Rise from Zero

Gate just for Player

Gatot steadied himself.

The distortion in the air around him vanished.

He glanced over his shoulder, and the busy streets of his residential neighborhood had been replaced by a landscape that was both unfamiliar and horrifying.

He continued following the glowing golden arrow guiding his path.

His suspicion had been correct.

This place was nothing like the real world.

At first glance, it resembled a city district lined with rows of houses and storefronts.

Yet it was utterly dead.

Not a single person was anywhere to be seen.

The windows of the buildings had all been shattered, leaving behind dark, dust-filled rooms.

An oppressive silence hung over every corner of the deserted streets, as though every trace of life had been drained from this place.

Krrreeekk...

The scraping sound of shifting stone shattered the silence from behind a wrecked car abandoned along the roadside.

A moment later, a short creature with wrinkled green skin and pointed ears leaped into view.

A goblin.

Gatot narrowed his eyes.

Floating directly above the creature's head was a glowing red exclamation mark.

The goblin bared its crooked yellow fangs in a grin before charging straight at Gatot with a rusty knife raised high.

Faced with the sudden attack, Gatot hesitated for only an instant.

There was no fear left inside him.

Every ounce of it had been burned away after enduring the merciless torture and slaughter inflicted by the insane elves inside the gate two days ago.

Compared to the overwhelming killing intent of the elves, the goblin's movements felt painfully slow and easy to read.

Gatot made up his mind.

From this moment on, he would fight with everything he had.

Putting all his strength behind the movement and relying on nothing more than raw instinct, Gatot dodged.

The goblin's knife sliced through empty air, missing his ribs by only a few inches.

Gatot wasted no time.

Taking advantage of every increase in his physical attributes, now all raised to one, he lunged forward with a speed he had never possessed before.

He slammed into the goblin, sending both of them crashing onto the asphalt.

Driven purely by his instinct to survive, Gatot locked down the monster's arm, ripped the rusty knife from its grasp, and plunged the blade into the goblin's throat over and over again.

The green creature convulsed briefly before finally going limp.

The instant its breathing stopped, a blue notification appeared in the corner of Gatot's vision.

[You have eliminated a Low-Class Goblin.]

[Status Up!]

The digital text flickered softly across the System interface.

Gatot had no time to celebrate his small victory.

From the shadows surrounding the abandoned buildings came the sound of synchronized footsteps.

Five more goblins emerged from different directions, surrounding him.

Gatot immediately shifted into a fighting stance.

Then he noticed something different.

The symbols floating above these goblins' heads were no longer red.

They were bright blue.

As the battle erupted once again, Gatot immediately felt the difference.

With his newly increased attributes, the movements of the blue-marked goblins appeared noticeably slower and more fragile.

As the fight continued, their markers shifted from blue to yellow.

He could now dodge their crude attacks far more easily, avoiding every wild swing without exhausting himself.

Every time he defeated another goblin, his status increased, and the remaining goblins seemed even slower in his eyes.

Even so, the battle was far from easy.

The goblins kept emerging from narrow alleys as though there were no end to them, attacking from every blind spot.

Gatot was forced to keep moving.

Punching.

Kicking.

Slashing every green creature that came within reach using the stolen knife clenched in his hand.

The foul-smelling blood of monsters soaked his black shirt.

After nearly thirty exhausting minutes of relentless fighting, Gatot finally killed every goblin surrounding him.

Their bodies lay scattered across the cracked asphalt.

The System screen before him flashed repeatedly, displaying notification after notification as each goblin died by his hand.

His status window updated immediately.

Every attribute, Strength, Speed, Vitality, and Agility, had risen evenly to two.

Strangely, however, his overall Player Level still remained at zero.

Thud... Thud... Thud...

The heavy pounding of approaching footsteps instantly put Gatot back on guard.

At the far end of the street, a goblin twice the size of the others slowly approached.

The muscles on its massive arms bulged beneath its green skin.

It dragged an enormous wooden club across the pavement behind it.

A blue marker floated above its head.

The giant goblin let out a furious roar before swinging the club straight down toward Gatot's skull.

Blam!

Gatot jumped backward just in time.

The massive club smashed into the asphalt, shattering it into chunks of broken stone.

Thanks to his improved attributes, Gatot reacted with far greater precision.

The moment the club became lodged in the ground, he seized the opening.

He sprinted up the giant goblin's thick arm.

Then, with a single powerful slash, he sliced cleanly through the monster's throat.

The giant goblin crashed to the ground with a thunderous impact.

A brighter notification immediately appeared before him.

[You have defeated the Goblin Colony Leader.]

[Your Level has increased to: 1]

[All of your attributes have been permanently adjusted to: 5]

[A special reward for reaching your first level has been sent to your Inventory.]

So...

A red marker meant the monster was stronger than him.

Blue meant it was at the same level.

Yellow meant it was weaker.

Whoosh.

A flash of golden light materialized directly in front of Gatot's chest.

A solid object slowly emerged from thin air.

Instinctively, Gatot reached out with trembling hands and caught it.

It was a longsword.

Its hilt was wrapped in high-quality black leather, and its polished blade gleamed with flawless sharpness.

Gatot stared at the weapon with shining eyes.

Pure joy swelled inside his chest.

For the first time since entering the Hunter profession, he finally owned a weapon that truly belonged to him.

Not borrowed.

Not discarded by someone else.

His own.

The sword felt slightly heavy in his blood-slick hands.

Gatot stepped back before giving it several experimental swings through the empty air, savoring the sharp whistle the blade produced.

His confidence soared.

With this sword and every one of his attributes now at five, he felt ready to face whatever challenges remained in this place.

The feeling didn't last long.

Awoooo!

A chilling howl echoed from the darkness beyond the abandoned shopping district.

More howls answered it, shattering the artificial night that blanketed this fractured dimension.

Two pairs of glowing yellow eyes appeared within the gray mist.

Slowly, two enormous creatures stepped from the shadows.

Their bodies were covered in thick black fur.

They stood upright like bipedal wolves, their massive frames packed with dense muscle.

Long fangs protruded from their jaws, strings of foul-smelling saliva dripping from their mouths.

Lycans.

A red marker floated above each of them.

Gatot instantly stopped swinging his sword.

His heart tightened.

As a former Hunter errand runner, he knew exactly what kind of monsters stood before him.

Lycans were nothing like goblins.

They were mid-tier monsters, predators that normally appeared only inside D-Rank gates.

They were infamous for hunting in coordinated packs and possessed jaws powerful enough to crush human bones with a single bite.

The two massive lycans lowered their bodies, their claws scraping deep grooves into the asphalt as they prepared to pounce on their newest prey.

Could Gatot, who had only just reached Level One with his modest stats, really defeat two D-Rank monsters all by himself?