Griffin lay on his narrow bed staring at the ceiling, eyes wide open even though the room was completely dark. The events of the day kept replaying in his head like a bad loop he couldn't pause.
The laughter in the DOA hall still rang in his ears, the way the crystal had felt warm for a second and then turned cold, the pitying looks from strangers, the quick and brutal rejections from the guilds. He hadn't touched his dinner.
His mother had brought a bowl of stew to his room, but he only managed a few spoonfuls before pushing it away. The food tasted like ash. Every time he closed his eyes he saw that silver-haired girl on the holographic screens, she had awakened an SS-Grade Class while the world cheered for her.
It wasn't fair. None of it felt fair. He turned onto his side, pulling the thin blanket higher, but sleep refused to come. His mind was too loud, too full of questions and disappointment.
From the living room he could hear his parents talking in low voices. The walls were thin in their apartment, so even from his small room he caught most of what they were saying.
His mother spoke first, her tone soft and worried. "He didn't eat much tonight. I hate seeing him like this. He tried to act strong when he told us, but I know it hurt him badly. Zero Mana Hunter Class… that's as low as it gets. The guilds rejected him right there in front of everyone. I keep thinking about how hard he's worked these past years, helping his uncle at the scrap yard, never complaining. He deserves better than this."
His father answered after a long pause, his voice tired but steady. "I know. It's a tough break. But we've faced tough breaks before. Remember when the gate breach hit our old neighborhood? We lost almost everything and still managed to rebuild. Griffin is strong. He'll find a way to keep moving forward. Maybe he can still work as support in the lower gates. It won't be glamorous, but it's honest work. We'll help him however we can. He's not alone in this."
His mother sighed deeply. "I just wish the crystal had seen what we see in him. He's always been the one who looks out for Lena and me. Now I feel like we should be looking out for him more. He went to bed so early. He never does that unless something is really eating at him."
Griffin closed his eyes tighter, listening to their words. He appreciated the support, he really did, but it also made the shame burn hotter. They were trying so hard to make it okay, but nothing could change the fact that he had walked out of that hall as the kid everyone laughed at.
He sat up slowly and leaned back against the bed frame, rubbing his face with both hands. The small room felt stuffy tonight. He reached for his phone on the bedside table and tapped the screen. A holographic projection lit up in front of him, floating in the air above his lap.
Normally he would scroll through feeds about Dimensional Gates, high-rank Walker battles, guild recruitment news, or strategy videos for different Classes. Tonight none of it appealed to him. What was the point? He was essentially waste material now. A Hunter Class with zero mana affinity.
He might as well delete all those bookmarks. He kept scrolling anyway, more out of habit than interest, his thumb moving slowly across the projected screen.
Just he started feeling quite dizzy. The dizziness started small at first, just a light fog at the edges of his vision.
He shrugged it off, thinking it was from everything he had gone through during the day, the stress, the lack of food, the emotional weight of it all. But as the minutes passed the dizziness grew stronger, and a heavy exhaustion settled into his bones like lead.
He tried to shake it off again, blinking hard and sitting up straighter. The room started to tilt slightly. His head felt too heavy, like someone was pressing down on his skull. A sharp headache bloomed behind his eyes, growing worse with every heartbeat until it felt like a sledgehammer was pounding against his temples.
He reached up to rub his forehead, but his hand felt slow and clumsy. Before he could react or call out, his vision blurred completely. The phone projection flickered and faded. The last thing he saw was the glowing time in the corner of the screen: 12:00 exactly.
Then everything went black. Darkness swallowed him whole. For a moment there was nothing, no sound, no feeling, just empty void. Then a cold, ancient voice boomed directly inside his head, deep and resonant like it came from somewhere far older than the world itself.
[Ding!]
[Origin Core Binding Complete!]
[Dimensional Hunter Class Activated!]
[Origin Realm Initializing…]
[Welcome, Griffin Creed. You are now inside your personal Hunting Zone. Become the predator.]
Griffin's eyes snapped open. He was no longer in his small bedroom. He was lying on his back in the middle of an endless sea of pale grass that stretched in every direction as far as he could see.
The blades were tall, reaching up to his waist when he slowly pushed himself up to a sitting position. The grass had a strange, almost silvery color under the dim light, swaying gently even though there was no wind he could feel.
Above him stretched a starless sky, deep black and empty, yet it wasn't completely dark. A faint, eerie luminescence came from the grass itself and from scattered clusters of small glowing flowers that dotted the plain here and there, giving the whole landscape a soft, ghostly glow.
The air was cool and carried a faint earthy scent mixed with something wild and ancient, like the smell of a forest after rain but sharper, more primal. In the far distance he could just make out low rolling hills that blended into the horizon, their shapes soft and hazy.
There were no trees, no buildings, no signs of human life, only the endless grasslands rolling on forever under that empty sky. It felt vast and lonely, but also strangely alive, as if the land itself was watching him.
Griffin stood up slowly, his legs a little unsteady at first. The grass brushed against his clothes with a soft whispering sound. He turned in a slow circle, trying to take it all in. The ground beneath his feet was firm but slightly springy, covered in layers of the pale grass that seemed to go on without end.
Small insects with faint glowing wings darted between the blades, leaving tiny trails of light that faded quickly. In the distance he thought he heard faint rustling, like something moving through the grass, but when he focused on it the sound disappeared.
The whole place felt real, the cool air on his skin, the faint dampness of the ground, the way his boots left slight impressions in the soft earth. Yet it also felt impossible.
One moment he had been in his room fighting a headache, the next he was standing here in this strange, boundless plain.
A cool, ancient voice spoke again, echoing inside his mind with the same resonant tone as before.
[This is Zone 1: The Sunless Grasslands.]