Emerald Atavism. That sounded powerful, but her gamer instinct said go for Unique, not Legendary. It was real life and a different dimension, but so what? Unique. Tread new ground. Find a way to break and cheese whatever system they give you.
The orb dimmed, then a minute later, it glowed again.
It started to swirl with a complex, dancing light. "Are you recording it, Miri?"
"Negative. The energy signature is too intense for clear capture."
"I think it's obvious now, Miri. That is mana. Let's call it that for now."
"Unknown substance designated as 'mana.'"
The orb turned silver, then ochre, before resting on an azure glow. Red streaks pulsed from it and crawled up her arms.
"Measuring increased heart rate and warmth in your core, Phantom. Health check pending. User feedback?"
"It's not painful. It's warm. A resonance. A core, or a soul—call me superstitious, but that's what it feels like."
"Measuring. Failing to establish the presence of any anatomical abnormality corresponding to a 'core' or 'soul' within your biological parameters."
It's not physical. It's just... there. No further analysis required. Let's see how this works and how the rules of this reality operate.
She focused her mind on the feeling. Let's see if it works.
[Nexus Archive 2.0]
[Processing age, anomaly, measuring telomere length, mana tolerance, genetic cosmic synchronization, life form rank on ascendance ladder, species default lifetime parameter intrusion...]
[Age: 320/330]
My actual age. That is rude. My life extension was running out, but this is a bit harsh. No, wait—this is my Orc body that influences it, maybe. Strange. Ten years left only, and no access to a certified bio-lab. I usually get extensions when I'm a hundred out. I don't like this at all.
Keep calm, Jess. Maybe you can solve it. Your human baseline cloned body should wait for you on the other side of that rift. Might as well be a universe away. Which it is.
[Name: Undeclared]
"Phantom," she said, almost expecting the name to already be in use. But why would it be? Like a game server? Jess, what are you thinking?
[Name: Phantom]
[Age: 320/330]
[Race: ???, consolidated to: Orc]
[Class: Frontline Huntress]
[Level: 1/25]
[Exp: 0/100]
[Slain Unique Enemies: 0]
There we go. At least I didn't have to use darkPhantom380 as an account name and then set a nickname.
[Strange mana and spell resistance detected. Species parameter deviation: heightened regeneration and strength above baseline for known specimens of similar racial pattern.]
So it is mana. I was right. Orcs are known to it? Who knows how the TESR Conglomerate acquired the samples. The game-like specs and visuals always seemed odd, but everyone thought the designers lacked imagination or that the species they found by chance were similar to existing fantasy races.
[Advancement Quest: Unavailable.]
Not very useful. Advancement in what? Ignore it for now, Jess.
No breakdown for Strength or other status, very lean. No HP or mana bar either. Not like Myriad Expanse Online. That would have been too weird if they worked the same.
The feeling in her chest expanded, grew more intense. A new message surfaced.
[Core Slot 1 (Rank 0): Empty]
[Core Slot 2 (Rank 0): Empty]
[Core Slot 3 (Rank 0): Empty]
Three slots. Ready to be used for skills. All currently Rank 0. They felt like empty sockets in her soul.
"Can I get more?"
No answer. I guess it's not the chatty type of interface. MOBA more than MMORPG? Not like the Massive Online Role Playing games I used to play in VR with vast numbers of skills, but a focused match with limited skills and tighter strategy. Different game types, different playstyles. Talking with myself.
"Miri, any thoughts?"
"No, Phantom. Insufficient information for qualified analysis."
A new awareness pushed into her consciousness, like a new limb, or an old familiar one. From endless hours of playing, she knew it was a skill even before the full description appeared in front of her mental eyes. It consolidated from motes of light and thought, then formed coherent text. Ambient mana and her own newfound class nature seemed to push and filter together to create it.
[Too Close For Comfort – Rank 0]
[Passive Skill. Any and all ranged attacks against the Frontline Huntress weaken drastically. Ranged attacks are half as effective against you. This includes area-of-effect, elemental, magical, delayed, sustained, and natural indirect hits. Blunts the impact of melee attacks by 15%. No limit to the scale or number of attacks; the reduction is applied as a constant.]
