ã€ŠDominationã€‹


 Prologue: Glowing Fruit

    Tree of Worlds

    Bigwood stared at the towering tree before him. Its trunk stretches infinitely from top to bottom, with no end in sight. On its infinite branches liescountlessfruits containing a myriad of worlds and universes. Some of these fruits glowed with light while most others are dim and grey.

    Despite his size that spanned a few galaxies, Bigwood''s body was still dwarfed by the sheer size of the tree. Even after countless trillions of eons spent observing the tree, Bigwood still could not find where the tree ends. Every time that he felt like he had seen all the tree has to offer, Bigwood would always findcountless of new things that he has never observed before.

    Bigwood has already lost count of how long he had spent floating around. As the only conscious immortal being that has finally managed to break free from the shackles of the tree of worlds, the concept of time is not really that important to him. Also, Bigwood suspects that the tree of worldsitselfisprobably free from the constraints of something as petty as time.

    Bigwood still remembered when he was still a mortal who cared about time. He was living in a universe contained in one of these fruits of the tree. At that time, he still cared about love and honor, life and death.

    How petty those things were! The moment he first laid eyes on the tree of worlds, Bigwood knew that all of the various concepts that he deemed to be important are nothing. Nothing at all compares to the splendor of the tree.

    This is because the tree holds all of the myriad worlds. It holds all of the various universes and dimensions. How can anything compare when the tree itself already represents both everything and nothing all at the same time? Existing, yet not existing, that is the tree of worlds. The tree that holds everything together.

    That was why Bigwood decided to spend an eternity toobserving the tree.Every moment, he would float around the infinite branches of the tree of worlds as he soaked in the various happenings of the countless worlds. Boredom is impossible as there are infinite things that he could see. Infinite things that he can experience.

    "Oh? A world undergoing its first tribulation? That''s rare," Bigwood said as he saw one of the fruits that he had just passed by was flickering with light.

    When Bigwood gets near it, the fruit that was flickering glowed brightly as it became one of the rare glowing fruits on the tree. Bigwood stared at it for a while before he chuckled. He had seen a universe like this one before.

    "So, the only sapient being in this world are humans huh? To think that a single race that is still stuck in its home planet would have the chance to undergo the tribulation.Wouldthey be called lucky or unlucky?" Bigwood said as he looked at the glowing fruit with interest.If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

    Of course, Bigwood only had a slight interest. He had seen countless worlds undergo the tribulation before. Heck, he even went through the tribulation in his original world back when he was still a mortal. The only reason why he stopped to look at the newly glowing fruit was only because it doesn''t really happen that often.

    Just when Bigwood was about to move on to other fruits, the fruit that just recently glowed suddenly changed.

    It was a very subtle change that didn''t look like it even happened at all, but Bigwood noticed it. As long as he is close to the tree, no changes can ever escape Bigwood''s eyes. Immediately, he decided to focus most of his attention on the glowing fruit.

    The fruit was still glowing as usual, but Bigwood realized that there was now a tiny black dot on its surface. The black dot was strange as it was growing and shrinking at a rapid pace. It looked as if the dot did not know what size it was supposed to be.

    "A time paradox brought about by time travel? And it seems to be caused by some powerful time god from the future sending someone back to the past? Interesting," Bigwood smiled as his interest was piqued by the shifting black dot.

    Suddenly, the fruit turned all black and startled Bigwood. The fruit stayed black for a shortwhilebefore it turned back into its glowing form. However, Bigwood did not leave it alone like he did earlier.

    "A small time paradox actually completely changed all of the laws of this universe? How can it be?" Bigwood said as he closely examined the universe contained in the glowing fruit.

    "Could it be? The birth of a new Overgod? But that''s impossible. There is no way something as petty as a time paradox can lead to the birth of a new Overgod! Unless..." Bigwood said as he took a real close look at the glowing fruit.

    Suddenly, Bigwood laughed, "Hahahaha! I should have known! There is no way that a universe''s Overgod would suddenlybe bornjust because of some time paradox."

    "But to think that this particular universe with its backwardcivilizationactually has the potential to create this kind of being. How scary.That being probably wasn''t even supposed to stay alive that long, yet the time paradox had allowed him to survive till it reach this point. How interesting," Bigwood said.

    Bigwood suddenly stared at the fruit as his eyes focused inside the universe straight into looking at a young man sitting bored in class, "To be so strong that you threaten the foundation of your universe''s laws itself. Even if you are not the Overgod, there is no doubt that you are at least as strong if not stronger than the Overgod. Coupled with the fact that you are not bound by the laws like the Overgod does, you are definitely a frightening existence."

    For beingsin a universe that can rival the Overgod, Bigwood had only seen it in five different universes. Considering the fact that he had seen almost an infinite amount of universes, those five different beings are special even in the various worlds that the tree holds. To see another of those beings born because of a petty time paradox, Bigwood counted himself lucky.

    "Let me see what you can do. Show me an existence that can rival the strongest being in a universe!" Bigwood said excitedly as he decided to focus most of his attention on observing the strange youth projected in the fruit.

 Chapter 1: From Classroom to Hunting

    Santa Cruz, California

    Four hours.

    That was the time it took for the world to be thrown completely into chaos. That was all the time that was needed to completely alter Alex¡¯s everyday life. That was all the time it took for everything to completely descend to hell.

    Only four hours.

    It was supposed to be your normal Monday morning. Alex was sitting at his desk listening to the teacher drone on about some new school policy on bullying. Basically, something that Alex could not give two shits about.

    All those safe spaces and political correctness only breeds sheep. Sheeps that society is going to wring the most out of before it slaughters them and throw them aside. In the end, 99% of the populace would become like those discarded sheep.

    Alex do not want to ever become something like that. He wants to be the wolf, the 1% standing above the masses. He wants to be the wolf preying and wringing out the 99% sheeps who are too weak to defend themselves.

    That was why when it came to bullying prevention, Alex tend to lean on fighting it out.

    He had once been bullied before back when he was in elementary school, but that didn¡¯t even lasted for a day. Unlike the other sheeps that just accepts the unjust treatment, Alex did not hesitate to fight back. He always believed in destroying the problem at the root.

    Alex stabbed one his bully¡¯s eye with a safety scissor and permanently blinded one of that kid¡¯s eye.

    Needless to say, he was expelled immediately after that incident. Not only did he permanently cripple one of his classmates, he also did it with freaking safety scissors. Those things weren¡¯t designed to actually be able to cut flesh, but Alex still somehow managed to cripple a kid with it when he was only eight years old.

    Anyway, Alex was bored out of his mind listening to the teacher. He didn¡¯t really stayed up late last night, but Alex was never a morning person. Even when the bullying announcement was out of the way and the lesson started, Alex¡¯s head was already bobbing up and down ready to sleep through the whole class.

    That was when it all happened.

    Gigantic roars woke Alex up as they reverberated all over the school. Alex wasn¡¯t sure what they sounded like. It sounded like a mix between a lion¡¯s roar, a dog¡¯s bark, a pig¡¯s squeal and various other animals. It sounded like a zoo suddenly came to school.

    Then the screams followed.

    Two giant wild dogs along with what looked like a turkey as tall as an SUV barged into Alex¡¯s class and started attacking people left and right. Their strength was insane as no one in the room could even put up any resistance at all. Tables were smashed and high schooler corpses were thrown about the room as the giant animals rampaged to their heart¡¯s content.

    During all this, Alex played smart. Since his seat was the furthest away from the classroom entrance, he simply ducked down and hid underneath his desk. Coupled with the fact that the animals seemed to be focused mostly on the other students that were screaming as they fled or standing dumb in fear, the dogs and the turkeys didn¡¯t notice Alex under his desk at all.

    It only took about two minutes for the two dogs and the turkey to kill everyone in the classroom. With the room filled with the smell of blood and human corpses stacked everywhere, the three monsters nodded their heads and left the classroom. Only then did Alex felt it was safe enough to pop his head out of his desk.

    Suddenly, a voice spoke loudly in his head.

    ¡°Rejoice, humans! Bathe in the fire of chaos and embrace your destiny! Power is the only key! Reject power, and perish like the rest. Embrace power, and you will rise above the gods!¡±

    ¡°First Tribulation: Survive for more than one week, three days and thirteen hours.¡±

    ¡°Considering your predicted fighting tendency, claw gauntlets have been assigned as your starting weapon.¡±

    Alex¡¯s forearms glowed before a set of thick gauntlets covered both of his hands. It seemed to be padded with some sort of strange leather as steel lined the outside of the forearm area along with the top of the five fingers. Although it felt comfortable, Alex felt like it was somehow old, worn and somewhat dull looking.

    A transparent floating screen popped up when Alex examined the gauntlets further.

    Dull Claws

    Attack: 0-4

    Durability: 150/150

    The voice suddenly spoke in Alex¡¯s head again

    ¡°Player stats have been calculated. It can be accessed at any time.¡±

    ¡°Stats?¡± Alex thought.

    The things that have been happening around him seemed similar to an old RPG that Alex have played before. The strange screen depicting the claws¡¯ attack stats and durability seem no different from a game. Perhaps what had been happening around him was all a game?

