Mike didn’t realize his hands were still shaking until Arin tightened her grip on his forearm.

  “Sit,” she said quietly.

  It wasn’t a suggestion. She guided him down to a flat rock at the edge of the clearing where he’d landed. Lumi hopped from his shoulder to his lap, turning around twice before curling into a tight ball against his stomach. Her tail flicked once, annoyed at the world on principle.

  Marina hovered a step away, staff clenched in white-knuckled hands, as if the Trial might reach up from the ground and drag him back. Vex stood a little behind them, arms folded, trying to look casual and failing.

  The place where the Awakening chamber had been was now just… air. No door. No platform. No glow. The grass there looked a shade too new, a little too green, as if the System had simply rewritten that part of the world.

  Mike tried to slow his breath.

  He was alive.

  The Trial was over.

  The Administrator had thrown him back into reality and vanished with only a few snarky comments and a passive skill.

  His ribs ached when he inhaled too deeply. His shoulder twinged if he moved it too fast. His whole body felt like one massive bruise. But under that, beneath the soreness and exhaustion, something else pulsed—new weight in his stats, new density in his mana, Titles burning quietly in the background like recently installed software.

  He’d figure that out later.

  Arin crouched, studying his face. “Any dizziness? Blurred vision? Harder to breathe?”

  “Just… tired,” Mike said. “And hungry. And mildly offended that the System apparently gave my Awakening a six out of ten on the screaming scale.”

  Vex snorted. “The System rates screaming now?”

  “Apparently,” Mike muttered. “It has opinions.”

  Marina let out a small, shaky laugh. Some of the tension bled out of her shoulders.

  Lumi, sensing the shift, lifted her head. Her eyes met Mike’s, bright and sharp. For a split second, something like static prickled against his palms where they rested on her fur.

  Before he could process it, the world froze.

  Wind stopped. Leaves halted mid-rustle. A bird hanging on a distant branch stayed perfectly, unnaturally still.

  Then the System spoke.

  [Main Quest Complete.]

  The voice didn’t come from anywhere. It was just there—inside his head, in the air, under the ground.

  [Survive the Tutorial — First Phase]

  Duration: 72 hours

  Status: SUCCESS

  A faint hum rippled across the land, almost subsonic, like the world itself acknowledging a milestone.

  [Initial Candidate Count: 1,500]

  [Remaining Survivors: 512]

  Silence followed the numbers.

  Marina’s lips parted. “Oh.”

  Vex exhaled. “Shit.”

  Arin’s fingers tightened slightly on her knee. Her eyes didn’t move, but her jaw clenched.

  A thousand people, gone in three days. More. Most of them from Earth, some from who-knew-where else. All dropped into the same nightmare and told to survive.

  Mike stared at the invisible interface floating in front of him, the numbers strangely small and heavy at the same time.

  He’d almost died multiple times and he was still here. For an uncomfortable moment, he wondered how many others had fought just as hard and simply failed a roll of the dice.

  A soft tone cut through his thoughts.

  [Reward: +1 Level to All Surviving Candidates.]

  [You have reached Level 11.]

  [Stat Points +12.]

  Warmth flowed through his limbs. Not as drastic as the jump to ten and the Title surge, but enough to smooth the hard edges of his fatigue, enough to deepen that sense of density in his muscles and bones.

  He didn’t open the character sheet. Not now. There would be time when he wasn’t sitting in the ghost of a Trial.

  The System’s presence pressed in again.

  [Phase Two Initiated.]

  [The Establishment Cycle Begins.]

  The frozen world exhaled.

  Wind resumed. The bird shook itself and flew. Leaves completed their rustle. Arin’s hair moved again. Vex swore under his breath.

  Marina swallowed audibly. “Establishment…?”

  “Building,” Mike said. “Bases. Camps. Something like that.”

  She stared at him. “We just survived three days of hell and now the System wants us to start… urban planning?”

  “It could’ve said ‘Phase Two: Have a nice nap,’” Vex said. “But no. Of course not.”

  A new window blinked into existence, neat and brutal.

