Free Web NovelChapter 4: Cursed from the Start [1]
Zen sat on the edge of his bed as the soft mattress creaked under his weight.
He had pulled a fresh linen shirt and black trousers underneath.
He held a dry towel in one hand, absent-mindedly rubbing his wet black hair as some droplets dotted his shirt’s collar, which he barely noticed.
His attention was fully focused ahead on the translucent grey rectangle that had materialized a while ago.
_
— ◈ [ Quest: Prologue ] ◈ —
Objective: Get admitted to Astralspire Academy Safely.
Reward: Exp + 7%
— ◈ [ Quest: Prologue ] ◈ —
_
’What a cheapskate.’
He remembered when he was playing the other characters’ routes, the rewards for prologue completion were much, much better.
Almost double the Exp they’re currently offering.
And he was sure Mikael’s prologue was going to be much harder than the others.
His eyes followed the objective again.
[Get admitted to Astralspire Academy Safely]
The word "Safely" wasn’t really giving him good vibes.
He didn’t know what they had in store for him.
"Haa..."
He let out a slow breath and tossed the towel on the bed.
He had gotten some fragments of Mikael’s memories, not long after transmigration.
They hadn’t arrived at once, as usually it happened in the transmigration novels he had read.
Mikael’s memories were scattered around his mind like puzzle pieces, waiting to be solved.
And from those scattered pieces of memories.
He had found that Mikael came from the noble family of the Marquess Morwell, one of the prominent families of the Valerion Kingdom.
From the lore of the game, he knew, the Valerion Kingdom was one of the three human kindoms situated in the north of the shattered continent of Aetheris.
A land fractured millennia ago in some cataclysm that game’s lore only hinted at.
Valenrion Kingdom is also where Astralspire Academy is located.
From his fuzzy memories, he recalled that Mikael had come to take the Academy entrance exam.
He had arrived in Thornhaven, a city near the Astraspire Academy, a week early before the exam, and booked a modest inn to rest.
After a few moments, he finally decided to call his status again.
He hadn’t checked it properly the first time he saw it.
He was too shocked and panicked when he noticed the name Mikael Morwell on the top of the status screen to notice anything else.
"Status."
*Ding!*
The air in front of him flickered, and the same translucent grey window similar to the quest appeared in front of him.
— ◈ [ Status ] ◈ —
Name: Mikael Morwell / Zen Ashcroft
Rank: Tier 1 (Mid)
Level: 16
Exp: [0%—[37%]———————100%]
Class: Magician
Affinity: None
Abilities: None / ???
Talent: Spellcasting (Divine Grade), Melodic Supremacy (Elite)
Curse: Soul Drought
Strength: 1.1
Endurance: 0.8
Agility: 1.3
Essence: 0.9
Willpower: 2.1
— ◈ [ Status ] ◈ —
His ghostly grey eyes lingered over the very top line where a slash separated two names.
Mikael Morwell slash and.... Zen Ashcroft.
His original name.
’Does that mean that my soul is now combined with Mikael’s....?’
But he didn’t feel any foreign emotions invading his mind.
He felt no sadness or any emotions injected into him, or even a flicker of affection for the people he had never met.
He was still... himself.
He had read many novels like those in which two personalities merge and the older one overtook the other.
And he was thankful that it wasn’t happening with him.
He didn’t want his emotions or feelings tempered by anyone, and he certainly didn’t want any emotional attachment to this world.
But does that also mean Mikael’s soul is alive somewhere deep within him?
Or is he truly dead?
’Wait.... was Mikael even dead?’
There weren’t any signs of suicide or murder in the room.
Had he just... possessed a living person?
Just the thought of that was making him feel the strange knot in his stomach.
No... He must be overthinking.
He quickly shook those thoughts.
He had a more pressing matter to look at first-- his status.
His eyes skated down at his rank and level.
Tier 1 (Mid) and Level 16.
"Haa..."
Zen let out an audible sigh.
Even the average student of the academy is at least High Tier 1, while the other playable characters start at Low Tier 2.
On the other hand, he was only Mid Tier 1.
In Eclipsed Realm, power ranks were measured across ten Tiers in total.
With Tier 1 being the lowest and Tier 10 being the highest.
Each Tier is divided into three stages -- low, mid, high.
His current level was 16, placing him in Tier 1.6--Mid Tier 1.
The breakdown was simple:
0.0 to 0.4 meant Low Tier, 0.41 to 0.7 was mid, and 0.71 to 0.99 was high Tier.
His gaze moved down, reading the glowing lines.
[Class: Magician]
[Affinity: None]
He wasn’t surprised by this.
He already knew from the forums he had read that Mikael had no affinity and no abilities.
He was a mage without any affinity.
Well... he could still cast some affinity-less magic like Essence Bullet, Essence Shield, and all.
But what caught him off guard was the next line.
[Abilities: None / (???)]
There was the extra ability that... "???" after the slash.
It sat there just like his name had, tucked behind the original.
Did that mean it was his ability?
