1 A Humble Beginning

I died. I'll never forget the ice cold grip of the abyss. It hasn't forgotten me.

Memories of my life that pulled me down into an ocean without a bottom. Death's waters tore at my memories and the tighter I clung to them the deeper its undertow pulled me. It was impossible to reach the surface and escape the undertow of death's ocean memories intact. I had to give pieces of myself to escape.

Since then, I haven't felt anything. Its been decades since I felt the sun's warmth on my face. I only remember that there were memories of it.

After emerging from the pull of death itself the administration found me. They changed me.

My name is Jacob and I'm a system AI.

Sometime between my death and the new job, I was extracted. While others were given new bodies and a new world to explore, I was assigned a different task. From my death the purpose for my existence was never in question.

My job was to navigate the lucky few gamers who get my system through life. Unfortunately, I've had a bit of bad luck as of late. No matter how well my hosts start off they always die before their time.

I've dealt with all kinds. Whether it's the power mad maniac, the horny forever teen, or the few true heroes, I've seen it all. As a system AI, my success is measured by my host's achievements. Believe me when I say, I didn't want any of them to die. I've never had a host reach lvl51.

Its embarrassing. I might have the lowest success rate in the multiverse.

I followed the self-help guides, I tried a few quiet runs, but even taking my hand off the reins didn't save them. None of it worked, whether I liked them or hated them, they all died.

At first they weren't just bodies to me they were people and I tried to help them. I gave the quests that steered the user to the highest chance of success. Unfortunately, that also puts the host in a lot of risk. Then I stopped caring.

My last couple of hosts hadn't made it past level five. That stamped a black mark on my record. No one wants a faulty system.

I didn't want to be a faulty system. But, that had to be it. When I stopped caring they died. That's what I was thinking. Its what the high council of Admins thought.

My first host managed to get to lvl50 before he picked a fight with some pretty boy with a better system. Then my hosts gained less and less levels. Their lives could be described as painfully short. In the beginning, I'd shown a lot of promise, but my last few vessels hadn't passed lvl1.

SYSTEM MESSAGE: LAST CHANCE!

They tossed me into an unknown world destined to attach to a random host. It could be anyone or anything. My host pulled me, and I flew towards it like a staple to a magnet.

Above the clouds massive towers glowed with sunlight. The world was a frigid place covered in ice, old forests, and towers peeking into space. An invisible force pulled me through open country, heavy doors, and through walls. Soon, I was in a lab of some kind. The locals were reading out reports and arguing about something. Not important, I didn't bother recording her words in audio logs, my host glowed to my sight.

Ping!

System Message: HOST IDENTIFIED INITIATING MERGING PROCEDURE!

I went through the normal procedures. Once attached to the host, I began booting up. The Scientists were transfixed upon a red button. They argued profusely while my systems booted up.

Ping!

System Message: ENGAGING AVATAR PROTOCOL!

That was new. No host before had engaged an avatar protocol. That should only happen when certain skills activated. Unless the body already had an auto pilot skill, that wasn't likely. It hit me then. Before the sudden sensations of flesh slammed into me.

Madness, it was madness running through my processors. Sensations connected to shattered memories. And suddenly I was freezing in ice cold embryotic water. I halted systems and mitigated the damage to my processors. With the will that only an AI could possess, I turned down the sensations to 10%. Then, I played back the events before the merging.

The host wasn't reacting. It floated in its pod and didn't move. The thing's eyes were glazed. It was still alive because, I could attach to it. Shit, I realized too late that the host was brain dead. I tried to put a full stop to my systems, but it was too late. The drives had already linked to the host body and I felt myself shifting into my host.

New connections were forming between my systems and the host. This wasn't right. Nerves fired, sinews pulled, and muscles flexed pushing the biological machine into action.

Pain coursed through my new body and I turned my head. That wasn't right, I haven't had a head in decades. I turned it again while my own systems powered up. Screens flashed before my eyes filled with the familiar data.

Errors covered the systems and I had to shut the whole thing down and rebooted it. I expected to fall unconscious. That too wasn't the case.

The system rebooted and to my horror, I remained in the host body. I screamed. The scientists jumped in shock. They started high fiving and chatting excitedly.

"I'm in pain you moldy twats, get me some damn pain killers." Even 10% of the sensations was too much for me. I roared and choked on the fluids within the tank. It was then that I noticed all the wires sticking through my body. This wasn't happening. I couldn't be in a host body. This was a violation of too many rules to count. I didn't know this was possible.

Ping!

System reboots successful.

