A new day, a cautious pat on the shoulder from my new acquaintance Andreas, an annoying whistle, cold, and pain in stiffened muscles... Good fucking morning, world!Again the canteen and the same disgusting gray slop. Ni, what's my status?STATUS: Health: 82%; Stamina: 70% Alertness: 86% Hunger: 1% Thirst: 10%Urgent food consumption recommended, critical hunger level!Thanks for the advice, as if I can't feel it myself, damn it! But where, my dear Ni, do you see food here?! Can you tell me what this slop is made of?Information unavailable. Unable to analyze composition.You can't even analyze the composition... Well, there's no choice. I take a deep breath and decisively swallow as much of this crap as I can. The main thing is not to think about the nasty taste, don't think about the nasty taste... With difficulty, I finish consuming the unsightly breakfast and sigh heavily. Phew, at least I've slightly quenched my hunger.Next is distribution with a new duty officer. This time a woman in her forties is assigning us. She has the same look, the same absent expression as her predecessor. Andreas and I are assigned to "cleaning." My acquaintance's face expresses dislike and even disgust, and I hurry to mimic something similar, not even knowing what this cleaning means. Now I'll have to follow my poorly thought-out cover story, shit!I hurry after Andreas to the administrative building. "Cleaning" turns out to be washing all the personal rooms of the chiefs of this fucking concentration camp. On the plus side - there are almost no guards here, you can even talk quietly. This quickly becomes a downside - Andreas won't shut up. Oh yes, there's another downside... It's so filthy here!I try not to ask anything more to avoid ruining the fragile cover story, and I pray that Andreas doesn't remember about the escape plan. And he seems to have forgotten about it completely. He babbles all sorts of nonsense, some local gossip mixed with stories from his life. As if I'm interested in his gray slave life!"They say Tate from the administration is interested in boys. And yesterday a new slave arrived, a prisoner of war from the Edinheim Republic. Their ship was completely destroyed, only he survived! And they continue to build the fleet, cutting down forests by hectares. Soon the forest people will start to protest, I'm sure. By the way, here's something else I didn't tell you! When I lived in slavery with that woman, I even ate meat sometimes, so delicious! You can't imagine..."This stream of words doesn't end, I sincerely regret meeting this fool Andreas. He keeps squawking, but I barely listen to him, just nodding like a bobblehead. Why do I need his stories about fat women and prisoners of war, I need to escape from here! Home, to Earth... How ironic, and I thought my life would finally get better after that mission... The first cosmonaut to scan an anomaly and return from it alive - Alexander Voidovsky. I thought my father would finally be proud of me...A guard's shout pulls me out of my thoughts. Andreas has already managed to fall silent and start pretending to work diligently."Hey, you, go down to the chief, now," this guy seems to be addressing me, "move it, or you'll be left without dinner."Dinner, yeah, right, what a grand word he chose. I obediently follow him, leaving Andreas to scrub the rooms.The guard leads me into some bedroom, but for some reason stays outside himself. I don't like this...After a few minutes, that same fat man I saw on the day of my arrival appears from another door. Instead of a black suit, he's wearing a strange blue robe, barely closing over his fat, folded belly. I really fucking don't like this!"Well, come in, why are you standing there," the fat man's voice is disgustingly sweet today, "I don't bite. I thought from the first day that you were the same as me, your face is too pretty. And when I was sure - I immediately asked to invite you.""W-what are you sure about? What do you mean 'the same'?" I have bad suspicions, but I really hope I'm wrong... This is just some kind of mistake, right?Judging by the surroundings and the interlocutor's behavior, he is sexually aroused and wants to...Oh, shut up, Ni, I didn't ask you at all who wants what!Meanwhile, the fat man confirms Ni's guess:"I think you have the same views on life. Let's have some fun together, and I'll help you settle in our camp. You'll get food, maybe even move to another room!"Very tempting, fuck. I'm already running and taking off my pants, or rather my gray robe. No, I had many admirers on Earth, but they were all girls! This is the first time I've been taken for gay."I'm not gay, you horny fat ass!" I shout, losing control of myself in anger. "Go to hell with your rooms and food!"I try to run out of the room, but suddenly the same guard who escorted me here enters. Apparently, he was guarding outside. I don't care, I won't tolerate this disgusting place anymore! Ni, what's my unarmed combat skill?Unarmed combat: 16 out of 100Not a very high score of course, but I'm definitely going to improve it on these perverts now.I sharply kick the guard in the front of his shins, and taking advantage of his momentary delay due to the pain piercing the bastard's leg, I punch him in the face with delight. How they've pissed me off, the whole camp, all these guards, this whole damn place! I land a few more blows, then knee him in the stomach and continue pummeling his face with my fists, turning the overseer's physiognomy into a bloody mess. The element of surprise played in my favor, the guard is now too busy defending himself to go on the offensive. I manage to land a few more blows before something hard and heavy hits me on the back of the head. Mistakenly thinking that reinforcements from the guards have arrived, I turn around and see the fat man with a club in his hands. This time is just enough for the beaten guard to grab me, knock me to the ground, and tie my hands.