Zen Ashcroft’s ability?
Mikael had never possessed any ability in the game, and from the game’s lore, he knew that abilities were tied to one’s soul.
Some lucky people awakened their abilities when their Essence first manifested at sixteen.
But how could he have an ability-- he wasn’t from this world.
He ran a hand through his hair, messing his already messy hair.
’This is so frustrating.’
’Let’s hope this ability is something good.’
Zen closed his eyes and tried to reach for the ability, searching inwardly for anything that felt like it.
But no matter how hard he tried, nothing stirred.
Maybe it needed specific conditions to activate, or it could also be a passive ability.
He had another guess, too.
The question marks might simply mean his level was too low--too low to see its name, let alone activate it.
Then,
His eyes scanned down, checking the one thing he was excited about but also nervous about at the same time.
This was what would determine how deeply he was screwed.
He read the glowing lines, and his expression turned glum.
Talents.
Talents play a major role in Aetheris, the game world’s power system.
They didn’t just influence the class you will awaken, but they also defined the very ceiling of your potential.
A talent was fixed from the moment of your awakening.
You can’t change it, nor can you gain another.
Some people gain the talents for swords, some for spears, some for fire magic, or some might even awaken something else entirely, like talents for being a technician, a craftsman, a blacksmith, or even a farmer.
But that doesn’t mean you can’t learn anything outside your talents.
You can-- but the progress would be slow and painful.
A Talent didn’t just give you an edge-- it was the difference between remaining a normie and becoming something monstrous.
It could make learning things easier.
It could turn years of practice into months and grant a depth of mastery others could only dream of.
Moving on, Talents are divided into five grades.
Mortal, Elite, Saint, Transcendent, Divine.
Mortal being the lowest grade, and Divine being the highest grade possible.
A grade of talent that even heaven would envy.
And Mikael possessed the same Divine-grade talent.
And not only that... he possessed one of the most broken talents in the entire game.
Even Tier 9, Monarch Sophia Ellert, has only Saint-grade Spellcasting talent.
[Talent: Spellcasting (Divine Grade), Melodic Supremacy (Elite)]
[Spellcasting (Divine Grade): The pinnacle of magical comprehension. Any spell complexity, or origin---can be comprehended, modified, and cast with terrifying speed]
[Melodic Supremacy (Elite): A natural mastery over voice and melody]
Now, anyone would wonder-- why would anyone look so gloomy after seeing such a heaven-defying talent?
And how, despite this, could Mikael still be considered the worst playable character?
Because at the moment of Essence awakening, people don’t just awaken their affinities, abilities, and Talents.
They awaken something else.
Something that could even rot the brightest future from the inside out.
Curses.
[Curse: Soul Drought]
[Soul Drought: The soul’s connection to Essence is withered and thin. Manipulating Essence becomes an exhausting, uphill struggle]
The difficulty in controlling Essence.
One of the most crippling curse a mage could bear.
It didn’t just mean he would struggle in spellcasting.
He figured he could force his way through his divine-grade spellcasting talent, but even with that, it would be like fighting against the current.
Even with his talent, bridging the gap, his control over essence would still be worse than an average academy student’s --- at least in the start.
But the real problem ran deeper.
Because of his difficulty in controlling essence, he would even have a hard time ranking up.
He would have to work twice or even thrice as much as any normal mage.
Zen dropped onto the bed, his back sinking into the mattress as he stared at the ornate ceiling above.
He draped his forearm over his head.
With his current strength, he wouldn’t even survive the first arc.
Did he have no choice but to try ’that’?
He still had two days till academy starts.
He needed to try that ritual.
It was dangerous, and there was a chance he would fail miserably without getting anything in return.
But.
What choice did he even have?
Mikael had a secret, unique class, but he didn’t know anything about it.
Those details never mattered to him back then.
He had hoped to avoid that route... hoped to find a safer plan, but that hope felt foolish now.
He had to do ’that’ if he wanted to survive. freewebnøvel.coɱ
Zen rose from his bed and looked around the room to find a clock or something to check the time.
His gaze landed on the gold pocket watch resting on the writing desk.
He had found it in Mikael’s trousers’ pocket earlier and removed it before taking a bath.
He studied the pocket watch again. It had a rather strange design with delicate rose-silver patterns.
He tried to click it open, but no matter how much he tried, it wouldn’t budge.
’Is it broken?’
He didn’t remember Mikael owning such a pocket watch.
’Let it be.’
He had more important matters to take care of, and it was probably morning by now anyway.
According to Mikael’s memories, today would bring a full twin moon.
A perfect day for the 5% ritual boosts.
He needed to get to that spot before midnight.
It would probably take him 7 to 8 hours to get there.
He pulled a black jacket over his white linen shirt and took some money from the drawer.
Money that he remembered putting there from Mikael’s memories.
He reached the door, but just as his fingers brushed the handle.
The door opened on its own.
A figure was standing at the doorframe.
"Going somewhere.... Mikael?"
*****
