THE SOVEREIGN SYSTEM CHOSE ME

Chapter 4: Threats Detected

Ethan remained completely still.

For several seconds, he kept staring at the empty space above his bed, waiting for the strange panel to appear again. Nothing happened. There was only the white hospital ceiling, the quiet beep of the heart monitor beside him, and the faint hum of the air conditioner.

Everything looked normal, but Ethan didn't feel normal. A strange warmth still moved through his body. It was faint now, almost like a gentle heat beneath his skin, but he could feel it clearly. He looked down at his hands and slowly raised his right one.

He opened and closed his fingers, the movement feeling different. His fingers moved with surprising ease, each one responding exactly when he wanted it to. There was no weakness, no stiffness, and none of the heaviness he had felt when he first woke up.

Ethan stared at his hand. “This isn't real,” he whispered, the words sounding weak even to his own ears.

He had lived in this body for twenty-six years. He knew how his body felt. He knew what his normal strength was. He knew how difficult it could be to lift something heavy or push himself when he was exhausted.

But this? This was different.

If the system was nothing more than a hallucination, there had to be a way to prove it.

His eyes moved around the room until they stopped on the small table beside his bed. A plastic water pitcher sat there, almost full. It was the cheap, lightweight kind used in hospitals, with a thin handle and a soft plastic body.

Ethan stared at it for a moment, then he reached for it. His arm moved without the effort he expected, and his fingers closed around the handle as he lifted the pitcher slightly from the table. But it felt almost weightless.

Ethan frowned and tightened his grip. Suddenly, the plastic suddenly gave way.

Crack.

The pitcher collapsed in his hand. Cold water spilled over his fingers and rushed across the table before pouring onto the floor. A few drops splashed onto the white blanket covering his legs.

Ethan froze, his eyes dropping to the pitcher. The thin plastic body was crushed inward beneath his fingers. The handle had bent almost completely flat, and a jagged crack ran along one side.

For several seconds, Ethan simply stared at it, then his fingers slowly loosened. The ruined pitcher slipped from his hand and hit the floor with a dull plastic thud.

Ethan didn't even look down. He was staring at his hand, and his fingers were trembling now.

He turned his palm over and examined it as though it belonged to someone else. There was no pain. No strain. Not even a hint of the effort it should have taken to crush something that easily.

A chill ran down his spine as he emembered the words from the panel.

[Installing: Superhuman Strength...]

Ethan's heart slammed against his ribs.

“No way,” he whispered in disbelief.

Whatever had happened to him on that highway, and whatever had happened during the three days he had been unconscious, it was real.

The strength still humming beneath his skin was real. The strange sharpness in his hearing was real. Even now, Ethan could hear footsteps moving along the hallway outside his room, the soft squeak of rubber soles against the polished floor, the distant murmur of nurses talking at the station, and the steady rhythm of the monitor beside his bed.

A sharp knock suddenly came from the door.

Ethan's head snapped toward it.

The movement was so fast that even he was startled. His body had reacted before his mind had fully registered the sound.

The door opened a moment later, and his sister stepped inside, looking extremely exhausted. Her hair was messy, her eyes were red and swollen, and dark circles sat beneath them as if she had barely slept in days. She took one step into the room, saw Ethan sitting upright in the bed, and stopped.

For a second, she simply stared, her lips parted and her eyes filled with tears. Then her face broke into a trembling smile.

“Ethan,” she breathed, her voice cracking with disbelief as she rushed across the room.

Ethan barely had time to react before she threw her arms around him. He stiffened in surprise, then carefully wrapped his arms around her. He could feel the strength in his muscles, the unfamiliar power waiting beneath his skin, and for one terrifying second, he worried that he might hold her too tightly.

She buried her face against his shoulder and began to sob.

“You're awake,” she cried, her whole body shaking against him. “Oh my God, you're actually awake. They called me three days ago and I thought... I thought I was going to lose you.”

Ethan closed his eyes.

The sound of her crying did something to him that the system couldn't explain.

He held her a little closer, but gently.

“Hey, I'm here,” he murmured, his voice soft as he tried to calm her. “I'm right here. You're not losing me.”

Sarah pulled back, but she didn't let go of him completely. Her hands remained gripping his shoulders as she searched his face, almost as if she needed to make sure he was truly there.

