Ryder opened his eyes, and the first thing that greeted him was complete darkness. Confused, he looked towards his surroundings, but there was nothing he could see.

‘Shit, I’ve been kidnapped..’

Rather than being panicked, Ryder was actually calm as this had happened in his previous life as well. As an accomplished inventor, he had his fair share of companies trying to extract information from him.

He was laid back on some kind of board that bounded his hands and feet. He tried struggling to break free but to no avail. It seems like he was trapped in pitch black darkness, with no mobility at all.

At first, Ryder actually enjoyed the silence and peace in the dark, as it let him think about all the crazy things that had happened thus far. But as time passed, a sense of unease crept into his thoughts. He started to realize that this was not like the kidnapping back on Earth, he was in a completely different world and who knows what would happen to him!

His thoughts started to grow restless, and he wondered what would happen to him now that he was completely vulnerable.

‘Who kidnapped me? Why? What do they want?’ Such thoughts invaded his mind every so often.

Ryder thought about his perpetrator who, in his mind, looked like the reaper who came to take his life. He thought of a couple of possibilities of who his kidnappers were, which included Tamsa or the demons. However, he had no idea what they were like, and he shuddered at the scenarios of what the other party would do to him. Unlike on Earth, here, he didn’t have anything of value, which meant he didn’t have anything to bargain his life with. Or so he thought.

As time passed, Ryder’s uneasiness continued to grow, but he had already accepted his fate. He just wanted to know why this happened to him, the forgotten son of a Duke, instead of his other well known brothers.

Hours seemed to have passed, or that’s what it felt like to Ryder. It could’ve been just minutes even, but there was no way for him to tell. More time passed, and now his throat started to feel parched and his stomach started grumbling. He wasn’t starving, but the pang of hunger still added to his growing insanity.

His muscles started to strain from being in one location for so long, and he struggled to try to loosen them. Just as he couldn’t take it anymore, Ryder heard the faint sound of footsteps. He couldn’t the direction it was coming from, but the sound became louder and louder before it stopped.

Suddenly, a click was heard before Ryder was faced with a blinding white light. As his vision cleared up, he could see the faint silhouette of a small figure before him. This time, Ryder could make out the person’s face, who wore a white lab coat and a menacing glare. He had no hair, which made him all the more look like a goblin.

The man walked up to Ryder before stopping right in front of him. He then checked Ryder’s pulse before doing all sorts of checkups on him. After he was done, he looked up at Ryder and said “why did he bring in someone as weak as you?”

Ryder was confused as well, he looked at the man in front of him with questioning eyes like he didn’t know how to answer. Instead, he responded with a question of his own.

“Why did you people kidnap me?” He asked, staring at the man.

The man ignored Ryder and reached into his coat before pulling out a laptop. The laptop looked different compared to the laptops back on Earth, and there was some kind of magic design on the back of it, but the screen still lit up and functioned like a normal laptop.

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He then proceeded to type furiously into his laptop before showing Ryder a screen of what seemed to be a fasta. The man pointed at Ryder, then at the screen, which meant that the fasta on the screen was Ryder’s. The man then compared Ryder’s fasta with another one, which confused Ryder.

“This is the problem.” The man grumbled. He stared accusingly at Ryder as if he had done something wrong.

“What’s the problem?” Asked Ryder. “They look the same.”

“That’s the problem!” The man snapped. “You’re supposed to be the descendant of a bloodline family, but the problem is your genes are the same as those of a normal person!”

At that moment, Ryder knew why he had been kidnapped. It seemed like his perpetrators were after his bloodline genes, but he didn’t know why.

“Can’t you just feed me those bloodline enhancement elixirs?” He asked, hoping to gain something out of this.

The man stared at Ryder as if he was special. He then said mockingly “and why should we spend something so precious on you?”

Ryder knew he was right, so he tried thinking of other ways to get out of this situation. However, before he could further contemplate, the man suddenly sighed and shut his laptop down.

“Well, it seems like we’ve got another body to dispose of.”

Ryder was horrified, as he knew the body was going to be him. As the man started to stand up, Ryder’s mind went into overdrive in order to think of solutions to survive. He then went with a solution that he decided was the safest bet, the one where he had to prove his worth.

“Wait.” He said, trying to keep his voice as steady as possible. “I know I don’t have any activated bloodline genes, but I do know biotechnology.”

The man stopped with whatever he was doing and then looked at Ryder with a raised eyebrow.

“Biotechnology.” He muttered. “What’s that?”

Using this as his chance, Ryder quickly added: “I can help with any of your research. In fact, if you give me enough time, I can come up with a way to activate my genes without needing anything.”

The man was in disbelief as if he couldn’t believe what Ryder was saying.

“Do you know what you’re saying?” He asked in a grave tone as he stared at Ryder.

At this point, Ryder was saying whatever came up in his mind, and seeing that it was working, tried to further fuel the fire.

“As long as you have the equipment needed, I can do it.” He responded.

The man folded his arms, and Ryder could feel his gaze pierce through him. “And why should I believe you?”

“Because you have nothing to lose.” Ryder quickly said. “If I fail, then you could dispose of me as you wanted to initially, but if I succeed, then you would gain an invaluable method.”

For a moment, silence overwhelmed the room. The man said nothing, only continuing to stare at Ryder, who, on the other hand, was starting to become embarrassed by the staring.

“Alright, I’ll only give you this one chance.” He finally said, before walking up to him and untying his arms and legs. “Fail, and you die.”

An ecstatic Ryder looked up as a wave of relief hit him. He laid there dazed as if he couldn’t believe he had gotten himself out of the scenario.

“Well, what are you waiting for.”

The man’s sudden voice snapped Ryder out of his stupor. Shaking off his thoughts, he stretched out his arms and legs before struggling to stand up. Now that he could see his surroundings, Ryder was shocked to find that his room contained nothing in it besides the “bed” he was tied down to.

The man then led Ryder out of the room, and the scene before Ryder stunned him yet again. Before him lay the biggest laboratory he had ever been to, with highly advanced technology covering up nearly every surface. Everywhere he could see, crystalline tubes lined up the walls with something pulsating inside of it. Magic designs glowed behind each piece of machinery, which Ryder thought was the source of energy that powered the machines.

As Ryder was standing there still taking in his surroundings, the man looked at him before grinning. “Welcome to Tamsa, home of the damned.”