In the backyard of a towering building, a boy lay motionless on the ground, unconscious and still. Then, a sudden light burst forth, flooding the entire structure in a brilliant glow.
As the light faded, the boy shot up with a sharp gasp, his chest heaved heavily like he hadn’t breathe in a while. His body had been still for so long, his nerves silent, and his breath gone, almost as if life had only just returned to him.
The boy rose to his feet and brushed the dust from his clothes.
He looked around, struggling to make sense of it all. Everything had happened so quickly, his death, the pull of his soul into purgatory, and now this mission forced upon them.
It was Rai.
He examined the body he now inhabited. It wasn’t all that different from his previous body, except for one thing. He was slimmer, almost bony, as if his body had gone days without food. It felt weak, worn, and worst of all, malnourished.
Almost immediately, a sharp ringing ran through his head, and he clutched it tightly, screaming in pain.
Several memories flooded his mind, crashing hard on him with relentless force. Memories he didn’t recall, memories he knew he never lived.
And by the time it stopped, he found himself on the floor again.
"Soul Awakening." He muttered under his breath.
He sprang to his feet immediately.
The memories came back, the memories of his old life, and he remembered what this was. He recognized the term Soul Awakening from his favorite novel he re-read over and over again each time he felt depressed.
So there was no mistake.
Somehow, he got transmigrated into his favorite novel! Path Of The Ascension.
It’s story was simple.
Many, many years ago, a supernatural tradegy plagued humanity, making what was usually considered as nothing but fantasy, all too real.
The Advent Of The Gates.
The Advent Of The Gates was a result of the conditions being met, creating a portal that linked the human world to the other side, and from these gates, they came along. Creatures never thought to exist, creatures that could have only existed in fantastical settings.
Soul-Beasts.
They were given this name because of their unique abilities, the ability to grow stronger by consuming human souls. But that wasn’t the only thing the Advent Of The Gates brought along, after being exposed to the human world for a long time, the atmosphere of the gate seeped in.
And after being exposed to the other side’s atmospheric energy, humanity awakened extraordinary gifts that enabled them to fight against these beasts. Those gifts were referred to as Soul-Core, and the extraordinary superhumans who used this gift to defend humanity against these beasts were referred to as Soul-Hunters.
Soul-Hunters were revered as saviours of humanity, the ones who averted the apocalypse. After a lot of these saviours emerged, their abilities were eventually seperated into five different functions.
Elemental Soul-Core - Soul-Hunters with the ability to utilize the various elements and Sub-elements of nature.
Zen Soul-Core - Soul-Hunters with abilities that boosts physical attributes or augmentations.
Alchemist Soul-Core - Soul-Hunters with the ability to manipulate the laws of nature and reason according to their will.
Support Soul-Core - Soul-Hunters with the ability to aid regeneration, or healing in general. While they don’t fall under the combat class Soul-Hunters, their abilities also provides a buff in the strength of others.
Knight Soul-Core - Soul-Hunters whose abilities cannot be classified under the four functions, they are regarded as the strongest amongst the five and their abilities are said to be able to shake the world itself.
To prevent this calamity from ever happening again, they banded together, creating a large association with different branches and sections, gathering and training elite Soul-Hunters in other to prevent another Advent.
This association was known as the Soul-Hunter association, and in this association were different segments in different countries, which collectively, was referred to as the 14 Soul-Squads.
Each year they had their awakening ceremony, recruiting capable soldiers who will become strong enough to defend humanity.
And now, due to age limits, it was finally this character’s turn, but there was one problem.
He had no idea who this character was. He re-read the story a hundred times over, but he had no memories of such a scene in his past live.
Then he remembered what happened moments ago. "System? Activate?"
Almost immediately, a soft chime echoed, and a translucent blue screen appeared before him.
______________Status_________________
[Name: Rai Voltia]
[Age: 18]
[Occupation: Dropout]
[Level: 0]
[Experience: 0]
[Dexterity: 2]
[Stamina: 2]
[Agility: 2]
[Strength: 2]
[Durability: 2]
[Intelligence: 5]
[Soul-Energy: 0/0]
[Soul-Core: None]
[Rank: None]
_______________________________________
[Ding! Your first quest has arrived!]
[Activate your Soul-Core.]
[Rewards for completing mission: 50EXP]
"Rai Voltia? Isn’t that my name? And what the hell is with this horrible stats?"
Then it hit him.
"Fuck." He cursed under his breath.
He heard about it in his previous life, the stories that were popular back then.
