“Your System is a toolkit. Use all of it. Ignoring a feature out of ignorance or pride is the same as entering a shard unarmed.”

  — Scavantis Handbook

  Tuesday morning hit me like a thrown wrench.

  I blinked awake to sunlight slicing through my blinds, the faint hum of the air filters, and a new ache in my ribs I didn’t remember earning. For a terrifying half-second my brain went:

  System? Have I imagined all that? Please don’t tell me I hallucinated an ancestor AI and a door that wants mana dust.

  My heart kicked into a sprint.

  “System,” I muttered, or thought, or panicked mentally at. It didn’t matter which.

  A window snapped open in my mind with all the grace of a dying microwave.

  [Minor System - Status: LIMITED]

  [Personal Trait: Hoqalo]

  I collapsed back onto the pillow with a long, shaky exhale. The relief was so strong it was almost embarrassing. I wasn’t sure what would’ve been worse: discovering everything had been a delusion or explaining to Mom that her son had gone clinically insane but still intended to fight aliens for money.

  “Okay,” I whispered to myself. “Not a dream. Not dead. Not hallucinating. Good start.”

  The system interface hovered patiently, like a bored clerk waiting for me to make a transaction. I hadn’t had time to explore it yesterday, too busy discovering I’d been cosmically robbed for half a year and arguing with Mom about legal hunting licenses.

  Now that I wasn’t actively bleeding anywhere, I poked around.

  The layout weirdly resembled corpo-services: minimalist, sterile, as if the system had hired the same UI designer who made Grome. Four tabs sat neatly in a row:

  [Level]

  [Attributes]

  [Skills]

  [Plugins]

  I mentally tapped the first.

  [Level: 1]

  That was it. No experience bar, no numbers ticking up, no “kill ten bugs to reach Level 2!” Just Level: 1, like the system was saying, “You exist. Barely. Congrats? Now scram.”

  I backed out and opened the Attributes tab.

  The window flickered. Glitched. Then vomited a line of symbols that looked like someone had smashed a keyboard during a seizure:

  STR: ?▓█???██?

  AGI: █▓??????█

  INT: [ERROR]

  ??? : ￥?#§█? ?????????????????????

  Below the chaos, one lonely line appeared, meek and perfectly readable:

  Preset: sol-warrior

  I blinked at it.

  “Sol-warrior preset,” I repeated aloud. “What the hell does that mean? Solar? Soldier? Some corpo idea of a melee build?”

  If the system expected me to swing a sword, it really should’ve shown up six months earlier, ideally with a manual, a user guide, and maybe a complimentary skill point.

  Speaking of skills—

  The [Skills] tab was grayed out. Clicking it did nothing. Not even an error message. Just dead silence, like the system didn’t trust me not to break anything yet.

  “Rude,” I whispered.

  Only the last tab, [Plugins], responded when I poked it.

  The window unfolded smoothly, almost proudly.

  [Plugins]

  Weekly pp allotment: 0

  Weekly pp used: 0

  Saved pp: 0

  ? Incursion Predictor v39.54.2 edition 6

  Status: ACTIVE | Level: 1/15 | pp weekly: 0

  ? ??? plugin

  Status: INACTIVE | Level: 1/1 | pp weekly: 0

  I squinted at the screen. “Uh-huh. Sure. Great. Love the transparency.” Then my eyes drifted back to the top. “…What the hell is pp?”

  I stared harder, as if I could intimidate the system into being helpful.

  It stared back, aggressively unhelpful.

  “System,” I said slowly, carefully, like I was talking to a toddler holding a plasma torch, “define pp.”

  Nothing. No pop-up, nor tooltip or helpful note saying, “pp stands for Plugin Points, you idiot.” Which probably was, but how did I get plugin points?

  Just silence.

  I tried again, mentally this time, just in case the system was shy about public humiliation.

  Define pp.

  Again: silence.

  Not even an error message. Not even a passive-aggressive “Insufficient permissions” warning. Just pure weaponized indifference. “Seriously?” I dragged a hand down my face. “You can glitch my Attributes into ancient runes that look like they could summon chaos demons, but you can’t explain a two-letter acronym?”

  The system continued not giving a single damn. “Rude again,” I muttered, out loud and on purpose. “Actually rude.” My gaze shifted back to the second plugin. Great. Love that. A mystery plugin installed directly in the operating system of my soul.

  I hovered mentally over it, half-tempted to poke it, half-convinced it would immediately eject me into low orbit.

  “Okay,” I whispered to myself, “we’re not touching the unknown thing until I get at least one tutorial. Or a manual. Or a sticky note… literally anything.”

  The system, once again, offered absolutely nothing.

  I sighed and flopped back against the headboard. “Fantastic. I have plugins, a weekly pp allowance that means nothing, and a system with the communication skills of a brick.”

  Still… it was mine, and it hadn’t vanished overnight.

  That… was something.

  I dragged myself through a shower that alternated between “arctic death spray” and “sun surface,” because of course the smart-home water regulator refused to acknowledge my existence before 8 a.m.

