A flurry of strange blue panels appeared before Lucas’ very own eyes, and after rubbing all the sleep out of them, he could do nothing but stare at the panels in mute amazement and excitement.
Sure, he hated the system for what it had done to him, to his family, and to the whole planet. Yet, two major parts of him, the part of him that loved video games, and the part of him that wanted to help out his grandfather, both held the system to be the ultimate answer to both.
For, if Lucas wanted to be able to aid his grandfather in anything, he needed to grow more powerful through the system. So, as he read through the first panel that appeared, he felt his heart rapidly beating in his chest.
Congratulations on receiving your system!
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 meaningful system-related action.
LUCAS GOODMAN’S STATUS:
Tier: [F]
Realm: 1st Step of the [Lesser Devil] realm
Level: 0
PHYSICAL: 15 | MENTAL: 9 | SOCIAL: 9 | SPIRITUAL: 25 | SYSTEM: 15
HP: 150/150 | HP regen p/s: 0.15.
STM: 300/300 | STM regen p/s: 0.3.
MP: 90/90 | MP regen p/s: 0.9.
Qi: 250/250 | Qi Regen p/s: 0.25
Lucas was brought back to reality after having been sucked in by his status page by a slight tap on his shoulder.
When he turned his head and saw his grandfather, the man was looking down at him with a large smile on his face. He then gestured to the air in front of him and said, “When you’re ready to distribute your stat points into the various perks, know that I will be right here to offer you advice on the perks you aren’t sure about. However, I want to make it clear to you that all decisions are truly up to you. This is your life. Your system. And, fundamentally, your future is at stake. But, still, I only want the best for you so do try and listen to what I have to say.”
Lucas was so full of emotions at the man’s words that the only thing he could do was smile widely back at his grandfather and say softly, “Thank you, Grandpa.”
Then he turned his head to the second of the strange new panels. This one about his physical stat it seemed.
POINT SHOP:
PHYSICAL:
Balance: 15 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
NEW: Enhanced Dexterity (Lvl:5) | Cost: 10 Physical Points
“Um Grandpa, which of the physical stat perks should I upgrade or purchase?” Lucas asked, uncertain.
“Well, what perks are available to you?” Arthur asked as he sat down next to Lucas on the bed.
“Bone Strength, Organ Function, Muscle Strength, Tough Skin, Enhanced Dexterity,” Lucas replied.
Arthur thought about it for a moment before replying, “And, how many points do you have to spend?”
“15.”
Arthur’s smile widened for some unknown reason, before he quickly answered the boy’s earlier question, “Well, if I were you, I would probably get all of my basic perks to level 4, then purchase the Tough skin perk, and put the last remaining points into upgrading one of the basic perks to 5.”
Lucas thought about his grandfather’s words for a bit and then thought about his own experience playing video games and the like in the past and decided that his grandfather’s advice was solid. He decided that he would put his last remaining point into the Muscle Strength perk to get it to 5 as that sounded like it would be the most useful. Then, he felt the excitement build in his chest as he tried mentally commanding his system for the first time.
The feeling of a new kind of power coursing through his body after he confirmed his selection was such a foreign one to Lucas, that it had initially frightened him, then, after a few seconds, it felt incredible, and then, it disappeared completely. Lucas could tell that his entire body had changed dramatically, and all for the better it seemed to him.
His grandfather noticed his shifting expressions and asked gently, “So, how do your new upgrades feel?”
Lucas could only smile back at his grandfather as he felt up and down his body, seeing his once quite meagre non-existent muscles seemingly brimming with newfound power and refinement.
Not only that, but even how he was now breathing felt incredibly different and superior to how he had been breathing previously, and he now was starting to understand just how his grandfather managed to do what he had done over the last few weeks.
He then replied excitedly, “My body feels incredible.”
Arthur chuckled, before gesturing at Lucas and saying, “Alright, let's move on to your mental stat.”
Lucas nodded enthusiastically and shifted his eyes from his grandfather to the next semi-transparent blue panel seemingly hovering in front of him.
