Chapter 05: Awakening

Volume 01: Start Again

Chapter 05: Awakening

[Player [Mikael Walker]]

[Skill generation activated]

The large book sucked in my crest and then flung open for me to see it flip through what seemed to be blank pages until it finally stopped. Looking at the pages I could not understand a single word that was on them as everything was written in what this world considered runes.

A message popped up in front of my face.

[Skills Generated: 2 |

Time Lock [Obsidian] | Passive Ability: A single touch of time that hastens enemies toward death. Any attack dealt by the user to an enemy has a 3% chance to lock the enemy in a time freeze of 1 second. (Enemies' abilities and passives are deemed inactive during Time Lock.)

Backtrack [Diamond] | Activatable Ability: Time shall only be strung by the wielders of time and can only be restrung by the Keepers. On activation, all players and creatures within 10 meters of the user will have their abilities and locations reversed to 5 minutes before the spell's activation excluding the user. (All health and mana lost by players affected by Backtrack will stay lost and not be regained by Backtrack only cooldowns will be reset.)

Mana Cost: 50% of the current mana pool

Cooldown: 6 hours]

[Skills being applied to the player.]

[Stats Awakening]

[Name: Mikael Walker | Race: Timekeeper (Human Undead)| Core Class: Chrono Wizard

Tier: Jade

Level 1

Power Level: 55

Occupation: None

Title: None

Subclass: Locked

|Stats|

Health: 50/50

Constitution: 10

Strength: 10

Agility: 10

Intelligence: 25

Mana: 100/100]

'AGH.' My mind felt like it had a huge load of knowledge being dumped into it all to be squished in within the frame of a single second causing my body to slightly tremble and my joints to lock. After this second passed everything in my body now felt full and warm as if I had just come to life for the first time.

Looking over my new player window of stats and abilities I could not help but smile to myself as this was a huge change from my last life. In my last life, I had only gotten a single passive ability and it was just to reinforce my skin against attacks. After a couple of seconds of admiration, the large book shimmered and then slammed shut allowing me to see my jade crest back on top of the book's cover.

Grabbing ahold of my crest I rubbed it a couple of times before I stuffed it back into my pocket. Now that there was nothing more for me to do, I turned around and headed out of the room.

Waiting right outside the door was the enthusiastic Darwin who had his small tail swaying against the brown carpet of the library.

Seeing that I exited the small room the face of the little rat man lit up as he looked at me.

"Did everything work out for you sir?" Darwin called out smiling wide which seemed to exaggerate the two large teeth he had at the front of his narrow jaw.

"Yes," I responded rather politely to the small Darwin.

"I am glad sir. Thanks to you being my two-thousandth awakening it allows me to move to a larger library." The little Darwin puffed out his little chest that held his silver crest on his brown robe.

'Ah, that's why he was acting so nice and took me to the book room immediately. He just wanted to get his occupation promotion.' Thinking about this point I nodded to myself as many players were not as welcoming as Darwin had been and had thrown me off but hearing this now reeled me back in as it all made sense now.

"Well thank you Darwin I hope to see you at one of the larger city libraries soon." Bowing my head, a bit in thanks I turned to exit back down the aisles of the library.

"I also wish you luck!" Darwin gave a hearty call as he saw me begin to walk away.

"SHHH!" A loud ancient-sounding voice came from somewhere deep inside the library seemingly unhappy with the loud voice of Darwin.

Hearing this loud voice, I could not help but smile to myself as I continued out of the library passing by the large amounts of people who seemed to be barely arriving to awaken their abilities as many of them had iron and silver crests placed on their chests.

'All these people must have already signed their contracts and were then informed by their employers that they had to come here first to get their stats and abilities.' Seeing all the happy faces I could not help but grimace a bit as I knew most of these players were just going to be used as slaves.

Shaking my head, I continued past all these smiling players who were being seen by the librarian assistants like Darwin.

Stepping back out onto the porch of the library I looked over to the side area of the courtyard to check to see if the woman and the man were still waiting for me. To my surprise, they were indeed sitting by a small pond as the woman was sitting on a small stone bench and the masked man stood behind her watching the main walkway seemingly deterring anyone that may want to enjoy the side courtyard with just his gaze.

'Seems like I am going to be forced to follow these people for a while.' After observing the man for a split second, I noticed his gaze immediately attracted to my own causing me to slightly freeze in place. Quickly moving my gaze away, I began to walk down the front steps and made my way back onto the main walkway.

Taking in a deep breath to myself I stepped off the main walkway and began to walk over to the only two people who were using the side courtyard. Making my way closer to the pair I noticed that the woman did not seem to even glance in my direction as she seemed to be staring towards the small pond before her lost in a slight trance.