    ¡°Status screen, show yourself,¡± Alex said out loud as he felt like an idiot.

    Name: N/A

    Race: Human (Basic)

    Level: 0

    Class: N/A

    Strength: 9

    Agility: 13

    Vitality: 8

    Spirit: 12

    Surprisingly, a status screen filled with Alex¡¯s stats actually did appear. Other than the fact that the screen didn¡¯t have his name on it, it looked similar to most other status screens in your typical role playing game. Alex was intrigued for a while before he decided to close the screen.

    ¡®Hmm, let¡¯s try it I guess?¡¯ Alex thought to himself as he looked at the dull claws on his two hands.

    Slash!

    Alex suddenly thrusted his arm and clawed at the head of one of the corpses of his classmates. It instantly penetrated through the flesh and ripped a whole chunk out of the dead girl¡¯s face. Alex felt like he had just skinned the girl as the meat that he had just ripped off exposed the girl¡¯s white skull.The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

    ¡®This is 4 in attack? I can probably crush her skull easily if my gauntlet has 10 attack maximum,¡¯ Alex thought as he stared at his claws that were filled with blood.

    If there was one thing that Alex knew about role playing games is the fact that levels are pretty much everything. After all, it represents how powerful you are compared to everything else. A high level player can easily toy a low level player to death with almost no effort.

    From this, Alex realized that he had to level up and grow quickly. Just from the fact that those giant monsters managed to charge into his classroom and kill everyone was already a sign that things would get to be even more chaotic in the future. Also, he was sure that the notion of order that people had before would surely crumble in the future.

    When he looked out the window, he could see saber-toothed dogs, flaming tigers, giant horned boars and various other monsters that biologically should not even exist. They were all killing left and right as they overturned cars and smashed buildings into pieces. Even as many people tried to run away, they were all bitten, crushed, mangled, and torn apart as their bloody guts and limbs painted the pavement red.

    With this level of chaos, Alex was sure that there would be no way for the police or the military to contain the situation anymore. He just saw a freaking tiger spit out an exploding fireball for God¡¯s sake! Unless the military sent in real heavy artillery in the next few hours, the whole population of Santa Cruz would all be killed.

    Instead of going out there and getting himself killed, Alex would much rather stay inside his ruined classroom. None of the monsters ever came close to it, so Alex was relatively safe. Rather than charging to that flaming tiger in the hopes of killing it and levelling up, he was much better off just hiding and assessing the situation. Who knows, he might just see a smaller monster that he could kill with his claws.

    In the end, Alex waited in the classroom for about an hour and a half. It was then that the the giant monsters outside started leaving. He waited for another 15 minutes till all of the monsters disappeared before he finally decided to come out of the ruined classroom.

    With the monsters gone, the whole city suddenly turned quiet. It wasn¡¯t surprising as most people were already dead while the ones that were still alive were too afraid to make any noise. Who can say if the monsters would come back again?

    Alex¡¯s school, Santa Cruz High, have already turned into a pile of broken bricks and concrete. It was no wonder why no monsters came to the school anymore. From the outside, it looked like anyone who still stayed inside were all buried alive under tons of rubble.

    Although there was still one monster hanging around out there, Alex still decided to come out. The monster was as big as a car, but Alex wasn¡¯t afraid at all. He had already observed the beast and he was sure that he could kill it.

    The monster was a giant tortoise.

    Although it was slow, Alex had seen it shoot out a gigantic laser beam from its mouth that turned a relatively large building straight to dust. The tortoise can shoot out a beam every five minutes, and every time it discharged, a large tract of land was directly pulverized. That tortoise is part of the reason why the city grounds was filled to the brim with giant holes.

    Alex sneaked stealthily towards the giant tortoise. Since it was slow, Alex was not worried about having to eat a laser beam to the face as long as he can get behind the tortoise. Coupled with the fact that it acted even dumber than a regular tortoise, Alex was confident in his success.

    Alex made his way behind the monster while the tortoise itself seemed to be stuck inside a building as it slowly tried to move its big body out. Its laser beam was still on cooldown, so it had no way of destroying the rubble that was blocking its way out. It was the perfect opportunity for Alex to strike.

    Alex immediately jumped up and latched onto the big tortoise¡¯s shell. It was at that moment that he was glad he had the claw gauntlets. Its sharp tips made it easy for him to grab onto the shell.

    Alex began to climb up. It wasn¡¯t that hard, since he was only a few feet high above the ground. After thirty seconds, he was already on top of the tortoise¡¯s shell.

    Alex did not hesitate at all as he plunged his claw gauntlets down onto the tortoise¡¯s large head. He specifically targeted its eyes to make sure that his claws can get in deep. He was aiming to skewer the tortoise¡¯s brain through the eyes.

    Sure enough, Alex¡¯s decision was right. Despite pushing with all his strength, the only place that he could injure with his claws were only the tortoise¡¯s eyes. Everything else like the skin around its eyes and the head were all too tough like trying to pierce through thick elastic rubber.

    Roar!

    A huge sound that did not sound like what a tortoise would make came out of the tortoise¡¯s mouth. It was so loud that it made Alex¡¯s ears ring in pain. In fact, Alex was sure that this sound was louder than the sound this tortoise¡¯s beam created when it pulverized half of Santa Cruz.

    Of course, no matter how much it screamed, Alex would never let go. He had already plunged his fingers deep inside the turtle¡¯s eyes, and it felt like he was piercing deeper and deeper. Getting into the thing¡¯s brain was only a matter of time.

    It shook its head hard as it tried to throw Alex off, but Alex had already anticipated that. That was why he had already coiled his legs around the beast¡¯s neck. Even though it was risky and the only thing keeping him from being thrown off and breaking his rib was only his hip strength, Alex still gambled on it.

    Despite being close to death, Alex smiled brightly. His face that was usually monotone and expressionless for most of the time had been filled with pure joy as he battled to the death with the giant tortoise. The screams of pain that were unbearable before suddenly made Alex want to laugh out loud.

    This is what have been missing from his life. The feeling of living on the edge of death. The feeling of having to keep beating down his opposition as he strives to become on top. The feeling of having someone¡¯s well being in your hands as you hear their screams for mercy.

    The tortoise didn¡¯t scream for mercy as much as it was screaming in pain and anger, but Alex have already gone into his own world. Regardless of what the tortoise is doing, he would always interpret it as a weakling struggling free as it begged to be released from the pain. It strangely made the killing process more pleasant to Alex.

    Just like that time his bully pleaded for mercy as Alex plunged that safety scissors into one of that kid¡¯s eye socket.

    Alex kept on plunging his hand deeper and deeper into the tortoise until the tortoise¡¯s scream died down and it dropped down dead on the ground.

    ¡°Level up!¡±

    ¡°Level up!¡±

    ¡°Level up!¡±

    ¡°Level up!¡±

    ¡°Level up!¡±

    ¡°You are the first person to have killed a Special monster by only relying on your starter equipment. Gained bonus 10 stat points and a free skill book.¡±

    The strange voice spoke in his head again, so Alex decided to not bother with it and bring up his status menu.

    Name: N/A

    Race: Human (Basic)

    Level: 5

    Class: N/A

    Strength: 9

    Agility: 13

    Vitality: 8

    Spirit: 12

    Unassigned Stat Points: 20

    ¡®One kill and I gained five levels? And a skill book?¡¯ Alex became surprised as he saw his harvest.

    Well, if you counter in the tortoise¡¯s laser beam and impenetrable hard shell, the tortoise does seem like a really tough boss monster to fight. The only reason as to why Alex was able to kill it was only because the beast was stuck in a building and couldn¡¯t roll its body around. If they were fighting in the open, the beast could just roll around and Alex would¡¯ve been completely squashed under its shell if he tried to pull off that shell riding stunt.

    ¡®So this is a skill book?¡¯ Alex thought to himself as he picked up a wet bloody book from underneath the tortoise¡¯s head that was still bleeding profusely.

    Life Energy Beam

    You can shoot a beam of life energy that can decimate anything in your path. Keeping it activated consumes 10 health and stamina per second.

    ¡°IT¡¯S THE FUCKING LASER BEAM!¡± Alex shouted excitedly.

    Alex never thought that he would get the tortoise¡¯s most powerful and devastating attack right off the bat. He thought he would get some crap defensive skill when he heard he got some sort of skill book. Alex was glad that he was wrong.

    Just as Alex was about to open up the bloody book and learn the skill, a burning sensation suddenly assaulted his neck.

    When he looked down, he saw blood clearly dripping out of the area where his neck meets his chest. There was a small hole there as blood kept pouring out of it like a faucet. Alex could only fall down limply as he tried to cover the bleeding with his hands.

    Off to the side, a small bloody squirrel that was moving so fast that it left behind after images made eye contact with Alex. On its sharp fangs, pieces of what looked like Alex¡¯s flesh was left behind as it chewed on it like a predator. When Alex saw the little animal, Alex shivered.

    ¡°I underestimated the monsters of this world...FUCK! I UNDERESTIMATED THE MONSTERS!¡± Alex screamed as he felt his life draining away from the hole on top of his chest.

