Jack Of Nothing

A meek and of average-height boy awakes, in a completely white room, his pale face covered in bruises, he clutches his head from the intense headache and he looks up.

He notices there are about a hundred people around in the space with him, each one laying on the floor, eventually they manage to sit up groans and moans of pain fill the room, and then he hears a voice coming from behind him, a woman with a bob cut says with a groggy voice, "What is this place?"

an attractive angel with lustrous blonde hair and glowing white wings appears out of thin air, almost as if to answer her question, wearing a black overcoat and white dress shirt, his radiant white wings prompt the attention of the people in the space.

With a friendly tone he says, "Good question, you see... you humans have lived far too well without paying a single dime for far too long, and that isn't fair, is it? so we decided to make you earn your good lives, at the price of your lives." he pauses, prompting people to ask questions, rightfully so most are too frightened or shocked to speak.

In an instant the whole room gets up in a panic, fervently looking for an exit, they run to the walls but there's none in sight, some start panicking, some nervously laugh as they curl up into balls trying to escape the reality of their situation, the pale boy watches from the floor with a blank expression, and the angel looks at the hysteria with a friendly smile.

A muscular man who radiates an aura of toughness and who's unaffected by the panic looks at the winged man without a tinge of nervousness on his face, with a deep and gruff voice he asks, "What do you mean by that?"

The angel smiles at the man before answering, "What do I mean by that? well... there will be a monthly trial, where you'll have to survive in a unknown environment with unknown creatures, for this trial you'll be going alone, but most of them will be done with others."

A man with rounder build, who was listening with fear in his eyes suddenly gets an excited look on his face, "Like a video game?" the angel looks at him and nods, "Exactly there are even skills which-" a blue tab appears in front of every person in the room, "everybody gets, it caters to the specific person and could be useless, but you're sure to get one" 

Everyone in the room silently checks their skills, and an amalgamation of reactions can be seen some light up with joy and some the light escapes from, darkening their faces with despair, the outlier being the muscular man who just closes his status immediately not even bothering to look.

The pale boy checks his own status with an expectant look on his face, he expected that he'd at least get a mid to low-rank skill but...

The angel looks at his own status screen which seems to function differently than the humans with a shocked face, "Oh dear, looks like someone is really unlucky here" he says looking at the boy, "Nobody's ever had no skills before, unfortunately, I can't do anything for you but... don't give up" the angel pitied the boy even putting his hand on the boy's shoulder and patting it, turning away and walking away.

The boy stares at his status with a blank expression seeming as if he has already given up, but suddenly a notification pops up on top of the status snapping him out of his despair, this one glitching and a deep black color unlike the system's light blue [Unique Title obtained: Jack of Nothing]

The room hangs in silence as they stare at the skill-less boy for a moment and in a few more forget about the boy's desperate situation, checking what their own skills do instead, as if he didn't exist. The boy paying no mind to the other people's loss of interest, instead focuses on the mysterious notification.

The boy didn't have any skills to check, but he decided to check what his "title" did, he tries to touch the status screen, but his finger just phases through it as if it's nonexistent, realizing now that it's not a touch screen, he reads his status.

[Status]

Name: Kalin

Age: 17

Str: 2

Agi: 2

Def: 2

Mana: 3

Skills: None

Title: [Jack of Nothing]

Kalin laments his low stats but shakes the thought away, deciding to focus on his unique title instead, he wonders how he's supposed to check the description of it but before he can ask, someone else around his age does, "Um... Mr. Angel how do we check our skills?" his voice trembling out of fear which makes sense considering he's talking to a supposed angel, Kalin silently respects the boy for speaking up.

The angel smiles at the boy amiably, "Ah yes, sorry I forgot to explain because it's so natural to me, please forgive me... all you need to do is think about wanting to see your skill's description and it'll pop up the same goes for items and titles, though you can't get those right now" he smiles again and goes back to tapping some unknown things on his status menu.

 The boy wonders how he managed to get a title then, but realizes he has more important things to do he thinks to himself, [Jack of Nothing] Instantly the description pops up...

[Jack of Nothing]

This title belongs to the talentless Kalin, the first human in the trials without a skill, the title's effects make learning any skill 2x harder but if a skill is learned the effects of the skill are amplified 2x

Kalin's mouth goes agape, 'am I really this unlucky' Then he remembers his life, it was a life full of hardships, he was abandoned, abused, bullied, had to deal with shady people, etc... Kalin shakes his head, 'Never mind...' as Kalin's about to think more depressing thoughts, he's interrupted by a loud clap.

