Paleview City never slept.
Neon billboards flickered above crowded streets, their glow casting shifting hues over the passing cars. The scent of street food mixed with the exhaust fumes of motorcycles zipping between traffic. Pedestrians moved like waves, some in tailored suits, others in ragged hoodies, each lost in their own world.
Despite its modern allure, the city had a dark underbelly. Crime festered in the shadows, and in certain areas, it was easier to find a fistfight than a friendly face.
Paleview City College
"It's a fight!"
The shout echoed across the campus like an alarm, igniting excitement among the students.
"A fight? Who this time?"
"Caster and Derek!"
"What did Derek do to piss off Caster?"
Students rushed toward the back of the school like a tide. Though fully aware, the teachers made no attempt to intervene.
At the center of the crowd, a lean, yellow-haired boy knelt on the cracked pavement, his face already bruised and bloodied. A tall, muscular youth with dark hair towered over him, gripping a fistful of his hair.
Bang!
A powerful punch sent Derek flying. His body slammed into a pile of trash cans, a fresh spray of blood spilling from his nose.
Laughter erupted from the crowd.
"Who called this a fight? It's a one-sided massacre."
"My Caster is so handsome!" Some girls swooned over the dark-haired youth as if he were some champion rather than a bully.
Caster smirked, shaking his fist as if shaking off dirt. "Remember your place, you piece of trash."
With that, he turned on his heel and walked off, his group of lackeys following behind. The rest of the students lost interest and dispersed, not sparing Derek a second glance.
To them, he was nothing more than a punching bag, an outcast, a loser.
Dark clouds gathered overhead.
Without warning, the sky split open, and the rain poured down, drumming against Derek's battered body.
"Is my luck this bad?" he muttered, groaning as he struggled to sit up. "I don't even look for trouble, but those bastards still find me."
Then—a flash of blue light.
Hovering before him was a translucent blue screen, its glow flickering in the dimming daylight. The air around it crackled with static energy, sending faint ripples through the rain.
Derek's heart skipped a beat.
[The world is dying.]
___________________
In a small apartment room with cracks formed all over the walls, a panda-eyed figure stood before the bathroom mirror, pressing an ice pack against his swollen cheek.
Derek sighed. Did the beating mess up my brain?
Because no matter how many times he blinked, the blue translucent screen was still hovering a few feet away from him. It emitted a soft hum, a digital pulse that resonated faintly in his ears. The edges of the screen shimmered, occasionally distorting like a hologram on the verge of glitching out.
"Should I go to the hospital?" he muttered. "What if I have a concussion?" A mysterious blue screen that only he could see—no matter how he thought about it, it was the definition of crazy.
He read the words again:
[The world is dying.]
Annoyed, he scowled. "What does that have to do with me? I can't even save myself from getting my ass kicked."
The text on the screen flickered violently, glitching for a brief moment before stabilizing.
[Do you want to save the world?]
[Yes / Yes]
Derek's eye twitched.
"What the hell? Where's the 'No' option?!"
Yet, despite his complaints, curiosity gnawed at him.
Cautiously, he reached out and tapped one of the flashing 'Yes' buttons.
A sharp, metallic chime rang in his head, followed by a robotic voice—calm yet unnervingly cold.
[Ding! Binding with host… 10%... 20%... 50%... 90%... 100%! ]
The blue screen suddenly expanded, a torrent of cascading data flooding his vision. Text, symbols, and arcane code scrolled rapidly across the screen in neon trails of light. Then—pain.
A sharp, searing pain exploded in his skull. Derek gasped, clutching his head as his vision blurred. His body trembled as a wave of dizziness overtook him. The screen pulsed, and a surge of something foreign seeped into his veins—cold, electric, and impossibly vast.
The last thing he saw was a flood of blue screens surrounding him.
Then—darkness.
When Derek opened his eyes again, he wasn't in his room.
He was standing atop a skyscraper.
His breath hitched. "How the hell did I get here—?"
Then he noticed something wrong.
The sky.
Instead of the familiar blue, a blood-red expanse stretched above him. Dark chasms tore through the heavens like gaping wounds in reality itself.
From one of those cracks, a dark figure emerged.
Massive black wings unfurled, blotting out what little light remained. A metallic, inhuman screech echoed through the empty city streets below.
Derek wasn't the only one watching. Below, countless humans stood frozen, their eyes locked onto the sky in horror.
The winged figure—a man with inky black feathers and piercing red eyes—smirked, revealing gleaming white fangs.
He raised a hand.
A dark red flame flickered to life in his palm.
Then, with a flick of his wrist, the flames shot forward, growing—expanding—turning into a flaming meteorite.
Derek barely had time to blink before the meteor struck.
In an instant—the entire crowd of humans below evaporated.
No screams. No resistance. Not even ashes remained.
Derek's body trembled. I have to run—
But his feet wouldn't move.
The winged man turned, his gaze locking onto Derek.
A second flaming meteorite formed in his palm.
Derek's heart stopped.
The fireball descended.
Instinctively, he squeezed his eyes shut.
A loud gasp. Thanks for reading—brought to you by *.
Derek bolted upright in bed, drenched in sweat. His heart pounded like a drum.
"A… a dream?" he whispered. "No, it was too real…"
A familiar voice rang in his mind.
[It wasn't a dream. What the host witnessed was a fragment of the world's future.]
Derek froze.
Slowly, his eyes moved. The blue screen was still there, glowing faintly in the dim room, its edges flickering with ghostly data streams.
He promptly fainted again.
Derek sat on his bed, his face pale as he processed the insane information dumped on him.
According to the System, the world would end in a few weeks. Or rather, the beginning of the end was coming.
Even worse?
It was up to Derek to stop it.
"System," he muttered weakly, "how the hell am I supposed to fight that when I can't even handle high school bullies?"
A brief pause.
[The System is aware that the host is currently weak, fragile, and can be classified as a complete loser.]
"…That's a bit harsh."
[ However, the system will make you stronger in return ]
Derek swallowed hard, for a kid who had been bullied all his life, that did not sound like a bad deal, he just felt that his life was gonna get a whole lot messier.
[ System is it, how are you gonna make me strong ]