The Sun had long set. It was about five hours to midnight.
Claire came to check on him after a while, and saw that he was asleep. She asked Roger to arrange the necessary to shift Charles back to his bed and prepare a nutritious meal for dinner.
...
Meanwhile, Charles was in a different space. It seemed like this place was located in his mind or the more mysterious realm of soul.
It was a completely white space and in front of him were a seemingly infinite number of shadow beings. A screen appeared in front of him, when he wanted to investigate more about this space and the shadows.
[Choose Character]
He realized that these shadows were the characters. He didn't want to be rash and select one to know the details, only to end up being forced to use it. Hence he willed for getting more information related to it, and another message appeared on the screen.
[Would you like to see the list of recommended characters?]
He thought of saying 'YES!'.
Then a list appeared in front of him with a few number of characters.
[Recommended Characters]
[1.Knight
2. Cook
3. Berserker
4. Warrior
5. Thief
6. Doctor
7. Sorcerer ]
Charles only spent a moment on the realization that the six character classes provided are closely related to the types of people he had seen in this world. Then he right away chose [Sorcerer].
The screen changed showing new information.
[Sorcerer]
[A class of people who are born with magical power or gifts and gain power by the level of their connection with the source of their gift]
[Choose inborn trait]
[1. Fire]
[2.Random]
Charles chose the Random option and the screen refreshed to show:
[Lightning (Paralysis) trait chosen]
Then suddenly, all shadows except one disappeared from the white room. The remaining shadow then got illuminated with yellow streaks of lightning. Charles suddenly felt something pulling him to the yellow lightning being. As both of them got pulled into each other, they melded into each other on contact.
As he regained his awareness, he saw a glaringly visible text floating in front of him.
[Play(Y/N)]
He thought 'YES'.
Then he was pulled to somewhere by an irresistible force. Charles felt like he was in a rollercoaster. When the feeling of vertigo ended, he found himself sprawled down on a damp ground surrounded by darkness and smell of wild animals.
As he stood up, patting the dust off his butt, he saw a piece of information floating close to 2m in front of him.
[Lv32 Shadow Wolf]
Before he could digest this information, what he saw next gave him the chills. He was surrounded by such floating sets of information of varying levels. He realized that he was most probably in a wolf cave. In an effort to resist, with nothing else to do, he decided to use the move that was incorporated in his mind, when he chose the [Character].
[Lightning Chain]
With a thought he imagined using the lightning chain and guided the dim yellow streaks of lightning that flashed from both of his hands into the direction of the closest floating data.
The dim lightning struck a wolf, then without dissipating struck another one closest to it and one more similar strike. Charles got goosebumps, not because the lightning strikes were totally ineffective, since the wolves didn't even seem to feel anything, but due to the number of wolves he saw during the brief illumination provided by his move.
His mind started panicking as he felt death approaching closer with each second. He soon calmed himself down to escape this calamity, but before he could produce another thought, he heard growls and felt something biting into his neck, shortly after.
Although he felt mind-numbing pain from all the bites, what was worse was that he didn't die instantly. His flesh were bitten off and chewed upon, he was clawed at, one even managed to rip off his legs. In an hopeless state, totally paralysed, he could not do anything but watch the sinister smirks of the wolves and witness the cruelty inflicted on him as he bled slowly to death, with a strong resolution:
'If I have another chance, monsters like this, beast or human, shall die under my hands, painfully!'
And he died.
...
Charles opened his eyes wide in panic, heavily breathing and covered in sweat. His whole body was shivering from the trauma. He realized he was in a familiar place, his bedroom in the Novark Manor at the capital. He took some time to relax his nerves, drank water from the jug and checked the system after a few minutes.
[Play (Y/N)]
[Status]
[Character]
[Base]
He figured that the 'Play' meant the death episode from before. He was depressed that he couldn't find any pain modifier option. He checked [Character] to see if he could select one with substantial damage output, but found that he could unlock another [Character], only after special conditions are achieved, but what conditions they were, he was not given any clue.
'By normal game logic, if you max a character's level, its possible that you will be able to unlock another character. If the same logic appears here, I guess I am stuck with the Lightning Sorcerer for a long time.'
He checked out the new option, [Base]:
[Your current location is under your area of influence. Do you want to set this location as your Base? (Y/N) ]
'Yes.'
[Base: Novark Manor]
[Your session/play zone can start from your Base or a random location. Characters can return to the Base at any time from any place. A Base can be set up only in an area under your influence. You can have more than one base. If the base you set up is no longer under your influence, it will be removed.]
[Since the area of your influence is limited to the bedroom. Your character can return anywhere within the bounds of this room. ]
Having familiarised with the new function and accepting the 'reality' that he did not die, Charles decided to play again.
[Select Location:
1.Novark Manor
2.Random ]
He chose 'Novark Manor' this time.
Charles fell unconscious, but this time, he felt like he was in a separate space, being able to see every corner of his bedroom, including his sleeping figure. He mentally pictured appearing before the mirror in the room, and in an instant, his vision shifted to see someone looking back at him. He realized that he was in front of the mirror in a real body.
The figure that was staring at him was the same height and body structure as him, but had sparkly yellow undercut hair and eyebrows, his black eyes had a ring of electric yellow between the pupil and iris. Gazing into his eyes, one will feel like they are paralyzed. The facial structure of the figure in the mirror had about 50% resemblance to his. Above all, he was naked!
Charles looked down and when he looked up, his expression was as if, he was proud of what he saw. His new physical structure was same as that of his original. Seeing it as not a good idea to randomly appear across the world naked, he opened his wardrobe and wore a full sleeved white shirt, a bright yellow vest over it, an underwear where it was supposed to be worn, and black pants and shoes.
Once again at the mirror, he gave himself a look over.
'I am pretty sure, people and beasts will see me, even if I don't make a sound!'
Charles then checked his sleeping body. Like handling treasure, he tucked his original into the bed. Feeling satisfied, he checked the status.
[Status]
[Name: Enter a name
Level: 0
Class: Sorcerer
Trait: Lightning (Paralysis)
Skill: Rank 0:- Lightning Chain(Lv0)
]
He also learned that a new option was unlocked: [Inventory]. With a thought, he unequipped his vest, and it disappeared. He found that it was kept in the [Inventory]. He equipped it back and it appeared magically on him and that too was perfectly worn. He took his time fiddling with the [Inventory] and found that it was a separate dimension of sorts whose limits, if any, are yet to be explored. He could store plants and all non- living things that are not in motion. So, if he stood in front of an arrow, trying to store it in inventory, the arrow will penetrate his body, like it should have. He tried storing his original body, which didn't work, making him want to experiment on storing other humans.
He also tried familiarising with the skill [Lightning Chain] and levelled it up by one level, after which the information about how the skill was affected appeared in his mind. He also felt drained of a special type of energy, possibly mana, belonging to him. And as he tried meditating, trying to keep his mind blank, he felt his energy recovering, albeit very slowly. Now, understanding the limits of his energy, number of moves and recovery speed, he meditated for about two hours and stopped once he fully recovered.
Done with all that he could do, he exited the session and returned to his original body. Once again he started to 'play', but this time he chose for a random location.