What is bad luck? First I thought it might have been when my flight to Japan had encountered an unexpected bird to the engine during lift-off. Making the plane have to land back at the airport and me being delayed for 3 hours. Or perhaps the moment when, after a 7-hour flight of thinking of how to start a conversation with the cute girl next to me, right before landing I looked out the window and see another bird. Mind you not that bad in of itself but lets just say I had developed a bit of a trauma because of the last incident, which decided to manifest itself as the shrillest scream you might have heard in your life, making the flight attendant, the girl next to me and the whole plain start laughing after I frantically explain the reason that I screamed.
Next thing I know I am being consoled by a 6 year old little girl that was sitting next to the window, and that I later found out was the sister of the cute girl that was sitting in the middle of us, "Don't worry oni-chan the kamikaze birds can't get you if you don't show them fear, Amaya-one-chan told me after the first attack.". Between the little girl that was nodding sagely at me as if she had imparted the great truths of the universe and the feeling of embarrassment that had started to threaten to transform me in a tomato I just gave up any inhibitions I may have still had and just started talking to Amaya to try and hide my current emotional state. Father always said to make the most of the hand that you were dealt, and as the filial son that I am, I had decided to not disappoint him, at least not now.
20 minutes of talking later and an impromptu tag team with little Day-Nyoko we manage to convince her sister to go out on a date with me. Little Nyoko wherever you may be pleas know that you are truly a treasure.
Oh sorry, I have gone on a bit of a tangent there, so what is bad luck? Perhaps it was the next day when I came out of a taxi to go on a date with Amaya and I see the most obese pigeon that you could imagine fly over my head, or perhaps it is the moment when you can't find a Japanese person that can speak English when you are desperately looking for a bathroom to wash off an impromptu welcome gift from the local bird community. Honestly speaking I am starting to consider that this might just be a conspiracy of the birds of the world to get me in an early grave, to see me buried before my time be it by dirt or by shame.
So after a lot of miming and digging up all the knowledge of the Japanese language that I have managed to acquire in my years of watching anime I manage to get myself clean and on the date on time.
Now then you might think that this is the end of this little chain of misfortunes but I am afraid that you are sorely mistaken, right as our food had arrived and I picked up the boul of chicken ramen, yes I am that petty FU*K YOU BIRDS, I start feeling the world around me twist and turn.
And here we are in the present, me sitting in the middle of, what I can only describe as, a battlefield where 3 people fight using swords, magic, and guns a bunch of robot birds. Perhaps the birds are really out to get me? And as I watch one of the giant monster robot, plain size, scary-looking birds makes a b-line for me, I am finally convinced of the there exists a greate bird conspiracy to kill me.
As I was watching the giant monster coming towards me, considering if I should just eat the ramen as a last fu*k you to the world, my chest started feeling hot, seconds later I was experiencing the worst pain I had ever felt in my life. There I was falling to my knees watching the bowl of ramen fall in slow motion in front of me, my pyrrhic victory about to spill on the ground, and suddenly I hear a female metallic voice.
System initializing. Creation of Selium core in progress please stand by.
Strenght and hope start filing my body again as I hear the voice in my mind and the comprehension of the meaning of the words dons on me. Perhaps this is not the end but just a new beginning and the hardships of the last days were just the beginnings of my heroes journey. And then I looked again at the plane sized giant bird, that had gotten so uncomfortably close to me that I was only seconds away from being eaten alive by it. I came back out of my delusion enough for my instincts to kick in and with the world still moving in slow motion from my adrenalin rush I start my attempt at not dying.
As my body starts moving I hear the voice once again.
Selium core completed.
Side effect detected.
My mind blanked out when I heard the last notification and the next thing I knew I was jumping up and to the side of the monsters giant mouth, that was threatening to eat me whole, one hand on the monsters giant head pushing myself to go above its body in an attempt to get on it's back and as far as possible out of its reach, and my other hand was surprisingly somehow holding the bowl of ramen again with most of its content still inside.
As I managed to land flat, and painful if I may add, on the monsters metallic back I realize to my dismay that there is nothing to hold on to and I start sliding off the creature that had started gaining altitude again after its failed attempt at my life. Looking desperately around trying to find anything that I may be able to hold onto for dear life, I notice in the distance one of the people that were fighting these creatures in the first place rushing towards my direction.
When I finally slid off the monster and entered a free fall, the person rushing to me was close enough for me to make out her features. She was a tall girl, with raven hair and a heroic expression on her face, perhaps a bit biased of a description considering my situation but I digress, as far as I could tell she was around my age perhaps a little younger 18 or 19 she had a slender body fair skin and surprisingly unmoving considering the ridiculous speed that she was probably flying at. The most striking thing about her was definitely the 2 rectangular shapes that where coming straight out of her back and where spewing flames like some sort of future tech jetpack.
