As far as the eyes could see, it was black and littered with shimmering stars. The bright crescent moon hung high, overlooking an old town. It was dead silent. The winter breeze swept through the roads, rattling the dusty windows of the moldy wooden buildings.

Icy wind carried fishy guts, cut with gunpowder, which spread to every corner. There were several corpses strewn along the road. Among the bodies were tall and short, middle-aged and young, some tall, some short. But they were all the same, as they each had multiple bullet wounds and were horribly pale in shock.

A dark, desolate, and somber air filled the alleyway. A thin young man lay in a puddle of blood, leaning against a stone, icy wall. Its black hair was a tangle, its ghostly white skin was like porcelain, and its gray eyes appeared dull like a flame caught in a gale. In the dark, his tattered shirt and pants glowed in crimson red. In between his fingers, warm red liquid gushed from his bony hand. The young man’s breathing was rough and faint at the same time.

Bryan said without emotion: “So this is it.”

His strength was ebbing away as his life slipped away from him. Despite this, he could reflect on his life so far. Reflecting, he realized the amount of happy memories he could remember was on one hand, since his life hadn’t been the best.

To survive, he had to steal and commit minor crimes, like the rest of the abandoned. Bryan could only ally himself with others like him to survive longer.

Feeling the bullet lodged in the middle of his gut, he realized it was this very thing that got him where he was now; in a cold alley way losing the sensations of his body.

There was no law enforcement, or any official governing body for that matter. There were only petty gangs degrading themselves to brute savagery to gain a hint of control.

Bryan looked out of the alleyway. The street was devoid of any life, only the empty husks of his former friends lay stiff and cold.

A hole had formed in Bryan’s stomach, and he was bleeding to death while he should have been studying, hanging out with his friends, and living his life to the fullest.

Yet strangely enough, he didn’t feel sad or frustrated that this was the way things turned out. His life would not be worth living, even if something miraculously saved him.

While his demeanor implied he had no regrets, a deep ache in the bottom of his heart said otherwise. He wanted as much power as possible to decide his own fate.

While his resolve strengthened with each passing moment, he slowly shut his eyes. Suddenly, everything went black.

While he thought he was dead, Bryan felt he could still move his body. The strange feeling made him open his eyes and stare at a ceiling.

As he got up, he murmured, “Where am I?”

It was a room. It wasn’t too big, but it wasn’t too small either. Light streamed into the room through the drawn curtains.

Posters and pictures adorned the walls. An open notebook sat on the desk and a lamp in the room's corner. There were various books and magazines neatly organized, along with a few DVDs.

The room, however, was not what overwhelmed his mind. In front of him was a floating pale blue screen, seemingly ethereal. On the screen, white bold letters centered in the middle.

“Welcome! System Initializing…”

Bryan stared at the screen, dumbfounded, unsure of what to do. As he contemplated what had just happened and where he was, he felt a powerful pain in his head. As information and memories forcefully pushed into his brain, ingraining themselves, he clutched his head and belched.

Bryan lied on the floor with cold sweat glistening on his body, the pain slowly subsided as his brain sorted out his thoughts and digested what he just heard. Almost in a trance, he murmured to himself.

My name is Bryan, but I now have the last name, Hayes. I don’t have a father, and my mother is a stock trader. I have one sister, Emily, who’s one year younger than me.

The muttering continued as Bryan processed everything he received. The straw mattress he normally slept on was far from his soft bed.

His blank look gradually turned into a stunned expression as his mind sank deeper into his memories.

He’s a total loser. I can’t believe this.’

The ‘Bryan’ before wasn’t assertive and was an introvert.

In his memories, ‘Bryan’ didn’t have the best grades and was at the bottom of the food chain in the jungle called ‘high school’.

Bullying almost daily turned Bryan into the punching bag of the public. Emily found it embarrassing to even call him her brother, so she refused to associate with him.

Bryan’ even let a bully take his crush away from him in front of him. Simply ridiculous!

Bryan sat there in silence as he sifted through memories of pain, suffering, and agony.

As he whispered softly to himself, Bryan answered, “I suppose we have a lot in common.”. His faulty memory wasn’t too much of a concern for him because neither of them had any happy memories.

Despite having a worse life in the past, Bryan could still relate to his current struggles. His resolve from before reestablished and hardened itself once more because of these painful memories. The man would decide his own fate and would not live for anyone else.

After that, he redirected his attention back to the blue screen. Considering how long he ignored it, it was surprising.

The words on the screen morphed into another string. The information shown on the screen shocked him.

NAME: BRYAN HAYES

LVL: 1

EXP: 0/100

PRGRMS:

It presented him with a screen that contained information about him. Through the memories he received, he realized this screen was like a ‘status window’ in games the previous Bryan played.

He was scanning down the screen when he saw a peculiar word.

“PRGRMS?” the screen changed display, displaying the answer to his fleeting thought.

PRGRMS ARE THE PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES THE HACKER HAS STARTED TO LEARN AND SLOWLY MASTER. THE MORE LANGUAGES THE HACKER LEARNS, THE BETTER THEIR UNDERSTANDING OF VARIOUS MACHINES AND NETWORKS.

“This is a joke, right?...”

As he read this, Bryan zoned out. Among all the skills and fighting experience he mastered in his previous life, coding, and machines were not among them.

In fact, he never even touched a computer his whole life! In his status window, another tab called ‘Store’ appeared out of the corner of his eye. Upon touching the Store tab, it automatically shifted to the Store tab.

STORE:

BASIC JAVA — 5 CRYPTS

INTERMEDIATE JAVA — 25 CRYPTS

MASTER JAVA — 50 CRYPTS

USB KILLER — 7 CRYPTS

COMMUNICATIONS INTERCEPTOR — 15 CRYPTS

…

…

It bombarded with items and languages on the screen. Bryan calmly scanned everything and immediately planned his next move.

Bryan could accept and adapt to various situations with ease, as he was a seasoned veteran. A sweet voice caressed his ears.

“Bryan, get up! You’re late for school!”

As he awoke from his trance, he realized he had a family now. Bryan knew he had a long road ahead of him.

What was at the end, he would have to find it out for himself.