《Dawn of the System》Chapter 9
Advertisement
Richard moved away from Professor Brown’s home and walked in the middle of the road at sunset, without a clear destination. He wanted answers and he got them. That he had been involved in a mass murder and he didn’t do anything to stop it.
There was no doubt now that the world had ended for real, something that deep down he had known all along, but wasn’t able to admit, fooling himself with strange theories. In his old life, things that were considered life goals such as having a high paying job, or an own home without roommates were now something out of a history book.
Now that his family and friends were gone forever, there was nothing worth to live for anymore, and he wasn’t sure he even deserved to if it was true that he had been an accomplice in that thing.
In the following days, he wandered around the city at night, usually taking shelter inside one of the still standing buildings during the day. When he heard a faint movement, he hunted for whatever that thing was. Normally, it’d be a rat or a rabbit, but sometimes there were stray dogs roaming around and even an adult deer, of which he ate even the antlers.
He stopped from managing the item section and ingested all the wood he could find, making his vision to shift from yellow to orange. Every night he lashed his frustrations at the Husks. Countless times he had tried to reason with them, but they always screeched and flailed their weak arms at him as if they would do some kind of damage.
After some days he went hunting for them, blinded by hatred because they could have been smart and talk with him, but they didn’t want to, so he had to punish them by burning them alive. One day he had even tried to take hostage one of their babies, but they preferred to kill it themselves than trying to reason with him.
Advertisement
His eyes opened. The sunlight was shining on his body through the revolving door of the hotel he had been sleeping inside for the last three days.
System weekly report n.1:
1. You need 650 EXP points to reach lv.7;
2. From the last time, your mental state has been deteriorating and has dropped to lv.2 (Max is 4):
You gain 20 points to Ruthlessness (STH); You lose 14 points from Willpower and Focus (INT); Your spells will be more powerful, but they will consume more Mana.
3. You have been eating too much and your weight has increased to 500 lbs/226kg: you lose 10 points from Endurance; you gain 8 points to Strength.
4. Anti-Grinding measures has been activated: you will only gain 1 EXP if you defeat a Husk.
5. You are now a master in killing Husks. You gain the (Husk Slayer) title.
He sighed, dismissing the window. Every time that stupid prompt appeared when he was sleeping. There was nothing he could gain by training, as the world had ended and being stronger in a such a lifeless world like this was useless, and he was already able to survive as it is.
There were steps outside of a kind he had never heard before. Husks were always very silent, and they didn’t roam in the middle of the streets by daylight.
Richard lowered his head to pass through the door and peered outside. A group of five men were gathered near the wall of the building opposite to the hotel. Their limbs were proportionated to the rest of their bodies, and their faces weren’t pale. There was no doubt that those were real humans.
Their hoodies and jeans were tattered, fixed with lots of patches. They wore masks with a protruding tube that ended inside a bag sitting at their belts, while the eyes were covered by dirty orange ski glasses. Long knives were sitting inside leather pouches against their thighs.
Advertisement
You have spotted five lv.3 Scavengers and a lv.1 Human.
They were surrounding a young man who was kneeling on the ground, keeping his head low, the only one to not wear a mask. He was panting and his hands behind his back were shaking, the fingers covered by blood-stained bandages. His face was full of bruises and his left eye was closed and swollen.
In front of him, a bald man grabbed his shoulder-length hair, raising his chin.
“You have failed us for the last time”, the bald man said, his voice was distorted by the mask, “And you know what happens to the ones who disappoint us”.
He turned towards the others, “What should be his punishment?”. The teenager burst in tears and he raised his head to look at the others, but the bald man hit him in the back of the head.
“P-please”, he said, “I was just-”;
The slap made his face turn into the opposite direction, leaving a red mark on his cheek. The others jeered.
“I say that we should cut his throat and be done with him”, said a man with short black hair;
“He’s right”, another one nodded, “We can’t afford to have someone leeching from our supplies”.
“You two may be right, but I think that he can still be helpful to us”, the crow’s feet wrinkles of the bald man’s eyes became more evident, keeping a hand over his belt, “No, we shouldn’t kill him now. Maybe we have given him the wrong role”;
“Do you remember the last time we had some good fun tog-?”, said a man with a red mohawk.
Richard sprinted towards them and knocked over the one with a mohawk, his elbow crushing his teeth. The scavenger’s lifeless body dropped on the ground with a wide-open broken jaw. He roared, and swung his claws at the one with the short hair, reciding his jugular vein.
You have defeated two lv.3 Scavengers. You gain 60 EXP. You need 490 EXP to reach lv.7
“Run!”, one of them said and they all bolted away from him.
Check passed. You gain two points to Intimidation(STH).
The bald man stumbled on a rock and fell face first on the ground.
“Help me!”, he said at the other four, “You idiots!”.
Richard was clicking his claws to shoot a fireball at him, but the man turned and raised a gun with a large barrel. The flare exploded on his forehead and ricocheted on the ground, covering him in a red cloud. Richard fell on one knee and groaned.
You have lost 2,4% of your Health Points.