 Chapter 2: What Should Have Been

    Alex kneeled on the ground as he stared bitterly at the small squirrel in front of him.

    ¡®A damned squirrel! I killed a giant laser tortoise and a damned squirrel freaking downed me in one hit!¡¯ Alex thought wryly.

    Alex knew that the two beasts couldn¡¯t really be directly compared. The tortoise sacrificed all of its speed for pure destructive power while the squirrel was the direct opposite. Still, Alex felt like a joke.

    If the tortoise was like a giant bunker filled with devastating artillery, the squirrel was like a special ops hiding in the dark. The tortoise had frightening defensive capabilities and was completely devastating at range, but it can be taken down through strategic maneuvering at the right moments. The squirrel did not have even half of the tortoise¡¯s destructive potential, but its speed allowed it to strike unexpectedly and evade attacks easily. The only surefire way to kill it is to be as defensive as the tortoise or to be faster than the squirrel, neither of which Alex was capable of.

    The squirrel suddenly moved. Alex immediately tensed up as he braced himself for the squirrel¡¯s attack. He had already put his arm up to guard his head.

    Bang!

    Alex felt something small and hard colliding with his stomach and forced him to fall on his back. Just as he was about to get up hastily, he felt a burning sensation on his stomach. When he looked down, he immediately regretted it.

    ¡®Is that the mac and cheese I had this morning?¡± Alex had a strange thought.

    There was a small but deep hole on his stomach. Not only was blood flowing out, Alex saw a yellow bile coming out of it. The squirrel had hit Alex so deep that undigested food in his stomach poured out.

    The squirrel itself was standing just a few feet away from him. It was munching on blood red meat that was covered in yellow bile. Strangely, Alex felt like the squirrel was looking at him with derision, as if it knew it was in control of the situation and Alex was just a prey that it could toy with.

    ¡°You FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT!¡± Alex shouted as he flew into a rage and charged at the squirrel.

    Alex do not like anyone looking down on him at all, even if that someone is a frighteningly fast predatory squirrel.

    Alex immediately body tackled the place the the squirrel had been standing on. The force of his body that was fueled by rage actually cracked the ground and broke some of his ribs, but Alex didn¡¯t really care. With his mind clouded by rage, the only thing he cared about was ripping the fucking squirrel to pieces.

    ¡°Uuh!¡± Alex said as he felt an impact on the side of his face.

    By relying on its speed, the squirrel rushed and slapped Alex flying to the ground. The squirrel didn¡¯t seem to expect Alex¡¯s sudden charge, as it didn¡¯t manage to attack deep enough into his face. The only thing its attack managed to do was create two bloody cuts on Alex¡¯s left cheek. It seemed like the slap was mostly the beast¡¯s version of a reactive counter attack.

    ¡®So it gets easily flustered when attacked? Perfect,¡¯ Alex sneered in his heart.

    Despite Alex¡¯s two grievous injuries on his abdomen, Alex still screamed as he kept charging at the squirrel. The squirrel still dodged and smacked Alex away like before, but after ten times of doing that, the squirrel started slowing down.

    ¡°Hahaha! You¡¯re just a dumb animal after all! You do the same thing over and over again,¡± Alex said as he laughed sinisterly.

    On his 11th charge, Alex could finally somewhat see the squirrel moving towards him. Due to that, he actually managed to dodge the squirrel¡¯s charge by a hair¡¯s breadth. His hand that was wearing the claw gauntlet actually managed to smack and clawed the squirrel¡¯s abdomen.

    Squeak!

    The squirrel screamed in pain as blood poured out of its body. The squirrel turned out to have a crap defense as Alex managed to inflict a sort of serious wound on it just by grazing it a little. Red blood was pouring out incessantly as the squirrel squirmed on the ground.

    ¡®That thing get downed that easily?¡¯ Alex thought in disbelief. He was expecting more fight from the little monster, but the squirrel just kept squirming on the ground. It was as if the squirrel had suddenly turned from the predator to the prey waiting to be slaughtered.

    ¡®That makes things easier. I¡¯ll rip you the fuck apart!¡¯ Alex sneered in his heart.

    Just as he was about to charge at the squirrel again, Alex suddenly fell down.

    ¡®Huh? What the hell? What¡¯s going on?¡¯ Alex thought as he looked down at his body that just gave way at the critical moment.

    It was then that Alex realized that he was already on his last breaths. Back when he kept on charging at the squirrel, he had pushed his body too much because of his overwhelming anger and desire to kill the little bastard. If it wasn¡¯t for the adrenaline keeping him up, Alex¡¯s body probably could not possibly endure fighting or even standing up with all the wounds that it got.

    After the squirrel was downed on the ground, the adrenaline disappeared and various pain flared up across his body. When he charged at the squirrel, Alex had overstrained his whole body as he bruised his body and broke some of his bones. Couple this with the fact that the squirrel would leave deep cuts all over his body whenever it smacked Alex away, it was very likely for him to die at any moment from blood loss.Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

    In fact, when you compare the squirrel¡¯s and Alex¡¯s body state, it was obvious that the one closer to death was Alex. His face was badly mangled up to the point of showing bone while some of his joints was pointing in the wrong direction. It was a miracle that Alex was still conscious at this point.

    ¡®D-damnit! So...close!¡¯ Alex swore as he tried to crawl towards the squirrel that was still squirming on the ground.

    Miraculously, Alex managed to crawl his destroyed body over to the squirrel. The whole process was painful and Alex could not help but think that death would be better than this, but he still pushed on. His pride won¡¯t let him to just give up and die.

    ¡®At least if I am going to die, I have to take my killer with me to hell!¡¯ Alex swore in his heart as he plunged his claws at the dying squirrel.

    Smack!

    Alex felt an impact on the center of his face as his broken body was sent flying yet again. This time, Alex felt a burning sensation on his face as he felt like his nose had been burned to ashes. Alex couldn¡¯t even react to it at all as he only truly felt the effects after he was already lying half dead on the ground.

    Alex struggled hard to bring his head up to look, and what he saw stunned him.

    The squirrel was standing up. The wound on its body was still there, but it was rapidly closing. Furthermore, its body became frightening.

    Blue electricity current have cladded all of its body, making it look like a dangerous glowing ball of energy.

    It was looking at Alex with its red eyes. An expression of pure primal fury was plastered on its face as lightning kept pouring out and surrounding its small body. Judging by the increasing amount of electricity that the squirrel emitted, Alex guessed that it was charging up for some devastating attack.

    Alex knew that staying around in one place was just asking for the squirrel to kill him, so he tried to move his broken body. Unfortunately, that last sudden hit imbued with electricity that pulverized Alex¡¯s nose seemed to be the limit of what his battered could take. Even after Alex tried to push his body, it won¡¯t move no matter what.

    ¡®Is this where I die?¡¯ Alex thought as he stared at the glowing ball of death charging up to kill him.

    Two hours ago, Alex had seen two beasts that can call on the elements like the squirrel did. One of them was the giant flaming tiger that can spit out giant exploding fireballs that turned most of Santa Cruz into flaming rubble. The other one was a giant wind raptor that flew past. The bird only stayed in Santa Cruz for less than two minutes, but it managed to whip up a giant gale that ravaged the whole area. If Alex haven¡¯t been hiding underneath the school¡¯s rubble, he would have already been swept up by the gale and fell to his death.

    Well, Alex was already close to death anyway. Looks like even if you avoid most of the monsters and pick your fights correctly, there is always a chance for everything to go wrong. Alex learned that in this new world, death lurks in every corner. Unfortunately, Alex had to pay the ultimate price just to finally learn this.

    ¡®Wait a minute. This new world doesn¡¯t work that way,¡¯ Alex thought as he suddenly had a realization.

    ¡®Add all unspent stat points into vitality!¡¯ Alex suddenly thought.

    Instantly, he felt a large amount of energy suddenly engulf his body before it disappeared completely. When Alex felt around his body, he was surprised to find out that the pain from his wounds and broken bones have actually started receding slowly. The wound and broken bones didn¡¯t heal, but at least the pain suddenly became bearable. Also, Alex felt like his body was slowly recovering little by little, but not at a rate that would make a difference. If anything, the injuries on his body that would take more than a year to heal felt like it would only take 11 months to heal completely.

    At least, Alex could finally sit up and crawl instead of being stuck there laying on the ground.

    ¡®Damn! To think that I forgot to assign stat points!¡¯ Alex cursed at his own stupidity.

    He was too hung up on trying to kill the squirrel that he forgot he could have just add more points into his stat. For example, if he added all of his stats to agility at the start of the fight, maybe his chances of winning might be higher? Although Alex doubted that since he felt like the squirrel probably had more than 100 points in agility, Alex still regretted not doing it. Instead, he waited until he was close to the brink of death before he was forced to spent those stat points on vitality just to stay alive.

    Alex saw that the squirrel was still charging up energy. It seemed that whatever attack it was charging up for, it was going to be a very powerful attack that would probably kill Alex instantly. That was why Alex decided to leave as he crawled away to hide behind the corpse of the giant tortoise that he just killed.