"Ranged attacks are half as effective against you." She stopped breathing. This. This sounds good. I love Unique class. No, no reason to get too excited. Maybe it's normal to get it? She doubted it. Physics, out the window. If that was her first passive from her class… The limited slots. Oh, that’s how we play. Limited slots, powerful skills. Or rather, hard choices? How do I get more? Is it in effect? No, right—slot it.
She focused her will on the first empty slot in her mind.
[Core Slot 1 (Rank 0): Too Close For Comfort – Rank 0 - SLOTTED]
A new line of text pulsed beneath it.
[Too Close For Comfort: Standard cooldown of 1 year upon removal initiated.]
[Gained skills will never be lost. Only skill evolution or rank-up might alter their intrinsic power.]
So removing it triggers a year-long cooldown before the same skill can be slotted again. ‘Will never be lost’—that’s comforting, but limiting.
Another message popped up, answering the exploitative thought forming in her head. So, could she accumulate endless skills and then switch them all into her slots in series during one combat? The obvious way to abuse it…
[Nexus Log: Core Slot 1. 24 sol-hour swap cooldown until a new skill can be removed.]
Question answered. No mid-combat hot-swapping. Except for one at a time, with a day's penalty.
"Miri, did you notice any changes in my parameters?"
"Negative, Phantom. Your biometrics are unchanged. A small increase in heart rate correlates with excitement, but nothing abnormal."
So it seems metaphysical. Or rather, beyond our old dimension's understanding.
Her stream of consciousness continued, analytical and sharp. Maybe this reality operated on different rules. Can I abuse the system to get more skills? Kirael, my old elf-crafter gamer pal, would just let it happen, happy-go-lucky, and come up with some genius craft and gear anyway.
I was never that type, or that patient. So how does this work? How would a universe work that is a bit like a game you never played? No tutorial. Nothing. I guess.
What if she got a Rank 1 skill she can't slot? All three slots are Rank 0. Is that what the ‘Advancement Quest’ is for? To increase the slot rank? Even if I don't qualify for one right now?
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
"Miri, note down that I expect to have to cross a bottleneck or complete a specific task when I reach my maximum level for this rank."
The life expectancy was a sour spot in her mind. Not that she expected to stay here ten years, but given the 250-year temporal displacement, it might represent her most immediate, threatening deadline.
Phantom, dying of old age. That is not something I want.
The sour thought of a deadline faded under the immediate, pragmatic need to understand her new tools. The giant bird’s nest was a ruin of sticks and strange, pulpy vegetation, but nearby, a slab of dark, sedimentary stone lay half-buried in the loam, its surface unnaturally smooth and flat.
A test platform.
"Alright. Let’s test if skills unlock by actions. Old MMO logic. Grinding."
She positioned herself before the slab, rolling her shoulders. Best way to find out is to repeat an action. They call it grinding. This feels stupid.
Her first punch was controlled, testing. A solid thwack that sent a jolt up her wrist. The stone didn’t chip. Her Orc knuckles, tough as seasoned leather, reddened but held.
Punch number 1.
She settled into a rhythm. Jab, cross, hook. Thwack. Thwack. Thwack. The forest sounds—chitters, distant calls, the rustle of leaves—became the background to a monotonous, percussive beat. Her breath steadied into harsh exhales timed with each impact.
This is moronic. A high-tech operative turned cavewoman, punching a rock.
Ten minutes in, her knuckles were scraped raw, the black biosuit material over them fraying. A thin mist of stone dust hung in the air. No notification. No flicker of insight. Just the stubborn, unyielding solidity of the rock and a dull, spreading ache.
Punch number 124.
"Miri, monitor for any neurological shifts or synaptic patterns that deviate from repetitive strain baseline."
"Monitoring. Pattern is consistent with focused physical exertion and minor tissue trauma. No anomalous activity."
Of course not. Keep going.
The first hour was a battle against boredom and rising self-mockery. The initial theory-crafting excitement curdled into dogged stubbornness. She switched tactics, using the heel of her palm, hammer-fists, trying to mimic the motions she’d used with the broken bow—the brutal, penetrating strikes. The stone, slowly, begrudgingly, began to shed tiny grey flakes. Her hands throbbed in a steady, hot rhythm with her heartbeat.