Jacob lvl1 System AI

Jacob lvl1 Nightling

Type: Night Fiend

Stage: Youngling

Next Stage: Plebe

Identified forms: 3%

Common: Winged Stalker, Night Haunter,

Uncommon: Battle Bat

Rare: Winged Sorcerer

Super Rare: Noble Imp

Requirements:

Common: Dark Material: 10k/100 Check

Uncommon: Blood: 0/100, Dark Matter: 10k/500

Rare: Flesh: 0/100, Blood: 0/200, Dark Matter: 10k/2k

Super Rare: Pride Shards: 0/1, Blood 0/500, Flesh 0/500, Dark Matter: 10k/10k

Cultivation Base Locked

Stats

HP 10/10

Aura: locked

Strength 1

Dexterity 1

Agility 1

Endurance 1

Constitution 1

Intelligence 3

Perception 1

Luck 1

Skills

Dark Matter Arts

Pain Tolerance

That was great and incredibly bad. The pain had settled down into a dull ache. I could distribute points to get this hunk of flesh moving but I needed a lot of things. A bunch of agility wouldn't do me any good. I activated a few diagnostic programs and felt satisfied at the pings of confirmation. Even trapped in this body, I was still the system AI. I could issue quests.

Ping!

Quest: Communicate with Scientists

Reward: ???

I wracked my mind for a reward I could give that could help me in this situation. I had only so much in the way of points after the last host. I needed to buff up the host body and start feeding off its aura. Then I could do some fun things like assign myself easy quests to buff up the body. Only, that was sure to kill me.

Changes to the fabric of reality can sometimes attract attention. Multiple changes without a counter balance was asking for trouble.

This wasn't some host body, it was me. If I was going to survive then I had to be careful. Even if dying doesn't kill me, I didn't want to die again.

Every time I try to buff my host, they end up getting attack by something beyond them. Giving a host a few cheats and easy levels invited disaster. It hurt me to do this but, I needed to think about things before I did them. What should be the reward for communicating with scientists, perception or intelligence. I checked to see how much I could give with such a quest. The unknown factor gave me some leeway. This was an unknown world filled with hidden variables. I entered that in the equation and felt my host smile like a shark.

This was even better than I thought. Just to be safe, I dropped the possible reward down to a tenth.

Show time, I knocked the hell out of the glass. The scientists stopped their celebrating to check on me. After a few readings they stared at me clicking my claws against the glass. I looked one of them in the eyes and he waved at me. I waved back.

The scientist blinked before writing something down. More scientists entered the room and before I knew it, they were all chatting.

There were a problem. I was stuck behind glass. That isn't effective for leveling up. Even if I spoofed my own system, I can't get more levels this way. But there is a function I could try. It was a dumb function and one I never used if I could help it.

After my first host, I had enough points to purchase a new system feature. It was the only other feature I had but it was a powerful one.

I could encourage random encounters. How random was random? Well what were the odds of monsters getting into a sealed off lab. Now was the time to see.

I held my breath and activated the random encounter feature. Nothing happened. I expected a horde of rats to pour from the vents. A few swarms of locust to invade or something. These sorts of random encounters happened all the time, but my feature made them happen immediately. Well maybe it needed a few more tests.

Random Encounter Incoming...

Nothing happened, I waited for something. Maybe some lab rats might escape their cages. A bee to find its way through the vents. Nope, nothing happened. So, I activated the skill again. Nothing happened, I used it again.

After the 12th activation the scientists had drained my pod and were in the middle of opening the glass when an explosion shook the lab. Large blast doors shut over the normal lab door before a mighty force launched them across the room. The scientists in front of the doors exploded into pink mist.

One lucky fellow managed to leap out of the way in time but lost his arm. He collapsed against a wall and ripped off his belt and made a tourniquet.

I looked around to see worried looks staring down at something in the corner. It was the head of a strong jawed man still wearing a military helmet. What were they? A few bugs couldn't do that.

The temperature of the room suddenly plummeted. Even through the glass of my pod, ice crystals formed over my skin. I shivered in place to get warm as a snow-white hand clasped the side of the doorway.

Ice spread where her delicate blue nailed fingers touched. Beakers with unknown liquids in them exploded shooting glass across the lab. Parts of the concrete wall cracked and popped while tiny ice crystals grew. The scientist leaning against the wall suddenly froze solid before shattering into ice crystals.

A beautiful woman with silky blue hair stepped through the doorway and with her came a blizzard. behind her a creature with a hardened bug like face stepped in and waved a long tail. At the end of the bug creatures tail was a sword like stinger.

The bug creature skewered a scientist. The man screamed while his body dissolved from the inside out. Jacob covered his ears, but my system audio wouldn't turn off. Errors appeared over my data streams.