    Boom!

    Before Alex was even halfway there, a gigantic explosion sound rang out as giant arcs of lightning filled the whole area. Alex was already screwed because the arcs of lightning was already heading his way, but the situation was even worse. The squirrel who was clad in in lightning reached Alex first.

    After that, Alex didn¡¯t know what happened. He was laying on the ground close to the corpse of the giant tortoise while his body was emitting smoke. The only thing he remembered from what happened before was just the feeling of extreme pain as he felt his whole body being hit all over right at the same time. Alex didn¡¯t even want to look down to see his body¡¯s state anymore as he was sure that it probably looked worse than the burnt chicken that he accidentally made for lunch last weekend.

    So there he was, laying on his back and pretty much on the brink of death. Even with the added vitality, Alex knew that his time was up. There was nothing else that he could do. The squirrel was too strong.

    It was already frighteningly fast to the point where Alex could do nothing to it before. When it started spewing out electricity, the squirrel moved so fast that it might as well be a living lightning bolt. Coupled with its destructive power being multiplied by tens of fold by the lightning, Alex never stood a chance.

    The squirrel was standing on top of Alex¡¯s chest, peering down at him with its red eyes like a death god clad in lightning. Alex could only stare at it angrily, as he could not move his body. He was sure that even the slightest hit would send him straight to the embrace of death.

    ¡°Aaaaggnnjwo¡­.nifrwlq....olrapwiiw,¡± Alex tried to curse, but he found out that he couldn¡¯t even move his mouth right. His mouth and tongue must have been blown off after being hit by the squirrel¡¯s attack. He couldn¡¯t even curse the beast that was about to kill him.

    Alex only stared at the squirrel hatefully as he thought in his mind, ¡®Fuck you! I swear to god! If I have another chance to fight back, I will make sure to rip you to pieces! No, ... I would torture you over and over until you will BEG me for the sweet release of DEATH!¡¯

    Of course, that was only his thoughts, as the electric squirrel casually swiped his head off and ended Alex¡¯s life.

    <hr>

    Tree of Worlds

    "So that was what was supposed to happen? I admit that the strong will that he displayed was definitely admirable, but there are many in other universes that share a will even stronger than he does. I wonder, what makes him special?" Bigwood said to himself as he observed the glowing fruit in his hand.

    "Well then, don''t you think it''s about time we see how that little time paradox changed your fate Mr. Alex?" Bigwood said as he smiled.

    The glowing fruit suddenly turned black again for a moment as Bigwood''s eyes were completely focused on the mortal boy inside the glowing fruit.

 Chapter 3: Future Changing the Past

    Bulgaria-Turkey Border

    Like most of the rest of the world, both Bulgaria and Turkey were attacked by frightening beasts equipped with various super abilities that would only come out in myths. In Turkey, a mountain-sized humanoid creature that was completely covered by a sack tanked most of the firepower of the Turkish military, allowing the other beasts to freely wreak havoc. Bulgaria was directly carpet bombed by several thousand ugly flying hags that could fling fireballs.

    The border between these two countries however, was strangely peaceful. Most of the beasts and monsters were more concentrated in the cities and towns while the people in charge of border patrol were all called back to help out in defending the country. That was why there was relatively few people around.

    At this moment, there was one brown-haired girl holding a small dagger sitting down on the ground as she leaned on one of the chain link fence surrounding the border. Her skin was deathly pale and she was wheezing over and over as if she had just done something really strenuous. If a beast came around and found her, the girl would be quite the easy snack.

    ¡°What are those things? What are those monsters?¡± the girl said as she seemed terrified.

    Her name is Adelina. Originally, she was going to move to Turkey with her family because of her father¡¯s new job, but then weapons started appearing in their hands while a voice talked in their heads. Then, a big bull the size of a truck rammed into their car and sent them flying to the wilderness. With both of her parents dead, Adelina became scared as her brother told her to run away with all her might.

    She was completely bad at sports in school, but during the last few hours, she felt like she could easily beat any long distance athletes. With the threat of death in front of her face, Adelina¡¯s body suddenly felt like it had unlocked some hidden potential inside her. A 5 kilometer run through the Bulgarian wilderness, and she had done it in about less than half an hour. Even Adelina could not believe what she had managed to accomplish with her chubby body.

    When she arrived at the border and finally escaped the fearsome beasts, she was completely spent. She couldn¡¯t even get up anymore as she leaned weakly on the border fence looking as if she was about to die. Worst part is that she didn¡¯t think to bring her water bottle out of the car¡¯s wreckage when she ran away.

    After she had managed to slightly calm down, tears started running down her face as she cried, ¡°Mom, Dad ¡­. Mikhail....¡±

    All of her family died by that giant bull¡¯s charge. Her father, her mother, her big brother, all of them died tragically. The worst part was that she was grumbling all the way about having to move to Turkey before this.

    Her father and mother died instantly from the initial collision with the bull as they were sitting on the front. The reason why Adelina was not seriously injured was because her older brother Mikhail had taken the brunt of the impact. When the bull started charging at them again, Mikhail forced both of them out of the car and told her to run away. She still remembered Mikhail¡¯s last words to her.

    ¡°Run Adelina! Run to the border and call for help! The military will know how to kill this beast!¡± Mikhail said.

    ¡°But what about you? Aren¡¯t you coming?¡± She remembered herself saying that.

    Hearing that, Mikhail just smiled and said, ¡°Don¡¯t worry about me. Someone needs to hold this beast back. We can¡¯t let it chase after the both of us. I¡¯ll hold it off.¡±

    ¡°But¡­¡±

    ¡°No buts! I am the older sibling remember! That means you have to listen to what I say!¡± Mikhail said as he gave the same mischievous smile that he always do.

    Usually, Adelina would feel annoyed when seeing that smile as if her brother was teasing her, but at that moment, she knew that smile contained no smile. The mischievous smile was more similar to the smile on the photos of world war 2 soldiers going to their deaths to protect those they cherished. She had only seen such a smile on the museums and the internet, so she was completely shocked to see her brother displaying that same smile.

    Adelina grabbed Mikhail¡¯s arm as she said, ¡°No! I¡¯m not leaving you! We¡¯re going together!¡±

    Roar!

    A huge sound suddenly broke their intimate family moment. The giant bull who was still going around the wreckage of the car had finally found them. Smoke came out of its nose as it readied itself to charge at their position.

    ¡°Sorry Adelina, but you are going to survive,¡± Mikhail said before he pushed her towards the bushes as he ran towards another direction.

    ¡°Hey bull! Go die!¡± Mikhail shouted as he threw the sword that had appeared in his hand when that mysterious voice showed up in his head.

    Mikhail had completely nailed his throw as he managed to hit the bull right between its eyes and made it focus its entire attention on him. Once he got the bull to look at him, Mikhail immediately sped up in a direction away from Adelina who was still lying dazed on the bushes. Despite the fact that he had dislocated one of his shoulder and had blood flowing out of his body, he still ran quickly like his life depended on it.

    That was the last that Adelina had seen of him.

    ¡°And yet¡­ where did the border patrols go? Why is this place so empty?¡± Adelina could not help but ask.

    When Adelina reached the border, she didn¡¯t actually stop running. She kept on moving around the place, trying to find other people, but no one seemed to be around. The only thing that Adelina could see was various tire tracks moving back towards the country, as if everyone had abandoned this place.

    Feeling alone and helpless, Adelina sobbed on the ground as she brought her knees to her chest.

    A few hours ago, she was still just a normal 16 year old girl who was moving to another country with her family. It was the first time she had seen a person dying before her eyes. It was the first time she puked after seeing the dead bodies of her parents. It was the first time she had to be scared for her dear life.

    And now she¡¯s all alone.

    ¡°Mom, Dad, Mikhail ¡­¡± she said limply as she fell lifelessly to the ground.

    Her tears were still falling, but Adelina felt dead inside. The family that she spent all of her life with, dead just like that. Although Adelina felt that they were not as close as other families with their bonding, she knew that she loved them all very dearly.Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more.

    Mom would always argue with her when they were at home. MIkhail and Adelina were both naughty children, so Mom would always scold them. Adelina always felt like her mom was too strict, but only after she died did she realized that mom had done it for her own good.

    Dad was almost never home as he would job hop all over the place. Adelina used to hate him since he never spent time with her or her brother, but only now did she realize that he was doing it for both of their sake. When he¡¯s gone, Adelina realized how deeply she missed her father that she rarely saw.

    Mikhail, who was always beside her since they were kids, was the one that she missed the most. Unlike her, who was more of a chubby nerd, Mikhail grew up to be the sporty center of attention in the school. He would usually drag her around to socialize and make her feel even more insecure. Furthermore, he never let up on the teasing ever since they were kids. Adelina always hated the fact that he always seemed to be the same goofy older brother she knew, as if he didn¡¯t want to mature unlike her that was forced to do it.

    Now, she felt like there was nothing she would want more than to hear his teasing again.

    All of her family members, dead just a few hours after they were having their normal family road trip. Her parents both died and her brother had sacrificed himself just to let her get away safely. For the first time in her life, she felt that everything was bleak and filled with sorrow.

