Consciousness swam back like surfacing from deep, cold water. Except… it wasn't cold.
For the first time in longer than he could remember, he wasn't shivering. No ache in his bones, no gnawing pit in his stomach. Just… warmth.
Sunlight? Felt like it, kissing his eyelids.
He blinked them open.
Green. So much green. Leaves rustled overhead, sunlight dappling through them onto soft moss below. The air smelled… clean. Like wet earth and growing things, not garbage and exhaust. Birds chirped somewhere nearby – actual birds, not just grumpy city pigeons.
'Woah.'
He sat up slowly, testing limbs that felt… different. Stronger. He flexed his fingers. No numbness. No ingrained grime under the nails. He looked down at himself. Clean tunic, simple trousers, bare feet resting on cool moss. This body… it wasn't his old one. This one felt… solid. Healthy.
Not like a bundle of rags about to fall apart.
'Okay. So that wasn't just… dying weirdness.'
The Goddess. The sad eyes, the golden light, the coin. Sunny. She called him Sunny. The name felt… okay. Better than 'rat' or 'trash'.
He scrambled to his feet, a little unsteady but definitely not weak. Took a deep breath. Fresh air. Really fresh air. It almost made his head spin. He looked around. Trees, grass, sunlight… looked like a park, but wilder. Untouched. Beautiful, yeah, but… empty.
Where was he?
'A different world, she said.' He chewed on his lip. 'Right. Easy peasy.'
He felt a wave of something… not quite happiness, more like giddy relief mixed with total confusion. He was alive. He wasn't cold. He wasn't hungry. That was… huge. Massive. Groundbreaking, even.
But also… now what?
Just as the question formed, something flickered into existence right in front of his eyes. Like transparent writing hanging in the air.
He flinched back, hands coming up defensively. 'What the—?!'
Then he remembered. The light flowing into him. The weird tingling. The System. The Goddess's… gift.
He squinted, forcing himself to look.
STATUS:
Name: Sunny
Level: 1
Class: Unassigned
HP: 20/20
MP: 5/5
Stats:
STR: 6
VIT: 7
AGI: 6
INT: 3
WIS: 4
CHA: 5
LCK: 8
Unspent Stat Points: 0
Unspent Skill Points: 0
CURRENCY:
Divine Coins: 1 [Unique – Cannot be spent]
Gold: 10
Silver: 0
Copper: 0
SKILLS:
None acquired.
PERKS:
[Goldflow Interface] – Converts monster kills and quests into gold.
[Instinctive Appraisal] – Automatically scans enemy threat level.
TITLES:
[The Forgotten Kind] – Earn +5% gold from all sources.
[One Who Was Hugged] – Random chance to gain 1 gold per act of kindness.
INVENTORY:
- Divine Coin (1) [Cannot Drop/Sell]
He stared at the floating panel. Level 1. No class. Okay, whatever that meant. Stats… numbers. Six strength? Seven vitality? Sounded low? Or maybe high? How would he know?
Then his eyes snagged on INT: 3. Three.
'Ouch.' Okay, yeah, that tracked. Never went to school. Couldn't read much beyond basic signs. Spent his life trying not to starve, not solving puzzles. Guess the Goddess didn't throw in a free brain upgrade. Fair enough. Wisdom 4 wasn't exactly genius level either.
He looked at the last line. Inventory. Divine Coin (1) [Unique]. He reached into the pocket of his new trousers, more out of habit than expectation. His fingers closed around something small, smooth, and heavy. He pulled it out.
A single gold coin, gleaming softly in the sunlight. It felt warm, almost alive. Just like the one she'd given him before the void took him. "Let the world owe you." Her voice echoed faintly in his memory.
He closed his fist around the coin. One coin. A new body that didn't feel like death warmed over. A forest. And a screen only he could see telling him he was basically dumb but kinda lucky.
'Right.' He looked around again, at the endless trees. 'So… which way is… civilization? Or food? Or… anything?'
He talked to himself, a habit born from long stretches of silence. "Okay, Sunny. You got a second chance. Don't mess it up." He frowned. "Step one: Figure out where the heck I am. Step two: Uh… survive? Yeah. Survive sounds good."
He wasn't smart, the numbers said so right there. But he knew how to survive. Or at least, he knew how to try. This time, maybe… maybe he'd actually get somewhere.
He picked a direction – mostly based on which way looked slightly less overgrown – and started walking.
An hour dragged by, marked only by the shifting patterns of sunlight through the endless canopy. Green blurred into green. Every tree looked the same, every patch of moss indistinguishable from the last.
