《Soul Bound Adventurers Book One: The Multiverse Arrives》 Chapter I "Well this is nice bud." Cassius "Cash" Andromedus was watching the beautiful display of lights in the sky with his dog, Opie, as the apocalyptic event hurtled towards the planet. Opie''s head was resting on Cash''s thigh while Cash was petting his back. The German Shepherd had been with Cash for nearly a quarter of his 25 years of age. Opie was getting old and was gradually developing hip issues but never let that keep him from following Cash everywhere. The two were inseparable, partners-in-crime, the epitome of man and his best friend. Opie had been there for Cash when no else was and shared a bond that was deeper than most. Cash''s past girlfriends were often jealous of the connection the two shared. It''s not like Opie wasn''t accepting of them, they just weren''t able to fit into the bond. Opie did often ''accidentally'' kick them off the bed while he was "sleeping" but who''s counting? As Cash was thinking this, Opie made a huff sound expressing that they were indeed accidents. Opie somehow knew exactly what Cash was thinking which wasn''t an odd occurrence but other people certainly found it uncanny. Cash laughed. "Hush turd, you''ve done it to every lady that got into my bed." Cash ruffled Opie''s ears earning a bite in return. Both man and dog shifted their gazes back to the sky. The shifting light display was beautiful to behold but depressing in reality. The world was ending. Governments across the globe had done everything they could to prevent or remove the inevitability of the massive meteor flying towards the planet, but everything had failed. Nukes had been launched, massive lasers were built, decades old enemies united to combine resources to build anything that could give us a chance. But nothing worked. A month ago, the President of the United States held a conference that aired to over three billion people at once. Opie and I sat on the raggedy couch in the living room of the shitty apartment I was renting with our eyes glued to the TV screen. It was the largest audience that had ever watched something at the same time in the history of television. The President addressed not just the American People but the entire world. He raised everyone''s hopes stating that the newest weapon created to stop the apocalypse was guaranteed to work. "The Department of Defense along with public and private space sectors have combined efforts to create a missile we''re calling the Spear of Hope," the president said. "Agencies have combined to make a missile that contained the remainder of the nation''s nuclear missiles as propellant for a kinetic strike". That''s what everyone was told about humanity¡¯s last hope. What my brain translated that into was that the best we could come up with was a really hard telephone pole being propelled by a bunch of nuclear explosions to go really fast to break a big rock. I may not be the smartest, but it didn''t seem like a good plan. The president and his committee were recorded live as the missile was launched. They cheered and shook hands with one another as they watched the rocket leave earth''s atmosphere. The president was shown stoically standing in the control room as they watched it start its nuclear detonations to reach an astronomically fast rate of travel. People all around the world were holding loved ones and waiting with bated breath.The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. And then the rocket exploded with its first detonation. Before the live broadcast was paused, the camera captured the moment the president''s facial expressions changed from stoic determination to slack-jawed shock and despair. There were quite a number of suicides that day. The president and his elites never bothered to release statements or guide the country after their most recent failure. Instead they locked themselves in their bunkers and bid the public good-luck. Obviously, pandemonium quickly followed and law and order was thrown out the window. Cash and Opie had to defend their home several times from cocky criminals thinking the man and his dog were an easy target. They quickly realized their mistake when they were met with sharp teeth and a Colt .45 with no zig-zags to share. A few weeks ago two teenagers kicked open the door to Cash''s apartment and found him in his underwear sitting on the couch with a large German Shepherd next to him. Cash and Opie were in similar states of disaster, Cash was wearing boxer-briefs with a grease-stained wife -beater trying to set a new record on the number of beers consumed in an hour while Opie was blowing bubbles in his water bowl (which