    Adelina regretted not listening to her mother and being a good girl when she was still alive. She regretted not being able to thank her father for all the gruelling work that he did to keep the family alive. She regretted not following Mikhail and making friends.

    It was true what they said. You only appreciate things when you have lost them. After losing her family, Adelia finally realized how much her family meant to her, but it was already too late.

    Roar!

    A sudden noise suddenly made Adelia¡¯s ears perked up. When she looked at the source, she saw the giant bull that killed her family. On one of its horns, Mikhail¡¯s dead expression could be seen.

    ¡°You! YOU!¡± Adelina shouted as tears flowed bitterly down her cheeks and rage filled her heart.

    She was scared. To be facing a monster that can ram into a speeding car directly without getting hurt, she might as well be facing down a tank. There was no chance for her to win.

    Yet anger and desperation have clouded her head. With no one around and her brother¡¯s corpse hanging on the one of the bull¡¯s horn, Adelina felt a rising feeling of vengeance. She wants to strike back at this evil monster that stole her family away from her.

    ¡°YOUUUUUUU!!!!!!¡± Adelina screamed as she used the last strength of her tired body to rush at the giant bull.

    She knew she could not outrun the giant bull. If it weren¡¯t for Mikhail sacrificing himself before, Adelina probably would never be able to escape from it. Now that she was alone, the chances of escaping was zero.

    ¡®At least I need to land a hit on you! As mom always said, it is better to fight back and fail than it is to just do nothing,¡¯ Adelina consoled herself as she did her suicidal charge.

    When she saw the bull¡¯s thick horns coming quickly to her face, Adelina strangely curved her sorrowed face as she made a smile and thought, ¡®Mom, Dad, Mikhail, looks like I am joining you soon.¡¯

    The dagger that she got when the voice spoke in her head was still in her hand, and she used it to stab straight at the giant bull. At least one hit, that was all Adelina could want at this point. Just one hit to say that she had tried to avenge her family.

    Boom!

    Contrary to her expectations, the impact that she had imagined did not come. Instead, when she took a better look at the bull, she saw that the bull was charred dead. There were some static electricity around the beast as it looked like the bull had taken some lightning directly to the face.

    ¡°What...what happened?¡± Adelina asked bewilderedly.

    The bull that looked so mighty before actually died right in front of her. It happened so quickly in an instant that even Adelina, who was near the bull, was not really sure what happened. Judging from the metallic smell in the air, Adelina felt like some high voltage electricity had passed through here. It smelled like that one time she accompanied her dad when he was fixing the telephone pole that was hit by lightning back when her dad was an electric repairman.

    ¡°I-is this God¡¯s judgement?¡± Adelina suddenly muttered.

    She had heard that some gods in certain mythologies would strike down sinners with lightning, but she never thought that she would witness it for herself.

    ¡°Silly child. Of course it is not God¡¯s judgement. God doesn¡¯t exist,¡± a voice suddenly spoke and startled Adelina.

    When she looked to the source, she found a giant black hole forming in the sky as clouds and lightning swirled around and thunder boomed in the sky. Adelina could only watch dumbly at the miraculous phenomenon that she never thought was possible. It looked like the black hole was trying to open up and spit out something.

    Boom!

    For a split second, Adelina actually saw that the sky actually looked like it split apart. Five gigantic lightning bolts the size of aircraft carriers scattered from this split and instantly flew apart into five different corners of the world. From the black hole in the sky, a shining figure emerged.

    It was a 7 meter tall brown haired woman draped in a white gown. Her facial features was so beautiful and her body was so gorgeous that Adelina felt like she wasn¡¯t looking at a human being. With the glow surrounding the giant woman, she was more like a divine goddess coming down to grace the mortal world.

    ¡°A-are you a god-goddess?¡± Adelina nervously asked.

    ¡°Goddess?¡± the divine-looking woman smiled. ¡°No, child. I am not a goddess. I am you from the future.¡±

    ¡°W-wait...what?¡± Adelina said as she felt completely lost.

    ¡°I do not have much time. Just my presence here alone have already greatly affected the timeline¡¯s corrective force. I cannot stay for long,¡± the woman said.

    ¡°Listen well to my warning my past self. For what I am about to tell you is knowledge of the future; knowledge that is far too burdensome for you currently, but I have no choice but to impart,¡± the woman said.

    ¡°Knowledge of the future?¡± Adelina said as she became even more confused at the situation before her.

    ¡°Yes. You should know it child. This world is ending. We tried to stop it, but we failed in the end. That is why I am here. To make sure you avoid our mistakes. To help you save our universe.¡±

    <hr>

    Santa Cruz, California

    After putting 20 points into vitality, the pain of the injuries lessened and Alex was finally able to prop himself up. Although he was still too weak to walk or even stand, he could still crawl. That was the best thing that Alex could do right at the moment with the electric squirrel on his back charging some sort of killing move.

    Alex immediately dragged his broken body over to the corpse of the giant tortoise. He hoped that whatever powerful attack the squirrel would dish out, Alex could defend through it by hiding behind the tortoise''s tough shell. Of course, Alex didn''t hold out much hope.

    Just as he was only about halfway to the tortoise''s corpse, Alex felt all the hairs on his body standing on end. A split second feeling in his gut had told him that he was too late. His instincts were screaming in alarm as Alex felt like something really terrible was about to happen.

    Boom!

    A deafening sound surrounded the area as Alex saw what looked like a gigantic lightning bolt the size of an aircraft carrier suddenly streaked just past his head. When he looked back, the ruined building that he was on was reduced to rubble. A giant crater was formed on the street outside as if an atomic bomb had detonated in the middle of it.

    Inside the bottom most part of the crater, Alex was surprised to find the charred and blackened remains of what looked like a little furry animal. Since there were no charging sounds anymore and he was not attacked, Alex was confident that the dead little animal in the crater was the squirrel. After he realized this, Alex could not help but feel that the electric squirrel that was killed by a lightning bolt had quite an ironic death.

    When Alex looked at the crater again, he could not help but ask in his mind, ''What the fuck just happened?''

 Chapter 4: Miraculous Food

    Although Alex didn''t know what exactly happened, he has decided to ignore that for the time being. As long as he was safe, there was no need for him to raise up much of a fuss. He finally stopped and laid down his injured body as he leaned against the giant tortoise''s corpse.

    Too stimulating. The events of the day had been far too stimulating for him. He never thought that he could experience so much excitement and pain in just a few hours.

    ''This body, how do I treat it?'' Alex thought wryly as he stared down at his broken body.

    Alex knew that with the attack of the monsters, the hospital probably didn''t even exist anymore. Just looking at the various broken bones, big lacerations and various internal bleedings on his body, Alex knew that he was not that far off from death unless he got some emergency treatment. The only reason as to why he hasn''t died yet was mostly because he had spent a lot of points on his vitality.

    ''Wait a minute, if this was a game..." Alex suddenly had a thought.

    He immediately dragged his wounded body around the giant tortoise''s corpse. His eyes were looking carefully left and right like he was diligently searching for something. He kept this going for about five minutes before he finally plopped down and sigh in disappointment.

    ''I thought that the giant tortoise would drop a health potion or something. Looks like I was wrong,'' Alex thought wryly.

    The only option left for him at that moment is to lay down and hope that his higer than normal vitality would be able to heal his body in time. He did felt his wounds gradually turning better and better, but Alex knew that at the rate he was recovering, he would be dead or permanently crippled before it can actually heal him completely. Also, his body was frantically losing stamina quickly. Alex was sure that it was because of his high vitality stat using his stamina to recover. At this rate, he might also die from over exhaustion.

    ''Even when I''m safe, I have so many problems. That squirrel have pretty much ruined me,'' Alex thought.

    He was just about to lie down and leave everything to fate before something glowing at the side of his vision suddenly made him curious. Since it was closer to the crater and futher away from the tortoise''s corpse, he didn''t notice it before. It was glowing blue with crackling noises that sounded similar to the squirrel''s charge up state.

    When Alex made his way towards it, he saw that it was something small. It was about the size of a small pebble. The one thing that differentiated it from a normal pebble was the blue electricity that kept dancing around it.

    Thunder Squirrel''s Fang

    Unlike normal squirrels, Thunder Squirrels are a mutation from Fanged Squirrels that feast on meat. Its tooth have all been turned into fangs and infused with its deadly electric aura.

    Possible alchemical ingredient.

    Alex saw the description of the little fang even before he had to touch it, which made him sigh in relief. Even with his hands gloved up in his claw gauntlets, Alex did not want to touch the thing at all if he could help it. His bad experience with the squirrel made him afraid of touching anything that came straight out of that little monster''s body.

    ''Wait, if the squirrel''s tooth can become an alchemical ingredient...'' Alex thought as he stared at the giant tortoise''s corpse that was still just sitting there intact.

    Sure enough, a long list of notifications and descriptions appeared in front of him when he looked carefully at the tortoise''s corpse.

    Laser Tortoise''s Shell

    The shell of the laser tortoise. Despite its durability that rivals regular diamonds, it is relatively weak compared to the shells of other tortoise type beasts. Decent armor material.

