Chapter 1

AHHHHHHHH! A mind twisted in pain without the ability to voice it. I woke up in abject horror, my consciousness floating in a sea of excruciating pain and nothingness. No sight, sound, smell, feeling of any sort, all of my senses ripped from me with only the endless searing pain of every nerve. Except for what seemed to be flashing notifications that were almost imperceivable with the amount of pain that I was in.

With what seemed like hours senses started to come back first with smell, a damp earthy scent. Next came sight, the soft glow of luminescent moss clinging to the surrounding walls. Finally touch, as he felt the coarse dirt and rock under my arms and legs. Slowly my eyes came into focus and unable to move, I watched in horror of the slow mending of my body under the soft light of cave moss. I watched as my battered bones slowly ground and slipped back into place and my torn mutilated flesh mended itself around the freshly healed bones. Just before I passed and with the slight smirk my last thought was, and Veronica didn’t think I had a heart….

After a few hours of laying on the cold hard packed earth, I was starting to breathe easier as the pain started to slowly drain away. Trying to remember exactly what happened, I thought back to what I could remember. Slowly pushing myself up onto my elbows reality snapped into focus. The first words that come to my mouth on this new alien world are “What in the HOLY HELL happened?!?!”

Pushing myself off the ground I looked down at the sticky, drying puddle of blood that stained the floor. Then I noticed the state I was in. Looking down at I took stock of how he looked. My shirt (using the word shirt loosely) was hanging on my shoulders with slightly more than a few threads and a prayer. My shorts had rips, tears and holes so thorough I was surprised that any part of myself was covered up. Finally, my shoes though beaten looked to have enough life in them for maybe a couple days’ worth of walking. Everything was covered in dirt and blood, from my hair to the soles of my shoes. “Damn, I really do look like a homeless man’s turd”.

Trying to take stock of where I was I started to look around the cave that I was in. Soft greenish/yellow moss clung to the ceiling and walls giving off an ethereal light to see by. Looking up I noticed my grand entrance. A six-foot hole plugged up with debris stared down at me, loose dirt and stones still drifting down. Looking around there were pieces of the ceiling strewed around the floor, some pieces still glowing with the moss. Slowly I made his way around the room, touching the rough walls, hearing the soft scraping of my shoes on the rocky floor, smelling the stale air; and taking in everything that I could. The only point of interest is the dark tunnel entrance at the end of the cave. Almost beckoning to me.

Walking over to a large boulder I sat down to try and figure things out. Taking a moment, I closed my eyes and takes a deep breath. With my eyes closed I noticed a faint blue light pulsing in the corder of my eyes. Opening them I started looking around to see what could be causing it. I start to noticed it was everywhere that I looked, the soft blue light pulsing just stayed in the corner of my eyes. Starting to cross my eyes and staring intently at it I say, “what the hell is that..” With that a blue box pops up in front of me. “HOLY SHIT!” and nearly falling off my rock, I start to swipe my hand through the box, passing right through it. Calming myself a bit I start to look from side to side, the box staying perfectly centered in front of my vision. Looking more intently I notice the box is similar to those that were part of the MMORPG games I used to play, and figured I’d take a closer look.

Welcome to Raylia! The 9,582nd planet to enter The System. The System offers you the ability to grow in strength. Strive to be more than you are; work to fulfill your destiny!

With your unique entrance to Raylia, you have gained the interests of the gods!

Ugborh, god of the Insane; appreciates a man who is willing to take a leap from the heavens with out a plan a clue or a parachute. Receive: Magic Bag of Holding (godly).

– Magic Bag of Holding – (Godly)

A soul bound bag that is far more than meets the eye. Drive everyone crazy on where you put things. Also try to figure out where it all goes! The Magic Bag levels as you do. Starting with a 3 meter by 3 meter storage room, every 10 levels you may choose another room to add to your bag. Can enter your bag and invite others as well (just be carefully not to get carried away…literally). Can place or recall items by thought. Items cannot be stolen or lost from the bag.

Idros, god of Luck; takes notice of a man that while falling to certain death is able to fall into the safe room at terminal velocity of the only dungeon in 200 miles, leaving him with 1HP. Receive : Title Lucky Bastard.

Title – Lucky Bastard – (Godly)

Luck being the most difficult stat to raise, where rogues literally kill for equipment to boost luck by a mere point or two. You however really stepped into it, or missed a step actually. Luck Bastard grants you an additional 100 points in Luck.

Oemis, god of Beer; leaping into the unknown without a plan without a plan or a clue takes balls of steel (or a complete lack of forethought). Oemis appreciates both qualities and wants to toast to your fortitude. Receive : Beer Stein O’ Plenty (godly).