The angel looks at his wrist as if he has a watch even though he doesn't, and claps his hands looking up at the people, "Well, time's up for the tutorial, I'll leave you with these words humans, and listen well, Skills have more than one use if you use your brain you'll be fine" after leaving them with this useful knowledge although not for Kalin. He waves to them with a carefree smile, and suddenly everyone in the room's vision becomes black...

Kalin feels like he's floating he tries to open his eyes but all he sees is darkness, and then a girl's voice startles him, screaming in a distressed voice, "Jack!" his eyes shoot open, unlike the first time he woke up today, this time his face lay on soft grass, a stark contrast to the cold and hard ground he was on mere seconds before, Kalin gets up from the ground, dusting himself off and looking around, 'where am I and what was that?' he thinks as he looks around.

The only thing in his sight is a vast forest that seems almost endless, as Kalin is about to despair a notification pops up, [Kalin! First Trial: Escape the Endless Forest, Difficulty: Easy Reward: Beginner Weaponry Technique] 

'Endless Forest?' Kalin looks around and then back at the two words, 'seems right' he sighs again studying the infinite expanse of the forest, and begins walking the direction that he's facing, as he walks the sticks snap and the leaves break underneath his feet this sound would be the only noise he would hear from now on...

He'd been walking for what felt like 5 hours, though he couldn't tell, in the forest it seemed like the sun didn't move at all, so it was impossible to tell, and he didn't feel the need to track it. after probably an hour more of simply walking without any obstructions he thought to himself, 'is it okay for a trial to be so easy?'

He would soon find the answer to that question, after walking through the space of two unusually tall trees he spots two small creatures with sharp fangs and pointed ears, each one holstering clubs made of thick branches.

Noticing that there are only two he thinks, 'only two? even I could kill them' and he grabs a particularly sharp stick from the ground, moving out of the cover of the tree he starts slowly approaching the goblins, but before he can even get in stabbing distance the goblins twist their necks violently and look at him.

The goblins dash Kalin leaving him with barely enough time to react, he barely manages to dodge by ducking down, but a goblin still manages to hit him and he gets cut on his fingers by the goblin's claws, he barely avoids getting them chopped off.

Kalin grabs his bleeding hand gripping it to make the pain lesser and suppresses his urge to scream forcing his mouth shut, scared of attracting more goblins, he glares at the goblins silently with his mouth clenched shut, the silence only being broken by the noise of dripping blood.

They watch him do this, with eyes that see him as mere entertainment and not a threat, they look gleeful as if they're enjoying his suffering... relishing in it, making Kalin grit his teeth in anger. he forces his butchered hand to move and mixed with the adrenaline, he manages to grab his stick, his fingers throbbing in pain from moving them but he forces himself to ignore it, 'now's not the time for pain' he thinks and sprints toward the smaller goblin, but as he approaches the taller goblin jumps aiming for his nose spinning midair to kick him.

Kalin gracelessly falls backward, blood spurting from his nose like a fountain leaving a trail on the auburn leaves and tinting them a dark red, his stick clutters on the ground as the goblin lands on the rock with a graceful landing and starts snickering at Kalin's pathetic state.

Winded from the kick Kalin struggles to breathe, his vision getting blurry, he looks down at the floor, momentarily focusing on the wound on his hand the blood loss getting much worse and covering his entire hand in his blood, he staggers up, his feet wobbling as he does, again the goblins just watch with evil and ecstatic smiles etched on their faces deriving pleasure from his suffering, Kalin's vastly declining blood boils with anger.

Kalin's stick unluckily fell near the rock the two goblins stood on, he looked around for a substitute weapon while also making sure that the goblins didn't move from the rock, until he saw a jagged rock that resembled a dagger, he grabbed it intending to throw it at the short goblin, he raises his arm to throw it but the taller goblin rushes him before he can do so, Kalin was already in the process of throwing it and with quick thinking Kalin manages to swing the rock down instead, hitting the tall goblin in the skull a loud cracking sound following...

But Kalin's low strength made it so it didn't do much, though the goblin was bleeding so he surely had a chance, the tall goblin now with a murderous expression instead of his usual playful one looked at Kalin even though his stature was low it made Kalin flinch, the unfamiliar feeling of looming death breathing down his back made him shiver. The short one just watched with a curious gaze not caring if either his own species or Kalin dies, as long as he has fun.

