Chapter 2 [The Grimoire System]

"Hu-kh-Cough!!" Alph exhaled harshly causing him to break into a coughing fit.

He rolled on the ground as intense pain burned through his chest and throat, as if he had drank a bottle of acid.

After few moments, the pain slowly receded, leaving Alph confused and flabbergasted.

"I-Im Alive?"

He clearly remembered that his throat had been slit by the crazy old serial killer.

"That morherfucker! Piece of shit!" Thinking of that detestable bastard made him clench his teeth so hard that blood started dripping from his gums.

He still couldn't believe that people like that existed.

"But how can I speak? Even if I was somehow saved, my throat should still be badly damaged!" He immediately started touching his neck.

Even though his clothes were still drenched as if he had took a bath in blood, the wound was nowhere to be found.

"All that aside, where then hell am I?" As someone who was quick to adapt he decided to throw everything aside and focus on the current situation.

He quickly surveyed his surroundings, rocky walls, dim light, damp and humid air.

"Am I in a cave?" He was extremely shocked.

"Don't tell me that crazy bastard kidnapped me? Fuck!" He could only come up with such a conclusion.

But there was still something that was off, if he was really kidnapped he should be shackled or bound with a rope or something.

"Whatever it is I should make a run for it!" He didn't know how such a deep wound could suddenly heal nor why he was in a cave but doing nothing would solve nothing.

He shakingly stood up, his head was feeling as if it was about to split up so he stretched out his right hand and grabbed the wall to support himself, and there he saw it.

A strange golden mark could be seen on the back of his hand.

"What the-" Alph could hardly believe his eyes as he gazed at the golden mark which was pulsating with a faint golden light.

He leaned on the wall and pulled back the hand to take a closer look.

It looked like a strange symbol but no matter how hard he focused Alph couldn't figure out what it was.

It was as if it was constantly changing form yet he knew it wasn't, he was staring at it but yet he couldn't comprehend it's shape.

As he dazedly stared at the mark, a strange sensation took over him, as if a calling from deep inside his soul.

"Activate!" Alph subconsciously put out his hand and shouted.

Suddenly the dim golden light being emitted by the mark intensified, making Alph squint his eyes.

It remained intense for only a second before it dimmed, and as he regained his vision Alph saw a golden rectangular holographic screen floating above his hand.

"T-This..." Alph was at a loss for words as glowing texts started appearing on the holographic screen.

[Assimilation Complete! Activating The Grimoire System!]

[The Grimoire System allows the user to bind any Grimoire to the system and use it without having to follow it's clauses or conditions.]

"The what?!" He stammered.

The texts soon vanished and a set of new texts appeared on the screen.

[Main Menu]

-Library

-Configurations

-????????

-????????

For a long time Alph didn't know how to react, his mind went blank at the absurdity of the events unfolding.

"Could it be?" He thought of a possibility which would have sounded very ridiculous under normal circumstances, but the situation he was in right now was anything but normal.

As the owner of a bookshop, Alph also liked to read in his spare time and his favourite books were fantasy novels, mostly eastern ones.

Among the novels that he had read were those where the protagonist would die and reincarnate in another world, mostly a fantastical world with dragons and demons.

There were also those where the protagonist would awaken a so called System, a cheat like device that would grant them various abilities and powers.

His current situation was completely similar, he had presumably died and transmigrated to a different world and right in front of him was the floating system menu as described in the stories.

"Am I going insane?" Even though he had a strong will and was quick to adapt he was still unable to wrap his head around the situation, the whole situation wasn't something that one could easily accept.

But no matter how much he doubted himself, the glowing screen in front of him didn't go away.

He focused on the Library option and immediately the screen changed again.

[Library]

All the Grimoires binded by the user will appear here, the user can select the Grimoire they want to use by thinking about it.

(Grimoires)

1. Grimoire Of Gluttony {0%}}

........

"This is it!" Alph was excited, it was going as he had expected.

"Gulp!" He gulped down a mouthful of his own saliva and focused his mind on the Grimoire Of Gluttony and as he did Alph saw a ripple appear on the golden screen.

A dark purple smoke like substance flew out of the screen, appearing in front of Alph before condensing into a dark purple book.

The book was thick and old, and even somewhat tattered and it emitted blackish purple smoke as it floated in front of him.

The text on the golden screen also went through a minor change as an °Equiped° Tag appeared in front of the Grimoire Of Gluttony.

Alph hesitantly put out his hands to hold the evil looking grimoire, once his hands touched the book it immediately stoped floating and Alph felt the heavy weight of the thick book in his hands.

"Is this the same book from before?" Alph muttered suspiciously, the book looked a bit different but the strange circular symbol on the hardcover page was still there.

