CHAPTER 5 - How Does This Work?

After being relieved along with his team, Altair heard while passing by one of the radio reporters that volunteers had rescued 84 people, all having varying levels of injuries, and that an additional eight people were already dead when found and still waiting to be identified.

Altair did not know if that was a lot or too little, he did not know how many people were present in the vicinity at the time the accident occurred since it happened around midnight of coordinated time (CT).

What he knew however, was that the team he was in, had only found two people in their search.

'Even after working through the night, in the end that is all we could do.' Altair thought this with clenched fists and a sad expression on his face as he kept walking.

While he was in his thoughts, just like with other teams before his team, someone directed them towards the new camp.

They were all dirty with soot and dust all over their faces and clothes. The gloves on their hands, showed signs of wear, with the gloves grazed in many places and looking worn-out from all the lifting they did in the ruins.

Under one of the tents arranged like an office, the team met with some people that were there for a debriefing of sorts.

The professionals under this tent/office asked them to recount to the best of their ability what they did, the places they went to and other stuff like how stable these locations were.

The team made some kind of verbal report and people were noting what they said and recording them.

Apparently, every little detail was important and they needed to give as much information as possible.

"We understand that you're tired after working through the night but please just bear with us for a while."

"Everything you tell us will help us in providing better assistance to those waiting for help in there."

Altair's team began reporting their activities, highlighting unstable areas and various other details.

From time to time, the professionals would ask them some questions for clarifications.

Altair saw that there were two people around an enlarged map and that as the volunteers talked or reported, those two would occasionally circle some spots and add some abbreviations or numbers to them.

After finishing the report, they all left the tents area in order to find a place to rest.

Given the circumstances, no one was really in the mood to suggest a get together so they went their separate ways, their fatigue only now catching up with them.

.

After separating from the team, Altair kept walking away from the ruined site, and once in a place that he judged safe, he teleported away.

In the distance, the sun was just beginning to peak over the horizon.

Looking in the distance, he thought, 'Is it that late already. Looks like it's already 7 a.m.'

.

He reappeared in his home and slumped on a couch in front of the TV, and quickly fell asleep after doing so.

.

A few hours later, he woke up from his sleep, still feeling a little tired and lethargic.

Since he did not feel like moving, he rearranged himself on the couch to face upwards, with his head facing the ceiling of the room.

'The way I suddenly appeared in Kyrnac even though I've never been there in my life makes me wonder. How exactly does this teleportation ability work? What is the limit?'

He stayed lying on the couch thinking of various possibilities.

After some time, he stood up from the couch and walked to the bathroom with the intention of splashing some water on his face.

When he got there, a certain familiar foul smell assaulted his nostrils and dispelled his grogginess.

'This again? Right, I forgot to throw away the clothes and just left them on the floor.'

He picked the clothes he had left on the floor to put in a plastic bag and sealed it shut.

He used some warm water to brush off the remaining smell on the floor.

After doing all this, he remembered his purpose for coming to the bathroom.

'Well, I'm well awake now.' He thought with a self-deprecating smile.

Since he was already in the bathroom, he took a bath before returning to the living room.

Later, while sitting on the couch in changed clothes, he started wondering.

'Is it possible that I don't need to have gone to a place, and I just have to see the destination to appear there?'

With this line of thought, he picked his phone and typed a location in the browser's search bar.

|Lutetia…|

Doing so showed several results about the city of Lutetia or as the Gaulish called it Lutèce.

He switched to image search and started looking through the locations.

One place in particular stood out, the Gustave tower. As the most famous destination in the city of love, there were many results with it in the view.

He willed it, and the next instant he appeared there.

Although it was morning, with many people rushing to their various destinations, no one really noticed his sudden appearance in the place.

Nonetheless, he quickly willed it and reappeared in his house's living room. He was excited seeing that he could teleport to a place just by having an image of the location.

'So, it's really possible.' He inwardly thought, ecstatic at the possibilities this offered.

He took his phone again and typed in another location in his navigator's search bar.

|Dibei…|

Again, he browsed through images and quickly choose another location, this time less prominent, and as before, he willed it and he appeared there instantly.

This time, he remained in the area, taking a moment to explore his surroundings. He decided to move around to confirm a few details and gain a better understanding of the environment.