The tall goblin grabs his club which was resting comfortably on his belt buckle before, it's extremely jagged and chipped from the goblin's previous fights with dried blood painting it, the goblin jumps up at Kalin aiming to crush his skull with one swing, Kalin barely dodges by ducking, swinging the rock up hitting the goblin in its jaw, green blood covering Kalin's fist, the blood has a slight burning sensation but the adrenaline makes it bearable.

The goblin staggers backward from its blood loss and looks at its short companion for some reinforcements, instead, it's lying on the floor joyfully laughing at its companion for losing to Kalin, or at least that's what Kalin assumes. He doesn't care right now though the only thought he harbors with his injured body is to kill, he approaches the goblin, the bloody rock at his side, and now it's the goblin's turn to be terrified.

It staggers backwards falling on it's butt, in a last-ditch effort it throws its club at Kalin which Kalin again manages to narrowly dodge primarily because of the goblins disorientation, still though a cut spanning across his whole left cheek starts dripping blood, adding to the trail of blood following him

Kalin approaches it despite the pain he's in, until he's directly in front of the goblin. Putting his hand up and violently swinging it down without a hint of hesitation completely crushing it's skull, he stares at its corpse, it's lying on the floor green ooze pouring out of where its head used to be.

For some reason he wasn't grossed out, on the contrary, he was extremely satisfied he also felt his muscles become filled with energy, he felt like his strength had doubled. As he was relishing in the feeling of a well-earned victory he got a notification, [You have killed a Lv.1 goblin with the ferociousness befitting one, Title acquired: Goblin Killer]

Kalin looks back to the rock to see if the short goblin is still there, but he sees that the rock it was previously situated on is now empty, so Kalin deems it safe to check his new title, he opens his status and thinks to himself [Goblin Killer]

[Goblin Killer]

[This title is given to the talentless Kalin who has killed a goblin with the same level of violence as a goblin, +3 Str and +4 Str when fighting goblins]

After a couple of seconds just staying in the same spot staring at these words, a wave of tiredness and pain rushes over him, the adrenaline draining from his body and being replaced by terrible pain, making him instantly fall to the floor, his battered body twitching in pain as he suppresses the urge to scream, though, After an hour of enduring the agonizing pain, it subsides, albeit just enough for him to think without being distracted by it. Since he can't move he decides to sleep in that spot... not like he has a choice though.

Kalin finds it hard to sleep considering the sun is always up but eventually his tiredness wins, and he drifts off, he dreams about his life or... the bad parts of it, which to be honest was most of it he was born to two idiot's who tried to make a business with no business experience and when it went under, they abandoned him to pay their debts which he obviously couldn't, he also dreamt about when he was bullied in school, stuff like getting ganged up on behind the school or getting pushed down the stairs was a common occurrence... perhaps that's how he survived that fight, he should thank his bullies... if they're alive.

He dreams about such things until he awakes. Greeted by the radiant sun beaming on him and rejuvenating him, he gets up followed by sharp pain and he starts his infinite trek once again, he walks and walks, walking for what feels like months he fights many more goblins ending in similar ways as the first fight, him being injured and them being dead.

Eventually, it became easy, he knew all their patterns, and then when it was over he walked away, he walked so much he couldn't tell if he had walked for days, weeks, or months, he couldn't tell nor did he care to, the amount of walking drove him near insane, he honestly wouldn't have minded meeting some more goblins... no actually he would've, humans would be preferable, yeah he was really starting to miss the touch of humans.

Even if the touch he usually felt was intended to hurt him, he missed it, 'this must be Stockholm syndrome' but he didn't need to think about such things anymore because, in the distance he saw land uncovered by the seemingly endless trees, and without worrying about his tired and battered body he ran as fast as his minuscule speed stat allowed, which was just slightly above an average person and soon he reached the land.

What he saw looked like pieces of civilization, pieces of scattered wood and stones placed all around without a sense of order, and the terrible pungent smell of blood lingered in the air which weirded out Kalin because there wasn't a single drop of it as far as he could tell, disappointed by this turn of events, he walks through the rubble to the next stretch of the forest, and then from the corner of his eye he notices through the thick of some trees, a building that hasn't been destroyed

The building was a quaint looking home, more like a cabin than a home really, he goes up the front steps, the wood stairs creaks after every step, and then he stands on the patio facing the door.

he puts his hand on the door knob intending to turn it but, the moment his hand touches the handle, with no force needed, the door opens, now sticking his head inside he sees a suspiciously clean house, a leather couch that is faded in color lays in the living room scratches strewn all around it, sitting in front of it was a small wooden coffee table with a wilted flower held by a thin clear vase, atop it.