The sun was about to fall asleep, shielded behind three sloping mountains of different colors and sizes. The cloud was painted crimson red with touch of a pinkish hue, even the tall trees were painted of such colors and now were like colorful soldiers standing in an unmoving row except for one silhouette that was running quite desperately through the thick forest.
"Shit! Shit! Shit! I was so caught up with this new ability of mine and forgot about the closing time of the gate on our dorm!"
A slim figure of a boy in his teens slowly emerge at the end of the forest and now running on the pathway leading to the Hot Pot City, he was running at a speed that was uncommon for an average human being but not too fast to be blurry or invisible for the common eyes. The figure was about 5'11-tall with a built that was apt to be called fit, his muscles were not gaudy yet looking at him shows that he got some firm flesh beneath his two-toned azure long sleeves with some yellow-like lining for the details and outline. An insignia of a fork and a knife on the right side of his chest were printed. Behind him attached a three-foot-long sword that was akin to a single edge bread knife.
The young man was Nil O'Berry, a 16-year-old lad and a newly enrolled student at the prestigious River Fork University.
"There! The lights of the city!" Nil started to quicken up his pace and took a short glance at the mountain where he hit his jackpot.
Name: Shabu-Shabu Mountain
Type: Earthbound Terrain
Status: Active
Apprehension Rank: Unranked
One of the three great hot-pot mountains of the Stew Republic, house of abundant wildlife and fresh herbs. At the top of the mountain holds a kilometer wide mouth filled with different kinds of ingredients that were floating on a natural boiling broth that was specially made for shabu-shabu!
(Note: The broth is exactly at 112 degrees celcius, take precaution for an eruption!)
Digitals lines of familiar language from his previous life flashed upon Nil's field of vision it was the general information about the mountain before him.
"How convenient it is!" Nil rejoiced inwardly, praising himself for picking up an odd ring that was littered somewhere on the mountain.
"With this, I can have monstrous speed on cultivating! Sweet!"
...
A few hours ago, near at the mouth of the Shabu-Shabu Mountain, Nil was trying to accomplish the assignment that was given to them by their homeroom adviser. It was his first task upon his enrollment at the university. He was assigned to get 5 fresh stone eggs from the Drill Vulture and a container full of the mountain's delicate broth. The broth was the easy one to gather for it was just a common ingredient with zero danger unless someone was careless enough to fall on the mountain's crater or had some terrible bad luck to meet with some strong beast, the broth was contained on a special container of a high variety of material that the school provides.
On his way to the vulture's nest, Nil's usual bad luck started to kick in when the mother bird spotted him robbing some of its egg.
After gathering what he needed the drill vulture let out a screech that was very disturbing to the ears and its pointed beak started to rotate like a drill that could pass through a boulder. The vulture's black wings flapped at an intense speed and dive their way to her prey, the poor thief Nil.
Startled, Nil got out of his balance and fell from the vulture's nest to the cliff beneath him.
Luckily the vulture did not bother to follow Nil from his fall. After all drill vultures only have an apprehension rank of E which is commonly just above the realm of a regular animal.
Down at the cliff, thanks to her enormous years of training since he was reincarnated in this world. Nil only suffered some bruises and a slightly pained body.
He only felt bothered about her lower back that fell on something like an uneven rock.
As he saw what was under his sorry butt, Nil found a piece of ring decorated by some mathematical equation like runes. The ring was silver in color that gives off a metallic gloss when struck by the rays of the sun.
Without second thought Nil who saw it was just a regular ring wore the odd ring on his left index finger. After all, even the smallest fiber was still meat! That's what he thought after his reincarnation. If something can give benefits to him, then he will bite on it.
The next thing he felt was intense pain in his left hand, the pain was unbearable, and he screamed from the pits of his lungs. The pain was just too much like the ring was squeezing his very finger trying to get it on his flesh and worse, Nil can't get the ring off of his finger!
A minute pass like a year for Nil the pain suddenly subsided in an instant and the ring was gone from his hand. What's left was the weird runes and equations that were left on the index finger where the ring was. The marks were left like a tattoo on Nil's skin, he even tried to brush it off using her sleeve and some water, yet nothing happened.
Minutes passed; Nil was about to stand but his vision turned digitalized with the very exact language from his past life.
The user's soul, mind, and stomach successfully bounded with the legacy ring.
Booting...
Booting, done!
The Gastro-Battle System
User's Status:
Level: 9 (Novice)
STR 30 | INT 28 | DEX 29 | PREP SKILL RANK: Novice | COOKING SKILL: Novice | GASTRO POINT: 25
Hours and hours passed unknowingly, Nil was immersed in the system's tutorial and was joyfully screaming inside which leads to his predicament at the moment.
...
6:56 PM
The time was displayed on the upper left corner of Nil's vision, he was catching up his breath, yet he was still rejoicing from the happening of today.
He's now at the front gate of the River Fork University, Nil casually greeted the guards that were appointed on the gate's pose after some inspection and chitchat on how Nil ended up with bruises, and late at this hour the guards let Nil passed through and while also closing the gate as it was already 7:00 pm after their short conversation with the beaten schoolboy, Nil.
...
The next day, Nil woke up still can't get over his joy. He excitedly packed his things up together with the ingredients from his task and walked out from his room after hearing the bell of the university rang.
"Get ready for me!" Nil roared inwardly clenching his fist as he walked proudly in the hallway of his university.