*TING*
Ark gets surprised when he hears the sound. His pickaxe hit something.
Excitement and expectation completely filled his face. Squatting down he starts to remove the soils. His face lits up as he picks up a crimson red coloured stone from the ground.
The watch on his wrist emits a faint green light on the stone.
" Scanning the material"
" Scanning complete"
" It is a High-Grade Energy Stone. Estimated Value 1,000,000."
Just as the word reaches his ears he gets even more excited. A wide smile appears.
" Look at him." " Wow so lucky" " Oh my god. What luck" A commotion started in the cave.
All must every one of the miners were looking at him with greed and jealousy. When a hoarse voice interrupted the commotion" Hey, What are you all doing? You guys want your wages deducted."
As soon as the voice was heard everyone stopped talking at once and the sound of pickaxe hitting the stone filled the air.
The man had a bulky build and stern face with short trimmed hair. He was the supervisor of this mining cave. His name was Leo.
Ark suddenly felt a surge of energy rushing inside his body from the hand which was holding the stone. He was confused when a voice spoke. " Hey, Ark what did you find?"
Ark immediately turned his head and with a slight smile said " Sir?. Yeah. I just found a high-grade energy stone according to aria."
Aria is an Artificial Intelligence which connects the people of the whole world to the government. It makes it easy for people to learn about the prices of various items and various emergency notices can be given immediately.
" Oh, Lucky lad," Leo said in a normal way " Come to my office right away." As he turned back and started walking.
" Yes, Sir," Ark said and immediately followed behind him.
Ark is an orphan. As far as he can remember he was always in this mine. His childhood was full of struggles. He had to start working in mines from the age of Five when Leo stopped giving him fold and told him to start working.
He had to carry the energy stones from the mine to the containers. And only after working for 8 hours would he be able to get enough points to get enough food for himself. But most of the times he was always bullied by the adults to hand over his points to them and of he declined he would be beaten very badly.
But even in such disparity, he continued to live on and on. Thinking maybe one day he would be able to live a beautiful life free from all the disparities and sufferings.
Ark is standing in front of a building shaped like a square. It has a light-dark colour to it due to the material used in it called mithyril. The hardest material found in the whole solar system.
A small camera was set up on top of the metal door. It moved vertically upon seeing Leo in front of him.
" Scanning personal"
" Supervisor Leo- Welcome back"
Just as the voice finished saying those words the metal door opened slowly. Ark entered the room along with Leo.
Leo walked straight to his desk and sat down. While ark walked and stood in front of his desk. He spread his hand asking for the stone.
Ark hurriedly pulled put the stone from his pocket and placed at Leo's hand.
Leo started looking at the stone carefully when a robotic female voice spoke " High-Grade Energy Stone detected. Estimated Cost-1,000,000"
Leo looked at the excited face of Ark's and spoke " According to rules. You will be awarded 33,333.3 Points."
Ark smiled happily and said, " Thank you."
Leo nods and asks " What will you do with this much money? You can easily buy a small house and some energy stones. And after consuming it you too will be able to become either rector or opifex."
Ark listens to his words and replies after a moment " I want to read in an Academy." Leo raises his brows and asks in a curious tone " Which Academy?" Ark smiles and says" Optimus Mech Academy."
Leo nearly chokes and after coughing for a while he shouts " Are you an idiot? Why do you want to waste your time? Do you think you can enter the academy when you don't even know much about mechs."
Ark gives an awkward smile and says" I Know. But I want to try it out. "
" How can you be such an idiot? There is no way you can do it. Their entrance exam will be to control a training mech and do some tasks which will be very hard for an inexperienced person like you.
Ark scratches his face but does not says a word.
Seeing Ark like that Leo sighs inwardly and says " Do what you want. I will help you to register for the exam. And after registration, I will transfer you your remaining points."
Ark smiles and nodding his head turns around to leave.
Just as he gets near the door it opens itself. The door is made in that way it only scans while someone enters but automatically opens when someone leaves.
Points are the currency of this world. There are no countries in this world. As humans have already become an interplanetary species. They have already explored all over the solar system.
While exploring they also discovered about monsters in other planets. Along with various different kinds of materials.
Ark is currently on a planet called Treon-635. It is a mining planet. The planet is full of natural minerals like energy stone, mithyril and many others.
