“The world was fine. Until it wasn’t. My father, sister, and best friend were alive. Until they weren’t. I was a human. Until I was just a user.” - Poem entitled 'Thoughts of Past Times' by Epolas the Reactionary.
Arthur grimaced uncomfortably as the unfamiliar female nurse applied a painful massage to his lower leg. That was the drawback of growing old; everything hurt, often for no apparent reason. Moreover, the treatments intended to alleviate the pain typically inflicted even greater discomfort, at least in the short term.
"I'm sorry if this is painful sir. However, we're concerned about your muscles atrophying over time due to lack of usage." The pretty, blonde-haired nurse said softly as she continued massaging. Her voice had the perfect tone and cadence for ‘old people speak'. She was a veteran of performing such anti-atrophy massages, that was clear.
Arthur nodded at the young woman. He needed to be more stoic, he knew that, but the world had long since sapped him of any strength, either physical or otherwise. The home that he had spent all of his retirement money and savings on building had only lasted 5 years as his full-time accommodation before he'd had an accident and his family had felt it necessary to put him into full-time care.
He now saw his family less and less as his relatively young children started families of their own. Arthur desired strongly to be a grandfather to his grandchildren but without any real knowledge of them, he was effectively cut off from being able to act on those more primal paternal instincts. For all that he really knew was that he had 4 grandchildren. 3 boys and 1 girl. Due to his faulty memory, he often struggled at times to remember all their names. And, to his great dismay, it seemed like now was one of those times.
Tears slowly started streaming down his face. The nurse looked at Arthur and smiled softly with a look of concern in her eyes as she asked softly, "Is everything alright sir?"
Arthur tried holding back more tears but the thought of being unable to remember his grandkids always brought him to tears and a dark place mentally. His were tears of pure frustration and sadness. He truly wanted to remember them. To be a part of their lives. However, if he couldn't even remember their names what right did he have to be in their lives at all?
He stuttered out a reply to the nurse, trying not to come across as rude by not answering, "I am fine. I was just thinking of my 4 grandchildren, that's all."
The nurse's smile remained warm and supportive as she nodded and returned to massaging. Arthur simply endured. Just as he simply daily endured the plain, uninteresting food that the kitchen served, he would endure being seen as just any other old man. For, in a sense, he was. He knew plenty of old geezers at the care home who were just like him, or even further along in the process of dying miserably than he was.
He chuckled at his dark joke. The nurses rarely told jokes, so his jokes were all he had to laugh at. Clearly, the nurses' manager had instructed them that old people don't want to laugh. They want total seriousness and professionalism as they enter the "pre-death" "phase". Arthur appreciated the sentiment, however, he wished for even a hint of jubilance in his surroundings. As currently, all that surrounded him was the lingering gaseous presence of death, decay, and old age. It seeped into every room in the building, the hearts of every member of staff, and the souls of all the elderly residents. Yet not even the slightest hint existed that someone somewhere in this damn home is living a life anyone considers worthwhile.
Arthur knew he had lived a good life before, yet now he was here. In the last few months of his life. Unable to even remember the names of his own grandchildren. The banality of the end times truly was suffocating to any lingering sense of hope he may have had before. For he would die. If not now, then soon. To his surprise, that thought only brought a weak smirk to his face.
The anti-atrophy massage was about to conclude when a flashing light suddenly enveloped the whole of Arthur’s vision. Then, only a blink or so later, it disappeared, and the room returned to its usual dim lighting. The nurse’s perfectly controlled facial expressions from earlier slipped, with worry and irritation being obvious on the young woman’s face. She quickly remembered what she was doing before the flash, and she looked Arthur in the eyes and said in a soft but hurried voice, “I am sorry about that sir. I need to go and see what is going on. I shall be right back.”
Without even looking back at Arthur, she walked quickly to the door of his small room, opened it and left. Arthur was a little grumpy that he would be unable to find out about what was going on for himself. Another one of the myriad privileges one loses with age, he thought to himself.
