"Don’t die by falling over Quinn! "A boy shouted down the hallway.

Quin carried on walking down the school corridor. Harassment had become a daily occurrence for him but it still bothered him just as much every day and he couldn’t help himself but retaliate.

Quinn stopped and pushed his glasses back up as they had slipped down from his face. He needed a new pair and just from looking at them, you could tell they were heavily worn. The sides were covered with tape and they didn’t even fit straight on his face.

Quinn then turned around and immediately gave the middle finger.

"I bet you don’t even know how many fingers I’m holding up!"

The boy clenched his fist and started running towards Quinn.

"You level 1 piece of crap! When are you going to learn that you don’t belong in this world?"

The boy then placed both of his hands together and a green ball of light started to form. When he was only a few meters away from Quinn, the boy threw his hands forward and the green light shot out from the palm of his hands.

Quinn had nowhere to go and the beam of light was too fast for him to dodge. All he could do was grit his teeth and bear the pain. As the light hit Quinn, his body was lifted into the air and sent flying backwards into the corridor wall.

"What’s going on?" One of the students nearby said. "Are they fighting on the last day of school?"

A crowd had immediately formed outside as people were interested in what the commotion was about. One of the female students ran over to the damaged part of the wall to check on the student’s safety.

The dust started to settle and Quinn’s slightly curly black hair was coming into view. When eventually the dust all cleared up and the female saw who it was, she immediately backed away and continued her business as if nothing happened.

When the female student had returned to her friends, Quinn could see that they were laughing at her.

"I can’t believe you tried to help him."

"I didn’t see who it was." The girl retorted with flushed cheeks.

After that, Quinn stood up and picked his glasses up off the floor. Once again one of the sides had fallen off.

"Dam it. Not again..."

It was the last day of school for Quinn and he was hoping just once someone wouldn’t try anything with him. Quinn was sick and tired of it and he wasn’t the type to ignore it either. He had seen people who had chosen to keep their head down and tolerate the harassment and their treatment was far worse than what he got.

Quinn didn’t bother to stay at school like the rest of the students. As he walked past, he saw people talking to each other. Some were laughing while some had tears thinking it was the last time they would ever see each other again but Quinn wasn’t a part of any of that and he didn’t want to be.

When he finally arrived home, Quinn immediately got to work. Quinn lived in a single bedroom apartment that had just enough space to fit a single bed and desk. There was also a TV that was part of the wall but Quinn would only use it as background noise and didn’t actually watch anything.

The apartment was provided to him by the government since he had no living relatives and was still only 16. On top of his bed was a single suit case that had all his belongings neatly packed.

When Quinn entered his room, he immediately pulled his drawer open which contained a book inside. It was a large thick book that weighed about half a kilo. The front of the book was black in colour and in the centre, it had a ring with lines going off in all different directions.

"Let’s try again today." Quinn said as he placed the book on the desk.

He then immediately went to his bag to pull out a little test tube which had a clear liquid inside.

"Test 112, Hydrochloric acid. Let’s see how it goes." Quinn then started to slowly pour the liquid out of the test tube and onto the book.

"So far no reaction." Quinn then continued to pour the whole test tube onto the book but still there was no reaction.

Quinn carefully examined the book to see if there was any damage done but the book looked the same as always.

"Another failure. Why won’t you open? Why did mum and dad even have this thing?"

One hundred twelve times. This was the number of different ways that Quinn had tried to open the book. Not only would the book not open, but it seemed like it wasn’t able to be damaged either. Quin had tried burning the book, cutting the book, melting the book...but nothing had worked.

Quinn then went to lie on his bed and turned on the TV for some background noise. He never really paid attention to what was on but the sound of other voices made him feel less lonely.

The TV was currently tuned into the news station.

"The peace treaty with the Dalki race has lasted for five years now but officials say that tension is rising once again and we must prepare for another war...."

The mention of war had always been shown on the TV nonstop since that day. Thirty years ago, the human race received a visit from the so-called Dalki. They looked like humans except for their dragon-like tail and scale-like skin.