The bald man had the time to rise from the ground and run away from him. Richard tried to pursue and throw fireballs at them, but, as his vision was too blurry, he missed all of his shots and only wasted his mana. After they had turned the corner, it was impossible to keep up with them, as smoke was starting to rise from his nostrils.
His feet became entangled with each other, making him fall and roll on the ground. When he raised his gaze, the men were only four distant shapes. His low endurance had betrayed him. Everything happened too quickly, and something broke when he had heard those words that made his blood boil, but now he had to check if the boy was well, which was the most important thing.
When he turned back, the young man was still sitting on the ground. A white glowing line now connected the two of them.
You have unlocked the (Pawn Master) perk.
Would you like to claim a lv.1 Human as your pawn? You will share a percentage of your EXP with him, and you will be able to access and modify his stats and skills in the Menu.
Advertisement
A Beautiful Woman of Science and Other Absurdities
Beauty AND brains??? See if you can figure out the secret that allows Viviane Fox to study for her Ph.D. in Physics while she moonlights as a beautiful fashion model before it is revealed in the story. Follow her in this futuristic, sci-fi adventure/comedy where she learns about her forgotten past while navigating the silly and maddening situations from admiring, jealous, competitive, stereotypical and shallow people around her. What she learns about herself will determine if an evil organization takes over the world. She will have to use ALL her feminine smarts and talents to defeat them. This is a G-Rated story appropriate for ALL ages. No smut. No swearing. No gratuitious violence. A Beautiful Woman of Science and Other Absurdities is a satirical, futuristic comedy adventure. It is sometimes funny, sometimes silly and sometimes outrageous, but never takes itself seriously. Starts off lighthearted, but grows into a larger-than-life, outrageous, EPIC by the end. It touches on politics, feminism, world order, technology, spirituality and undying love and devotion. It contains:Pictures of pretty girlsA herbivore manA mad scientistA deranged villainCute teenage identical twin girlsQuantum physicsA tsundere pop idolA love triangleMilitary guy with a gunPoliticsFeminismPhilosophical musingsLarger than life storyThank you for reading!
8 370The Red and the White
Mahana has everything to be a happy little girl. She returns from Japan with her family, where her father has just been hired for a prestigious job. However, her homecoming will be a lot stranger than expected.6/6, SHORT STORY. COMPLETED.
8 161Terms and Conditions
The planet Earth –galactic name Driew—has always been an ordinary and peaceful planet with a small population of ape-beings ruling it. Conflicts do break out from time to time, but that is to be expected since most living planets die by either solar flares or some form of self-destruction. But, unfortunately for the Earth, a Mustela named Exflibberaguil was approaching this planet, and something destructive seemed to always follow him—though he would say it was just his destructively-hot looks. Marine Nick Lucifay is a female inhabitant of Earth, always too ready to run. When presented with an opportunity of adventure, her ape-brain figures that adventure is probably worth the consequence of death. And so, setting off to the nearest McDonalds, Marine Nick finds herself in the midst of an intergalactic struggle that involves a great quantity of bubbles. Chased by the most unlikely of enemies, Exflibberaguil must give up his secrets to save a world—and Marine—from running to their deaths.
8 75Chrono Pact
follow the story of a boy who is devastated after losing his friends in a tragic accident, he was transported to an abstract dimension where he meets Chrona a rogue time skipper. she asked for help. the reason why she chose him was that he has a rare trait called chronic core and the person with this trait can time skips. losing his friends made him feel uneasy so he unreluctantly agrees to help the girl. what does Chrona need help with? what will they learn from the adventures they went on? read this novel to find out chapters may release every monday/wednesday/sunday
8 124I Have Even Read the Rulebook!
As all stories begin, Prof died. Yes, truck-kun had something to do with that, but also a bird, a cat and some rebar. When he was presented with with the opportunity in the Afterlife Administration Bureau to be transmigrated into a game-like fantasy world, he did something, no one ever did: he read the Rulebook. Follow Prof on his road to be rich without working, touring a whole new world without a care and witness his realisation, that despite having read the Rulebook the folks living with the System for untold millennia know more about the rules. Important notes: 1, I'm not a native speaker, so be prepared for occassional typos, iffy grammar and maybe awkward sentences. The spell check was running, when I wrote the chapters, but it works in strange ways... If you point out mistakes, I will try to correct them 2, Scheduling will be two chapters a week, posted Saturdays before noon (CET). Depending on how much new chapters I can write consistently there will be probably more but as long as I have leftover chapters, the two per week will be posted no matter what. Chapters will be around 1500-2500 words as MS Word counts it. 3, I did not and will not post this novel on another site, if you find it somewhere else, please inform me 4, The Main Character's progression is slow, there will be no Levels, Skills, Abilities, Feats, Perks and Cheat Powers raining down on him 5, I've put Comedy as a genre because of my writing style not because the novel is a comedy per se. On the other hand, Traumatising Content is there because there is a lot of speciesism - those Elves are not nice people. 6, I put a lot of pop-cultural references into the chapters, try to find them! Enjoy!
8 711Don't be Mistaken! I'm not a Reincarnate!
I have someonelse's memories but none of it makes sense. It's like looking through a photo album that doesn't belong to you. But still you can't help but wonder: Who were the memories meant for, if it wasn't supposed to be mine?
8 185