[Trial phase is now ending. Ten percent of the aboriginal population has awakened.]

[Aboriginal life forms advanced weapons are to be rendered inoperable.]

[Aboriginal life forms fixed constructs and landmarks to be destroyed.]

[Merit will no longer be awarded to users for awakening abilities.]

[Merit will be awarded to users for actions of bravery.]

[Merit can now be exchanged between users.]

[Soulless currently undergoing enhancement.]

[Soulless physique increased.]

[Soulless intelligence increased.]

[Soulless mutation increased.]

[Role quota unmet, allocating.]

As each announcement from the voice of the System echoed in his mind, Noah felt the situation become more and more hopeless. He rolled over onto his back and stared blankly in front of himself as he felt despair take hold of him. He snapped himself out of his self-pity before it took hold. The vibration of the roof beneath him was rising in intensity, becoming more violent as debris began to fall into the street.

He heard the sound of a gunshot over the humming in the air. He turned to look over the roof peak, to see a group of survivors had taken advantage of the soulless' current incapacitation to skirt around the edge of the crowd. The survivors had climbed onto a boat then successfully pushed off from the docks. One of the survivors was now firing a rifle into the horde of silently screaming creatures.

There was no reaction from the soulless as the crowd remained motionless. Seeing this, more people he hadn't noticed during his reclusion came down from nearby rooftops and buildings. The survivors moved cautiously at first but saw hope when the soulless remained still like statues.

He saw one girl around the age of ten, accompanied by someone who looked to be her grandfather, crawl from one of the half-submerged derelict boats to hurriedly make their way to join a group of other survivors embarking onto a ferry. Noah ignored what happened next as the rooftop he was on was starting to show signs of collapse.

He had no idea how much time the soulless would remain motionless for, but he knew that it wouldn't be forever. He tentatively made his way into the horde, nervously watching them for any signs of life. Noah had navigated halfway through the crowd amidst the horde when he heard another gunshot come from the boat currently bouncing against the dock.

The echoing gunshot seemed to create a chain reaction in the eerily silent soulless roaring at the sky. All at once, the monsters regained their senses, drawn towards the sound of the gunshot.

A wave of soulless rushed towards the boat as the rifleman fired another shot, the lead soulless running towards the vessel collapsed. The sound of the previous gunshots was significantly louder than the last one.

Noah saw the rifleman raise the gun again, but the sound was drowned out as the ambient humming sound once again rose in pitch. Following the hum's increased intensity, the surrounding buildings began to collapse as an announcement echoed inside the survivor's minds.

[Trial phase has now ended.]

Noah watched as the rifleman began to panic when nothing happened as he tried to fire again. The boat had drifted a considerable distance away from the dock at this stage, so he pulled his gun-clip out then attempted to reload it. The rifleman raised his weapon to fire. Once again, nothing happened.

The crowd of soulless had now made it to the dock where the boat had been moored. The first soulless to arrive managed to leap the distance onto the boat. A man beside the rifleman reacted quickly to push the creature back into the water.

Several more soulless attempted to leap the gap. But as more arrived, the now-hairless monsters suddenly pushed each other off the dock into the water as the pier began to collapse. Seeing that, the survivors on the boat started to celebrate with cheers while throwing their arms into the air.

A tentacle suddenly exploded from the water, dragging the rifleman screaming into a gaping maw that had appeared at the surface of the water. Additional tentacles appeared to wrap around the small fishing vessel.

Now that the destruction had stopped, Noah's heart stopped beating in his chest as he furtively glanced at the horde surrounding him while attempting to remain as motionless as possible. He shrank as his body tensed up with fear.

The soulless streaming around Noah stopped running. They all seemed to take notice of him together. Suddenly, he realized with despair that he was still in the middle of awakening an ability.

Noah's mind went into overdrive and he became unnaturally calm as the first of the soulless seemed to lunge at him in slow motion. His eyes narrowed as he instinctively activated the [Spirit Armour] ability of his chest plate.

The soulless' claw bounced off his chest piece with an attention-grabbing burst of cyan light. He instantly became garbed in intricate swirling transparent blue plate armour. The ethereal armour pulsed with faint cyan light as it became invisible in places. Noah could feel that the mysterious spirit armour left none of him exposed. The sword in his hand raised up on its own volition, unleashing a wind blade into the crowd as he shifted subconsciously out of the way of another claw that would have taken off his head.

[Very rare Mental ability awaken…]

[Abilities consume the user's stamina and will deactivate if the user...]

He couldn't spare the required attention to listen to the System right now. Noah was currently in critical danger, he couldn't see any exit through the surge of soulless.

At some point, Noah felt energy flowing from his origin crystal into his eyes. He was able to see an illusionary version of anything his eyes focused on. Black shadows appeared to move beneath the soulless skin, comparable to what he had seen when an ability was activated for Users. He was also able to feel the ghost-presence of everything surrounding him indirectly as if he could predict what was about to happen.

The most unnerving detail was that when Noah focused on an object, the illusion displayed the object moving as usual, while time seemed to slow down in the world around him as he foresaw what the object would do next.

He once again shifted instinctively to crouch down as an opportunistic soulless flew over his head, Crashing into the quickly reforming wall of soulless in front of him. Two of its peers were tackled to the ground.

The soulless that had missed Noah acted on its own instinct, biting into the neck of a pinned soulless beneath it. The unfortunate soulless let out a screech of rage and pain. The enraged creature retaliated by digging its claws into the neck of the attacking soulless straddling it, tearing its throat out.

Noah effortlessly twisted his body as three claws belonging to different soulless glanced off his blue-ethereal armour. He was in a trance as he retaliated by swinging his sword in an arc to shear through the knee of an attacking monster. He impassionately thrust his sword vertically through the slavering jaw of a hungry creature attempting to latch its mouth onto his face. The sword tip reappeared covered in gore, piercing through the crown of the creature's sickly head.

He felt disconnected from his body as he calmly looked into the soulless' empty black eyes. He was able to see himself reflected as he looked into them. Noah's eyes were burning with a striking purple glow, causing him to become distracted for a moment.

The reflected figure looked heroic, decked out in the intricate glowing ethereal-blue armour despite his ragged appearance. Noah then saw his face. There was subtle purple light moving beneath the surface of his skin, as it moved from his origin crystal to power his intense, radiant purple eyes, representing his new unknown ability.

All of this only took an instant before Noah levered the sword down, effortlessly slicing the soulless' head in half at the jaw, simultaneously unleashing another wind blade into the crowd of slavering demons. This time he didn't hesitate. Noah shoved the decapitated corpse into a limp heap at his side as he began to follow the devasting wind blade as it left a trail of carnage among the amassed soulless.

He could not entirely avoid all attacks as he took a few glancing blows while chasing closely behind the constant stream of wind blades being released as he dashed towards the harbour. Noah still felt unnaturally calm as his face remained impassive. He now had time to wonder about that as the soulless no longer paid him any exceptional attention now that his ability had awakened. He took this brief respite in the battle to rush in a different direction.