《The Ancient Game》 Lifes Just A Game Now Life isn''t easy. That''s what I learned ever since I entered the years where I started to be attracted to women. Before even finding a good woman, you need to be able to get women in general first. That''s the hard part of life. I mean, not for me obviously, I''m decent looking, I am in good shape from all the sport I do, and I have a good career ahead of me. I''m at the ''finding a good woman'' part. There are worse problems in life, but as someone from one of the wealthiest country in the world, none of them directly affect me, and I have no intention nor resources to dedicate myself to helping others. Might be selfish, and I won''t even hide behind the ''everybody does it'' excuse, but that''s how it is. In an age where everyone is trying to virtue signal to appeal to minorities, not putting yourself in the spotlight is the best way to not get into problems, faking a concern for others your whole life to get cookie points can only get you so far. Now, where was I? Ah yes, I was on my way to a girl''s apartment. At 22, I am nearly done with my studies and ready to enter the working world. Walking through the busy streets of my city, I finally arrived at my destination. I wasn''t that excited about this; it would be just a one-night stand; she wasn''t anything worth dating. We wouldn''t be seeing each other after this night, and she just wasn''t aware of it yet. The moment, I climbed the few stairs to get to her apartment''s door, I tripped. I couldn''t help but think I was unlucky. Consider the recent rainy weather, the stairs were wet, and my clothes would get dirty. The next second, I felt a ground, but not what I expected. It wasn''t wet, nor was it hard. I opened my eyes and saw. Nothing. Nothing was there, just blackness. I heard many groans somewhat resonating around me. That''s when the panic hit me. I couldn''t smell anything, and even if the sense of smell was pretty weak in humans, my brain simply couldn''t interpret the complete lack of smell any other way than ''danger''. I looked at myself since I was still on the, technically, ground, it wasn''t too hard. I had no clothes on, and my body was somewhat hazy. The proportions were kind of right, but I looked more like the souls from certain games, a mix of white and blue in a cloudy humanoid form. The distinct lack of everything around me only increased my fear. I looked out for whatever groaned around me and saw dozens of soul-like people, just like me. Am I dead? Did those stairs kill me? The number of questions in my mind kept increased, but I wasn''t willing to speak, considering there were about a hundred people just looking awkwardly at each other. Finally, someone decided to act and asked, with evident confusion and fear in his voice, what was happening. Nobody answered, which only made him more frightened. He got into a panic attack and simply tried desperately to get answers from people that knew as much as himself. Since he was somewhat close to me, he looked at me dead in the eyes, although I didn''t know how I was able to tell that, considering our forms. " Hey, you! You know something right! Spill it out! M-my children''s are waiting for me! " he continued his rant while I kept my mouth shut, somewhat confused why he targeted me, as it was apparent that I knew nothing. " Look, man, nobody knows what is happening here, calm down, you''re just annoying. " said the man to my right. While the volume in the place increased as people started to panic and talked or screamed at each other, the loudest one was still the first, and the people that stayed calm, even though confused, were annoyed by his lack of composure. The screaming men stopped his rant and looked at the one that decided to step up and try to shut him up. He then jumped at him and tried to hit him while accusing him of kidnapping him. I reflexively wanted to hold him down, but the three of us and the people watching the scene unveil realized we were passing through each other. We couldn''t interact in the slightest, at least by touch. This only confirmed the theory, that at least everyone thought of once, that we were dead. And the one realizing that had varying reactions. Some broke down in tears, some were angry, and some were trying to confess their sins, though I could tell that they weren''t necessarily religious. Suddenly a game-looking screen appeared in front of me. Then a voice resonated in my head, though I only realized it after I looked around and saw that nobody was talking with this voice. Everyone got the same treatment as the cries, shouts, and so on stopped altogether in the room. Welcome, participants, to the 148th edition of the Ancient Game! Power, Riches and Women? Everything is at your reach within this game! You have been selected to play in the most entertaining game in the history of creation! Choose your starting attributes, explore different worlds, fight to the death the other participants and be the last one standing! Infinite treasures and rewards await you at the top! I had to pause to understand what was just said. I skipped past the unfair fact that none of us chose to participate in a death game and that only one would remain, and tried to calm down. But the voice or announcer in my head didn''t even let me finish. The rules are simple! Every participant is given 100 points and can browse through the universal shop to buy attributes to a maximum of 5 attributes! Those attributes contain bloodlines, legendary equipment, systems, magics and other miscellaneous things and items that would prove extremely important in your fights! After choosing those five attributes, you will be transported in a new body fitting for your choice in a random world, but there''s more! Only one bloodline can be bought from the shop, and there