“They said you were shot in the head,” she whispered, her voice trembling. “They told us the doctors had no idea whether you were going to wake up. Three days, Ethan. Three whole days.”

She shook her head, tears slipping down her cheeks.

“And now you're sitting here talking to me.”

Ethan looked at her without saying a word. He wanted to tell her everything. He wanted to tell her about the blue panel that had appeared above his bed. About the strange messages that had appeared on it. About the strength that now filled his body.

About the crushed water pitcher lying on the floor.

But how could he explain any of that?

How could he tell his sister that he had apparently been given superhuman abilities by something calling itself a System?

She would think he was confused. She might even think the bullet had damaged his brain. And, if Ethan was being honest with himself, a small part of him still wondered if that was exactly what had happened.

“I don't know,” he admitted quietly, lowering his eyes for a moment. “I don't know what happened. I just remember the highway, and then... nothing. The next thing I knew, I was here.”

It wasn't the whole truth. But it wasn't completely a lie either.

His sister studied him carefully.

For a moment, Ethan wondered if she could somehow see through him. Then her expression softened.

She pulled him into another hug, this one slower and gentler.

“You scared me so badly,” she whispered against his shoulder.

“I know,” Ethan replied quietly, resting a hand against the back of her head. “I'm sorry.”

She sniffed and pulled away, wiping her cheeks with the back of her hand.

“You don't get to apologize for this,” she said, giving him a watery smile. “You're the one who got shot.”

Despite everything, a faint smile touched Ethan's lips.

“I guess that's fair.”

His sister let out a small laugh through her tears, then looked at him again. But while she was relieved, Ethan's thoughts had already returned to the highway.

The relief in the room could not erase what had happened.

The men who attacked him were still out there. The people who had ambushed his truck were still alive. And the man who had pulled the trigger was somewhere in the world right now.

His sister wiped her eyes again and suddenly seemed to remember something.

“I should call Mum's ward,” she said, already reaching for her phone. “She needs to know you're awake. The doctors wouldn't let her come down here because of her condition, but she's going to want to see you the moment they let her out of bed.”

The moment his sister mentioned their mother, Ethan's relief disappeared.

His thoughts went straight to the surgery.

Two weeks.

That was all the time they had left.

The doctors had already made it clear that the operation could not be delayed much longer, but the cost was far beyond anything Ethan could afford. Before the shooting, he had been struggling just to keep up with his daily expenses. There was no way he could suddenly find that kind of money.

At least, there hadn't been.

Ethan looked down at his hands.

The strange strength was still there, quietly running through his body. Even after everything he had seen, he still couldn't fully understand what had happened to him. A glowing panel had appeared out of nowhere and given him abilities that should not exist.

Yet they were real.

If the System could give him strength like this, perhaps the money he needed for his mother's surgery was no longer impossible.

For the first time, Ethan allowed himself to think that maybe he could actually save her.

His sister reached the door and pulled out her phone as she walked. “I'll call Mum right now,” she said, her voice still shaky but filled with relief. “She needs to hear your voice.”

Ethan watched her leave, and the door closed softly behind her. His eyes drifted around the quiet room while his mind raced through everything that had happened. The shooting. The System. His new abilities. His mother's surgery. The men who had tried to kill him.

Then a soft chime sounded behind him.

Ethan turned sharply.

The blue panel had returned.

It hovered above the bed, faintly glowing against the white walls.

A single notification blinked at the top.

[New Notification: 1]

Ethan's eyebrows drew together.

He stared at the message for a moment before reaching toward it. This time, his hand did not tremble.

The moment his fingertip touched the glowing panel, the screen expanded.

New lines of text appeared.

[The System has detected active hostile entities within a five-kilometer radius of the Host's current location.]

Ethan's expression changed.

Hostile entities?

Before he could fully process the words, another message appeared beneath it.

[Warning: Multiple System-affiliated signatures detected.]

[Threat classification pending.]

Ethan stopped breathing for a moment, his eyes fixed on the blue screen.

Multiple System-affiliated signatures.

The meaning slowly sank in.

He wasn't the only one. Several other people else had a System. And according to the notification, they were close… very close.

Ethan stared at the notification, his thoughts moving quickly.

If these people were hostile, why were they here?

Did they know about him?

Had they sensed his System too?

Or was this somehow connected to the men who had attacked him on the highway?