In a far off home within the Deva Tribe village, Asur groaned as he woke up slowly. As he did, he felt pain in his neck.
“God dammit! What the hell are they doing using such an unskillful method to knock someone out!?” he screamed inwardly.
Crack! Crack!
As he got up, he began to move his body in a particular manner causing his stiff neck and back to crack along each and every joint relieving his pain in his neck and back from the hit he received.
When he opened his eyes, he was met with a slightly trembling young woman who had been tending to him since no one knew when he would wake up. It was said that those knocked out in similar fashion by the war chief would be unconscious for days at a time yet it not even a day has passed and Asur, a frail looking young man who was clearly not even a match who was capable of seeing the movement of the one who struck him, was waking up, albet sore and in pain.
“@#*@&@(#!” she exclaimed and it confused Asur who slightly tilted his head.
Grrr!
Suddenly his stomach rumbled loudly because he had not eaten anything since he arrived at this place and it had been nearly a full day since then.
Hearing his stomach react so loudly, he blushed. Seeing the blush on his face, the young girl was actually quite amused by the strange man and even giggled before walking to another room which had a small amount of food the village had prepared for him. It was all fruits because meat was gained only from hunting. To eat meat, one needed to hunt it themselves or have a hunter in their family.
That said, the basket was plentiful and full of nuts and freshly picked fruits. The fragrance from a few fruits were very appetizing, much better than some of the fruits he encountered in the forest but he found some that he did see. Since they were brought, it meant they were safe so as soon as she placed the basket down he bowed once and dug in.
When he started to eat, he felt an insatiable hunger. His body was in a nutrient poor state making his first bite a trigger for his brain that roared for him to eat.
What shocked the young woman was that as Asur ate, it was like the food fell into a pit. Even poorly chewed food fell in yet his body did not swell and instead, crushed apart everything entering his body.
The four tattoos also began to suck up the energy in the air which combined with the incoming nutrients pumped through his body. Before he knew it, the basket was completely empty and when his hand landed at the bottom he woke up from his stupor.
The woman was slackjaw because even though a warrior of the tribe could eat the same much, their bodies didn’t have such efficiency as Asur did.
GRRR!
An even louder growl came from Asur who held it and looked awkwardly at the woman.
She blinked a few times before saying something and left.
Asur was left alone. He finally had time to examine his situation. He saw the room was a dug out cave. Thinking back to the woman’s appearance, the tribe should have a reasonable amount of intelligence and civilization despite living in a cave. It could simply be the danger of the world doesn’t allow for the luxuries from earth.
He found a jar of clean water and drank it down completely. His heated body cooled down greatly as he filled up more of his needs.
“I wonder where the woman went?” he thought but since he didn’t know what she said he decided to simply remain here and see what would happen.
***
In another place in the village, the war chief was currently holding a headless spear and was in combat with a young man. This young man was none other than the son of the chief.
He had an angry expression as he swung his own spear.
Thak! Thak!
They were in an intense combat but the war chief wore a strange expression.
“Baal, is something wrong?” He suddenly asked causing the young man to momentarily stop before lunging.
“Mother has gone senile!” he said coldly and swung down.
The war chief sidestepped and attack. “How so? From what i know, the Seer is in perfect health.” he said all the while he sparred with the young man.
“That trash you brought back! Mother says something about him leading us to greatness! She has gone senile for sure! I will be the one who leads our tribe to greatness!” he said arrogantly.
The war chief was surprised and raised a brow, “She spoke just for some unknown man?” he asked.
“Yes, she spoke until she was covered in sweat. See how crazy she has become!?” he exclaimed never stopping their spar.
“I think we should listen to the seer. She has never been lead astray and she would never lead the tribe astray because she and the chief were the ones who united us to form our tribe and they would not lead us to our end for no reason.” He said. “What were her words exactly?” he asked.
“Urg… she said ‘This man holds immense power and destiny’ or something. She mentioned something about evolution but I don't understand.” The boy said.
“Evolution?! You mean the realm evolution! That which happens when one crosses one of the celestial Gate of Evolution!” The war chief exclaimed.
He stopped making the boy stop. “I don’t know, i just know she said some strange stuff which don’t make sense.” He replied.
“It doesn’t make sense because you never properly learned from the village scholar. The Gate of Evolution is the pinnacle existence in all realms. Beings from the lower realm will always come from these gates and these same gates lead one to the next realm. Every time one passes through their, karma will become their power making them stronger and more powerful each time. Almost all kingdoms in the world center around a Gate of Evolution as its foundation and through the people coming from below, they form their immense powers.” The war chief said.
The boy clicked his tongue, “It’s just a gate that gives us power.” he said.