+3 to "Unarmed combat" skill. Unarmed combat: 19 out of 100STATUS: Health: 75%; Stamina: 52% Alertness: 80% Hunger: 28% Thirst: 30%"This bozoprat, I'll kill him, I'll flog him to death!" the fat man fumes, finally removing that sickly sweet intonation from his no less disgusting voice."Hmm, he's not bad," the beaten guard unexpectedly says, surprising both the fat man and me, "we could try him out.""What? Try him out?" Tate's eyes light up. "Are you suggesting sending this pretty face for beating? To the pits?""Yes, exactly. What, would it be better if he's flogged and sent to dig in the mine? This klutz is much better in a fight than in cleaning and other routine," the guard convinces Tate.I glance at the guard's chest and notice that a small piece of cloth depicting three red drops is sewn to his armor. I haven't seen anything like this on other overseers. Apparently, this man is not the last person in this camp."Bah, do what you want with him," the fat man gives up. "Just bring me someone at least half as pretty as him by the end of the day.""Deal," the guard nods and turns his gaze to me. "And you - quickly lower your fists and march after me. And no foolishness, or you'll quickly get it from me and be sent back here to old Tate, only tied up."I only notice for a second some kind of inscription above the head of the overseer talking to me, but it immediately disappears. What was that just now? "Level 8"? Or did I imagine it...? I'll have to ask Ni what inscriptions it sends me when not asked.The guard leads me out of Tate's quarters and takes me to another edge of the camp past barns and descents leading to the mines. I've never been here before. He leads me to a small but rather sturdy little shed, where it's impossible to even lie down due to the cramped space, and locks me inside."Stay here. Consider today your day off," the guard with three drops on his chest tells me. "In the evening, I'll come back for you and tell you what future awaits you in the fighting pits. Stay quiet and don't attract unnecessary attention to yourself. Otherwise, I'll have to punish you so that you won't be able to use your tongue anymore. Got it?"I let out some irritated growl from behind the shed door, but the guard takes this as my agreement with his words. The man's footsteps recede, I angrily punch the cold, loose earth, and a wave of dust mixed with sand washes over me.The situation is starting to appeal to me less and less. It seems this time I'm really in trouble. Looks like I have a talent. No, seriously, no jokes! I had a whole world, and I crawled into one single wormhole located somewhere far beyond the moon and ended up... in a completely different world, but not only that, my ass was carried to the shittiest place possible - a slave camp. But I didn't stop there. Alexander fucking Voidovsky never stops, and now I'm in the worst place of the worst place - in a fucking shed, from which I'll be delivered straight to some fighting pits.I recommend the user to prepare for the upcoming fights. You have unallocated skill points...Don't bother me, Ni!I wave away the appearing messages.I've been worthless all my life, since childhood; so why am I surprised now? When my older brother studied diligently, I fooled around, looked for friends on the street, only angering my old man. What did I achieve in the end? Became a cosmonaut? That's not even my achievement... And if you think about it, what then is my achievement?Your nervous system is perfectly suited for using all the functions of the neurointerface. And you're missing out on this opportunity too, Alexander.Missing out on an opportunity? Alright, you win, Ni. I have plenty of time anyway. Give me a tour of your menu or whatever you wanted to do. I don't want to miss the last opportunity I have left in this life.Ni literally blossoms, covering my entire field of vision with various messages, but they all come together to form the main menu.STATUSCHARACTERISTICSSKILLSPERKSCRAFTINGYou're familiar with the status menu, but I'll still stop and tell you about some details. Your health, stamina, and other indicators are calculated by me and have a certain size. For your convenience, a percentage of the total number is displayed so as not to strain your brain unnecessarily, but it's useful to know the absolute sizes of your parameters as well. Want to take a look?"Go ahead," I say out loud. "Nothing else to do anyway."Detailed status menu: Health: 345 / 460 units. (75%) Stamina: 205 / 392 units. (52%)The limit of these units can increase or decrease depending on the lifestyle you lead and how you distribute skill points, which I mentioned earlier. For example, now your Health limit is 460 units. If you regularly eat, train, and exercise, you can