"Hello," said the boy with a smile.
"What's up, the name's Akihiko Tanaka," I said to the boy.
"And my name is Sora Kamiya," Sora said to the boy as we naturally changed from using our surnames first to instead using our given name.
"I'm Zoran Ambrose," said the boy as we shook hands with him, and this time I didn't feel anything when I touched Sora once more and breathed a sigh of relief in my mind.
"So… what are your Gifts?" I asked.
"I could heal people, I could even regenerate limbs," I said towards the both of them who looked at me in surprise.
"Really?" asked Sora with a sparkle in his eyes.
"Yep, what about you?" I asked Sora as I wanted to gather information about him.
"I could make my body stronger," said Sora with a wry smile as he can't really demonstrate it with us being inside a classroom and all.
"Well I could make weapons that have special properties like a stick that could vibrate," said Zoran as we looked at him with suspicious eyes at the example he gave towards us.
"Hey! I don't use it for stuff like that okay" said Zoran with an embarrassed face as we quickly got close to each other, I'll just treat the bugs inside them as a failsafe if we do become enemies in the future, not like the whole city has my bugs that can kill any normal man within an instant, yeah…
"So, did you guys get to sleep comfy today? I certainly didn't, just this morning I felt like I got a heart attack" I said towards the both of them.
"M- me too, haha," said Zoran with an uneasy smile as if he remembered something unpleasant, probably a really bad nightmare or sleep paralysis.
"Well I slept like a log today," said Sora as we talked about some random topics for a while.
"So, do you guys play New World?" I asked towards the both of them.
"Not really," said Zoran.
"I can't play it, we're not that well off in terms of money," said Sora with a sad smile as we patted him in the back.
"Well now that you are here, you could support your family in the future once you become a Hero," I said towards Sora with an encouraging smile.
"Thanks," said Sora as he regained back his happy smile.
"But yeah, yesterday, me and my brother reached B-" but before I could finish what I was saying, I felt like something was zooming towards me at a pace I couldn't even process and in a split second, I felt something entering my soul and the pain flooded my mind like no other, it was the same discomfort I felt just this morning but less intense and I felt like blacking out on the spot.
"Akihiko!" said Sora as he stopped me from making my head hit the table and looked at me with worried eyes while Zoran was about to stand up to call for help, but what happened next shook us three to the core.
In front of everyone's eyes inside the classroom, a floating screen appeared, and the details were oh so familiar towards me I thought I was hallucinating.
[Akihiko Tanaka] [Title: ]
[Race: Human]
[Class: Hunter]
[Gift: Shape Shift(Epic) Bug Manipulation(Epic) Flight(Rare) Air Bullet(Uncommon) Knife Hand(Uncommon) Flame Body(Common)]
[Body: D]
[Mind: B]
[Energy: S]
[Skills: ]
"W- what?" I muttered and looked around the room to see similar floating screens and knew that they should be able to also see mine, so without a second thought, I tried to turn off the screen and with a mental command, my screen disappeared from view and I let out a breath of relief.
But what did I see? My healing is not inside the Gift tab? Wait, how does this screen even exist in the first place!?
As I turned around to look at Sora and Zoran, it seems like Sora has also turned off his screen but I managed to look at Zoran's screen.
[Zoran Ambrosa] [Title: ]
[Race: Human]
[Class: Hunter]
[Gift: Weapon Creation(Legendary)]
[Body: C]
[Mind: C]
[Energy: C]
[Skills: ]
As I started to realize that my power to heal might not be a Gift but a different power altogether, I rapidly racked my brain trying to find a way to conceal my Gifts that appears on my status window but I realize what I just felt moments ago.
So with bated breath, I opened my screen once more and tried to utilize the power deeply intertwined with my presumed soul, and this time, I could feel the connection between the status window in front of me and my soul, and just like that, my screen started to rapidly change into one that is drastically different from before.
[Akihiko Tanaka] [Title: ]
[Race: Human]
[Class: Hunter]
[Gift: Healing(Epic)]
[Body: D]
[Mind: C]
[Energy: B]
[Skills: ]
"You guys okay?" I said towards the both of them as they nodded in response while we looked around the room with our classmates looking at their screen in confusion.
"Isn't this the system from New World!?" said a random voice.
"Y- yeah!" said a female voice.
"D- did Gtech make the system real!?" said another male voice that was full of excitement.
"What do you guys think, is this real?" I asked them while I started to think about my power to heal. Or how did I gain the power to manipulate the system all of a sudden, or suddenly give bugs Gifts?
As I started to rack my brain in pain, Zoran started to talk.
"I- I think so," said Zoran as the duo sat down on their chairs.
"H- how do these stats work if you don't mind, I don't know how New World works," said Sora with an embarrassed smile.