They immediately demanded that the Human race hand over their resources and wanted to use them as slaves. Of course, the humans decided to fight back but they quickly found out that their modern technology was useless against them. Bullets couldn’t penetrate their skin and as for tanks, well Dalki had airships.

Every man and woman was told to fight for their planet and that included Quinn’s parents. The war went on for years and Quinn grew up not knowing what his parents looked like.

When the humans were on the brink of defeat, a select few came forward. These people had special abilities. They began sharing their knowledge of how they obtained such power in hopes of turning the tide in the war and it worked. Even so, the Dalki were still strong and a seemingly endless stalemate lead to the peace treaty signing five years ago.

Of course, human greed got the better of humanity and instead of sharing these powers with everyone, the higher ranked governmental officials decided to keep them for themselves. Only those with money were able to learn the more powerful abilities while everyone else was left with scraps.

Quinn was given nothing when his parents died. The government agreed to pay for his living accommodation while he was still in school but that was it. When his parents died at the age of ten, an agent appeared at his doorstep and handed him a book. He was told this was the only thing his parents possessed which they passed down when they died.

"Why is the world so unfair?"

Quinn got out of his bed and started walking over to his desk. He picked up his glasses that were still slightly broken and decided he needed to fix them. He noticed that one of the lenses was slightly out of place and tried to punch it back into its frame.

"Come on, just get in!" He shouted as he pushed down hard.

The lens suddenly smashed into pieces and one of the shards of glass created a deep gash in his thumb.

"Why does the world hate me."

Quinn immediately started to clean up the little pieces of glass and noticed a piece had landed on top of his book. As Quinn removed the piece of glass, a drop of blood from his thumb landed in the centre of the book.

The ring around the centre of the book started to glow and suddenly the book started to lift itself into the air.

"What the hell is happening!"

The book started to shine brightly and shake uncontrollably. It finally opened up and page after page was being turned. Quinn couldn’t take his eyes off the shining book as if he was in a deep trance. The words written in the book weren’t in any language he had seen before but for some reason, he felt like he could understand it.

When the book finally turned its last page, it started to disappear as if it was slowly turning to dust. At the same time, Quinn’s vision was starting to fade. His body felt weak and his eyes slowly shut.

But just before he passed out, there was a single message that he heard.

\u003cCongratulations you have been granted the Va....\u003e

Unable to maintain consciousness long enough to hear the final words, Quinn passed out.

Slowly Quinn’s eyelids started to lift open and his vision started to return. His head felt heavy and his body was slightly sore. As he lifted himself off the ground, he touched his head to see if he had gotten any injuries.

"Why does my head hurt so much?"

After making sure his skull hadn’t split open from falling over, Quinn then went to pick up his glasses off the floor. Although there was only one lens now in it, out of habit Quinn put the glasses on. Suddenly, he felt a little disorientated and his vision was slightly blurry.

He took them back off and noticed that his vision only got blurry when he put the glasses on. Quinn then immediately rushed to his desk to grab a pencil. He drew the letter "A" on the wall and stepped back. Quinn continued to step back until his back had hit the room wall.

"What, but how!" Quinn thought.

Somehow Quinn’s vision was now perfect. He had lived his whole life with terrible eyesight but suddenly he could see clearly. Images then started to flash in his head of what had happened before he passed out and he could think of only one thing. The book.

When Quinn looked around the room, he started to panic.

"The book! where the hell’s the book?"

Quinn looked everywhere for the book but nothing could be found. It couldn’t have gone missing in such a small room and the disappearance of it was making Quinn go mad.

"Maybe it’s like my socks, they go missing all the time? Ahh don’t be stupid, this is a book were talking about not a sock."

Quinn then tried to think hard about what had happened just before he had passed out. He suddenly started to remember the book being lifted into the air. Then just before his eyes closed, he heard a few words.

"What was it, it sounded like some type of system message?"

Then as soon as Quinn had said those words.

A status screen had appeared right in front of his eyes.