is a lot of attributes and worlds that participants cannot attain to keep the game fair!The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation. This time, instead of the cheerful voice, a monotonous voice rang inside my head. [ Would you like to access the universal shop? ] I mentally said yes, and another game-like panel opened up in front of my eyes. I first tried to test if others could see mine as well, but considering I noticed those close to me swiping their fingers in the air, I considered myself safe. The shop was immense. There were too many items to browse through it simply, and you had to search for specific things. But when I realized what kind of items were sold, I nearly jumped from joy. The stuff sold in the shop were from every fiction created in our world. When that fact was completely understood, I quickly searched for the Saiyan bloodline, obviously by the fear that if one bought an item, it would be impossible for others to obtain it. [ The Saiyan Bloodline cannot be obtained. ] Well, there goes my easy access to power. Now that I think about it, it was apparent, it was simply too overpowering, and it wouldn''t be a contest of training and planning, it would be merely a contest of whoever can choose these kinds of bloodlines the fastest. Browsing through the different worlds, I realized the Dragon Ball Multiverse was also locked out. I sighed as I had to think of another plan. My focus was on races and bloodlines since these would dictate how high could I go without external help, and a diabolical plan quickly formed in my head with my limited knowledge of fiction in general. I searched for multiple things in quick succession and simply smiled when I realized that I could go even higher than I initially thought. [ Add-on: Nord ( Human Race ) from The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim. Cost: 10 points. ] [ Bloodline: Hanma ( Human Race ) from Baki. Cost: 25 points. ] [ Item: Peerage Set from Highschool DxD. Cost: 20 points. ] Changing myself to a Nord from Skyrim was not considered a bloodline. This was an actual hack, in my opinion, so I quickly selected those three attributes. Any human race from Skyrim was close to humans, but at the same time, they could become much more robust than us. Nords were also naturally more muscular and tougher than us, so this was a pleasant bonus if we only look at it from this angle. I wasn''t sure about this, but those other points would be incredible if true. Nords were the ones that could use Thu''um the most in Tamriel, due to their ancestry, I didn''t know if it would be possible for me to do the same eventually, but the possibility was worth taking the attribute. Also, every species in Skyrim could naturally use Aura, which was their projected life-force, similar to ki in that regard. That was how warriors could destroy mages that had spells that could level entire cities. This affinity would come in handy if I were transported into a world that did not have these kinds of powers. The Battle Cry and Resist Frost racial abilities were also a big plus in this choice. The Hanma bloodline was quite straightforward; it was the closest you could get to a continually evolving body in terms of the human race, or at least that I could think of. The feats from Baki''s father were simply mindblowing, and within a supernatural world, I was sure I would eventually be able to surpass him with my body. The Peerage Set from Highschool DxD was another way for me to fuck with the system. It would grant me an additional bloodline that would be quite strong with training, not as intense as the Hamna bloodline, but still, nothing to scoff at. The most important part of the Devil Bloodline was that they were magic freaks and could use magic just with their imagination. That would grant me an extreme affinity with magic without having to spend another attribute. Plus I got the information that the people in my peerage would be able to travel with me to fight against other participants. I was sure other items could grant allies to participants, but I wasn''t sure about another item that would give both bloodline and partners. The downside to it would be that I would be weak against light and holy magic, but it was worth the risks. I still had two attributes to choose, and my first reflex was to look for systems. Considering the Gamer System cost 100 points, I expected them to be quite expensive and didn''t know if I would be able to buy one. My problem was that I had a lot of potential, but it was still not enough since I lacked time, I needed another way to increase my power in a short amount of time, and systems were the best way to do that. Browsing my way through the various systems, I finally found an excellent one that would help me with both my problems. [ Levelling System from The Death Mage Who Doesn''t Want A Fourth Time. Cost: 30 points ] The system wasn''t that expensive because the biggest problem was that it technically required EXP to increase your power no matter what, and without that the growth was limited. The thing is that since my other wishes were from different worlds where it was possible to increase your power without it, it would simply negate the downside. It would also resolve my other problem, which was even bigger than the first one, defence. I wasn''t talking about Physical Defense, my bloodlines were enough for that, especially the Hanma Bloodline, but mental defence. I noticed a huge number of abilities, bloodlines and items that revolved around mental or soul manipulation, and I had little way of defending myself from them. This system would allow me to take jobs related to mental or soul manipulation if I exposed myself to it. It wouldn''t be strong, but it would be a good start. The Devil Bloodline would certainly help me with