– Beer Stein O’ Plenty – (Godly)

A soul bound mug that will be the envy of all your friends. Why drink water when you can have an ice cold beer! Simply fill with water and say what kind of beer you would like. Enjoy a dark stout or a nice pale ale. (can also have a hard cider if you swing that way).

Merasil, goddess of Wisdom; Having missed the full introduction to Raylia and The System. As well as starting in a level 50 instanced dungeon far exceeding your level one capability; Merasil takes pity on you. Receive : Soul Companion.

– Soul Companion – (Godly)

As the name suggest a soul companion is forever linked with you (well as long as you live (resurrections included)). Your soul companion will grow as you grow.

As I read them they scrolled through, when I got to the bit about the soul companion my interest was a bit more piqued. Re-reading that bit over and over I muttered “what the hell is a soul companion”. Willing the boxes to the corner again, I sat there and just started to think about just what these gifts were. Closing my eyes again, just what the hell is going on, and put my head in my hands and my elbows on my knees, I take a deep breath and mutter, “I’m sooo losing my mind.” Feeling a bit better I slowly open my eyes and notices a brown leather satchel laying next to my feet and a large beer stein laid on top. Starting to reach down to the items to take a closer look a red ring of light begins to glow on the ground in front of me. Jerking my legs back I watch as the line pulses brighter and brighter ending in a bright flash of red light.

“WOW, that’s always a rush! Well, great to meet yo….. OH COMEON!!!! You have GOT to be kidding me! Seriously you stick me with an absolute Noob?! Westley’s death was NOT my fault! He was all “All I have to do is take a little to build up a tolerance”, I told him you CAN’T build up a tolerance to iocane powder without having at least a 20% resistance to poisons. Does he listen to me NOOOOOOOO, he goes gets him self killed and then I’m there with a crying princess. I mean Princess Buttercup was gorgeous, but man could she cry and cry and cry...”

Stunned, I just stare at the creature. In front of me is standing what could only be described as an imp. Staring at the little guy he must be no more than four feet tall. Pointed ears and two small horns stuck out of the top of his head; bit of a stubby nose, a devilish smile with sharp teeth and with bright yellow eyes were made even more startling with the dark red skin. As the creature paces back and forth I notice small wings coming out of its back as it continued talking to no one in particular and gesturing wildly. Completing the look were a pair of black pants with a long tail poking out the back that ended with a black spade. What the hell is with the pants? “ummmm, hey…? Who are you?”

Eyes nearly popping out of his head the imp hands touching his chest the imp exlaimed, “Who am I?!?! I’m your damn soul bound companion. Of which I have NO idea how the hell you pulled that off! Do you have any idea how rare and hard it is to get a soul companion?! There are less than 500,000 of us in the whole System! Sure, you could get yourself an AI on one of the technology planets, would only cost a few million gold or so, still rare though. But a full soul companion…inconceivable! I’ve had 175 soul companions and now here I am stuck here with a LEVEL ONE NOOB”!

Completely not thinking clearly I mumbled, “Why do soul companions always seem to be imps or fairy’s…”

Almost spitting the imp pointed at me,” and you’re DAMN lucky you got an imp! Do you have any idea how annoying fairy’s can be? They get dust all over the place! And what? You thought you’d get a minotaur or maybe a giant griffin? What the hell would they need you for? You’re a squishy bag of meat. If anything you’d be their little soul companion! Where the hell are we anyway?”

Jaw dropping, at the verbal tirade the little guy was on, I said, “On a planet called Raylia I think.”

“On Raylia?! That back water planet? Great, now we have to go hunt thousands of horned rabbits to get you leveled up. Where the hell in Raylia are we and why are we in a cave? You should be in a cozy town or something; and how the hell are you only level 1? Kids usually hit level 2 by the time they’re 5. Even the stupid fat kids stumble into level 2 by the time they’re 7 and you’ve got to be at least 20.”

“Actually I’m 22”

“How is that even possible? Wait never mind I’ll find out for myself”. With a quick snap the imp flew into Thoren like a ball of mist.

Jumping off my rock, I started to slap at my chest, “WHAT THE HELL DID YOU JUST DO?!”

Well part of the whole “Soul Companion” thing is that I can merge with you.

Still feeling my chest but with the panic settling down just a bit, “what do you mean you can just merge with me?”

This isn’t too hard a concept, Your Intelligence seriously can’t possibly be over 10. (with a sigh and the attitude that he was talking to infant he continued) We are “soul companions”, get it? The whole “SOUL” part, I’m a part of you now. Where you go I go. I grow as you grow. As you’re a level 1 noob, I’m in my weakest form. Thanks for that by the way. I haven’t been this weak in hundreds of years.

