Ryan Mercer sat in the corner of the motel room, cleaning the barrel of his pistol in silence. The faint smell of gun oil hung in the air, blending with the cigarette smoke curling from the ashtray beside him. Another job finished. Another body left behind.
His phone buzzed once on the table. The message was brief: Payment received. Disappear.
Ryan exhaled slowly, flicking ash onto the floor. Same routine. Same empty life. He hadn't felt anything for years—just the cold precision of the kill and the promise of a paycheck.
He glanced at the clock. 3:47 AM.
The world outside was as broken as he was—wars, corruption, people killing each other for scraps. He figured it would burn itself out sooner or later. He just planned on cashing out before that happened.
Then it began.
A sound—low and vibrating, like static crawling under his skin. It filled the air, growing louder until the motel walls seemed to shimmer around him. His breath caught as the cigarette slipped from his fingers.
A single message appeared before his eyes, floating in the dark.
[System Integration Complete.]
[Welcome to the Ascension Trials.]
[Status Screen Unlocked.]
Ryan's heart pounded. He blinked, but the glowing text remained. He reached for his gun out of instinct, but what good was a weapon against something like this?
Ryan's vision blurred as a searing pain burned behind his eyes. He stumbled forward, clutching his head.
When the pain finally faded, the world returned to normal. The cigarette still smoldered in the ashtray. The gun sat untouched on the table.
But something was different.
A screen flickered before him, cold and merciless.
+
Name: Ryan Mercer
Rank: F-Grade
Level:1
Race:Human
The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
Class: None
Expertise: None
Stats:
Vital Force:90/90
Mana:120/120
Strength: 8
Agility: 13
Resistance: 9
Perception: 12
Willpower: 12
Intelligence: 10
Abilities: None
+
His mind raced, trying to make sense of it. An RPG system? He'd played games before, but this... this was real. And why it was letters and not numbers in the status, everything is so confusing to him.
Before he could grab his pistol and see the streets, he sensed an outer force pulling him and he passed out.
' Where am I?' he thought, the last thing he remembered was an weird Rpg like system and now he was in an even weirder black space, trying to move he immediately noticed, he don't have senses.
Suddenly he heard a voice, not an message like the other times, a real voice.
"The tutorial will begin, it will last 30 days, you and a group of five will be teleported to an forest, there will be beasts and monster, in this tutorial there will be a total of 5000 people, it will end after 30 days or if the hidden mission ends. Now chose an weapon you would like."
When the voice said that, a table appeared magically in front of Ryan, there was a sword and shield, bow, dagger and a wooden staff.
Seeing that Ryan thought, he like using daggers but he needs to try something.
"Can't I get a pistol?"
When he said the last word he felt an incredible pressure, so strong that even without senses he got goosebumps.
The voice raised to an fever pitch an said almost exploding Ryan's ears.
"No." There was no emotion or anything just pure raw power.
Ryan quickly choose the dagger, he wouldn't try to make whatever the other thing was angrier. Sighing he felt like drowning and passed out again.
He waked up after some time, looking around just trees and more trees. Until he looked at the ground, 5 people were rubbing theirs head in pain.
There were two guys with sword and shield, one with a bow and a girl and a guy with the wood staff, of course the only one standing was Ryan. He sighed.
The man with blonde hair was the first to get up. Holding his sword and shield he looked at Ryan before speaking.
"So... You all know what is happening right? This weird Rpg stuff and all, I think we will probably need to kill someone or something soon. So let's work like a team and get to know each other's better. I'm Travis."
"Ryan." He looked up and just waited for the others.
"I'm Olivia, nice to meet you." She was clearly scared, being the only girl in a group of four males, for her it's terrifying.
"Nathan." The archer said, he was really small, Ryan even thought he might be under age.
"I'm Tim and he's Evren. We are twins." The twins were identical, black hair, same height, both were thin. Ryan made an mental note that Tim is the other'warrior' and Evren the guy with the staff.
After all the presentations Travis clapped his hands and said.
"So the first thing we should do is find a place with water and a place to make an base. After that we can go hunt. Who killed an animal in the wilderness?"
Ryan, Nathan and Tim the warrior raised hands, Evren just chuckled but Olivia shrank.
"The first time can be pretty hard or disgusting, but after some time you get the way."
Travis signaled to the group follow him and they began walking.
Ryan was always looking at the sides, hearing every noisy. He suddenly stop, the others noticing.
"I heard something breaking, in our front, we might need to face it or we can run."
"L...let's run. Yes let's run." Olivia said, she was trembling and clearly scared.
"No, if we run it might run after us but if we get a little closer, I might hit him the first shot. So I say to we face it." Nathan said, he was probably a hunter, Ryan thought and nodded, saying.
"Travis and Tim, you both have shields so you go in front, I will try to hit and run while Nathan, Evren and Olivia make something useful with their weapons."
"Okay. Let's smash it."
Walking a bit they saw an boar, but bigger and appeared to be stronger. Nathan stopped and whispered.
"It's not a normal boar, they don't grow to that size, after I take the shot we might kill it quickly, the blood smell with make more beasts come."
After that he breathed heavily and aimed. For some moments the only noise was the sway of the leaves, with an whistle the arrow flew.
Olivia took a step back being the one further away from the boar. He got hit, the arrow landed in the middle of the chin. But not penetrate enough, the boar roared and began to run to them, blood spilling from it's mouth, Tim and Travis got in the front of the boar, when it reached range Ryan finally saw.
[Brown Boar
(level:4)]
It was 3 levels above but Ryan felt fair, after all they were in 6. Should be easy, or it was what he thought.
