Realising the potential fun that could be derived from its idea, the spectre of darkness began to walk back towards the young man whom it could now recognise to be of the ‘human’ race; having remembered a race like that beginning to emerge before it went off to slumber.
As the creature got closer, it watched as the human attempted to fight the boar.
He was failing miserably…
If the combined effort of ten fully equipped individuals could barely even harm the beast, the creature wondered what the human could possibly be thinking to actually believe he could handle that beast by himself.
By the time the creature had gotten within twenty paces of the one-sided duel, the human was lying on the floor, panting. It was obvious that the boar had just been playing with the human, knocking the human down, then waited for him to get up – which he did – only, however, to once again knock him back down on his back.
This pattern continued.
The creature had to admit, it was kind of comical to watch; the boy, sword in hand, reciting some dumb poetic speech about slaying the fearsome beast who dare slayed brother.
It sounded fucking stupid.
Lest the creature knew it’d have to intervene, else the human would truly die.
Pause, the creature sighed, freezing time in the process.
…
Cruise Doberfell led what most would consider to be an ordinary life; he went to school, got a degree in something he wasn’t particularly interested in, and found a nine-to-five job in an industry he didn’t care for.
As a fairly low-level ‘corporate slave’ at his job, Cruise never really earned enough to truly explore his interests.
Whatever spare change he could scrape together after paying for food and rent, he generally spent on video games.
Video games allowed Cruise to take his mind off how crappy his life was turning out.
Video games allowed him to escape.
“How did my life turn out so shit?” Cruise thought, opening the door to his apartment.
Walking through the mould-festering corridors that comprised the dull-coloured home, Cruise made his way to the living room.
The room, if you could even call it that, consisted primarily of a worn down couch, made of some shit brown fabric that looked to be tearing at its seams, a carpet so shaggy you’d turn into a living bug zapper and a matching trash television he’d picked up from a garage sale for seventy bucks.
Next to the TV, lay an immaculately kept PS4, the sleek-black console a diamond in the trash heap Cruise lived in.
Exhausted from a long day of work, Cruise quickly stripped out of his suit, hanging his clothes on a hanger before putting them away in his closet. He briefly fought with the closet’s sliding door as it got caught on something.
Rather than investigating the source of this hindrance, Cruise deliberated to just pull harder.
It worked.
Stumbling over to his couch, wearing nothing but a pair of underpants his mother had gotten him for Christmas, Cruise practically collapsed into the rock-solid seat.
“Uhggg”, Cruise groaned, wishing for the thousandth time that week he could go back and redo his past, “If only I studied more as a kid”, he lamented further.
Picking up the controller he had placed on the ground beside the couch, Cruise pressed the start button.
“Skyrim time”, Cruise spoke aloud, already looking forward to all the adventures his orcish warrior would, what enemies he’d slay with his Dragon bone battleaxe would cut through today.
Suddenly, as Cruise was waiting for the game to load, a notification popped up on his phone. It was from his brother, Jason. It read:
Hey bro, open your door.
Sighing at having to get up, but also excited at the prospect of seeing his brother again, Cruise walked back over to his front door. Briefly stopping by his closet to equip a generic pair of long pants and a plain white T-shirt.
Upon arriving at the portal leading into his abode, Cruise looked through the peephole embedded in the door.
As expected, on the other side stood a humanoid figure that Cruise immediately recognised to be his younger brother.
Opening the door with a mostly genuine grin, Cruise greeted the younger man.
“Jason! How long has it been? Two years? How’s mom?”
“Cruise! It’s so good to see you again”, Jason replied, putting a plastic bag, containing something Cruise couldn’t quite make out, on the ground before immediately embracing his older brother.
“Mom’s doing great. She wishes you’d call more.”
“Yeah, I’ll do that”, Cruise returned noncommittally. “What brings you here?”
At this, Jason looked to his brother rather confusedly, “Uh, Cruise, you do know what day it is?”
“Umm, let me think… it was the 27th last week, so… Holy shit! It’s my birthday, how the hell did I forget that?” Cruise exclaimed in surprise.
“Why am I not surprised?” Jason shook his head, “Well, lucky for you, I didn’t forget, and I even brought some beer for the occasion.”
“Aww, my little brother does care!” Cruise said jokingly, opening his arms to hug his brother again.
“Knock it off you idiot”, Jason retorted, socking him in the arm lightly.
“Ouch! You wound me, brother!” Cruise pretended to hold his ‘injury’.
“Anyway, let’s go inside before this beer goes warm”, Jason ignored him, picking up the plastic beer full of what was now revealed to be alcohol.