mental protection, but I still had nothing about soul protection. I had one attribute slot and 15 points left. I didn''t have enough for anything compelling, and could only look for something like a strong item. Anything related to the soul was costly, especially bloodlines and magics. I didn''t need any soul attacks, just protection, but both went hand in hand so I could only hope to find a decent solution for my problem as I continued to browse through the shop. My eyes stopped on an ability, and I smiled. Since I went for the most potential and no direct strength, why not maximize that aspect? [ Aura from RWBY. Cost: 15 points. ] Perfect. Aura wasn''t too strong compared to my other choices from what I''ve seen in the show, but then again, we didn''t know the end of it, and with it, I could maybe get a semblance, another power that would add on to my already extensive list. This would allow me to get various soul related jobs from my system and protect my soul eventually. With it, I paid for the five attributes and exited the shop, smiling at my choices. I wasn''t too optimistic. Still, the Gamer System, for example, would completely negate all of my decisions with enough time, even if I had a system myself. There were similar choices in the shop that would have incredible late-game potential and that I couldn''t afford to let train too long, even if my build was also heavily invested in late-game potential. On the opposite side, there were incredible powers that would give enormous immediate power to their wielders, but with close to no room for growth. Those I would have to avoid meeting at first. There was also the case where some would be born in worlds that would give them merely another way to get more power. If I could choose the world I was reborn into, I would want either Highschool DxD or RWBY, so I could get Aura or get reincarnated as a devil without spending an attribute. When I looked around, I realized that I took more time than most participants, who now were looking at each other warily. There were no tears or anger now, only the realization that only one would be able to get out of there alive, though I could see some that were excited about it. What did I get myself into? A King Is Born Now that everyone has spent his points and the selection is made, I have some information about the transmigration! For the sake of entertainment, every bloodline''s results that is foreign to the world you''re sent to won''t be ignored! So be careful about how you present yourself since some bad things can happen to you! The childish and excited voice was starting to become tiresome in my mind. Plus the fact that whoever was talking seemed joyful at the point that 100 people will start killing each other. Also, for the first world, only one person per world will be allowed, that means that until the protection period of 3 years is over, you''re alone in your world! When this is over, every participant may teleport to a world of their choosing only once per year. Each year the number of planets available will be tremendously reduced to encourage fights! I sighed, although I technically had no mouth. There was no way for people to simply wait until everybody kills each other and train with that. People who bought the Gamer System would be too advantaged by this. Plus, I didn''t know a whole lot about fiction in general. Still, I already guessed that some worlds with enormous potential for growth would be an absolute clusterfuck of participants once the protection period is over. People that knew about worlds that aren''t mainstream could quickly get an advantage over the other. Even then, the advantages one could get would majorly rely on their purchases in the shop and their training, the world they went into would be subpar in comparison to these two factors. I needed a world in constant conflict with monsters, or any race that I could continuously kill, and with steadily bigger targets. That was the aim of any system holder with some sort of RPG mechanics. Without further ado, good luck and have fun! I could feel a bit of anger at the cheerful voice''s words, but nothing I could do really. The reward from whoever made this game was not even mentioned further, so there was a chance that this whole thing was a joke. Since someone who could give all of the things that were in the shop so quickly wouldn''t be threatened in the least by us, I could only calm down. Instantly, the world of nothingness around me flashed, and the next second I was in the middle of a street. Since I stopped, someone behind me bumped into me. This action made the one that knocked into me drop his plastic cup of coffee to the ground, and he started to talk to me, visibly annoyed, in a language that I didn''t understand but recognized. It was Japanese. I could only look at him in confusion, because I didn''t understand him, and simply decided to walk away. That didn''t please him, and he grabbed my shoulder. " I''m sorry Mister, but I can''t understand you. " I said in, what I thought was English. Instead, perfect Japanese came out of my mouth, and the man in front of me thought I was insulting him since I realized he was half Westerner half Japanese. People around me laughed as discreetly as they could, reminding me that Japan wasn''t precisely a foreigner tolerant country. The man''s forehead threatened to burst, considering how red he was and how many veins were ready to pop. He tried to punch me while yelling ''Bastard'' in Japanese, that I somehow understood now, but, by reflex, I caught his feeble attempt at hurting me and pressed his hand just a bit. In the end, the ''just a bit'' destroyed his hand, as he screamed in pain and held what was left of his hand when I released it. People started to stop walking and looked at us; I decided not to