Richard’s eyes shot open. He expected to be back in the forest and needing to do this all over again, but he found himself in his room with the sunlight coming in through a small window. He walked out of bed, touching his forehead. Maybe strange time anomalies only happened after he died.

  He was still in his same clothes, but they didn’t smell. Did the system take care of that? A certain ability to keep body odor at bay? With a smack of his mouth, he realized his morning breath was nonexistent. Perhaps at level one his body could take care of whatever bacteria made bad breath and body odor. He wouldn’t complain, though he mourned not being able to have a nice hot shower at night. Then again, he doubted this place had the plumbing for hot showers.

  He wasn’t sure if he was supposed to change, because he didn’t have other clothes to change into. It seemed like a new outfit wasn’t an option until he chose a class.

  Richard stretched, trying to decide how his new basic skill was working. Would he tell with such a low percentage? He went to place his hands behind his back to do another stretch when half his hand slipped into the small of his back. He jumped back, startled. His feet shuffled away when he realized it was pretty stupid to back away from something new happening to his back.

  Fang snorted awake. He stood up, his eyes still bleary. “What happened?”

  “Uh, not sure.” Richard shook out his arms, then tried that again, prepared for it this time. He reached behind him, his fingers entering his spine. He should’ve touched his innards. Instead, he felt a deep void. Five empty squares appeared at the bottom of his vision. What was going on? When his hand was buried into the void, the five boxes grew until they filled his vision. On top of the boxes was the glowing word Inventory.

  Fang noticed what he was doing and smiled. “Oh, excellent. They have those here.”

  Richard watched as Fang placed his hands into his back. “Wait, you’re… used to this?”

  Fang glanced at him, shocked. “You’re… not?” Richard shook his head. “Must be a Shrouded Domain thing.”

  “Must not be an Earth thing,” Richard said at the same time.

  Richard didn’t feel sore, but he still felt like his mind assumed he was far weaker than what his new strength could handle. He took a few uneasy steps, and the inventory shrank and returned to the bottom of his vision. Would that be there forever?

  That wasn’t the only new thing in his vision. In the very left-hand corner, so far he almost didn’t notice it, he saw another bar. Once he noticed it, it came to the forefront of his vision. It was a blue outline of a bar, as though waiting for something. On the side were the letters LVL 1. He assumed that meant he was at level one. He didn’t see any other numbers, just the bar.

  “Do you have a bar on the left side of your vision?” Richard asked.

  Fang glanced as per Richard’s instruction, then nodded. “I’m assuming it’s our experience bar. Do things, gain experience, level up. Then, put the points into unlocking abilities on our skill tree.” Fang squinted at the information in front of him. “Huh. I wonder why we don’t have a health bar?”

  Richard sighed, experimenting with the void in his back again. “Did you have that in the Shrouded Domain?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  Right. Richard… forgot they all forgot.

  “You just seem familiar with this setup.”

  Fang did some stretches. “Maybe. Perhaps I’ll remember more about my past life, too.”

  Richard hoped he would feel better about this in the morning, but something still nagged at him. The apocalypse was chaotic, no doubt. Order was certainly helping, but it was in ways Richard was unfamiliar with. Skill trees, leveling up, inventories. All of them were gifts, no doubt about it. But there was something unsettling about needing to be more powerful than he was in order to fight back against something. It brought way too much dependence on a being he knew little about.

  None of this really made sense to him. Fang seemed unfazed by the oddity of this. Richard would have to see if Leylah or Amber thought this was weird.

  The bell sounded, and Richard spun around again. Part of him was still back in that forest, feeling the claws dig into his back. Or watching a Mog throw itself out of the forest and barrel toward the guards.

  Fang stood up, heading toward the door. “I think that’s for breakfast.”

  “Right.” Richard brushed his sweaty hair from his forehead. How could he sweat but not have body odor? “That makes more sense.”

  Fang opened the door, watching him close. “Do you know why the system took longer to get to you?”

  With that question, Richard felt all the exhaustion come back to him in a huge wave. Despite feeling rested, he wanted to curl back into bed.

  “I… I’m not sure.”

  Fang shrugged. “Alright, well, I’m starving. Let’s go eat.”

  Perhaps Fang was trying to start a conversation, but Richard couldn’t help but wonder if his passive skill was working as they walked out of the room. He didn’t feel nearly as hungry as he thought after sleeping so soundly.

  “What skill did you choose?” Richard asked, happy to change the subject from what he had experienced last night.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  “Oh, I don’t remember.” Fang again looked almost a little cross-eyed as he brought up his skill tree. “They weren’t kidding. I was really exhausted last night. I chose the one that makes me 10% stronger.”

  “Oh, nice. I did hunger.”

  “Sweet. Did it work?”

  “I think so. It’s such a low percentage.”

  Amber and Leylah caught up with them, and they headed toward the mess hall. They all talked about how exhausted they were last night, then traded experiences of things they noticed with the system. Richard decided not to bring up the lack of morning breath or the body odor unless someone else did.

  They were still talking as they gathered their food. Leylah talked about how she didn’t hurt nearly as much. She couldn’t explain it, but the dull ache that was always there seemed to have been cured. It got Richard thinking. Perhaps Leylah in her old life had experienced some sort of cancer. But that didn’t seem right. When he got to this world, the cancer was already gone from his body. Leylah seemed to always have a dull ache, even when she had been transported.

  Richard took a bowl of a lighter-colored protein slurry and wondered why they didn’t give this one at dinner instead of the fertilizer-colored one. The orange juice was a pleasant treat, as were the strawberries.

  They sat down together and kept talking about their abilities. From what Richard understood, they hadn’t noticed what the low percentage abilities gave them, but they had noticed the system in general.

