Cleo stared at Leira incredulously.

“… what the hell does Mind even mean? What kind of weapon is that? Do you have psychic powers now?”

“Ehm… I don’t think so? I don’t feel anything...”

Cleo pulled at her own hair in exasperation.

“Again, what the hell Laira. Mind wasn’t even an option! Can you think faster now? Did you turn smarter? You must feel something.”

Laira threw her hands in the air, also clearly exasperated.

“I don’t know, Cleo! Do I look like I get kidnapped to other worlds on a daily basis!? I also don’t know what’s happening!”

That seemed to calm down Cleo a bit.

“Right… I’m sorry. It’s just… forget it. Whatever it is, we’ll probably figure it out. Maybe you are special and that’s why you got granted an amazing superpower, who knows.”

Cleo hated how bitter she sounded. How bitter she felt.

It was quite childish really. Why was she upset that her sister got something completely different? Maybe it wasn’t even something good, the System had clearly been malfunctioning. Maybe her sister was doomed.

In truth, she was just a little jealous. She had always dreamed of ending up in another world, to go on an adventure, to escape her own dark reality and to become someone special.

Now that it finally happened, it was her sister that got granted something special, and not her.

Which was a stupid thought.

Don’t let yourself feel down from this. We are in a new world, god damnit! There will be plenty of opportunities to get better and to get special powers.

A sudden warmth interrupted her brooding, her sister tightly hugging her.

Cleo reluctantly reciprocated.

They stood there in silence for a while.

“You are annoying, you know that big sis?”

Laira chuckled.

“I love you too, Cleo.”

They left the embrace and Cleo spoke again, without any hint of bitterness left in her voice.

“Alright, let’s start thinking about what to do now. I think we should leave this clearing, I have a feeling it won’t be so nice here after the trial starts.”

Laira looked around them and noticed that many people had formed both small and large groups.

“Uhhh… shouldn’t we join other people?”

Cleo shifted around, clearly uncomfortable.

“I don’t know… do we have to?

“Wouldn’t it be safer?” Laira replied, raising her empty hands towards her sister, “I don’t even have a weapon.”

“Yes, but I don’t trust the other participants here. Especially when they all have weapons”

She looked disapprovingly at all the groups.

“What do you think they are going to do when they see a helpless girl like you?” she said, shifting her gaze back towards her sister.

Laira opened her mouth to answer, but was suddenly interrupted when a loud *GONG* rang in everyone’s ears and a system notification appeared.

System Announcement

Dear Champions of Earth!

The first of a series of trials will begin shortly.

First trial: Survival I

Survive the attacks of wild beasts for 1 week!

Beasts will slowly grow in strength throughout the trial period.

A Copper V boss will appear on the final day.

Trial objective: Defeat the final boss [0/1].

Events and personal quests may occur during the trial.

All participants are encouraged to do their utmost to complete all objectives.

Special prizes await the best performing Champions!

Warning: Trial failure will result in death.

Time until trial start: 00:15 h

Good luck to all participating Champions!

****

Jett was awoken from his slumber by a loud ringing sound in his head.

Ughh… stupid system announcements.

He dismissed it immediately.

15 minutes…

Jett was faced with a dilemma. On one hand he didn’t feel like moving at all. He felt so empty and without energy that even moving a single muscle felt impossible. Sleeping didn’t help at all, the problem wasn’t physical exhaustion after all. His mind was just too burned out to generate even the slightest motivation.

On the other hand, the first trial would start shortly and if he kept lying around, he would soon either have to start running or get mauled to death by some boars.

Which didn’t sound like much. After all, who would fear some small pigs?

Well, smart people would. A wild boar back on Earth could heavily injure you if you weren’t careful.

And they weren’t on Earth. Any boar above ungraded would be System enhanced. And even on the first day there were a few Copper I grades already.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

And the more people are in one spot, the more likely they are to attract higher grades.

He didn’t particularly mind dying, but it would still be painful. If he had to die in the first trial, he would probably prefer jumping down a cliff. Or something similarly abrupt. Death by boar was not particularly fast. Only if you were lucky (or unlucky, depending on one's point of view).

Killing himself with a weapon was out of the question. He still had PTSD from the one time he tried to kill himself with a dagger through the chest, only for it to miss his heart and get stuck between his ribs.

Desperately trying to get a more lethal injury while writhing in agony in his own blood was not something he wanted to repeat. Ever.

But at the same time, if he were to regress right now, he would have barely a few minutes of peace until he would be in the exact same situation again.

I guess I should at least move somewhere…

He turned his head in the direction of the nearest hills. They weren’t visible behind the trees surrounding them, but he knew the starting area like the back of his hand. There was a small water source near them and there were also some shallow caves where he could hide.

Should be the perfect place to relax.