The war chief frowned, “Do not underestimate what you don’t understand boy. You will do well to improve your studies if you truly want to inherit the chief position. You, of all people know how your mother and father view education. They had lived in a slightly more structured world before their rising. If you want to become a leader, you will need more than a forceful hand.” the war chief said.
“You’re just like my old man now. Preaching about learning. We live in a world where might is right. Who in this village can be stronger than me besides my father and mother? I am already your match at half your age so when i reach my maturity who will stop me!?” He said.
The war chief sighed and shook his head. “I wonder how we can fix this boy?” he thought. “Well, let’s end the spar here.” he said.
At that moment they saw three women running past the training ground with large baskets of fruits.
“Hey!” the war chief shouted making them stop. “Where are you taking all that food?” he asked.
The leading young woman was actually the one who was taking care of Asur.
“War chief! The man you brought back that the chief said to take care of, he awoke and is in a strange famished state. He finished an entire basket of food and then his stomach growled even louder. I decided to take more food. This man is very strange, he finished the initial basket of fruits which is as much as what warrior eat when there is no meat, but he did not even remotely bloat. It was like the food fell into a pit.” She said with an intrigued expression.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
On the side, Baal scowled when he heard this. On the other hand, the war chief was shocked, “He is awake already?! How? Most men won’t even wake up after a day when they are struck in the same manner!” he said.
“I don’t know, sir, but he woke up and moved his body strangely causing all his bones to pop from his neck down his entire back.” She replied.
“Alright, go on ahead, I believe the chief will want to know that he has awoken but i will see to it that he knows.” He said.
“Alright war chief, come on.” the young woman said to the others and walked off with the large baskets of food.
“Just waking up and already eating so much of our food.” Baal said scowling.
“Stop acting like a child, you know well that our food stocks are immense with how many fruit trees we have planted all along the nearby forest. I doubt he will eat so much that it would affect the village.” the war chief said.
Baal just snorted making the war chief shake his head and sigh.
“Let’s go see your father.” he said.
“Fine.” Baal replied coldly and the two walked towards the back of the village.
***
In Asur’s room, the women arrived and when he saw the baskets of food, his stomach rumbled like a roar of a tiger. He gave a thankful bow to the women, because body language is truly a universal language, and dug in.
The baskets weren’t close to small. If compared to something on earth, they would be like large storage baskets, a meter in height and in diameter. There were three baskets like the first which were plate like and three container style. He attacked the plate ones first stuffing one after another.
This time he finally had enough food to satisfy his needs. Still to the shock of the women who brought it. He finished all three plate type baskets and two containers and half of the third before he sat down and breathed a sigh with a smile.
What was strange was that the red tattoos on his body had turned blood red and one could faintly see the outlines of his veins and arteries through his pale grey skin. Another strange thing was that he actually seemed to have grown, even if just a little bit, in bulk.
If Asur was very thin and like a hungry man, now he seemed like a young boy who lacked food during his developing stages.
He stood up and moved his body, which felt incredibly comfortable at the moment. Every movement caused his body to release a dull pop along his joints and he made each and every bone in his body pop at least once as if he was putting a dislocated bone into place. Weather it was involuntary or a voluntary action it was unknown but when he finished, he felt like he was ready for a workout.
Different from the 21st century, the 22nd had virtual reality which appeared at the end of the 21st century. The 22nd century was dubbed the virtual era and through this, it made it possible to extend humanity's lifespan even if only virtually.
Time dilution made it possible for people to learn faster and later on they developed what was called the bleeding effect system. This was nothing more than a feedback system which stimulated the bodies nerves in the same manner as what was happening in the game to help teach the body what the occupant was doing.
In this way, the 23 year old actually had a mental age of close to 100 already. He had majored in Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Architecture, a few math majors and more. Beyond that there was also the many Virtual reality games he played. His play style was always the casual but long term play styles. This means, instead of being the type of player who uses the system to attack, he would learn the martial arts of the game to use it manually. Obviously this would bleed through to his real body. It was in this manner that his body had reached such a strong state that it could handle his evolution and at the same time, it’s because of virtual reality that he could amass so much karma.
At this moment, he just wanted to work out and test his power. Living through virtual reality games, he has obviously had ‘beyond human’ strength before. Through the use of his past knowledge in gaming, he would be able to gauge his own physical strength and condition.
The problem was that he didn’t know how to ask these women that he wanted to train. It left him in an awkward state and he scratched his head.
The three women all knew he was looking for something and they looked at each other before waiting for him.
He was left with using miming. He wanted to go to some kind of training ground so he pointed towards the door and did normal movements that would associate with training. He made gestures to indicate he wanted to practice.
They looked cautious before walking out and him following. When they saw he wanted to go somewhere, they thought about his movements.
