He landed with a hard bump on the top of a pickup truck, setting off a blaring alarm. He rolled off it and landed on his feet, wincing as his left leg gave slightly. His mind was racing with what he had just heard. Just the first few sentences were enough to set Sam off down a rabbit hole of conjectures. The words “multiversal records” meant nothing to him. Well, he knew what the words meant of course, but there was no real world connotation to them.
Suddenly, he felt a chill come over him. There was something wrong with the world. A moment later he discovered what it was. The wind had suddenly stopped. Not only that, but all sound save for the beating of his heart and his shallow breaths was gone. A voice spoke directly into his mind a second later, causing him to jump.
“Humans, Lycanthi, Aberiths, Dougons, and the countless other sapient species of this universe, welcome to The Boundless Expanse. You have been granted this great opportunity courtesy of your sponsor, Tantalos Veruvax. All of existence is a far larger thing that any of your collective races have ever scratched the surface of. Your universe floats in the middle of the greater Multiverse, which is in turn one of countless other Multiverses that continue to stack upon each other upwards into infinity. Rejoice, for you are no longer mere peons of mortal drudgery, but citizens of a realm of endless potential. You all will shortly feel the effects of your initialization into this new order.” The voice paused and waited for something. Sam waited as well, and then he suddenly doubled over in pain. A burning sensation, like lava was being poured directly into his chest area, overcame him. He rolled on the ground, trying to get some relief, but there was none. He lost track of where he was for a brief moment, and then all was still.
“Now that that unpleasantness is gone, I can better explain what is happening. What you just received was a cultivation core. All of your wasted potential has been condensed into something that will allow you to transcend the shackles of your prior existences. You can now use my functions to manage and direct your growth. Level up, grow stronger and make this universe tremble before you, or die as fodder for the one who will. Over the next year, various tournaments and other such growth conducive events will allow you to establish a hierarchy among yourselves. True power is only achievable through true desire for growth. Good luck and farewell.”
Sam just stood there, stunned. This was all too much. Barely ten minutes earlier, he had been walking into his dead end job. What had changed since then? Apparently a lot. He sucked in a deep breath to steady himself and then as he breathed out, something was kindled inside himself. Pausing, he repeated the action. It was as if there was an ember deep within his body that was being fanned by the winds of his breath. He closed his eyes, something told him that this was the right thing to do, and he kept breathing. A light started to grow within his vision and after a few more breaths, it stopped guttering. He looked at it in bemusement. It was a tiny orb shaped object that glowed with a faint white light. Still, it gave off an imponderable, ineffable aura of infinite potential, as if it was the seed of some mighty tree, ready to grow into its full glory with the help of his careful tending. He opened his eyes and the afterimage of the light was still there. His closed fist glowed with a faint blue light and he opened it. A transparent blue screen expanded out of nowhere, appearing directly in front of his face.
Sam Atlas
Human
Mortal Tier
G Rank
Class:None
Level 1
Strength
11
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
1.00x
Constitution
10
1.00x
Resilience
10
1.00x
Dexterity
7
1.00x
Intelligence
9
1.00x
Wisdom
11
1.00x
Health 100/100
Mana 90/90
Stamina 110/110
Skills:0
Titles:0
Marks:1*
Sam felt a strange attraction to the floating asterisk and he selected it with his mind. Before he could take in just how bizarre this whole thing was, the floating display was replaced with another.
Marks:1
Mark of Tantalos Veruvax: Grants greater ease of Dao formation. You have gained the barest fragment of a fraction of the interest of the being known as Tantalos Veruvax. As the sole inhabitant of this universe to resist his aura pressure, you have been marked as his personal project. Perform well and your death will be swift, perform poorly and you will suffer the same fate as the rest of your universe.(This Mark can be hidden.)
This was probably a bad thing. One thing that Sam knew was that the odd ones out were always the first to die in any of the horror films that he had watched. Luckily, this seemed to have been countered by the ability to hide it.
“Hide it from what?” Sam wondered. It wasn’t as if anyone could see it, if he didn’t have the strange floating screen open. He didn’t even know if anyone else could see his personal screen. This screen reminded him of a status screen from a video game. He had played a few RPG’s before and this was very similar. He even had levels and stats. Were those gamified versions of his parameters in real life? The stat names were very simple and he could have told what they meant even if he had never played a video game in his life. His Strength was on the higher end of his stats, with the average around 10. He snorted as he read the number next to his Dexterity.
“Yeah, you can say that again.” Sam had been plagued by clumsiness for most of his life and this seemed to confirm it. As to his other stats, they were all around the same range. Perhaps 10 was the average for a human? Sam knew that he was pretty average as things went, except apparently with his mental fortitude, as Tantalos had said. That was supposed to be quite high, although it wasn’t marked on the stat screen. Maybe the man had meant willpower, but had said it in a fancy way. If so, that was a complete joke. If Sam had possessed some sort of incredible strength of will, he wouldn’t have been in the situation that he had been before Tantalos came.
A low growling noise came from his left. It was probably just a dog. Sam continued reading, sure in his assessment of the noise. A moment later, he was on the ground, with a creature hanging off his arm. He called it a creature because it was like nothing he had ever seen before. The closest thing that he could think of was a garden gnome, and that was a very loose parallel. The thing looked like a small greenish humanoid, with a vast potbelly and viciously sharp teeth. It projected a vile odor into its immediate vicinity and Sam started coughing. It seemed harmless enough, but then it started to glow. Sam grabbed it after that and threw it into a wall. There was no way that he was going to let some radioactive green alien latch onto his arm. He didn’t want to get cancer.
It picked itself up with a high pitched screech and charged at him. It was far faster than it looked. It raised one of its forelegs, Sam wasn’t sure whether it was running on all fours or simply running with extremely bad posture, and it slashed at his leg. Sam gasped. The tiny claws of the creature had sliced straight to the bone. He toppled over with a muffled squeak and turned to face the green beast as he fell. Luckily, he landed on top of it. The thing splattered underneath him, dousing the area and his clothes in a viscous green goo.
You have killed a Juvenile Gremlin!
You have leveled up!