3: A System

CHAPTER THREE

In moments of peril, the human body awakens a primal response, surging adrenaline through the veins, sharpening senses, and amplifying strength and reflexes. It’s the fight-or-flight instinct, an ancient mechanism meant to safeguard human survival.

For Gale, this instinct kicked in as he teetered on the brink of death. His lungs burned, and his muscles screamed in exhaustion, but an unexpected warmth spread through him, igniting a desperate resolve. With a final, explosive effort, he propelled himself upwards, cutting through the water with astonishing speed. He broke the surface and found himself hurled several meters into the air, landing in the shallows. He collapsed by the lakeside, gasping for breath, disbelief washing over him.

He had escaped death.

But what saved him was not merely the fight-or-flight instinct. Something else awakened an unknown energy within him when he chose, using his mind, the [Yes?] option that appeared before his eyes.

He had no idea what was going on.

He thought he was just hallucinating—seeing things as he was on the brink of death.

But whatever appeared in his vision was real, and he was sure of it. Because if it wasn’t, how the hell was he alive now? How could he have survived that near-death experience? He had been drowning, drinking in huge amounts of lake water, and was about to suffocate.

Yet, after choosing the [Yes] option, a surge of warm energy suddenly flowed throughout his body, giving him enough power to escape the deadly situation he was in.

With this in mind, the only question left in Gale's mind now was: What was that?

As if hearing his thoughts, something suddenly appeared in his vision.

It was the same as before—an image of blue text floating in the air in front of him, resembling a pop-up notification on a phone screen. But this time, the text was different.

[System Activated]

[Checking the System's Compatibility with the User]

'What is this?' Gale wondered, disbelief heavy in his mind. He didn't know how to react as the things before him seemed too absurd to believe.

[System Compatibility: 100%]

[Initiating System Sync with the User]

[System Sync Status: 1%]

Another wave of notifications appeared while Gale was still trying to process everything.

What he saw now was just like the notifications he saw when installing an application on a computer. He could even see the System status with a bar moving as it reached 1.3%.

'What's going on? Am I dead that I’m seeing things like this?' Gale, still not convinced of what he saw, tried to stand up and slapped himself.

'It hurts. This means I'm alive. But what the hell am I seeing now?'

Realizing that everything might be true, he tried to think of closing the screen-like image in front of him, and to his surprise, it did close. He thought of opening it and it did.

[System Sync Status: 2%]

'Okay, really. What the hell is going on?' Gale panicked, unsure of what to do next.

Another thing that worried him was what would happen when the status bar reached 100%.

"Hey, are you alright?"

"We're sorry that we didn't do anything to save you. We were scared of Gin."

Gale heard several worried voices from the side of the lake, snapping him from his daze. He turned to look at them and realized they were his fellow students from the academy.

But the moment the students recognized him, they frowned and halted in their tracks.

"Oh. It’s that piece of trash!"

"I can't believe I almost saved that idiot."

"I even bothered to worry about him. Damn it!"

He heard the students, disappointed that they had shown him sympathy.

It was something Gale experienced almost every day—people treating him like trash because he was a favorite target of the rich bullies.

Maybe it was their way of siding with those rich kids, but did they have to go that far? Even when he was on the brink of death, they still wouldn’t help him because he was targeted by those bullies.

He had almost died because of Gin, and those students didn’t dare intervene out of fear. They only showed concern when Gin was gone, but after realizing who he was, they turned their backs, disappointed they had shown concern.

What kind of shit was that?

However, Gale thought it was what it was. Instead of complaining about things he couldn’t change, he closed his eyes, taking deep, steadying breaths to calm himself.

"Ethan, do you think that piece of trash is drowning now?" Gin’s voice broke through his thoughts, snapping his eyes open.

But upon turning around to find Gin, a frown formed on his forehead as he couldn’t see him or his cronies.

"Yes, Boss. I haven't seen him move since we left," an unfamiliar voice replied.

"Maybe he doesn’t know how to swim," another voice added.

The voices were low, indicating they were far from him, but he could hear them clearly, yet he couldn’t see them around.

Does this mean he could now hear things so clearly that even from a distance away, his senses could catch anything? If so, something was really wrong with him.

Did it have to do with the things appearing in front of him?

But how? And what was this System?

Still unable to process everything, Gale thought he might just be hearing things.

And these system notifications he was seeing might just be hallucinations as the students who tried to approach him didn’t seem to notice anything unusual.

'I mean, these texts from the system notifications I am seeing right now that seem to follow my vision are something unusual, right? So they could have seen it if it wasn’t my hallucination.'

To confirm everything, he needed answers. So he approached the students, trying to see their reaction. He wanted to ask if they could see some text floating in front of him but restrained himself.

But when his fellow students just frowned and glared at him, he concluded they really couldn’t see the status bar displaying before him.

With this, he decided to go in the direction where he could hear Gin talking with his cronies. Soon, he spotted five figures walking away from the lake. They were several hundred meters away from him, but he could hear their footsteps.

Gale felt a mix of relief and confusion because he wasn’t just hearing things. But how could he hear them from such a distance?

"Boss! He’s behind us," one of Gin's men's voice rang out, making the rest of the group turn to look in his direction.

"What? You want more beatings?" With eyes locked on him, Gin shouted, arrogance dripping from his tone, even from nearly a hundred meters away.

Being one of the scariest bullies, to think that Gin would even attempt to drown him at the lake, fear immediately washed over Gale. So instead of confronting their group, he took a different path out of Redwood.

While running away, a thought crossed his mind.

'What they did was beyond what I could tolerate. They almost killed me! I need to report them to the police!'

Gale could endure the emotional bullying as he was not weak-willed, but physical assault definitely crossed the line. And if he didn’t take action, they would continue doing this to him.

With this resolve, Gale quickened his pace. Exiting the forest, he immediately made his way to the nearest city’s police station.

The Lexington Academy was located in Santa Mesa City and occupied a huge acreage. However, the academy was quite far from the city's center, so Gale needed to walk the three kilometers distance to reach the police station.

After half an hour of walking, he now stood in front of a police officer at the information desk, his clothes wet and dirty, but he didn’t care.

"Good afternoon, Sir. I want to report an assault by Gin Lopez and his group," Gale said, his voice steady despite the chaos inside his mind.

The officer eyed him, then took out a logbook. "What's your name and address?"

"Gale Rushton. I live in Zone 5, Barangay 7, Santa Mesa City. I'm a student at Lexington Academy," he answered, handing over his wet student ID.

"Tell me what happened," the officer prompted after writing down the information.

Gale then recounted everything, from his confrontation with Gin's girlfriend to the brutal beating and being thrown into the lake.

"No wonder your clothes are wet," the officer remarked, jotting down notes. "Sir, I have to warn you. The Lopez family is very powerful. So, you need to prepare for their reaction once they know about your complaint." The officer warned him in a very serious tone.

"Anyway, rest assured, we'll take immediate action on this matter," the officer added, patting Gale's shoulder before heading to inform the police chief about the report he filed.

Gale knew the Lopez family’s influence. They might try to quash his complaint, but he had to fight back. This was not just bullying anymore; it was attempted murder!

Gale was deep in thought when he heard a notification sound. Upon thinking it was the system again, the usual screen once again popped up.

[System Sync Status: 100%]

[System Sync Complete]

[You are now ranking up!]

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