raise it to 1000 or more. If you do exactly the opposite, your Health can decrease to a critical mark of 50 units. People with a lower limit usually die very quickly.You can also use earned (or in other words, developed by me) skill points to increase your status indicators. I can improve the health and stamina of your body through the nervous system, but the result will be much better if you monitor your condition in a team with me."That makes sense. It's just that here I can't eat normally, and it's very difficult to take care of my health. Let's move on to the next menus. Maybe there will be something useful there," I address Ni.The next menu is the Characteristics Menu. It describes the basic features of your body, fully characterizing your capabilities.Strength: 6 out of 10. Agility: 4 out of 10. Intelligence: 6 out of 10. Will: 5 out of 10. Charisma: 8 out of 10.These indicators are composed of both innate traits of your body and life experience acquired later. I cannot change these parameters using skill points, but I can temporarily increase them when it's extremely necessary, however, as you know, everything has its price."Pretty average characteristics I have... Although, what did I expect, really?" I grumble.I would rate your characteristics as "Above average". You surpass most Earthlings since you underwent a series of trainings to become a cosmonaut."Okay, that's more or less clear too, shall we move on?" I say to Ni, finally relaxing and moving to the adjacent wall of the shed, hoping that the pebbles won't dig into my ass as much as in the previous position.The Skills menu is the most important menu for us. This is where my power is broadest, as most skills are directly related to the nervous system. Which means - I can influence them."Skills - is that something like Unarmed Combat and such?" I clarify.Correct, only in reality there are an infinite number of them. I can show you any of your skills, from Unarmed Combat to playing ping-pong. However, I won't display such a voluminous list on the interface, I'll just show you the most important skills for you and those skills that you've improved recently. If you want to see other skills that interest you, let me know and I'll show them to you.Unarmed combat: 19 out of 100. Stealth: 10 out of 100. Endurance: 29 out of 100. Eloquence: 31 out of 100. Survival: 20 out of 100. First aid: 19 out of 100. Agriculture: 15 out of 100. ... and so on.You can improve each of these skills by training them on your own. You've already seen this when you raised "Unarmed combat" twice. But your abilities will grow much faster if you use the points I mentioned earlier."Shit... If I understand you correctly, I can gain any experience and gradually transfer it into whatever skill I want?" my thoughts start to stir in search of interesting options. "Um... Look, Ni, for example... If I read various literature for one day, gain enough experience, and then you can redirect this experience to develop my combat skills?"Correct."Even if I read a gardening manual in a slave camp?"Correct. It all depends on the quantity and quality of the acquired experience. You can do the opposite too. You can gain physical experience by training and experiencing various new feelings, and then level up the Agriculture you so badly need."Damn... You know how to joke!" I'm genuinely surprised. "Was I wrong about you?"That's why your intelligence corresponds to 6, not 7. It's a fine line."Alright, alright, I get it! How do I lower your humor percentage? I think I've seen this in some movie..."Unfortunately for you, my humor percentage is not adjustable, like the robot in "Interstellar"."What, you've watched that movie? Ah, what a stupid question..."I'm merely using your memory. Nothing more. Shall we finish exploring the menu?"Wait, wait, I think there were a few more sections!"I'll explain the Perks menu to you a bit later, for now you won't be able to use it fully anyway. You're already somewhat familiar with the Crafting menu. You can create various items and structures with my guidance and are limited only by available materials and your skill levels."I see. I hope I can create a rope and hang myself if they send me back to that fat pervert..."The last thing I'm going to show in this mini-guide is your experience bar.Currently, you have 115 out of 100 XP. You need to confirm the transition to Level 2 by ordering me to send one unallocated point where you wish.This evening they'll take me to the fighting pits... Obviously, I need to continue improving my Unarmed Combat."How much will my 'Unarmed combat' skill increase if I put one point into it now?" I ask.Calculating... At this stage - by 5 units. The higher the skill, the harder it will be to level up. For now, you're just at the beginning of your journey."Excellent, put it in," I command.Accepted. Unarmed combat: 24 out of 100 You have reached Level 2. Your experience bar: 115 out of 250 XP.Excellent... The neurointerface is much more useful than I thought. God, what an idiot I was when I ignored it! I won't make such a mistake again. I'll start gaining experience... Right now. In this shed, I can do push-ups and stretch other muscles. By evening, when they come for me, I'll be even stronger. I'll survive these fights and definitely find a way to escape from here, no matter what it costs me!