When the light disappeared, Enok found himself wearing clothes he didn’t recognize. They were simple tight fitting white shirt and short with light shoes that were definitely not suited for traveling.

He was still in the throne room, except it was now illuminated by sunlight entering through a glass dome that was the ceiling.

The screens had disappeared, and unless he simply had not noticed earlier because of the shadows, the room now looked like it was part of the ruins of a deserted castle. Grass grew between the cracks of the floor and on the walls, different insects were leisurely flying around.

Long tables, vestige of a time when lavish feasts were held in this place, had been pushed and stacked against the walls, probably in order to free up some space. Many of them had collapsed under their own weight, eaten away through the years by termites and the likes.

At the top the carved stairs, there was no throne, nothing but more space. On the opposite side, was a big double door, whose red paint had lost its luster long ago. And at the center of the throne room, was Enok, reading the words on a familiar blue canvas that had appeared few moments ago.

Knowledge he never had was now present in his mind and he now knew that it was called a ‘window’, same as the screens he had seen earlier.

Welcome to the tutorial, a simulation designed to teach you the basics of the dr1ft3r system, test your abilities and calibrate it for the best experience. You have been identified as:

Rank D master of aura

Is this correct?

A rank D master of aura. He had only started training as an aurosei about a year ago, when he escaped his prison. Considering there were five standard stages and that he was at the second one, saying that he was a rank D was accurate if rank A was the highest.

“Correct,” he said.

As his voice echoed in the vast room, the window was quickly replaced by another one.

Performing status calibration Read Letter of the Engineer during process? (optional)

He answered by the affirmative and a second window popped up. Unlike those he had seen until now, that one was black.

The dr1ft3r system was created in order to allow warriors, scholars and adventurers to go beyond the limits the pagan gods selfishly imposed on the creation. It will allow one to improve their strengths, correct their weaknesses and one day challenge the heavens as representative of all mortals when they will try to make us their pawns again.

While the gods used mantra to dominate us, we mortals only had ki and a few ways to manipulate it. But alone, ki was useless, because no forms of ki manipulation can stand before the almighty power of the mantra.

But there was another source of power, one so great that even the pagan gods did not dare approach it.

The ether.

While ki is the power of life and mantra is the power of gods, the ether is the raw power of creation that precede them all. Thanks to technomancy and knowledge that doesn’t belong to the Path, we have developed machines so small they can’t be seen with the naked eyes. They have the ability to alter properties of the ambiant ether and I named them ethernano.

If you are reading this, they are inside of you, and they are what makes you a drifter. Harness their power. Prove the gods that we wont bow down anymore.

Make the price we had to pay worth it.

Odir Aramowyn the third, last king of the dwarfs.

Although I haven’t been on the Path for long, I fell in love with all of it.

As soon as he was done reading it, the window disappeared, leaving Enok in an odd mix of confusion, alarm... And anger.

What the hell had these fools done? Ether? They had dared to use something even him saw as sacred, something beyond their little understanding! One mistake could have destroyed more than they could comprehend!

Thinking back, he now understood how the entire dwarf race could have disappeared. This idiot, this ignorant king, this Odir, had somehow sacrificed his entire people, and for what? For a chance to fight creators they were cut off from?

Enok’s thought were cut short by a new window filling his vision.

Calibrating successful

Status attributes defined

As a drifter, the measure of your power is the amount ethernano present in your body and the quality of your blueprints. As an aurosei drifter you have four main ways of gaining said power:

Defeating opponents.

Completing quests.

Clearing dungeons.

Mastering the four stances.

Fulfill one of those conditions to gain Experience, or Exp. Enough Exp will allow you to level up and produce additional ethernano in the form of attribute points. Adding a point to one of your status attributes means allocating more ethernano to reinforce said attribute.

Beware, once added to an attribute, AP can’t be subtracted to be added to another attribute.

You currently have ten (10) unassigned AP. Use them after willing open your status window.

So this is what drifters were. Constantly evolving beings who bended all the fundamental laws of the universe in their favor. Rewriting their nature as they saw fit... ”Like us,” Enok thought, ”like they were their own creators.”

“Open status window,” he thought.

All the windows were replaced by a new one displaying words, some of them followed by numbers. His attributes.

Status Window

Class Rank C Aurosei Drifter Level 1 Strength 0 Speed 0 Durability 0 Perception 0 Physical Control 0 Energy Control 0 Energy Conversion 0 Computational Power 0 Materialization 0 Title None Trait Favored by Ultimecia Unused ability points 10

When he wondered what “Favored of Ultimecia” could mean, a smaller window appeared on the side.

Favored by Ultimecia One of the three eyes is set on you. Instinctual knowledge of machines. Improves with level. +25% Exp for killing natural biological beings.

“Some sort of blessing that includes killing living things? Isn’t that opposed to the ideal of representing mortals?”

