“Congratulations! Quest completed: Kill a single human being!”

“Congratulations! You have completely unlocked class: PROTEAN!”

The two messages flashed before me for a moment before a myriad of consecutive messages followed it.

“Quest rewards rewarded: 10000 XP, four appearance slots!”

“Congratulations! You reached level three!”

“Level up reward: One appearance slot!”

“Level up reward: One appearance slot!”

“Title Achieved: Avenger! You got your due revenge. Which fool said revenge is best served cold?

Reward: You can completely assume the identity of anyone you kill. Including taking on their identity on the OrderWeb.”

“Title Achieved: First Leveller! You were the first one to level up. Isn’t that just fantastic? Take two more level-ups for your trouble.”

“Congratulations! You reached level five!”

“Level up reward: One appearance slot!”

“Level up reward: One appearance slot!”

I couldn’t take anything further than that mentally. The constant barrage of messages made my head hurt and I mentally signalled to close the tab or whatever this was. The messages stopped as ordered and I came face to face with a menu that had options like ‘Stats’, ‘Titles’, ‘OrderWeb’ etc. I closed them too, not wanting to get into the technicalities of what this weird system had to offer.

I stood on the edge of the cliff, thinking about what I had just done. I had just murdered a person and to my utter surprise, I found myself feeling no remorse. There was no self-justification on my part, trying to prove that I was innocent. I knew I wasn’t. The thought never crossed my mind. Instead, the most prevalent emotion I was feeling was acceptance. Acceptance about what I had done. And that the victim had deserved it!

After all, the system had said I was an Avenger. I only got my due revenge. My due justice. There was a hollow voice behind my head that suggested that I was only believing what the system had said because it served my purpose and cleared my conscience, giving me some semblance of innocence. I pushed that thought to the depths of my mind, never wanting to hear it again.

I walked back to the cabin and stood in front of the door, ready to knock, when I realised that I probably wouldn’t be allowed to enter. There was a simple way around the problem though. I just visualised the appearance of my recent victim and within moments, I was the perfect replica of him. I knocked on the door and waited for a moment before the door was opened and a girl whose name I couldn’t quite place peeked from behind the door with an unsure expression on her face.

Her face quickly lit up with a smile on seeing me though. I was quite startled by her reaction before reminding myself that I had taken on the form of the douche and the reactions I would get weren’t meant for me.

“Hey, Brad, why did you go out?” The girl asked with a curious look on her face. Looking around, I saw that few of the other people in the cabin were also listening in on the conversation.

Before I could answer though, one of the other boys in the cabin asked boisterously, “Hey, Brad, you find any sign of that loser?”

I struggled for a moment, trying to place who the said loser was before realising that he must have referred to me. The real me. Cold rage filled my veins as I wanted nothing more than to go over him and knock the stupid smirk off his face. Some of the emotion must have shown on my face because he asked, “Hey, man, you ok there?”

I shook my head and said stiffly, “Yeah, man. Just thinking of that loser sends my blood boiling, you know.”

The smirk on his face grew wider as he said, “Tell me about it. I was afraid that bringing him on this trip would spoil the whole experience. You did a good job of phasing him out, Brad.”

“Can we talk about what’s happening to us right now instead of wasting our breath on that weirdo? This whole Grand Order or something. I am looking at my screen and I see my stats and stuff. Doesn’t that strike you as remarkable at all?”, one of the other guys spoke up. I really needed to associate these guys with their names or else my jig would be up pretty soon.

‘Or you could just kill them all and get rid of the hassle. You know, they deserve it as much as the douche.’

I shook that thought out of my head as soon as possible. I was concerned by the fact that I was hearing voices in my head but didn’t ponder on it too much because it was disconcerting to the extreme.

While I was literally trying to sort out the voices in my head, the others had a wild discussion on what course of action to take. I found myself unable to deal with all of this and loudly suggested, “Why don’t we go home and take stock of what is happening? If the system is right, then whatever we are experiencing is happening to everyone else on this planet. Let’s meet up with our families and then see what’s going on.”

Everyone unequivocally agreed with me and we all decided to leave for our houses at the earliest. It was still quite early in the night and based on whatever was going on, we decided that leaving in the night was a risk worth taking.

We gathered all our belongings and began to leave the cabin. I waited for everyone to exit before getting out of the cabin myself. As soon as we exited the cabin though, the cabin began to change its shape. We could only stare on in shock as the cabin transformed into some sort of a shrine. A plate adorned the entrance of the shrine, where the words ‘The Minotaur’s abode’ was engraved in gold letters.

Those words brought back the memories of the Minotaur I had died at the hands of. I had a bad premonition that I hadn’t quite seen the last of the Minotaur. We started moving down the hill when suddenly a message flashed before us, “Welcome to a new dungeon!”

“Dungeon: The Minotaur’s abode”

“Required level: 25”

“Recommended party members:7”

As soon as I saw the message, I knew that we were screwed. If the dungeon boss was the same Minotaur I had the unfortunate meeting with, we might as welcome death with open arms.

