Congratulations! Your world has been pulled into the Narrative! You are one of a lucky 100,000 people to receive a minor reward. Please select one of the following options.

a) Improve your starting Class one level of Scale.

b) Begin with a piece of gear two levels of Scale higher than your starting Class.

c) Pay It Forward

That prompt flashing directly into my eyes really made the hangover worse. My headache went from ‘Oh God, why, why, why’ straight to vomiting into the tub. Mark must have left me here last night.

I staggered away from the tub with the prompt still flashing in my vision. None of it really made any sense to me, but the “Pay It Forward” option really puzzled my throbbing brain. Wondering about it caused another prompt to blare into existence.

Pay It Forward

A gift for the generous, the stupid, or those that believe in others. You “Give up” your bonus. Doing this causes the option you received to be offered to three other players in your contacts list. Should they also pay it forward you will receive an increase in your bonus by one level of Scale. This also triggers should any further players pay it forward.

The gamer in me sprang to life upon reading that. As I collapsed on the couch, the min-maxing instincts carved into my very soul could not be denied.

“Can I pull up my contacts?” I wondered aloud. Another prompt flared.

Contacts

Current contact list 4,129

Search:____________

Reply All?

I focused on “Reply All” and another window opened. Powering through the pain and forcing myself to not vomit I manage to mentally type out the message:

“Hey everyone, if we do this right we could chain this into hilarious levels. Everyone just keep paying it forward. For each person that does, everyone else gets something. Don’t do it for me, do it for yourself and for the lols.”

I then selected the “Pay It Forward” option.

Twenty seconds later I received another prompt.

Payback!

One of the people you paid it forward to has also paid it forward. Reward increased by one level of Scale.

Three seconds after that, a goddam hurricane of prompts pounded my psyche like the drummer in a Scandinavian metal band. I passed out. When I woke up I found the strangest prompt yet.

You are the sixth spawn of the Titan of Darkness.

You are a titanic Scale race. You will receive a titanic Scale class.

You are a world boss. You have been spawned to change the fate of this world!

Spawning in the goblin wastes. You will exist in 3…2…1.

I sat up gasping. I was in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of a blizzard. This should have been an immediate problem because I was bare-ass naked. The wind was violent, well over thirty miles-per hour, and ice pelted me, . I expected this to be more uncomfortable, but my skin held up and didn’t even chafe. There is no way the thermostat should read positive. That should have translated to my skin getting frostbite in five to ten minutes, and blistering in an hour or so, but I sat there in the snow completely uninsulated and didn’t even shiver. I have been in weather like this before, and I can tell you that this was not normal. I looked at myself.

…that wasn’t normal either.

I am not gonna bullshit you guys: I was no major-league athlete before this moment. To be frank, I had gotten dumpy. That was what it was, but now though… I didn’t look like any of the shredded bodybuilders you see in action movies. I was built like the proverbial brick shithouse. I had become a monster truck that walked like a man. I had a barrel chest, tree-trunk legs, and my arms were just massive. My hands and feet were also enormous. I am gonna leave the rest for you to imagine or make jokes about depending on your preferences.

I just sort of sat there for at least five minutes. What the hell was going on? Why was I in a different body? What is a Goblin Wastes? Where were the goblins? Was this damn snow going to stop? Seriously, how was the cold not getting to me? Why was I asking myself so many questions?

I mean, I didn’t know.

“Okay,” I told myself, nodding. “Okay, let’s treat this like everything else. First, let’s take stock of the situation. I am naked and afraid in a blizzard. I am getting prompts like I am in a video game. This points to several possibilities. I could be dreaming. The drinking could have finally destroyed my brain or some other physical damage may have done the same thing. The other option is this is happening, or I am at least perceiving it to be happening. If that is the case then perhaps this functioned based on some sort of rules. "Stats screen?"

Name:

If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

*please enter Name*

Race:

Titan Spawn

Class

*Please Select Class*

Level:

1

HP:

60

Power:

8

Mobility:

8

Body:

8

Mind:

8

Face:

8

Magic:

8

I frowned. Were those good numbers or bad? Was this a World of Darkness system or a Final Fantasy system? If this was like WoD, eight in an attribute would be incredible. If this was an FF system, then eight was probably a bit low for level one, but possible to become good with a metric ton of grinding. The other high likelihood was this operated-on Dungeons and Dragons rules, and if that was the case I had horrible stats. I was pretty sure I could puzzle out what each stat did.

I focused on the race.

Titan Spawn

The second highest rank on the Scale of existence. Your creator is a Titan. You have a level of Scale versus all forms of damage and effects except those aligned with your bane. You also gain an additional level of Scale for all damage and effects you produce on anything of lower Scale.

You are aligned with the primordial element of darkness. Your bane is light. Currently, there is no Titan of Light to create spawn. One will rise per the dictates of the narrative.

Everything about that seemed… good.

