2025-07-04 10:41:38CHAPTER 3: Death, Lit
Seconds ticked like the teeth of a hungry clock, gnawing into Kaelen's skull as he kept his palms flat against the orb. Thirty seconds: that was all. More than that it was mere hope licking the fringe of failure. Ten seconds. Fifteen. Twenty. Twenty-five. The breath of the teacher caught. He was already halfway to raising his clipboard to terminate it. And Kaelen, whose heart sank like a stone in the Mariana Trench, could already feel the burden of disappointment starting to bury him alive-- Then it came. A vicious flash of light burst forth out of the orb, not soft and welcoming, but rough and wild, as though the thing was shouting. Kaelen was burning. Not agonizingly, but warm: a breath of strength creeping up his arms, writhing through his blood like intelligent steam. His eyes tunneled. The room disappeared. He was in darkness. Melancholy settled down on him like a tar-fog. Out of the twister a spectral staff had coalesced, blacker than space, overlaid with jagged obsidian runes which flared purple, then red, then a color that had no name, yet still tasted like dread. Then it disappeared, and there was only silence. The teacher winked. Stared. Then bellowed: "Kaelen Norman has successfully awakened a class—Necromancer!" Gasps. Somewhere in the audience, a voice muttered, "Another one?!" Another replied, "Necromancer, huh? Sounds powerful. Maybe evil." "Be confident with your words, cunt," said another. "That’s evil as fuck." "Yeah, and I'd sell my soul, my kidney, and half my asscheek if it meant awakening too." "You’d do that even if it didn’t." The outburst of responses was not as spectacular as the flame display by Brian, but it was sufficient. To distinguish Kaelen as more than a background extra in the poverty play. The teacher didn’t know Kaelen. Didn’t care. But his face lit up as if someone had promised him tenure. "Good, good, good," he muttered, each repetition more pleased than the last. He gestured Kaelen over. “Stand with the others.” Still stunned, Kaelen nodded and walked over, joining Lilian and Brian. Lilian gave a shy, unsure nod. Brian, more serious than cocky, gave a respectful acknowledgment. Kaelen returned both but was barely present. Because hovering in front of him now was something new: --- [Name: Kaelen Norman] [Race: Human] [Class: Necromancer Apprentice] [Level: 1] [EXP: 0/100] [Strength: 1.3] [Agility: 1.4] [Constitution: 1.2] [Intelligence: 4.5] [Attribute Points: 0] [Skills: Undead Summoning, Undead Revival] [Talent: Infinite Evolution] [Class Skill: Contract Slot {0/2}] [Gift: Mark of Origin] --- Kaelen's brain stalled. He’d actually awakened. The word pounded against the walls of his mind like a drunk kicking open doors. Awakened. His chest heaved, then slowly settled. A grin cracked across his face like it hadn’t done in years. Whatever came next, it didn’t matter. He had a fucking shot. He let his attention drift back to the stage. Only six students left. Four minutes until this life-defining ritual ended. He allowed himself to breathe. Necromancer. Not a Knight. Not a Fire Mage. But… Necromancer. What did that mean, exactly? He knew the basics: Combat, Support, and Lifestyle classes. Necromancers weren’t exactly featured on school posters, and teachers rarely talked about them unless prompted. Was it powerful? Was it evil? Did it come with tax benefits? Kaelen didn’t know. But he’d find out. The panel in his vision hovered like a tattoo behind his eyes, begging for exploration. But before he could poke around, the teacher’s voice rang out once more. "Alright, that's it for today." Dozens of heads slumped, the non-Awakened trying to hold themselves together. The teacher continued, voice equal parts sincerity and institutional damage control: "Failing to awaken doesn't mean your life is over. When the apocalypse hit, half the cunts who saved the world didn’t have classes. Just guts. So chin up." Kaelen gave a small nod. It was a good speech. Sharp. Motivating. Delusional. But necessary. The world might be digitized, but reality still had teeth. Failure here meant scraping through life while tech kept evolving without you. Machines had already killed most jobs. The only things left for the average person were minimum wage, misery, or dying creatively. The teacher ended with a reminder: "The college exams—both standard and cultivation-based—are in three months. Use the time wisely. Just because school ends today doesn't mean learning stops." "Yes, sir!" came the chorus. The teacher looked at Kaelen, Lilian, and Brian, smiling as if he'd just adopted three golden geese. "You three, with me. Principal's office." Kaelen stepped off the stage, every movement echoing the new rhythm in his blood. He was something now. And the world was about to find out what.