This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.
Right as she reached my position she decelerated to be able to grab me without hurting my already bruised body, next thing I knew was in her comforting embrace.
As I looked at the girls ruby eyes her face of utter concentration I could only avert my gaze so as not to distract her. Slowly calming down I take in my situation, first my now tattered and dirty clothes, my bruised body, the ramen bowl that somehow is still in my hands, half full, then the princes carry that the girl was holding me in and then finally at my surrounding, the ground was filled with the bird monsters, half-destroyed with apparent slash marks and puncture wounds that where leaking luminous green particles that evaporated into nothingness, but I could not see what I was looking for so I turned my eyes to the sky and the bird monster that was making a slow U-turn towards us surly ready to make another attempt at my life but I still did not manage to see what I was looking for. As I realized that my dignity was nowhere in sight I decided to just relax in the hands of the girl and enjoy what was left of my meal while someone else deals with this sh*t.
Taking a sip of the soup I start trying to figure out how this system works I start thinking of possible keywords and commands that may trigger a menu or some sort of response, determined to try them out loud as soon as I get my feet back on the grown if my mental attempt dose not work. As I was cycling throw possible commands "Help", "Stats", "Side effect" nothing seemed to work, the mysterious system that was given to me not deeming it necessary to respond to me, at least until I reached the word that I had had the highest hope for all along "Menu". I knew that all my years of being a weeb will come in handy one day.
Right in front of me lay a blue screen that reads:
Error f030a03 memory corrupted functionality no longer available.
As I proceed to unceremoniously spit out the ramen out of my mouth a sentence comes to mind that encompasses perfectly my current emotional state "Fu*k me", of course, I get a broken superpower all the heroes do but mine seems to not be broken in the usual way.
Foreign language detected. Analysing pleas wait.
Language determined to be English crossreferencing with database.
Automatic translation activated.
Well, I guess it at least has its uses.
My savior noticing my antics takes a quick glance at me, a frown apparent on her face, and I can only smile wearily back unable to say anything because of the wind that is rushing by. Resign with my apparent weirdness she stops paying attention to me and glances to the monster that has almost reached us the girl having to slow down significantly so that I would not die in her arms.
Following the girls gaze I also ended up staring at that stupid bird that is gunning for my life and a thought passed through my mind 'Just what in the seven hells is that thing?'
RX-hunting Hawk
A remnant autonomous selium robot, from the shattering war, this self suficiant unit has reconstructed itself into a large variant, fast and agile it is designed to swallow selium sources hole to continue it's functioning
Quest issued: Survive
Description: You have been targeted by a Hunting Hawk that wants to consume you to grow its energy reserves. Survive the encounter.
Reward: Armor Trigger
Oh, now that is more like it. The only question is what is an armor trigger. As my head kept filling with the possibilities my body must have shown my excitement because the girl looked again at me, and with a small smile on her face she said "Don't worry this will all end in a moment just hang on tight I am about to make a sharp turn"
Her voice soft and caring sounded clear even with the wind that was howling around us, and it quieted down all my iner fantasizing, without even thinking my hands wrapped around the girls neck and as I was enthralled looking at the girls ayes, we made a really sudden movement that I thought might split me in half. Just as we started moving the world started to slow down once again, as I was trying to figure out what is going on a luminous projectile flew past us at a slow pace, in my state of hipper perception I saw how the projectile pierced the Hunting Hawk and made a puncture wound similar to the ones I have seen on its brethren already on the grown. The world seemed to regain its normal speed and in my apparent daze, the red eyed girl had slowed down her flight speed and was preparing to land next to her other two companions.
Just when we landed the girl put me very slowly down before the other two who I now could tell where two men one in his late 40 raven hair similar to the girl whit a stern face marked by the vicissitudes of life and a scar from his mouth to his ear telling stories of his past battels he seemed to be the father of my savior and the other man that was in his mid twenties whit a kind smile on his lips but the same piercing rade ayes that seam to be running in this family. But before I could take in more of their appearance a sudden notification interrupted my train of thought.
Quest Survive completed. Issueing rewards.
Suddenly a black sphere of the blackest black, that I had ever seen, materialized right in front of me and a rectangular object fell out of it on the grown.
Before I could even complain in my mind about how the system had just thrown a possibly valuable item in front of a bunch of strangers, that may or may not rob me of said valuable item, I hear the girl that saved me say from behind me "Oh it seems you got a quest from the system that is quite rare!"
In other shock, I try to ask how she knows about my system but instead of words what comes out of my mouth is the content of my stomach. The stress and fatigue hitting me all at once as I black out while falling to the ground, the last thought crossing my mind before the darkness enveloped me being 'I hope I don't fall in the vomit'