LGHTNOVELBOOK Chapter 2: Re-Awakening [2]
'Where am I?' Leo thought, his head groggy as though he had just woken up from sleep.
Fear washed over him as the realization came – he had died in a place of no return – he instinctively reached for his chest, surprisingly there was no blood nor wound.
'Did I... really die?'
The thought just felt too surreal for him, but the memories of the day said otherwise.
Eternal darkness surrounded him, darkness that stretched out as far as his eyes could see.
"Status!" He yelled out.
[Name: Leonardo Varian
Level: 5
Rank: 5 (1st stage)
Strength: Mid Stage 1
Mental: Late Stage 1
Transcended Energy: Mid Stage 1
Skills: Spatial Awareness – Rank 3 skill
Adaptation – God Level skill]
"Holy..." He couldn't help but voice it out loud.
For one, his level had plummeted down to level 5 along with all his stats, but he had really awakened a God Level skill.
He didn't know if he should curse out loud or shout in joy.
'I really had a re-awakening, and a skill that far transcends my current one at that.'
For people like him whom awakened their skills at this time, they only had a chance of awakening a rank 5 to rank 0 skill.
God Level skills were only awakened during the time of the apocalypse; an era that had ended half a century ago.
Peace made humans weak, that was true as even their abilities weakened during the era of peace that appeared after the apocalypse.
'But no cap, I really had a reawakening!'
His eyes moistened and then tears began streaking down his face, all his emotions left him through his tears.
He had always felt weak, always been a pathetic loser who could only scout the battlefield, who could only survive and kill enemies by using his teammates and baits and flanking.
'Wait...'
Another realization hit him like a speeding bullet train.
'I'm already dead, I died before I could even be useful.'
Suddenly, his status screen disappeared.
The darkness left. The sudden change made it hard for Leo to see.
When his vision finally returned he found himself standing next to a few dozen people.
Each person was dressed in a white skintight bodysuit with green stripes.
'Are these people all dead?'
There were a lot of murmurs, each person talking to one another. They all talked about their current strange situation, they had all died, but they were miraculously alive.
"Did your team kill you too?" One of the people standing next to Leo asked.
"...Yeah." Leo replied reluctantly.
"I guess that makes it the same for all of us, I wonder if this was one of its secrets." The guy muttered.
Each one of the people recruited here were either 17 or 18, they were all young adults but had seen death so many times.
At this stage, knowing they were dead didn't even faze most of them.
Leo anxiously glanced at a large screen, it was on the wall in front of them.
He had a feeling that their questions would be answered when the tv turned on, but until then he had to wait.
The large screen flickered to life after minutes had passed, illuminating the room with a bright, blue glow. The murmurs ceased as soon as they turned their attention towards the screen.
'He's here.'
Leo wasn't surprised.
The person on screen only had his head revealed, he had a pale face, a bowl cut and black eyes covered by glasses.
On the day he found himself here, the aura this same person emanated was enough to bring everyone down to their knees even though he had taken a lot of effort to hold it back.
"Welcome. I'm sure you're all wondering about how you ended up here."
The man on the screen had a look on his face, as if he was looking at a bunch of hopeless individuals.
"As you were informed, dying outside of the ring would result in a permanent death, one where your lives will end and your soul will pass off into the otherworld. But we took the opportunity to turn this into an opportunity."
The man's explanation made no sense.
"You aren't really dead."
His explanation suddenly began to make some sense.
"Death in there is the same as death in the ring."
'So I'm not dead.' Leo thought.
"Everyone who died in the second round has been brought together for a singular purpose: to turn at least one person into the ultimate fighter, a killing machine to be precise."
'A killing machine.' Leo shuddered at the words.
He wasn't afraid of killing, his hands had already been stained in the hands of dozens. But for the purpose of creating someone not even at 18 whose only drive was to kill, that seemed impossible.
"I'm sure all of you are wondering..." The man paused, putting both hands together before resting his head on it. "How do you create a killing machine in a place where deaths don't really kill? Its simple really.
Now, in the ring, if you die, you die."
"What the hell is that?" A voice asked.
The person was bold, very bold to talk back to someone with as much power as the man on the screen.
"Didn't you hear?" He asked with a mocking smile, then added. "If you die here, you die in real life. No cap."
"You can't just decide the fate of all of us, we didn't even want to get involved in this crap but here we are!" He shouted in indignation.
"Kyle Walker, former level 8, depended on his teammates to kill even though you made no contributions to the team and jeopardized victory many times.
It doesn't come as a shock to anyone, you're just an arrogant boy who just got a taste of power, but quickly discovered that his power was useless when compared to others.
It wasn't even shocking when you died."
"I..."
"Moving on." The man said, clearly not interested in arguing with a child. "There are three programs of this stage."
Three blue phrases appeared as he raised his head from his hands and brought out his palm.
Re-Generation
Re-Ascension
Re-Awakening
"These are the three programs in this stage, and first you'll begin with Re-Generation." The man explained.
Re-Ascension and Re-Awakening disappeared from the visual display hovering above his palm.
In this program, your main goal is to have at least four kills under your name before the end of this program."
Under Re-Generation, numbers appeared under his hand.
"There are eighty of you all in total and each of you are required to kill four people. Can anyone guess the answer?"
There was silence until they realized that he wasn't joking.
"Twenty." Someone spoke up.
"Exactly, with twenty people remaining the next program will officially start. And in case you're wondering, per say you killed someone with three kills under their name, all of their kills will go onto you and you would have passed this program."
He said the thought that was on everyone's mind.
"This program has a time limit of two weeks, anyone who has an inadequate number of kills under their name will be killed off, joining their brethren in the otherworld.
To begin, form a team of two."
The man vanished from the screen, instead there were now two things on it.
'The door on the right leads to the dorms assigned to everyone participating in "Re-Generation". And the door on the left leads to the rings.' Leo read the words on the screen.
'Welcome to the Re-Generation Program. Survive, and you shall rise. '
His mind raced.
He was meant to choose a teammate now.
The betrayal was still fresh in his mind, and at his death he noticed that Kyrel had a space ring even though he was only level 7.
One needed to be level 10 to gain the rights to buy a space ring.
He knew his other former teammates were involved in his death, maybe even their leader.
Leo wasn't going to make the same mistake again.
'Re-Awakening.' Leo thought.
If the last program was as he thought it would be, it meant that they were supposed to have a re-awakening.
'I'll deal with the thought later.' He decided, shaking off his worries.
He just had a re-awakening and he had gotten a God Level skill at that, the realization still shocked him.
'Maybe my dream of standing at the top isn't as far-fetched as I thought.'
Tears streamed down his face.
This time, they were tears of joy.