  Ten minutes later I was dressed, half-awake, and making my way downstairs.

  Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  Our dining parlour, Mom insisted on calling it that, looked like the living room’s equally pretentious sibling. Smooth chrome surfaces, soft under-lighting, a table that could seat eight even though it was just the two of us. A holo-frame drifted lazily in the corner, displaying rotating landscapes specifically curated to show great-grandpa's old homeland... I just never bothered to learn where it was on Earth 1.0.

  I’d barely sat down when Mom leaned out from the kitchen doorway, hair pinned up, apron neat. “Good morning,” she said, voice already evaluating my mood. “What do you want for breakfast?”

  I shrugged. “A baguette?”

  She shot me a look sharp enough to cut armor plating. “Dash. It is Bánh mì.”

  “Bánh mì then,” I corrected, raising both hands in surrender.

  She disappeared for a second, then walked in carrying a plate, and set it gently in front of me. Scrambled eggs. Perfectly folded, fluffy, golden.

  I blinked. “Why ask me then?”

  “Because you never say Bánh mì.” She tapped the plate like it was a moral lesson and not breakfast, then turned back toward the kitchen. “Call your sister to eat.”

  I rolled my eyes affectionately… mostly… and dug in. The eggs were good. Annoyingly good. “Comma!!!” I yelled, because there was no way she would get out of the bed anyway.

  Mom returned a few minutes later, no longer in her cooking apron but in her full corporate attire and in her hand was a single sheet of real thin paper, which only corporations still bothered printing because they liked the ritual of signatures.

  She placed it deliberately on the table in front of me.

  I blinked. “Wait—are those the Scavantis papers? You already signed them?”

  My hand shot out automatically, but she pulled the sheet back with a quick motion, as if she expected me to eat it out of excitement. “Have you opened the message from Grandma?” she asked, eyebrows raised.

  “Mom… come on, seriously?” I slumped back in my chair. “It’s not like I—”

  “Dash.”

  That was all she needed to say. A single syllable with the gravitational pull of a black hole.

  I groaned, grabbed my holoband from my pocket, and slipped it onto my wrist. The device hummed faintly as it synced up, projecting a circular interface above my palm. I navigated to the Grome browser, pulled up the Kallum services, and presented it like a kid showing homework under duress.

  “There,” I said. “See? Store. Happy?”

  She didn’t look impressed, just relieved. “Take your band with you today. Don’t rely on your broken chip.”

  “It glitched one time,” I protested, because technically that was true if you didn’t count yesterday, last week, or that incident at the mines. “And the band is awkward to use with armor. The gauntlet—”

  “You’ll wear the band,” she said, cutting neatly through my excuse with corporate precision. “And you will run away from incursions you’re not supposed to fight.”

  I made a noise that was somewhere between a sigh and a dying animal, but I nodded. “Fine.”

  She leaned a little closer, peering at the holo-display hovering over my wrist. “Pending?” She repeated, her expression flattening into that specific maternal deadpan reserved for Things That Should Already Be Solved.

  I frowned at the screen. “Huh. I didn’t notice that last night. I’ll fix it. Probably just need to call or confirm something.” Mom exhaled, a sigh that suggested she believed exactly none of what I’d just said but also didn’t have time to argue.

  She finally handed me the short paper, placing it into my palm with all the gravity of a judge passing sentence. “They already have the documentation electronically, but you still need to fill your details, so go in for the—”

  “I knoooow,” I interrupted, waving a hand. “The exam, the orientation and the safety briefing with a digital signature. I’ve read it, like, a hundred times.”

  She gave me a smile. “Good. Then you know what to expect, but read the fine print.” She gathered her tablet and datapad, slung her purse over one shoulder, and headed toward the front door with the strides of someone who refused to be late to anything, ever.

  “Bye, Dash!”

  “Bye, Mom…” I called after her, watching the door hiss shut behind her.

  I sat there for another minute, finishing the last of the eggs, then stood and stretched. The house hummed quietly around me, serv-bots somewhere in the walls doing their automated cleaning routines.

  Time to suit up.

  I slipped out the side door into the garden, boots crunching softly on the white gravel path. The morning air was crisp, carrying that artificial freshness the district’s environmental filters pumped out 24/7. The statue of great-grandpa loomed ahead, bronze oxidized to green, eternal plasma torch flickering at the top.

  I glanced around. Empty. The serv-bots were focused on the front hedges.

  Good.

  I stepped over the low decorative wall and pressed the hidden button at the pillar’s base. The stone shimmered, rippled like water, and dissolved into nothing. The stairwell yawned open beneath great-grandpa’s boots.

  I descended quickly, the artificial lights flickering on as I moved, and my armor hung on its rack exactly where I’d left it, plates gleaming dully in the LED strips.

  I started with the underlayer, pulling on the padded suit that held all the shock absorbers and motion sensors. Then came the plates: shin guards, thigh armor, chest piece, pauldrons. Each one clicked into place with satisfying precision. The new repairs held beautifully! No rattling, no grinding joints, no squeaking like last time, just smooth movement.

