My Goalkeeping System

It had been about ten minutes since Emma arrived for work and she had quickly gotten to work on her laptop.

Of course, there was a whole PC set sitting on her desk but she preferred to work on her laptop.

The room was very large with lots of desks scattered around the area for the various workers in various departments.

It was normal to have those working in the same departments stay close to each other to make things easier in the office, that was why Matthew's desk was right beside hers but he wasn't there.

She knew he had already arrived for work judging by the fact that his monitor was on and he had already begun to type something on it.

"I wonder where he went." She muttered before slowly turning her gaze to the side.

"Hey."

She quickly turned her gaze to the other side to see Matthew standing there with both of his hands stuck into his pocket and a smile on his face.

"Hey, where have you been?" She asked. "I've been here for like ten minutes and you were nowhere to be found."

"I was with Miss. Nelly." He said pointing backward.

"Oh, why did she call you?"

"Last night's interviews and articles, she just wanted to talk to me about a few minor things that needed changing," Matthew said.

"Okay."

"She wants to see you."

"Huh?"

"She wants to see you, Emma." He repeated. "And before you ask me why, I just want to say that I don't know but you should go answer her fast."

Emma didn't say anything as she stared toward her office while Matthew made his way to his desk.

'Why are you so frightened all of a sudden? It's probably just to change a few things.' She thought to herself before slowly getting up from her seat.

She adjusted her skirt by pulling it down to her knees a little and then made sure her jacket was buttoned properly.

The place was open and was quite a large office because of the constant summoning of all staff so Emma didn't have to go through knocking to get into the office.

A blonde haired quite young-looking woman was sitting behind the desk in the office, she had little bags under her eyes to indicate that she had not been getting enough sleep and as always she had a cup of coffee beside her to keep her going.

She slowly raised her gaze to look at Emma as soon as she entered the room and seeing who it was, a smile suddenly appeared on her face

Emma wasn't going to be fooled by that smile ever again because that was how things had started last time.

"I heard you wanted to see me, Miss. Nelly." She said as she walked closer to stand in front of her desk.

"Emma Smith, right?"

"Yes, ma'am," Emma replied with a nod.

She didn't say anything else for a while as she slowly went through what was written on the paper that she was holding.

That silence alone was making Emma's heart sink deeper and deeper inside.

"So." She said before putting the paper down. "I read the report you wrote about last night's match and the catchy title you picked out."

"You think it's catchy?" Emma said, trying hard to hide the surprised expression she had on her face.

"Of course, Unique FC's ball magnet." She said with a nod. "You must have felt really proud of yourself to give your boyfriend such a nice nickname."

This was one of the things she had been avoiding and wanted to avoid given the fact that she was working in the sports department football specifically and Dave was a professional footballer.

She didn't want her to find out about her relationship with Dave or her brother as she knew it was going to lead to her being biased with her writing.

Miss. Nelly had just dropped one on her but she was going to keep her composure and answer her in the best way she could.

"I didn't write it because he's my boyfriend, I would have done the same if it was another person in that position." She said,

"Would you have also written the article like this if it was another person in the position?"

"Is there anything wrong with the article?" Emma asked with a confused expression on her face.

"All I'm seeing here is I know, I think and I believe, you were told to write an article about the match not give us your opinion on what you think, know, or believe will happen in the future, that should be left as a question and then you leave the fans to know, believe and think." Miss. Nelly asked. "You're free to think whatever you think will happen but nobody asked for it here, keep it to yourself. I believe you have the draft with you, of course, you have the draft with you, I want you to quickly rewrite the whole thing and I want you to keep your opinions to yourself this time."

"Okay, ma'am." Was the only thing Emma could say as she couldn't think of anything to counter what she had just said, she was right in a lot of ways, she had let personal feelings get in the way while writing the article without even realizing it until now.

"I'm sorry about what happened last night in the interview." She said just before she stepped out through the exit.

"If you're thinking that's the way I found out about your relationship then you're wrong." Miss. Nelly said.

"Of course, it's not." She muttered before making her way out of the area.

______ _____

Dave had finally stepped outside after spending two hours indoors just like he said.

[ 105/105 Energy ]

[ 100% stamina remaining ]

He felt like he had just woken up from sleep, he didn't usually feel this way but he felt like he needed a way to expel all this energy.

<A few rounds of intense training would do the trick>

'I know, I just wish the system would give me a really good physical quest with very nice rewards, I feel like I could do a hundred push-ups and still have a lot of energy left in me.'

<You did not just say that>

'Yes, I did, I know I can do it.' He said before jumping up a few times right in the middle of the lawn.

<The thing is that you do not know the implications of what you just said>

'Implications?' Dave replied with a confused expression on his face.

[ Quest received ]

[ Complete a hundred push-ups in one go ]

[ Quest rewards ]

[ +60 exp ]

[ +10 upgrade to energy ]

[ +5 stat points to strength ]

'Hey, I was just joking, the rewards look nice but I don't think I can do a hundred push-ups in one go, I'm going to have to fail this one.'

<I don't think you will like the implications of that>

'Implications?'

[ Failure to complete the quest will attract punishments ]

[ Punishment ]

[ -15 deduction to all stats for six months ]

[ Only one skill will be available in matches ]

[ Skills will not level up until punishment duration is over ]

[ Punishment duration: six months ]

Looking at the messages that had just popped up on his screen, Dave had quite a horrid look on his face.