MENTAL:
Balance: 9 Points
Brain Processing Speed (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Mental Point
Brain Capacity (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Mental Point
Brain Subconscious Function Capability (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Mental Point
NEW: Accelerated Thought (Lvl:3) | Cost: 5 Mental Points
Lucas thought about each of the perks, and before his grandfather could give him any advice, he had already decided on how he would distribute his points. That was, he would do it in a very similar fashion to how he’d distributed his points just a second earlier, with the basic perks all receiving a level, then purchasing Accelerated Thought, and placing his final point into Brian Processing Speed.
Once it was confirmed, it was almost as if the world around him slowed for a moment, then suddenly sped up again. His thoughts were racing in his head, at a speed that he had never experienced before, yet, somehow, it felt no different to him than his prior mental state. And, if this was his mind after only a couple of points of investment, he wondered just how crazy it would get once he had levelled as much as his grandfather had.
Now that he had the system, Lucas’ respect and admiration for the person who was his grandfather was only growing and growing. Lucas wanted to be as strong as him, to be as good as him, to just be like him in general.
He was brought out of his thoughts by the man himself speaking to him, “Lucas, son? Do you need any advice on how to distribute your mental points?”
Lucas shook his head and said, “Nope. I already distributed them, Grandpa.”
Arthur nodded uncertainly at Lucas but said nothing. He wanted to give the boy as much control over his own point distribution as possible, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t extremely concerned about the boy’s decisions perhaps not being the most prudent they could be.
However, as Arthur knew first-hand, there were many ways to get enough stat points to correct for any initial mistakes, and so whatever the boy ended up picking wouldn’t be totally life-destroying, even if he spent all his points recklessly. He thus cleared his head of negative thoughts, and simply focused on trying to be there for Lucas as the boy distributed his stat points.
After a repeat of the same distribution style with his social stat, i.e., Basic perks upgraded as well as a perk purchased, Lucas shifted his eyes to the stat that was undoubtedly going to be the one to cause him the most anxiety. In fact, just thinking about his Spiritual stat caused his heart to start to rapidly beating in his chest.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
However, after a deep breath, and a gulp, he finally allowed himself to take in what was in front of him and it was about as bad as he imagined. That was, until his eyes made it to the bottom of the prompt, and a slight spark of hope flickered in his otherwise despondent mind.
SPIRITUAL:
Balance: 25 Points
Qi Absorption (Lvl:1 -> Lvl:2) | Cost: 1 Spiritual Point
Qi Corruption (Lvl:0 -> Lvl:1) | Cost: 1 Spiritual Point
Qi Condensing (Lvl:0 -> Lvl:1) | Cost: 1 Spiritual Point
NEW: Leach Strike (Lvl:3) | Cost: 5 Spiritual Points
NEW: Touch of Death (Lvl:5) | Cost: 10 Spiritual Points
NEW: Veil of Anonymity (Lvl:1) | Cost: 25 Spiritual Points
Lucas’ new enhanced mind scrambled for clarity as he thought about all the potential implications of the final perk on offer. Sure, the perk would cost him all of his Spiritual points, but if he bought it, and the perk did what he thought it did, then it would be more than worth it.
If the perk truly masked his demonic cultivation from others, then that meant he could live and avoid the scenarios that had run through his mind over the last few weeks, ever since his meeting with the demon Jergras. That all of his anxiety about being found out could finally cease.
Yet just a niggling of doubt at the back of his mind was enough for Lucas’ whole world to start spinning, as the potential scenarios of his demonic cultivation being discovered ran through his head. All of which involved him dying horrifically in an endless myriad of different ways should the nature of his cultivation be known, and or this perk be proven to be ineffective at doing what Lucas wanted/needed it to do.
“Lucas?! Are you alright, did something happen?!” His grandfather asked, his voice full of concern and worry.
Lucas shook his head, put on a fake smile, and said, “Oh it's nothing. The system just made me feel odd for a bit. I’m fine.”
Arthur looked down at his grandson with concern, but as the boy kept insisting that he was fine he decided to save a more detailed questioning for later. A minute later the boy seemed to come to a decision, and his eyes shifted to the right somewhat. Arthur assumed he was looking at the system stat point shop screen and he smiled upon recalling the day he had first met the boy.