    Possible alchemical ingredient.

    Laser Tortoise''s Bones

    The bones of the laser tortoise. Due to its main Life Energy Beam skill, its bones contain a few hundred times more vitality than regular tortoise type beasts. Eating can restore a slight bit of health.

    Legendary cooking material.

    Laser Tortoise''s Meat

    The meat of the laser tortoise. Due to its main Life Energy Beam skill, its meat contains a few hundred times more vitality than regular tortoise type beasts. Eating can restore a slight bit of health.

    Legendary cooking material.

    ¡®Jackpot!¡¯ Alex could not help but thought to himself as he stared at the corpse of the giant tortoise with happiness. He did not waste any time as he immediately made his way to the giant tortoise. He stabbed his clawed hands at the giant tortoise¡¯s meat and ripped of chunks and chunks of them.

    While he could not even leave a scratch on the giant tortoise¡¯s body before, ripping out chunks of meat from its dead body seemed to be so much easier, almost effortless in fact. Alex took off his ruined bloody shirt and laid the ripped tortoise meat on it. At that moment, he didn¡¯t care what sort of bacteria and diseases that he could get from putting the meat on his dirty shirt. All he cared about was to gather as much meat from the tortoise corpse as possible.

    When the one fourth of the tortoise¡¯s corpse had turned into nothing but bones, Alex stopped. The meat on his shirt had piled up and could hold onto any more. After that, Alex went and tried to look for dry wood that he could use to start a fire.

    It took him about an hour to do so because he could only crawl due to his injuries, but in the end, he managed to gather a sizable pile of wood. He gathered a few of the sticks into a circular formation and started a bonfire with it. When he was done, a decent fire burned in front of him.Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

    Despite the fact that it was still midday and the smoke could probably be seen for miles by others, Alex have already stopped caring. Most of the people in the city are dead, so Alex didn''t think that anyone would be attracted to the smoke. As for beasts, Alex wanted to level up anyway. He needed to put more points in his vitality so that he could heal up faster. If a monster was as hard to deal with as the squirrel, then he would fight it to the death.

    He skewered some chunks of meat that he had ripped off from the giant tortoise and grilled it over the fire. Immediately, a nice smell of burnt meat wafted out. While Alex didn''t have any condiments that he could use to cook the meat better, just the smell of burnt meat in the air was already making Alex''s mouth water.

    Alex suddenly realized that it was around lunchtime, which meant that the time was just about right.

    When he took out the skewered meat from the fire, Alex suddenly saw a notification.

    Cooked Laser Turtle Meat

    The meat of a laser turtle that have been cooked over a live fire. Due to the immense vitality that the meat possessed before its cooking, this cooked meat restores 1000 health points when consumed.

    "Holy shit, 1000 health points!" Alex could not help but shout out in excitement.

    Although he didn''t know how many health points he currently had, Alex didn''t think that it is ever close to a 1000. He immediately shoved the cooked meat into his mouth and chewed happily. The meat seemed to burst into his mouth as Alex felt a strange energy flow out from the meat into his mouth. From his mouth, the energy went and circulated itself all over Alex''s body.

    Hah!

    Alex sighed in comfort. The pain from the various injuries that the squirrel had inflicted on him suddenly disappeared as he felt all of those cuts and wounds suddenly disappearing. The various broken bones had also mended back to their proper place like magic.

    "Goddamn! This is some good stuff!" Alex said.

    Alex''s cooking skill was mostly just ordinary. In fact, most of the food that he had tried to cook in the past all tasted kind of bland. However, the cooked tortoise meat that he ate before was without a doubt the single most delicious food that he had ever eaten.

    ''Healing my body completely just from eating a few chunks. This is miracle meat!'' Alex thought to himself as he stared greedily at the mountain of tortoise meat in front of him.

    Alex immediately made his way over to his ruined classroom on the other side of the street. He took out some lunchboxes that were left behind because of the student''s death and brought it back to the ruined building that he was just in before. He also gathered a few more dry wood and piled up onto the pile that he had just had.

    ''I can''t let these meat go to waste,'' Alex thought as he started smoking the pile of meat in front of him.

    After about three hours of smoking the meat and filling it up in different lunch boxes, Alex finally heaved a sigh of relief. The giant tortoise beside him that was as big as a car was left with nothing but its shell and bones. Alex had stripped it off all of its meat.

    Alex had originally planned to strip off its bones as well since it seemed to also be capable of healing him after it was cooked, but his bag was full and Alex did not really know how to cook bones in a meal. That was why he left it all along with the bones.

    Alex had changed out of his tattered clothes and he was wearing a black shirt with some cargo pants, both of which he looted from some other people''s corpse. He was also carrying a large backpack that he looted from somewhere within the rubbles of the school. The backpack was filled to the brim with lunchboxes that was filled with smoked tortoise meat.

    ''I guess I should learn the skill book that I have gained before I go huh?'' Alex suddenly remembered.

    He made his way over to the ruined building again and picked up a bloodied book that have now been covered in building debris and dirt. Alex cleaned off the dirt and blood as he opened the book carefully. Instantly, a notification appeared in front of his face.

    Do you want to learn the skill ''Life Energy Beam''? (Yes/No)

    Alex picked yes without any hesitation. The book immediately turned into countless white balls of light and flew directly into Alex''s body. A sudden surge of knowledge suddenly assaulted his head as Alex felt that a plethora of images and information flashed over and over in his mind.

    When Alex finally regained himself, he looked at his watch and realized that not even three seconds had passed. However, to Alex, it felt like learning that skill took quite a long indeterminate amount of time. After learning the skill, Alex suddenly knew quite a bit about how to shoot out that life energy laser beam.

    ''Still, to eat up 10 health and stamina points... I''m going to have to have at least 50 vitality before I can use it comfortably,'' Alex thought wryly to himself.

    After learning the life energy beam skill, Alex had learned that his health and stamina points is very hard to grasp. There was no set point that could determine how many health or stamina points he have at any given moment. The only thing that he could rely on is his vitality.

    Apparently, vitality not only determines how tough your body is, it also determines how much health and stamina points you recover each second. From the knowledge gained from the skill book, Alex knew that he recovers one fifth health and stamina points of his current vitality stat per second. The more vitality he has, the more health and stamina that he could recover each second.

    If Alex has 50 in his vitality stat, he would recover about 10 points in health and stamina per second. In that case, he would be able to shoot and keep up his life energy laser beam forever. By that point, he would be so freaking overpowered!

    ''I might not have enough vitality points yet, but maybe I can try the life energy beam once to see how strong it is?'' Damien thought to himself.

    Alex put out his hand in front of him as he focused the life energy in his body. After a one second delay, a gigantic light blue beam of light suddenly shot out from his hand and flew straight to the school that have already turned into piles of rubble. When it his this rubble, the beam suddenly exploded and made a two feet crater.

    Alex had only kept it going for three seconds, so he only lost about 30 points in health and stamina. Despite this, his body already felt slightly weak and tired, as if it was feeling unwell. Thankfully, it only took around 6 seconds before he recovered to his normal self.

    ''I''ll just treat it as a killmove that has a cooldown proportional to how long I use it,'' Alex thought as he stared at his consumption.

    ''The power of this move isn''t as strong as the tortoise''s though,'' Alex thought as he compared the two feet crater he made with the giant holes that the tortoise made that spanned at least a few miles around Santa Cruz.

    When he looked into it further, he realized that his skill was only at level one. The skill itself has a maximum level limit of thirty, and every level up of the skill would improve the skill''s destructive power. Alex had no doubt that he would be able to completely decimate a whole city if he managed to level up the skill to its maximum level.

    ''I guess it''s about time I go back home and find my family huh?'' Alex thought as he slung the large backpack on his back and made his way over to the city.

 Chapter 5: Family Bonds

    After the start of the first tribulation, many monsters popped up out of nowhere and wrecked havoc. While the giant beasts with frightening supernatural abilities were the ones who wrecked the most havoc, many slightly mutated animals also played a huge part in creating chaos. Despite not having even half of the size of the frightening supernatural beasts, their vast numbers made them a nightmare to behold.

    One type of these small mutated animals happened to be horned badgers of Santa Cruz. After most of the giant beasts finished wreaking havoc and left the area, these horned badgers became the king of the area as they populated most of the city. While they were only about as strong as a normal badger, their horns, which are their primary weapon, were as strong as steel. Couple that with their numbers that reached to the thousands, many leftover survivors were easily overwhelmed and killed by them.

    Inside a house beside Delaware Avenue, a man in a white tank top was holding a metal bat as he tried to swat away the ten horned badgers that was assaulting him. His body had been chewed on countlessly by the surrounding badgers as blood kept pouring out of the various bite marks and holes. Despite his desperate struggle, the badgers kept on charging at him with their steel horns and eventually killed him with their numbers.

    They then feasted on his corpse.

    About half an hour later, when these horned badgers have finished consuming the man and let out satisfied burps, the door to the house suddenly flung open. A young man with clawed gauntlets was at the door and his face was as cold as the face of death. Looking at the bloody scene that the horned badgers created, he didn''t seemed the least bit perturbed as he unhesitatingly rushed towards these ten monsters.