There were confused whispers all around me, each wondering what the message meant for them. Nonetheless, we started walking down the hill, with me in the lead. It seemed that everyone considered the douche their de facto leader and trusted him to lead them out of this mess. We had barely walked a few minutes before there was a startled scream from behind us.

We quickly turned around to see what was going on. What followed were hysterical screams from our group as we saw one of the boys who was bringing up the rear in the Minotaur’s grasp. He casually tore through the body with one of its claws before tossing the remains towards us before staring us down.

That was all the motivation the group needed to scatter in all directions. The group was broken and before I could even suggest that it was probably the aim of the Minotaur, I found myself standing with the obnoxious guy who had repeatedly called me a loser and one other girl.

The Minotaur soon focused on us and began rushing towards us. I turned around and ran down the hill as fast as my leg could carry me. A scream from behind me suggested that the Minotaur had gotten hold of one of the other two but I couldn’t care less over the fate of the others in the party.

I kept running and soon found the obnoxious guy beside me. It seemed that the girl had been the one who had unwillingly sacrificed herself so that we could live, although I didn’t think that was her intention. I didn’t give it much thought though, too occupied with the thought of getting out of here.

We were leaving the forest behind us at a rapid speed. The sound of screams that would periodically tear through the silence of the forest was chilling and seemed to make our legs work faster. It was clear that the Minotaur was picking off our group one by one. I just didn’t want to be in this forest or dungeon or whatever it was called when it finally ran out of all the prey and concentrated on me.

Before long, the base of the hill was within our sights and I could finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. The guy who was beside me had fallen a little behind and was panting hard, but his determination to live seemed strong enough to carry him through.

With our escape in sight, he started laughing hysterically. I looked towards him, puzzled regarding his behaviour. He must have seen my look because he said, “Do you realise what this means? We are the best, man. The elite.”

I couldn’t help but ask, “What do you mean?”

He replied, the grin still on his face, “There were twenty-eight but only we will survive. Doesn’t that tell something? That we are better than them. If everything we experienced today is true and not just some hallucination, then together we can achieve great things. This is the beginning of something special, man. I can feel it.”

I wondered if all the running had finally made him crack and lose his mind. I didn’t pay him anymore mind. Another scream tore through the silent night, although one thing was different about it and it made me very anxious. It sounded like the latest victim was in close proximity to us. Too close for comfort, in fact.

No sooner did that thought cross my mind than we heard an ear-splitting roar from the Minotaur. Against my better judgement, I turned and saw the Minotaur barrelling towards us with inhumane speed. I was ahead of my companion but not by much.

I found myself feeling tired and some doubt crept into my mind regarding whether I was going to make it. The destination was very close and it was sheer desperation that was making me move my legs. Legs that felt like they were made of cast lead due to the fatigue.

“We will make it, Brad. It’s destiny. It’s fate.” My companion was jubilant, an emotion that should have been alien in this situation. It seemed as if he had firmly believed that he would escape the clutches of the Minotaur on our tail.

I don’t know what came over me after listening to his words. I just changed my appearance back to my original one and turned back to look at my companion, a smirk adorning my face. He caught sight of my face and his whole demeanour screamed shock.

Getting the expected reaction, I just halted in my tracks and time seemed to stop for a split second. I just stuck my foot out and he tripped over it and fell, having had no time to react.

“Sorry, man. I am not Brad. And there’s no fate at play here. Just the luck of the so-called loser.”

I just started running again, determined to reach my destination. I didn’t stop for anything, not even when my former companion’s anguished cry reached my ears as the Minotaur inadvertently caught up to him.

There was no trace of remorse in my emotions. I had survived, he had not. His noble sacrifice had bought me a few precious seconds. Seconds that were enough for me to escape this dungeon.

“Dungeon exited!”

“Title Unlocked: Discoverer! You were the first one to discover a dungeon and exit it unscathed. A pity you couldn’t defeat the boss though. There’s always the next time, coward. ”

“Title Unlocked: Survivor! You survived a dungeon way above your paygrade. You might be a cowardly cockroach but remember, only cockroaches are capable of surviving nuclear explosions.”

I didn’t pay the notifications much mind. I just turned around and found myself face to face with the Minotaur. We stared at each other from across the imaginary line that must have separated the dungeon from the rest of the world.

To my surprise, my former companion was still alive in its claws. It just tore him apart with full strength, its gaze focused on me the entire time. I wondered if it was sending me some sort of a message. I didn’t imagine that the Minotaur was too pleased with one of its prey escaping.

I didn’t care though. I just turned around and walked back in the direction of the city, mentally preparing myself for the changes that must have obviously shaped the new world.

It was the dawn of a new age, one I had ushered in by stepping over the corpses of my so-called ‘friends’. ‘And there was no better or more satisfying way to do it’, the haunting voice in my head remarked, frightening me more than the Minotaur ever could.