Name: William Carnell

Level: 0

Class: Tarot Mage [F]

Titles: Trial Runner

Coins: 0

Mana: 15/15

Skill Points: 0

Stats:

Due to your title Trial Runner, your stat menu will be disabled until you have survived Main Events 0 and 1.

Universal Skills:

> Identify

Passive Skills:

> Card Seal: lvl MAX

> Deck Box: lvl 1

> 4 open slots

Active Skills:

> Draw: lvl 1

> Shuffle: lvl 1

> Invert: lvl 1

> Discard: lvl 1

> 2 open slots

Deck:

> Magic Missile

> Shield

> Chill

Will’s status menu appeared for the first time as he dashed backwards, avoiding the spider’s lunge. He wasn’t sure what triggered it, but he was happy to see it. With another act of, well, will, Will closed the menu.

The spider’s mandibles clicked on thin air, its legs nearly tangling on a cubicle. It was too wide for the narrow office hallways.

“Came from the Senior Director’s office,” Will mused. “Hope you shat on his chair. Wait. Do spiders shit?”

While Will talked to an indifferent monster, he tried getting a handle on this “deck” of his. Unlike the Identify skill, which came naturally, he wasn’t quite sure how to get his cards out of the deck.

“Hey, do you mind?” Will asked, stepping back. “I’m busy.”

Obviously, his Draw skill was what would facilitate that. To trigger the Identify skill, all he had to do was look at something and think really hard. Was the same true for Draw?

As he prepared himself to visualize the scrolls he’d taken, the spider pounced again.

Will definitely did not let out a scream, but if he did, it was a manly scream of anger and vengeance, not fear.

His heart in his throat from the sudden movement, Will did the first thing he could think of.

He picked a stapler up and threw it.

It bounced off one of the spider’s eyes, and the thing hissed, retreating a step or two.

No visible damage, though.

Will went back to trying to visualize his deck, closing his eyes. He got an entire one and a half seconds into his attempt when he heard the spider knock a chair over, crawling back towards him.

He opened his eyes, annoyed. “Don’t be such a David, man. Give me some space.”

Oh, wait. This spider didn’t know who David was.

That was probably for the better. The less said about that narcissistic prick, the better.

With no more staplers at his cubicle, Will instead threw his least favorite coffee mug. Samuel had gifted him that one instead of a bonus last year.

He couldn’t help but smile, watching that Employee of the Month decal shatter into a dozen pieces.

This time, he drew blood. Green viscous fluid flowed forth from the spider’s abdomen where he’d hit it, and it tumbled backwards.

Not a very durable monster, apparently. Well, it was only level 1, so that made sense.

Instead of trying to visualize the deck, which clearly hadn’t worked yet, Will decided to attempt something more direct.

“Draw,” he said, holding a hand out. He felt the slightest tinge of embarrassment acting as if he was some character in a mediocre anime, calling out his attack, but that faded when he felt the familiar touch of a card between his index and middle fingers.

Before the spider could recover fully, Will turned the card over in his hands. It was the same size as his Magic and Yugioh cards, and he couldn’t help but feel a twinge of regret at the reminder that he wasn’t going to be able to play at that tournament.

Just like his other cards, this one had art—and it moved. It displayed a looping image of a robed elder holding out a hand against an oncoming fire, a pale-blue circle of force protecting him and his allies.

The text on it read:

[Shield (Basic) — lvl 1]

Cost: 5 mana

Summons a circular forcefield, four feet in radius. Lasts 30 seconds + 15 seconds for each level of spell.

Forty-five seconds, then, if he was reading correctly. Though he wasn’t sure how exactly to activate it.

The spider, unfortunately, was not willing to wait for him, and it pounced once more, having righted itself surreptitiously. Will prepared to dodge, but then he felt the connection between him and the card. A thin thread of something—magic, maybe—leading from his arms into his fingers into the card itself.

He pulled on it.

Even though he knew it was coming, the sudden appearance of a saucer large enough to conceal his entire body surprised him. It looked straight out of a sci-fi movie.

And evidently, it worked. Rather than closing its long, hairy legs around him, the spider hit the forcefield and tumbled backwards, knocking half of the next cubicle over to the floor.

