The next morning Kyle, his family, Sarah, and Li were gathered around the TV in Kyle’s living room. The head of ODE was scheduled to make an announcement in a few minutes. He was not the only one. Various government leaders, world leaders, and people like the Pope and the Dali Lama were also set to make an announcement. The last time an announcement of this scale was made it was to announce the Change. Kyle knew he was not the only one on the edge of his seat waiting to see what it would be about.

Mickey was sitting on Kyle’s lap, much to Li’s disappointment. They were playing I spy. Mickey really liked the game, but he had not quite gotten the hang of how to play it yet. He always said the same thing, “I spy wif my widdwle eye somefing nice!” Kyle then had to guess which of the people in the room Mickey was talking about.

The camera finally cut from the newscaster to ODE’s director and everyone’s eyes focused on the screen. After a few words about everyone working together and standing firm the director finally got to the point.

“We, just like many other leaders and governments, have recently come across some information that we deem vital not just to the American people, but people worldwide. When the Change came, we were able to warn of its existence and prepare. We have recently found out that the Change was not a singular event, and will be ongoing. There is no cause for alarm as the changes will be rather mundane compared to the previous changes, and we have already successfully weather that storm together, just like we will continue to do. Within the next twenty-four hours we will be receiving an upgrade of sorts to our statuses. Right now, when you check your condition you hear information about two things in your head, your stats and your skills. It seems another piece of information will be added to that. We do not know the full details of what it will entail, but we do know that it will be some sort of title system. We ask that you please be patient and keep calm and ODE will make a further announcement within twenty-four hours of the title system being implemented. If you have worries about your personal safety remember that you can always call ODE’s main number to receive help. Thank you.”

Mickey was the first to break the silence after the announcement.

“What’s a titwle Kywle?”

“It’s like I’m your big brother Kyle and you're my little brother Mickey,” Kyle told him.

“Wike big sis Sawah too?” Mickey asked

“Yeah, like big sis Sarah.”

“This change shouldn’t be huge,” Carl said, “But all the same it might be good to hunker down and be prepared if it’s not. I’m going to go talk to the other people in the Guild just to make some backup plans if everything goes sideways.”

“That’s a good idea dear,” Lisa replied. “Come Mickey, let’s go see your friend Mateo.”

Carl, Lisa, and Mickey left the room leaving Kyle and his two friends to discuss this newest “update” and its potential consequences or gains.

Li turned out to be the most helpful one when it came to brainstorming ideas. Kyle used to play a lot of video games, but he had not played as many RPGs and mostly played games with online PvP that weren’t MMORPGs. Sarah was almost useless as she had spent most of her time doing physical activities like sports and martial arts before the Change.

Li’s “expertise” in the matter came from reading. It apparently was a common theme in books with game like elements for there to be titles that the characters got that increased the character’s status in some way. In video games, titles seemed to be more innocuous and showy, but according to Li the titles in these books could be OP and would often stack for large benefits. She said they often gave passive bonuses, which were currently the hardest type to obtain.

Kyle thought that the titles would be based on what people had achieved so far, while Sarah thought they would be random like the starting skills. Li was in the middle, and thought there would be some reason for the title but that you could still get the title dragon slayer from killing a small lizard. Sarah, wanting to have all her bases covered, was about to run out the door to go find a lizard to kill before Kyle told her that kobolds were thought to be descended from dragons, so she should be fine.

As the hours went by the tension kept mounting. The practice field at the Guild compound was nearly empty, when Kyle had tried to play some video games on his computer his concentration was atrocious. He died over twice as many times as he killed the enemy. He eventually drifted back down to the living room to watch a random show on TV. Sarah and Li came over from Sarah’s house and joined him an hour or so later.

Kyle had just gotten up to go to the bathroom when it finally happened. When you checked your stats and skills or absorbed a new skill crystal, the information transmitted into your head was a mix of someone reading the information to you and you recalling it from memory. Kyle knew this was what they were waiting for because the information was heard the same way.

“The title system has now been implemented. Each person will have their highest ranked title activated. Qualifications for titles can be earned by completing special actions outside and above the norm. Titles are only able to be activated by special events such as an awakening or by using rare title crystals.”

The title Exponential Growth has been activated.

Title: Exponential Growth

Effect: A person with this title receives additional stat points equal to the base stat point amount of a skill when that skill reaches an increment of ten. When any skill reaches its maximum level the title holder obtains a combination point.

