Awaking

The systems were a universal mystery.

Religions, cults, guilds; everybody had a different explanation for their existence and why people were all were given this tool. Some attributed it to the gods' kindness while others simply viewed it as a way of the world, a part of themselves no different from their arm or leg.

Humans, Dwarves, Dragonians, and others are all given the Deva system from birth. As they grew and got older, all would gain"points" which they could then allocate into different parts of themselves via the status page. These points were an integral part of living in this world.

Growing older was the passive and most common way to get points, however, this world didn't betray hard work. Slaying monsters also gave people points, the amount that it gave varied depending on the strength of the creature itself, some weaker monsters gave 0 points while the stronger ones can give upwards of 10. Each point could be manually allocated into Health, Strength, Mana, Ki, Constitution, Agility, or Wisdom. The power of choosing your own paths allowed humans and other races to construct a society where many specialists gathered. Some trained ki and strength, becoming dangerous warriors on the battlefield, while others trained wisdom and mana, drawing upon the mystical forces around and within nature to empower themselves.

The Deva system gave them the ability to survive in a cruel and unforgiving world. There was not a single soul on the planet who took the system's abilities for granted and as such, its existence was the fertile land on which many ideologies and religions grew, all based on the system's mysterious and mystical origins.

The Asura system is the monster counterpart of the Deva system. Most low leveled monsters lack intelligence and as such do not have the foresight to choose a specific way to use their stat points and increase their strength, because of this, the common belief is that the Asurian gods gave the monsters a system that increases every aspect of their strength by a little after each kill. This unburdens the need to manually choose which areas they want to grow in and gives them a better chance of surviving.

However.

No Human, Dragonian, Elf, Dwarf or other conscious species had ever been in possession of the Brahma system.

'Is this perhaps the system we get given when we die? But then why did the Asura system start to download?' Cal thought, his mind was going through twists and turns in order to accept the reality in front of him.

'Ugh… this is making my head hurt and I'm pretty sure that's impossible since I'm dead.'

*Ding!*

'Oh an alert! Finally!' Cal started to get lonely in the darkness.

-----

ALERT!

Restoration process commencing

-----

'Restoration?'

Cal was very well versed in his old systems alerts and behaviour, so much so that he could often predict what the system was going to say before he even heard its ding.

However this wasn't an alert he was familiar with.

'What the hell kind of aler-'

Before Cal could finish his thoughts, the darkness that enveloped him was replaced by a harsh yellow light that surrounded his entire being. Cal felt like his brain had been ripped from his head and was now hurtling through the sky, if he didn't know any better he'd assume he was falling to his death!

The moment it felt like he couldn't take it anymore, the light started to fade.

-----

ALERT!

You have been restored!

-----

'Ugh… what was that? Where am I??'

The system's screen popped up but unlike before, the screen was a light golden colour with graceful writing across it, it looked more human than the printed styles of the Deva system that Cal was used to. Its edges were curved and blended into the background, it felt as if this pop-up was meshing with the world rather than being a physical presence that showed up.

Beyond the alert, Cal could see a rocky wall with broken tiles strewn about the floor; they looked aged and decrepit. Familiarly decrepit to the boy.

'No way… am I back?!' Cal thought, shocked.

There was no doubt in his mind. That's a wall from the dungeon.

He turned my head and saw a familiar scene. There were about 5 or so skeletons walking up and down the dungeon's path, each dragging a weapon that scratched along the ground, they were too weak to carry the swords properly.

Accompanying this familiar scene was an unfamiliar one.

Monsters in the dungeon looked through Cal as if he were a fly on a wall.

'Am I invisible?'

Cal looked down at himself and surprisingly enough, he did look invisible at first glance! He looked through his body and into the floor below.

Most of his body.

Cal could see through his ribcage to be more specific.

He could also see his ribs. No, not through skin.

Cal could see his white, bony, shiny ribs.

'Haha.'

'haha.'

'ha.'

'…'

'…'

'…'

'…'

'WHAT THE ACTUAL FU-'

Cal passed out.