On the roof of an old apartment building, a boy looking to be around 90 to 100 kg in weight and around 19 years old in age was leaning against the railing at the edge of the building, looking down at the streets below, his eyes mostly calm with a hint of annoyance with a slight frown on his face.

He sighed before turning around putting his back against the railing and looking to the sky with a resigned look of acceptance, the old and rusty railing slightly creaking at his weight.

"The world ain't a very nice place most of the time..."

He was recently fired from his job at a fast food joint, due to being framed on stealing around 500$ from the cash register, the staff was gathered and searched of their belongings to see if the any of them had stolen it, all agreeing that no one in this day and age would have around 500$ in cash with them.

He had thought that he was all in the clear and had casually opened his bag with his belongings, only to find the exact 500$ in his bag.

Despite that being the case, he was still calm and a bit amused that someone actually tried to frame him on stealing the money, as he knew he was not well liked in amongst the staff for being unattractive and unsociable.

He went on to explain to his colleagues who were looking at him with scorn when they saw the 500$ in his bag, that he wouldn't be stupid enough to actually put the 500$ in his bag and that someone was trying to frame him.

At first, they started to believe what he said, before a popular member of the staff, a handsome teenager stated that no one would be stupid enough to frame him so poorly and that this was what he planned from the start in case he got caught.

He wanted to laugh at the absurdity of the claim as he tried to open his mouth to counter his accusation, before seeing that the rest of the staff started to believe the handsome teenager.

And then leading to the present, he was fired from the job with the "compensation" that the staff members wouldn't report him to the police for his act of theft.

Though it wouldn't be that hard to get another job, just the experience itself left a bad taste in his mouth, and he didn't care too much for his image in the first place, whether or not someone spoke badly about him or showed open disgust or rejection towards him.

Now after being fired from this job, he'd have to find a new one, and not because he had nothing else to do during the school break, it was because he didn't attend school in the first place since around 3 years ago, and the fact he broke all ties he had to his family.

He had never known his parents all his life, being told they died of an accident shortly after he was born, being brought up by his only relatives, his uncle, and his uncle’s wife.

They were both awful caretakers and parents, they more or less hated children as they never had their own, and they never cared about him in the slightest, only instilling into him what was right and wrong, buying him only necessities such as clothes, books and whatever he said he needed and was reasonable, and a weekly allowance that increased as he grew older.

Thought they were never really kind or caring, they were neither strict and allowed him to do whatever he wanted, not even bothering to know about his grades in school.

In the beginning, the lack of love or care didn't really affect him as he had the positivity of a young child, the lack of strict discipline beyond simple rules had assured that he had a more or less normal childhood.

He wasn't the smartest of students and only had average grades with the exception of mathematics, as he had always liked the way maths fit together like a puzzle, and that all he had to do was put the pieces together.

Though as he became older, he drifted into playing online games and reading novels online, his grades slowly dropping, and his physique getting worse from the constant unbalanced meals, as he had to order food online for dinner, and chose whatever he wanted to eat during breakfast and lunch using his generous allowance.

Then at the age of 16, he decided that all he needed in life was a wifi connection, a computer, and all the basic living necessities and moved out of the house of his uncle and his wife, they had agreed to provide him with money monthly for a year and would cut all ties with him, as he moved out together with the things he bought with the allowance he’s saved over the years, including his computer.

He had quickly found a cheap apartment to live in, already having its own bed and small kitchen, he had quickly arranged his things and set up his computer on the table he brought with him.

He had then quickly found a job and his life was more or less secured at that in time.

During the three years since then, he had only changed jobs thrice due to them being slightly better than the other, such as having fewer work hours to a similar pay or being closer to his apartment.

Hee thought back on his life until now, putting more weight upon the railing as it creaked louder. It was quite laid back and uneventful, with no ups or downs as he never formed close relationships with others, possibly because of the lack of affection he had received in his childhood, making it harder to create close relationships as he grew older, forcing himself to indulge in games and novels.

He let out one last large sigh as he tried to push off the railing to stand straight up...

CREEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAK... SNAP

And then he fell backward, failing to grab onto anything as he starting falling towards the ground, his face changed from surprise from the lack of support from the railing to fear as he finally noticed that he falling backward onto nothing but air, and then disbelief and regret as he was quickly falling towards the ground, and then immense sadness, knowing that his life was at its end, tears falling together with him as he suddenly hit...

---

"Shit! I'm late!"

A figure sprinted along a pavement at a speed that professional sprinters on earth would look at in disbelief, the figure was a man in his mid 20s wearing office attire with a tie and all, a look of panic on his face, his feet touching the ground every 8 meters or so, and a small impact was made everytime his feet hit the ground, the bystanders adeptly avoiding the man, or jumping to the side before he accidentally crashed into them, some the bystanders being middle-aged men and women, who would seem like such an action would require some amounts of luck or skill, though it showed on their faces rather than surprise or fright that they were almost hit by the speeding man, they showed disapproval and shook their heads as they continued on their way.

The man named Clive continued to sprint for another kilometer or so before checking watch on his wrist, the watch was literally only a thin blue disk floating above his wrist as it showed the time to be 9:45 AM, he had to be at work at 10:00 AM and if he continued at this pace he would reach around 10:05 AM.

Though being late for 5 minutes seems to be moderately acceptable, he had already been late around 8 times this month for around 10-20 minutes each time and that his salary would be temporarily reduced for the month if he was late another time.