  [New Objectives Unlocked:]

  ? Create a Base

  ? Join a Base

  ? Unlock a Profession

  An optional line appeared below those, faintly different in color.

  [Optional Objective: Solidify Identity]

  Reward: ???

  Mike closed it with a thought. The words would still be there later. The pressure they carried already was.

  Lumi shifted on his lap, stretching. Sparks tickled his fingers—small and sharp, like static building on a dry winter day.

  He frowned. “…Did you feel that?”

  Arin glanced down. “What?”

  Lumi hopped off his lap before he could answer, dropping to the grass. She stood unnaturally still, head low, ears angled forward as if listening to something underground. Her fur puffed slightly.

  The smell in the air changed—faint, like the taste of ozone before a storm.

  “Lumi?” Marina said carefully. “What are you doing?”

  The fox’s muscles bunched.

  She took three quick steps forward and vanished.

  Mike’s heart nearly stopped—

  but she reappeared two meters to the right in a blur of white fur and blue light, landing in a skid with a crack of tiny lightning under her paws.

  Everyone froze.

  A System prompt popped up at the edge of Mike’s vision.

  [Your Companion has awakened a Skill.]

  [Thunderstep Cub — Stage 1]

  Effect: Short-range lightning dash (max. 3m). Minor electric discharge on landing. High stamina cost.

  Lumi blinked, clearly as surprised as everyone else. Her legs wobbled. She sat down abruptly, breathing a little faster.

  Vex pointed. “…Can I do that?”

  Marina swatted his arm. “You almost fell into a spike pit walking straight last week.”

  Arin’s lips quirked. She knelt, extending a hand. Lumi trotted back toward Mike instead, climbing into his arms with the dignity of someone who definitely did not just nearly fall over afterward.

  Mike scratched behind her ears. “Show-off.”

  She nipped his thumb lightly, which he decided was agreement.

  For a moment, that small, ridiculous display—his fox blink teleporting and then pretending she hadn’t—cut through the heaviness.

  They were exhausted, yes. Scarred, probably. But they were also… evolving. The System was pushing. They were pushing back.

  He stood, testing his balance. The ache in his chest was real, but muted. The Titles and level-ups were doing what they were supposed to.

  “Alright,” he said. “We can’t stay here.”

  Arin nodded immediately. “We’re too exposed. Anyone could wander through.”

  Marina glanced at the former Trial site. “And this place feels… wrong now.”

  “Like something that finished eating and left,” Vex muttered.

  He wasn’t wrong.

  Mike looked around. “We need three things. A defensible spot, water, and somewhere close enough to watch what others are doing without being dragged into it.”

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  “And a place to sleep,” Marina added.

  “Sleep is under ‘defensible,’” Vex said. “Sleep in non-defensible places is called ‘dying.’”

  No one argued.

  They moved. Not quickly—none of them had the reserves for that—but steadily, away from the blank stretch of grass where the Trial had been, deeper along a subtle slope that led toward thicker tree cover.

  For the first time since he’d landed in this nightmare, Mike had enough bandwidth to really look around without thinking something would jump at his throat every second.

  They weren’t alone.

  Past the first row of trees, in the distance, he could see movement. Not monsters. People.

  Small clusters of survivors were forming in the open areas—no more than a dozen here, five there, twenty in one dense knot closer to what looked like a stream. No walls, no structures yet. Just people standing together because standing alone felt like asking to be picked off.

  Some groups lit fires. Others paced or argued, gestures sharp even from this distance. A few had someone at the center talking, others seemed more like chaos without a focal point.

  And scattered among them, he saw shapes that weren’t quite human.

  There was a tall figure with skin faintly tinged violet and sharp, swept-back ears, gesturing with quick, precise hand movements as if everything needed to be coordinated. Another shorter, broad-shouldered being with mottled green-brown skin hauled a log like it weighed nothing.

  If the System hadn’t been translating, their voices might have sounded alien. As it was, the content was understandable. The cadence, the odd turns of phrase, would come later.

  Right now, Mike filed the sight away. Different species. Same fear.