Yet, despite all the privileges ageing causes one to lose, there is something that never dulls no matter how much one might age. The ability to feel awestruck by something right before your eyes. As a child, one might be awestruck by the magic tricks of a talented magician, but what awestruck Arthur now was no trick. It was a strange semi-transparent blue panel that somehow hovered weightlessly directly in his line of sight.
Arthur raised a shaking hand to try and touch the floating panel, but his hand phased through it as though it were nothing more than a hologram. Yet, it didn’t seem like any hologram or projection that Arthur had ever seen before. This was no construct of lights. It felt way too real for that. He looked at the panel more sceptically and saw that on it was inscribed actual words.
He groaned as he pushed himself up into a sitting position. Then, he carefully inspected the various words that were written on the panel. However, for a small while they were incomprehensible. Then, suddenly, weirdly translucent letters and words sped on and off of the panel until eventually coherent English sentences were formed, and Arthur could finally interpret the panel. Though, upon reading it, he felt no closer to understanding it as more panels appeared. He had to go through each one, one at a time.
System Integration Complete!
Your world is now integrated with the system-governed multi-verse. Access to the remainder of your universe and other realities is now possible.
To utilise system functions, you need only use mental commands. System notifications/prompts/popups will appear either upon command or upon the finalisation of any important system-related action.
ARTHUR GOODMAN’S STATUS:
Tier: [F]
Level: 0
PHYSICAL: 7 | MENTAL: 15 | SOCIAL: 25 | SPIRITUAL: 5 | SYSTEM: 10
HP: 70/70 | HP regen p/s: 0.07.
STM: 140/140 | STM regen p/s: 0.14.
MP: 150/150 | MP regen p/s: 1.5.
Qi: 50/50 | Qi Regen p/s: 0.05
Arthur was startled by the fact that this floating panel not only had his name but purported to tell him how each aspect of his personhood stacked up against one another. Or, at least, that was what he could gather was being told to him from the first 4 of the stats listed. He guessed the [System] stat was related to the mainframe that had “delivered” this panel right in front of him as a part of some “integration” that had been completed.
He didn’t know what to make of that so shifted his slow eyes downwards at the next prompt. This one was long and with lots of text, so he tried splitting it up into manageable chunks to be able to absorb the odd text better.
POINT SHOP:
PHYSICAL:
Balance: 7 Points
Bone Strength (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Physical Point
Organ Function (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Physical Point
Muscle Strength (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Physical Point
NEW: Tough Skin (Lvl:3) | Cost: 5 Physical Points
Shop? Physical Points? Arthur had an eery calmness about him as he thought about the implications of what he was being asked to believe about what the panel would do. He felt a smidgen of hope, of life, spring up in his chest. If this legitimately could improve his actual bone strength, and or muscle strength, then he would no longer need to be confined to the care home.
He would be able to return to his own home. His perfectly designed shelter for him and him alone. The thought of leaving this death-saturated care home filled Arthur with true happiness, for it meant a return to freedom. However, he doused out any flames of passionate hope with the sobering reality that this panel may not be real. Or it might not give the full extent of what Arthur wanted/needed it to. However, he could not extinguish hope completely. Hence why the decision of what to spend his points on was so difficult.
He had 7 points in total to spend and options that, if he bought all of them, would cost him 8 points. That meant he needed to decide which of the potential options was not worthwhile investing his few points into. When it was choosing between his organs functioning better, and being able to walk again, he had to think seriously about it. Eventually, though, he decided what he wanted to spend his points on and purchased his first ‘upgrade’ and a small prompt appeared in front of the points shop.
Bone Strength is now (Lvl:2)
Arthur could feel his once brittle bones become more solid and he no longer felt so weak. It wasn’t anything like being young again, however, it was almost as if he’d lost a decade of ageing from just one upgrade. He felt tears begin to leak once more out of his eyes. He wiped the tears away quickly, before dismissing the small prompt with his mind, then focusing back on the larger prompt. Only to discover something that he hadn’t even thought about.