“What do you think he wants?” One of them asked.
“His movement reminds me vaguely of the warrior’s muscle training.” another said.
“Let’s lead him to the training yard, if that is what he wants he will react, if not he will try to fix it again.” the first woman said to her friends.
The other two nodded and waved for him to follow.
They walked through the village and soon they arrived near the center cavern where the training yard was.
The gear was very simple boulders laid in line from small to large, there were practice targets made of straw and so on. Most tools were made of wood and stone.
“Do they not have iron or is it that they don’t know how to make it?” he thought to himself but he found that these primitive things were good for some basic tests.
With a faint smile he gave a small bow to the women and ran to the boulders. He faintly moved the smaller ones and gauged their weight.
“Hmm, these first ones are nearly 20 kilos while the third one is already over 100 kilos. From what I can understand, the average person would already be much stronger than a common human so starting at 20 kilos isn’t strange.” he thought.
He moved down the line to the fourth stone and found it was 200 kilos. A boulder this large was already a weight lifter’s peak during the 21st century. Weight lifting lost its fame by Asur’s time thought but he did know of the sport. He placed his hand on it and pushed only to find he easily pushed the stone. He then tried to lift it and found it was lift in his hands.
“So I developed super strength with my evolution along with heightened senses.” he muttered.
The following stones all went up by 100 kilos each but all the way to 800 kilos, besides needing two arms to lift the stones, the rest of the time he could support the stones with one arm. At 900 kilos he needed two arms.
At the 1000 kilo mark, the stones increased by 500 kilo at once.
By this time, the women were already shocked by his strength display but when he lifted the 2,500 kilo stone, his current limit, they were shocked even more.
In the Deva Tribe, a warrior can be considered a warrior when they lift the 1,000 kilo stone. After the 2,000 he is a senior warrior and 2,500 he can captain a hunting party.
Who would have expected this thin young man’s base strength to be 2,500 kilos. This was over 2 ton.
Boom!
The stone was thrown down and it crashed down with a low rumble. Asur was smiling as he looked at the weight he could lift. “Nice, over 10 times stronger than a human’s max weight lifting limit.” he thought. If he knew that this kind of strength was something most of the Deva Tribe had to train several years to achieve it would be unknown how he would think of them.
Next he saw the shooting range. Remembering his strange senses he walked over and took a bow. He tried to see his current ability with the bow. Because there was no wind inside a cave, it became easy but he found these bows were subpar compared to the ones he knew.
Weather it was playing in a medieval era game or a futuristic game, he had, at least once, learned the production of high quality bows of all kinds. Of course, being able to shoot accurately with a poor quality bow was also a sign of skill. Adding the quality into his calculations, he shot the first arrow as a test. When it hit nearly 30 cm off, he scowled at the accuracy. He looked at the bow shape and how the string was attached.
He removed the string and reattached it in a more firm and better state. He couldn’t fix the shape of the bow but he could at least try to improve it. He gave another test and it was only half as bad after that and the arrow was faster because the string wasn’t as loose.
Being able to work with this he began to shoot and shockingly hit the bulls eye.
When he hit the bulls eye again with this bow, the woman turned wide eyed. What was amazing was that he switched targets and shot once more and hit the bulls eye.
He switched again to an animal shaped target and shot one arrow at a time. An animal shaped target had several bullseye but what was amazing was that each arrow he shot hit a bullseye each shot and never the same.
After a minute, all the target bullseye was fitted with an arrow.
He smiled, “My calculating ability has gone up. Did my brain get better as well?” he asked himself but thought of this no more.
Sadly testing his acrobatics would have to be in the wild itself because the tribe didn’t have training equipment for this. They didn’t even have a climbing wall. He lamented the poor quality equipment. If he could at least get some basic material and tools he could make his own weapons.
When he was finished, he walked back to the women and walked past them. He wanted to explore some now and see the village.
After a short walk he returned to the room he woke up in because the village was rather boring. He found there wasn’t even a blacksmith and there were only tanners. It could be called nothing more than an indigenous tribe who used stone arrows and spears. Thankfully the sanitation wasn’t bad but it could be compared to medieval era because it was just a pot to do your duties before taking it to a specific place to throw it out.
Lastly, water was pulled from a well with a bucket, there wasn’t even a wheel to help draw the rope. He scowled at each and every primitive situation he saw the tribe he had arrived at was in. The last straw was when he was passing a warrior’s hut and saw them eating raw meat.
He couldn’t stomach this and went back to the room thinking that these people should have at least some basic knowledge of cooking.
He simple waved for the women to leave so that he could shut his eyes and rest. The rest of the fruits remained there for him but he didn’t feel hungry anymore, at least not for now.