    ''Hmph! As I thought, none of the monsters around here came even close to being as fast as the squirrel,'' Alex thought as he swung his dull claws around and ripped apart the badgers that were swarming at him.

    Alex had already killed around three hundred of these horned badgers before he made his way over here. He had struggled at first, but after killing ten of them, he started to get the hang of their movements. After killing his hundredth badger, Alex could already kill them all with almost no effort.

    Unfortunately, these little badgers give way too little exp points. Even after killing almost four hundred of them, Alex had only managed to level himself up by two levels to level 7. The two stat points he gained from his level ups were spent on raising his agility to 17.

    Of course, Alex was tempted to just pump all of his additional stat points into vitality until it reached 50 points so that he could fire his life energy beam forever, but he knew that it was not feasible. With the various monsters and beasts hanging around in every corner, Alex needed to have some life saving method. He decided to spend points into his agility because not only was it already high, so he only needed a few points to raise it to a high level, it also allowed him to move faster and nimbler, which made it easier for him to escape if he ever needed to.

    Fortunately, he never needed to. The horned badgers did not have the devastating power of the giant tortoise or the frightening speed of the deadly squirrel. All they had going for them was the fact that their horn was as strong as steel. When facing these kinds of normal monsters, Alex could kill them even when they outnumber him ten to one.

    It only took him about five minutes minutes for him to sweep up and clean the whole house out of these little horned rascals.

    ''Oh, a storage ring. With this, I''ll have five of them,'' Alex said nonchalantly as he picked up a bronze ring off the ground and put it on his hand.

    The storage ring is a pretty rare drop item that he got after killing these horned badgers. Once worn, he can store around 99 items in each them. After getting these rings, Alex ditched the large backpack he looted from the school and stored most of the smoked tortoise meat in these rings instead. Not to mention, he had also stored about two hundred horned badger corpses in these rings as well.

    Since the storage space inside the ring seemed to be similar to some sort of vacuum space, Alex have decided to store the badger corpses that he have killed as a sort of food supply that he can take out and cook at any time. It was better to stock up on food whenever he can. Who knows when he would have to flee and couldn''t find food quickly?

    ''Tsk! They have already gotten you too Hank? Looks like I came too late,'' Alex said as he stared at the bloodied and tattered tank top lying on the floor.

    After his parents'' death, Alex had been living with his uncle Hank for the last eight years. Their relationship have been shaky at first as they usually went head to head and argued with each other on a regular basis. Eventually, their relationship became one that is focused on ignoring each other and not getting in each other''s way. Alex always thought that once he turned 18 in a couple of months and graduated from high school, uncle Hank would''ve kicked him out of the house and he would have to fend for himself. Unfortunately, the world went to shit before that could happen.

    ''Well, I''ll try to t give you a proper burial at least. You were my uncle after all,'' Alex thought as he picked up and collected the pieces of his uncle''s bones that have been picked clean.

    Alex came out into the house''s backyard as he brought uncle Hank''s remains and a shovel with him. Alex dug a hole in the house''s backyard with the shovel. Since he didn''t really have any experience with digging, the hole that he dug looked sloppy and messy, but at least it was deep enough. Alex threw his uncle''s bones down into the hole and covered it up quickly with dirt.

    He brought out a big rock that he found on his neighbor''s yard. With great difficulty, Alex tried and succeeded in creating a small life energy beam from one of his fingers and used it to carve out his uncle''s name on the rock. After that, he embedded the makeshift tombstone on the ground.

    This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

    Due to your precise control of the skill, ''Life Energy Beam'' had leveled up to level 2!

    The strange voice spoke in his head right after Alex finished carving out the crappy tombstone. Of course, it was good news since he had not leveled it up even after he had already used the beam at least a hundred and fifty times to kill many horned badgers on his way home. However, Alex did not celebrate as he directly ignored the voice in his head. His mind was completely focused on the grave that he had just created for his uncle Hank. Two streaks flowed down his cheeks.

    Despite the fact that they were not close at all, even to the point where they could be considered to be enemies, uncle Hank was his dear family after all. After his parents'' death, uncle Hank was the only person left in this world that he could call to be family. The middle aged man was also the person that Alex had been the closest with for the last eight years. While he had made quite a few friends in school, Alex have always thought that blood will always run thicker than water, and his blood related uncle Hank would always hold a special place in Alex''s heart, even if they never did ever get along.

    ''Farewell, Hank. If the afterlife do exist, I hope that you can go to heaven and find eternal happiness,'' Alex prayed to his heart one last time before he wiped the tears in his eyes and returned back to his normal deadpan expression.

    ''Maybe I should stay here for the night?'' Alex thought as he gave a good look at the home that he have stayed in for the last eight years.

    While most of Santa Cruz city was completely destroyed by the giant beasts, Hank''s house was relatively intact due to it being more on the outskirts. While the house only had some flimsy wooden fences surrounding it, the door was relatively sturdy. The only reason as to why the badgers managed to make it into the house before was mostly because uncle Hank had opened the door some one time ago.

    When Alex looked through the house, he found that other than the blood splattered all over the living room, most of the house was completely fine. His room looked exactly the way he had left it back in the morning. The gas and water in the house was working fine, but the electricty seemed to have given out and won''t work no matter what Alex tried.

    With the water working, Alex''s first order of business was getting as much drinkable water as possible. Alex gathered all of the bottles in the house and unhesitatingly filled them all with water. In fact, he even filled up the bathtub with water after he ran out of bottles to put water in.

    After that, he closed all the windows and curtains. He also locked all of the doors going outside the house and he even locked the fence gate at the front of the house. While Alex knew that the fences outside could not stop the monsters, at least it would make some noise when some beast tried to force its way into the house.

    With all of his preparations done, Alex made his way into his room and laid on his bed. The day had been long, and killing almost four hundred badgers have made him tired. As the sun sets outside the window, Alex felt like the world is finally starting to start its first new day after the end.

    As he laid on the bed, Alex felt like what had happened before was slightly unbelievable. Not only did his whole life was rocked as he saw the city he had lived for eight years in decimated in front of his eyes, Alex even had to bury the dead body of his own uncle. If it wasn''t for the fact that all of the pains that he have felt in this day was completely real, Alex would''ve felt that he was still daydreaming in class right then.

    With his uncle gone, Alex had no one left in this world. All of his classmates are dead, and he haven''t seen even a single living human ever since the monsters came and killed everybody. At that moment lying on the bed, Alex felt for the second time in his life that his life is empty and he had no more reason to live.

    ''No, that''s not really true is it?'' Alex thought as he brought up his status screen.

    Name: N/A

    Race: Human (Basic)

    Level: 7

    Class: N/A

    Strength: 9

    Agility: 17

    Vitality: 28

    Spirit: 12

    Skills: [Life Energy Beam lv. 2]

    With this status screen and the capability to level up, Alex was sure that there would be many others like him in this world who have survived. Humanity would no doubt rise up from this catastrophe and strike back against the monsters. It probably wouldn''t take long before he would see another human being again, and with time, it wouldn''t be strange at all if some of them would become like gods once they accumulate enough levels.

    A strong burning desire suddenly welled up in his heart. The desire swept away the feeling of lost that he had felt before and replaced it with a strong will and determination. Alex realized that it wouldn''t do to just stay here and wallow in self pity at his loss.

    ''Father, mother, you had such high hopes for me back when you were alive. I haven''t accomplished anything even after the 8 years that you have left me. All because I''ve sunk into a pool of apathy and rotted from the inside. The ambitious drive that you have instilled within me have turned into a form of twisted pride that meant absolutely nothing.''

    ''Well, I will allow it no longer!''

    ''I will be one of those ''gods'' of this new world! I will stay alive and accumulate levels until I have reached the peak! Father, mother, I swear to you that I will achieve something great in this new world! To make sure that as my parents, your names would be immortalized in my legacy!'' Alex swore in his heart.

 Chapter 6: Preparing

    Surprisingly, the night after the world went to hell was relatively normal. Aside from various beast roars that came from outside the house from time to time, Alex was not disturbed at all. That was why he managed to sleep soundly and wake up energetically the next morning.

    ''Well, time to level up I guess. It''s been a day and I''ve only gotten to level 7. This world is filled with crazy people after all. I''m sure some of them have probably reached close to level 20 already. I can''t allow them to gain an advantage over me like that,'' Alex thought as he got up and washed his face.

    With the water still running, Alex made himself a meat broth made out of badger meat for breakfast. Despite the fact that they are wild badgers, their meat actually tasted really good. Perhaps his culinary skill have improved? Although these badger meat didn''t restore health points when he ate them, but at least Alex enjoyed his breakfast.

    After that, he took a bath in his bathroom. Alex had already completely given up on holding ''drinkable water'' inside his bathtub because the water had already turned moldy in less than a day. Instead, he had decided to loot all of the surrounding bottles around the neighborhood area and store water in them before the water system stops working.

