1 The Start

The surroundings were dark and the few lights above barely illuminated the dim corridors.

Some of them were also damaged to the point that they were hanging down from their supposed embedded positions.

Swinging around in place and making a shadowy play on the dark steel walls when they passed an object that could throw said phantoms.

Coupled with the flickering that indicated them being close to malfunctioning, it gave the whole corridor a more dangerous and sinister cold feeling.

It was definitely not a place to feel safe and secure.

If it weren't for the sparks coming from damaged wiring and showing the running energy source was still supplied and connected to them, it was a miracle how there was any light here.

Following along those corridors, the place was eerily deserted and quiet for a while.

But when reaching a certain point where the lights started to suddenly change color to red and a shrill repeating alarm sound engulfed the surroundings, it all changed rapidly.

It was hard to see in the dim light. Yet what one saw was horrifying.

There were bodies lying everywhere in that place and the red coloration of light came from the blood that covered the light's surface.

A ripped arm here, a severed leg there. Some undefined gooey matter that was splattered on the walls and seemed to mix with the steel.

The place gave a picture of someone who had fun decorating the place with Halloween decorations.

Only thing was that those bodies were not fakes. They were all real. Even the small creature that was bursting out of one unfortunate guy's chest was real.

And so was also the 2-meter tall black creature standing in front of a young man.

But weirdly enough the young man was sitting with a rather carefree attitude on another black creature's body beneath himself and even started to lit a cigarette that was placed inside his mouth.

The creature in front of him that was called a Xenomorph only gnarled its razor-sharp teeth at him and the saliva dripped to the ground.

The young man took a breath in and then exhaled the smoke towards the alien that was staring at him. It was already so close that one could see the reflection of the man inside the black shiny exoskeleton head of the alien.

The reflection of the man had black hair with some scars on its face. One was running along his right chin towards his cheek and another two were right underneath his left eye.

The white color in the left pupil clearly indicates the loss of eyesight in it.

But the crimson color in the right eye still made the expression of the young men fearless, dangerous even.

So much so that the alien just kept hesitating and staring without knowing what to do.

But the decision would soon be made for it without its consent by another creature.

The young man sighed when everything suddenly stopped and the time froze.

It just happened at the moment when a big muscular creature with a mask came jumping out of nowhere and stabbed the alien in front of him with a dual-clawed wrist blade.

Looking at the freeze of time a little longer the man then stood up and looked over to the person that had the chest-burster coming out a second ago. The eyes of the person were dim now and signaled the death that came with it.

"And he is dead...", said the young man softly.

Right at that moment, everything started to dissolve into small white particles and after a short blink of the eyelashes made the scenery change completely towards a circular room with a big white levitating orb in the middle.

The young man just kept smoking and started looking at the orb.

"Oi, this is already the fucking 50th time I get a total wipe with my team. How about you start picking some useful people? Or just send me to another team or something. I am already tired of this shit...."

The young man seemed annoyed and made a remark about how things were progressing terribly. Just when the young man started to walk towards a door the orb started to shine reddish.

[Calculating...The guide survived 3 of 3 worlds as a player. Previous Guide died unexpectedly. New guide was chosen. The new guide survived 50 out of 50 worlds as the last man standing. Team Norse was wiped out 50 of 50 times in a consecutive manner. Resetting the status and privileges of the new guide. Calculating...Commencing transfer of guide to another team.]

"What!?" That response from the orb suddenly surprised the young man and he looked back at it. "Wait, you are saying you agree that it is already useless to keep trying in establishing a Team Norse? Well, I'll be damned. Literally, I wonder what will happen to me now. At least I don't have to be guiding those useless idiots..."

The youth scratched the backside of his neck and looked a little bit guilty. "Well, maybe it was also my fault for being a bad guide? But who fucking told them to die so stupidly every time...Whatever, rules are rules I guess."

Then he laughed lightly as if to push away his bad thoughts and then continued to talk with the orb. He knew this construct had intelligence inside it even if it was just a program.

"Hey, God. How about I at least get some reward for working for you?"

[Request analyzed. Confirmed. Reward initialized. 50.000pts and S-Rank coupon. Good luck, Mortal.]

"Huh? Wait, can't I just wish myself back now? That transfer will make things diffic....!" The young man did not expect a confirmation from the orb. And neither the large compensation. It was strange behavior from it that did not align with its previous goal.