The shop had updated and now Bone Strength (Lvl:2 -> Lvl:3) appeared as an option, costing 1 physical point. This threw a wrench in Arthur’s prior plan for allocating his points. If upgrading his more basic physical attributes could go beyond being upgraded just once, then it might be possible to use all of his points to effectively negate all the ageing of the last few decades. Just the thought of that made Arthur shiver with delight.
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
He would need to think about it once again. However, before he could get too deep into his thoughts, the noise of a thunderous explosion overwhelmed his still frail senses. It was startling and it alone demanded that he quickly hurry his decision to escape whatever it was that was going on outside. He now had his first opportunity at freedom, he would not die due to some explosion.
He frantically rushed his decision and at the last minute decided not to spend 3 points on Tough Skin and instead just spend all 7 points upgrading his organs, his bones, and his other muscles. He upgraded his muscles three times, then his organs two times, and his bones one more time.
He then hurriedly moved along to the rest of the panel, aware that he may only have minutes left before whatever caused that explosion may target the care home.
MENTAL:
Balance: 15 Points
Brain Processing Speed (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Mental Point
Brain Capacity (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Mental Point
Brain's Subconscious Function Capability (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Mental Point
NEW: Accelerated Thought (Lvl:3) | Cost: 5 Mental Points
NEW: Enhanced Memorisation (Lvl:3) | Cost: 5 Mental Points
NEW: Mental Clarity (Lvl:5) | Cost: 10 Mental Points
NEW: Mental Resistance (Lvl:5) | Cost: 10 Mental Points
Arthur quickly approximated the implications of spending his points on any of the options and went with his immediate gut instinct in how he should spend his points. He bought Mental Clarity (Lvl:5) and then upgraded his Brain Processing Speed to level 3, then did the same with his Brain Capacity, before putting the final mental point into his Brain's Subconscious Function Capability.
He felt everything return to him. His memories from his past as a butler. The names of his grandchildren. Even the sharp wit that he had been famous for in his youth that he had only had faint access to due to his advanced age. Having it all back with perfect clarity would have almost certainly caused more tears to flow abundantly out of his eyes, but he had seemingly run out of those.
He pushed through the joy at the upgrades’ effect and moved on to the next part of the system panel.
SOCIAL:
Balance: 25 Points
Speech (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Social Point
Etiquette (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Social Point
Persuasion (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Social Point
NEW: Analyse User (Lvl:3) | Cost: 5 Social Points
NEW: Ambiguity (Lvl:3) | Cost: 5 Social Points
NEW: Language Learning (Lvl:5) | Cost: 10 Social Points
NEW: Musical Talent (Lvl:5) | Cost: 10 Social Points
NEW: Bargain (Lvl:10) | Cost: 25 Social Points
With Arthur’s enhanced mental abilities thanks to the upgrades he had just bought, his choices of upgrades were considered much more deeply in the same short amount of time. He eventually selected thusly: Language Learning (Lvl:5), Analyse User (Lvl:3), then 3 points into each of the basic Social abilities and then he put the last remaining point into etiquette.
As a former butler, Arthur knew that etiquette was of utmost importance – especially when dealing with those in positions of power, and or you need serious assistance. He imagined he would be needing it for both of those things in due time, hence its fundamental utility to his current situation. The other choices had been due to their pure practicality for him going forward in a world which was “integrated” into this new “system.”
Another powerful explosion sounded off in the distance. Arthur needed to hurry. He looked down the panel once more.
SPIRITUAL:
Balance: 5 Points
Qi Breathing (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Spiritual Point
Qi Gathering (Lvl:0 -> Lvl:1) | Cost: 1 Spiritual Point
Qi Condensing (Lvl:0 -> Lvl:1) | Cost: 1 Spiritual Point
NEW: Palm of Fury (Lvl:3) | Cost: 5 Spiritual Points
Unlike with the previous categories of which the system offered related abilities, Arthur had little to no understanding of what any of these different upgrades would do for him. He had no time to consider, so instead, he just made an educated guess and put 3 points into Qi Gathering, and 2 points into Qi Breathing.
