1 Prologue

Within the City of Dubai, a land filled with opportunities and a haven for the people around the world as an exotic vacation cite, in a residence at the rural edges of Dubai, a young man was currently sat thrilled at his chance to explore the city, at last.

This young man was Xenos, an unfortunate person, who was diagnosed with multiple illnesses both physical and mental, the doctors had been unable to identify the exact cause of these illnesses as this had been never seen before, moreover, could not track the cause of the disability the young man experienced.

The illnesses had been something that were not life-threatening but could also be described as something of equally suffering as things he thought within reach were unreachable as though in a 'living paralyses'. Xenos could not engage himself in daily activities like a normal person, much less sports which he deemed interesting; he was unable to perform continuous movements and certain amounts of activity during the day could exhaust him, causing his vitals to spike and make him feel unimaginable pain.

This situation did not differ with his mental ilness. He was unable to concentrate at what he wished in specific tasks such as studying which required his concentration, since he could not force his mind to obey him without causing himself unspeakable pain, he had gotten used to letting his mind wander and function freely.

This did not only cause him to barely pass his education levels but also caused him isolation from his age-group. It was not that people did not wish to befriend him, it was mostly due to the fact that he could not, he for one did not share interests with them but also was seen as an under-achiever as his condition was not publicly revealed with the exception of his physical limitation as compulsory sports within school needed to be avoided, this was the decision of his parents as they previously hoped he could overcome this illness through sheer will power, but they had underestimated the condition of Xenos. People being ignorant of his conditions around him thus began to judge his 'lacking' character.

"So, what are we doing once we have dinner?" asked Xenos, somewhat anxious, he was currently within a car towards a restaurant they planned to dine at. He although experienced these medical conditions, was not cold but quite welcoming despite his childhood isolation, this was especially true towards his parents.

They both worked continuously day and night, thus there was rarely time they spent together.

He however, never complained but was instead thankful because in his perspective not only had they adopted a child which was nothing but a disappointment to them, being an under-achiever in studies and spending their hard-earned money on his appointments to the doctor but they had also never showed a displeased or disappointed expressions at least openly. Although they had distanced themselves from him.

He did not nag them about their lack of interaction with him, because he realised that he could not be self-centred and expect everything to revolve around himself as people had their own lives to live. This was especially true for his parents who got the short end of the stick when adopting a child.

When Xenos had been adopted, his parents were not yet aware of his illnesses and thus were filled with endless joy when they adopted him into their lives. Since they could not have a child of their own, they had finally filled the void in their hearts with the 3-year old at the time.

But the happiness was destined to not last, as the child began to shown symptoms of extreme fatigue and would unusually experience pain randomly throughout the day, and this only got worse as he grew older.

As time went by, so did their joyful expressions until the child was left with a caretaker in a desolate and cold home. He grew up, never having an ounce of negativity on his face, instead was abnormally optimistic. This only caused more pain to the hearts of the people around him.

"We will go back to the house; you know that you are unable to withstand more physical activity." Responded a dazed mother, answering with an absent mind as though she had repeated these answers innumerably.

"oh... yeah, sorry... I forgot, ha ha..." masking his disappointment with a fake laughter. Although Xenos knew that he was physically weak, he was also aware that sitting in the house all day left him with enough energy to do some common activities with his parents afterwards, simple activities such as buying ice cream to eat together or just roaming around in the car, and even they knew this to be the case but didn't wish to engage in these activities for some reason. Once again, he began blaming himself for this.

As they reached the restaurant, which was unsurprisingly a high-class one, they continued into it and soon began to dine as a family. Except this could hardly be called as one as they seemed more like strangers busy in their own worlds than family members.

Looking at them he excused himself to use the restroom, but seeing the lack of response from either of his parents he sighed.

Shifting his attention from them, he used the joystick of the wheel chair to go to the restroom, the wheel chair was not used because he was disabled but was a way for him to conserve his energy from walking to places showing how severe his condition actually was. As he was making his way to the restroom his mind began to wander once more as he thought of the high school examination in the following week and how unlikely it was for him to score even averagely.

As he entered the restroom, he noticed that he was alone, this was not uncommon at all but what was uncommon was the lack of noise in the bathroom. He thought this was unusual because of the lack of even the slightest noise, not even the noise of the air conditioner was heard. It was eerily quiet.

He became aware of a small hue of white light within one of the sinks. Curious, he made his way to the light, what made him curious was not just the presence of light but how the light made the bright lighting of the surrounding seem dim despite the restroom being brightly lit.

He began to stand up upon reaching the sink to look into the sink as the wheelchair did provide enough height for him to see into it. What he saw made him dumbfounded.

"Is this a Magic Cube from Martial World?" He thought as he saw the gray 'one-inch' cube which could clearly fit in the hands of an adult perfectly, wondering who forgot their replica. As for how he knew this was a Magic Cube from the Chinese novel "Martial World" was because he had heard it. Since he was unable to read books he had asked his caretaker to read him the entire book, which in itself was a miracle. He enjoyed this specific book quite a bit as this was one of the only books he was read to, as he couldn't ask his caretaker to read long books like this one. Thus, fanfictions were usually read to him by the caretaker as they were evidently shorter.

As for how he remembered how the cube looked like, he had once seen the image of the depicted cube from the wiki.

Just when he was about to go back to his wheelchair to sit down, he remembered how the cube was described to possess black inscriptions on it rather than the glowing white ones, making him think that whoever possessed this cube and had forgotten it was either sold a fake replica or made a huge mistake when they had it custom made. He had drawn this conclusion because he had not seen any merchandise of the Martial World novel, moreover, people who could spend enough money to dine in this restaurant had enough money to have custom items made.

What he did not realise at this moment was that his thinking process was smooth and not at all fatigued as it should have been...

He now planned to return the cube to the rightful owner by handing it in to the reception so the owner can potentially get it back from there.

However, as he made the motion to pick the cube up and made contact with the cube, he seemed to experience the same pain of overexertion and felt pain beyond what he had ever experienced before.

Thump

He fell to the floor, or more accurately a corpse did.

...

Xenos's dead body was not found until twenty minutes after when his father walked in looking for him as too much time had passed. Finding the body, the colour from his face drained as he ran towards it shaking the body manically hoping he would wake up, he soon began to call for him loudly but no response was heard, no heartbeat... nothing.

The commotion inside caused some people dining to become concerned on what had happened, this was mostly true for the mother of the deceased Xenos, she was aware of how her husband had gone to look for Xenos as he had been in the restroom for too long. Although they had been stoic and expressionless towards him, they cared deeply for him.

As she heard the voice of her husband from the men's restroom, she had a foreboding feeling concerning her son. She sprinted towards the restroom before slowing down as she heard her husband clearly.

"COME ON! WAKE UP! We can go to the ice cream place to spend more time with you, please..." As his voice got lower and lower, so did the colour of his wife until it turned ghastly white. Witnessing the lifeless body of her son she had pushed herself away from, in the arms of her husband. She began to regret, painfully regret, but it was of no use. It was too late.

As they grieved and desperately tried to wake their son up, the employees of the restaurant had already called upon the ambulance.

Soon the ambulance arrived, after checking the body up and confirming the death, the eyes of the parents became lifeless. The cause of death was assumed to be his unique condition as nothing was found around him, the magic cube had disappeared.