take this any further and simply left the scene to compose myself and understand what was happening. After walking a bit in a city that I knew nothing about, I sat down in a public park and sighed. I mentally called my system to make sense of what is going on. Name: Deo Aellias Race: Human Age: 22 years old Title: None Job: Jobless (0) Level: 0 Job history: None Passive skills: None Active skills: None [ You have five attributes waiting in your temporary inventory ] I was currently the same as before I was forcibly reincarnated I guess, although that didn''t explain my current strength. I imagined my previous'' life experience didn''t carry over considering the system considered me jobless. Suddenly memories appeared in my mind, and contrary to the cliche of it being painful, I didn''t feel anything, and it was nearly instantaneous. I was born in England, orphan and of European blood. I am an English teacher here in Japan and is going to teach at Kuoh Academy in about two months when the summer break is over. '' Hold on a second, Kuoh Academy? That sounds a lot like the school from Highschool DxD, doesn''t it? '' I thought. '' Surely a coincidence, or maybe Kuoh is an actual city in Japan, and the creator of Highschool DxD simply took the name? '' '' ... I''m fucked, aren''t I? '' Not only the peerage set was a waste, but I was close to canon, meaning that except the conflicts from canon, there''s peace nearly everywhere, no monster race to extinguish for me to level up. " At least if I''m lucky I can get a sacred gear... *sigh* " I muttered under my breath. I had no way to know if I had one yet, much less if I had a Longinus, though that would refund my peerage set since for example the Boosted Gear also cost about 20 points in the shop if I remembered correctly. Not only that, but Draig could grant me dragon body parts, which would give me a new bloodline and job related to this draconic aspect in my system. It was wishful thinking, and I was close to canon. Therefore Issei existed and I had no chance to get the Boosted Gear. I could only hope to get something that is at least worth it and could complement my future battle style. Anyway, I shouldn''t think negatively about this world. There was a lot of benefits I could get from this¡ªnamely, the women. Besides the fact that they are described as inhumanly beautiful in the original work, and that I wouldn''t mind to recruit them in my peerage for apparent reasons, they can also grow quite a bit in power, contrary to what was shown initially. Now that I thought about it, would the peerage set make me a high-class devil from the 72 Pillars of Hell, or would it work like the King Piece, making me between 10 times to 100 times more powerful energy-wise? I doubted the latter option, it only would be worth more than 20 points in this case, but the first was still possible. Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there. I now needed to claim my five attributes, but I wasn''t dumb enough to do it in the middle of the city. Moreover, I was intelligent enough to not do it in the apartment I now had. The energy signature would surely alert the various supernatural creatures scattered around the city, and doing the transformations in my place of residence or close to it would simply be suicidal. Luckily my memories granted me an understanding of this city, so I knew exactly where to transform. As I walked towards my destination, I couldn''t help but grow increasingly excited and stressed about it. The realization that I was in a do-or-die situation right now made me both scared and happy. Life separated from boredom and filled with incredible things was at my hand, but at the same time, I needed to stand on a pile of corpse surely more significant than 99 to survive. As I stepped into the old cemetery, I pushed these thoughts out of my mind as I looked for a spot to start. The land allocated to this cemetery was filled to the brim with graves, and thus the city had to construct another one somewhere else. This cemetery didn''t welcome any new corpses since the fifties. It was abandoned, far from civilization as the closest buildings were all destroyed in a fire and no reconstruction project had been started ever since. I opened the temporary inventory that apparently would disappear after I claimed all of my attributes and selected first the Nord Add-On. Suddenly my body cracked. I grew taller, bigger and stronger. All of my being was being filled with a light, a fire that I didn''t know about before. I could see it was the size of a small ember right now, but I knew one day it would burn brighter than anything. The question of why was my life force represented by a flame was something that I quickly ignored in favour of claimed another one of my attributes. The system was already installed, so I moved on the Aura from RWBY. Nothing much changed, except the fact that I felt as if multiple doors had been kicked open. I could now feel my soul; it was very different from my life force, the aura from Skyrim. It was just a not-so-small ball of light. I could manipulate it a bit and use it as an aura around my body. It was nothing incredible, but all of my attributes were focused towards growth instead of immediate power. I moved on the next attribute, the Hanma Bloodline. My body was already much more prominent than before, thank god I stripped out of my clothes previously. The cold weather didn''t affect me in the least now because of my Nordic lineage, but I couldn''t help but feel a bit weird, in the middle of corpses with not even my pants on. I expected the most significant change yet. The pure strength of my current body was incomparable to anything I''ve ever felt, the vitality in this body seemed immeasurable to me, but then again I only had standard humans to compare it