Another explosion ripped, this time being close enough to cause the heat in Arthur’s room to visibly rise. He got out of his bed and rushed to the door. His new physique in action felt roughly equivalent to his body when he had been his 40-year-old athletic self, rather than the atrophied 89-year-old man he had been just moments earlier. He opened the door and saw that the corridor was filled with nurses and care workers grabbing random stuff from all over the place and running as fast as they could down the corridor.
He soon followed them in running the hell out of the building upon hearing another explosion rip in the background. As he ran down the straight corridors, he finally got to the last segment of the system panel and hurriedly assigned points.
SYSTEM:
BALANCE: 10 Points
Thresholds (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 System Point
Gains (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 System Point
Personalisation (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 System Point
NEW: User Manual (Lvl:3) | Cost: 5 System Points
NEW: User Inventory (Lvl:3) | Cost: 5 System Points
NEW: Map (Lvl:5) | Cost: 10 System Points
Arthur immediately purchased both the User Manual (Lvl:3) and User Inventory (Lvl:3) upgrades. Any kind of explanation would be infinitely helpful to him considering he was currently totally clueless about the state of the world outside of the care home. Let alone the full extent and details of what it meant for Earth to now be “integrated” with some new “system”, so a User Manual would hopefully be a good source of information in that regard. Furthermore, the idea of an inventory with which to store stuff sounded like an incredible ability to Arthur and he could think of an infinite number of scenarios where that would be essential.
With his choices made, the long system prompt disappeared. He now focused completely on the task of running forward. However, upon making it outside the care home facility, he was confronted with a pack of rabid wolves who were busy gnawing away at the bodies of some dead care home staff. Likely they’d run to the exit just like him and these wolves had ambushed then killed them. Arthur felt himself turning back around to try and flee unnoticed, but the quickly approaching snarl of a wolf behind him alerted him to the fact he had been spotted.
With a speed that startled him, Arthur spun around and launched a kick against the side of the wolf’s head. The wolf hadn’t anticipated the old man to spin so fast either, as when the momentum/force of the kick hit it, it was sent rolling to the side and away from Arthur. The other wolves seemed to notice their comrades’ failure to kill their target immediately, but they did nothing as they kept feasting away on their victims.
The wolf who had been kicked, however, now snarled with such ferocious anger that Arthur would attest to the fact it could not have been a normal wolf. That snarl was full of malice, wrath, and rage. Those kinds of emotions never used to radiate off of animals in such dense waves, this was something new entirely. Arthur completed his turn back towards the care home and began running back to his room at his top speed. All in the hopes of avoiding becoming food for the now furious wolf.
He had learned some Historical European Martial Arts (HEMA) back in the day as a way to relive the traditions of the past, but not only did he not have a sword or weapon at hand, he doubted the unarmed techniques would be much use against an angry wolf. He was doubtful that a fight with the monstrous beast would result in anything other than severe injuries, and or in the worst case, death. So, running was objectively the best option.
However, the wolf outmatched Arthur in agility and it soon caught up with him. Arthur’s seemingly heightened senses were the only thing that allowed him to move his right leg in time to avoid having it gorged by the sharp teeth of the wolf. Long gone were thoughts in Arthur’s mind of running away, as now he had been effectively forced into a fight for his life. He would need to somehow beat the wolf enough so that the opportunity to escape would become available to him.
He delivered another kick to the wolf’s side. This kick forced the beast to hit its head right up against the wall, though it was not enough to do any kind of real damage to the creature. However, it did buy Arthur time to frantically rush towards the nearby nurse stations in search of anything that he could use as a weapon. It was while he was frantically looking through a green drawer, that the side of his leg was slashed by the wolf.
