Noah had finally achieved the single, driving goal of his entire adult life. He was, at last, Awakened. Tears of pure, unadulterated joy streamed from his eyes, mixing with the sweat and grime from the collapsed building.
"YEEEEAAAAHHHH!! FINAALLYYY!!!"
The celebratory shout echoed off the sterile hospital walls, raw and triumphant. Hearing the commotion, Mina burst back in through the door. Her face wasn't relieved; it was a mask of pure thunder. Noah, still riding the high of his victory, flashed her a massive, triumphant grin.
"Mina!! I have some good news! The best news!"
Mina's glare didn't soften. She approached the bed, her knuckles cracking ominously. Noah, oblivious to the immediate danger, continued, "I finally awa—"
He didn't get to finish. Mina's fist connected squarely with his face, snapping his head back against the pillow with a painful thwack.
Noah wasn't surprised. In fact, on some level, he was expecting it. A brutal, non-System-enhanced beating was the Chambers family's primary way of showing deep, profound concern. And he had just stubbornly gotten his stomach bored through by a seven-foot-tall, scorpion-like ant after ignoring her direct order.
"Ahhhh! What are you doing?!" Noah protested, reflexively shielding his face as Mina continued to wail on him, aiming for his shoulders, arms, and anywhere else that wasn't a vital, life-sustaining organ.
"You fucking bastard!!" Mina shouted, her voice thick with rage and the lingering terror of finding him dead. "Since you're still alive, I'll beat you up till you're dead again!!"
The door burst open again as two beefy UNPA security guards rushed in, alerted by the nurse. They immediately recognized the S-Rank Pyromancer and hesitated, clearly terrified.
"Ma'am! Please! This is the ICU!" one of them pleaded, cautiously trying to grab her arm.
"Let me go! He deserves this! He's an idiot!"
Noah chuckled nervously from behind his pillow as he watched his younger sister get dragged out, her eyes still promising a future beating.
A few minutes later, Mina returned. She stood stiffly by the door, her uniform still singed, her breathing deceptively calm. She had clearly composed herself, but the rage was still simmering just below the surface.
"A-are you calm now?" Noah asked cautiously, not lowering his pillow.
Mina's eye twitched. She lunged, and the beating resumed.
"Ahhhh! Guards!!" Noah yelped, protecting himself with his pillow.
For the second time, Mina was escorted out. When she returned a third time, Noah didn't wait. He scrambled to the opposite side of the hospital bed, holding the pillow up as a shield, his feet planted on the mattress.
Mina coughed, covering her mouth, a small, grim smile finally breaking through the anger. "You look fine for a man who I thought died just two hours ago. The blood loss alone should have killed you."
Noah warily peeked over his pillow. He looked at himself, then tentatively touched his stomach where the massive hole had been. There was nothing. No stitches, only the faint residue of bandages, not even a faint pink line. "Ooohh, I didn't know doctors could regenerate my injuries that fast. That's top-tier service."
Mina crossed her arms, staring at him. "They didn't. They couldn't."
Noah paused, confused. "Wait, what?" He analyzed the situation. "If they didn't do this, then who did?"
Mina gestured vaguely. "I dunno. The doctors were amazed. When they were stabilizing you, your heart had stopped. Then it just... started again. They said they watched your internal organs, the ones that were liquefied, regenerate on their own. Your spine healed, your skin knit itself back together. No scars. It's as if nothing even happened."
She leaned against the wall, her expression now more awed than angry. "Even our S-Rank Healer classes couldn't do that. Not this fast. They'd have to spend hours and a massive amount of mana bioprinting new organs inside you, visualizing the most accurate anatomical shapes. You can't just heal a mortal wound automatically without the knowledge of a doctor."
"That seems to be what I learned from those YouTube Healer Class tutorials," Noah said, lowering his pillow. "The good ones have to restudy the entire human anatomy, or their magic just makes tumors."
Mina scoffed. "That's right. Most Healer class Players enjoy a high-paying salary as normal doctors, assisting with complex operations. The combat medics are only there to close the bleeding or stabilize you on the spot so you make it to the hospital without being classified as 'Dead on Arrival.' What you did... that's not healing. That's regeneration. On a different level."
Noah rubbed his chin. "Hmmm... then what could it be?"
Mina grinned. "It must be the System, idiot."
"Oh, right!" Noah's face lit up again. "Yeah, that's what I was trying to tell you! I Awakened!"
Mina's smile finally became genuine, the last of her anger melting away, replaced by pride. "Congratulations, brother. You're one of us now."
Noah acted humble, scratching the back of his head. "Haha, thanks. I've been waiting for a lifetime for this. Though, the requirement for me to Awaken seems to be... well, dying horribly."
"What's your class? Did you roll the dice already?" Mina asked, suddenly excited, her professional Player-mode kicking in.
"No, not yet," Noah admitted. "Uhhh... how?"
Mina chuckled. "You can just say 'System' or, better, mentally summon the System panel. You don't have to close your eyes, idiot," she cut him off as he tried to squeeze his eyes shut. "Just mentally summon it. Like cursing me in your head or something."