"I can't afford to have my pay cut... damn! I knew I shouldn't have drunk so much yesterday... I'm blaming Javen for making me drink so much if my pay gets cut."

Clive started to look around to see if he could find another way to work, spotting an alleyway by the side, though he was unsure whether or not the way was faster or not.

"Gah!! who cares? Even if it takes an extra hour to get there, it would make no difference to my reduced salary!!"

As he shouted that out, he quickly sprinted into the alleyway, the impact when he started sprinting again being larger than the previous times, though the ground stayed perfectly undamaged.

He quickly sprinting past piles of trash and dumpsters changing alleyways every intersection, going to the left then to the right constantly, after about 30 or so turns and sprinting across 8 roads in between, he stopped to look at his watch once again, showing 9:55 AM, still quite far away from his workplace, the "shortcut" actually much longer than his normal route as he predicted.

"Aaah... my money.."

Clive slumped down to his knees, his head facing the ground, as he punched the ground with his fist, making a small impact and collapsing a trash pile just a few meters behind him.

He sighed and went to stand up and slowly made his way out the alleyway, before stopping as he spotted a figure laying on the ground a few dozen meters away in front of him.

He quickly came forward to find a fat boy, that he assumed was around 17-20, unconscious and laying on a pile of trash, his clothes were tasteless, wearing a pair of slippers and shorts, with a plain black t-shirt

He wasn't dirty or smelled like garbage like normal homeless people, except for the trash beneath him. It seemed like someone had left him here, though he wasn't injured in the slightest nor did he have a bump on his head.

Clive thought of another way he could've become unconscious and agreed with himself that it seemed reasonable, before deciding to bring the boy to a nearby hospital, despite his lack of injuries.

He noticed he could use this as an alibi for why he was late for work and he wouldn't get his pay cut!

Quickly taking out his phone and messaging his superior that he had found an unconscious boy on the way to work and was taking him to the hospital. Though what his superior didn't know was that Clive would've been late anyways even if he had not found the boy.

After sending the message he quickly bent down and placed his hands underneath the boy, channeling energy into his arms as he picked the boy up effortlessly and placed him on his shoulder, and then only holding him by his thicks legs with one arm.

Satisfied and happy that his pay wasn't getting cut, he started to sprint of the alleyway, albeit much slower than his previous frantic pace as he went to the nearby hospital.

---

The door of a hospital dorm opened, and coming inside was a nurse pushing a gurney with a patient lying atop it.

"Whats the problem?" Another nurse inside the room had asked as she was preparing some medicine on a table.

"Found in an alleyway unconscious, no visible wounds on the body nor any signs of blunt force trauma, and he was drained of Vaes with only a little left when he was found, we first thought it was caused by a spell but scans show no external spells have affected him or been affecting him for at least 48 hours with our most accurate scanner."

"And he had no Vaes left too? How is that possible!! still being unconscious for at least 48 hours after the effect of the spell that had affected him had ended and also not restoring his Vaes in that time span as well?" The nurse asked, confused on the impossibility of the situation.

The other nurse shrugged, also unable to come up with a conclusion.

"The most viable explanation was that our scanner was unable to detect a spell that was used in the span of fewer than 12 hours, assuming his rate of Vaes recovery was that slow."

"That's still quite improbable..."

"Well, even if it is, he's in your hands now Anne, maybe some further scans would help you understand what happened to him?"

Anne shook her head, knowing if the scanner failed to find anything, she wouldn't be able to do much either, taking the gurney off the other nurse as she nodded and exited the room.

Anne went to the side of the gurney, as she placed her hands above the patient's body, a whitish energy left her palms as it slowly came downwards, engulfing the body of the patient, and lifting him off the gurney as she slowly guided his body onto a free bed, letting the energy disperse and using it again to cover his body with a bedsheet.

She pulled up a stool and sat beside his bed, as she sent out a wave of invisible energy to pass through his body, doing this around five times before stopping.

She furrowed her brows, finding out that he had no injuries whatsoever even internally, and his Vaes was calmy being restored, no fluctuations or abnormalities, even his brain only showed a lack of activity, as if he was only sleeping.

Though as a professional she knew the lack of activity in his brain was due unconsiousness rather than fatigue or voluntary sleep.

---

...

Did I die?

...

So this is death, just darkness huh.. and softness on my back.

back?

So... I'm on a bed...

Aaah... that's great, I didn't die...

Though at that height I was sure that I was dead...

I'll thank whatever god made the miracle of my survival, I'm still not finished with living I tell you! Still haven't found out what happened in the next episode of that anime I was watching, Heh, humor after you almost died is really lame, isn't it?

Whatever, I don't feel any pain anywhere on my body, I should've sustained major injuries and might even be a cripple for life, but at least I'm alive, they must've pumped a lot of anesthetic and painkillers into me, or whatever it is they put into patient in order to reduce the pain, but.. I still feel... something deep within me... though it doesn't feel painful, I just know it wasn't there before...

Well, I should open my eyes and see where I am, wonder where the nearest hospital was, never really checked before... is that thing floating?!?

As he opened his eyes, he saw Anne operating what looked like a tablet with her fingers as it was floating in the air, being held up by a translucent whitish energy, the same one she used to carry him onto the bed.

Was I sleeping for such a long time we've invented hover technology?!?