with so I could be mistaken. Even then, I knew that my body was nothing yet compared to the Hanma bloodline. The moment I claimed the bloodline my mind nearly blanked out. I felt as if I was on fire. My life force multiplicated and spread throughout my body. Every cell of my body was changing on a significant scale. I grew even taller and bigger. My muscles shifted as my body was taking a more appropriate form made for pure destruction and domination. Not one part of my flesh prison escaped the change. It hurt, but I have never felt a better pleasure yet¡ªthe joy of growing stronger despite the pain. My brain felt more efficient, faster and focused on merely improving endlessly. I was pretty sure the base material of my body even changed. It was listed as a human bloodline, but I felt as far as a human as humanly possible. I simply felt superior. I knew my worth. I knew that humans could simply not compare, and with a bloodthirsty smile, I changed my aim to the supernatural beings of this world. It was as if I was always under the hunger of growing better in fights. My change in mentality was not unnoticed, but I accepted it nonetheless as it would only help me in the long run. I decided to take a look at my body, although I couldn''t look at my face without a mirror. I popped all of my bones with a satisfying grunt that sounded more animal than human. My skin had tanned, but it didn''t feel like a natural tan. My skin was so much more robust and thicker than before; it was ridiculous. My bones were much denser, my muscles, although they didn''t gain that much in volume, so I was far from looking like an actual fighter, were immensely thicker and more durable. My eyes were also much better than before, and my nerves delivered the information at speed I couldn''t fathom previously. Overall, my whole body was different, and my body temperature was quite higher as well, I couldn''t help but laugh, realizing my voice turned several octaves deeper and my laugh was thunderous. I looked internally and realized that the previous ember turned into an inferno of life force. It was still unrefined and far from the biggest it could become if there was an actual limit, but there was still no comparison. Even my soul grew, although the change was not as significant. The most significant change I felt was my back. Most of the blows a human body could deliver physically were relying on the whole body, instead of a single muscle, and the back is the most important muscle of the body. Now, my back was significantly different, the muscles didn''t have the same organization, while extra muscles grew. I felt as if I had a switch on these muscles, and I could enter a better version where my power would be multiplied. I felt weird, but I realized this was supposed to be the Demon Back, although I guessed the reason why I couldn''t use the switch was that I simply didn''t have the necessary muscle fully developed yet. I decided to use my last attribute before leaving quickly. I could feel energy quite easily with the Hanma Bloodline, a boon that I wasn''t expecting, but then considering that Yuichiro could smell the strength of someone, it shouldn''t shock me that much. With that new sense, I knew that there was no energy leakage from my previous transformations, but that if I didn''t learn during these two months how to hide my life force and soul strength, the devils in Kuoh Academy would easily spot me. The moment I claimed the peerage set, a beautiful and ancient-looking wooden box appeared in my hands. I opened it, and a particular scent hit me. I smiled. The smell of sin invaded my mind, although my body simply rejected it automatically, I knew that humans would either flee or be hypnotized with the red pieces. I picked the King piece as the scent of sin grew thicker, and the remains of human nature in my body subconsciously tried to escape it. I laughed because it seemed that the Hanma physiology simply took it as a threat and did what it did best, adapted as I felt my mental resistance increasing against what I could only recognize as corruption. I didn''t even know how I knew my mental resistance was upgraded. I assumed the knowledge came from either my bloodline or my system. The King Piece slowly entered my body, and I felt a foreign energy appear in it. It was separated from my life-force, and it was vile. It felt like liquid evil; it was demonic energy. We had more in common than I thought as I felt my cells sing in delight as the energy spread through my Hanma Nordic Body, feeding them. My life force also shifted, becoming demonic, taking a purple colour compared to the original orange. My demonic energy or mana was red like the blood which fitted my new body. Surprisingly my soul grew but didn''t change. It was like a continual source of light within my bloodthirsty body, which could maybe explain why even when I transformed into a Devil, it didn''t seem like I took after the different sinful attitudes they have. I also instinctively realized that because my original body was transformed into a Nord, I was much stronger than an average human Hanma. I was ultimately a new breed, a Nordic Hanma. It sounded funny, but that was what I would call myself now. I had already left the cemetery as the moment the King Piece entered my body; it leaked small strands of demonic energy in condensed form. It wasn''t anything too important, but Devils would think a Stray was walking around here. I also picked up my clothes that would simply no longer fit and tried to clothe myself to the best I could. Albeit I looked like a monster among humans with my new body, I also looked like a homeless person. But I didn''t care about the thoughts of the mundane anymore. They were too inferior for me to care; a predator does not care about the thoughts of insects.