The shield stood just in front of him, vibrant blue energy hanging in the air.

“So this is magic,” Will said, observing his handiwork. “Hell yeah.”

This card was purely defensive, though. Even the edge of the forcefield seemed to be rounded, so it couldn’t be used as a blade. He had about forty seconds left before it faded, and potentially less time than that if the spider realized it could just crawl around the shield instead of throwing itself at it. He still needed to find a way to kill it.

In that case…

“Draw,” he declared again, reaching down towards the table and flicking his wrist out, as if he was actually drawing a card. Will drew from thin air, but his card appeared halfway through the motion. A magic trick, except this involved actual magic.

This card depicted a frozen cavern dripping with icicles.

Chill.

Once again, the card tugged at his heart. The magic felt different this time, as if the spell was cooling his veins as it traveled through his body, centralizing in the card, and then it activated, following his mind’s eye.

The air around him cooled noticeably, but the brunt of the effect was directed at the space the spider occupied. Its eyes began to frost over, and its movements slowed. The repeated impacts against the shield grew slower and slower—but it still looked alive.

Shield cost 5 mana and Chill cost 6, so no matter what card he drew next, he wasn’t going to be able to use it.

If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

“Nothing to be done about it, then,” Will said, unbuttoning his suit. “Here we go.”

He’d been ready to punch the living daylights out of his boss anyway. Samuel wasn’t here, so the spider would have to do.

Will stepped up onto his table, grabbed a paperweight, and hopped over the cubicle, going around his spell. He wasn’t yet familiar enough with the card to figure out how to move the shield, but he had a human brain, while the spider was, well…

He leaped toward its abdomen, pushing aside his thoughts of disgust, and he slammed the paperweight down.

With its size, the spider didn’t have much agility, so it wasn’t able to turn around as he punched it again and again, using the awkwardly shaped paperweight to keep his hands clean.

Just think of it as Samuel.

After two hits, he could feel the flesh beginning to give way under his fists. Will whooped, doubling the vigor with which he struck as primal bloodlust filled his body.

After five hits, the paperweight punched into its body, emerging covered in neon-green blood.

After ten, it stopped moving.

[You have received 6 coins!]

Will’s shield faded away as the notification arrived, and he stood with disgust. Even with the paperweight hitting the spider’s body instead of his actual fists, his hands were absolutely covered in sticky green blood.

Thankfully, he had an empty office to use.

After wiping his hands off on Samuel’s chair—which Will was displeased to find was ten times nicer than his—he sat back down at his cubicle, thinking.

Outside, a crow cawed. Maybe it was the same crow that’d cried out earlier, before the System came. Will wondered if a bird like that would even notice that the world had changed.

Will took another sip of the overly sweet coffee.

“I should probably leave the office,” he said to himself.

There were likely to be more monsters outside than there were in a relatively empty office. Will relished the adrenaline rush of killing the spider. He felt alive. He wanted more of this.

Main Event 0 required him to survive a single day. Will was sure that his coins would enable him to improve himself during that time, but compared to the 1,000 coin reward that the end of the Main Event would grant him, the 6 coins from killing the spider were practically nothing. There were bound to be monsters that awarded more coins out there, right?

Technically, it was safer to just wait here and survive, but there were two issues he took with that.

Number one: if Main Event 0 had the ominous “Current Objective: Survive,” Main Event 1 was sure to have something similar. Hiding was probably not going to be rewarded, and Will wanted to get as many coins as he could get before the difficulty ramped up. Which it definitely was going to, if he knew the first thing about sys—about this kind of apocalypse.

Number two: this office building sapped the shit out of his soul. Will wanted out.

So that was that decided. He was leaving.

But before he exited into the wider world, he needed to figure a few things out. There was nothing immediately threatening him, so he had time to experiment.

First: what did his Draw skill actually do? Was it a predetermined order? Did he have to say the word every time?

The latter was simple enough to test.

Draw, he thought, putting all his willpower into the strange magical sensation within him. He felt a thread of power within him, just like with Identify, and he focused on it, trying to catch hold of that feeling.