Kyle slowly sat back down. It took a few seconds for his brain to catch up and process the information that was unceremoniously shoved into it. Kyle then tried to make sense of what he had just learned.

Okay, so it seems everyone got one title just like everyone got one skill before. That most likely means all titles are not created equal, especially since it did say it was based on your actions. It seems like earning a title has two parts, first unlocking the title qualifications and then activating the title. I get the feeling that activating a title is very rare. And what the hell does my title even do? I guess I now know that skills have a max level, but what is a combination point? The stat point part doesn’t make any sense either.

It was at this point that Kyle checked his stat points and realized that he had an extra thirty-two stat points to distribute. Seeing a connection, he looked over his skills and realized what exactly his title must do.

If he rounded down his skills to increments of ten and then added them all up, he got three hundred twenty, which would indicate that he gained an additional stat point for leveling up a skill to an increment of ten. After reviewing his title Kyle realized that was what it said. Sort of. There was a whole lot of other information in there and he still did not know what combination points were. His title also made it sound like you could get multiple stat points, but if his math was correct Kyle clearly only got one for the skill levels.

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“Umm, do you guys know what your titles do?” Kyle asked Sarah and Li. “I think I know what mine does, but it is kind of confusing.”

“Yeah, I think so,” Sarah said, scrunching up her face in confusion. “I’m pretty sure it increases my physical power based on my speed. It sounds like it means that my physical power stat is now effectively doubled, and not just the speed I get from it.”

“Guess I shouldn’t be surprised you got a broken title,” Kyle said. “It seems like the titles are based on what qualifications we unlocked so it is probably related to your skill. Mine seems to be at least. It gives me more stat points when I level up my skills and has exponential in its name.”

“My skill makes my Shadow Suppression better,” Li chimed in. “It seems fairly straight forward to me. It makes the skill harder to resist. You know how Curtis got rid of it with his skill? My title says that now he would only have a fifty percent chance to get rid of it.”

“I guess we haven’t done anything special other than have good skills,” Kyle said, before turning to Sarah and joking, “You will have to kill an actual dragon before you get your next skill if you want a title for it.”

“By the way,” He continued. “Have either of you heard of combination points? My titles says I can get them for getting a skill to max level. Of course my title doesn’t helpfully specify which level that is. Skills could have a level cap of 5,000 for all we know.”

“Never heard of them,” Sarah replied. “Any hints in the title? What exactly does it say?”

“Just that I get a combination point for getting a skill to max level.”

“Maybe God had to meet a deadline for the title patch and scrapped the user’s manual,” Li joked. “He was probably like, who cares about those mortals, they don’t even read the holy texts that I gave them so why would they read a user’s manual?”

“Yeah, maybe. The government seems to be in on it so hopefully they say something in their announcement,” Kyle said.

The government’s second announcement contained no new information and was just them rehashing the title announcement. It seemed other people also had titles that mentioned skills getting to max level, as the information quickly came out online, but Kyle saw no mention of combination points.

Kyle, Sarah, and Li went back to the dungeon school after two days had passed. There was no level three dungeon on campus, but Li’s family owned one. Li decided to suck it up and ask her parents if the group could enter the dungeon. Li and her parents didn’t have the best relationship, but hopefully all they could do was say no to her request. The group had outgrown the level two dungeon while the level four would still be too dangerous so going into a level three would be preferable.

But events were moving forward, and Change had finally come.

Before they heard back from Li’s parents the group decided to do a few runs of the most profitable dungeon they had access to, in this case the kobold dungeon.  It happened when they were inside walking through the rainforest.

Sarah noticed it first. Her basic awareness afforded her a few precious extra second to react.

“Guys group up,” Sarah said, moving back towards the rest of the team. “I feel something strange.”

“Strange how?” Walt asked.

He got his answer a few seconds later.

It would have felt like wind, if wind didn’t actually exist. Kyle thought it sort of felt like mana wind. Whatever it was, it formed a sort of invisible formless pulsing wave that moved through the group. It pulled at parts of them they didn’t even know existed, stretching their awareness in new ways. The feeling slowly settled down, and just when they were about to relax, the feeling came back stronger.

This happened a total of ten times, and each time Kyle and the group could feel themselves being stretched. Sometimes it felt like they had an extra arm and sometimes it felt like they were simultaneously standing on the ground and also ten feet above floating in the air. Each wave was different.