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Chapter 10: Reckoning and Preparation
Chapter 10: Reckoning and PreparationKaelen ran his eyes down the perpetual scroll of information: courses, races and the ugly facts behind the pretty phrases of the Supers Association. His teacher had once preened, pompously, “No discrimination of classes.”Bullshit, Kaelen cursed in his head with a vengeance.No open discrimination, no formal caste system that excluded any group of people, that was at least the case. Yet under the surface Kaelen could see the jagged fissures--the divisions so distinct that they could cut flesh and soul alike. Classes were not equal, by no means.The forum motto, whispered over and over, was There are no weak classes, only weak Awakeners. However, the new information Kaelen had acquired gave a more complicated picture: there were classes with sharper claws, faster wings, or tougher scales than others. The crafty snake and the clumsy turtle were both living, but one was much more deadly.The triad of roles, Combat, Support and Lifestyle, was the only
Chapter 9: Secrets of the Mark
Chapter 9: Secrets of the MarkWhat Kaelen saw on the screen was misleadingly simple: a clean white background, the severe Supers Association logo flashing in the top corner, and two friendly blank bars marked email and password. No glittering symbols or occult writings to suggest that behind this portal are great secrets.Kaelen grinned to himself and quickly typed in the log-in credentials, which that oddly calm woman at the front desk of the Association had provided. His hands were moving on the screen, excitement and anxiety tingling in his flesh.It was not just a regular site, he thought. I am not merely logging into another hellish social media platform, but I am entering a closed club of supernatural cunts.He tapped sign in with certainty and was instantly transported to another world. The dullness of the log in page was replaced by a vivid churning hive of activity that filled the screen like a hive of buzzing information wasps.The new page was like a forum but drenched wit
Chapter 8: Awakening Secrets
Chapter 8: Awakening SecretsThe two-bedroom apartment that Kaelen shared was squatting on the second floor of a plain six-story block, a building that had four identical apartments on each floor. The type of establishment where the walls had echoes of daily struggle and hope intertwined within the flaking paint and humming fluorescent-lights.The living was not luxurious,--not by any means--but it was tolerable, the kind of simple comfort to which one adjusts oneself when life requires patience and silent endurance. Kaelen was sure, in the obstinate optimism of new money and new power, that one day soon he would haul his ragged family out of this little, rented cage and into something befitting the future he could see.Within this common territory, the two-bedrooms were partitioned with some practicality and unspoken demarcations. One was Kaelen, a narrow room overfilled with textbooks and an obstinate green plant that would not die. The other was a joint refuge of Aunt Velithe and h
Chapter 7: Homecomings and Revelations
Kaelen lost no time. He called a taxi, threw a crisp bill to the driver without batting an eyelid, and dropped back into the close, leather-scented seat. His muscles, freshly stirred and tingling with the electric hum of potential energy, could have managed the walk, but why the hell would he punish himself, when he was now so suddenly cash-rich? His home was miles away, and the Supers Association was a cruel journey that would consume at least an hour and a half, and he was not going to demonstrate how stubborn he was by dragging his weary ass through the streets of Woodstone.Frugality was off the books with fifteen thousand federal bucks flashing happily on his phone. This was not the moment to be the poor kid who was always sweating over bus fares and day old bread.The taxi was sliding through the streets of afternoon light and buzzing neon signs, and Kaelen sent a quick message to Aunt Velithe: Registered. I am on my way. Till later. Then, just when the car was going over a spee
Papers and Promises
Chapter 6: Papers and PromisesThe Supers Association building had a smell of burnt ozone, cheap-soap, and ambition.Kaelen went through the twin doors to find a solemn silence, perhaps a couple of glowing ceiling runes humming with divine bureaucracy. He received noise instead. Chaos. Youth. At least thirty children wandering around like lost cultists in a neon temple.It surprised him. The place had been dead still outside, with a false quietness that is like a predator awaiting lunch. But inside? It was a madhouse of hushed whispers, weary employees and glowing registration sigils that flickered like they were about to fall into digital nausea.The majority of the people here resembled him. Young. Unsettled. Stiff-backed with the kind of posture that screamed “I don't know what I'm doing but I want to look cool while doing it.”And they were New Awakeners, like himself.Kaelen didn't need divine insight to piece that together. With only two Association branches in Woodstone City an
Chapter 5: Registering the Dead
Chapter 5: Registering the DeadThe instructors disappeared like bureaucratic ghosts with hangovers and the nine newly minted Awakeners stood blinking in their newfound freedom. They all hung around as though they did not know what to do, go left, right, or up the social ladder. But Kaelen? He did not tarry.He walked as a man with a mission. He was because.Two things had to be done, and one of them was bureaucratic. The other was holy: to tell the woman who had fed his body, warmed his nights and occasionally slapped sense into him with a spatula that he had not failed. Not this time.The first stop was Supers Association.The basics were already known to the former owner of this body even before Kaelen soul crash-landed into this fucked-up magic-cyberpunk hellscape. Everybody did, hell. This was one of the few things that everyone in the Aurora Realm knew to be true: don not mess with the Association or you would have your kneecaps dissolved in the acid of bureaucracy.The Supers A
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