Chapter 3 – Mana Fever

It was a typical morning at the Sharma household. By 9 a.m., everyone except for Pran had gathered at the dining table for breakfast. Arpita, Pran's mom asked Anya to go and fetch Pran.

With a begrudging expression, Anya made her way to Pran's room, knocked on the door, and shouted, "Wake up, sleepyhead! Breakfast is already on the table."

After waiting for a while without receiving a response, Anya decided to enter Pran's room. The room was dark and slightly humid, which caused her to frown. She turned on the lights, but what she saw was odd.

Pran was asleep on his bed, but he was lying on his bed with his legs hanging over the side. He still wore his clothes from yesterday and hadn't even taken off his shoes.

Anya shook Pran to wake him up, but he remained unresponsive. However, when she touched him, she felt his feverish body. She placed her hand on his forehead and realized that it was burning with a high temperature.

In a fluster, Anya rushed back to the dining table and informed everyone that Pran was likely unconscious due to a high fever. Their father, mother, and elder sister were initially taken aback but quickly rushed to Pran's room.

Upon arrival, they found that Pran's body was burning up, and he seemed to be unconscious. Daksh, their father, promptly called a doctor to examine Pran's condition. Meanwhile, Pran's mother and elder sister, Saanvi, removed his shoes and carefully laid him on the bed. They placed a damp cold cloth on his forehead to reduce his fever. Upon checking his temperature, they found that it was 105 degrees.

After around an hour the doctor finally came and started examining Pran. But when he heard that Pran had awakened yesterday, he said: "In some rare cases when someone awakens they might be down with a fever because mana would be starting to circulate in the body and the body might treat it as an infection and try to fight it. We call this 'Mana Fever'."

"Usually, the fever would last for around 48 hours with the first 30 hours being the peak for it. And it should only have been around 9-10 hours since Pran had gotten the fever. Just keep the cold damp cloth on his forehead and everything should be alright, and around 20 hours later his temperature should start going down." 'But it's not really necessary.' Though he did not say the last part after seeing the faces of the family members.

He then continued: "I will come to check on him later tomorrow evening, but if his temperature doesn't start to go down after 20 hours don't hesitate to give me a call."

After finishing his work Daksh saw the doctor off and came back to Pran's room, after a brief pause said: "Don't worry our son is strong, and it's just mana fever. The doctor said that he will be fine after 2 days and some rest, so don't worry."

Everyone, except for Arpita, went to eat something, and she stayed by Pran's bedside, trying not to worry too much and consoling herself with the doctor's advice.

While all of this was happening, Pran was having a dream of his "previous" life which slowly began to turn into a nightmare. It started from the day he awakened, and he saw how he neglected his family. His father and sister had died in front of him fighting "Blood Harpies" due to a sudden high-level dungeon break. After luckily surviving, he found that his mother and sister were also hurt during that dungeon break, with his sister having a major head injury while his mother had a broken arm.

He saw himself working to death to kill monsters so that he could earn money and get the best possible medical care for his remaining family members. He barely cleared the entrance trial of the Tower of Trial and then saw himself trying to survive in the tower, clearing a few trials.

He joined a small guild named "Whitemantles" and eventually rose to become a team leader. He frequently left the tower to take care of his family with the money he earned. Then he saw himself coming into contact with his "best friends" and the "love of his life", helping them and receiving help from them. He laughed and cried with them, fought side by side with them. After a few years of hard work, trials, and wars, he became one of the vice guild leaders.

He saw how he got the "Primal Stone" after accidentally finding an unknown dungeon while running away from an ambush from a rival guild. He shared the news with his best friends and noticed that their attitudes started to change ever so slightly towards him.

He lamented that he was a fool for not noticing it and just brushing it aside by thinking that everyone was under a lot of pressure due to their current war with a rival guild. He was eventually attacked by his best friend when he denied giving them the Primal Stone. Then he died by making the Primal Stone's mana go on a rampage in his body.

Just as he died in his nightmare, he woke up in his current life. He still had a bad headache and felt very hot all over his body like he was on fire. His body felt like it was being pressed down by a huge mountain, and it was almost impossible for him to move his fingers.

Pran gave up on moving and, with a lot of effort, opened his eyes. His vision was still blurry, but he saw something in front of him. He tried to concentrate, and after a while, he was barely able to make out a countdown window with [12:29:51] remaining. He was perplexed as to why there was a countdown timer in front of him, but he wasn't able to focus on it too much because of his headache. He just closed his eyes again and tried to rest and somehow actually fell into a deep sleep.

*****

[Ding!]

A system notification sound suddenly woke him. His body was still very lethargic and he struggled to open his eyes, but when he did, his vision was still blurry.

Then he heard a message:

[Players body has successfully adapted to the new stats.]

[Mana circulation will begin now!]

[Time remaining till the player can move freely: 07:59:59]

So I still have to stay in this state for another 8 hours. But why is this happening? Pran wracked his brain but couldn't find an answer. The most he could deduce from what he remembered before he was put in a forced sleep was that he had achieved a feat that has never been done before, and due to that, he had received a lot of rewards.

That's right, the headache, dizziness, and the 'forced sleep' happened right after I received the title. What was the title... He tried hard but couldn't recall the title, so he tried to call his stats window but was disappointed that he was not able to speak.

*Sigh* Guess I'll have to wait until the new timer is over. He grumbled to himself because he was unhappy, but he couldn't do anything else anyway. So he just closed his eyes and waited for the timer to be over.

After six hours, Pran's body felt less lethargic, and he could finally speak. He spoke to his mother, who was still by his bedside, "Mom, why are you looking so worried? Look, I'm feeling much better now." He tried to sound positive, but his weakness was evident through his voice, and he had to put all his might to give a smile.

Pran's mother lovingly stroked his hair and said, "I know dear, thank God you're alright, we were all so worried about you," her voice choked with emotion.

Pran looked around at his family members, his father, and his sisters, and felt a deep sense of gratitude and love for them. He knew that he had to be strong for them and protect them at all costs. "I'm okay now, guys. You should all also get some rest," he said, his voice filled with sincerity.

His family members smiled back at him, happy to see him recovering. Pran knew that he had a lot to think about, especially the strange occurrences that had happened to him, but for now, he was just happy to be with his family, safe and sound.

He made a vow to himself that no matter what, he would never let any harm come to his family, and anyone who tried to harm them would be obliterated by him.