Looking around at his surroundings, Altair sighed. Even after a full sixteen years in this world, he was already used to the bizarre sights around him. Everything around him was foreign, and by foreign, Altair did not refer to just the culture and race difference.
Yes, he was reincarnated into this world. However, Altair did not retain any memories from his past lives, though the fact that he was reincarnated remained firmly in his mind. Contradictory and seemingly impossible, yet this very scenario happened to him.
"That will be a total of five credits." A deep, gruff voice sounded as a man covered entirely with an 'ice armor' handed Altair his ice-cream. The ice-cream was a mix of weird colors, but Altair did not bat an eyelid as he started enjoying his ice-cream after paying. Walking a bit further down the path from the ice-cream truck, Altair found an empty bench and decided to sit down.
It was a good morning - cool temperature, soft wind, the gentle humming of the nearby songstress, the various shouts and yelling from children a few tens of meters away, the ice-cream - everything made him relaxed.
He would be more relaxed if not for the fact that the songstress had gills by her necks, a tail for legs, and was currently in the water fountain singing. Perhaps the fact that those children were not all similar also reduced his relaxation by a bit. Some had flames or water as hair, while others were bigger than Altair himself. If not for their nearby parents not stopping their children from playing with one another and the children's laughter, people might have mistaken the bigger kid as a pedophile.
The new world that Altair was reincarnated in was weird. And by 'weird', it was not some alien-coming-to-invade-the-world weird. Instead, something now known as 'Deviants' appeared out of nowhere in the mid 1990s.
At first, they were hidden. Some chose to found secret societies to explore mysteries while others wanted to rule the world in both a high and low profile way. Most of them chose to hid and live a normal lives, mainly because their powers were useless or had minimum use in society.
But as time passed, these 'powers' only grew and grew. From having uncontrollable growth of hair and fingernails in the mid 1990s, people started having the IQ of the once-smartest recorded human that existed on Earth, William James Sidis (250 IQ as compared to Albert Einstein's 160 IQ), in 2030, and spewing fire from their mouth that helped lit cigarettes and forge metals in the 2040s.
And in 2050, that was when the powers' stopped growing so uncontrollably; it has reached a plateau. It was also when the various government decided to give up on the calendar they had used for the last two millennials, AD, and start a new Era, as they called it.
Era of Brilliance - an era named after the various acts of brilliance the Deviants had done for mankind during the AD period. Technology had leaped forward by several hundred years all due to the people with William's IQ working hard, and coupled with all the possibilities the Deviants' powers offered, various things that were thought to be impossible in their lifetime happened within two to three mere decades.
Everyone was a Deviant. In the past, it might contain a negative connotation, but in the Era of Brilliance, it was nothing short of praise. In fact, the more someone was praised as a stronger Deviant, the more ego the person would have had.
Deviant was no longer a word used to describe criminals. It was a word of status, a description of heroes, a position of power.
If it was any other reincarnation, they would have taken a few days to adapt to the new environment, but for Altair? He did not even have the need to 'adapt'. Born as a blank slate, this place was nothing short of home for him.
After finishing his morning ice-cream, Altair decided to return home. Altair was not poor. In fact, he could even be considered semi-rich due to his own power. But being rich is one thing, and wanting to spend lavishly is another. Opting to take the flying bus instead of a private taxi today, Altair waited patiently for his bus to arrive.
Due to the efficiency of traffic in this era, Altair did not have to wait long. Not even five minutes passed before the bus that he needed arrived.
Bus BP1503 followed the structure of most public vehicles that existed today. The first alphabet, B, represents the country, and the second alphabet, P, represents the city it was travelling in. The numbers,1503, represent the route number the bus was going to follow. It was a simple structure, if not for the 26 different countries or kingdoms that existed in this era. And within those 26 countries or kingdoms existed 26 cities each.
Unlike the more than four million cities that existed in 2050 AD, the land that separated the four million cities now joined together to only produce 676 cities. One could only imagine how big each city was, and the number of routes available for every citizen increased yearly.
897 EB (Era of Brilliance) now proudly boasts more than a million routes within each city.
Along the ride, spectacular sights that could not be seen in the AD period were everywhere. The trains that used to run on tracks have evolved to run solely on magnetism and Earth's gravity. Altair could see the trains flying above him, bringing along hundreds of Deviants at one go.
Of course, in an area where transport vehicles could go in any direction they desired, accidents were almost non-existent. Gravity and magnetism have been used in everyone's daily lives since the late 400 EB, yet with almost six hundred years of progress, no figure of authority ever announced the results of space exploration.
Everyone knew that Earth had the resources and technology to have space exploration, but no common people ever got news of the results of various exploration.
As for the people with more influence? Altair did not know what they knew, nor was he interested in them. As the bus came to its fifth stop, Altair alighted on an open platform located ten floors high. The bus stop was located in the open clearing of a bridge that connected the tenth floor of five surrounding buildings.
