Terrence yawned as he stretched, getting ready to turn off the TV for the night.
Standing and picking up the remote from the coffee table, his mother called out to him. " Put it on the news channel before you go to bed honey, oh and can you check if Lawrence has finished his homework before you go to bed?"
Terrence sighed and yawned again. " Yeah, no worries ma, good night."
"Good night honey." Came the reply from his mother as he walked upstairs and knocked on his brother's room.
*knock knock.*
"Lawrence, did you hear that?" Terrence asked through the door.
"Yeah, bro I'm just finishing now, fuck mathematics anyway, who needs this stuff?" His brother grumbled.
"He said he's done, ma!" Terrence yelled downstairs to his mother. "Night, little bro." He said, bumping his fist on the door before turning to his room and entering ducking down a bit as he did.
"Night, bro."
Terrace was a tall well built teenager reaching 6'8 and weighing 146kg he had broad shoulders and a chiselled handsome face with light blue almost gray eyes and sandy bland short hair, some of Terrence's friends complained to him sometimes about him winning the genetic lottery with his size and good looks joking with him with names such as Terrence the tank engine, heh jellyfish the lot of em.
Letting out another yawn, Terrence changed his clothes and lay down in his bed. Ready to turn in for the night. He'd had a long day at high school and was tired from studying, his last set of finals was coming up in the next few days and as it was his last year of high school he'd have to start looking at getting into a college or university.
He closed his eyes, and after some time tried to clear his mind of all these thoughts, or else he was afraid, he would never fall asleep, but after some time, he did.
Terrence felt like he was suddenly falling, a familiar feeling that made him jolt as it always had, but this time, it was different... Feeling a sudden change in environment made him swiftly wake up.
It was way too noisy. The sound of birds and insects filled his ears and the smell of crushed grass assaulted his nose making him prop himself up on an elbow to look around Terence found that he was in a small clearing surrounded by trees and all sides to his left, he could see the glimmer of water reflecting light from the sun through spaces between the trees and leaves.
"Ahem."
The sound of someone clearing their throat behind him made Terrence shoot to his feet and enter a defensive stance. This was already way too weird for his liking.
"Greetings, young lord to the infinite expense. My name is Sebastian, and it is my pleasure to guide and introduce you to the basics. First of all, take this potion and these scrolls, the potion will awaken your ability if you have one, and as for scrolls I will explain that after you are done." Sebastian said in an even voice while heading the potion and scrolls to the stunned Terrence before stepping back to stand beside a gateway-like structure filled with a pool of silvery-blue swirling liquid. He didn't know but it was something magical.
Terrence stared at the man dressed in a traditional black butler uniform who introduced himself as Sebastian, and then looked down at the red hp looking potion in his hand and shrugged.
There had been some rumors going around lately on the internet but they seemed to get tagged and deleted soon after appearing Terrence had still been fortunate enough to have seen one, it was of a man lifting water in the air and forming spears then firing them off like a rail gun into a patch of trees smashing them to pieces, some comments on the video said it was real but most were just exclaiming that it was nice cgi.
Terrence uncorked the potion raised it to his lips and in one go swallowed it down much to the surprise of Sebastian who had an eyebrow raised. "Usually they ask me 20 questions and go into a state of denial, or think that it's a dream. How very curious."
Nodding, Terrence replied. "That doesn't surprise me, I mean when you suddenly find yourself in an unfamiliar place with a stranger who just popped up out of nowhere... yeah people are going to get freaked out. But you're in luck this time Sebastian, I've seen something in my world so I know I'm not the first, am I right?"
Sebastian nodded and lightly pushed his glasses up his nose with a finger making them glint as they reflected the sunlight.
"That is indeed the case Young lord nor will you be the last as this expanse is well infinite." He paused and
Terrence noted that seemed to be mulling over his next words didn't mind and just waited for him to continue.
Finally, Sebastian spoke again. "Not that need to know, or rather that I have any business telling you this but, your world is just one of the newly awakened worlds to join the Infinite Expanse there have been countless before you. When a planet awakens and is added to the Infinite expanse its people between the ages 16 to 35 will be added to the aloted zone for your world within the first year, then every year henceforth all 16 years will also join."
Terrence was surprised to hear this, and his thoughts turned to Lawrence, his little brother would be turning 16 next year so that meant that he would be joining Terrence in the Infinite Expanse soon.
"Okay I understand, and thank you Sebastian for the information," Terrence said, smiling in gratitude.
Sebastian also gave a kindly smile and continued. "You're welcome young lord, now then on to business shall we? The Infinite Expanse is a place of great opportunity but also perilous dangers you and everyone else join as a lord with a small territory that you must build and guide its population to thrive, if you succeed power wealth and fame await you in your future, you might even gain immortality or ascend to godhood if you find yourself lucky enough. But with such opportunities comes the inherent risks, you will be forced to battle and protect your territory from beasts, monsters, and the other inhabitants of your world and others who will seek to take your resources and land for their own. If you lose your territory but do not die you can continue your journey in the Infinite Expanse by traveling around it and finding shelter in other lord's territories. If this does happen you will find the pace at which you gain strength will severely decline."
Sebastian then pointed to the gateway that he was standing next to. "This, young lord is your summoning gate, it can be activated once a day to summon a member of your race who will have their abilities or specific jobs such as civilian, blacksmith, soldier, etc, you can also activate it using mana stones which can be found inside monsters and a few other ways but I'll leave that up to you to find out."