As I stepped within 5 meters of the pair the woman began to speak, "Are you hungry?" These were the only words the woman spoke as she continued to stare out at the water.

Hearing these words, I was a bit shocked as I had not expected such a thing to be asked by the woman. Although I could not see any of her facial features, I could tell from her tone and words that this woman was rather serious about what she said.

Not seeing anything wrong with this question and the possibility of getting a free meal I nodded my head in response.

Without even seeing me nod my head the woman took out a small gold coin from under her cloak exposing the snow-white skin of the woman's hand once again. Tossing the gold coin into the pond the woman then stood up and began walking towards me than past me. Quickly following in her wake, the masked man followed behind the woman almost like a shadow.

Not too concerned about such things I also followed behind the masked man but as we exited the library's front gates our small group immediately drew a lot of attention from the passing crowds as the shiny crests of the two were too eye-catching in a small city such as this one.

Luckily no people dared to walk in the way of the pair allowing us to make our way down the streets rather quickly. Arriving before a small building that seemed like someone's home, curious I turned to read the sign that was arranged on the front window of the building only to read that it was a dining house.

[Hampshire's Home Styled Cuisine]

I had never seen this place before as we were now on a very remote street at the edge of the city very far away from the city's center. Looking around at the surrounding buildings I could only spot a couple that actually had business with actual customers.

Looking back forward I noticed that only the woman was in front of me now as she was now walking alone up to the door of the building.

Seeing this my vision immediately went to scanning my surroundings for the masked man but to my surprise, the man that seemed to never leave the backside of the woman was now completely gone. As the woman seemed unaffected by the disappearance of the masked man, I continued to just follow silently behind her as we entered the small building.

As we entered the front glass door.

*Ting*

I was immediately hit by the smell of smoked meat. Following the smell, I watched as a large set human waitress came out of what seemed to be the kitchen carrying a large bowl of steaming food. As I watched the woman place the food onto a small table where two players seemed to be a couple. Staring at the pair my eyes latched onto the sight of the two bowls of food.

"Table for two." The woman who was standing in front of me called out to the waitress.

"Sit anywhere that is open I will come back shortly to take your orders." The waitress spoke out without even giving the both of us a single glance as she quickly disappeared back behind the door leading into the back of the building.

I silently watched as the woman I was with began moving towards a corner table that could only sit two people as both chairs seemed to face one another.

Swiftly moving onto the chair that was facing towards the entrance of the building the woman took her seat. Moving into the opposing chair I sat down across from the woman.

Not saying a word, the both of us sat in silence until I watched as the waitress once again stepped out from the kitchen once again but this time with two pieces of paper that seemed to be the menus tucked under her armpit as she carried two glasses of what I assumed to be water in her hands as she walked towards us.

Arriving before our table the waitress placed the two glasses of water in front of us along with placing the menus at the edge of the table for us to distribute. Before I could fully reach for the menus the woman across from me took both menus and began to look them over.

Seeing this a rather annoyed expression began to slightly show on my face as I retracted my slightly outstretched hand back to my side. The waitress must have seen my expression because she began to chuckle to herself as she looked between the both of us who were sitting before her.

After a couple of seconds of watching the woman in front of me look over the menus, I watched as she silently showed the waitress the menus pointing to one of the items and saying, "Two please."

Hearing this I could not help but roll my nonexistent eyeballs at the woman who had just ordered for me without even asking what I would like to eat.

Nodding her head in acknowledgment the waitress gave me one last glance in which she chuckled then took the menus before turning around to head back to the back where she had come.

After the disappearance of the waitress, the woman in front of me began to take several sips of her water as she just seemed to stare over the edge of the glass at me without saying a single word. After seemingly finishing her water, she finally spoke to me. "Is your tier above diamond?"

Hearing this question, I was a little confused as I thought the woman in front of me was rather certain that my tier had to be rather high but right now it seemed like she was rather uncertain, so this made me rather on edge. This woman who probably stood at the highest of places in this country asked someone she was unsure of to eat alone. 'I wonder what she is doing.'

"…" Not responding I took a sip of my water.

Nodding her head, the woman twirled her finger around the inner opening of the glass. "Okay fine. I get it." The woman rather confident now spoke out once again.

"May I ask what government or corporation you are representing first?" I asked knowing full well that the woman would most likely have some type of backing as many high-importance players such as ruby tier players would have rather large backings no matter where they were.

"No problem. I work for myself, or should I say others work for me. I don't know but I don't work for any large corporation or governments." The woman responded rather happily as she continued to play with her glass tapping her nails against it.

Slightly taken aback by her response I only nodded my head to her. Even though it would make sense now that I think about it that she could openly scout and recruit me by herself if she really ran a team.

"What did you actually want to talk to me about here?" I responded rather seriously knowing what she was here to do now.