They had slowly moved closer together, the remnants of some ancient response to danger and the unknown. When the final wave came, it was accompanied by a purple glow. Again, Sarah was the first to react.

“Grab hold of each other,” Sarah said, hurriedly grabbing hold of Kyle and Li. “This looks like the light that accompanies a teleport skill. I saw Clarrissa use her teleport skill in the Guild’s dungeon and she said that she could not teleport if other people were touching her. Hopefully we will either not teleport or go together.”

The purple glow increased in its intensity, finally blinding the group of four who had managed to grab hold of each other’s hands and were holding on for dear life. The final wave pulsed, pulsed and finally reached its crescendo. Kyle could see the purple glow through his closed eyelids, and with a final pulse he felt everything that made him him shift, as it first was one place, and was then another.

Kyle stood still. He could feel Sarah and Walt’s hands, so at least whatever happened hadn’t separated them.

“Is it over? Walt asked in a small voice.

Kyle slowly opened his eyes.

It was clear they were no longer in the kobold dungeon. The surroundings were underground, but beyond that Kyle couldn’t say. They had appeared in a large round chamber. The ceiling was over twenty feet high and the room seemed big enough to fit multiple tractor trailers. There appeared to be only one exit.

“Your dad didn’t tell you about this and you forgot to mention it, right?” Walt asked Sarah.

“No. I think I would remember if he had told me about something like this.” Sarah turned to Kyle for confirmation, recent events causing her to doubt her memory. “He didn’t say anything, did he?”

“Not that I recall,” Kyle answered. “Do we have any way of determining where we are?”

“What about the walls,” Li said, finally calming down enough to think critically. “The walls don’t look like they’re sandstone or something. Caves are only made out of certain types of rock. If it’s a different type, we are most likely in a dungeon.”

“Good idea,” Kyle said, and promptly fired a Compressed Mana Bolt at one of the walls.

It didn’t even leave a mark.

“I think it’s a dungeon,” Sarah said rhetorically.

Kyle mutely nodded. He had not expected to cause a large hole with his skill, but not leaving a mark clearly demonstrated this was a non-earthly location.

As Kyle took a closer look at the wall, he noticed it looked like something was written on it. He walked over to take a closer look and once he was only a few feet away realized what it was.

“You guys might want to come over and see this,” Kyle called to the others. “I don’t think we are in Kansas anymore.”

The other three came over to see what had drawn Kyle’s attention.

There was a message left on the wall. And as Kyle read it, he couldn’t help but wonder if this was what Moses had felt when he received the Ten Commandments.

“To all of Humanity who is reading this, I am sorry. I have left this message for all of you to find to help explain the situation you will find yourselves in. You can think of me as God, but I am not like the image of God you have built for yourselves. I am merely a flawed being with incredible power that happens to have had a hand in your creation. You can call me God or whatever else you please, but the rest of existence knows me as Earth or Gaia.

“You find yourselves in your current situation because I have failed. I had wanted to create a small world, a world filled with life that would not know the perils that plague the greater existence. To that end I tried keeping it a secret, withholding mana from the world to help avoid the presence of prying eyes.

“But my enemies are equally powerful, and what I can do, so can they. I have grown to love the flawed existence that is Humanity, and so instead of letting them come and find you, I decided to give you the chance to fight. All of existence is embroiled in conflict, and enemies abound. You must become stronger and join my other children, the Titans, in fighting for your right to exist.

“I have sealed you all inside a giant dungeon. You must grow stronger, and eventually break free and find the Titans before those who seek to destroy you can find where I have hidden you and break in. I tried to prepare you as best I could. I controlled your leaders to ease you into the introduction of mana and influenced Humanity as a whole to want to work together and grow stronger. I can only hope my efforts were not in vain.  

“Everyone with an unawakened child was transported to a giant city area. It is protected by golems I have created to protect you from the monsters you must defeat to grow in strength. For everyone else, I have placed you in groups of four in various areas around the first level of the dungeon. Find your way to Humanity’s first city and grow strong enough to make this dungeon your fortress and training ground, so when the eventual time of conflict comes, you will be ready.

“My final gift is a title, Part of Humanity. Hopefully it will aid you and help you survive in the desolate land I have been forced to place you in. May your race be strong enough to stand firm against all who would erase you, and may we one day meet in the great Beyond.”