was filled with beer) with pieces of what looked like, pepperoni, stuck in several places in his fur. The two may have looked like an easy score but as soon as the door was open, Cash reached into his drawers and pulled out his ''gat, drunkenly aiming the pistol at the open door while Opie slowly stood up, his hackles rising, ready to launch himself at the stunned fools. The teenagers took one look and ran as fast as they could. Whether that''s because Opie and Cash looked and smelled like death or if they were actually intimidating is unknown but they both like to think they scared them away with one look. Cash got up to close the door and immediately faceplanted, not realizing how drunk he was, while Opie was struggling to reach for one of the pepperonis stuck to his rump. Back to the present, Cash and Opie watched the impending end of their lives on the rooftop of their apartment center together. The meteor itself was visible now as it hurtled towards them. They sky itself looking like it was burning as the meteor slowly pressed into the atmosphere and caught fire. "We had a lot of fun didn''t we." Cash said. Opie sneezed in agreement and put his head back on Cash''s lap, whining while looking up at him. Cash let a tear loose when he heard and felt Opie''s whine. The meteor was seconds away from impacting the earth''s crust. At least their deaths would be painless. "I love you bu..." Cash was in the middle of saying his goodbyes to Opie when all of a sudden, Cash noticed the meteor wink out of existence. It was massive and consuming the entirety of the sky and then just disappeared. Before he could say anything, a game-like display forced it''s way into his vision. RESIDENTS OF EARTH WELCOME TO THE MULTIVERSE YOUR PLANET, AND THUS YOUR LIVES, HAVE BEEN SAVED FROM CERTAIN DOOM BY THE SYSTEM IN EXCHANGE, YOUR PLANET AND YOUR LIVES WILL BE INTEGRATED INTO THE MULTIVERSE INTEGRATION WILL RESULT IN SIGNIFICANT CHANGES TO THE PLANET AND YOURSELVES ALL LIFE WILL NOW BE CRYSTALIZED TO ALLOW CHANGES TO BE MADE ...INITIATING CRYSTALIZATION... "What in the fuuu..." was the last thing Cash could be heard saying before everything froze. Chapter II Cash felt like he was floating in a pitch-black void for eternity. The void felt cold and stagnant. Unable to determine how long he''d been in the void for, Cash was stuck reliving the memories of his life. Cash''s life up until now hadn''t been anything noteworthy. He graduated college at a local university, hadn''t known what to do afterwards and decided to join the Army. Cash spent a few years in the Army as a combat engineer and got a lot of training and did some cool things like using explosives but didn''t see any combat. He got out at the end of his contract and wanted to try something new. He struggled to find a job that really interested him and ended up just doing odd construction jobs to pay the bills. His life was boring. He had always had an interest in medieval history and its weapons and had even tried blacksmithing as a hobby. None of his blacksmithing work was anything worthy of praise yet but he enjoyed getting lost in the craft. Working with his hands and seeing his hard work come together at the end was a deep dopamine rush for him. But playing around with metal all day didn''t pay the bills. Cash was the youngest of four in his family and had grown up in a separated household. He loved his parents and siblings but weren''t able to connect with them at the end due to the chaos that was happening because of the end of the world. He wondered if they were experiencing the void too. Would he see them again one day? He hoped they were okay. Cash started to think about Opie too. Was Opie stuck in the void as well? Is he safe? Did this multiverse accept him too? "If I ever get out of this damn place and Opie is not there, I swear I will burn this multiverse shit down." Cash said. As if in response to Cash''s threat a screen flashed before his eyes. SCANNING... "AHHH! What the hell!" ANCIENT BLOODLINE DETECTED... CASSIAN ANDROMEDUS YOU HAVE BEEN SELECTED TO BECOME A FORERUNNER FOR YOUR SPECIES ACCEPT? "Ancient bloodline? What the hell is a Forerunner? This looks like the same screen that popped up in front of me before I found myself in this place." Cash began to remember the events that led him to this moment. The world was about to end. The meteor was approaching earth and had consumed the sky when all of a sudden it just disappeared, and that screen popped up before he was sent to this place. Opie was there with him too. ACCEPT? The option to accept or decline repeated itself once again. The display reminded Cash of some of the video games