However, after staying in the place a little, he found that he could not really do much. The major thing hindering being the language barrier.

The people of Dibei mostly spoke Safaitic and he knew nothing of the language.

He teleported and left the place to return home again.

Checking several locations around the world, he confirmed his ability to teleport to any location, not only through visualization but also by using a picture of the desired place.

Time slowly passed, and he forgot about other stuff but after some time, he eventually calmed down.

'I thought I would have to travel to different places before I could become a super-hero but this makes things much easier.' Altair thought elated.

Thinking of his super-hero idea, his thoughts returned to the System he had almost forgotten about.

He focused on the System's icon in a corner of his vision and it expanded, opening the System's interface.

He had not been able to go through the System earlier because of the body reconstruction notification that prevented him.

After that, with everything that was going on, he had almost forgotten about it.

He started browsing through the System but there was not much to see.

When the System's icon enlarged, it first loaded.

[…]

Immediately after, it showed a greeting.

[Greetings to the 'Player']

Following the greeting, the Status tab appeared again before him.

STATUS

[NAME: AKROATÍS SOFÓS ALTAIR ROHAN]

[LEVEL : 1 ]

[RACE : HUMAN ]

[TITLE(S) : PLAYER▾▻ ]

[CLASS : NONE ]

[HEALTH : 100 ]

[MANA : 160 ]

[STRENGTH : 10 ]

[AGILITY : 10 ]

[VITALITY : 10 ]

[INTELLIGENCE : 16 ]

[SENSE : 10 ]

[POINTS : 0 ]

'Nothing seems to have changed' He thought before looking to the side.

Beside the status panel, there were three other icons with different drawings on them.

Focusing on it, he enlarged the first icon. When it expanded, it showed to be an inventory tab.

The inventory tab was large, and like the Status tab, it was a deep blue transparent tab with flowery patterns at its edges. At the top right, it had a Close (⨉) and a Minimize (_) button.

It also had several small square grid boxes with each having a smaller triangle at their bottom right corner. Inside the triangles was the number 0 for all of them.

Wanting to test how the inventory worked and what its limits were, he started going around the house trying to put things of different sizes into the inventory. From a simple pen, to the bed in his room.

Then he went around the house putting everything in the house to check the number limit of the items the inventory could carry.

However, even after emptying the house of all its items, the inventory did not stop accepting items even when he put the clothes he was wearing in the inventory.

For a brief moment, he just stood in his house that was completely empty of everything it had ever had.

'Hmmm'

He willed it and the clothes reappeared on his body as if they were game items, which equipped without having to wear them slowly.

'I was just trying but it actually worked?'

Looking at the empty house, he thought. 'I wanted to rearrange the place anyway, this works just fine for me.'

He went around the house removing the items from the Inventory, putting them where he wanted them.

With just a thought, the items just appeared where he wanted them to be. They always appeared within a 1-meter distance from him or in contact with him and he could not bring out anything to appear further than 1 meter from him.

Although the names of the items in the Inventory did not appear anywhere, somehow, he was able to know which item was in each Inventory grid just by wanting to know.

More than the name appearing in his mind, he just knew which item it was exactly.

He could also bring out items as long as he knew they were there even without having to look at the Inventory.

With both the Status and Inventory icons expanded into tabs, he could still see two icons.

He willed it, and the next icon opened.

As it expanded, he saw a Shop tab. The items appeared in a 'content' view, but everything looked so pixelated that he could not even make out the shape of the items' icons, not to mention their names and prices.

A single line of text overlaid the contents of the Shop tab.

[Conditions not met.]

That was the only thing readable on the Shop tab now.

Seeing that he could do nothing about the situation, he focused on the last icon he saw. For some reason it was flashing in an orange light.

He opened the flashing tab and it was a Quest tab. The design was similar to the other tabs.

All the System showed was an Inventory tab, a Shop tab, a Status tab and a Quest tab. With all the tabs open as they currently were, they appeared side by side, all four deployed in a semi cylindrical style, with Altair standing in the center of this cylinder.

'A Quest tab? Why is it blinking, and why is it orange when everything else is blue?' He thought.

When he opened the Quest tab, he saw the dreadful words that he would soon come to hate.