“You can level up? What the hell are you talking about? And it’s weird being able to hear your thoughts”

“Well as I’m a part of you right now genius I can’t talk as I don’t have a mouth, but our thoughts can communicate as if we were having regular conversation. Continue to talk out loud, no one here is going to think you’re any crazier than they already do. As for leveling up yes, welcome to the System! Let’s see what I can find in your memories to explain it better…. Damn there were 13 billion of you humans on your planet Earth? What did you do just eat and procreate? WOW ok, now that’s a lot of porn you’ve seen, definitely fits into the procreate part but you were really on a looooong dry spell weren’t you”.

“HEY! I was busy at school and just didn’t find the right one I wanted to spend more time with”.

“Sure, keep telling yourself that…WHAT THE HELL? You watched a woman and a HORSE? Not even a centaur but a strait up horse?!”

“NOOOO! Was just a thing I heard about, was curious so I looked it up to see a video what they were talking about”

“uh huh…suuuuuuuure. You’re a bit of a lil freak aren’t you. Never mind let me look….ahhhhhh here we go. You were something called a gamer. Kind of fits with why you were sent to Raylia. Your MMORPG games are very similar to how the System works and your fantasy based games are just as similar to Raylia. So I hope you got your pail and shovel cause welcome to the sandbox! You want to be a fire mage miner go for it. You want to be an assassin pilot, suit up. There are over 11,000 planets in the System. Some are highly magic driven with mana such as Raylia. Others are technology driven with little mana such as your sci-fi games; space ships, lasers, and almost every technology you can think of. Now this part is VERY important, so I’ll say is slowly just to make sure you get it, mana and technology don’t mix… at all…period. Mana degrades technology incredibly fast. Leave a laser rifle on Raylia for more than 2 days and it’s got as much use as a metal club with less stats. So, if you want to be a mage and work on a starship well you better master Internal Mana Manipulation. And I do mean master it, not just “Hey I got the skill!”, it needs to be over level 100, cause if you’re out in space and you start to leak mana and fry your ship, you’re screwed; and if you’re screwed I’m screwed. Well at least until you die. Ok I think I have enough to work with to work this out”. With that the imp materialized in front of me again.

“Damn it! Little bit of a heads up before you do things like that please. Actually, what the hell is your name? I just keep thinking of you as “imp”, as a soul companion figure we should at least know each other’s names.”

“Ah, you’re right, fair enough. I should have introduced myself. My friends call my Wick. I’m an infernal imp.” With a bit of flair, he took a bow. “I’ve been in the System for a little over 1200 years. Though it’s been about 112 years since my last companion. In between, us soul companions just float around in nothingness playing cards and telling each other stories about our latest companions; and let me tell you that gets old fast!”

“Wait, so your friends call you Wick, what’s your real name?”

“Ughhhh fine its Chadwick. Yes, it’s stupid and a bit pretentious. My mother is a succubus and my father was a snob of a hobbit. Really have no idea what my mother saw in him, but she did, and then they did, and then I was. Though I’m pretty happy about being an imp. The other two options were just awful. I could have been an Incubus that looked like a hobbit with all the powers of an incubus in the pathetic form of a hobbit (which is just wrong); or I could have been hobbit that looked like an incubus with all the powers of a hobbit (which I think is just the ability to have really hairy feet) while being hated and hunted by everyone. Final choice is being an imp which gives me growth potential and less despised than the others (god I really hate hobbits!). So back to my name I thought about going as Chad, but that really just made me sound like a tool. Then I decided to just go as Wick, kinda fits and nice and simple.”

“Huh, well great to meet you Wick. I seriously have got to know though, what is up with the pants? I thought imps were either naked or wore a loin cloth.”

Wick walked up and smacked me.

You have take 2 points of damage.

Giving me a steely glare and says, “Thoren you really are a perv aren’t you? Seriously I don’t swing that way. Did I ask you why you’re wearing pants? Oh, and don’t EVER talk about loin cloths or ever think about having me WEAR a loin cloth.”

“OW! Damn it! Oooooooooook, fine but you have to give me a better reason”

“Fine.” With a sigh, Wick continues. “My 79th soul companion and I just cleared out the first level of a crypt when the ceiling partially caves in, separating the two of us. There is a small hole in the rubble pile, instead of just starting to dig me out a bit he says, “I can just pull you out”. With that he reaches in the hole grabs me and starts pounding me into the hole. I’m screaming and yelling at him to stop but he keeps pounding and screaming back that he almost has me. After about 15 minutes of pounding I finally come through the hole. Our eyes lock for what seems forever but must have been a minute or two; and then he looks down to see where he’s grabbing me. My loin cloth is torn off at this point and he has a handful of my twig. Let’s just say the next 31 years of our companionship was extremely awkward.”

“…..He…..grabbed you….and jerked you through a hole….till you came….out….AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA”

*CRITICAL HIT* You have received 8 points of damage.