Though that first night when Lucas and he had talked about the importance of the system stat had been only hours after one of the most tragic days in Arthur’s entire life, remembering the smile on the boy’s face despite it all as he talked about video game stuff made Arthur happy. In his mind, that night proved that the boy was both incredibly resilient and most certainly still a normal child on the inside, both reassuring facts to Arthur's worried parental mind.
After the boy had seemingly decided on how he should distribute his system stat points, he looked to Arthur and said, “I’m all done, Grandpa.” Confirming the man’s suspicions.
Arthur smiled back at the boy and then put on a serious face, “Alright that’s very good. Now, Lucas, I’ve decided that come dawn you and I are going to go out of the camp to try and get you some levels. This world will only grow more dangerous as time passes and I can’t have you be too weak to defend yourself if that ever proves to be necessary.”
Arthur noticed that the boy seemed quite excited by his words, but he quickly wanted to reign in that excitement, “However, this shall involve a lot of danger, so you must promise me that you will take what I say seriously, and listen to everything I say, and obey my instructions. This is all for your own good. Is that understood?”
Lucas nodded.
“Please give me a verbal confirmation my boy. This is serious.” Arthur said sternly.
“I promise to listen to you, Grandpa,” Lucas said sighingly.
“Good.” Arthur said curtly, before then saying, “I think it's time that we both get some rest so that we’re ready for what comes tomorrow.”
Arthur smiled as he watched the boy nod and then get back under the covers of his bed, swiftly following his grandpa's instructions. It was clear to Arthur that the boy was looking forward to fighting with monsters and levelling up, but Arthur just hoped that with him being there he could help guide the boy into turning his passion for fighting into something productive, rather than delinquent. Something he wished he'd have done in the past with Albert, but here he was again thinking about his regrets about what he did or did not do in the past when he should be focusing on the future. And with that in mind, he decided to try and get some sleep as well. Even if he doubted he'd get any, the process of trying to sleep may give him a reprieve from thinking too deeply about his past mistakes and suppress the strange feeling of excitement that he too was feeling about what he'd be doing in just a few hours.
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The last week had been sheer and utter hell for Amanda.
It had felt like every single second that she was stuck in this damned survival trial, she was in imminent danger of being killed at any time. Yet, at the same time, though the last few days had thrown her in at the deep end, in and amongst the primal struggle for survival, she had found pure ecstasy.
She didn't know how it had happened, but after a near-death encounter with a damned boar-like monster, she had just about come out victorious. And, as she had stood over the dying creature, she relished seeing the suffering in the monster's eyes. Then, a sudden thirst had struck her, and like some kind of animal, she had then dug her teeth into the monster's neck and began sucking its blood from the body.
As she did so, system prompt after system prompt flooded her vision, but she kept going. At first, the metallic taste of blood had been disgusting, but then, it turned into the most delicious drink that she'd ever drunk, not only that, but she felt that the more blood she drank, the faster her injured body started to heal.
After an unknown amount of time, she stopped drinking from the now very dead boar's body and stood up once again. A part of her, the pre-system version of her, then started freaking out about what it was that she had just done, but another part of her quickly suppressed those thoughts. This other part of her was the only reason that she'd made it this long in the trial, the part of her that put survival and power above everything else, and whatever the ethics of what she had just done, she was now alive, and by the heavens, she felt powerful at that moment.
Eventually, upon checking her system prompts, she discovered that she had inadvertently begun walking down the path of demonic cultivation. She had no idea what that really meant, but what she did know was that just by simply killing the monsters around her, she grew more and more powerful. And, after only a few days of killing monsters, she received a very peculiar system prompt that had also given her a significant jump in terms of power.
You have taken the first step into the [Core Devil] realm!
Total Reward: +5 Points into your Spiritual stat
She couldn't stop herself from laughing hysterically as she realised that the path that she had accidentally started walking on was one that was destined to grant her significant power. However, her laughing and her dreams of grandeur were cut short by the hurtling into view of a very much not-good system prompt.
TRIAL BOSS:
[Pest] [Boss] ELEMENTAL WATER RHINO (Lvl:41) HAS SPAWNED IN THE MARSHES.
To Successfully Complete This Trial, Kill the Boss!
Of course, there was a damned boss monster. And, just judging by its level, it was going to be one hell of a fight for her. However, with her new power-up, she almost felt like she could do it. Plus, what did she have to lose? And, just the thought of drinking the boss' blood was almost making her salivate in anticipation.