Some people usually fortify the water source there, so I won’t even have to deal with beasts. I’ll just chill somewhere and take some water here and then.

Of course, any sane person who wanted to survive throughout all the trials would need to fight beasts sooner or later, it was impossible to upgrade one’s grade without it after all. Well, there were also events and personal quests… but they usually included killing things. Or were triggered by fighting. In conclusion, avoiding fighting would just delay it until later, when everything became more difficult. Trying to fight beasts then, as an ungraded person… was like an ant trying to fight an elephant.

But he didn’t really need or want to survive until the end, it was enough to just do nothing for as long as possible.

He sighed, slowly propped himself up and reached for his weapon.

…

Right. I forgot I didn’t choose one.

Well, not like I really need one… but I wonder what my alignment says.

He ironically never tried not taking a weapon, even though he had used every single weapon listed multiple times already.

With a thought he conjured his status screen in front of his eyes.

STATUS

Name Jett Rivers Race

Human Grade

Ungraded Alignment Unaligned

… I don’t know what I expected.

Whatever. Doesn’t matter.

Alignments weren’t that important in his eyes anyways.

Anyone else in Alyrra would probably beat him to death if he said that, as their alignment determined their whole future path, but for him, who had tried every starting alignment, it didn’t matter much.

Apart from giving you an actual physical weapon, your choice of alignment would also give you certain invisible boosts to acquiring alignment related skills. For example, choosing a sword would make it much, much easier to learn all the different sword fighting skills. That didn’t mean you couldn’t use other weapons, it was just harder. In fact, learning other (unrelated) skills would enable you to influence your alignment later on. The most common one in the Tutorial was to take up a shield and transition your alignment from something like Sword to Sword & Shield.

If I really wanted to I could probably acquire an alignment later on as well…

Not like I do, though.

Jett glanced at the remaining time.

Well, I should go.

He let out another sigh, then stood up and slowly started trudging towards his planned hiding spot.

It was better to get as much distance from the people around him as fast as possible.

The starting ground was one of the most dangerous places during the first trial, precisely because there were so many people.

Most people thought that being in large groups was beneficial, and to a certain extent it was…but it was also more dangerous as it attracted stronger enemies.

Ugh, the path already seems longer than I remember it. Maybe I should just ask someone to drive a sword through my head so I can lie down again?

… no, I’m sure they would mess it up somehow. Can’t trust anyone on the first day to even hit a tree.

I’ll have to keep going, I guess.

He soon passed the line of trees delimiting the clearing from the vast forest.

After another few minutes of trudging through the undergrowth, another *GONG* sound rang out, followed by growls from the forest around him.

The first trial had started.

****

“How powerful do you think Copper V is?”

Laira dismissed the System announcement she had been reading for the second time and turned towards her sister.

“Don’t know. What are we?”

Cleo almost rolled her eyes again.

“Think of wanting to see your Status and you should see.”

Laira furrowed her brows and did as she was told.

A new textbox soon popped up in front of the System announcement.

STATUS

Name Laira Harper Race

Human Grade

Ungraded Alignment Mind

“Ungraded.”

Cleo let out a breath, seeming almost relieved.

“Yeah, me too. So I guess the boss is gonna be five grades above us. Whatever that means.”

Laira dismissed all her notifications and looked around. She didn’t technically need to dismiss them to see, but it was just very weird to still be able to perceive everything while realistically you shouldn’t be able to.

Many of the groups that had gathered before the announcement had now started to move and were going in several different directions.

Laira got nervous again.

“Ah, everyone is moving away, are you sure we shouldn’t join anyone? I don’t think it’s gonna be as bad as you think it will, even without me having a weapon.”

Cleo sighed in resignation.

“I really don’t want to, but it might be rational to do it. What about this? We start without one, see how it goes, and if it becomes too dangerous we can always just run towards one of those groups. If they really are as nice as you think they are, I’m sure they would still let us join later?”

Laira looked into the air, considering the proposal.

“But I have a feeling it will be better if we are alone,” Cleo continued, “if it weren’t for you I would have just gone by myself as well.”

“Alright alright, let’s do as you say,” Laira said while waving her hands, “you've always been the smarter one of us anyways.”

“And yet you got that Mind thing…,” Cleo muttered under her breath.

“What?”

“Nothing, sis. Let’s go.”

With that they started trotting towards the woods.

Along the way, there were multiple groups who called out to them to join them, but they declined them all.

Well, Laira did, Cleo just straight up ignored them.

Shortly before entering the forest, Laira turned her head towards Cleo.

“By the way, is there a reason we are going in this particular direction?”

Cleo shrugged.

“It’s as good as any other, I guess. But I think I spotted someone just like you here.”

“Like me?”

“Yeah, someone without a weapon.”