Stranger in a Strange World

As I tried to open my eyes, a throbbing pain assaulted my head.

It felt like someone was constantly sticking needles into it.

After an unknown amount of time had passed, the torture suddenly ended, and I could finally breathe again.

Once again, I tried to open my eyes, hoping that this time I wouldn't be met with pain.

Luckily, instead of despair, I was greeted by breathtaking scenery.

I was currently standing in a small grassy opening, surrounded by a beautiful forest that seemed to come straight from a fairy tale.

Looking down I could see that I was not wearing any clothes and upon closer inspection I realized something even stranger..

I was missing 2 of my toes, one from each foot.

But it didn't look unnatural, almost like I was born with 8 toes instead of 10.

Wait? 10 toes?

Where did I get that from?

Isn't 8 toes the norm?

I tried to remember, but couldn't.

I couldn't remember anything.

No memories, no identity.

I was just a blank canvas of existence.

A small panic gripped my soul, but it disappeared faster than it arrived.

Almost like my mind was used to this.

I decided to explore my surroundings to maybe find a lead about why I was here in the first place.

I chose a random direction and started walking into the woods.

As the forest wasn't densely packed with trees and the sun was still shining brightly, I had no problems with visibility.

After walking a few hundred steps, I came across something interesting.

Nothing.

In front of me was literally nothing, a void.

The stunning forest landscape was suddenly cut off by a jet black abyss.

Curious about the mysterious darkness, I decided to throw a small pebble into it.

After throwing it, I started counting seconds in my head, to get a better understanding of its depth.

But after waiting for a few minutes, nothing reached my ears..

Actually, isn't it kinda weird?

The forest itself was eerily quiet, no birds chirping, no wind blowing, nothing.

I thought that I might've actually gone deaf, so I decided to clap my hands to find out.

Clap! Clap!

Nope, looks like I can still hear, it's just the surroundings that are weird.

After my little experiment I decided to follow the black void's border to see where I'd end up.

After a while, I reached the same spot that I was at when I started.

Alright, so it seems like I am in some kind of flat circular world that is surrounded by nothingness.

Has the world always been like this?

I don't know.

What I do know though is that I need to find something to eat and drink.

…

A few hours later

I was done thoroughly exploring the small forest I was in.

I found absolutely nothing that could help me out.

No plants, except trees and grass.

No animals, birds or even bugs.

No rivers, or any water source for that matter.

I thought about drilling a hole in the side of a tree, to maybe get water that way, but quickly realized that I didn't have anything sharp enough for that.

All of the pebbles around me were too small and round to be used as a cutting tool.

Huh? I guess I still have some knowledge left from my old life..

Old life?

What am I talking about?

Anyways, this is quite problematic.

I don't have food or water, so how am I supposed to survive in this place?

I guess I could eat tree bark as an emergency, but I don't think that's gonna work for too long..

Should I just give up and jump in the seemingly endless abyss?

What? No.

What kind of stupid idea is that?

Hmm.. Maybe climbing a tree would help me gain some inspiration?

I didn't realize it before, but the trees are quite short here aren't they?

The tallest tree I could see was roughly triple my height, and I wasn't even that tall..

I started climbing said tree and to my surprise I was actually struggling to progress up it.

Why is climbing a tree so hard?

I tried and tried again, but still couldn't get past the 3 meter mark..

After a grueling 30 minutes of endless attempts, I decided to give up and think of another idea..

After one last try of course..

But, unsurprisingly, after climbing for a few seconds, my hand slipped and I fell on my butt.

Sigh..

I guess I have to settle for tree bark then…

My sad mood was interrupted by a sudden noise.

Ding!

Huh?

What was that?

A bell?

Just as I was about to look for the source of the sound, something happened.

Out of thin air, a translucent blue screen appeared right in front of my face.

⠀

〖Climbing: Level 0 ➤ Level 1〗

〖Reward: World Points x5, Basic Climbing Technique〗

⠀

A familiar pain attacked my head once again, but this time it didn't even last a second.

Ouch!

What was that?

But before trying to investigate the weird phenomena, a sudden urge washed over me.

It was an urge to try and climb the tree in front of me.

So that's exactly what I did.

And surprisingly I actually succeeded this time, and with relative ease.

Did that weird screen thing make me able to climb this tree?

But how?

That doesn't seem very logical..

