Willams awoke to the sound of glass clinking, darkness, and a world of unbelievable pain, His vision sputtered erratically and returned utter nonsense to him as his [Ee sight] struggled to take hold Returning broken images and sometimes nothing at all.

The annoying feeling of the system mentally thugging him to check his notifications didn't help either, His thoughts were a mess as he remembered how close He was to death and that absolutely terrifying encounter with that monster.

The spirit shuddered involuntarily as he remembered the slender monstrosity that had hunted him down, its rows upon rows of unnaturally sharp and glinting teeth. His reminiscence was cut short as a wave of pain shot through his body the moment his body moved, threatening to knock him unconscious.

He struggled to stay awake as the pain stormed through his body, the pain was almost unbearable, and it took all His willpower to remain awake as he fought down the pain, trying to be as still as possible, the motes that made his body spasmed out of control constantly, causing new waves of excruciating pain to wash over him constantly, as he struggled to control his own body.

Willams was beginning to lose hope when he felt the familiar presence of the system wash over him briefly, it left as quickly as it came but Willams felt something acting to ease the pain, it helped him tolerate it better. It felt similar to how his skill [Ee sight] felt, they both worked in the background but this one felt distinctly different.

Bit by bit the pain he felt became more tolerable as what he assumed to be a new passive skill worked in the background, He felt his willpower grow as he became able to tolerate a truly impressive amount of pain as time went on, eventually, he able to calm the raging motes that made up his body and regain full control.

The exhausted Willams rested his aching body and was glad to know that his body wouldn't be able to move without his conscious input going forward.

Now that his body was fixed, somewhat, Willams looked inward, where his system notifications always layered themselves over his mind as they waited, but he found nothing, he could feel them so he knew they were there but he couldn't see anything nor interact with anything no matter how much he willed them to unfurl and show themselves, he felt the system acknowledging his request, however, nothing happened.

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In a Fitz of panic, he tried summoning his status only for the same thing to repeat itself. His skills wouldn't even respond to his call, he could only feel their existence but nothing else, the system was broken too, it was then he realized the horrifying truth, he was powerless without the system, and the skills it granted him.

They weren't his, to begin with, they could be potentially taken back any time the bastard who gifted him the system if they felt like it, it was toying with him, just like how it toyed with him when it offered him a reward, from the very beginning, he was being toyed with.

The realization struck him like a bullet to the chest, he wanted to make it pay, but with what? With whose power? How laughable, he cursed himself for not realizing this earlier. He couldn't escape, and he couldn't abandon the system either, not only did he not know how to, and as much as he hated admitting this, he needed the skills the system gave him.

They were the only real way he could defend himself, they saved his life he would've died without them. Willams fumed in impotent anger, he was angry at himself, at the sadistic bastard who put him here, at everything. His shield of confidence cracked and true despair leaked in, but he couldn't give in, it was so easy to give up and let that thing have its way but he refused, he would find a way, he didn't know how, but he would.

He felt the system wash over him once more but it didn't matter, his recovery was his first priority, he would deal with everything else after he was in the shape to do so, with that settled, he dove into the center of his being, and looked for his core. It was fairly easy to do but it wasn't in food shape.

His core was on the verge of collapsing on itself and the tried to will it to fix itself but he soon realized it was the worse decision he had ever made, it started to move, very slowly at first but the barest of movements caused the pain he was feeling to be quadrupled, overwhelming his pain tolerance easily, and slapped him in the head like an angry sled hammer with a particular grudge for Him.

He felt his new skill flare up immediately and started working in overdrive, eventually, the pain subsided enough to finally get around to fixing himself, though this time he used a different approach and called upon his [Ee sight] skill that still refused to work properly but it would have to do.

Willams gathered his awareness and tried to scan his body once again, He began as slowly as possible, afraid of the pain that may slam through him if he dared to rush things, this was going to take a while, He knew that and if he rushed things he may end up permanently crippling himself if he wasn't already, he hoped he wasn't, as that would complicate things. Seeing that everything was still in place, he focused on his core again.

As he focused on his core, he noticed that micro-cracks lined its metallic-looking surface, where once was a hive of hot crackling motes was now almost a void, bereft of any.

Williams pushed his attention into the largest of the cracks and seeped deeper into his soul core, inside his soul core, he found the same strange metallic substance that made up the exterior of his soul core in lumps that seemed to stretch on infinitely but it was slightly different, each lump radiated a small amount of heat as well as a small amount of the motes that made up his body, they drifted each lump, lazily and listlessly, without purpose.

Willams willed his attention to the closest lump of metal and observed, the metal glowed hotter upon his arrival and spewed out more motes the longer he observed and took note of its features, the metal resembled iron at first glance but a closer inspection proved that to be incorrect.

It sparkled like crystal yet retained and conducted heat like it was metal.

'This is going to take a while.'