Despite the half-transparent window floating in front of him and the horror nearly on top of them, Sam’s brain was too focused on processing the possibility that he might have carelessly agreed to a blood pact.

A loud ping interrupted his thoughts, forcing Sam’s gaze back onto the floating window.

[Shall we play a game?], it read. It was accompanied by the smaller window of [YES/NO]. The no option was grayed out so there wasn’t really an option at all.

Curiosity drove Sam to tap on [YES], and as soon as he did, all noise and color were suddenly drained from the world. Time had stopped.

A message box appeared.

[ALERT! Khronos, the Lord of Time, has temporarily provided you this blessing.]

This brief reprieve came just in the nick of time, for only a few feet away, the horror was in the midst of stretching freakishly long fingers toward Sam’s head.

“Holy Zeus,” Sam breathed. “What in blazes is going on?”

[Don’t mention his most hated son’s name when you’re under the influence of Khronos’ blessing, fool! Don’t you know anything?], a new message box read.

This new message box was a different shade of blue from the first.

“You can talk to me?” Sam asked in surprise.

No reply came.

Sam’s eyes flitted between the frozen horror to Thunder’s worried face and then to the new notification that popped up to replace that weird message box.

[ATTENTION! The Argonaut Ability Advancement System (Triple-A) was designed to assist a hero’s growth. Following the system’s training regimen will ensure the further development of the hero’s powers and provide opportunities to earn system-exclusive rewards. Failure to comply with Triple-A’s instructions will force the hero into a penalty game.]

The message was replaced by a new window that had [STATUS] scrawled at the very top.

The first lines detailed Sam’s personal information.

[NAME: Samuel Shepard] [HERO NAME: None]

[LEVEL: 1] [RANK: Zeta (ζ)]

[ROLE: SUPPORT]

[TITLE: Loser who has yet to prove his true worth]

“This thing’s damn rude,” Sam grumbled.

The next listed information showed a quantified version of his health and stamina.

[HEALTH POINTS (HP): 120]

[STAMINA POINTS (SP): 60]

[FATIGUE: 0]

Underneath HP and SP were the quantified values for Sam’s attributes.

[STRENGTH: 10] [DEXTERITY: 10] [CONSTITUTION: 12]

[INTELLIGENCE: 10] [WISDOM: 10] [WILLPOWER: 8]

[POINTS TO DISTRIBUTE: 20 (Beginner Bonus)]

Finally, the last section of the [STATUS] menu listed Sam’s powers.

[ACTIVE]

[Healing Hand (ζ)]

[PASSIVE]

[None]

“It’s like a role-playing game,” he realized. “Is this for real?”

Although there was a [?] beside each line item that might have an explanation for their significance to Sam’s growth as a hero, he had no time to read through them as a new notification—a green one this time—appeared over [STATUS].

[URGENT MISSION: [SAVE THE GIRL, SAVE THE WORLD] HAS ARRIVED.]

[CONDITION 1: Heal the hero [Thunder] so she can return to fighting form.]

[CONDITION 2: Help hero [Thunder] defeat target [Horror: Alpha-level Terror]. Bonuses will be provided depending on your contribution.]

[WARNING: Failure to complete the mission will result in the hero’s death and the city’s destruction.]

“Wow...way to add on the pressure,” Sam sighed.

One final notification appeared in front of Sam. This one was blue again.

[ALERT! Time will restart in fifteen seconds so that the mission may begin. Good luck, hero!]

The timer began to countdown from 15 to 14...

“Whoa, wait, I haven’t even distributed my points!” Sam protested.

12... 11...

“Okay, Healing Hand requires my life-force as an energy source, so that would be HP...which means I need to increase my HP,” he guessed.

9... 8...

“Which attribute?” Sam took a quick glance at his status. “Styx, I should have known my days playing Dungeons and Dragons would eventually become relevant.”

7... 6...

“Constitution was always connected to health in DnD.” Sam’s hand hovered on the [+] button next to [CONSTITUTION]. “Athena, please let me be right!”

The timer went down to 5…

Sam button mashed [+] and gave all twenty beginner points to [CONSTITUTION] as he reasoned he would need his HP to go as high as it could in order to heal Thunder. He was in such a rush that he didn’t even have time to regret not balancing out his stats.

Just as the timer dropped to 1, a portion of Sam’s status updated itself to [CONSTITUTION: 32]. This resulted in a higher HP value of [320]. Interestingly enough, his SP had also risen to [160], which was half of his total HP.

Another notification appeared over [STATUS], but Sam didn’t have time to read it. The color suddenly returned to the world and all the noise that had been stilled by time stopping flooded into Sam’s ears. It was quite disorienting.

“Sam!” Thunder’s fingers bit into the skin of his arms. “Heal me...or we both die!”