But to be honest, I don't really remember what's logical or illogical..

I tried recalling the screen's appearance in my mind and it suddenly appeared in front of me again.

I, of course, wasn't ready for that and got a little spooked, causing me to fall off the tree I was currently on top of.

Bang!

Ouch, that stung a little..

Wait? Shouldn't that hurt way more?

Even if the tree isn't that tall, it's still over 5 meters.

Ahh, whatever..

So, what's up with this weird floating hologram thing?

This time, the screen displayed different symbols and words.

⠀

〔System〕

—————

▹World

▹Market

▹Skills

▹Quests

—————

⠀

Hmm? Does it want me to click on one of these options?

I brought up my finger and clicked on the first option.

The screen changed its display and gave me another set of options to choose from.

⠀

〔World〕

—————

▹Information

▹Settings

▹???

—————

⠀

I once again clicked on the first option and was greeted by another screen, which was filled with text.

I read it through and actually learned some new things.

So apparently this world is currently 750x750 meters large, but it could be enlarged by spending things called World Points?

Its location is in an isolated dimension, hence why there is no wildlife here.

Apparently this is my personal space and I can do whatever I want in here.

Alright, sure.. This doesn't really tell me anything useful though?

What I need right now is food and water, not more land..

I closed the screen, just by thinking about wanting to go back, and opened the second option ''Settings''.

⠀

〔Settings〕

—————

▹Weather

▹???

—————

⠀

I clicked on the only option that was available to me and to my great surprise, it was actually useful for my current situation..

This option allowed me to change the weather in my world to whatever I wished for.

Naturally, I changed it to (Rainy) and opened my mouth to relinquish my thirst.

After I was done drinking the rainwater, I changed the weather back to (Sunny) and exited out of the Settings menu.

I still have no idea if this system was something I always had, but something deep inside of me told me that this was something abnormal.

I went back to the main screen and chose the third option ''Skills'', since I was curious about the first notification that popped up and seemingly gave me climbing skills.

⠀

⍟ Combat Skills:

〖Swordsmanship〗

〖Archery〗

〖Martial Arts〗

〖Magic Casting〗

〖Defense〗

⍟ Gathering Skills:

〖Mining〗

〖Fishing〗

〖Farming〗

〖Hunting〗

〖Foraging〗

⍟ Crafting Skills:

〖Blacksmithing〗

〖Alchemy〗

〖Enchanting〗

〖Cooking〗

〖Building〗

〖Leatherworking〗

〖Jewelcrafting〗

⍟ Adventuring Skills:

〖Exploration〗

〖Stealth〗

〖Climbing〗Lv. 1

〖Tracking〗

〖Trapping〗

⍟ Social Skills:

〖Negotiation〗

〖Intimidation〗

〖Leadership〗

〖Seduction〗

⠀

After reading through the new information, I noticed that some of these skills were incredibly useful and some incredibly useless?

I mean, jewelcrafting? Negotiation? Seduction?

Who am I gonna seduce here? The trees?

Sigh..

I guess I get rewards if I do these things?

Alright, seems simple enough..

I went back again and this time clicked on the ''Market'' option.

⠀

〔Market〕

—————

▹Materials

▹Farming

▹Magic

▹Consumables

▹Minions

—————

⠀

I naturally clicked on the first option and was greeted by a long list of pictures and words.

Apparently, this was a place where you could spend World Points to buy different things.

There were also ''search'' and ''sort'' buttons.

I clicked on the sort button and it instantly sorted the items by price, starting from the highest..

But, the items were all blacked out and the names were all question marks.

The only thing I could see were the prices, which almost went off the screen with their absurd amount of numbers..

I clicked on the sort button again and this time it sorted them the way I wanted it to, cheapest first.

The cheapest material was ''Dirt'', which cost 1 World Point.

I don't know how much of it I would get if I were to buy it, but I was sure it wasn't a lot.

Also, I still have no idea what World Points are, I just know that I have 5 of them due to me leveling up my climbing skill?

I looked through the rest of the marketplace, at least the products that I could see, and I must say that I was quite surprised.

Even if I had lost my memories, I could still tell that my brain had never heard of some of these things like magic journals or mana potions before.

But the strangest category was by far ''Minions'', since everything there was blacked out and the cheapest product cost a whopping 1000 World Points.