Pain radiated from the injury, but adrenaline forced Arthur to deliver a retaliatory blow to the beast’s face – this time a punch. This attack of Arthur’s seemed to do a bit more damage. He presumed it was because it involved not only muscles but also the prominent bones in his fist. He wasn’t certain, however, and it was still not enough to even slow down the beast. Yet, it did buy him just a few more seconds. He rushed down the corridor some more, looking for a single room. He frantically looked at the door signs as he sprinted down the corridor until he found the one he was looking for. The morgue.
He slammed the door open and rushed over to the surgery table. Nearby he found a set of sharp scalpels and even a bone saw. He picked up the longest-bladed scalpel he could find, just in time for the wolf to come running into the morgue as well. Arthur then soon realised a big problem with scalpels and combat. One needed to be extremely close to the opponent to get any serious damage in with one.
Suppressing his fear, Arthur charged at the beast and aimed his scalpel at the wolf’s head. The wolf made deep slashes at his body, but he too was now delivering stab after stab at various vital points on the wolf’s body. Now it was simply a competition of endurance and only thanks to the upgrades he’d made earlier, Arthur soon stood covered in gaping wounds and drenched in his blood but alas, victorious.
He dropped to the ground, and the shock from the whole situation started to kick in. Yet, he was prevented from fully going into shock by the sudden appearance of another two system prompts. This time both panels’ contents were short and sweet.
You have killed a [Vermin] Vicious Wolf (Lvl:11)!
Reward: 1145 EXP
(Note from User Manual: The [Vermin] tag indicates the creature’s tier. [Vermin] is the lowest possible tier and is only usually seen tagged to weak and infant monsters, or system-corrupted native species present in the initial waves of monsters seen on a newly integrated planet.)
You have levelled up!
Stat Point(s) awarded: 2.
(Note from User Manual: To allocate Stat Points into the various stat categories utilise the ‘Status’ mental command.)
New Level: 1
Progress to Next Level: 145/2,000
Arthur thanked the heavens that he had chosen the User Manual upgrade and then did as the manual instructed. He uttered ‘Status’ in his mind, and up popped his status. He then allocated the two stat points he had received into his PHYSICAL stat category. Then, the point shop reopened.
Bone Strength (Lvl:3 -> Lvl:4) | Cost: 1 Physical Point
Organ Function (Lvl:3 -> Lvl:4) | Cost: 1 Physical Point
Muscle Strength (Lvl:4 -> Lvl:5) | Cost: 1 Physical Point
Bodily Healing (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Physical Point
Arthur, upon seeing the new option, invested one point into Bodily Healing and then put the other point into his Muscle Strength. As soon as the points had been allocated, he felt the speed at which his body seemed to heal its injuries double. He had no idea how that was possible, but he wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth and just accepted it. In truth, he probably should have bled out on the morgue floor from his injuries, but with the system, he was fine within a couple of minutes. It was… incredible.
However, upon being fully healed up, he realised that he still needed to find a way out of this care home. If wolves guarded every exit and entrance, then he’d need to fight through them to get out. He didn’t like his chances of making it out if that was his only option for escape. Yet, having decided to leave, he had to make do and he made his way to the back entrance to the care home. Though, something at the back of his mind disturbed him. Why had there been no more explosions?
There had been almost half a dozen explosions ringing out in 10 minutes just before his fight with the wolf, yet since then, there had been almost complete silence. It was eery and it made Arthur’s sense of urgency triple in potency, and he now felt he would willingly throw himself at a dozen wolves if that was what it took to escape whatever it was that was going on around him. He was at heart a butler, not a fighter, so all this danger and combat were putting every nerve he had under extreme pressure.
He was only glad he had restored his mental and physical capacity to its younger extent before he had to deal with everything. If he had fought the wolf as he had been before the system arrived… it wouldn’t have been a fight at all. Yet he still had more wolves to fight, so until they were all dead, or he escaped and well, he doubted that his fighting would be over any time soon. He guessed he would just have to keep both his scalpel and wits sharp, for that alone would get him through.