Civilization? Not a whiff. No distant sounds, no smoke, nothing. Just... more trees.
'Okay, maybe picking a random direction wasn't the smartest play.' He swiped a bead of sweat from his forehead. His stomach rumbled again, louder this time. The initial relief of not being freezing or starving was wearing off, replaced by the familiar pangs of actual, current hunger.
The clean air was nice and all, but you couldn't eat it.
He paused, leaning against a thick trunk. 'Right, System thingy. You showed me my stats. Can you, like, show me a map? Or point towards… food? People?' He focused, trying to will the floating screen to change, to offer something useful.
STATUS:
Name: Sunny
Level: 1
Class: Unassigned
HP: 20/20
MP: 5/5
... (rest of stats unchanged) ...
CURRENCY:
Divine Coins: 1 [Unique – Cannot be spent]
Gold: 10
Silver: 0
Copper: 0
... (rest unchanged) ...
Nothing. Just the same info panel, hanging there mockingly. 'Useless hunk of light.' He sighed. Great. Super helpful magic system can't even give directions. Figures.
'Okay, okay. Think. Survival. People hunt, right?' He scanned the forest floor. Lots of leaves. Some weird bugs. No obvious furry critters waiting to become lunch. 'How do you even hunt? Throw rocks? Sneak up with a pointy stick?' He remembered the vendor with the ladle, the flash of metal. Shuddered.
Violence wasn't exactly his strong suit. Unless you counted getting stabbed. Which, probably, you didn't.
His INT score of 3 felt particularly relevant right now. 'Yeah, I'd probably just starve trying to catch a squirrel.' This second chance was starting to feel suspiciously like another dead end, just with better scenery. He was tired. The initial burst of energy from the new body was fading into a familiar weariness.
Then he heard it.
A scream. High-pitched, terrified, cutting through the quiet forest ambience like a knife.
Instantly, the image flashed in his mind: the little girl at the bus stop, tears streaming, shrinking away from the man with the oily voice. The feeling – that helpless urgency – hit him like a physical blow.
'No. Not again.'
He forgot the hunger, the fatigue, the cluelessness. He just pushed off the tree and ran. Towards the sound. Branches whipped at his face and arms, leaves crunched under his bare feet. His breathing grew ragged, lungs burning with the effort. The new body was okay, but it wasn't magically tireless.
The screams grew closer, more frantic, punctuated by choked sobs. They sounded… different from the girl before. More raw. More… final?
Just as he burst through a thicket of ferns, a warning flared in his vision, sharp and red.
[!] DANGER DETECTED [!]
Multiple Hostiles Ahead - High Threat Level
Proceed with Extreme Caution!
He registered the words, the flashing red border. High threat? Great. But the screaming… he couldn't stop. Not now. He pushed past the warning overlay, skidding slightly on loose soil as he entered a small clearing.
And froze.
The sight hit him like a physical impact, stealing the breath from his lungs. Bile surged up his throat.
It was a girl. Or had been. Maybe 15 years old? Hard to tell. She was on the ground, limbs twisted at unnatural angles. But that wasn't the worst part.
Clambering over her, tearing at her clothes, her flesh, were three… things. Small, maybe waist-high, with grotesque, green-skinned bodies, spindly limbs, and oversized heads dominated by wide mouths filled with needle-sharp teeth.
Their eyes were black beads, gleaming with malice. They were grunting and chittering, ripping… eating.
The screaming had stopped.
Sunny stared, horrified. His mind struggled to process it. Monsters. Actual, real-life, nightmare monsters. Eating a child.
'This… this isn't like before. This isn't some creep in an alley…' This was raw, brutal, savage. The smell hit him then – copper and something fouler, visceral. He gagged, stumbling back a step.
Right then, obscuring the horrific scene slightly, another translucent box popped into view. Blue this time, calmer than the red warning, but somehow infinitely more jarring.
[QUEST RECEIVED]
Goblin Extermination
Objective: Kill all Goblins in the vicinity (0/3).
Reward: 5 Gold Coins, +10 Unspent Stat Points.
Failure: Potential further loss of innocent life.
[Accept] / [Decline]
He barely saw the words.
Quest? Rewards? Stat points? Who the hell cared? His eyes were fixed on the small, still form on the ground, on the repulsive creatures defiling it. The sheer, nauseating horror of the scene overloaded everything else. That could have been the girl at the bus stop. It could have been him, left bleeding in the alley.
Forgotten. Devoured.
The world spun. He felt sick. Helpless. And utterly, utterly terrified.