But just at that point the man disappeared and could not say anything else.

The scenery just changed from white to black and then white again.

It took just a fraction of a second.

The young man suddenly felt exhausted and had to kneel and catch his haggard breathing. Coughing a little he threw the cigarette away.

"Damn...That was fast...Shit, I feel like crap."

Slowly raising his head the young man looked at another white orb now.

[Welcome, Player Revna Ulfsen. For surviving alone three consecutive times you were chosen to become the new Guide of Team Norse.]

"Wait what? What is going on? Are you bugged or something? Don't fucking tell me it starts from the beginning again. Show my status."

Suddenly the orb stopped reciting the preprogrammed speech every guide had to listen to and showed the young man a transparent window only he could see.

*Revna Ulfsen*

*Intelligence: 100*

*Mental Capacity: 100*

*Cell Vitality: 100*

*Reaction Speed: 100*

*Muscle Density: 100*

*Immunization: 100*

*Rewards: 50.000pts, S-Rank Voucher*

*Enhancements: None*

"Wait a minute. Something definitely ain't right at all. I do feel weak and I lost all the attributes and enhancements that I brought. But all my stats are the average of a normal human now. Even if it is 50% of a peak human. That was not how I started...Also, the points and voucher are still there as well. Fuck..."

[...Guide...arhuadfuaujhzdbferu...]

"Huh?" Revna got shocked when suddenly his window vanished and the white orb in front of him started to dim after a short sentence of gibberish.

Its color became an eerie blood red and its perfect spheric construct started to fall apart and trickle down like viscous syrup.

"Okay...now that is a problem..." Revna slowly stood up and backed away from the orb.

The red substance slowly traveled over the floor and started to fill the space that was the room called God's Dimension.

The substance seemed to be neverending and it slowly brought Revna to a wall.

"Damn, the rooms are gone...What to do now? Is it self-destructing?"

[Next Destination: DOOM. Please enter your transport circle.]

Then as if to answer his call something good happened. At least to some extent. It was a cylindrical light that started shining from the ceiling.

The only problem was that it was already inside the fluid and Revna didn't know what it would do to him.

Clicking his tongue he had no other choice but to grit his teeth and start running.

The exact moment he came into contact with the substance there was intense pain traveling through the nerves of his legs.

"GaaahHH!!" Revna cried out and nearly buckled over straight down into the fluid. But he gritted his teeth and looked down. He saw how the substance slowly started to crawl up his legs.

At least his legs were still there and it pushed his determination towards one goal. Keep running to the light.

It took him some time because his body seemed to not react to his commands as it should have normally and started to slow down.

But he still made it and reached the light just before the corresponding timer stopped. Yes, there was a timer that counted down and told one how much time remained in entering the light.

Revna of course could not keep track of that in a dire situation like that and just struggled on until he collapsed inside the light and lost consciousness.

The moment that happened his body disappeared and the room behind him also got filled completely with the red substance.

When he came back to his senses he could feel a cold floor underneath him. And with a groan, he pushed himself up only to be stared at by a man in a trenchcoat.

"Looks like the last person also woke up. Took a while. So, just like I explained, it will start soon. Someone give this guy the basics."

Revna had a splitting headache and looked around. He could see metallic walls all around him.

If it were not for the bunk beds that were neatly put in line and the storage cabinets beside them, he would have thought this looked like some sort of prison.

Well, not that he was not used to the changing scenery.

It was just the unimaginably more painful and disorienting way that he entered and awoke from the teleportation beam, that was forcing a gloomy look on his face.

And while looking at the surroundings to look at the people that were with him this time the other people from the movie that were supposed to be frozen for a while longer suddenly started moving.

A soldier threw an orange at another guy and this person reacted with a baseball bat swing to send it flying straight through the room.

The next thing Revna did was to pull his head to the side so he was not hit by the orange.

The fruit traveled without hitting the other "users" as he liked to call them and hit another soldier's locker.

That got the black guy near the impact to stop playing on his handheld console for a short moment and glaring at the batter only to shortly go back to gaming.

Some of the other users at the side looked at Revna weirdly and even the person in a trenchcoat that talked to him when he awoke had now a frowning expression when following the scripted event.

"Hey, easy there...", said Revna with a wry smile after finally figuring there were only 4 other users here with him.