  Arin watched the distant clusters for a few seconds, eyes narrowing. “They’re going to start choosing leaders soon. Or killing each other over who should be.”

  “Should we… talk to them?” Marina asked quietly.

  “Not yet,” Mike said. The answer came more easily than he liked. “We’re in no shape to bargain. Or to drag other people’s mess into ours.”

  Vex nodded quickly. “For once, I agree with the man who punches lightning.”

  They turned away from the open ground and kept to the trees, circling wide instead of marching past anyone. It took time, but the forest swallowed them gradually, until the voices faded and the smell of smoke was distant again.

  The land sloped downward. Roots twisted out of the ground like old bones. Eventually, the terrain dipped into a narrow, shallow ravine cut by a thin stream. Moss clung to the rocks, and a natural overhang in the stone formed a partial roof along one side.

  Arin stepped under it, running her hand along the rock. “Good cover. One approach from the front, one from the stream. Hard to flank without we’d hearing it.”

  Vex crouched by the water, cupping some in his hand, sniffing, then tasting cautiously. “Fresh. Not stagnant. No weird mana residue. We’re good.”

  Marina knelt by a patch of herbs growing near the stream. Her face lit up a little. “These are regenerative, and those might help with infection… I can work with this.”

  Mike looked around. It wasn’t home. But nothing here ever would be. It was enough.

  “This is ours for now,” he said. “We’ll keep it small. Quiet. No big fires at night, no shouting, no signs that scream ‘please raid us.’”

  Vex raised a hand. “Can I vote for ‘no giant monsters in our backyard’?”

  “You can vote,” Mike said. “The Tutorial doesn’t take ballots.”

  They set to work.

  It was basic, rough labor. Moving fallen branches to form a crude windbreak. Clearing sharp stones from the flattest section under the rock overhang. Digging a shallow trench near the stream to keep water from pooling where they would sleep. None of it would hold against a determined attacker, but it would make the difference between resting and shivering in mud.

  Mike carried heavier pieces of wood, appreciating in a detached way how his new stats made everything feel less back-breaking. Arin handled anything that required leverage or precise placement, using her strength as if she’d been doing this for years. Vex found vantage points, tagging nearby trees and rocks in his head with that scout’s instinct that told him where he could stand, where he could hide, where he could fall back to.

  Marina collected plants, stones, and strips of bark, muttering to herself about salves and teas and “if the System thinks I can do all this without caffeine, it’s delusional.”

  Lumi supervised from a sun-warmed rock, occasionally blinking out of existence in a tiny flash and reappearing half a meter away with a proud chirp, then promptly curling back into a ball like the effort had cost her three hours of life.

  By the time they were done with the bare minimum, the sky had shifted toward late afternoon. Mike sank down near the incomplete fire pit, rolling his shoulders carefully. Things hurt. But in a way that meant recovery, not imminent collapse.

  A soft chime appeared in the corner of his vision.

  He ignored it once.

  It blinked again.

  [Profession Unlock Available.]

  He sighed.

  “We should probably talk about this,” he said.

  Marina looked up from the bundle of herbs she was tying. “Professions?”

  Arin sat cross-legged, sword laid across her knees, eyes half closed but attentive. “They’ll shape how we grow outside pure combat. We can’t ignore them.”

  Vex dropped down onto a flat stone and flopped backward dramatically. “You mean I can’t just be ‘guy who runs fast and makes bad decisions’?”

  “That’s your subclass,” Arin said dryly.

  Mike pulled up the interface.

  [Choose your Profession Path:]

  [Guidance: Choose an Initial Focus]

  ? Survival & Gathering

  ? Crafting & Building

  ? Alchemy & Healing

  ? Magic & Enchanting

  ? Leadership & Organization

  He frowned at the last one. The System loved mystery boxes.

  Arin checking the list as well. “Enchanter suits you.”

  He had already been thinking the same thing. Lightning, runes, the idea of imprinting power into items—it all tugged at the part of him that used to debug systems and refactor code. Structure and chaos in the same line.

  But he didn’t click yet.

