"Preposterous!"
A sudden outburst by a young almost adult like man would happen, in a scene where almost it was as if sci-fi.
The walls were dark, many monitors displayed as well as workers having their own computers to work at, along with seats and desks separated by a foot. It's as if they were a rather secret organization, maybe the government even.
Many people would look at the man who had shouted the word from earlier, a woman, tall as him would approach while raising an eyebrow.
"Can't you be quiet? You know we are all working here."
She said in an annoyed fashion, her tongue clicking along with her words, the man would look at her, his face distorted with a twisted and crazy smile.
This made her expression shift, now being curious as she looked at him worried. With the two now engaging a conversation.
"..tell me."
"It.. It's fascinating! Glorious and revolutionary! Compared to those who have it.. This.. This one might be able to conquer Earth! Heck, even the entire Universe! Maybe.."
"Maybe.. What?"
"Maybe even different universes!"
He exclaimed loudly, just enough for the group of people to perk their heads up to look at the man, everyone's eyes widened at the words he had said except for him and her.
The woman was shocked, she has never seen him act like this before, but if it's this incredible.. Then maybe she can believe him.
"What do you.. Mean by that?"
She asked, her expression now slowly forming a nervous yet excited smile, the excitement and the thrill was coursing through everyone in the big dark room, mostly filled with the blue lights of the monitors as they were being shaken by this man's words.
"It means.. It shall be a game changer. To our problematic world."
---
In the world of Earth, there has been many stories or shows where a person obtains a life changing system, be it here, or in another world.
But what if.. They were more than that? Rather than your typical level up system, or maybe status system. What if there was something more terrifying?
As the narrating yap ends, a room would be shown, a guy's room to be specific.
"Eugh.. Damn it, what's the time?"
A young man, almost likely a young adult still in his teens would sit up on the bed, yawning and stretching his arms as he sighed, turning to his desk to see it was 9 AM already. Which was the starting time of his school. Oh, and his name is Zodiac.
"Oh shit."
He said to himself before beginning to do what most students do, rush things.
He would jump off the bed and grab his uniform, before taking a look at the mirror and taking a sniff from his collarbone, he smelled rather.. decent.
"Why did I have to stay up and grind with her last night?!"
He said, his tone being annoyed and mad even though he brought it to himself.
He lived alone meaning he was solely independent on himself, being able to handle the adult life while still being in high school as a late teen.
As he entered the bathroom while dragging his uniform along with him. With a minute gone, he was instantly ready and clean, despite not showering, he used deodorant and some cologne. Who doesn't?
"The time.. the time.."
He muttered to himself as he went down stairs in a rush, grabbing his bag in the couch on the living room as he stared at the clock at the wall, it was now 9:03 AM.
"I can probably make it if I run.. Maybe, think think.."
He kept muttering to himself before shaking his head, composing and calming down, deciding to grab his bag and grabbing the keys to his house as he opened the front door.
"You're up early."
His best friend greeted him at his front porch, where she was waiting. Zodiac being confused, he would look at her then at the time.
"Wait.. But it's 9:05?"
"Dude.. Your clock is broken, it's only 8:35."
Zodiac being stupid, had forgotten the recent events last night, where he may or may not have tampered with his own clock.
"Yeah.. Broken.. Anyway, you're waiting for me as always aren't you Chai?"
"Obviously, who else?"
"My bad, forgot you get lonely without muv .. Ow."
After his sentence, he would receive a strong punch on his arm, making him only react the slightest as he chuckled.
His best friend, Chai, was a tomboy, despite her girlish assets, if you know you know. She had short hair which almost resembled a pixie bob cut, although her attitude isn't as girly as the other things.
Zodiac would lock his front door before walking along with Chai, as they leave his home.
The two beginning to walk to school as they see other students with the same uniform as them. Yet they paid no attention, they were more focused on talking to each other while they continued walking.
"Did you even sleep Chai? Like, I slept at midnight after we finished mining for coal."
"That depends if you want to know or you're just curious if I ACTUALLY slept or not."
"I'm genuinely asking here, even if you have a face like that, it can easily be ruined with a punch or maybe eyebags."
"Funny. And yes I did sleep after you did, I just went to make some armor made of platinum."
"...when did you have platinum bars?"
"When I went mining after you slept, duh."
"I absolutely hate you."
"I love you too man. Oh right! Did you hear about the rumors going on in Chirps?"
"I barely go active on Chirps.. The people there are a bit too sensitive and will take anything seriously, be it their fictional characters or games."
"Fair, but really! I found a thread about some anonymous user saying they have some sort of like.. Game system appearing whenever they try to do something, some pics were even shown!"
"You sure it isn't CGI? I mean, a lot of people wish to have that kind of experience. I can't relate to them though."
"Trust me, it isn't, but when I went back to check the thread again. Poof. Gone."
"Gone? Don't tell me he got ratted out for making his editing a bit too obvious."
"No like, gone gone. The account was gone permanently, the thread disappeared along with it.. Don't you think it's suspicious?"
"As long as it doesn't bother me. Maybe he got hired or something that's why he had to lay low."
"I guess.. Man if only I had a game system like that, it would be cool picking stuff or maybe leveling up!"
"You leveling up? I doubt you would make any progress."
"Who was it that lost to me in a 1v1 on a game he was, quote on quote. 'Goated' at?"
"...you win this time."
