Super Fracture.
It's been one of my favorite novels ever since I had discovered it a few years ago.
Before I had discovered this novel I had typically hovered around the transmigration and reincarnation type stories.
You know, the ones where some modern dude gets reincarnated to a medieval fantasy type world and discovers that he's got some super rare talent given by god.
The he goes on a journey, meets some people, kills a dragon, that kind of cliche type reincarnation story.
Of course I never actually read one as stereotypical as that, but they had similar kind of baseline.
Problem is, there's only oh so many stories in that genre one can read before they begin to run out of things to read.
So I began to expand my horizons a little bit.
Maybe a slice of life here. A romance or two. Perhaps dip my toes into a horror novel to see if it excites me.
But I always did favor the action and adventure type novels.
Boss fights, tournaments, training montages. I just found those types of literature more engaging for me.
Long story short, it meant that on my quest to sate my desire for another action packed novel, I had come across Super Fracture.
Superhero genre stories weren't rare per say, but that were more of a... comic book or manga type thing. That's what most people think of when they think of comic books right?
Upon reading Super Fracture for the first time though, I had immediately fallen in love with it.
The plot line of the novel was pretty much like this; everything was the same as normal earth, but one day people suddenly began to get mutations and put simply, started gaining super powers.
Not long after, the inhabitants of Super Fracture found that they were able to see statistic in some sort of window, that only themselves would be able to see.
Not a quest system or anything like that, hell it would be more accurate to call it basically just a status window more than anything, but it was still similar to the system that a lot of popular characters in system novels got. .
It basically just showed people their 7 stats ranking from F rank to SSS, and the stats were as follows.
[Strength]: A measure of pure physical capability in terms of weight, typically connected to Endurance and Power.
[Dexterity] A measure of skill, both with one's body and abilities, typically connected to Intelligence.
[Endurance] A measure of how well one can withstand external stimuli or how long one can last for such as a persons innate stamina, constitution, or mental resilience, typically connected to Strength, and Intelligence.
[Intelligence]: A measure of ones intellectual prowess and processing speed, helps one not only perceive the world around them faster, but also to make better judgement and less susceptible to mental afflictions. Typically connected to Dexterity, Endurance, and Charm.
[Agility]: A measure of ones physical speed and ability to accelerate, decelerate, and change directions quickly. Typically connected to Dexterity, and Power.
[Power]: A measure of how much energy one is capable of exerting, can range anywhere from physical ability, to superpowered abilities. Typically connected to Strength, Endurance, and Speed.
[Charm]: A measure of ones ability to mentally affect others, both subconsciously and consciously. Typically connected to Intelligence.
Those were the 7 base stats of the novel.
The status window also showed any unique "traits" that people possessed which were equally, if not more important that peoples stats.
The one catch of it though was that you could only see your own status window unless someone had a trait specifically related to detecting information about that status window.
Now it should be known that Super Fracture didn't take place right as this transformation to the world happened, it had actually been a few decades or so since this happened to when the actual start of the story took place.
It was about the story of the protagonist, a superhero by the name of Silver Valkyrie or more commonly referred to as Silver.
It followed her journey of moving through the superhero rankings, fighting villains, and growing stronger.
It also had a decent power progression. As mentioned before, the stats were ranked from F to SSS, but changing that ranking was quite arduous.
Most people would get their rank for a certain stat and stay at that same rank for the rest of their life.
It was possible to train these stats to increase them further, as well as there being certain drugs or people with certain powers which could boost these stats, but these weren't as accessible to the common people in the novel.
For Silver of course, she gained access to all of these throughout the novel, but the most easily accessible one, training, was also the hardest, and couldn't drastically change those stats.
The other important part of characters in the story, was their traits.
Traits were for lack of better words, abilities that people had.
They weren't ranked in any way shape or form, although some were obviously much better than others, seeing as they were unique or specific to only a single character.
Traits were also important because while people could typically use their full stats in their normal bodies, some people could only unleash their full stats while using their traits, which also typically had transformative abilities tied with them.
For example Silver was known as Silver Valkyrie because her trait transformed her into what a lot of people said looked like an angel or Valkyrie of some sort.
She would grow grey feathered wings along her back and also grow feathers throughout the rest of her body alongside roughly doubling in size when using her trait to its full extent.
Most other people in the novel were like that as well, at least most of the important people.
Simply put, using ones traits meant that they would transform into a sort of battle mode, typically growing bigger and gaining extra limbs or noticeable changes in their physical appearance.