Noah focused. System.
Instantly, the crisp, blue interface popped up in his vision, clearer than any HD screen he'd ever seen.
[ Welcome, Player: Noah Chambers. ]
[ Your soul has satisfied certain hidden conditions for Awakening. ][ You have faced Oblivion and returned. ]
[ Please proceed to the Class Selection Interface. ]
[ Proceed ]
"What does it say?" Mina asked, leaning in.
"You can't tell?"
"No, I can't," she said, annoyed. "Normally, you can't see anyone's panel. Although, there's an option to set permissions, but since this is your initial Awakening, I can't see it. It's like the Windows setup when you first buy a computer. You can't access your status, skill trees, or the whole she-bang until you finish."
"Ahhh, got it," Noah nodded. "Well, it says to proceed, and there's a button for it. And something about... facing oblivion."
"Go on, tap it," Mina urged, her curiosity piqued.
Noah mentally 'tapped' the button. The interface dissolved and reformed into something far grander.
🎲 [CLASS ACQUISITION SEQUENCE – "ROLL YOUR FATE"] 🎲
A swirling constellation of glowing icons appeared before his eyes—over a thousand floating, shimmering symbols. Blades, books, wings, hammers, halos, and flames orbited a vast, digital roulette wheel. He saw icons of lightning, icons of bones, even a tiny, glowing gear. A massive golden button materialized before him, labeled in shimmering script:
[ROLL YOUR DICE – AWAKEN YOUR CLASS]
Noah's jaw dropped. It was beautiful. It felt like staring into the heart of a galaxy.
Mina watched his awestruck expression, chuckling. "I've seen a lot of new Players cry after they pulled their first class," she mused, reminiscing. "Others just jump for joy. The high-rarity ones get swarmed by guild recruiters and sometimes even Gods... like Helios, Apollo, Vishnu, or Sun Wukong. I heard Buddha himself even visits some."
"Visits them? Like, for a guild?"
"Sort of. Joining a Pantheon is like a guild, but only mortals who pull Legendary classes or above get invited. But they personally have to sacrifice their time and freedom for the god they're serving. It's a full-time contract, body and soul."
"What about Dad, though?" Noah asked, his hand hovering over the golden button. "He works for Hephaestus, but I've never heard him complain about freedom, one bit."
Mina scoffed. "Well, that's because they drink on the job and Hephaestus actually cares about his craftsmen. He's a worker, like Dad. Unlike that bastard Zeus, who's always off playing with women and enjoying his life in Las Vegas, claiming it's 'for the war effort'."
Noah chuckled. "You can't blame a true casanova. It's like he said in that interview, right? The only way to satisfy the Trial's condition of 100,000 demigods in a thousand years is to... well, impregnate a lot of mortal women."
"Ahhh," Mina said, frustrated. "Although I hate his guts as a god, I can't blame him. He's right. Earth is a double-edged sword right now. The Ascension Towers—the black spires—flood the earth with mana and give us the System, but that System is basically holding us hostage to accelerate our evolution. It's not a gift; it's a demand."
She pointed to a spot in the air, as if viewing her own panel. "There's a massive Main Quest every Player can see. Even the Gods are Players, just with a massive head start. It basically demands that humanity produces at least 10,000 Gods and 100,000 Demigods."
Noah's eyes widened. "And the rewards?"
"The human race passes the Last Trial and is certified as a 'citizen of the new universe,' whatever that means. The failure... is total annihilation of the human race. A Dryas Cycle reset. A full System-wipe."
"Woooahh," Noah breathed. "That's... not good at all. What about India? Don't they have, like, 300 million gods? Didn't they all spawn with the Towers?"
"I'm not sure if you heard," Mina said, her voice dropping, "but I saw an interview with Shiva and Ares. A similar thing has occurred before. Way before. Back during the Younger Dryas period, the 'Great Flood' myths. The Black Spires appeared then, too. The gods we know—Odin, Ra, all of them—were just mortals back then, the first ones to Evolve."
"So what happened?"
"They failed. When the time ran out, they hadn't met the previous requirement—which was apparently 50% of the entire world's population evolving to Godhood. They failed spectacularly. Earth reset. Global cataclysms, temperature changes... Ragnarok. That's what the Asgardians called the end of the Sixth Trial. And they had the same force field we do. They couldn't escape."
Noah was overloaded, absorbing the sheer scale of the information. "Wooooooaaaaahhhh... that's pretty insane. We're on a timer. The whole planet."
"Yeah, it is," Mina said, crossing her arms. "The gods don't know why the requirements changed this time, but they're significantly lower, even with a much shorter, 1,000-year deadline. They're happy, though. They're confident we can make it this time. And they've actually put aside their ancient differences—mostly—to make sure we pass the Trial. They're all Players, trapped in the same game."
She looked back at Noah, who was still staring at the massive golden button, the weight of the cosmos suddenly on his shoulders.
"Now," Mina said, breaking the tension. "Roll the damn dice."