Chai chuckled in a happy fashion as she wrapped an arm over Zodiac's neck, as he sighed, not minding it nor her chest touching his arm. They've been childhood friends ever since then, making their bond a bit unbreakable.
Some students from their class would see them entering the school gate as they talked.
"Man.. Lucky guy having a girl like that with him."
"I bet I can pull a girl like her or maybe herself easily, heh."
"Dude, you literally fumbled a 10/10 by using the corniest pickup line."
"Just because I said: Should we get a coffee? Because I like you a latte. Does not mean I failed."
"She literally slapped your face."
---
After some cruel hours of tedious studying, Zodiac would be busy, staring at the window due to him being at the far right edge of the class. Meanwhile, Chai was in front of him.
She would turn behind her to look at Zodiac while raising an eyebrow.
"You thinking about something?"
"No.. I felt like I saw something fall outside."
Zodiac was confused himself as well, expression curious and cautious at the same time. When he wasn't paying to his teacher, he saw a darkish sphere falling from the sky. Which raised suspicion as to what it is.
"I'll go check it out. You coming?"
Chai would think for a bit before hearing her other friends from other classes call for her.
"Well, I don't think I can, gotta hangout with them you know?"
"Finally. I can have some time away from you."
Zodiac said with a relieved face before receiving another punch on the arm, the two of them exchanged a laugh before going their opposite ways.
Both would wave goodbye as they walked at a different hall, him being alone while she had a couple of friends.
Of course it was normal for him to be alone, heck, he enjoys it surprisingly. Which not most people can relate to of course.
Heading outside and walking around, he would try to find the darkish sphere at the middle of the schoolyard.
Many students walking around, either a grade higher or a grade lower, it was hard to find it especially when he somehow forgot where it landed.
"Where the fuck is it.."
He sighed while scratching his head, walking around even more before seeing a tree in front of him, and what else? The darkish sphere resting at the side of the bark of the tree.
"Found it!"
He ran towards it and grabbed it, holding it up to him to get a better look to see it was a perfectly circle, no broken edges no unbalanced curve, it was the perfect sphere.
"I wonder what this is.."
Suddenly, a countdown would appear in the sphere, starting from 5 then beginning to count down as he raised an eyebrow, curious if this would explode or do anything at all.
Then out of nowhere, another voice would call out for him.
"Hey! Let go of that sphere!"
Zodiac would raise his head up and look at the random student calling for him, they were running as if they were in a hurry to catch up to him, it was a guy that looked very weird, his bangs were covering his eyes while he had blonde hair, until he recognized it.
"Wait.. You're the president of the school-"
Then the countdown reached to zero.
---
Zodiac would open his eyes to see he was still in school, but the place was darkened, the students gone, the place all dark and dim.
"What.. What the fuck is this place?"
Until a system like screen would pop in front of him, causing him to stumble back down, his back hitting against the hard wood of the tree as he winced in pain.
"Shit.. What the hell?"
[VN System... Now Online. Greetings Owner.]
"Is this.. Real? No way.."
Zodiac was surprised at the sudden game like system that has appeared in front of him, he stood up slowly as reaches out to it, only for his hand to phase through before pulling it back to him.
"I'm starting to believe Chai might be telling the truth.."
He sighed, now hating the fact that his best friend was telling the truth to him, the system then spoke again.
[Mission: Survive for 1 hour.]
"Survive? Survive? You're joking right?"
The screen disappeared as he sighed, looking around to see the school still dimly light and dark, but he was curious, what did the system mean by survive?
"I guess I'll hide somewhere.. But where is a good place to hide?"
He began thinking, looking at the big school building in front of him, or the small storage building at the side, he had two choices, one was pretty obvious for him to get seen, and the other is a good choice to run and hide.
Of course he picked the storage building.
"I mean, if someone's going to find me then surely they'll have to go to the school building right?"
He said confidently before running towards the storage building, he entered and saw it mostly random stuff for school events as well as sporting events.
Closing the door, he walked around seeing it was dark but enough to see to where he headed.
Then the system's screen popped up once again.
[Spawning..]
"Should I be worried for my safety.."
He said before rushing around to see multiple lockers, hiding inside one of them as the screen stayed, the word: Spawning. Was still on it.
"What are you even going to spawn?"
[Spawning complete.]
[Creature: Corrupted Angel.]
[Time: 00:56:21]
"..this is bull."
Outside of the school, a blinding yellow light would appear from above. An angelic figure would slowly float down, although they had their head decapitated, no blood coming out. But a weird black liquid resting on it.
The black wings would open as they landed on their feet, having a yellow and white robe, opposite of the color of their wings.
Their body resembling a woman's as well, then summoning a golden infused dark spear, moving their neck as they would look around, before pointing the edge of the spearhead towards a tree near the storage building.
A huge blast would come out of it, instantly disintegrating the tree and half of the building due to how big it was.
Luckily, Zodiac was at the other side. Leaving him unscathed yet, peeking through the little holes of the locker, he witnessed what just happened.
"Am.. Am I going to die?"
He couldn't crack a joke nor swear in the current situation he was in, all he felt was fear and anxiety, causing him to breathe rapidly as he clutched his chest, trying to calm himself down.
"No.. No. I can't die. I have to survive.. This.."
A small part inside of his mind would flicker, a smirk forming in his lips as he clutched his chest harder.
"This is amazing."
[Ongoing Mission: Survive.]
[Time: 00:54:01]