Chapter 1 - Hope

He opened his eyes.

A screen hovered in front of him—floating text, numbers, labels he didn’t understand.

ID: 815165

Grade: C6

Level 1

Physis: 434

Magia: 0

He stared beyond them.

The land was green. The sky was blue. A warm breeze brushed against his face.

It wasn’t cold.

He looked at his hands—white, smooth. Cleaner than they’d ever been.

He was dressed in white. Plain shorts, a simple shirt, and soft boots. Comfortable.

He glanced around.

Green things blanketed the ground, shifting with the wind.

He pressed his boot down. The green stuff bent beneath it and crushed with a faint sound.

Crouching, he reached out and ran his fingers through it. Smooth. Slightly wet. Water?

But he wasn’t thirsty. Not right now. Actually… he felt good.

Really good.

He brushed the green strands aside. Underneath was brown—dirt. But this wasn’t the deep, dark red stuff from the streets. This was softer. Warmer.

He stood and looked up.

The sky stretched endlessly above, a blue so pure it almost hurt.

Then he noticed them.

White shapes—massive, distant, shifting slowly across the sky. Blurred, but not hidden.

Elementals? Ships?

He wasn’t sure.

They moved in one direction, smooth and steady.

Weird.

He frowned.

The screen still hovered at the edge of his vision. Persistent. Annoying.

He blinked. Tried to swipe it away. Nothing worked.

He ignored it.

He started walking.

He didn’t know where he was.

But it wasn’t freezing. There were no cracked walls, no buzzing streetlights, no sirens or shouting in the dark.

No hunger. No thirst.

All of that was… gone.

Had he… died?

He shook his head.

Mano always said death was just dust. Cold. Blank. Nothingness.

But this wasn’t nothing.

He closed his eyes for a moment and tried to remember.

The alarms. People running. Chaos.

He and the other crawlers left behind in the tunnels.

The cold. The dark.

No food. No water.

The others had gone quiet—one by one—until, finally—

Nothing.

He tightened his fist.

What happened? Why was he in this strange place now? Kidnapped?

He reached for the back of his left hand, fingers brushing the scar. It was still there.

Hope.

That was the name Mano had given him—the day he got that scar.

Hope took a deep breath. Even the air felt nice here. Fresher than anything he’d ever breathed. Even that one time he managed to sneak into a citizen haven—it didn’t compare to this.

Strange. This place didn’t feel like somewhere a crawler like him was ever meant to see.

Hope scanned his surroundings carefully. No remarkable features. No signs. Nothing to point the way.

So, he picked a direction at random—and walked.

He walked for a while, eyes sharp, ears tuned. Always alert.

It wasn’t long before he saw something.

A small creature, far off on the horizon.

Then, suddenly—something flashed into his vision. He froze.

Nuppa

Level 1

The letters floated just above the strange creature’s head. Some of them looked familiar—especially the second line. It matched the beginning of the third line on his own screen.

Five letters, a space, and a number.

What did it mean?

The creature didn’t look dangerous. It hadn’t noticed him either.

Hope’s eyes narrowed as he crouched low.

He tapped slowly on the ground next to him, then began walking toward it—slow, measured steps.

Poor eyesight and sound sensitivity.

He watched for a while and noticed it chewing on the green stuff. It seemed to be edible.

More than a minute passed. The creature strolled around casually, occasionally eating. That was it.

But as he watched, something suddenly flickered on his screen.

Passive Skill Unlocked: 

• Sharpwatch (Level 1)

🔻Sharpwatch (Level 1)

When unseen, you see more. Your senses heighten in silence and shadow.

➤ 5% increase in perception while observing unaware targets.

What the…

Hope flinched back at the new text appearing on his screen.

Unfortunately… he never learned to read. He could barely distinguish numbers from letters.

Suddenly, the screen flashed again and returned to the initial one—but now with two extra lines at the end.

ID: 815165

Grade: C6

Level 1

Physis: 434

Magia: 0

Skills

➤ Passive (1)

Hope focused on that last line, and the screen changed again, showing what it had earlier—the bunch of text.