Ark returns to his own tent. Which is at a distance from the supervisor's office. There are many more tents near his own tent. All of them have a pitch-black colour. But they have numbers on it. Ark's number is 63,523.
It is also his citizen number, bank account number and phone number.
It is made that way by the government.
Ark enters his small tent. Although the tent seems small from the outside, the inside is pretty spacious due to some special elements present in it.
There is a small bed on the side and just beside it is a small self which haves many books on it. All the books are about mechs but there are only superficial details about mechs because the books with detail information are only available to those who own a mech or are students in a mech Academy.
It is also illegal to leak this information to the general public.
Ark was quite tired from all the mining he had done today. But when he remembers about mining he gets even more excited thinking about how much points he had earned today.
He will even be able to take an exam in the most prestigious academy of the whole solar system.
Thinking about all those blissful things happened to him today he slowly closes his eyes drifting away in sleep.
*Ding* *Ding* *Ding*
An alarm like sound quickly wakes him up just as he is about to completely fall asleep. He lazily opens his eyes. ' What the heck? I thought I set the alarm for 6 in the morning. Why is it ringing now?'
[ Congratulations! The host has successfully awakened the system]
[ Award Received-Low level Mech rector Skill]
[ Would you like to learn?]
These messages are right in front of his face. Ark rubs his face once to confirm his eyes aren't deceiving him. ' What is this? Is this is a prank played by the government? Rector skill?'
Ark once again watches the messages in front of his eyes. He tries to touch it but his hands go right past it. It proves that it is a virtual screen.
'Low-level mech rector skill? Learn? How can anyone teach others something like this? First, in first is this even legit? Who the fuck is pulling leg?' Ark can't believe those messages. No one is idiotic enough to teach others the skills which are banned by the government to teach others.
" I am a system. Specially created to help a person become excellent in every field of mechs."
Ark gets surprised while hearing this unknown female voice sounding similar to aria.
" Wh-Who are you? And how are you talking to me? And what are those weird remarks?" Unable to hold his curiosity he asks.
" I am a system or rather a consciousness present inside you. As I am inside you and connected to you. I can read all your thoughts and desires. I received your strong desire for learning low-level mech rector skill. And just as I awakened thanks to your energy I decided to give the skill as a reward."
Ark was dumbfounded. Inside me? But how? I mean...argh.....what the heck is going on?
" Host does not need to worry. I am only here to assist in everything you want to achieve whether it be learning mechs skill or any other thing. And I was present inside the high-grade energy stone you picked up before while mining."
"High-grade? That means the surge of energy was caused by you while entering my body." Ark asks in a suspicious way.
" Affirmative. I was just on the verge of dissipating due to lack of energy. And exactly on the right time, you picked it up letting me into your body to sustain my consciousness by consuming your energy.
And I took some time to awaken after weakening so much. Thanks to you I was able to sustain myself. Which makes you my host and to lay you back for what you did I have decided to make you the strongest mech rector of the world."
After hearing the long summary of the system ark has calmed down. And with a calm voice, he says" Is there any risk to my life from you?"
" Affirmative. If the host does not takes in proper food with adequate energy host may die from malnourishment." The system says in the same way as ark.
Ark squeezes his brows upon hearing his words but again relaxes after thinking that he has enough money to eat properly from his earnings of today.
" Can you really teach me those skills?" Ark asks.
" Affirmative. You will be taught the best skill of using low-level mechs that have existed." The system says in quite a proud manner.
Ark once again properly reads the message the system has sent and tries to touch the 'Yes' button on the virtual screen.
To his surprise, it clicks and an immediate response comes from the system.
" Initiated learning" and just after few seconds a new message prompts
" Learning completed."
"What? It just-" before ark completes speaking floods of memories hits his brain. He closes his eyes tightly while his mind processes the information at an incredible speed.
After a few minutes, ark slowly opens his eyes. As soon as he does various images starts displaying in his mind. He soon realises the images of himself using a low-level mech so smoothly as if he is using his own body.
Seeing all those memories he gets surprised. Because he never expected it to happen this way. Just as he is lost in his thoughts a voice brings him back to reality.
" System never lies to host. So, how is the skill?" The system says in a proud voice.
Ark smiles awkwardly and nodding his head says" Surprisingly it does."
....