  The rifle went over my shoulder. Pistols on my hips. Sword strapped to my back.

  I checked myself in the reflection of a polished metal panel leaning against the wall. Yeah. I looked like a cosplayer again, trying to look like a system user, like those kids on Pulse.

  But a well-armed cosplayer.

  I climbed back up; the pillar reforming above me with a soft whum of displaced air. Crossed the garden, slipped back through the side door and… nearly walked straight into the kitchen counter because I’d forgotten how much the shoulder pauldrons added to my width.

  “Smooth,” I muttered, adjusting my stance.

  Now came the hard part.

  I walked to the base of the stairs and tilted my head back. “COMMA!” I yelled up toward the second floor. “Time to go!”

  Silence.

  I waited five seconds.

  Still nothing.

  “COMMA! I’M NOT JOKING!”

  A muffled groan drifted down, followed by what sounded like a pillow being thrown at a wall. “GO AWAY!”

  I grinned and started up the stairs, armor clanking with every step. Her door was cracked open just enough for me to see the chaos inside: clothes everywhere, a desk buried under schoolwork and manga volumes, posters of AR idols competing for wall space with racing tournament schedules.

  And in the middle of it all, a lump under the blankets that was definitely my sister, so I knocked on the doorframe. “Comma. Seriously. We’re leaving in ten minutes.”

  The lump shifted. A single eye appeared from beneath the covers, glaring at me with the hostility only a teenager ripped from sleep could muster. “I hate you,” she mumbled, voice thick with teenage betrayal.

  “Love you too,” I said cheerfully. “Mom made breakfast. Get up.”

  She sat up slowly, blankets falling away to reveal a tangle of dark hair, half-Vietnamese, half-white features still soft with sleep. She was fourteen, compact and wiry in a way that made her look deceptively fragile until she kicked you in the shin for annoying her.

  Which she’d done.

  Multiple times.

  She was wearing an oversized shirt with a Pawadai band logo I didn’t recognize and had the expression of someone who’d been betrayed by the concept of mornings. “Why are you in full armor?” she asked, squinting at me like I was an offensive piece of abstract art. “You normally wear it on Fridays.”

  “Because I’m escorting you to school.”

  “You look ridiculous.”

  “Thank you.”

  She groaned and dragged herself out of bed with all the enthusiasm of someone facing execution. “I don’t need an escort. I’ve been going to school by myself for years.”

  “Mom’s orders,” I said, tapping the doorframe. “Also, breakfast is getting cold.”

  Comma shuffled past me toward the bathroom, moving with the energy of a dying slug. “You’re the worst.”

  “I know,” I called after her. “Hurry up!”

  Ten minutes later… well, fifteen, because Comma moved at exactly one speed in the morning and that speed was ‘glacial’… she emerged looking slightly more human. Hair brushed, uniform on, bag slung over one shoulder.

  She walked into the dining parlor, saw the plate Mom had left for her, and dropped into her chair with a theatrical sigh.

  I leaned against the doorframe, watching her pick at her food with the enthusiasm of someone completing a mandatory chore. “You know,” I said casually, “you could’ve just gotten up the first time I called.”

  She shot me a look that could’ve melted armor plating. “You know,” she mimicked in a mocking tone, “you could’ve just let me sleep.”

  “And get yelled at by Mom? No thanks.”

  She stabbed a piece of egg with unnecessary violence. “Why do you even need to walk me to school? You’ve got bugs to hunt or whatever.”

  “Because Mom thinks I’ll be a good influence.”

  Comma snorted. “You? A good influence?” She gestured at my armor with her fork. “You look like you’re about to storm a fortress during holo-con.”

  “I might be,” I said, grinning. “Depends on the day.”

  She rolled her eyes but couldn’t quite hide the smile tugging at her lips. “You’re such a dork.”

  “Runs in the family.”

  She finished her breakfast in silence, then stood and grabbed her bag. “Fine. Let’s go. Last week, they almost saw you. So if anyone at school sees me with you dressed like that—” she gestured vaguely at my entire existence “—I’m telling them you’re my weird cousin.”

  “Deal.”

  She walked past me toward the front door, and I followed, armor clanking softly with each step.

  “Dash?”

  “Yeah?”

  “...Don’t get killed doing something stupid.”

  I glanced at her. She wasn’t looking at me, just staring at the door, fingers tight on her bag strap. “I’ll be careful,” I said.

  She nodded once, then pulled the door open and stepped out into the morning light. I followed, and the house sealed itself behind us with a soft chime.

  Now it was my turn to frown.

  I’d been all bravado in front of Mom, confidence and assurances that I could handle this. But the Scavantis license exam wasn’t some school quiz you could bullshit your way through. People died during the practical. Real people with real gear, not scavenged under Eddy’s eyes.

  And here I was, walking into it with a broken system.

  Let’s hope I wouldn’t be added to the statistics.

  TODAY’S CHAPTER IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY Comma, I'M RICH DASH

  Join me on or

  On Patreon you can read 2 months ahead (~200 pages)