\u003cUser: Quinn Talen\u003e

\u003cRace: Human\u003e

\u003c Level 1\u003e

\u003c0/100 exp\u003e

\u003cHP 10/10\u003e

\u003cStrength: 10\u003e

\u003cAgility: 10\u003e

\u003cStamina: 10\u003e

"Wow, it’s like those really old games people used to play all the time."

Quinn noticed that on the status screen there were more tabs on the top but without even doing anything and just reading the tabs in his head. The screen automatically switched.

\u003cSkills\u003e

\u003c0 skill points available\u003e

\u003cSkill locked????\u003e

\u003cSkill locked????\u003e

....

On the skills tab, Quinn wasn’t really able to see much. Everything seemed to be locked and slightly greyed out so he quickly moved on to the next tab which was called, shop.

\u003cShop\u003e

\u003cUnlocks at level 10\u003e

"Can I do anything?"

The last tab was the Quest tab and finally, it seemed like this tab wasn’t locked behind something.

\u003cMain quest\u003e

\u003cReach level 10\u003e

\u003cDaily Quest: Drink two litres of water\u003e

\u003cReward 5 exp \u003e

After checking everything out that the system had to offer. Quinn had to just think about closing the system and it did. When Quinn thought about opening it again a screen would immediately pop up in front of him.

Quinn could only think of one thing, that the book his parents had left him was an ability book. These books could often be bought at very high prices from the military or a company and could even be obtained on the black market.

The only thing was, Quinn had never heard of an ability book that disappeared and granted the user a system like this. The ability books were designed to be learnt. It wasn’t something that you could pick up and instantly understand how to use.

A smile started to slowly appear on Quinn’s face. This was great news for him. He had always been a level 1 ability user because he could never afford to buy any Ability books. Finally, he had something, the next phase was for him to test what ability he had.

"Fire, fire come on!" Quinn said as he threw the palm of his hand forward.

"Ok next... Water, water out!" Quinn did the same again but there was no result.

After trying out many different things and all the abilities he had seen before, it turned out he was unable to perform any of them.

"What the hell useless thing is this. Is it really just a system ability?"

Quinn thought about it for a while. If it truly was like a game then perhaps by completing the quests, he would eventually get stronger and unlock more skills. He was treating it like an ordinary ability book and clearly what he had obtained wasn’t ordinary.

Usually, ability books were based around one ability. It was important for a person to select their first ability book because a regular human body would only be able to perform one Ability attribute. If you got a transformability as your first ability, you would only be able to get other abilities related to this attribute. This was the same for fire and so on.

Quinn then went to open his mini-fridge and started to grab the bottles of water that were inside.

He immediately started downing the water bottles one by one.

"Dam how much is two litres? My belly feels like it’s going to burst."

After finishing his eighth bottle of water, a new notification message had appeared.

\u003cDaily Quest complete, 5 exp has been granted\u003e

\u003c5/100\u003e

"Well now I know at least the system works."

Suddenly there was a loud knock that could be heard at the door. Quinn quickly went to the door and opened it. Standing in front of him was a large muscular bald-headed man wearing a black military uniform. There were several medals on it and his name written just above his chest. Sargent Griff.

"Boy, it is time for you to vacate your room immediately, the vehicle has been prepared and has been waiting outside for 5 minutes already."

With everything that had happened, Quinn had forgotten about what was to happen today.

"It’s time for you to head to military school," Griff said.

Due to the War between Humans and the Dalki, every person when they reached the age of 16 was required to go to military school for two years. Even though Humans and Dalki were in a peaceful period, everyone knew that it wouldn’t last forever.

Every day there was news of one race antagonizing the other and war felt like it could start at any moment.

Quinn quickly went to the toilet before heading off with Sergeant Griff. His bladder felt like it was going to burst any second now due to all the water he drank.

Once Quinn stepped out of his room into the outside world, something strange happened. A new notification screen had appeared.

\u003cYour body is being hit by direct sunlight\u003e

\u003cYou are affected by the sunlight\u003e

\u003cAll stats will be halved while in the sunlight\u003e

Suddenly, Quinn’s body felt extremely sluggish. It felt like he had just gone for a 5k Run and returned, his arms and legs felt heavier and there was nothing he could do about it.

