam?" Qoriski asked in a panic.

"That's our time limit to finish the audit in the Sudirman area, Qor. If we can't prove within an hour that this system suffered massive losses because of Malphas, this room will explode and we'll be considered 'System Errors' that must be permanently deleted."

"Huh?! One hour to audit a whole city?! Mas, you've got to be kidding! It takes me five minutes just to find a parking receipt in my own bag!"

"That's why you shouldn't complain so much. Quick, get on that dragon. We have to go around Jakarta to gather evidence of monster malpractice."

"But Mas, Malphas is gone! Where did he run off to?"

"He didn't run. He's preparing dimensional lawyers, I'm sure of it. We have to move fast before he comes back with an even scarier army of bureaucrats."

Freza jumped onto the back of the black dragon, which was now obedient to him. Qoriski followed with a still-tense face, but his hand gripped his gavel tightly.

"Qoriski, listen to me carefully. For the next hour, every monster you see, don't kill them immediately. Ask them first: do they have pay slips? Are they given meal allowances? If not, take a photo immediately and put it in the 'Monster Labor Rights Violation' file."

"Got it, Boss! I'll interrogate them until they cry!"

The dragon flapped its wings, flying low between Jakarta's skyscrapers, some of which were already destroyed. From above, they could see thousands of people still hiding inside buildings, staring in fear at the dragon now ridden by a man in a dress shirt and a small creature in a CS uniform.

"Mas Freza, look down there! A group of Goblins is surrounding a convenience store!" Qoriski shouted.

"Land there! That's a vital asset for our logistics!"

The dragon landed with a heavy thud right in front of an Indomaret with shattered glass. A group of Goblins, busy looting instant noodles, turned around and raised their rusty weapons.

"WHO ARE YOU?! HOW DARE YOU INTERRUPT OUR LOOT!" shouted the pot-bellied Goblin leader.

"Good afternoon, gentlemen," Freza got off the dragon with the air of a director conducting a field inspection. "I am Freza, an Auditor from the Doomsday Collection Office. I'd like to ask, have you gentlemen received your lunch allowance from the System?"

The Goblins looked at each other, appearing confused. "What allowance? We were told to eat whatever is here!"

"Wow, this is a serious violation," Freza shook his head while taking notes on his hologram. "Do you know that according to Tutorial Chapter 4, every field monster must be provided with standard nutrition in the form of 'Mana Bread'? Ordering you to loot human stores is called shifting operational cost responsibility from the System to a third party without a cooperation contract."

"So... so what if we loot?" asked the Goblin leader, his voice shrinking.

"It means you're working without pay. You're slaves, not soldiers. Do you want me to help you countersue so you can get gold wages instead of just eating raw instant noodles?"

"Really, Mr. Human? We can get gold?" The Goblins' eyes immediately sparkled.

"Absolutely. But on one condition: you must testify that Malphas and his team never provided any socialization regarding monster rights on Earth."

"We want to! We want to!" the Goblins shouted in unison.

"Good. Qoriski, give them the witness statement forms. Tell them to thumbprint it with their own blood. Then move them to the parking area; tell them to guard our assets there."

"On it, Boss! Man, this is crazy... we've only been going for five minutes and we already have our own Goblin army," Qoriski laughed gleefully while handing out hologram sheets to the green monsters.

However, amidst the bustle, the air temperature suddenly dropped drastically. Ice began to crawl up the walls of the surrounding buildings. From behind the boring grid clouds, a cold and sharp female voice was heard through the sky's loudspeaker system.

"User Freza. I am The General Counsel of the Central Administration. Your action of provoking field monster units is categorized as 'Internal Sabotage.' Based on the Non-Disclosure Agreement you implicitly signed when pressing the 'Start' button..."

"I never pressed the 'Start' button, Ma'am," Freza cut in sharply. "I only pressed the 'Report Bug' button. And according to legal rules, a bug reporter is not bound by a Non-Disclosure Agreement until the problem is resolved amicably."

"We do not know 'amicably.' We only know efficiency. Law Enforcement Unit 02: Execute this Paper Human!"

Suddenly, a creature far more terrifying than the previous Enforcers emerged from the ground. It had no physical body, but was a collection of thousands of document papers swirling to form a ten-meter-tall giant. In its hand, it held a sword made of a stack of duty stamps sharper than a laser.

"Oh no... Mas Freza... what is that now?!" Qoriski trembled, nearly dropping his gavel.

"That... that's 'The Paper Shredder.' The embodiment of physical evidence destruction," Freza narrowed his eyes. "This is bad. If it touches us, all the documents we've collected will be destroyed!"

"Then what do we do?! It's huge, Mas!"

"Qor, do you remember the article about 'Digital Archive Storage'? If the physical is destroyed, we must have a backup in the cloud!"

"There's no cloud here, Mas! We're in the middle of the street!"

"There is! You are CS, Qoriski! You have direct access to the server memory! I'm going to send all this data to your brain, but the risk is... your brain will get hot like an internet cafe CPU used for heavy gaming for three days and nights!"

"What?! Mas, I'm not married yet! Don't make my brain explode now!"

The paper giant swung its stamp sword, slicing Freza's black dragon in two with a single slash. The dragon vanished into digital ash, leaving Freza and Qoriski standing unprotected before the document-destroying monster.

"Mas Freza! The sword is coming for us!"

"Hold on, Qor! Receive the data now! EXECUTE DATA TRANSFER!"

Freza pressed his hand to Qoriski's forehead. A surge of blue light flowed, transferring thousands of legal files and evidence of system corruption directly to the little CS's central nervous system. Qoriski's eyes rolled back white, his mouth foamed slightly, while the paper giant had already raised its sword right above their heads.

Just as the sword was about to touch Freza's hair, the chime of the digital clock in the sky reached 00:00.

The world suddenly became silent. Not a peaceful silence, but a terrifying one, as if someone had just pressed the mute button on the entire universe. The paper giant stopped mid-motion, and a small piece of paper fell from its body, floating slowly in front of Freza's face.

Freza took the paper. His eyes widened as he read its contents.

"Damn... Qoriski, wake up! We miscalculated..."

"Uh... what, Mas? I'm so dizzy... what's wrong?" Qoriski tried to open his eyes.

"It wasn't Malphas the system wanted to destroy..." Freza pointed to the paper now burning in his hand. "The system... the system itself just declared bankruptcy."

In the distance, Jakarta's buildings began to crack and crumble, not from an attack, but because they were disappearing like a simulation running out of power. In the sky, a large red text appeared that no one in the history of this apocalypse had ever seen:

[LIQUIDATION IN PROGRESS: EARTH SERVER IS BEING SOLD TO THE HIGHEST BIDDER]

"Mas Freza... what does that mean?"

"It means..." Freza stared at the darkening horizon. "Earth was just sold to a third party. And we... we don't know who the new buyer is."

Suddenly, a very familiar laugh was heard from behind them. Not Malphas's voice, but a much smoother voice, yet full of pure malice.

"Congratulations, Auditor. You have successfully bankrupted the old system. Now, let's talk about the administrative fees for the new owner..."

A man in a pristine white suit stood there, holding a contract a meter thick.

"Who are you?!" Freza snapped.

The man smiled, showing rows of teeth that were too white for a human. "Call me... The Curator."

And at that exact moment, the floor beneath them completely vanished, sending them falling into an endless darkness, leaving a single page of the contract floating in the air with the words...