The one I was most interested in was the ''Farming'' category though, since I finally found a food source for myself.

I bought the cheapest thing there, which was a ''Sweet Potato Slip''.

It cost me 2 World Points and in return I got a small sprout.

I found a suitable spot and dug out a small hole in the soil.

I put the sprout in and covered it up again.

'…'

Hmm? What now?

I didn't think about this at all..

I completely forgot that plants actually take time to grow..

Am I stupid?

Wait, I think I saw something in another category that might be useful for this?

This time I opened up the Magic category and sorted it by cheapest again..

Ahh, that's exactly what I was looking for..

I bought a thing called ''One Time Use Fertilizer Spell'' for 3 World Points.

A small green glowing orb appeared in my hand and after inspecting it for a little bit, I decided to slowly put it above my planted sweet potato slip.

The orb stood there for a few seconds and then suddenly disappeared into the ground..

'…'

Is it done?

Ding!

⠀

〖Magic Casting: Level 0 ➤ Level 1〗

〖Reward: World Points x5, Basic Mana Gathering Technique〗

〖Farming: Level 0 ➤ Level 1〗

〖Reward: World Points x5, Basic Iron Hoe〗

⠀

Ouch!

Again, a quick but painful headache washed over me.

I looked in front of me and saw an iron hoe laying on the ground.

That could be useful in the future, I guess?

But I am more interested in my sweet potato..

I gently dug out the soil I planted it in and finally saw the finished product..

A perfect sweet potato..

I devoured the whole potato in an instant and I must admit that it tasted heavenly.

How can a raw potato even taste so good?

Was it due to the Fertilizer spell or the potato slip quality?

Well whatever, at least I'm not hungry anymore…

I can buy 2 more in the future, obviously together with the fertilizer spells, but what if I run out of World Points?

I realized that I hadn't checked an option in the system's main menu, which was called ''Quests''.

So I clicked on it and was greeted by a wall of text once again.

⠀

〔Quests〕

—————

▹Do 100 Push-Ups! (0/100) ⤍ 10 WP

▹Run 1000 Meters! (0/1000) ⤍ 10 WP

▹Do 100 Squats! (0/100) ⤍ 10 WP

▹???

—————

⠀

Wow..

I'm assuming WP stands for World Points, so I also get them by completing quests?

Why does it want me to do physical exercise though?

Does it want to see me suffer?

Or maybe it wants me to get stronger?

Is the system even a living being, or is it a part of me?

Welp, to be honest I don't really care right now.

More WP = More Sweet Potatoes.

I guess I should get started on completing these quests now?

And that's exactly what I did..

After 2 hours, I collapsed to the ground, while heavy rain hit my body, cleaning me of my sweat and relinquishing my thirst.

Why the hell was that so difficult..

⠀

〖Reward: World Points x10〗

〖Reward: World Points x10〗

〖Reward: World Points x10〗

⠀

At least, it's done now..

I used the system to turn the weather back to sunny and excitedly bought 3 sweet potato slips and 3 fertilizer spells.

This time I tried to use the spell on a potato that I hadn't planted, but the result was quite disappointing.

It was just a normal sweet potato, nothing too special.

But when I planted another one and used the spell then, I got the same result as before.

Heavenly gourmet food.

After my dinner break, I had 25 WP left and was currently looking at the sunset.

Just as the sun was about to disappear behind the endless abyss, I decided to look for a place to sleep in.

I didn't really want to sleep on the ground, so I looked through the market and found something I liked for 5 WP.

A fleece, a coating of wool.

I gently put it down on the grassy ground.

Sure, I could've maybe bought some wood and made some sort of bed, but honestly I was too tired for that.

I jumped on top of the wool and closed my eyes..

…

An unknown amount of time later.

I woke up to the sun rising from the abyss and stretched my body.

After that, I couldn't help but notice something strange in the middle of this world, at the place where I originally woke up.

It was a pulsating glowing mass of weird red energy.

Hmm.. That looks dangerous..

Am I gonna go near it?

Of course not, do you think I'm stupid?

It's literally colored like blood.

Why would I go near something so scary looking?

I'm perfectly fine here, with my fleece bed and sweet potatoes, there is no need to risk my life..

But sadly, I found out that I didn't have a say in this matter as the red mass started growing bigger and pulling me in.

''Seriously?!''

I shouted as I got dragged into the ominous portal...