Quinn then went to check his status and saw that his stats did indeed go down by half but it wasn’t just his stats but his HP as well.

\u003cHP 5/5\u003e

\u003cStrength 5/5\u003e

\u003cStamina 5/5\u003e

\u003cAgility 5/5\u003e

"What kind of drawback is this!" Quinn thought.

Then a new notification had appeared.

\u003cYou have received a new Daily quest: Avoid direct sunlight for 8 hours \u003e

\u003c reward 5 Exp\u003e

Quinn’s mood slightly changed as soon as he saw the new daily quest. Unlike the water one, this was something he was able to do naturally just by sleeping. If the system worked the same way it did in games, then that meant once Quinn had reached 100 exp points he would be able to level up and also level up his stats.

So the more daily quests Quinn got, the better it was for him.

"What are you doing walking so slowly! The School will eat you alive if you carry on like that!" Griff shouted.

Finally, Quinn had reached a large bus which was parked just outside his house. When he entered the bus, he noticed that it was already full of students all the same age as him.

He didn’t recognize any of the students though, meaning they had all come from a different school. Quinn then went to sit at the front of the bus which was the only seat that was still available.

\u003cStats have returned to normal\u003e

As soon as Quinn had entered the bus and avoided the direct sunlight, his stats had returned to normal and his body felt re-energized once again.

"Well, at least it looks like it’s only direct sunlight."

The students were all talking to each other in excitement but that quickly stopped as soon as sergeant Griff came on board.

"Alright, it’s time for us to head to the military academy."

The bus then started to move and the students were finally on their way. The bus remained silent during the journey. Whenever a student would start to speak Griff immediately would look in their direction and the student would shut up.

Griff didn’t even have to say anything, they all knew what he wanted just by looking at him. magic

Then about 10 minutes into the journey Quinn once again received another message.

\u003cA substance in the air has been detected \u003e

\u003cYou are feeling sleepy\u003e

\u003cResistance +1\u003e

Quinn found this message quite strange and then when he started to look around the bus, he noticed that nearly all of the students were either asleep or dosing off.

Suddenly, even his own eyelids started to feel dizzy.

\u003cYour resistance to the substance has increased\u003e

\u003cResistance +1\u003e

Then the sound of loud footsteps could be heard coming towards him, as he looked up he noticed Sergeant Griff hovering above him.

"Looks like a few of you were able to resist the sleeping gas. Then we will just have to bag you."

Aa black bag was then thrown on top of Quinn’s head and his vision now was completely covered. The gas started to slowly seep through and Quinn managed to doze off into a nice sleep.

Then the next moment, Quinn could feel a splash of cold water being chucked on his face. His eyes opened instantly and all he could see was the green grass.

He and several other students started to lift their heads to lock around them. There were currently a total of 200 students stood out on a plain open field But when they looked around they were in a place that was completely foreign to them.

"This is where you will spend the next two years of your life."

The students were amazed at what they were seeing. They were currently in a city like they had never seen before. Everyone was dressed up in military uniform and there were technology and engineering around them that was too advanced for their time. Giant robots moving crates and building machines.

Flying ships, and levitating trains. It was a technology that hadn’t been given to the outside world yet and was kept for the military only.

After the first war with the Dalki Race, the humans had managed to make leaps in technological advancement. This was because they had managed to salvage equipment from them after the war but of course, the military decided to keep most of it for themselves.

When Quinn finally stopped being amazed at his surroundings, he noticed that there was something placed around his wrist. It looked similar to a digital watch but there was nothing displaying on the screen.

"That there on your wrist is your lifeline. It will identify you as a student at this military base. It will allow you to access certain areas, pay for food and all sorts. It is your lifeline at this academy. That isn’t the only thing that it will display though. When not in use the Wristwatch will display a single number and that number is your power level.

As soon as Quinn heard those words, he gritted his teeth and clenched his fist. He thought his life might change was coming to military school but it seemed like it was going to be the same even here.

"With that, we will immediately begin the level test for you all, good luck!" Griff said with a smile on his face.