So, she started running as fast as she could away from her very makeshift campsite, towards the marshes where the boss had spawned. The speed at which she ran was leagues faster than she had ever imagined being possible for her prior to the system. She could cross a single kilometre in less than 30 seconds at top speed, and she felt as though she could probably run at that speed for about 100km before she would need to stop and take a breather. She had, after all, invested quite a lot of her stat points into her physical stat, as without a strong body, she would have been torn apart by the monsters within the trial.
Once she arrived at the edge of the marshes, it was not that difficult to distinguish the boss monster as it was the only monster nearby but also due to its incredible frame. The boss monster's entire body was bulging with muscle, and its horn pulsed with magical power that she herself knew the lesser versions of the elemental rhinos definitely did not possess throughout their whole body - let alone just their horns.
Furthermore, the boss' senses seemed far more adept than its lesser kin, as just as she was sizing it up, it turned around to face her before its hulking frame began bounding towards her whilst letting out a terrifyingly powerful roar that was full of killing intent. Its speed was also not something to sneeze at, as it moved at a speed comparable to that of a car travelling at 40 mph.
She grinned as she watched the boss hurtle towards her. Then, she began charging at it as well, wrapping her entire body with a crimson Qi that began convulsing as her form began amassing more and more power within herself.
She side-stepped the boss' horns just in time, before swivelling around and delivering her most powerful punch to the side of the monster's head. And, though she knew she had dealt quite a bit of damage to the beast, the immense pain emanating from her hand was evidence enough that the monster had terrifying strong defences.
She leapt back, avoiding a powerful-looking ice shard shot at her from the tip of the Rhino's horn. The monster then quickly turned and began charging at her again, to which she performed the same manoeuvre again, this time charging Qi into her foot, and delivering an incredibly powerful kick to the monster's neck this time. As, though she felt pain tear through her body, she had a monstrous healing speed and pain tolerance so she practically ignored the fact that she now had both a broken hand and broken foot from just two attacks on the beast and kept up her assault.
Then, she felt sudden pain rip her confidence away, as the rhino froze her legs to the marshes using magic, before then charging at her full speed. Gritting her teeth as hard as she could, she activated a defensive shield that only barely worked in lessening the impact of the rhino smashing into her - sending her flying backwards into the marshes. Her feet were now nothing but stumps as her feet had stayed in the ice, and as she had been sent flying back, they'd torn off.
The pain was unimaginably excruciating but she didn't allow herself time to acknowledge that reality, as she desperately prepared her next attack on her quite insistent attacker. A pitch-black qi began flooding through her body as she prepared to go all out on this damned water rhino, and once it was close enough, she shot forward with as much power as she could muster and clung onto its leg.
The monster began crying out in pain as death Qi began coursing through its veins, destroying its vital energy from the inside. The monster tried its best to crush her to death or send her flying off, but thanks to her very high physical stat giving her incredible strength this proved to be impossible. And, thanks to her high resilience and sheer willpower, she was able to keep clinging on to the monster as it sent countless ice shards into her body using magic - thankfully never hitting anything vital.
And, after 10 minutes of this, with her body now looking like cheddar cheese - she got the pleasure of watching the light of life in the boss monster's eye dim and then go out completely. Elation was the only thing she felt for the next few minutes as system prompts flooded through her, levels were gained, and her demonic core began sucking in more and more of the monster's qi so as to feed her own progress.
As she bit down on the monster's body, she tasted its blood and healing energy exploded in her mouth, then made its way down to heal the very injured parts of her dismembered mutilated body. And, only after what must have been hours of waiting, did she finally have enough of her body regenerated so that she could stand up again. However, every part of her was still racked with pain and she honestly felt like passing out or vomiting or both.
As it had during every other period of immense pain over the last few years, her mind wandered from her current situation to thoughts of her son. She wondered whether he was still alive. Whether she'd ever get to see him again now that the world has gone mad. Then, for the first time in a month, she resolved herself to a future course of action, as it now seemed she would have a future now that the trial was complete.
"Lucas, Mama's coming," she said with full conviction and gusto, despite her throat being hoarse with pain.