I was trying to figure out what exactly “Scale” was when someone spoke behind me.

“Are you just going to sit in the snow and stare at your dick all day?” a feminine voice asked.

I turned and found… a shadow in the shape of a woman. The details were hard to make out, but she was tall and looked to be wearing baggy clothes. She stood with a slumped posture and seemed to be watching me, but with very little interest.

Knowledge: Titans check… successful

A shadow avatar is a common ability of Titan Spawn. The avatar is capable of using perks, traits, and skills and attacking. The avatar is always ten levels lower than the titan spawn and is baselined at heroic Scale. Note: traits and perks could raise Scale, or capabilities of shadow avatars.

“The hell was that?” I asked aloud.

“Probably a Knowledge: Titans check.” The shadow replied. She sounded so tired as she continued. “Listen, it is technically my responsibility to guide each new spawn into the world. That said, I didn’t have anybody, so you need to listen good. Let’s go down the checklist. One, yes this is real. Two, you are not “BOB” -I know that wasn’t our name, but you know who I am talking about - never say the actual name you used to have out loud. If you try, a warning prompt is going to pop up so that should tell you all you need to know about that. Three, you are overpowered, not invincible. Take your time, grind out the levels, and you will basically become unstoppable. That said other bosses are still a thing, and they will actively seek you out to kill you, Demons specifically. We are technically at war with them because we signed a nonaggression pact with the angels, except for Adam, but he’s being a bitch. Also, I am Nadia. I have all the same memories as you and 280 years of extra experience.”

That was a lot to process, but somehow I felt like I could just… take it in stride. Bizarre. Being told that I was not the man I remembered being, but some sort of copy placed inside a different body and unleashed in a world that ran on game rules, made sense. At least in this very specific scenario.

Yes, I am a nerd, why do you ask?

The fact that I was talking to another copy of the guy I used to be was actually weirding me out more. Nadia was basically alien to me, but talking in ways that sounded like me. It is hard to explain.

“So, you are me?” I asked finally.

“Not quite, we have the same memories up to the point of spawning,” Nadia explained, sagging visibly. She flopped down next to me. “I once was right where you are now. I spawned in confused, lost, and naked. Unlike you I was missing my dick and I had these.” If I have to tell you where her hands were, then I just can’t help you.

“Okay, but what is the point?” I asked. I needed a goal. This was too much weirdness. I needed an anchor. “What are we trying to do?”

“There is no point, nothing we do matters. We just keep living, as the Narrators change things around us. Don’t fuck with a Narrator by the way. They are just trouble, and they will get the people around you killed. Often in terrible ways.” She didn’t even look at me as she spoke. Her head just hung sullenly.

“Why is this happening?” I followed up. None of the nihilism made any sense to me.

Nadia sighed and tipped onto her back in the snow. “It doesn’t matter. We are just entertainment for sick bastards and the Narrators just turn the screws so the Audience can watch people suffer.”

“What?”

“This is getting boring,” Nadia said. “The whole thing is pointless.” She rolled onto her side with her back to me. “Just do what you want. I don’t care.” Then she was gone.

That was weird. I wasn’t really sure how to process that I had elder copies of me, at least one of which was a woman, or in a woman’s body. As odd as that was, the way Nadia talked, and the order information was presented, it truly felt like the way I would have said it. Maybe a lot more fatalistic than I would have been... no, things had been a bit dark before this. The drinking was out of hand months before that message.

I shook my head. I really needed to get my shit together before…

Attack from Snow Lion… successful!

You take 2 damage

HP: 58/60

The large cat pounced on me. Four trails of fire ran down my back. Some latent instinct flashed through me and I jerked my head and neck to the side. This caused the lion’s jaws to miss the mark and not crunch down on my spine. The cat jumped back before I could think to retaliate. I got to my feet and the damn thing took a swipe at my leg. Kicking spastically, I managed to avoid getting clawed. Trouble was this put me really off balance with one leg in the air. It needed to come back down or I was going to faceplant and then probably be eaten by a white lion.

Given little other option I brought my foot down on the lion’s back while praying it would not maul my crotch. Imagine my surprise when my heel hit the big cat like a sledgehammer. The cat’s spine snapped and its body squished under my foot. Ew!

Attack Successful! Snow Lion takes 30 point(s) of damage

Snow lion slain. 8 point(s) of experience earned!

92 experience to next level

The adrenaline high from that fight was unreal. I could not stop my hands from shaking. A giant goddamn lion had tried to eat me. Also, the pain from the claw marks was way worse than 2 hit points should be. I had cut myself on broken glass before, had stupidly stepped on it. Thirty stitches worth of screw-up, and each of the claw marks was the same level of fall-to-the-floor agony I felt when they pulled the glass out. That is how much losing two hit points hurt? Holy shit! I really don’t want to know what being at low health had to feel like.

That is when the second snow lion ambushed me.