Walking over to the fourth adjacent building, Altair stepped into the lift of block AJM923, and went up to the fifty-fourth floor. It might be a tall building for residents in the AD period, but the fifty-fourth floor was merely the middle of the block in EB. Within five seconds, Altair had reached his desired floor. This quick efficiency was something Altair was forever grateful for. He did not know how people in the AD era survived being in the lift for more than a minute bringing them up to a mere twenty floors.
Just as he stepped out of the lift, as if he was trying to reenact an anime scenario, Altair bumped into a girl who was rushing into the lift.
Well, almost.
(Un)fortunately, Altair's inhumane reflexes moved himself aside just before the girl could crash into him, preventing an accident by a mere centimeter.
"Ah! I'm so sorry!" The girl uttered a quick apology before the lift closed and disappeared from his sight. With a dark purple color for hair and glasses that emphasized her wide eyes, she had pretty features. But if that was all she had to offer, Altair would not have remembered her as clearly as he did.
She had a singular purple horn protruding the center of the forehead curving up. On her shoulder blades, a similar set of purple wings extended about a meter long, leaving a trail of purple dust that existed only for a second before disappearing into thin air. The combined features made her look like a demonic-fairy fusion, especially with her blood-red eyes.
It was one the better mutant-type Deviant he had seen in his long life of fifteen years, which made him wonder who she was. He had spent almost ten years in this apartment and, knowing all the neighbors on this floor, he did not remember having such a girl living on this floor.
'Perhaps a relative visit?'
But as pretty as the girl was, Altair did not pay any further attention to her; the sweet calling of his home was calling out to him as he stood in front of his own door.
"Deviant wave confirmed. Welcome back, Altair." A mechanical voice sounded as the door slid open, revealing a cozy two-bedroom apartment with a balcony. Ever since the death of his parents at the young age of eight, Altair had bought and lived in this apartment ever since.
With his parent's inheritance, he could live comfortably, at least until he could start working. As for the house left behind by his parents, he had rented it out for more than seven years now, and whatever debt he had incurred with his current apartment needed was long gone with the rents. Any rent collected now was pure profit.
His main bedroom was decorated much like any other boys' room his age. A study table where he mainly uses to do everything but study; a closet where he keeps the same few sets of clothes he has; a rather plain bed with a singular soft toy that looked out of place.
A pink dinosaur that looked more suited to be in a girls' room was the only oddity in this room.
In the other bedroom, Altair treated it as a trophy room, where he placed all his trophies. There were plenty, and for a very simple reason - his Deviant ability. Officially, it was known as "Receptive Learner", a very boring and lame-sounding name.
On the other hand, Altair preferred to call it "The End". After all, he didn't just learn fast, he learns and perfect any skill with ease almost immediately, thus allowing him to reach the 'end' of any skill.
"TV." Altair muttered and immediately, a holographic screen appeared on the empty wall in the living room, currently broadcasting the afternoon news.
"Country Z has surprised us this morning with the sudden announcement of their first Zenith Abnormal-class Deviant. With him around, Country Z has stepped to being the strongest country in Antarctica!"
"Following he good news, congratulations to Country A for producing their ninth Zenith Abnormal-class Deviant! With this addition, Country A has secured their position as the strongest country within Asia!"
Apart from a slight glance at the screen, Altair did not have any other reaction. After all, while having nine of the world's greatest powerhouse does seem powerful, it was actually not. For example, Country K of Europe has fifteen of such powerhouses, but the only reason why Europe is still weaker in overall strength compared to Asia as a whole is because Asia has more countries than Europe. And that was true when comparing continents.
If solely ranked based on countries, Country A would barely rank top five even with nine Zenith Abnormal-class Deviant.
As the news droned on, Altair started cooking his own lunch. As an orphaned fifteen-year-old boy, it hardly seemed that Altair could cook. Anyone who thought this way, however, was very wrong.
After all, cooking was but a skill that anybody could master if they put enough time and effort into it. And like any other skill, Altair almost instantly mastered it as soon as he watched one Metube video about cooking at the age of 8.
Five-starred restaurants' head chefs could barely compete with Altair when he was serious. But, cooking was nothing but a necessity for him to survive. Thus, more often than not, he would barely put enough effort into the food he make for himself to taste.
With the background noise of the afternoon news echoing about in the living room, Altair laid down the two simple dishes he made along with two bowl of rice. The weird thing was, there was also a jar of honey beside the second bowl of rice, despite none of the dishes requiring honey.
Just then, the door bell rang as the mechanical voice sounded, "A guest is here to see you, Altair. Permission to open the door?"
At the same time, a holographic screen appeared in front of Altair, showing the current scene in front of his door. A pink-haired girl with red horns on her head was smiling towards the camera, exposing her sharp teeth.
"Seraph."