Putting aside those thoughts, he focused on the attributes.

He had nine points for ten attributes, and had a general idea of how each one would affect him, except for materialization and computational power. And for some reason, no window popped up to explain them.

Strength, Speed and Perception were obvious, unless Perception meant something other than the sharpness of his senses. Durability should be referring to his ability to sustain damage, Physical control to his agility or precision and Energy control to his ability to manipulate ki and aura. Energy conversion only made him think of the amount of aura created from a set amount of ki.

“Each of the attributes I can Identify are central points to any master of aura, and I can reinforce them just like that? How much of a difference will a single point make?”

This also answered the question as to how ascended beings and guardians could be slain by mortals. Drifters seemed to have virtually no limits to how powerful they could get. “But what is the catch?” he thought, as he added a point to every category and the remaining point to Strength. He was confident in his speed, but things would be better if he could improve his strength.

Just when he noted that he didn’t feel any different a new window popped.

New quest: Complete the tutorial test.

You have completed the first half of the tutorial and learned the basics of life as a drifter. Now test your new abilities and defeat as many enemies as you can.

Optional: Find the boss. If he dies in any way, you will be awarded a random blueprint.

Tutorial will be completed if you are dealt fatal damage or if the boss dies.

As he read the words, the throne room’s huge double door rattled on its hinges, and a dozen of rusted machines of different sizes entered the room, each one squeaking louder than the other. On top of each one were floating the words .

The lesser bots were all vaguely humanoid in design, with either a leg too long, an arm too short or a head to big . The metal that made their exterior was so rusted that it slowed their movements and made them more stumbling forward than walking.

But after his fight with the primer, Enok didn’t want to make the mistake of underestimating them. He didn’t have his sword, so readying himself for a bare handed fight, he reached into his reserves of ki. An that’s when it happened.

For a second it felt like goosebumps, and then it was like thousands of insects moving over and under his skin. He felt the formation of muscle fibers and organs that he knew weren’t made of flesh, and his skin became harder as thin green lines covered his arms.

The transformation happened in less than a minute. He looked at his hands, except the new glow of his skin and the lines on his arms, they did not look that different.

But they sure felt like it.

Without any second thoughts he launched himself toward the machines.

With just a glance he counted thirteen enemies and a smaller one hiding in the shadow of the others. He met the first machine with a kick that crushed its head and sent it flying back through the double door followed by a trail of screws and bolts.

The others reacted quickly and moved to surround him as two of them jumped, attempting to tackle Enok. But to him, things moved slightly slower than when he usually manifested his aura, and he effortlessly dodged the first one and punched his fist through the second. Which was a mistake.

The machine grabbed his arm and a scorching pain ran through Enok’s body as strong electrical currents coursed through him.

The lesser bot went limp right after, but before he could pull his arm free the sneaky one he had spotted came out of hiding, trying to pierce Enok with a rusty hook it had instead of a hand. Glad the machine had chosen such a simple plan, he intercepted the hook with his free hand and sent it flying against the wall.

He pulled his arm free and the machine fell to the ground. The skin had became as dark as cool, but that was it. Compared to the pain he had felt, the damage were mostly at a surface level and he could still move his arm around.

After the initial contact, the circle of lesser bots quickly thinned out as he dodged and easily defeated them. The main challenge was to not be electrocuted again, but he made sure not to pierce through them again.

The last fell, and Enok stood among their broken remains, unsatisfied.

Putting aside the surprise electric attack, it had been too easy. While he now knew how the AP affected him, he could have dealt with these things without being a drifter.

Level up! Level up!

Two windows popped into existence in front of him, notifying him he had earned enough Exp to be granted AP twice. His status screen showed he was at Lvl 3 and had four AP in total.

“Only two points per level, uh?”

If things in this dungeon were roughly as strong as the , what he had to worry about was another surprise attack dealing so much damage it would take him out or running out of ki because there were too many enemies. So he added two points to Durability and two points to energy conversion.

He went through the tingling sensation again, and he felt heavier. Durability seemed to alter his skin and bones the most, making them denser by fusing new elements to the natural cells. On the opposite, Energy conversion only altered something in his abdomen that had probably been created from scratch.

He walked over the metal junk that covered the floor with a grin on his face. He was going to beat this puny test the mortals had dared to give him.

Beyond the red double doors, was a hallway illuminated by sunlight just like the previous room had been. It had three rows of doors, some with holes in them, facing each other and ended with stairs going down. The doors were in metal and contrasted heavily with the bright stone everything else was built with.

Everything was eerily silent, and was it not for the insects that were franticly moving and flying around, he would have thought there was no living soul in the castle beside his.

Wait, was he thinking? Of course there was no living soul in this castle, it was all a simulation. Granted, it was well made, but it was just an illusion. He wasn’t even really here himself.