  “I thought there’d be like stats, or something,” Amber said. “You know, like strength, intelligence, things like that.”

  Richard furrowed his brow. “What?”

  “Yeah,” Fang agreed as though he hadn’t heard Richard at all. “That sounds familiar.”

  Richard glanced at Leylah, who shrugged. “Glad I’m not the only one who doesn’t know what they’re talking about,” she said.

  Fang closed one eye, concentrating. “Strength, Dexterity, Constitution.” It seemed like these words came from Fang digging them out of his foggy memory.

  “Maybe those are already calculated into the system. We probably can’t add to them manually, so they’re not shown. Because I swear my strength would be at twenty after the system came to me.” Amber flexed her arm for good measure.

  Richard stared at Amber as if she were speaking a different language.

  “Yeah, I think this place only has skill trees.” Leylah stopped talking and glanced at someone over Richard’s shoulder. Dmitri slid into the seat behind him.

  “Hello you four. The leaders all agreed that you’re good to meet with Lucy at the orb. She’s our healer and will go over rules, regulations, and health while here at base two. Also, don’t flirt with her, because she will break your arm.”

  Leylah and Amber shared a glance. Fang stared at Richard as though ready to laugh, but Richard didn’t. He’d met Lucy, and he believed this.

  “Uh… why? Why does she… want to break arms?” Fang asked.

  Dmitri sighed, rubbing his temples. “Because she wants everyone to know that just because she’s a female and a healer doesn’t mean she wants to be responsible for anyone’s mommy issues. Her words, not mine. She has very low tolerance of people, and a high curiosity about injuries and how to stop them. Do not expect her bedside manner to be good, but do expect her to be one of the best healers you’ve ever encountered.” Dmitri sighed again. “There are some people in this group that I have to bribe her to heal, because she just won’t do it.”

  Without even needing to be told, Richard knew at least one person Lucy needed to be bribed to heal.

  “This is the part where I tell you that under that rough exterior is a sweet girl but, uh… I can’t tell you that. No one’s been able to crack that exterior yet to find out. Just… do what she says.”

  Richard nodded, knowing they were in for an interesting time after breakfast. Dmitri got up, almost ready to leave, when he hesitated. “Oh, right. Richard, I studied the system more to figure out what happened last night. Turns out the orb hadn’t given the system to four people in a long while, so it was stalling out. You let me know if anything different happens while you use it, okay? I believe that’ll be our only hiccup, but just in case, let me know.”

  Dmitri winked at Richard, and Richard nodded. He kept nodding, afraid that if he didn’t, he’d be in trouble. The hidden message was sent. This is the story Dmitri wanted him to spread, and the leader of base two was spreading it around now as well. Richard was kind of glad he didn’t have to think of a lie. At least it was believable.

  Dmitri left, and Richard went back to eating his protein slurry. This one didn’t taste like steak. Maybe the fertilizer-colored ones tasted like meat. This one had a hint of an egg flavor, and once Richard thought hard about it, the word omelet came out of the fog.

  “Was there anything wrong when you got the system?” Leylah asked.

  “No.” Richard ate another bite. “It took longer to initiate, that’s all. I was worried, but I’m glad Dmitri figured it out for me.”

  Thankfully, the topic changed after that. They finished their breakfast and moved out of the mess hall. Richard hadn’t seen Lucy eating breakfast. They walked over to the pole, and Fang and Leylah were talking. Richard took a moment to close his eyes and study the skill tree he had been given.

  It was a short tree. He didn’t remember what level Dmitri said they would earn their gift and class, but if it would happen in two weeks, it probably wasn’t that long. As he expected, the tree was incredibly organized, with nine total abilities broken up into basic, advanced, and master, and further broken into health, mental, and physical. Even though the rest of the tree was grayed out, he could still read the branches and see what was coming.

  Basic

  Health (passive) (basic)

  Reduce hunger by 10%

  Physical (passive) (basic)

  Increase strength by 10%

  Mental (passive) (basic)

  Increase likelihood of finding best escape by 10%

  Advanced

  Health (active) (basic) (3hrs)

  Know how to heal (basic) wounds

  (This is for your body only)

  Physical (active) (basic) (cooldown 2 hrs)

  Increase kick strength by 50%

  Mental (passive)(basic)

  Navigation skills improve by 20%

  Master

  Health (passive) (basic)

  Reduce the sensation of unusual wounds by 10%

  Physical (active) (basic) (cooldown 2 hrs)

  Increase punch strength by 50%

  Mental (passive) (basic)

  Know best materials to build (basic) weapons

  He looked at the physical and traveled up the skill branch. It seemed like the physical worked in strengthening basic combat. Mental seemed like intelligence for survival, which he was fine to learn. He already knew he wouldn’t last three minutes in that forest, and he was still certain he got a lucky break with the time anomaly to help him survive the first time.

  Health was something he considered being the next ability to unlock once the advanced skills were open to him. What he wasn’t sure about was the master ability to reduce the sensation of unusual wounds. Did that mean it lowered the sensation of pain? That didn’t feel safe. Sure, he would have loved not to have felt the leopard’s claws digging into his chest, but that was the whole point of pain. He felt it so he wouldn’t be an idiot and search it out.

  He should probably ask someone what it meant, but he heard Lucy coming toward them, and he pushed the tree skill out of his vision. Lucy walked up to them, and didn’t smile.

  “Has Dmitri given you the warning that if you flirt with me I will break your sexual organs so they will no longer function?”

  Fang’s eyes widened. Leylah and Amber again exchanged glances, this time more alarmed. Richard, who had already experienced Lucy’s brashness, took it upon himself to keep talking. “No, uh, he said you’d break our arms.”

  Lucy grunted. “Yeah, that too. Come on, let’s go to the healer’s building.”