Sure enough, a card appeared in his open left hand. Magic Missile.

He’d gotten a unique card each of his three tries. Would he get a different one if he tried again?

“Draw,” he said out loud. It was easier to just say it instead of thinking it, but it was good to know he had the option.

Your current maximum hand size is 1. You may not Draw until your hand size is less than 1.

Fine. He supposed that made sense. Otherwise, he could simulate being a regular mage by simply cycling through every single card until he got to the one he wanted.

His mana was still at 4, though he got the sensation it was slowly ticking up. It seemed he wouldn’t have enough power to cast the 5-mana spell for some time.

While he waited, he perused the other skills he had. Focusing on them like he did with the Identify skill allowed him to view more details, just as expected.

First, the passives.

[Deck Box - lvl 1] - The Deck that powers your magic. Current maximum deck size: 3.

Oh, so he’d gotten the maximum number of cards right out the bat. Will hoped the number of cards he’d be able to store would go up as the skill leveled up.

Something told him it would, which was disturbing. Was he so sure because he’d read a few stories about this here and there? Was the System influencing him? To be honest, either of those reasonings sounded kind of shitty, so he just ignored it.

[Card Seal (NULL) - lvl MAX] - Facilitates your special class. Spells and some defeated monsters will be granted to you in the form of a card, not the traditional addition to your System that caster classes have. You have universal affinity with magic. Further details redacted.

Whoa, that descriptor hurt his head to look at. Will closed it almost as fast as he opened it, though he caught the text.

It looked like his greatest advantage was going to be that universal affinity with magic. Hopefully, that meant he would be able to get a much wider variety of spells than any regular caster would. The System wouldn’t give him a special class worse than a normal one, right?

And if it was worse, then fuck it. Wasn’t like he could change it now.

He shook his head, continuing to scroll through his skills.

Card Seal and Deck Box were his only passive skills. As for the actives, he already knew Draw, well, drew, but he still looked at it.

[Draw - lvl 1] - The key to the Tarot Mage class. Draw a card from your shuffled Deck. Current maximum cards drawn with one use: 1. Current maximum hand size: 1. Multi-card draws have a cooldown.

So there was more to it. From the wording, he could assume that the System was shuffling his deck, randomizing what cards he got. More importantly, Will was sure he’d be able to draw two cards or more at once as this skill leveled up. He would need skill points for that, he assumed. The tutorial being had said he’d be able to buy those with coins.

[Shuffle - lvl 1] - Returns your discarded cards to your Deck and shuffles it. You may physically shuffle the deck. Minimum duration: 5 seconds. Cooldown: 30 minutes.

Interesting. Discarded cards, huh… that definitely had something to do with the skill of the same name.

[Discard - lvl 1] - Discard 1 card from your hand without paying the mana cost for it. Cooldown: 15 seconds.

Based on a combination of the wording, he guessed that every card that he’d used would similarly go to the discard pile, just after being used.

In the corner of his vision, Will noticed his mana tick to 5. Perfect. That had been about… a minute to regenerate a mana point? Slower than he’d like, but that time would surely decrease as he got stronger.

The Magic Missile card was still in hand.

“Discard,” he ordered.

The card practically wilted away before fading into dust, slipping from his fingertips.

“Draw.”

Chill.

That confirmed that the deck was actually being shuffled, then. If it had been in the same order every time, that would’ve been Shield.

Will counted to ten, then spoke again. “Discard.”

Just like the last one, it dissipated into dust.

“Draw.”

Your discard pile is shuffling itself back into the deck. Please wait 1 more second.

Huh. Well then. Better to learn he had a built-in cooldown now than in the middle of a big fight, he supposed.

“Draw,” he said again.

Magic Missile.

This time, he decided to cast the spell. Will didn’t want it to go to waste, though, so he spent some time searching the floor.

By the time he found another one of those giant spiders, he had 8 mana points. This one had been hiding in David’s office, nosing through scrapbooks the other man had left behind, which was funnier to Will than it should’ve been.

He cast the spell, allowing it to leap forward from the card. A bright white sphere flashed forth from the space where the card had been, just in front of his outstretched left hand, and it slammed into the spider’s head with prejudice, leaving a glowing white trail in its wake like it was a jet plane.

