The pull-up bar creaked under Cassian's weight.
Ninety-eight. Ninety-nine.
His muscles burned with a familiar, rhythmic heat. His apartment was silent, save for his controlled breathing. He liked the silence; it allowed him to focus on the tension in his forearms and the precise alignment of his spine.
One hundred.
He held the lock-out at the top for a second, his jet-black hair damp with sweat. Just as he prepared to drop, the world stuttered.
Reality itself seemed to drop a frame. Before Cassian could chalk it up to a dizzy spell, some sort of script flickered across his vision. It was pale gold text, etched in a style that looked like a blend of ancient runes and circuit board traces.
[Compatible souls quota reached: 100,000,000/100,000,000]
[Initializing synchronization with 'Earth'...]
[World 'Earth' is now being registered to the Origin Records.]
"Too much coffee," Cassian muttered, his feet hitting the floor. He wiped his face with a towel, expecting the spots in his eyes to fade. Instead, they grew brighter.
The air in his room began to vibrate, a low-frequency hum that he felt in his marrow. The pale gold light intensified, swallowing the walls of his apartment.
[Batch 1-A: Processing...]
[Vessel Analysis: Human Tier (Standard)]
[Welcome to Synthetos]
[Location: Origin Village 1]
The floor vanished.
Cassian didn't fall; he was simply elsewhere. The transition was a violent surge of sensory data. He slammed into cold, uneven cobblestones, the air ripped from his lungs. Around him, the sudden, deafening roar of a thousand voices erupted.
He stayed down for a moment, hand pressed against the stone. He wasn't screaming. His mind was already racing, trying to categorize the event.
'Smell: Ozone and burnt sugar. Touch: Cold, porous limestone. Sight: Pale gold interface overlay.'
He looked up. He was in a massive plaza. Thousands of people were appearing in flashes of gold. Some were naked, some dressed casually, while others were still in their work suits. Beyond the plaza, grey stone buildings huddled together under a sky of deep, bruised violet.
[Talent Awakening...]
[Rank Determined: S]
[Talent Confirmed: Modifier]
Description: The ability to extract and apply 'Modifiers' to inanimate objects.
As the talent notification faded, a comprehensive window expanded in his vision, shimmering with that same pale gold light.
[Status Panel]
Name: Cassian Nil
Talents: Modifier [S]
Level: 0 (0/10)
Class: None
Titles: None
Health: 60/60 Stamina: 44/60
[Attributes]
Strength: 6
Agility: 7
Vitality: 6
Intelligence: 7
Wisdom: 6
Cassian closed his eyes and took a measured breath. 'Focus on the task.' He stood up, his sleek, wiry frame uncoiling. While the crowd around him descended into a panicked riot, he looked for the most logical point of interest.
On the edge of the plaza stood a dirt-packed yard. A man with skin the colour of old parchment and arms like knotted oak stood there, leaning on a heavy spear.
Cassian pushed through the sobbing crowds and approached him. The man's eyes were cold and vacant.
"Another one," the man grunted. "Stop staring and start moving. You want to live? Pick up a wooden sword. Hit the straw dummy fifty times. Learn which end is the business end, and you can keep the damn thing. It's better than your bare hands."
[Quest Received: The First Lesson]
[Objective: Hit the Straw Dummy 0/50]
[Reward: Wooden Training Sword]
Cassian didn't ask questions. He walked to a rack, gripped a wooden practice sword, and approached a dummy. It was a strange thing, straw bound by thick, glowing twine that seemed to pulse with a faint light.
He swung.
Thwack.
The wood was heavy, but Cassian's calisthenics training had given him a functional strength that many of the "ripped" gym-goers lacked. He didn't just flail; he used his core.
Thwack. Thwack.
He watched the dummy. Every time he hit it, the twine glowed. The straw compressed and then immediately sprung back, knitting itself together with unnatural speed. It was magically imbued to endure.
On his fiftieth strike, Cassian struck harder than before. He planted his lead foot and snapped his hips, putting the entirety of his body strength into a single, explosive horizontal blow.
The wooden sword barely held, but the dummy exploded.
The twine snapped, and the straw burst outward. As the dummy slumped, a small, vibrant green spark drifted from the wreckage. It hovered in the air, pulsing with a life of its own.
[Modifier Detected: [Regenerating] (Rank: F)]
Source: Imbued Training Dummy. Would you like to extract?
'Extract.'
The spark flew into his chest. A new notification pinged in his periphery, and a separate interface window opened. It was his Inventory, but it had a distinct, secondary tab.
[Inventory: Modifiers]
[Regenerating] (Rank: F) - Restores 1% Durability every second.
The category sat outside his standard item slots, an infinite library of potential. He looked at the wooden sword in his hand.
[Item: Wooden Training Sword]
[Description: A wooden training sword made with the sole purpose of being used for training novice knights]
[Durability: 50/50]
[Slots: 0/2]
'Apply: [Regenerating]'.