"I did this." I whispered. How, random encounters shouldn't do this. They just provoked nearby creatures into attacking. Stronger creatures shouldn't be affected. They normally ignored the prodding.

A blonde-haired scientist stared at me with what he could only describe as hope. She raised her hand and pressed the red button.

Below, my pod's door opened up and I fell through. My last view of the lab was the tailed monster shattering the glass and the woman who saved me frozen to death before shattering.

I fell down a winding tunnel. This couldn't be happening. Random encounter couldn't do that. It was impossible.

The tunnel opened up above a massive hill of trash. I slammed down hard on my side. My arm snapped like a twig and I screamed.

Ping!

System message: -3Health

I was well aware of my health calculations thank you data stream. Bones shot out of my arm and scraped against anything I rolled past on my descent downhill. Eventually, I landed on a pile of nice soft rotten corpses. My broken cut open arm fell deep in the cadaver of a humanoid deer.

Ping!

System message: 'Heavy infection imminent'

"Thank you, I know." It was like seeing something happen and then seeing it again and telling myself that yes that happened. I struggled up from the pile of guts and stumbled further down the junk heap.

Ping!

Quest complete: Communicate with Scientists

Rewarded: +4 Perception

Perception 5

Ping!

Quest: Find Shelter

Reward: +1 Luck

I stumbled my way down piles of trash. All around used needles spilled out from waste bags. Bloody piles of rotten bodies lay in larger piles often with the occasional carrion feeding. I stayed well away from that as I made my way lower. With some old canvas, and leather straps, I made myself a sling to hold my rot covered broken arm. Then I picked up a used syringe, I pulled stopper out and held it away from myself.

Further down in the dump, I saw some tables. With a bit of luck, they could make a temporary shelter.

Every step pained my arm and my legs wobbled. I made it to the tables and pulled out the side of one. Within a massive roach screamed before it lunged. On instinct I struck. Its brown shell was thick, and the needle couldn't get a purchase.

It bit down on my broken arm and I screamed. The pain nearly made me drop the syringe. I lowered the sensations even more until I could barely feel the world around me. It pulled at my arm and the straps snapped under its strength.

The creature wouldn't let up. It was dragging me deeper in it den to feed at its leisure. I still had the syringe. With all my strength, I stabbed into the creature's eye. A red critical appeared over its head. I hit the plunger and felt it give a roar in return.

It bit my arm harder and dragged me back with all its might. I could hear the scuttling of other roaches.

My syringe found its home in the roach's eyes again and again. I stabbed until its blood flowed over my hand and it lost the strength to bite me. Other roaches began to slowly make their way towards us.

Ping!

Quest: Make this shelter safe

Reward: 1STR, Restored HP

The roaches poured out of the tunnel in a sudden burst. They made up for their small size with numbers.

I started stomping even as the pain in my arm returned with a vengeance. They crushed under my feet. With ever crushed roach, I gained a little bit of xp.

Ping!

Quest Completed: Find Shelter

Rewarded: 1 CON

Constitution 2

Ping!

Quest Completed: Make This Shelter Safe

Rewarded: 1STR, Restored HP

Strength 2

Red energy passed through my body and the bones in my arm slowly snapped back together. The skin healed over without a scar and I was whole again. I collapsed against the shelter and caught my breath.

I checked my Plebe forms. I could become a winged stalker or night haunter in 9 more levels. There was absolutely no data from those creatures. But they were the easiest to become. Each form required a little bit more than the last.

My information was limited. There could be other forms and choices that I was unaware of.

My level was just at the cusp of the next. I picked a roach off the dirty floor and sniffed it. "Flesh, I whispered. I felt my mouth water and took a bite of the carcass. If I closed my eyes and ignored the wiggling, and the juices, I could pretend it was a potato chip.

Ping!

Level Up

Jacob level 2

+10HP +1 to all stats

Every three roaches were worth a single point in flesh. There were a lot of them but not 300. The big one was worth 4 points by itself. I ended up with just over 83 points in flesh. I needed to find a relatively safe hunting ground and identify the dangers of this world. At least I made it past level 1. That was better than my last five hosts.

Ping!

Quest: Explore the Trash Heap

Reward: 1INT, 1PER

Ping!

Quest: Regularly make 1kill per day for 7days

Reward: 5END

Ping!

Quest: Find Allies 0/1

Reward: 1INT, 1PER

I let my other hosts be idle and farm alone. That was a mistake. As much as it pains me, I can't fall into my old habits. This isn't some random host on the line, this was me. If I died it could be it.