Extras.
Extra’s were background characters.
He transmigrated as an extra, a character that was irrelevant to the story. But this time, it was different. And it all made sense now.
The reason the original owner of this body bad no name was simple. He was destined to die before the main story ever began, and because of that, he had no knowledge of this character or when he was supposed to die.
Almost immediately, his ears picked up a loud noise from behind him.
He turned his gaze to the structure before him. It wasn’t just a building, it was a towering, obsidian spire that rose high above the city. Thin silver lines traced its surface, glowing faintly with essence.
He left the backyard and made his way into the main compound. To his surprise, it was full of movement and noise. Around fifty to a hundred people were rushing toward the building, talking loudly and filled with excitement.
With no knowledge of the person who once lived in this body, he simply followed the crowd and stepped into the building.
They stepped into a wide, open hall with high ceilings and smooth marble floors that reflected the soft glow of the lights above. Symbols glowed faintly along the walls, and the air thrummed with quiet energy.
At the front center stood a large, floating crystal sphere above a round platform covered in strange markings. The orb shimmered with shifting colors, giving off a low mystical hum.
"I see you made the trip here as well." A voice called out, startling Kazuki. He turned quickly, and there they were. The two boys who had floated beside him in purgatory, the ones who had received the same mission as him.
"I don’t believe we’ve met, I’m Xander Reymond, nice to meet you, let’s get along well okay?"
Xander stepped forward with a bright smile, and offered his hand for a warm handshake. It wasn’t hard for Rai to see the natural charisma he had, the kind that easily drew people in and made him stand out among his peers.
"Nice to meet you too, my name’s Rai Voltia, pleasure working with you." Rai took his hand, returning the handshake with a firm, steady grip.
"Wait, Rai Voltia? Now I remember you! You’re that kid that got beat to a pulp aren’t you?" The other boy asked.
’How did he know who I am? Wait...’ It didn’t occur to him in purgatory because he was so frightened he barely took the two boys into consideration.
By Ren’s words it was clear, for Kirito to know about his encounters with Xander, the two boys must have been his school mates.
"You’ve got guts I’ll admit, the name’s Ren. But seriously, this goddess of destiny or whatever she calls herself, can we trust her? What if she has other motives?"
"Who knows, it’s not like we have a choice anyways, all we can do now is observe this new world, learn all there is to learn about this apocalypse and stop it from ever happening."
"Good day to you all." A voice echoed through the hall, drawing all eyes to the platform where the sphere rested. Behind it stood three men dressed in sleek black suits.
The one in the center stood out, far older than the others, with white hair and a neatly trimmed beard, his presence was calm, yet commanding.
The candidates couldn’t feel it yet, but they could tell. The aura emanating from the man in the center, it was powerful enough to choke them completely.
Calling him strong would be an understatement, he was a tidal force!
"Oh? There are quite a number of you, but now that we’re all here we can begin. My name is Arthur Daemar and I’m the Head Commander of the 14 Soul-Squads and the two besides me are my associates. I’m sure many of you are aware that after today your life is about to change forever, but first I’ll have to inform you on what is about to happen, the process of your Soul Awakening."
He began, clearing his throat as he effortlessly caught the attention of the crowd.
"Ever since the first Advent Of The Gates, humanity faced a threat so powerful that it could have annihilated our entire race, and we were reminded that we weren’t alone in this cruel world, but with that calamity, came a gift. Soul-Core. I’m sure most of you are aware of the details so I’ll skip it, we humans we all possess a Soul-Core as a result of the Advent, however with that core comes the energy to keep it alive. It’s name, Soul-Energy."
Murmurs arose from among the crowd. They were puzzled.
"Soul-Energy?"
"That’s right." Arthur’s voice silenced the crowd once more, clearing the doubts in the air.
"After being contaminated by the Advent’s atmospheric energy, This Soul-Energy is what keeps our core alive, although we can’t sense it because it is dormant in our bodies, providing only enough power to sustain our core. But do you know that this energy can be drawn to the surface?"
"And how’s that head commander Arthur?" One of men asked.
"That’s where this sphere comes in. We call it the Soul Sphere, and it draws out an individual’s latent Soul-Energy to the surface and activates his Soul-Core."
The head commander exchanged glances with his surbordinates, and after a nod of approval, he cleared his throat again.
"That’s all the information I can share with you for now, this awakening ceremony is divided into three stages, we will now beginning the 1st selection. With that said, let the Soul Awakening begin."