Samuel woke up feeling tired.

  He reached around to check for his phone, wondering what time it was. When he didn’t find it, he looked outside the window, trying to see how intense the sun was.

  What he saw outside brought him back to reality.

  Instead of the tall fence he was expecting to see from his room window, he was greeted by a field of grass that stretched as far as he could see. The absurd sight was enough to bring back memories of the previous day and drive away any lingering thoughts of going back to sleep.

  He looked around and finally found his phone on the ground, his excitement flaring up at that. He quickly brought it under control as he tried to remember exactly what happened just before he fell asleep. Though he hoped it was his telekinesis attempts that sent the phone to the floor, he knew that was far from guaranteed. He was a fairly mobile sleeper, and it would not be the first time he kicked his phone off the bed in his sleep.

  Unfortunately, he could not find any confirmation as he scanned his memories. He only remembered sending a burst of psi at the phone before falling asleep. That could have achieved nothing for all he knew.

  After a few minutes of searching yielded no results, he decided to abandon it. He could always continue his experiments later in the day. First of all, though, he had a few things he needed to confirm.

  A quick glance at the phone told him it was a few minutes to ten, which caused him to frown. He was certain he hadn’t slept late the previous night. From experience, he should be refreshed after sleeping for over twelve hours. That he still felt tired implied that there was an issue somewhere.

  Sure enough, he found the culprit after only a moment of searching. Though he was still too unskilled to properly gauge his mental energy capacity, he found that it had not fully recovered.

  It was a bit worrying that it took so long to refill, seeing as he did not even finish using all of it in the first place, but there was little he could do about it. He hoped it was something that would resolve itself soon, or his telekinetic dreams might be dead on arrival.

  He opened his status to see a blinking notification at the top corner of his vision. A message took its place when he selected ut.

  Congratulations. You have gained the skill, Telekinesis level 1

  Telekinesis - You have begun to walk the path of the mind. Uses mental energy to bend the world to your will. Control, power and range increase with level.

  Samuel stared at the message in front of him with not a small amount of excitement. All his worries and doubts about the outcome of the previous night's training melted away as he read the skill description.

  [Telekinesis]

  He took a small notebook and held it in his hand, eager to test his new skill. Activating it was as simple as just thinking about it, and the skill did its work. Unlike his clumsy and inefficient attempts the day before, his mental energy flowed smoothly this time, and he found that he could control the quantity that went into it. He put just a small amount, hoping to have an idea of how much was needed.

  The moment he confirmed his desire to let it float over his hands, the notebook shot up until it was hovering a full metre over his hand. It certainly overshot his goal by more than half a metre, but that wasn’t enough to dampen his excitement at all. One thing that was immediately clear was that though the initial cost had consumed a chunk of his psi, keeping it up in the air cost almost nothing. He could still feel the amount trickling through his connection to maintain the book, but it was something he could keep up for a long time.

  His attempt to spin the book in the air was met with more limited success. He quickly discovered that his control was not quite good enough for that. There were times when he managed to get a relatively smooth full rotation but he simply ended up opening the book or jerking it around more often than not.

  He was at least able to get the book to land gently on his palm without much issue. It was still not as smooth as he would have liked, but that would improve with time.

  Activating the skill once more, he made the book hover above his hand again. This time though, he reduced the amount of psi he put in and consciously willed it to rise slowly. It obeyed, much to his delight, and rose at a more measured pace, though still a little faster than he would have preferred.

  It was with great pain that he decided to end his experiments there at the moment. As much as he disliked it, Samuel knew that he would spend the whole day experimenting if he did not stop at that moment.

  Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

  A fun thought, but an impractical one given his conditions.

  The world had changed. In what ways that was, Samuel did not know how, but it would be dangerous to pretend otherwise. He went to pick up his bound weapon, taking comfort in its cold grip, and went over his situation.

  He knew there were now levels and a system in the world that could actually give skills and abilities, like a video game. He also knew that he was currently level one, which had to be the bottom of the barrel.

  The existence of animals with levels was also something he was sure of, given the one he had killed, That was his biggest cause for worry at the moment. The odds that the snake was the only levelled animal around were almost nonexistent. Certainly not odds he would bet on.