  “What about you?” he asked.

  Arin shrugged one shoulder. “Combat Specialist, probably. Or something defensive. I’m not suited for sitting at a workbench all day.”

  Marina hesitated. “Healer professions might stack well with my class. Alchemist, maybe. Or something plant-related if it branches more later.”

  “Gatherer sounds like ‘go pick berries until you die,’” Vex said. “I’ll pass.”

  “You might get tracking or stealth bonuses,” Marina pointed out.

  He grimaced. “Fine. That’s actually tempting.”

  Mike closed his window. “We don’t have to lock anything in today. Let’s see what the world looks like tomorrow. Who we might be trading with. What we can even gather.”

  “And who’s still alive,” Arin added quietly.

  They fell silent.

  A flicker of movement at the edge of his vision made Mike’s head turn.

  Branches rustled.

  Someone was coming.

  He stood without thinking, Lumi sliding from his lap to the ground, fur prickling. Arin was up a heartbeat later, sword in hand, stepping slightly ahead of Mike. Vex melted toward the shadow of a tree, fingers on his dagger. Marina took two steadying breaths and shifted, staff ready.

  A man stumbled into view.

  Human, late twenties maybe. Dark hair matted with sweat and dirt. Clothes torn. His left arm was wrapped with something that used to be a shirt and was now just a bloody bandage. He saw them and froze halfway down the slope, eyes wide and wild.

  Mike raised an empty hand, palm out. “We’re not going to attack you if you don’t attack us.”

  The man licked his lips, tremors running through his body. “I… I didn’t see your camp. I’m not… I’m not trying to take anything. I just—”

  His knees buckled. He caught himself on a branch, then failed and slid the rest of the way down the slope, landing on his side with a pained hiss.

  Marina was already moving. Arin let her pass but stayed tense, ready.

  “Easy,” Marina said, dropping to her knees beside him. “I’ve got you.”

  The man laughed once, an ugly, broken sound. “That’s what the last person said.”

  Marina flinched almost imperceptibly. She put her hands near his injured arm without touching yet. “May I?”

  He stared at her, then gave a small nod.

  She unwrapped the makeshift bandage carefully. The wound was ugly—a deep gash, crusted with dried blood and dirt, edges angry and swollen. Not fresh, not old. Something that had been bad and then ignored.

  Marina’s jaw tightened.

  She pressed her palm above the wound and whispered the trigger phrase for her healing skill. Soft green light seeped through her fingers, sinking into the flesh. The inflamed edges cooled. The angry swelling receded. Skin didn’t fully close, but it looked a lot less like the beginning of an infection and more like something that would heal if given time.

  The man stared at his arm like it had just grown back. “You’re… a healer.”

  Marina gave a tight smile. “Trying to be.”

  Behind her, Vex relaxed by exactly three millimeters. Arin lowered her sword, though she didn’t sheathe it. Mike watched the man’s eyes, the way he scanned their faces, their gear, their camp.

  Not calculating. Not yet. Just processing that he wasn’t dead or being stabbed.

  “Thank you,” the man breathed. “I thought—I thought that was it. I’ve been running since… since the second night.”

  “What happened?” Arin asked. Not aggressive. Just seeking data.

  The man swallowed. “Wolves. Something worse behind them. We hid, but they tracked us. My group… we tried to stand and fight. It didn’t go well.”

  “How many?” Mike asked, quieter.

  “Six of us,” the man said. “Then three. Then two. Then just me. I saw the sky split last night. Thought the world was ending again.”

  He looked between them. “You were at the center, weren’t you?”

  Mike held his gaze. “Why do you think that?”

  “Because after that storm, the monsters scattered,” the man said. “Some… died outright. Like something tore through their minds. And then the System started talking about the end of the first phase.” He paused. “And you look like you’ve been chewed up and spat out by something big.”

  Vex coughed. “Accurate.”

  Marina finished rewrapping the wound with cleaner cloth from her pouch. “You should be careful with that arm for a while. Don’t swing anything heavy.”