When Will managed to blink the spots out of his eyes, the spider’s head was a smoking husk.

[You have gained 5 coins!]

Was there even anything he could buy with 11 coins? Scratch that, where was he even supposed to spend them?

He pushed that thought aside. He would deal with that after he confirmed his theories about his class. If it turned out they were useless, then he was no more fucked than he’d be otherwise.

“Draw.”

Shield. Either he was correct, or the Magic Missile card had returned to the deck and he’d gotten Shield by chance. It was 50-50 in that case, after all.

With nothing better to do, Will decided to go about proving his hypothesis. There were more spiders in the building than he’d thought there would be, and all of them were level 1. He kept track of time through his mana points, which he found recharged exactly once per 60 seconds, thanks to his still-functioning watch. None of the advanced electronics were working, sadly.

Will used primarily Magic Missile to take down the spiders, since it was the cheaper attack. Every now and then, he tried Chill. Rather than beat them in with his hands, which he’d learned was a messy venture, he threw heavy, useless monitors at the rapidly-freezing spiders, which practically exploded with gore thanks to their increased brittleness.

By the time he was satisfied that using a card did in fact send it to the discard pile, an hour had passed and he had gotten 41 more coins for a total of 52. He’d cleared out all of the third floor and most of the fourth. Everything in here had been a spider, and they’d all attacked him one by one, so it was a cinch.

Will stopped by his desk, drained the rest of the coffee, and took a couple more to go from the vending machine, which he burst open with a very careful use of Magic Missile.

He still hadn’t leveled up, which he deduced was because he’d only been farming weak mobs. If this had been one of those webcomics he used to love, he would’ve been fighting super over-leveled bosses by now, not just experimenting.

Then again, he could take his time. This was real life—probably. Playing it smart was important, though deep down, Will knew that wasn’t why he was doing what he was.

No, he was dragging this out because it was fun. More fun than he’d had in ages. Partway through, he’d examined his last skill—

[Invert - lvl 1] - Invert the effects of one of the cards in your hand. Warning: inverted effects may not always be intuitive and are not guaranteed to be consistent between uses. Use at your own discretion. Cooldown: 1 minute.

While he hadn’t wanted to experiment with it too much, for fear that he’d accidentally blow himself up, Will confirmed that an Inverted Chill would heat the spiders so much that they would be half-cooked when he killed them.

Now, he was just about ready to go outside. There had to be more interesting prey than child-sized spiders in the outside world, and Will wanted more of this. More of everything.

But first, he needed to see what he could do with his coins.

“Shop,” he tried. “Purchase? Inventory? Sales? Store?”

Store was the word that triggered it, apparently.

System Store

Special Location: N/A

Universal Items

Stat Point - 5,000 coins

Skill Point - 10,000 coins

Food & Water (1 day) - 25 coins

Basic Mana Potion - 100 coins

Basic Health Potion - 100 coins

Class Items

Random F-Tier card - 50 coins

Random G-Tier card - 1 coin

That was it. Will really hoped the store would populate with more items later, because this was… well, it wasn’t disappointing, but it was rather sparse.

Knowing the prices for things gave him more context. If—when, he mentally corrected himself—he survived to the end of Main Event 0, he would get enough coins to buy 20 cards, but not enough to buy even a single stat point. Not that stat points mattered, since his stats were currently locked, but skill points were even less achievable.

Alright. There was nothing he could do about that other than earn more coins, so for now his options were limited to the less expensive stuff.

What would happen if he bought a card? Would he be able to slot it into his deck? The maximum size was 3 right now—would he even be able to swap one out?

No other way to find out.

You have purchased a Random F-Tier Card.

It cost most of his coins, but he could always get more.

A card appeared in his hand almost instantly, and he turned it over, revealing the animated image of a shaking earthen fissure.

That spark of excitement ignited once more. In a career with little free time and barely enough income to have money left over, opening card packs was a rare event that he could look forward to. Now, those cards had magic.

“Hm,” he muttered, looking at the description. His eyes widened. “This could be useful.”