Enok noticed dusty wires on both walls coming out from holes at the top of the doors and going in the direction of the staircase. He went to the closest one and tried to open it. The doorknob miraculously worked but the hinges were so rusted that they threatened to break as the door was pushed open.

There were wires all around the small room and dust covered everything. At the center was a large transparent tube filled with liquid so dark Enok couldn’t see through it. It was connected to a large panel with dozens of button and to metallic crates that seemed to have been randomly set across the room. From those crates, came the wires that went through the door.

“It’s some kind of generator,” he realized, “although I do not know what it was generating...” his eyes glanced at the dark liquid, “... And what it was generating it from.”

He left the room, and went to look at the others. The results were the same, except for one of them.

In the third room the tube had been broken by some tree that had managed to grow from the cracks in the stone floor. Yellow stains covered the ground on which the liquid had spilled, and the tree had grown tall enough to reach the glass ceiling, threatening to break it too.

He then went down the stairs and, just as he reached their end, stopped in his tracks.

The circular room looked like it was the main hall of the castle. In front of him was a great door that had been sealed with iron bars drilled into the stone. On his left were two hallways and on his right many metal doors like the ones he had seen. Out of each of them came wires, and they all merged together on the wall to form a multicolored rope-like cord that went in one of the hallways on the opposite side. And in front of it were three shining silver machines with the word floating above their heads.

Unlike the they were identical. Two meters tall with a thin frame forming a proportional body with no hints of rust. They were immobile, two of them standing while the other was crouching.

“They do seem to be decent opponents,” he thought.

Without much ceremony, Enok walked toward them, calling forth his aura. When he got twenty meters from them, they raised their heads at the same time and stared at him with the apertures that were their eyes.

“Intruder spotted in private area number zero-one,” their monotone, neutral voices boomed. Each word was spoken individually, “Target acquired. Termination procedures engaged.”

From the get go, Enok could tell that they were not only stronger, but smarter than his previous enemies.

The one that was crouching bolted toward him, closely followed by his partners. Enok dodged its fist and threw his own, but had to pull it back to block a kick from the second android.

The metal leg hit him hard enough to push him back a few paces, but caused enough pain to make him gasp in shock. Surprised, he looked at the point of impact, only to notice it was burnt dark and cracked.

They were able to electrocute him by simple contact.

He didn’t have time to dwell on the fact for a second before the third android reached him.

What followed was a meticulous and perfectly executed beat down. Each android was covering for the one attacking and each attack Enok dodged was followed by another one he had to block. They kept attacking without losing a beat and his arms and legs were soon covered with burn marks as his eyes got watery.

He needed to act fast and break their rhythm. Reaching deeper into his ki, he made his aura explode violently out of him as a shock-wave. While it wouldn’t mentally affect a machine, it caused the android to lose their balance. And that was all Enok needed.

His empowered fist pierced the closest one’s abdomen, almost breaking it in half. Clenching his teeth, he ignored the pain, determined to end the fight before the window of opportunity would close itself.

He darted toward the second machine and kicked it off the floor and into the wall. The shining metal caved in under Enok’s feet and the ceased to function with a concert of sparks and beeping noises.

Only one left.

The effects of the shock-wave had dissipated, and the remaining machine was now firmly standing in fighting position. But Enok was confident he would be able to deal with it now that it was alone.

As if both reacting to a signal, they launched themselves at each other, Enok throwing his fist and the android raising its blade.

“... Wait, a sword?!”

But it was too late. The shining blade slashed through right arm, cutting it clean off right over the elbow.

His surviving instinct kept him from letting himself fall, and instead he rolled over fast enough to see the android just behind him apparently also determined to not let the window of opportunity slip by.

“You’re centuries too young to try to finish me off, fucking piece of junk!”

The words had left his mouth without even him realizing. Now that he knew there was sword to avoid, dodging the blade covered in his own blood was simple. The head crashed against the wall, detached by an unbalanced spinning kick.

Level up! Level up! Level up!

Enok crashed on the stone floor, ignoring the notifications. His whole body was in pain, from multiple burns and a missing arm. He tried to stop the blood loss, and thankfully, the little ki he had left reacted better than he expected it would. The blood stopped pouring and skin started grossly covering the injury.

As he was mending to his most serious injury, in pain and covered in his own blood, he heard a powerful roar. He saw something moving in the hallway the androids were guarding, the one in which all the wires in the castles went.

First, he noticed its size. It was at least three and a half meters tall and two and a half wide. Second, he noticed it moved forward with the help of its arms, like gorillas. Then he noticed it wasn’t a machine, or at least not fully.

Metal spikes messily protruded from its arms and the rest of its body. Tubes came in and out of its abdomen, some going to a metal casing fused to its back and made visible by its crouching stance. Black goo was dripping from its mouth and made the blades that were his teeth seem even more shining.

Over its head was floating the word .