[Slots: 1/2]
[Modifiers: Regenerating(F)]
The wood shimmered. A faint, pale gold light ran along the grain of the sword, smoothing out the nicks and splinters.
"Not bad," the instructor said, his voice flat. "You broke the dummy. You have potential, kid. Keep the sword, but I'd look for something better in your shoes. Try not to die in the first ten minutes."
A few meters away, a massive man with shoulders like a bull, his name Jax, was laughing with a group of terrified followers.
"It's a game, guys! Look at my stats, I've got 8 Strength while you guys barely have 5! I'm gonna go squash some slimes and get even stronger!"
Cassian watched Jax lead the way toward the village gate. Jax moved with the confidence of a man who saw everything as just a game he could restart anytime.
Cassian followed at a distance. He didn't feel like he was in a game. He felt the weight of the wood in his hand, the grit of the dirt in his lungs, and the lingering, cold chill of the Origin Records in his mind.
He stepped through the gate. The smell hit him instantly. It wasn't the sweet ozone of the plaza.
It was the smell of a butcher shop left out in the sun.
The path beyond the gate was narrow, flanked by tall, yellowed grass that didn't sway in the wind. It stood rigid, like millions of tiny needles pointing at the violet sky. The village behind him felt like a fortress, but out here, the world felt vast and indifferent.
Farther down the trail, he saw the first signs of movement. Jax and his followers had already reached a cluster of low, jagged rocks. While most of the other players were still trying to team up before adventuring further, their group was shouting, their voices full of bravado that didn't match the environment.
"Over there! Let's kill those rats! That gotta be at least an entire level worth of EXP!" Jax yelled, pointing a splintered wooden sword.
Cassian slowed his pace, his eyes narrowing. In the shadows of the rocks, something moved. It was the size of a small dog, covered in matted, soot-coloured fur. Its eyes were a sickly yellow, glowing with a hunger that was far too intelligent for a simple animal.
This scavenger had clearly been waiting for the "Batch" to arrive. Its gaze lacked the mindless instinct of a common rodent and instead held a calculated, predatory hunger.
Cassian adjusted his grip on the wooden sword. He felt the faint pulse of the [Regenerating] modifier through the hilt, a steady heartbeat of gold light. He wasn't going to rush in like Jax. He was going to watch, observe until he learnt everything he could, but there wasn't anything he could learn by just watching those idiots fighting.
In Synthetos, the first lesson wasn't how to kill. It was how to not be the first thing that died, and Cassian was going to learn it first hand like many others.
Cassian decided to approach a lone rat himself. He wanted to experience the thrill of combat without throwing his life away like those attacking a pack for no reason.
'That's one fat rat if I ever saw one.'
He slowly and stealthily approached the rat, ready to ambush it to try and gain the advantage, but the rat was more perceptive than he imagined. It turned towards him instantly, its body tensing as it prepared to lunge.
The first clash was terrible. The rat jumped with all its strength, heading straight for Cassian's throat. He swung the sword in a frantic reaction rather than a practiced one, trying his best to hold onto his life. The rat's lunge was stronger than he thought, the impact almost splitting the wooden sword in two.
Cassian retreated as fast as he could, trying to avoid another direct confrontation, but the rat gave chase. It was relentless, its eyes glowing red with the single intent of killing the human that had dared to ambush it.
The creature lunged again, fiercer than before. Cassian reacted by instinct, raising his left arm to block the snap of its jaws. The rat bit right into his forearm, the teeth sinking deep into the muscle.
Cassian felt a wave of agony so sharp he couldn't see straight. With his vision blurring, he gripped the hilt of the wooden sword with his right hand and began to stab. He drove the blade into the rat's flank over and over, fuelled by pure, desperate adrenaline.
By the time his senses returned and the white-hot pain dulled enough to breathe, he noticed the rat had gone limp. His sword, which had been on the verge of shattering, was now pristine and fully repaired in his hand.
[Level 1 Scavenger Rat Killed, +5 EXP]
[Experience: 5/10]
A sudden, blood-curdling scream pierced the air from where Jax's group had been. It wasn't a shout of excitement or a battle cry; it was the sound of someone realizing their mortality.
Cassian stood up, cradling his bleeding arm. The pain was still thrumming, a sickening reminder that this world was very real. He moved toward the sound, staying low in the rigid grass. When he reached the jagged rocks, he stopped.
Jax lay on his back. His chest was a ruin of red, and his "8 Strength" had done nothing to stop the pack of scavengers that had swarmed him. The followers were long gone, their footsteps fading in the distance, still being chased by the beasts that had ended the big guy.
As Cassian stared at the cooling corpse of the man who thought he was the protagonist, a pale gold flicker caught his eye. A small orb of light began to rise from Jax's broken, splintered sword.
[Modifier Detected: [Sharpness] (Rank: F)]
Source: Broken Training Sword. Would you like to extract?