Punch number 2,323.
What if nothing happens? What if this world’s rules don’t work like that? What if I’m just wasting calories and damaging my primary weapons?
The doubts were insidious. She pushed them down, focusing on the impact, the transfer of force, the minute give of the stone’s surface. This was no different than endurance training in a VR sim, just far less glamorous and much more painful.
Punch number 6,499.
By the second hour, it was meditative agony. Sweat stung her eyes. Her shoulders burned. The skin over her knuckles had broken and sealed, broken and sealed again, her Orc regeneration fighting a losing war against constant abrasion. The stone slab now bore a faint, damp depression marked with smears of copper-green blood.
Kirael would be laughing his ass off. ‘Only you, Jess. Only you would get isekai’d and immediately start punching a rock for three hours.’
Punch number 9,909.
A hysterical giggle threatened to bubble up. She choked it down, driving a particularly vicious elbow strike into the center of the depression. A larger flake spat loose.
Punch number 9,999.
And then, in the midst of the numbness and the pain, something clicked. Not in the stone. In her. A crystallized understanding of angle, of kinetic transfer, of using the body’s architecture not just to hit, but to drive through. It wasn’t a new knowledge; it was an old, buried instinct from a hundred brawls and desperate close-quarters fights, finally refined into a principle.
The next punch felt different. Not harder, but truer.
A notification seared itself across her mind’s eye, vivid and undeniable.
[Bash – Rank 0]
[You have practiced your melee skills. The bread and butter of a Frontline Huntress is her fists. When all else fails, you don't need a weapon to invoke it. Your next unarmed or blunt melee strike within 30 seconds lands with 30% increased force and increases the harm inflicted. Only successful hits consume the effect.]
[Cooldown: 30 seconds]
She stumbled back, sucking in a ragged gasp. Her hands hung at her sides, swollen and trembling. She looked from them to the stone slab, to the skill description floating in her vision. A wild, triumphant grin split her features, cutting through the fatigue.
Still got it. I know how this works.
She slumped against a nearby tree, the bark rough even through her biosuit. She didn't deem herself an expert in much, but combat and gaming—the puzzle of violence—was what she had a knack for.
No testing for now, the fists still stinging and trembling from the assault.
Exhaustion washed over her, followed by a deep, gnawing hunger. The nest, she saw now, was bigger and softer than she’d first thought, a crude basin lined with gathered tufts of blue fur and dry moss. She looked at her battered knuckles, then at the colossal, feathered carcass.
"Time to grill some meat."
Using her field knife, she worked quickly, cutting away the surface layer of the bird’s thigh muscle where it might have been exposed to insects or contaminants. The violet flesh beneath was dense and cold. She had no way to store or keep more, so waste was not a major concern—only immediate sustenance. She skewered the thick cuts on sharpened green sticks, her movements automatic and efficient, and carried them back to the faint, remembered embers of the team's abandoned fire.
Before she could leave, a rustle sounded behind her. She jumped, spinning around, hands balling into fists, her body coiling to trigger Bash. Right, she forgot that it was not slotted yet and untested for now, so that option was out. She didn’t yell. No need to warn anything that I’m here.
The noise came from the nest. It was bigger and softer than she’d first thought, a crude basin lined with collected tufts of blue fur and dry moss. And something was moving underneath.
She approached cautiously, using the tip of her knife to move a large stick aside.
A white fluffball popped out from underneath.
It was a hatchling, barely the size of a large cat, covered in damp, spiky down. Its legs were too long, its neck comically slender, ending in a blunt, soft beak. It stumbled, blinking large, dark eyes that held none of its mother's malevolence, only a bewildered vulnerability.
Tied to the nest. Tied to the mother being dead.
The logical part of her brain, the Phantom part, ran cold calculations. It’s a predator. It will grow. It will need constant food. It’s a liability. A giant, screeching liability. She watched it struggle to clamber over a fallen branch, its tiny wings paddling uselessly at the air.
What to do with it?