Alph flipped open the book, the first page was a title page, and a big "Grimoir Of Gluttony" was written on it in an eerie font.

"Author Requira Elgrain Mavius?" He read the small line of text at the bottom of the tittle page before continuing to flip.

The next page was titled "Introduction" and was filled with words written with a purplish ink.

[The Grimoir of Gluttony is the embodiment of the Primordial sin of Gluttony.

The grimoir can devour any creature killed by the user and either store them, if there are enough empty pages available, or directly digest them.

Stored souls can be summoned as slaves or be assimilated by the user. Using the assimilate function will render the page the slave was stored on unusable for 30days.

At the beginning, the user is granted 3 free usable pages, new functions and additional usable pages will be unlocked as you continue to feed souls to the Grimoire.

Clause Of Use: Any who seek to use the Grimoire are to fullfil the following clauses.

1. Flesh and Blood: The user must provide the Grimoire Of Gluttony a set amount of flesh and blood everyday. The amount depends on the number of currently unlocked pages, the more pages the user has unlocked the more they will have to provide.

2. All But Holy: The user must not have any attributes corresponding to the Holy attribute. Nor should they have any connection to any Holy Factions.

3. True To The Sin: As the embodiment of the sin of Gluttony, the user of the Grimoire must also indulge in Gluttony.]

"Indeed, this is a magical Grimoire..." He would have been extremely shocked and excited under normal situations but right now his emotions were too numb to feel any of that, he was somewhat blaming the old book for everything that had happened to him in his heart.

It was a human nature after all, it would become much more bearable when you had someone or something to blame, if not then you would probably start blaming yourself even if it wasn't your fault.

Going to the next page he found something even more astonishing.

[Dane Robert

Race: Human

Age: 55

Slave Rank: Unique

Title: First Slave

(Stats)

Strength: 40

Agility: 70

Vitality: 20

Mana Pool: E

Mana Density: E

Intelligence: Medium

(Normal Abilities)

-Acting(Intermediate): An actor is someone who can make others believe their act.

-Agile Movement(Intermediate): Quick and flexible, could have made it big as an acrobat.

-Knife Wielding(Intermediate): Wielding the knife to butcher a cattle or a person? Well, why not both?

-Vehicle Driving(Basic): from cars and bikes to carriages and horses, he can drive them all, or can he?

(Special Abilities)

-Assassination: The slave can mark one target at a time. The marked target will have a harder time spotting the slave or feeling their presence. Also, the slave's first attack will deal twice as much damage as usual. The skill will be cancelled if the target pinppints the slave's identity and intent.

-Blade Magic (Elementary): Can use elementary level blade magic.

(Title)

|First Slave| The first slave is akin to the very first chapter written by an author, it might be their favorite or it might be their most hated one but one thing is for sure, it's the start, a start that can only happen once.

The first slave shares an extremely deep connection with the master and aside from the basic observe and command function the master can also send and receive non animate objects to and from the first slave.

•The first slave's basic states are slightly enhanced and they gain extra special abilities that fit their character.

•The first slave doesn't have any cool down when they are killed meaning they can be instantly summoned again and again without any restrictions.

•The first slave is easier to develop and strengthen than other slaves.

(Options Available)

Summon

Assimilate

Observe]

The picture of an old man wearing a white uniform which was stained with blood was drawn on one side and on the other was written his information.

"That old bastard? He became a slave? So I can summon him?" This time Alph's numb emotions started to well up again.

"Lets see, summon!" Without anymore hesitation be decided to just summon it and see.

The book emitted a purplish glow and the figure of a man appeared in front of him out of nowhere before condensing into the old man.

As he summoned it, a strange feeling welled up inside Alph, as if a link was made between him and the old man.

Along with the connection came some basic information about his role as a master.

"So as a master I can order my slaves to do anything, I can even order them to die and they will die?"

He looked at the detestable face of the old killer, holding himself back from flaring up with rage.

"But then again, the old man is probably dead!" He controlled his impulse, which was only possible because his emotions were currently numbed from all the shocks he had received.

"Kneel!" For some reason, it was the only thing he could come up with to check of the old man followed his orders.

The old slave didn't even hesitate, he immediately knelt on the ground.

"Hmmmm, jump?" He spoke, doubting his own words.

Swishhh-

"What the-" Alph looked as the seemingly frail old man jumped with astonishing force.

It was at least two stories high or more as the old man almost touched the roof of the cave which was by no means low.

Tak-

He landed softly on the ground like the scenes from those unrealistic Chinese martial movies.

"I guess the Grimoire really did boost his attributes!" Alph was beginning to accept the reality of his situation.

It was now certain that he wasn't kidnapped, but that didn't mean he was out of danger. He needed to first and foremost figure out where he was.