Chapter 1: The Last Normal Day

The scent of damp earth and pine drifted through the cold morning air as Kael stepped onto his porch, a steaming mug of coffee in hand. The world was quiet, untouched by the noise of cities, far from the rush of crowds. Just him, the trees, and the sky.

Thirty-one today.

Not that it mattered. No party. No calls. No one to care. Just another morning like any other.

He exhaled, watching his breath mist in the air, then took a slow sip of his coffee. Bitter. Strong. Exactly how he liked it.

As he leaned against the wooden railing, his fingers brushed over his jaw absently, feeling the rough scratch of his beard. It was getting too thick again. He should trim it, but that would mean exposing the scar the ugly thing running from his left jawline, cutting upward in a jagged slash. A reminder of another life. A wound that never quite faded, even after all these years.

His mid-length black hair was just as unruly. He’d let it grow longer than usual, something about the isolation making self-maintenance seem like less of a priority. No one around to care. Not like there is anyone to see and judge.

The wooden planks of the porch creaked beneath his weight as he shifted. The air was still, cold, the kind of chill that settled deep in the bones. The kind that woke you up better than any caffeine ever could.

This was home. This silence, this peace. The cabin was small, but he had built it himself a single room, enough space to live, to be left alone. The town was an hour away by foot, twenty minutes by truck, but he only ever went when he needed supplies.

He preferred it this way.

A Morning Like Any Other, ordinary peaceful.

Kael stepped off the porch, his boots crunching against the frost-laced ground. The sky was still tinged with the soft grays of dawn, but the forest was already awake.

Birds chattered in the distance. A faint breeze rustled the trees. Somewhere nearby, water flowed down through the valley stream.

Then, his eyes caught movement fresh tracks leading away from the treeline.

A buck had passed through just before sunrise, its hoofprints pressed deep into the damp earth. A good-sized one. Enough meat to last him for weeks.

He took another sip of coffee, then set the mug down on the porch railing. The hunt came first.

Stepping inside, he grabbed his bow from where it rested against the wall. The rifle leaned in the corner, untouched for weeks. Too loud. Too easy. Taking life should not be made easy.

The bow was better. More personal.

He slung his quiver over his shoulder and adjusted the worn leather straps. A hunt before heading into town. Then supplies. Then back before sunset. Simple. Routine.

That’s how life was supposed to be.

Kael moved through the trees with careful, practiced steps, his breath controlled, his body instinctively shifting with the terrain. Even now, years after leaving the military, his body still remembered.

The silence. The patience. The need to stay just at the edge of awareness, ready for anything.

His fingers brushed against the fletching of an arrow as he knelt by the next set of tracks. Fresh. The buck was close.

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He adjusted his stance and followed the trail, weaving through the underbrush. Every movement was deliberate. He had learned early on that the forest had its own rules, its own kind of battlefield. One mistake, and you went hungry.

He spotted the deer just beyond a clearing, grazing near the base of an old oak. A clean shot.

Kael pulled back the bowstring, exhaling softly as he steadied his aim.

Then, the world shifted.

A low vibration hummed through the air.

Kael felt it before he heard it a deep, unnatural stillness.

The wind died. The birds went silent. The usual hum of the forest gone.

The deer froze. Its ears flicked back, eyes wide with something primal. Fear.

Kael lowered his bow slightly, his instincts kicking in. He knew this feeling.

The calm before an ambush.

His breath slowed. Muscles tensed. His heartbeat was steady, but everything in him screamed that something was wrong.

Then, the sky split apart.

One moment, he was standing on solid ground.

The next, he was floating.

The trees, the earth, the cold morning air gone. Everything around him was dark. Not black, not night just nothing. A hollow absence that stretched in every direction.

And he wasn’t alone.

Shapes drifted around him millions, billions. People. Animals. Creatures he didn’t recognize. All of them suspended in the void, their eyes wide with shock, some screaming without sound.

Kael clenched his jaw, forcing himself to stay calm. Panic wouldn’t help. This wasn’t death. This was something else.

Then, the world below or what he thought was below, began to change.

Kael’s breath caught in his throat. He could see it.

Earth, or what had been Earth, was no longer alone.

Landmasses shifted, expanded, fused. Enormous continents stretched and reshaped themselves, folding into one another like molten metal poured into a mold.

Oceans swelled, swallowing entire coastlines before reforming elsewhere, creating new islands, new rivers, new landscapes that had never existed.

Then, from the abyss, other things or what looked like different worlds appeared.

Massive fragments of land, entire biomes that did not belong, descended from the void, merging with the expanding Earth.

A jagged, mountainous region the color of molten silver fused into the northern hemisphere. To the east, a continent covered in endless, ancient forests as far as the eye could see seamlessly blended into the growing world.

Cities appeared; ruins of structures built by hands that were not human. Enormous underground caverns stretched open as if Earth itself was swallowing new realms whole.

Kael could see everything.

And he wasn’t the only one.

Among the billions of floating souls, new faces appeared.

Elves. Dwarves. Individuals, unlike anything he had ever seen, their expressions just as confused, just as terrified.

The merging continued, stretching time into what felt like eternity—yet must only have been ten minutes.

And when the time passed, Kael felt Earth was now ten times the size it had been before.

It was no longer just Earth.

It was something else.

Then, the voice came.

It wasn’t loud. It wasn’t even sound. It simply was.

"Inhabitants of this new world. Your people and your old worlds has been integrated into the greater whole of the multiverse."

The void shuddered.

Kael’s breath slowed. What?

"You have all  been chosen."

Kael felt something tighten in his chest. Chosen? For what?

"As such, you will be granted access to the System and all it offers."

A pulse of energy ripped through him.

Pain tore through his body searing, burning, relentless.

Kael gritted his teeth as something rewrote him from the inside out. He could feel it his bones shifting, his muscles tightening, his mind flooding with something unnatural.

Numbers. Symbols. Unreadable text flashed across his vision, carving themselves into his thoughts.

"Struggle. Survive. And strive for something greater than you could ever dream of."

The void collapsed. Individuals around him started disappearing, and soon he joined them too.

Kael hit the ground hard.

The scent of damp earth filled his nose, cold mud pressing against his skin. His body ached, his lungs burned, but he pushed himself onto his hands and knees.

The forest around him was wrong.

The trees were taller, their bark faintly pulsing with an eerie blue glow. The air was heavier, charged with something unfamiliar.

And the silence... it wasn’t natural.

His bow was gone. His quiver was gone. Only the knife strapped to his belt remained.

Then, a soft chime echoed in his skull.

A floating blue screen appeared before his eyes.

[System Activation Complete.]

[Welcome to your New World.]

[Survive.]

Kael exhaled slowly. Trying to rest control of his beating heart, everything had changed. And he knew it was real. This was too much; he felt too much not to believe it was real.

He didn’t know where he was. Didn’t know what had happened.

But survival?

That, he had always understood.

A low, guttural growl rumbled from the darkness of the trees.

Kael’s muscles tensed. Something was watching him. Hunting him.

And for the first time in years, he wasn’t the one holding the weapon.