    Once he have killed all of the horned badgers in his area and looted all of the bottles within, it was already close to midday. Unfortunately, the neighborhood only contained about seventy badgers, which was not enough at all to bring his level up to level 8. With his drinking water source secured, Alex brought three water bottles with him as he made his way over to the central Santa Cruz area.

    ''How the heck would I have to repair this thing?'' Alex thought wryly as he looked at his claw gauntlets that looked like it was showing signs of slight tears.

    The claw gauntlets have already lost almost half of its durability after Alex used it to kill the giant tortoise yesterday. Couple that with the fact that he had been using it continuously in combat for three hours in the time for him to get back to his house, its durability have already dropped down to almost a third. Unless he found some way to fix these gauntlets soon, Alex might very well lose his only weapon in this apocalypse very soon.

    ''Maybe I can find new ones?'' Alex suddenly thought.

    When Alex made his way over to the downtown area, he was surprised to find out that there was a new type of beast prowling around the area. Other than the horned badgers that he had killed almost five hundred times by then, there was a new breed of monsters assaulting him. It was small though.

    ''That fucking squirrel again! Why are there so many of them in here?'' Alex thought wryly as he hastily retreated.

    Only after he retreated for more than three minutes did he realize that these squirrels was fundamentally different from the squirrel that almost killed him the day before.

    They looked exactly the same as the thunder squirrel that he faced yesterday, but that was all about it. They didn''t have the thunder squirrel''s deadly speed nor do they have its capability to emit lightning from their bodies. Other than their sharp claws and fangs, they were only slightly faster than the regular horned badger.

    After killing one of them, Alex found out that their name wasn''t even called thunder squirrel. They were actually called the fanged squirrel, and the thunder squirrel seemed to be a mutation that came out of their species. The hierarchy to them seemed to be the thunder squirrel being the boss while the other fanged squirrels were its minions.

    Needless to say, Alex killed them all with pure vengeance right after he figure that out.

    Unlike with the horned badgers, Alex did not leave even a single one of these fanged squirrels alive. Everytime he met one of these squirrels, Alex would immediately charge at them with reckless abandon as he ripped their little bodies to pieces. By the time it was noon, all of Santa Cruz''s downtown area was completely devoid of any fanged squirrel and Alex managed to level up to level 8.

    ''Hmph! Since I couldn''t be the one to kill you last time, I will exterminate your whole race as my revenge you stupid fucking squirrel!'' Alex cursed at the dead thunder squirrel that almost killed him yesterday.

    There was one thing that Alex found strange when he ran around the downtown area as he killed the squirrels. It was the fact that the horned badgers and the fanged squirrels both seemed to be avoiding the half broken down Regal Cinema inside the area. When Alex got close to it, a very bad feeling assaulted his gut and prevented him from just wantonly entering.

    There was some terrifying monster inside the cinema, Alex was sure of that. The fact that the other beasts avoided it meant that they didn''t have a good relationship with the beast either. In fact, Alex had seen a few horned badgers that would sometime bring about a pile of dead carcasses along with other piles of food that they scavenged into the building and left hurriedly after that, as if they were paying tribute to some kind of devil.

    While the monster would probably bring in a lot of exp for him, Alex wasn''t that stupid. He knew nothing of the monster inside the cinema, so if Alex charged in without any plans in mind, he would be killed. He had already almost faced death in the face just yesterday because he did not detect the thunder squirrel coming at him. Alex did not want to experience that kind of helpless feeling again.

    That was why Alex decided to prematurely leave the area before he finished clearing up all the horned badgers. Since the monster in the cinema seemed to have and god and worshipper kind of relationship with the horned badgers, Alex was worried that the monster in the cinema would notice him if he wiped out all of its followers so suddenly. Before he made enough preparations, Alex did not want to draw its attention yet.The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

    That was why he left to other areas and started clearing monsters by droves. After he went around most of the ruined city, Alex found out that there were at least five species of monsters in the city. One of them was the horned badgers, which made up most of the monster population in the city. There were the fanged squirrels, which are rare but can be found in most areas. There were the flying spiky crows that were mostly active around the Natural Bridges area. There were also the rare saber toothed mountain lions up the path to University of California Santa Cruz and the aggressive steel seagulls flying around the Beach Boardwalk.

    Out of all of these beasts, the spiky crows and the steel seagulls were the hardest for Alex to deal with. Since they fly around in the sky, the only way for him to attack them was to use up his life energy beam skill. Since he still didn''t have 50 points in vitality yet, most of his shots became important as he could not retaliate for a while once he had fired his beam. It gave Alex quite the headache.

    The only thing that Alex was glad about was the fact that he could feel himself getting closer and closer to level 10. Everytime he killed a monster, Alex realized there was an invisible thread of energy that came from the monster he killed and into his body. The size of this thread differed from monster to monster, and he felt it grew smaller every time he leveled up. From that, he concluded that they were exp points filling up into his body.

    After killing the crows, the seagulls and the mountain lions, Alex could easily feel that they gave tons of exp points. Just killing one of them granted almost the same exp points that he gathered from killing fifty horned badgers or fanged squirrels. Alex had only killed about thirty of them each, yet they easily leveled him up to level 9. The horned badgers and the fanged squirrels could never compare at all.

    ''Although I couldn''t make it into Natural Bridges, the University of California Santa Cruz, or the Beach Boardwalk, these places might hold boss monsters like the one in the cinema,'' Alex thought as he rested after coming back to his house.

    With the amount of monsters getting denser and denser when he tried to get much closer to these areas, Alex was sure that these monsters were protecting something. Since boss monsters seemed to have a sort of god and their worshippers kind of relationship, it wouldn''t be too farfetched to think that the monsters gathered around the area to protect their boss. That must have also been why the amount of horned badgers downtown was much larger compared to the other areas even though they were spread out everywhere.

    ''If I assume that the thunder squirrel was the boss monster for the fanged squirrels, then I should expect the same level of difficulty when fighting the boss monster of the horned badgers inside of the cinema,'' Alex concluded as he fried the fanged squirrel meat on the pan.

    After finding out this day that fanged squirrels exists, Alex had completely turned his diet to consist mostly of their corpses. All of the 10 storage rings that he wore on his fingers were all filled with squirrel corpses. The reason as to why Alex did this was mostly because he was petty and wanted to make sure the thunder squirrel''s race would all go extinct inside his stomach.

    ''If I want to kill that monster in the cinema, I would be better off if I can get stronger first. Maybe if I level up the life energy beam skill...''

    Alex had used the laser beams countless times during the day, so he had somehow felt familiar with using it and it has even leveled up to level 3. The consumption on health and stamina along with its destructive power was still the same, but the amount of control that it brought Alex was massive. At this point, Alex was not confined to shooting out the beam from just his hands. In fact, he could shoot it out from any points of his body. Alex remembered how cool it felt like when he shot two life energy beams out of his eyes and shot down that spiky crow.

    Unfortunately, he was not used to it, and shooting the beam out of anywhere other than his hands tripled the cost of creating the beam. That kind of consumption could never be used in a proper fight. That was why he couldn''t rely on it as a trump card in his fight against the monster in the cinema.

    ''Maybe I can create a new skill out of this?'' Alex thought to himself.

    While it was cool the first few times, Alex became bored of it after a hundred times firing the life energy beam. The beam always had to go in a straight line, so it severely limits Alex''s attacking options. Especially when he was fighting against those flying birds back then. His attack was too linear and easy to avoid. Alex needed an option that would allow him to hit targets over a bigger area.

    ''Can I make the beam spread out larger? Or maybe I shouldn''t try to make it into a beam at all?'' Alex thought as he tried to create the beam again and control it.

    Unlike last time when he did it according to what the skill book had taught him, Alex focused most of his attention to guiding the life energy of his body to condense into a sphere. His idea was to make a sort of bomb that would explode all of the life energy contained in it over a large radius. Alex wanted to see if he could modify his devastating life energy into something that he could use to decimate all of those flying bird monsters at once.

    In the end, Alex got his wish. A ball of blue light formed in his hand as Alex strenuously controlled his life energy to stay within the ball. His body was wholly sweating and veins could be seen on his neck and face as Alex tried to keep the sphere from breaking apart into a beam. The worst part was the fact that his body was turning paler and paler, as his health and stamina points were both being used up at an incredible pace.

    Before Alex could not bear it anymore and collapse, a sound spoke in his head.

    ''Life Energy Blast'' skill learned!

    ''Life Energy Manipulation'' skill learned!

    After that, Alex collapsed on the floor as the sphere of energy in his hand collapsed into several beams that shot out from all directions from within his home. Instantly, various big holes were created on his house''s walls and ceilings. Fortunately, that was the extent of the damage since it was still standing quite sturdily.

    Alex himself was in a very bad shape. His body was aging at an accelerated pace as he felt the last of his health and stamina points draining away. Alex knew that he would die at the rate that his health points was dropping, so he immediately pulled out some smoked tortoise meat and ate them. In the end, it took about five of the tortoise meat before Alex was back to his normal healthy condition.

    "Fuck!" Alex swore as he still felt his stamina hitting rock bottom. He immediately, made his way over to hide under the dining room''s table before he passed out.