  Another thing came to his mind. He remembered the message he had gotten at the start of the whole system nonsense. The system had talked about a tutorial, but mentioned his level was too high. He supposed it would be safe to assume that the tutorial only took people below level one. Though he was not so arrogant as to think he was the only one that managed to hit level one before the start of the tutorial, it was unlikely that most people managed it. Which meant he could likely assume that most people would not be around, presumably learning about the system in some other place.

  Something that worried him was the mention of dungeons. The system had said something about creating world dungeons. He was not completely sure what that meant, but dungeons usually meant either prisons, or monsters. Neither of those were good, and considering the situation, it was likely monsters.

  For a moment, the thought that he could be trapped in a dungeon struck him, and panic nearly filled him before he came back to his senses. Surely the system or whoever was responsible for the entire situation would have no reason to do something like that. He did not know much about it but it didn’t seem malicious or interested in actually killing them.

  It was unlikely that he would be trapped in a dungeon for any reason.

  He took stock of his weapons after that, somewhat disappointed to know that he only had a walking stick and two kitchen knives. They were sharp knives, but he still did not like those odds. Perhaps he should have listened to his grandmother and bought a machete.

  A bit more concerning was the food he currently had. There was enough to last him for a few weeks if he stretched it, but it was not something he felt confident in. Especially since the electricity was still down. A lot of his food would go bad if he couldn’t store it in the refrigerator.

  There was not much he could do about it except try to ration what he ate and hope for the best. So he went to freshen up for the day before taking a few slices of bread to eat.

  Checking the door, he found it was no longer locked, though he resisted the temptation to go outside immediately. It would be stupid to go outside when he was not completely prepared for what he would face. His offensive skills were currently limited to [Staff Proficiency] [Telekinesis].

  So he spent the rest of the morning alternating between practising with his weapons and his telekinesis. The training was fairly productive, all things considered. He thought his skill with throwing knives was now barely passable, but he had always had good aim. The lack of a knife skill was disappointing, but he supposed he couldn’t rely on the system for everything.

  That was, in fact, the philosophy that drove his telekinesis practice. As easy as it was to simply let the system take control, he found it more rewarding to try understanding how it worked even without the skill. His control had improved to the point where he was good enough to spin a notebook accurately most of the time, though he still hadn’t completely gotten rid of the jerking.

  Trying to use telekinesis offensively was a different ballpark. He found that his psi could go farther than he originally expected, which made it viable for combat, though he still had to be conservative. Either way, he was still at the very beginning of developing a viable strategy. It would be a while before he was making heads explode and ripping monsters to shreds with a glance.

  So far, he was trying to mould his psi into a shape that would cut better, but was currently met with limited success. There was likely something he was missing.

  Using telekinesis to throw his knives was a more productive endeavour. His aim was not yet as good as it was with his hands, but he was getting better. He also found that he could throw with more force than if he simply used his hands. It was something that pleased him to no end. The fact that his psi could pack a lot more punch even though it was lower than strength made him excited for how well it would scale in the future.

  Another thing he tried was coating the knives in a layer of mental energy to try and augment his stabs. It took a while to get the hang of it, and he ended up running low on mental energy, but he finally grasped it, at least. He found it easier to make his psi sharp when it was attached to something with an already sharp object. It increased both the cutting and piercing power of the knives by a noticeable amount, which left him pleased.

  At the end of the practice, he found himself fairly satisfied, even though the skill had not gained levels. He was fairly confident in being able to use the skill in a fight at least, which was a big improvement from just the start of the day.

  His practice with [Staff Proficiency]

  By the time he was satisfied with his progress, his mental energy was close of exhausted, leaving him with a feeling of bone deep tiredness. A part of him wondered whether he should simply postpone his exploration till the next day, but he eventually decided against it. He was tired, but he had to at least check what was outside before he went to sleep.

  His thoughts went to his sister and his grandmother and he faltered for a moment. He had to hope they were safe in the tutorial. Given how far away they were, it would probably be a pain to find them. Still, it was something he would do, regardless of how long it took.

  To be honest though, knowing his sister, she would probably end up as some kind of continental overlord or something. Perhaps he would have to worry less about saving her and more about keeping up with her. Racing each other to the top like when they were kids.

  That was a fun thought.

  Using that as fuel for his resolve, he steadied himself and took a deep breath before pushing the door open.