She decided against feeding it meat from its mother. That felt like a line even she wouldn’t cross. It had feathers; the mother couldn’t fly. Maybe it foraged. Maybe it ate… something else.
As she watched it struggle, a prompt seared across her vision, bright and demanding.
[Do you wish to tame the Titanic Terror Beak Hatchling? Y/N]
I don’t know if I want to constantly drag it along, she thought, even as her knife felt heavy in her hand. Put it out of its misery. Clean. Efficient.
The hatchling finally righted itself, spotted her, and let out a soft, plaintive, "Coo?"
It waddled forward, unsteady, and nuzzled its blunt beak against her biosuit-clad leg. "Coo!"
Its large, moist eyes looked up at her, reflecting the strange cyan-tinged moonlight. No. My god, no. You don't fall for it, Jess. Right? Remember its mother gulping down Vanguard and trying to snap you in half?
"Coo?" It tilted its head sideways, a gesture of innocent curiosity.
"Okay. Okay. You beat me." The words were a resigned sigh, spoken to the empty air. "Yes. I accept."
She focused on the ‘Y’, thinking yes with all the reluctant commitment she could muster.
A new, complex sensation unfolded in her mind, like a mental drawer sliding open. Information streamed in.
[Feature of Nexus Archive 2.0: Beast Space unlocked.]
[You may place a tamed creature into Beast Space, irrespective of its size or volume. Requires 30 seconds of uninterrupted concentration to summon or dismiss your beast. Food and water upkeep not included. Temperature and habitat inside are calibrated for maximum beast comfort.]
[Cooldown: 1 hour between transfers.]
[Nexus Log: Phantom has tamed ‘Titanic Terror Beak Hatchling.’ Beast Rank: D.]
[Obedience is based on treatment and bond. No mental adjustments of tamed beasts are authorized or induced by the Nexus.]
Beast Space. Convenient. A D-Class? She looked from the fluffy hatchling to the gigantic, terrifying corpse she’d barely survived. That was a D-Class? I had to go all out to beat it. Granted, she hadn’t had her class or skills yet, but she was in her prime bioweapon body. If that’s D, what the hell is A?
"Miri, classify 'D-Rank' as the standard threat equivalent to an elite cybernetic veteran drop trooper. Use me and the team as the baseline comparison."
"Database updated, Phantom. D-Rank threat classification now contextualized."
When she returned to cutting and preparing her own meat, the hatchling stumbled over and snapped at a hanging scrap. "No," she said, firmly pushing its beak away with the back of her wrist. "This is not for you." It let out a confused peep.
She concentrated. For thirty seconds, she focused on the new mental compartment, envisioning the hatchling safe and asleep. The little Terror Beak blurred, shimmered, and vanished with a soft pop of displaced air.
One problem temporarily shelved. What should I call it? No idea for now.
She finished her work, roasting some meat over the revitalized fire and wrapping the extra portions in a large leaf, sterilizing the bundle with heat and smoke to deter parasites. As dusk deepened into proper night, her eyes adjusted. She couldn’t see heat signatures, but the trace cyan luminescence in the atmosphere and the weak moonlight were enough. Her Orc eyes gathered the light, painting the world in a sea of stark grays, blacks, and silvery outlines.
Sleeping in the nesting ground of giant murder-birds is a stupid idea. Sleeping during the day, high in a tree, might be safer. But she still had many hours until dawn, and a restless energy buzzed beneath her fatigue—the thrill of unlocking a system, of gaining power in this broken world.
The despair of being stranded was still there, but it was now overshadowed by a focused, almost giddy curiosity. She had Miri. She had a class. She had a skill. She had a… pet. It was more than she had a few hours ago.
The team has the assets and the legacy tech. They have a better shot at getting home. Fine. But with the knowledge and power she was scraping from this world, she felt a spark she hadn’t felt in decades: the excitement of a new challenge, a new game where the stakes were ultimate, and she was learning the rules first.
Jess shouldered her leaf-wrapped rations, took a bearing on the southwestern landmark—that impossible wall—and started to run, a steady, ground-eating lope that carried her away from the nest and the traces of her former party, moving silently into the deep, gray shadows of the alien night.
Poll for the name of the titanic terror bird hatchling.
