The flames erupted like a volcano with a thunderous roar. "RRRRRAAAAAGGGHHH!" the fire giant screamed as he slammed his fist into the players in front.

"The tanks in group one focus on keeping the boss in place, while group two prepares for the summons!" the leaders said in the voice chat.

The raid had gone fine till now, but they couldn’t drop their guard. "Start putting buffs on the DPS!"

The giant slammed the players in front, and from his feet a carpet of fire gave birth to several dogs of fire with two heads.

"Deal with the Hellhounds fast, use ice spells. Wizards, save mana for the next phase!"

The Hellhounds were killed quickly by the mages and ranged DPS, just a little more. They were about to be the first guild to clear the Forge of Giants. This would put them in the top ten, a record and maybe special items from the developers.

"Prepare poisons and ice spells to burst him down!"

"[Eruption]", the giant turned black for a moment. He had an aura around him now. This was the first time they had seen it so far. They had no idea what that ability did.

"Should we keep attacking?" Someone asked on the voice chat.

"He’s still taking damage, but it could be a counter of some type. Stop and focus on healing the tanks!" All the attacks stopped with a single exception.

A single player kept casting spells, trying to bring the giant down.

"Lucassius WTF are you doing? I said stop attacking!"

"Only 20% of life left. We need to kill him now before he activates the aura."

"No, idiot, just stop attacking. If it is a counter, we only need to hold it for a minute!"

"What if it is not a counter? You really think the developers are just going to give him a boring counter to end the raid? [Ice Storm]"

"Stop, idiot!" The giant turned white and a blazing light burned all the players close to him and blinded all the others in the area.

"All the tanks are down!"

"Shit, I knew it was a counter." The giant summoned more Hellhounds, but with a frontline they fell.

Party wipe. They stumbled at the last moment.

"Goddammit Lucassius I told you to stop attacking. Three fucking hours down the drain!"

"What the hell are you blaming me for? We could have killed him if we kept attacking. Look at your death screen. The damage is fixed. It wasn’t affected by the attacks he took."

"Dude, I can’t play another three-hour raid. I have exams tomorrow." "My mom is going to ground me if I keep playing so late at night." "We can try next Saturday."

Half of the members ended up leaving while the leader checked the forum. "Yeah, it looks like the Knights of Horus just beat us. The first ones could have been us if it wasn’t for you, Lucassius."

"Whatever, man, if you can’t handle being a leader, maybe you should give the position to another person."

"Okay, that’s it. I’m tired of dealing with your bullshit. You never listen and always do things on your own. We need a team player, not a main character wannabe."

He saw the poll to kick him out of the guild. "Are you serious? I told you the truth and now you are trying to kick me. Good luck. Everyone here knows that I’m right."

The poll didn’t even take thirty seconds before all of them voted yes to kick him out.

"Wait, what the fuck! Are you guys crazy? I fucking carry this whole guild."

"Oh, shut up." "Go play in another game." "Item globin." "Go solo on the raid if you’re so good."

Those were the last words he heard before the leader kicked him out of the voice chat. "Bastards, I fucking carried that stupid guild for weeks and this is how they treat me!"

He punched his keyboard. It was ridiculous. Silas was better than all of them. His knowledge of game mechanics and strategy was top notch. A master of PVP, he was sure he could defeat them all one on one.

Yes, they are idiots. Stupid idiots that can't accept that someone else is better than them. No matter what game I play, I always end up surrounded by those kinds of idiots. They always turn on me because they’re jealous of my ability in the game. So pathetic. How can people be so petty without realizing they are making a fool of themselves?

This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.

Silas shook it off. It wasn’t the first time he was kicked out of a guild. But what good would listening to a dumb leader do? If he knows the best strategy, why shouldn't he act on it? This would be so much easier if people would only listen to me.

He sighed and tried to form his own guild, but players always complained about him not taking their opinions or him being bossy. Truly a shame. I guess this is the curse of smart people like me, attracting idiots wherever I go.

He looked around his desktop among the dozens of MMOs for something else to play. So many games, but he had played them all.

Even if I joined a new guild, they’re going to kick me out again for telling the truth. Why do MMOs always require big groups for the end-game content? He started to browse the internet looking for a new game when suddenly a flash came from his window.

"What the?" It was 2:00 AM on a Friday. Was a party close by or maybe a firework? He looked outside and saw more lights.

It looked pretty, like a shooting star. But they weren’t flying into the night sky; they were falling right on the city. The flames erupted all around the place, with fires and explosions.