  The man gave a humorless smile. “Honestly? My plan was ‘find somewhere out of the way and not die for a day.’”

  “You’re welcome to rest here for a bit,” Mike said. “We don’t have spare food, and we’re not forming a permanent camp yet, but we’re not throwing you back into the woods half-dead.”

  Arin glanced at him, then nodded once. “You can stay until morning. After that, we move.”

  “I won’t be a problem,” he said quickly. “I can walk. Fight a bit. I just… needed a place that isn’t teeth or claws or screaming.”

  “Low bar,” Vex said. “We meet it. Barely.”

  The man huffed something that might have been the ghost of a laugh. “Name’s Daniel.”

  “Mike,” Mike said. He gestured to the others. “Arin, Marina, Vex. And Lumi.”

  Lumi scrunched her nose and gave Daniel a suspicious sniff from a safe distance.

  “Thank you,” he said again. It sounded less like a platitude and more like something heavy he didn’t have more words for.

  They made room for him near the rock wall. Marina handed him a small piece of dried meat from their limited stores. He tried to refuse. Her glare convinced him otherwise.

  As the light faded from the sky, they built a small fire—low and controlled, tucked near the rock face where it would be harder to spot from a distance. Smoke rose in a thin line, barely visible through the branches.

  For the first time in three days, Mike let himself sit without expecting an attack in the next thirty seconds.

  He leaned back against the stone, Lumi tucked under his arm, her tail resting over his stomach. Arin sat nearby, sharpening her blade in slow, steady strokes. Marina sorted her herbs into bundles with an efficiency born from needing to treat too many wounds in too little time. Vex lay on his back, one arm over his eyes, pretending to nap but reacting to every snapped twig.

  Daniel ate in silence, occasionally glancing at them like he was still waiting to wake up alone.

  Above them, the System’s menus waited. Professions. Stats. Titles. Options. Promises.

  Mike stared into the fire.

  The first phase of the Tutorial was over.

  The kill-or-die chaos had shifted into something else.

  Phase Two wouldn’t be kinder. Just more… structured.

  People would build camps. Form hierarchies. Fight over resources and safety. Some would try to be decent. Others wouldn’t even pretend.

  Monsters were still out there. Dungeons. Hidden events. And somewhere far from their little overhang, among the 512 survivors, someone else was certainly looking at the same prompts and choosing a path that would lead straight into conflict with him.

  He didn’t know their name.

  Not yet.

  But he could feel it the way he felt the charge in the air before lightning struck.

  “We’ll need to move in the morning,” he said quietly. “Scout the area. See where people are forming up. Decide how close we want to be to them. And we should choose professions soon.”

  Arin nodded, eyes still on the blade. “We stay mobile for now. But we don’t isolate completely.”

  Marina sighed. “At some point we’re going to need people. Or at least things people can make that we can’t.”

  Vex groaned. “Can we have one day without planning world domination?”

  “We’re planning world survival,” Mike said. “Domination would be a patch later.”

  That earned him a tired snort from Arin, a reluctant smile from Marina, and a muffled, “Please don’t say ‘patch’ about reality,” from Vex.

  Lumi stretched, little claws flexing. A tiny arc jumped between her paw and Mike’s wrist. Not enough to hurt. Just a reminder.

  He glanced at her.

  Thunderstep Cub.

  She’d awakened because he had. Because everything was escalating whether they wanted it to or not.

  He closed his eyes for a moment, listening to the fire crackle, to the soft breathing around him, to the faint rush of the stream.

  “We survived the first part,” he thought. “Now we build.”

  The second dawn of the Tutorial wouldn’t come with a gentle sunrise.

  But when it came, they wouldn’t be hiding from it.

  They’d be walking straight toward it.

  END OF CHAPTER 37 (Rewritten)

  If this works better for you, we can move on to Chapter 38, where professions actually get chosen, the surrounding area gets scouted, and we start laying the first real bricks of the Establishment Cycle.

  Thank you for reading!

  If you are enjoing this story a like and follow help a lot. Thanks!

  Up to 50 early access chapters on Patreon:

  Join our Discord: