High in the sky stood a large sun, whose golden rays illuminated the whole world. Below it were green meadows, without any plants on the ground except grass. And at the moment, in these meadows, two small silhouettes could be seen walking forward.
Yulan covered her face with her hand and looked at the sun, complaining:
"Why is the sun shining so brightly? Where are we even? We've been walking in this direction for several hours, but besides endless green grass, there's nothing here at all!"
Lin was walking ahead of the girl; without turning, he replied:
"One of the most important rules of survival is to remain calm at all times. Your complaints now won't change the situation. So, I would advise you to focus your mind and try to recall everything you were taught in survival class."
The girl, clearly dissatisfied with Lin's answer, wanted to say something but slipped and fell on her butt.
Lin slowly stopped and turned to Yulan, saying:
"It's also important during survival to always be careful, even if you feel completely safe. You never know what or who might betray you first. So be careful," he didn't help the girl get up. Turning away, Lin continued walking.
Yulan looked at Lin with anger and a blushing face and cursed mentally:
"Damn it!" She quickly got up and straightened herself. Then she quickly caught up with Lin and cautiously asked:
"Uh... where are we actually?.."
"In the Dead World."
"Well, that's obvious. I mean, which Dead World are we in? They're divided into different levels..."
Lin sighed and replied:
"If you remember, we were pulled in by the Red Gate, and all Red Gates in the world lead to the Low Dead World."
Yulan paused for a moment and thought:
"I completely forgot about that... I should've gathered more information about the Dead Worlds... If we're really in the Low Dead World — does that mean we're in the Magic World? I know for sure that the Magic World is at the level of the Low Dead World."
She looked and voiced her thoughts:
"We're... in the Magic World?"
Lin nodded.
"Yes. Humanity has so far discovered only one Dead World at the Low Dead World level — and that's the Magic World. The fact that we're in the Magic World greatly simplifies finding the exit; we just need to find one of the five human Fort Posts and use them to return to Earth."
"Sounds easy," Yulan commented.
"What always sounds easy is actually the hardest task. We need to figure out which part of the Magic World we're in, and then, with the obtained information, head to one of the five Fort Posts." Lin stopped and asked the girl:
"Do you know how to determine where we are?"
Yulan shook her head.
Lin sighed and continued walking.
"Then we have little chance of survival," he looked around, seeing endless green meadows, and said: "We are in the endless meadows; there are many such places in the Magic World. They're both in the Northern part and the Southern part. But unfortunately, there are no plants or structures here to help roughly determine where we are."
The Magic World was a large continent surrounded by a vast ocean. This world was divided into two parts — the Southern, which had three Fort Posts, and the Northern, which had two Fort Posts. And in each of these parts, there were many plains with no plants. If Lin had at least one clue, he could roughly figure out where they were. But right now, there were none.
Yulan thought for a moment and replied:
"Maybe we're near the Fort Post — Hope, of the Matrix family? We live on their territory on Earth. Maybe the Gates somehow synchronize the two worlds and their coordinates?"
Lin smirked.
"Not a bad hypothesis, but it's incorrect. There have been many experiments proving that any Gates lead to completely random places. Even if you lived on the Matrix family's territory, it's not guaranteed you'll end up on their lands in the Magic World."
"If everything was as easy as you said, I don't think thousands of people would have gone missing in the Magic World."
Yulan fell silent and said nothing more.
Lin also said nothing and simply focused on the path.
...
Night slowly descended upon the world, covering the sky with a dark blanket. Lin and Yulan decided to stop and wait out the night.
Lin took off his cloak made of wolf skins. He made it while examining the wolves for Soul Shards. His previous clothes were heavily damaged, so he made this one.
Yulan sat in her dirty school uniform, watching Lin's "coat" with envy.
He noticed her envious look but paid no attention to it. When he lay down on the grass, he covered himself with his coat of wolf skins and looked at the brightly starry sky.
Yulan, lying a bit farther from him, opened her mouth and asked Lin what she had wanted to ask the whole way:
"Have you become an Awakened?"
Lin didn't answer immediately, then replied:
"Yes," he answered simply, not wanting to go into details.
Yulan nodded, expecting such an answer. She looked at the starry sky and sighed.
"What should I ask to keep the conversation going?! This Lin is both so scary because of his murderous intent but also knows how to maintain a conversation. He just doesn't want to!" she thought.
She sighed again.
"Exactly, he just doesn't want to keep the conversation going because he doesn't want to. There's no point in forcing him, otherwise, I feel like I might lose my head..." She decided to just watch the beautiful starry sky since such views are extremely rare on Earth.
"When will you turn sixteen?" Lin suddenly asked.
Yulan strained her mind to remember when she would turn sixteen.
"In... six days I'll officially turn sixteen, and maybe I'll be able to receive a Title. Though I hardly hope for that."
Lin smirked and thought:
"If Yulan really manages to become an Awakened, her value will skyrocket to unprecedented heights."
"Six days... I don't know how long we'll spend in the Magic World, but one day in this world equals one day in the real world. Which means I've already spent one day in this world... This is really interesting," Lin smiled and mentally summoned his own statistics, which he hadn't seen for a whole day.
[Name: Lin Matrix.]
[Title: Lord of the Time.]
[Title Category: Abstract.]
[Title Rank: Awakened.]
[Skills:
— "Slow Motion Perception(Lvl.1)".]
[Price: Forgetfulness (Price of Mind).]
[Status:
— Physical health: 78%
— Mental health: 98%
— Distortion: 8%]
[Soul Fragments:
— Low Soul Shard x1]
[Distorted Items:
— Fallen Sword (White).]
[Quests: (None).]
A blue screen appeared before Lin's eyes, through which he could see his current stats, as well as the items and skills he possessed.
"My physical health has started to rise a bit; before it was 76%, and now it's reached 78%. Also, Distortion has decreased from 28% to 8%, which is definitely pleasing. Because I get the opportunity to use the skill again without risking becoming a Distorted being."
"Although I keep such items as the Low Soul Shard and the Fallen Sword with me, they are still displayed here, which is quite convenient." Lin looked at other things and noticed that they hadn't changed.
"Quests... I've heard that quests are given very rarely. But the rewards for them are simply colossal. In any case, we'll find out when I get at least one."
"And also skill leveling..." Lin saw a small indicator next to the skill, which said: "Lvl.1".
He mentally wished to see how to upgrade the skill from level one to level two. A mechanical voice immediately sounded in his head, explaining:
[If Lin Matrix wishes to upgrade the skill, he needs five Low Soul Shards to do so.]
Hearing the answer, Lin thought:
"Five Low Soul Shards to upgrade the skill — is it worth it? How much will the skill improve? It's not even stated here... It's like blindly pressing buttons in a game, hoping to kill the enemy!"
"Why is the system so... raw? Who even created it? Where do these titles come from? What is their purpose?" Questions appeared in his head for which there were no answers.
And soon he fell asleep.