It stayed there for a while before returning to the default.

What the heck is this?

But as he focused again on the creature, he noticed something different.

Its outline looked sharper. The sound it made while chewing was clearer, more distinct—like his ears had just gotten better.

Hope narrowed his eyes.

That didn’t make sense.

He glanced up at the sky.

What kind of messed-up joke of a place was this?

Was this… the Virtual World?

The land of dreams where anything could come true—where pain didn’t exist and people could fly if they wanted to?

Mano used to talk about it. But only citizens could access that place. Not crawlers like him.

He had no idea how he ended up here.

But one thing felt certain now—out there, somewhere, someone was watching him.

Someone had put him here.

And someone… had absolute control over him right now.

He looked around more carefully this time. He tracked one of the big, white, blurry entities in the sky.

Was that someone up there?

Hope lowered his gaze and sighed.

In any case, all he could do right now was what he was used to doing every day: survive.

He wasn’t hungry or thirsty, but eventually… he would be.

He looked at the creature in the distance. That could be a source of meat. And the green stuff below—it was damp. It had water.

He ripped one out and chewed on it. Tasted bad, but with enough of them, he could quench his thirst when needed.

And that weird creature... its survival instincts seemed low. And now, for some odd reason, he could focus better when staring at it.

Hope remained still a while longer, then started moving.

He took one step at a time as he inched closer.

Twenty feet away—still no reaction.

Not just poor—its instincts were barely better than a rock.

Ten feet. Seven. Five—

Hope leapt forward.

The creature flinched, tried to flee, but he grabbed it by the neck and lifted it with one hand.

It screeched. Loud.

Hope ignored the sound and studied it calmly.

It had a lot of fur, a round body, small neck, pointy ears. Four legs, back ones slightly longer. Its teeth were dull. Mouth, small.

Its eyes darted around—but more in confusion than fear.

Hope stared into its eyes a moment longer.

Then he let it go.

The creature bolted away.

He exhaled.

There was no need to kill it. Not yet. He wasn’t really hungry.

His gaze locked on the creature as it rushed away. And then… he followed it from a safe distance.

But he hadn’t even taken twenty steps when it stopped… and after several seconds, began eating again.

Hope couldn’t believe his eyes. How had this creature managed to survive this long? Didn’t it have any predators?

He gave it some thought, then decided to ignore it entirely and keep moving.

He settled into a steady jog—a pace he knew well from long days chasing after scraps of meat, sometimes for hours… sometimes days.

Along the way, he spotted another one. Then several more.

And then, his screen flickered again.

Passive Skill Unlocked: 

• Longstride (Level 1)

🔻Longstride (Level 1)

Your body remembers the rhythm. Endurance becomes movement.

➤ 5% reduction in stamina drain while running.

Again?

After a short while, the text faded away. But as it did, the number on the last line of his screen changed.

➤Passive (2)

Hope stared at it for a moment. Then shrugged and kept jogging.

But he could feel it—just a bit lighter, like his body had eased into the rhythm. Running had suddenly become easier.

What the hell is happening here?

It was clear now… changes on the screen were affecting him.

First, his focus had sharpened while watching that creature. Now this—running made easier.

For him to change like that… was this truly the rumoured Virtual World?

If so… then doing things made those things… easier? As in, instantly skipping the natural process it usually took to learn and improve.

Convenient, sure—but pretty damn fake.

Hope suddenly thought of something and jumped high, landing with a dull thud on the ground. He tried again. Then once more. But nothing happened.

So… not everything was enhanced. There were requirements.

Or maybe it wasn’t up to him at all.

Maybe it depended on the will of whoever had put him here.

In any case, these new abilities gave him an edge. He might as well aim for them.

He kept jogging, keeping to a straight path. More of those fluffy animals came into view. He passed more than a dozen before he finally noticed something different. Or more like… someone.

But just as he did, a text appeared above the figure—just like with the creatures, but… different. There were more numbers.