he''d played in the past. He usually clicked accept but this wasn''t a video game was it? "If I''m going to learn more I might as well accept it, maybe it''ll get me out of this god-forsaken hell hole." "Accept." Cash said. CONGRATULATIONS! YOU RECEIVE TITLE: FORERUNNER AS A FORERUNNER OF EARTH YOU WILL BE RELEASED FROM CRYSTALLIZATION BEFORE THE REST OF YOUR SPECIES ERROR... SOULBOUND COMPANION DETECTED FORERUNNER AND COMPANION WILL BE RELEASED TOGETHER FORERUNNERS RECEIVE THE BENEFIT OF CHOOSING A STARTING CLASS CHOOSE CLASS:Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. Cash was getting overloaded with information without the ability to ask questions. He tried several times to interrupt the screen and get more information but to no avail. As soon as he was given the option to choose a class the display changed to one he was familiar with. It was just like the video games he played. He was presented with a list of the standard class options he''d seen in some of the common fantasy games. ERROR... BLOODLINE HAS AFFECTED CLASS SELECTION AND INCLUDED A RANDOM CLASS CHOICE CHOOSE CLASS: "What the fuck is a bloodline and why does it keep showing up?" Cash thought. "It would appear that the standard class selection consists of only fighter, archer, mage, and rogue. What''s special about my blood that I get another option? I''ve never been special my whole life. Why all of a sudden now?" "Might as well embrace it I guess." YOU''VE CHOSEN REVEAL CLASS SELECTION? "Yes, dammit!" Cash yelled. YOU RECEIVE "Huh." "That''s actually kinda sick." CHOOSE STARTING WEAPON TYPE: Unlike the previous options, the weapon types didn''t appear to give you much information. They had no other identifiers like ''basic'' which the other choices had. Magical was definitely interesting and Cash was definitely interested in choosing that but what if he got something that he wasn''t able to use with his Swordsman class? "That decides it, then." Cash said before picking his weapon type. YOU''VE SELECTED YOU RECEIVE "Yup. Sounds about like my usual luck. Just a swordsman with no sword. A trash wooden stick. What sort of bullshit is that?" CHOOSE ATTRIBUTE ALLOCATION POINTS AVAILABLE: 10 This next selection menu gave Cash a full breakdown of all his current attributes and man were some of them low. He couldn''t help but wonder how he compared to everyone else. ATTRIBUTES: STRENGTH: 6 ENDURANCE: 5 AGILITY: 5 DEXTERITY: 7 CHARISMA: 3 WILLPOWER: 6 WISDOM: 3 INTELLIGENCE: 5 LUCK: 2 "My luck is 2! I knew I had horrible luck! Stupid club!" Cash yelled. "My lowest stats are luck, charisma, and wisdom. I don''t know about wisdom, I mean that''s something that comes with experience, right? And charisma, I mean I did spend most of my time only conversing with a dog." Cash chuckled to himself. Cash''s favorite games utilized stat systems that allowed players to tailor their build towards a certain playstyle. Should he select a couple stats and put all his points into only those stats? Or should he focus on rounding himself out and being a sort of jack of all trades type? "This is real life, at least I think it is. I should prioritize the essentials for survival for right now at least." Cash tried to focus on an attribute to see if it would reveal more information on what the stat affected but was unable to discern anything else. "Okay, my class is Swordsman. I''m going to assume that the essentials of that class revolve around being able to deal damage. You need to be able to swing fast and hard and also be able to take a little bit of a hit yourself. At least that''s what I think you need. I''m going to choose strength, endurance, and dexterity for now. Let''s do three in each and one in luck cause screw you luck that''s why." Cash made the changes to his attributes and selected accept. ATTRIBUTES: STRENGTH: 9 ENDURANCE: 8 AGILITY: 5 DEXTERITY: 10 CHARISMA: 3 WILLPOWER: 6 INTELLIGENCE: 5 WISDOM: 3 LUCK: 3 CONGRATULATIONS! YOU WILL NOW BE RELEASED FROM YOUR CHRYSALLIS GOOD LUCK FORERUNNER, FIGHT HARD THE SURVIVAL OF YOUR SPECIES DEPENDS ON IT Cash read the last pop-ups with tension building in his gut. He didn''t know how long he''d been trapped in this strange place for and was nervous to find out what had happened to his home. He was worried about Opie too, he didn''t take separation very well. And what was that about the survival of his species depending on him? Before Cash could think anymore he heard what sounded like a crack and looked up to see jagged lines with rays of light shining throughout the void. As he stared in awe, he watched the void shatter around him like an eggshell before he was blinded by overwhelming light.