"Tarin, wake up! This is no time for sleeping!" Zelina's shrill voice pierced through the fog of Tarin's unconsciousness. He cracked open one bleary eye to see his hyperactive classmate looming over him, her pigtails swinging violently.
"Wha...what's going on?" Tarin mumbled, still half-asleep.
"We've been summoned to another world, dummy! It was by a super powerful magic person. Look around you!" Tarin finally took stock of his surroundings. Instead of their everyday classroom, he, Zelina, and about twenty other students were sprawled out in a forest clearing, surrounded by towering alien trees and bizarre glowing mushrooms.
A command window had appeared before each of them, floating in midair:
"Welcome to the World of Renmara! You have been summoned as Otherworlders to aid us in our time of need. Based on your karma in your former world, you have been granted the following Skills and Classes..."
Tarin skimmed over his stats with trepidation. His jaw dropped.
"Background Character: Tarin
Level 1
Class: Commoner
Skills: Squat, Napping Mastery"
"Are you kidding me?" he shouted. "This has to be a joke!"
Zelina was bouncing up and down gleefully. "I got so lucky! I'm an Archpriest of the Sun God with crazy healing powers! This is going to be amazing!"
The other students' reactions ranged from dismay to delight as they received ridiculous classes like Pickpocket and Furmancer or overpowered ones like Dragonknight and Worldshaper.
Just then, the bushes parted, and a wizened old man with a crooked hat and robes that glittered like stars strode forward. Even bent with age, he had a commanding presence.
"Greetings, Oh Otherworlders!" he proclaimed in a reedy yet powerful voice. "I am Zythax the Eternal, and I have summoned you from your world to aid ours in its peril..."
As Zythax launched his grand speech about the rising Daemon Horde and the need for heroes, Tarin tuned him out and quietly opened his Commands interface.
"There has to be a way to get a less lame class and skills," he muttered. "If I'm getting trapped in another world, I at least want a cool power or two..."
To his surprise, a new option seemed to have appeared:
"Reroll karma expenditure? Yes/No"
Tarin held his breath and tapped the "Yes" option. Immediately, his vision blurred, and he felt a strange tingling sensation wash over his body. When his senses cleared, a new window appeared:
"Select skills to learn from the following options..."
A massive list began scrolling past, with skills ranging from mundane like "Soup Tasting" to overpowered like "Reality Restructuring." Tarin's eyes boggled at the absurd variety.
"How am I supposed to make sense of this chaos?" he muttered.
Just then, an option caught his eye - "Power Gaming: Understand and exploit the underlying rules of reality." A grin spread across his face as he selected it, along with some basic combat skills like Sword Mastery and Flames of Rebuke.
When he finished, his new stats window popped up:
Tarin
Level 1
Class: Commoner
Skills: Power Gaming, Sword Mastery, Flames of Rebuke, Squat, Napping Mastery
His eyes lit up as he read the Power Gaming description. This was precisely what he needed!
"Halt, foul demon!" Tarin looked up to see Zythax, the wizard, pointing a gnarled finger at him, blue flames dancing around his other hand. The other students backed away warily.
"I can sense the corruption growing within you," Zythax intoned. "You seek to break what you do not comprehend!"
Tarin rolled his eyes. "Relax, gramps. I'm just optimizing a little. If you wanted chumps like us to save your world, give better starting stats next time."
Before Zythax could respond, Tarin concentrated and activated Power Gaming. Immediately, his vision shifted as reality seemed to fragment into a matrix of code and digital information overlaying everything.
"What sort of devilry is this?" Zythax gasped, seeing the strange aura around Tarin.
"Just getting a look under the hood," Tarin muttered distractedly as he rapidly scanned through the torrent of data streams.
His eyes widened as he started finding entries like:
playerRestrictions = falseÂ
combatModifier = 10xÂ
lootQuality = maxRarityÂ
"Well, well... you really shouldn't leave cheat codes wide open like that," Tarin cackled as he manipulated the values.
The other students watched in awe and horror as Tarin's existence seemed to rewrite, lines of code visibly shifting around him. When the aura finally faded, he gave them a confident smirk.
"So, who wants a little gameplay advantage in this crazy world?"
Zelina and a few others immediately crowded around Tarin. The rest hung back warily.
"What did you just do?" Zelina demanded. "Your power level feels totally bonkers now!"
Tarin flashed her a cocky grin. "Let's just say this game world isn't going to play by the same rules for me. Or for anyone willing to learn my tricks..."
Zythax stepped forward, flames blazing in his eyes. "Enough of this farce! I shall remove this corruption from our realm at once!"
But before he could act, a massive bolt of lightning blasted from Tarin's outstretched hand, sending the old wizard crashing backwards in a heap of smouldering robes.
"Like I said," Tarin smirked, electricity still crackling around his fingers. "New rules."
As the bedraggled Zythax stared up at him in mute shock, Tarin knew his role in this world had drastically changed. No more being a mere background character.
From now on, he would be the star of his own fantasy adventure story, and he had every intention of winning by rewriting the rules.