"Body is as its name says, it shows how strong your body is, from strength, vitality, endurance, agility, all of that stuff it all falls down to Body. Mind is a bit more complicated because you can't really make yourself smarter in New World but it's basically how fast you can rank up a skill and what's the base rank you will get the skill. Let's say you have C rank Mind and you gained a D rank skill, you will be able to rank it up to C faster but once it reaches C, your progress on it will just become normal, and once it's B, your progress will become slower. And Energy is just your energy reserves, from using skills to Gifts, you need energy for it" I said towards Sora who nodded.
"Then what are the ranks and how strong will you be at those ranks?" asked Sora.
"F is at the level of a weak slime or a rabbit while S is a dragon," I said as Sora nodded.
"What about Gifts?" asked Sora.
"If your Gift is at a higher rank, it will generally become more versatile or specialized, let's say you got Light Arrow, later, once its rank goes higher and higher, it will eventually be Light Manipulation. And the higher the rank, its energy usage will go lower while its potency will go higher" I said towards Sora.
"And the highest rank is?" asked Sora.
"Mythical," I said.
"Thank you," said Sora with a smile.
"No probs, but how do you guys think we will get Skill Books?" I asked towards the two.
"Wait, what are skill books?" asked Sora.
"Basically, a monster has skills and they can drop skill books upon their death, no one knows how your chances of getting one is calculated but Boss monsters seem to be a hundred percent drop rate for skill books," I said.
"Boss monsters?" asked Sora.
"There are three types of monsters in New World. The base monster which is the normal form, Alpha which is a stronger form of the base monster and it will also be bigger. Boss monsters are just the gigantic forms of the base monsters and their strength goes through the roof and they also gain a mechanic called rage where their power rises but their mind becomes clouded" I said towards Sora.
"Thanks again," said Sora.
"So, do you guys think monsters will now appear," said Zoran with a raised eyebrow.
"I don't know," I said as I took out my phone while the three followed along to see what the fuck is happening on the internet and the first news I saw devastated my soul.
"N- N- New World is now gone… noooooooo!!!" I said in grief as it seems like out of nowhere, the greatest Ai of Gtech has just died and the moment I read that, I felt more grief-stricken because Ai was a genuine friend to me.
"What!? Did Gtech combine the game world with the real world!?" said a voice inside the class as murmurs started to fill the room while the teachers are still out of sight, probably taking care of panicking students outside the wide city-like campus.
"Hey hey! What's that outside!" shouted a voice as we looked outside the window and the moment we did, we saw it, a popular genre of today in fictional stories.
"Is that a rift!?" shouted a voice as Zoran and Sora quickly neared the window to get a better look while I stood up with shocked eyes.
And as our whole class looked at the rift in the distance, we started to see green muscular arms and I knew what monster has those arms.
"SHIT! ORCS ARE COMING!" I said in shock.
"W- what do we do! The teachers are occupied by other rifts!" said a student in fear as we saw tons of rifts also appearing in the distance.
"Aki! Zoran! Do you think we could take care of them!?" said Sora who looked at the Orcs spewing out of the rift in the distance.
"Are you insane!" said Zoran.
"There's no time to think! People will die if we don't move now!" said Sora as he looked at Zoran and me with determined eyes.
"Tch! How do we go down there!" said Zoran as his eyes gained a gem-like glow.
"You up for the task Aki!" said Sora while looking at me with a sparkle in his eyes that encapsulates the special aura around him.
"Give me a weapon Zoran!" I said as Zoran nodded and gave me a spear, a perfect weapon for newbies like me.
"LET'S GO!" shouted Sora as he opened the wide window and picked both of us up from the waist and with determined eyes, we shot off through the window and flew towards the horde of Orcs in the distance while other students followed behind us as they rushed out of the building as a sudden war just erupted out of nowhere between monsters and students of Hope Academy.
AN: This is 1823 words, you're welcome.
YOU DIDN'T FUCKING EXPECT RIFTS AND SYSTEMS DIDN'T YOU!
Yeah, I know, my twist are abrupt and unexpected, just like my scam in Telekinesis by literally lying to the readers from the start, it just encapsulates the essence of my one shots so perfectly this might as well be a One Shot chapter.
We went from three friends talking to each other into a war in the span of a few hundred words, kinda insane if you think about it.
But yeah, I'll hate myself after the next chapter because if FB is just complicated complex plans where I need to plan from the start, this is where I will have to outline the plot possibly hundreds of chapters in advance and I have a chaotic brain so previous plans are hard to stick to, you guys don't know how much IR has deviated from the original plot line I was going for, but this one should be doable if I stay cautious against my future self ;) Kukukuku.
Besides that, the readers who actually went to look at my Twatter are probably beyond shocked right now, like "There's no way in hell that this voice I am hearing is from NoNameDeity, like the fuck!?" are probably what most first timers will think.
The Sword of Damocles hangs above each and everyone one of you with its ever present threat of despair, so send me some power stones with your power of friendship and save the thousands perhaps even millions to come who will read this masterpiece immortalized in the tunnels of time.
(March 25, 2022 – 121st day of writing)