ID: 353487

Level 1

The figure—he or she—was dressed in the same white clothes as him. Slightly shorter, with faint scales along the arms and a set of gills at the neck.

A Gilleos? That’s an odd one.

Hope stared for a moment, and then the person noticed him too.

They locked eyes.

Hope wasn’t exactly the social type. Aside from Mano and a few others, he rarely spoke to anyone.

After a few seconds, he just shrugged and changed direction, jogging away. He wasn’t in the mood to deal with strangers.

That person might’ve had some information, sure—but the clothes and the way they carried themselves said enough. They were probably in the same situation. Another crawler dumped here, just like him.

And that meant one thing.

He wasn’t alone in this place.

So… he kept going.

Minutes passed. He continued jogging, passing more and more of those lazy animals along the way. Occasionally, he spotted other humans too.

There was quite a mix of subspecies. He saw a Karnathi with their wide torsos, and two Yverni covered in thick fur. Most of the others he couldn’t quite place, though one looked like a fellow Parthenid—just like him.

Some of them reacted. One even waved. But most just watched.

He saw a female Theraxian hunting one of the animals. The way she did it wasn’t exactly to his taste… but whatever.

Hope had already been running for nearly an hour, but the scenery remained unchanged: green fields, the same kind of animals, the occasional human scattered across the landscape, and an endless blue sky streaked with slow-moving white structures overhead.

Along the way, another prompt appeared.

🔻Longstride (Level 1 ➤ 2)

Your body remembers the rhythm. Endurance becomes movement.

➤ 10% reduction in stamina drain while running.

It was an update to one of his abilities. He quickly figured it had something to do with further reducing how much energy he used while running. Useful, sure—but he didn’t think too much about it. He just… kept running.

He ran and ran, never stopping, never tiring. This was nothing for him. The ground was smooth, flat. Even without the new ability helping him out, he could’ve done this several times over.

But eventually… he encountered a problem.

Another human. A Karnathi, to be precise.

And unlike the others, this one wasn’t just standing around or ignoring him—he was running straight toward him.

Hope didn’t like that.

He didn’t like the guy’s face either.

And in the floating text displayed above him, the second line stood out—it had a different number than the others.

Level 2

What does he want?

Not interested in drama, Hope casually veered off in a new direction and picked up his pace.

The Karnathi followed.

Not good intentions, huh?

What a bother.

Hope leaned forward and shifted into a full sprint.

Within seconds, the Karnathi was left behind—struggling to keep up, quickly fading from sight.

Thought so.

If there was one thing Hope prided himself on, it was being fast—fast and relentless.

In Mano’s own words: “I’ve seen rats stop to breathe more than you, kid.”

He smiled at the thought.

After a while, he eased back into his usual pace and kept running.

More time passed. Soon, another hour had gone by.

He could’ve sworn he’d passed more than a thousand of those creatures by now, and nearly a hundred other humans—all dressed exactly like him.

However, in the last half hour, he hadn’t seen any more of the latter.

It was shortly after that the terrain finally began to change.

The small green stuff growing on the dirt gradually gave way to larger structures up ahead. A wide cluster of tall, brown pillars that ended in a darker shade of green—similar to the one on the ground.

Hope slowed down, eyes wide. He was amazed.

He had never seen anything like them before.

Cautiously, he walked toward one and reached out to touch it.

The surface felt rough, textured—firm like old metal, but not cold. Almost dry and fibrous.

They were pretty damn big too. And somehow… they felt alive.

He gazed down and noticed there was still some of the smaller green stuff growing out of the dirt, but it was more sparse now. Rocks and patches of uneven ground had started to appear.

Hope stared ahead, then quickly made up his mind.

Going back would be the same. So...

He rushed forward.

But it wasn’t long before his senses screamed.

Movement. Danger.

His head snapped toward the source.

A creature was charging straight at him, low to the ground, fast, and silent. It ran on four legs—muscles coiled tight under short, dark fur. Its frame was lean. Yellow eyes locked on him. Its mouth was open just enough to show jagged, stained fangs.

Fenvar

Level 4