"What the... are those meteorites?" He had watched TV shows with those ideas, but seeing them in real life was another kind of experience. He could only watch in awe and fear as the rain started to increase.

One, two, four, ten, or one hundred. The city was covered in light, and the only thing he knew was that the stars were failing on top of his house, breaking the roof and shattering everything, including his body and mind.

His mind was lost in the void after being ripped apart...........

He woke up in a dark void. Floating like a feather being carried by the wind. He regained his senses and a voice spiked inside his mind.

[Welcome, human. You have been chosen to join and help me.]

"What game? Who is talking to me?" He frantically looked around, but only darkness surrounded him.

[I have selected 100,000 humans, including you, to join my world. Your purpose now is to gain power and defeat the Ouroboros. You must defeat him before he devours all my worlds and destroys me.]

"Who the hell are you? I have no clue what is going on."

[You can call me the System. I’m a creature beyond your understanding. You only need to focus on your task. I brought you here to kill the Ouroboros. I can give you power. Pay attention.]

"Power?"

[I’ll take you to one of my worlds and assign you a class. Train and defeat creatures or others of your species to increase your ability. Do whatever it takes to defeat the Ouroboros.]

"Class, is this a game or something? You want me to level up? Then I can choose my class."

"Your class will be assigned according to my calculations of your personality, advantages, and overall balance among the 100,000 humans. Prepare to be transported.]

"Wait, at least let me choose my class!" he yelled, but a light came from above, dissipating him into nothingness.

The next thing he felt was the soft touch of the grass on his face. He woke up in a meadow. He stopped up quickly and checked his body. He was still wearing his clothes, but he didn’t have anything else on his person.

"My cellphone, or my wallet. They are gone!" He tried to call the System back with his mind, but nothing happened. He was alone.

"What does this mean? I don’t know what class I have or if I have any powers or skills I can use. What can I do?" He took a deep breath to make sense of everything that had occurred.

A meteor shower destroyed my home and then I got transported by a strange voice that calls himself "The System", and now I have a class that I need to level up to gain more power and defeat this Ouroboros before he destroys The System...

"Did I hit my head during the last raid or something?" He pinched his cheek, thinking the pain was going to wake him up. It hurt a lot, but he was still in the middle of the meadow.

He started to walk without a direction. He had the slightest clue as to where to go. All around it was a meadow, with some forest in the distance. He decided to avoid the forest for fear of encountering an animal.

Wait, maybe I should think that if I was playing a new MMO, I would need to go hunt beasts to gain loot. But there is no interface or a stats screen anywhere! He touched his body, trying to feel anything different.

He did feel a bit stronger than before. He sprinted a short distance and then dropped to do pushups. The fact he could actually do them without dying was evidence the System had changed his body to some degree.

I’m supposed to go into the forest and beat an animal to death with my bare hands. I don’t have any equipment. The prospect of fighting in such a crude way was running through his head until the sound of stomps came from behind.

"…!" he expected to see animals since the world didn’t look much different from Earth, but he couldn’t help but feel shocked at the sight of this beast.

It was a large bear, or at least he thought it was a bear. With six legs and dark fur, it was looking directly at him with fangs made of metal.

He took a short step back and then another. Their eyes met, and soon he was running away into the forest.

"Aaaaah!" he yelled as the massive beast followed him close, baring its fangs. He had gained more speed, but the size and power of the bear's six legs made it impossible to escape.

A sharp claw almost hit him in the back. He rolled on the ground and tried to hide behind a tree. The bear had his smell. He charged right at the tree and brought it down with one push. He jumped to the side and the claw passed over his head.

It was a scratch, but the blood was covering half of his face. It hurts. It hurts. I’m going to die. Am I going to die without doing anything?

His legs were frozen still by fear, but his heart was racing. His mind tried to think of anything, but the bear was getting closer. Time seemed to slow down as the beast got closer and closer with firm steps. It was the attitude of a predator in full control. In a flash, the bear pounced at him.

He had no time to practice. He focused his mind, trying to grasp at something, anything that the System gave him and direct his anger at the animal. He felt power rushing through his body. His right arm grew, and claws sprung from his fingers. The two clashed into a stalemate.

The bear raised two other legs and attacked. They were powerful, but Silas that felt its speed had gone down or maybe he had gotten faster. His leg turned into a similar claw and then leaped into the air. With a mighty swing, he slashed the bear on the face, taking one of his eyes.