“Good idea, don’t forget to leave your shoes by the door”.
“Why, I bit of dirt might actually improve this dump”, Jason retorted snarkily, bending down to undo his laces.
“Fuck you.” Cruise deadpanned, “It’s not that bad.”
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
“Dude, I’ve seen less trash in a landfill…”, Jason commented, sidestepping an empty bottle of soda.
Cruise was about to respond when something odd happened.
A loud Ding sounded within Cruise’s head. Looking back at his brother, Cruise realised he must have heard it as well.
“What the fuck was that?” Cruise questioned.
“Your guess is as good as mine,” Jason replied.
Suddenly, however, a blue screen appeared before both of the brother’s faces.
And that was how it first began.
In the next instance, the ground began to shake, with many buildings of poor quality simply collapsing in heaps around the globe. Luckily for Cruise, however, although his room was trashy, the complex was made out of concrete and was reinforced with steel rods.
Over the next few hours, civil unrest was high. As if by magic, technology around the globe disappeared without a trace. The governments had no way to communicate with the population.
Soon, it was noticed that new areas of land began to appear out of nowhere. It was also around this time the first appearance of monsters began.
Beasts both familiar and unfamiliar began to come out of the woodwork, what used to be normal animals, now transforming, evolving into creatures that could kill an adult human with ease.
At first, Cruise and many who were familiar with such occurrences in stories and video games were elated at the opportunity to use their gaming knowledge to become the protagonists of this new world.
That was until they realised how much more terrifying it was in a world where one couldn’t simply ‘respawn’.
Cruise didn’t give up on the idea immediately, and eventually formed a party of like-minded people who also wanted to grow stronger and become pioneers of this changed Earth.
Together with this party and his brother, who wasn’t as knowledgeable on the subject of video games, Cruise began to hunt monsters, and even level up.
As time passed, Cruise was eventually able to choose out of a selection of ‘skills’ upon reaching level five, even gaining the opportunity to advance into a ‘class’ at level ten.
Fantasising about the idea of becoming a sword-wielding warrior, Cruise decided to head in that direction.
Unfortunately, however, one’s luck is destined to run out eventually, and after an argument broke out over some uncommon loot dropped by a pretty strong monster, Cruise and his brother were eventually forced to leave the party.
This didn’t stop Cruise’s aspirations, however, and in just a few days, he’d joined a new group. The leader of said group was even stronger than Cruise was, which, although kind of triggered his inferiority complex a bit, he didn’t let it bother him too much. After all, it was far too arrogant for Cruise to actually believe himself to be the strongest person on Earth; he knew monsters existed amongst people as well, and he was but a ‘salary slave’ pre-system.
There had been reports of a level 23 boar roaming around in the forest only a couple of kilometres away from the town they had been staying at, and the leader of their party, Thomas, had decided it’d be a good way to judge their new party members' skills.
And after one thing led to another, Cruise was standing, with most of his bones crushed, before a charging boar the size of a truck.
He knew he was dead, however, that still didn’t stop him from cursing the boar's entire bloodline. It was way stronger than what they had been told; rather than it being a level 23 mutated boar, instead, the beast turned out to be a level 47 boar champion.
This was a beast that’d require at least ten level thirties to even stand a chance at defeating it. Cruise was only level 22, and Thomas had only been level 25.
If Thomas hadn't put so many of his stat points into agility, he doubted the man would have been able to dodge the beast’s first strike.
Resigned to his face, Cruise didn’t even really feel the pain of his bones being shattered. Well, he did, but it was mostly numbed by the grief he felt over Jason’s death.
Cruise once again felt regret, wishing to have the ability to turn back time, and start things over, however, Cruise knew he never could.
Cruise closed his eyes, watching as the beast charged towards him for the final time, its tusking aiming to impale his blood-smeared chest.
Cruise’s life was coming to an end.
“How do you do, human?”
Cruise thought he heard a voice, he laughed, “Looks like I’m losin’ it after being knocked around so much.”
After all what kind of person would be around this high-level area? Especially alone?
No, he was probably just in shock after having been penetrated by the boar’s powerful tusks, and he hadn’t been able to process it yet… or something like that.
“It’s quite rude not to answer someone when they’re speaking to you.”
There it was again, a voice! A voice he didn’t recognise…
“Have I been stabbed yet?” Cruise said, a tad confused, “Suppose I should probably open my eyes, then.”
Holding his breath, Cruise forced his eyelids open. Before him, Cruise stood eye-to-eye with a monster of a boar, at least 2 times his height.
“Ahhh!” came a scream from the young man, flinching away in terror.
