Feeling the cold, rough concrete against his face, Klay jolts upright as he realizes where he is.
Quickly looking down at his stomach, Klay feels nothing out of the ordinary as he notes the new hole in his shirt. "I… I must have dreamed I got stabbed…" he tells himself, chuckling humorlessly. Confirming this idea in his mind, he quickly stands up and attempts to back up to the wall, but trips and lays down.
Don't kid yourself, Klay. If I truly dreamed it, I wouldn't be wearing a shirt that has a knife hole and is stained with blood. Or be in this alley, for that matter.
Klay stares at the fully darkened night sky above him. "How long have I been laying here? And wasn't there another person before I came here?" He continues to speak to himself, attempting to wrap his mind around the events hours before.
"They must have run off during the fight. I would've."
Sitting back up, Klay closes his eyes as he thinks about what happened.
So I got into a fight with that mugger, then I got stabbed and I think he ran off? What was that voice I heard before I passed out though? And why am I fine, despite getting beat up?
"[That is because of me.]" A voice broke through Klay's thoughts, causing him to jump and look around the alley, empty of all but himself. Instead of a person, like Klay hoped he would see, there was a small transparent panel that had the same words written down.
"What the hell is that?!" Klay asked fearfully, swinging his hand through the words to no avail as his arm completely phased through.
"['That' is the Regeneration System, a power unique just to you.]" It stated, as the voice had a flat cadence, like a robot.
"This isn't good, I'm going insane." Klay groaned out, holding his head.
"[No need to worry, with the capabilities of the Regeneration System there is little need to worry about any neurological issues. As long as they aren't the base state of your mind, that is.]" The screen changed again, remaining silent as Klay took several long breaths to steady himself.
"Alright, fine. I'll assume you aren't an agent of death or anything. Before I passed out, what did you say? Something about a Legacy?" Klay spoke softly, almost worried to not completely ignore the flat voice. While rubbing his temples to sooth his mind, a screen quickly popped into being before Klay's eyes, with no voice to accompany it this time.
[Repeating prior messages]
[Congratulations, your Legacy has awakened after the following condition was met: [Survive a potentially fatal wound]! After taking into account your personality and most defining experiences, your Legacy has awoken as the Regeneration System!]
[Prior messages completed]
Taking a long minute to read over the words before him, Klay noted several things to ask for clarification about.
"So…" Klay spoke, unsure of where to start, "what is this 'Legacy' thing, and what exactly does it mean for me- I assume it was me. What does it mean for me to have awakened it?" He said each word tentatively, as though he were testing the temperature of a body of water.
"[Yes, you did indeed awaken your Legacy. A Legacy is a rare form of power in this world, and is inherited due to great accomplishments performed by your ancestors. The fact that you have it is quite impressive, and certainly something to be proud of as any potential you had before has been exponentially increased and improved!]" The voice seemed to be quite excited as it praised Klay, despite maintaining the flat tone as its voice sped up momentarily.
"I see…" Klay responded, rubbing his temples as he digested this new information.
So it's something I gained from my ancestors? I can't think of anything particularly great that they did, besides maybe making the martial arts our family practices. But is that really so great that it deserves a superpower?
"Then I suppose the next question is what exactly can you do?"
Quickly, new panels popped into Klay's vision.
"[The Regeneration System is capable of enhancing your body and mind with the primary ability being the absolute healing. You can even regenerate limbs should you improve enough!]" Along with the shocking statement given out by the voice, another larger panel popped up, displaying several items.
[Name: Klay Wynne (No title)
Rank: Peon (Low tier)
Exp: 1/5
Stats:
[Strength: 4
Dexterity: 6
Flexibility: 5
Senses: 8
Intellect: 14
Stability: 6
Regeneration: 0.7]
Abilities: [Observation Level 1], [Regen Focus (Passive) Level 1]
Additional Pages: None]
Ok, the layout makes sense to me, and nothing seems too complex. But these stats seem odd. What's stability supposed to mean?
"[Stability is your mind and body's connection and ability to retain form. To put it most simply, it is your durability.]" The voice speaks out, quickly answering Klay's internal question.
Nodding for a moment, Klay suddenly stops. "Wait, can you hear my thoughts?"
"[Indeed, the Regeneration System is directly connected to your mind, so actions like responding to your thoughts are second nature to the Regeneration System.]" The voice tells him as though it were the most obvious thing.
I really shouldn't be so shocked at this point. I suppose I just need some time to digest all this new information. I have a few more questions to ask before that point though. Hopefully.
"Then what does the rank thing mean? And besides that, it's kind of degrading to be ranked as a peon." Klay speaks to the voice, his face scrunching up slightly at the thought.
"[You do not have enough information about ranks for the Regeneration System to conclusively explain what ranks are and what the Peon rank means for you.]"
Oddly enough, the voice decided to deny Klay an answer to what the ranks mean. Klay frowned slightly, but decided to ignore it for the moment and move on to another question.
"Fine, don't answer if you don't want to." After thinking for a moment, Klay continues. "What are these abilities? Observation and Regen Focus?"
"[Abilities are simply skills that you train to have enough understanding to use. The Regeneration System turns the actions commonly performed by you into abilities. Observation and Regen Focus are both abilities that you have based on the awakening of your Legacy.]" The voice quickly explained the basis of abilities to Klay before showing him the abilities' specifics.
[Level 1 Observation: Active analysis of clues and information that can be seen.]
[Level 1 Regen Focus (Passive): When your health has been lowered significantly, your regeneration will automatically increase by focusing on primary wounds and lowering the regeneration rate of other injuries.]
Reading over the descriptions of the two skills, Klay's thoughts were somewhat positive.
So I can pretty much turn any behavior I do into an ability if I practice with it enough it seems. That could be pretty useful, depending on what exactly it means to do that. I can kind of understand why I have the Regen Focus skill, as it likely came to be as part of the system itself. But how did I get Observation?
"[The Observation skill was unlocked due to your habit to read mystery novels. You have gotten used to picturing and piecing clues together to the point that it became an ability of the Regeneration System.]"
With a nod, Klay sighs, his brain feeling overloaded from all the new information gained over the past few minutes. "I suppose I should thank you for saving my life, as I'd probably bleed out or something without the Regen Focus ability."
"[No need to thank the Regeneration System, as your unique power it is meant to give help to you however you need it.]"
Nodding his head slightly, Klay continues to speak to both himself and the voice. "It will definitely take me a while to get used to you responding to my thoughts. Oh, I should ask, can anyone else see these screens? That'd be worrisome, to say the least. I can barely handle the attention I get now." Klay asks, deflating slightly at the image of him being crowded by people thinking he had some sort of superpower.
"[The Regeneration System is only connected to your mind, and cannot be perceived by anyone without the proper powers.]" Quickly, the voice reassured him, but clearly made room for exceptions.
"Proper powers? What do you mean?"
"[You have not discovered enough information about other powers for the Regeneration System to conclusively explain.]"
Shaking his head slightly, Klay looked up at the night sky above him. It was pitch black in the alley besides the slight amount of light from the moon and street lights. Deciding he had enough of his questions answered to be confident enough to return to his normal life, he stood up and began walking out of the alley, looking around the road in case he saw anyone as he didn't want to be seen as weird or creepy for walking out of a dark alleyway after midnight.
Walking quickly and sticking to the main roads with street lamps on, Klay eventually returned home, and after confirming that his father wasn't waiting to question him for being out so late, changed out of his clothes. Hiding his bloody shirt and pants in the deeper corner of his closet, Klay laid down on his mattress and quickly passed out, exhausted.