Most people either had only 1 or no traits at all, normal civilians usually being the people who had none, but some people, such as our Protagonist Silver, had more than one.
For example Silvers most unique trait, and frankly most important one was [Nebulous Mind]. Basically giving her the innate talent and potentially to have some of the strongest mental abilities on the planet.
This trait primarily focused on mental abilities, including things such as telekinesis, memory manipulation, mind reading, Telepathy, and other advanced cognitive functions, which she further unlocked and progressed throughout the story.
She also had a few other traits but they were primarily supporting traits compared to the key [Nebulous Mind].
This trait also made it so that her baseline [Intelligence] stat, started out at an A rank, with a LOT of room for improvement.
Someone who started out with a higher stat meant that their potential was greater for that specific trait.
For example a person who had a [Dexterity] rating of F could maybe get it to E or D depending on how much help or how many resources they got to improve it.
Meanwhile a person who started off with a dexterity rating of B could more likely get theirs to S rank if they worked hard enough.
That may be the same amount of jumps in terms of ranks, however as one got higher in the ranks, the abilities got exponentially stronger.
It wasn't as simple as "2 D ranks equals a C rank" and "4 D ranks equals a B rank".
No, it was more of a "1 C rank equals 50 D ranks" and "1 B rank equals 1000 D ranks".
Simply put, the power progression system wasn't linear, it was exponential.
However at that rate, the world would have probably ended based on the insane amount of overpowered people in the world, so luckily people with that amount of talent an luck were few and far between.
Thankfully the author of Super Fracture realized that, otherwise I don't think even Silver would have been able to live for very long.
While she did eventually become the ace of the Hero association, and the number 1 ranked Hero in the world, that was well into the story, about 5 years in in fact.
She started out as a mid ranking hero, courtesy of her already absurd talents.
That's where my problem arises though.
Gathering my breath, I once again look down at the floating man still talking to the officer.
That symbol on his cape was unmistakable. Hell it was the logo on the cover of the novel so I got to see it basically daily.
Luckily I don't look like much of a creep as a few other people both on my side of the street and across the street also are looking off from their balconies seeing what the noise is due to.
So much so in fact that I actually hear the sliding of another balcony door off to my left and see a man with what appears to be a beard made of wood step onto his balcony off to my left.
He briefly looked down on the street, before noticing me to his side, and speaking.
"Good morning! Looks like they've caught an early patroller today eh?"
He says before chuckling.
I simply stare at him and thankfully unconsciously nod and chuckle nervously back with him before walking back into the apartment and slamming the door shut.
Am I in a novel?
Am I in Super Fracture to be precise?
I can feel my breathing becoming increasingly erratic, as my mind begins to twist.
"Hooooooh"
'Take a deep breath Zalen' I think to myself.
I close my eyes and take a slow drawn out inhale, before exhaling slowly as well.
I lean back against the wall before slowly lowering myself to floor. All while taking deep breaths.
That would certainty explain everything I've seen so far.
The weird mutated looking people.
The seemingly normal city life that continues moving despite the alien elements.
The man with the cape.
The Association symbol.
That has to be it.
If it was any one single of those elements maybe I could write it off as a coincidence.
Say, maybe I just so happened to come a cross a fellow Super Fracture fan in cosplay, I.E. the man with the cape.
But the city?
The People?
The Powers?
I can't think of anything else.
Of course that still doesn't explain where the hell I am, what I'm doing here, and what's going on.
But at least I would be at least a little more knowledgeable about my surroundings?
Hell who am I kidding...
I just want to know what's going on.
I mean, if I really am in Super Fracture that would be awesome but...
Standing up from my scrunched up position off the kitchen floor, I glance towards the kitchen. Thankfully It looks like the apartment does have a fridge, and what looks like a pantry.
Approaching the pantry I open it up to find...
Ramen.
... Honestly I kind of expected it to be empty like the rest of the place.
Oh? Wait?
There's also some breakfast bars, and a couple of other snack such as chips, nuts and a couple of candy bars.
Grabbing two breakfast bars from the box, I briefly peel it and inspect it, making sure that I'm not eating something weird.
I don't recognize the brand after all, and I proceed to take a bite before walking back to the bedroom.
God, I don't know if I had just noticed or if It was my nerves or what, I'm actually starving.
makes some kind of sense I guess.
As I wolf down the rest of the bar, I toss the second one on top of the blanket on the bed before opening the bathroom door and walking inside.
Still empty.
Stepping inside and locking the door behind me, I turn to the sink and turn on the water.
However, upon looking at the mirror above the sink I freeze.
...An unknown face stares back at me.