The boar didn’t move… It stood frozen in the foliage; it was as if someone had paused time, or… “Wait, that voice!” Cruise remembered, turning to look around, Cruise was unable to spot any person, but on a closer inspection, he saw orbs of flame observing him from the treeline.
Locking… ‘eyes’ with the being, Cruise immediately felt a sense of pressure, as he looked into those heavenly orbs of flame, Cruise could only think of one thing, “Inferior”. He was inferior. No. Everything was inferior to the existence that stood only a few steps away.
Cruise instantly felt the urge to bow, and was about to do so, disregarding the scorching pain of broken bones digging into his skin.
He was stopped, however, “Uh, no, don’t do that… Shit! I always forget! I even told myself, don’t forget to suppress your aura, and this time I actually remembered, but how’d I fucking forget to turn down my presence,” spoke the otherworldly being.
“You know what I mean, human? I swear, there are just too many things I have to do in order to communicate with you lesser beings without your bodies and souls being instantly turned to shreds.”
Cruise felt a little conflicted…
Was that superior being he felt a few moments ago really this… creature?
“Umm… this inferior one greets you… Mr…” Cruise stammered out, quite shell-shocked from recent events.
Cruise honestly thought his nigh-fatal injuries were the least of his worries.
“Oh, I don’t require something so useless as gender; procreation becomes a little meaningless when you live forever.” The creature of darkness answered, “As for my name, however… hmm, did I ever have one?”
At this, an odd memory sparked in the creature’s mind.
It remembered this funny-looking lizard king of some minor faction or another, and he had somehow gotten it in his mind that the creature was some Sultan of a great empire that he was determined to slay and take over.
The only reason it was so memorable, aside from the lizard man’s stupidity, was the lizard king’s speech impediment. It would always talk like, “Sssayltannn, Iss Sall ssslayyy you, s’and take s’over your empire for myssselfff.”
The creature remembered laughing so incredibly hard at the lizard king that he could swear the king’s scales had turned red.
“Hmm… call me… Salam, yeah, that has a nice ring to it”, the creature spoke.
“Uhh, okay… Salam? Thank you for saving me. I truly thought I was going to die.”
“Yes, yes, now that we’ve gotten over the formalities, let’s move on to the crux of why I saved you. Do you want your brother back?”, if Salam had a mouth, a salesman’s grin would be plastered all over his face.
At Salam’s words, Cruise’s face hardened, “Yes, I’d do anything. I’d even pledge my soul if that’s what it takes.”
“Woah, slow down there, no souls need to be pledged, I’m just here to tell you that upon reaching Godhood, one is able to use some of their divine power in order to transfer an unbound soul into another vessel.
And as your brother has died quite recently, his soul was still rummaging around so I ‘contained’ him for you”, Salam said, throwing over a small glass pendant that was attached as a necklace ornament to a piece of string.
Cruise caught it, looked down, and saw a purplish fluid moving around chaotically within the bottle-like ornament.
“I… Is this… him? Is this Jason?!” Cruise looked up towards Salam, a new hope festering within his heart.
“Your eyes don’t deceive you”, Salam replied.
“Thank you, you’re my hero… Please, tell me how I could possibly ever repay you!” Cruise cried in relief, “I thought I had lost him forever!”
“Pfff, this one’s free of charge, I barely had to go out of my way to capture his soul” Salam replied modestly.
“However…” Salam motioned his head toward the large boar, still frozen in place, “How are you gonna get away from that creature? I’m only powerful enough to freeze the beast for a few more minutes, and with the shape you’re in, I doubt you can get away in time.” Salam lied blatantly.
“Well, could you… fight it, I mean, you’re clearly powerful.” Cruise asked.
“I would, but, you see, a thousand years ago, I took an oath of pacifism, and I can’t, in good conscience, break that.”
The well of hope that had seemed to have sprung in Cruise’s heart looked to have deflated.
Now’s time for the carrot, Salam thought.
“But…”, Cruise’s ears perked up at the sound.
“Well, let me put it like this, you see, I’m kind of a wandering merchant throughout this big multiverse of ours, and while I can’t give you anything for free, I could perhaps sell you a ‘skill’ that might be able to help in this predicament of yours…”, Salam had to use magic to keep himself from bursting out in laughter.
“I’ll certainly pay whatever I can, however, I doubt I’d have anything worth a grain of salt in your eyes.”
“Bah! I don’t require anything physical, or of value. How ‘bout this, all you have to do is…” Salam paused and pretended to think, “Every week, you must slay as many boars as whatever level you are, I’m sure it’ll be an easy feat with the skill I’ll give you.” Salam continued, non-jokingly.
Cruise blinked…