-I can't feel my legs... What happened? I remember being on the roof of a building and then... oh right! I jumped to my death.
Immediately after that, Akihiko woke up all sweaty.
-That nightmare again...
He tried to go back to sleep, but couldn't. It was 5:30 AM and it was still dark in Neo-Tokyo. Akihiko got off his bed and opened a window. His apartment was one of the cheapest in this building and had a nice view of the garbage disposal zone of the city. The ashes that rose from the trash incinerator immediately filled the room and he was forced to close the window. Akihiko made a few steps back and looked around. His apartment was cramped and dirty, it looked more like a rat cage than a place that a human lived in. He decided to start his morning early by taking a walk.
-How did I end up like this? I remember having a decent life, back in Tokyo. Looking back at my old life, even with all my problems, it was better than this. A lot of people would like to be immortal, but an endless life of misery is more painful than death.
He had the habit of complaining about his life daily, his interior monologues are often long and don't mean much, but they do show his true self. His monologue was interrupted by a sudden scream:
-Ahhh!
He didn't jump right into the danger like a hero would do, instead, he just looked from a distance. Two older boys and one girl were attacking a woman with their swords. In theory, kids are forbidden to wield energy swords, but no one controls the distribution of those swords so anyone can have and wield them, as long as they have pure blood.
In this universe, blood works like a mana system. You can cast spells or use energy weapons, by consuming your blood. Obviously, you will die of blood loss if you use too many spells. While spells consume blood once per cast, energy weapons consume a certain amount of blood every few seconds. The stronger the weapon the more blood it consumes. It goes without saying that blood regenerates over time, that time is different for each person, varying from one day to one week. Akihiko has a regeneration time of one minute.
-It's not my problem. said Akihiko while continuing his walk. He will later come back and find the same woman dead.
6:30 AM Akihiko arrives back home and prepares for his job. He works at the local energy plant. The plant that fuels the city. His job is to carry heavy boxes around the facility without looking or asking what is in the box. There was a time when the curiosity would have pushed him to look inside, but that Akihiko is now dead.
7:00 AM He arrives at his job. He meets with his 2 coworkers, Aimi and Haruto.
-Good morning!
-Oh, you finally came Akihiko! Come on help me with this box, we already started working! said Haruto
Haruto was a well-built middle-aged man. He worked at the plant for decades and all that heavy lifting gave him an impressive body over the years. Aimi on the other hand looked more like a high school girl than someone that carries heavy crates. She started working at the plant a year after Akihiko, so she was the newest one out of the three.
-Sure.
While from the outside it looked like two-man joining forces to lift a heavy crate, looking inside their minds will reveal something else:
Haruto: "This box is heavier than usual, or maybe I am getting old"
Akihiko: "I have to be careful, one slight muscle contraction and I might send Haruto into the stratosphere!"
That's right! In this world, besides the regeneration of the blood, people have another quality that decides how strong they are. The amount of blood is related to their physical strength. While you can exercise to achieve your maximum potential, all humans have a point where, regardless of how much they train, they won't become stronger. What is limiting them is the quantity of blood they have. While a normal human, like Aimi, has 2.5 liters, and someone like Haruto has 3.2 liters, The amount of blood Akihiko is 500 liters, enough to use a highly advanced energy sword non-stop for days!
Suddenly, images started flashing in Akihiko's mind. He saw himself lying on the ground dead. But his body was speaking:
-That's right! I jumped to my death.
The sudden flash-back made him drop the box. The heavy crate made a loud noise when it hit the ground and its contents came out.
What is in the boxes? In the boxes, there are dead bodies.