"Kill that piece of shit!"
A fist slammed into my gut.
Then a shoe drove into my ribs.
Another kick followed, harder this time.
"Yeah, make him half-dead so he never forgets about your homework!"
Thud.
I curled tighter on the cold floor of the academy corridor, arms shielding my head out of habit.
The taste of iron filled my mouth.
Zen's voice rang out above the laughter of his lackeys, sharp and bored, like he was ordering takeout instead of ordering pain.
I didn't fight back.
I never did.
Not because I couldn't.
But because the world doesn't reward the clever or the strong—it rewards the rich.
And in Nexon Academy, the most prestigious school in the island nation of Liffelia, money spoke louder than any merit.
Zen's father practically owned half the board of directors.
Teachers looked the other way.
Students kept their heads down.
I was just another scholarship kid from a broken home who had dared to exist in their world.
My only crime today?
Forgetting to finish the homework Zen had forced me to do for him.
Again.
I let my body go limp, breathing shallow, eyes half-lidded.
I had practiced this posture for years—how to look completely defeated while protecting the organs that actually mattered.
One wrong move and I'd be in a hospital instead of the nurse's office.
Better to play the role they expected: the pathetic, helpless nerd.
The beating ended the way it always did.
Zen spat on the floor near my face, muttered something about "useless trash," and walked off with his crew.
Footsteps faded down the hall.
I stayed down for another minute, just to be sure.
Same ceiling again, I thought when I finally opened my eyes in the nurse's office.
The familiar white tiles stared back at me.
The nurse hovered nearby, her expression a mix of pity and discomfort.
"How are you feeling, Hsuya?" she asked softly. "How many times do I have to tell you to watch your step on the stairs?"
I met her gaze for half a second, then looked away.
The same excuse.
Every single time.
I didn't answer.
There was no point.
We both knew the truth, and we both knew nothing would change.
By the time classes ended, I slipped out early and headed straight home.
There was something far more important waiting for me than another day of pretending to be weak.
Yesterday, while sorting through my father's old belongings, I had found his diary.
Tucked between the pages was a single line that had changed everything: "The attic holds more than dust—if you're ready to see it."
I had known about the hidden key inside my pendant for years.
The day I turned eight, my father had given it to me with a strange smile and then vanished from our lives forever.
I had discovered how the cube-shaped mechanism inside it shifted and clicked on that very birthday, but I never knew what lock it was meant to open.
Until yesterday.
The attic was oddly clean—too clean for a place no one ever visited.
I knelt in the center of the room and studied the circular platform built into the floor.
Concentric rings etched with unfamiliar symbols.
Shallow grooves.
Deeper channels.
Some rings fixed, others clearly meant to rotate.
It wasn't random.
It was a lock that rewarded patience and observation.
I took the pendant from around my neck, removed the cube key, and slid it into the central slot.
Click.
Nothing.
Of course.
Too simple.
I remembered the diary again: "Let the circle breathe. Move only what can move."
I tested the outermost ring.
It turned—only after I aligned a specific groove with the one beside it.
The next ring followed the same rule.
Each successful alignment unlocked the next layer, the worn edges of the carvings guiding my hands like faint hints left by someone who had solved it long before me.
I worked in silence, adjusting angles, testing resistance, noting which symbols lined up with the grooves.
No brute force.
Just pattern recognition and logic.
When the final ring settled into place, the entire platform hummed.
The center sank.
A small platform rose, carrying a plain wooden box.
Inside lay a ring—sleek, metallic, bearing a distinct crest of a sword wrapped in thorns, surrounded by intricate markings that didn't belong to any language I had ever studied.
Beside it were two books.
One filled with completely alien script.
The other, thankfully, in clear English.
I opened the English volume first.
It wasn't a manual.
Just instructions.
A few lines on how to activate the ring.
A handful of warnings.
A short list of rules.
That was enough.
I slipped the ring onto my finger, reinserted the cube key as directed, and held it over the center mark.
A faint light traced the carvings.
The symbols ignited one by one.
Click.
A translucent screen materialized in the air before me.
You finally found it, son.
The message hovered in perfect English.
Then another window appeared.
Do you wish to continue?
Accepting will make you the next owner of the Noxford System.
Disclaimer: Only members of the Noxford bloodline may become owners. Unknown DNA will result in immediate termination.
In the top-right corner: Founder – Levi Noxford.
Levi Noxford.
My father's other name—the one I had only glimpsed in the margins of his diary.
I smiled, faint and tired.
So that's how it is.
Without hesitation, I pressed continue.
User verified. Initiating dormant memory transfer.
The ring shattered into glittering dust across my palm.
A splitting headache exploded behind my eyes.
The world tilted.
I staggered toward the attic door, vision blurring, but the pain dragged me under before I could reach the stairs.
When I woke up, I was in my own bed.
A new window floated in the air above me.
Initial integration complete. Core data will unlock upon exposure to mana.
WELCOME, MASTER.
Please select 'Next' or 'Close'.
I tapped Next.
Please enter your name.
Please assign a nickname to the System. It will respond whenever you speak it.
I entered Hsuya.
For the nickname, I chose Nox.
THANK YOU, MASTER HSUYA.
The text vanished.
And suddenly I realized I could read the second book—the one written in that impossible script—as easily as my native tongue.
The symbols rearranged themselves in my mind, fluid and natural.
I stood up, intending to return to the attic and study it properly, but my mother caught my wrist the moment I stepped into the hallway.
"Hsuya? Why were you lying unconscious in front of the attic door?" Her voice trembled with worry.
I kept my expression calm.
"I fainted at school earlier, so I came home early.
Must have happened again on the way to the bathroom.
Sorry for worrying you."
She searched my face for a moment, then sighed and let go.
"You've been pushing yourself too hard.
Get some rest, okay?"
I nodded and waited until her footsteps faded downstairs.
Back in the secret room, I opened the second book.
It wasn't instructions.
It was a diary—my father's final record, written in the language he called Zellish.
It explained everything.
He had come from another world called Alexia.
A noble of the kingdom of Dian.
An alchemist of considerable skill.
Ten years was all the time he had been allowed in this world before the portal would pull him back.
Mana did not exist here, and without it he had grown deathly ill—until my mother found him and brought him home.
They fell in love.
They had me.
But he knew his time was limited.
So he used everything he knew—alchemy from Alexia, chemistry from Earth—and created the Noxford System.
A bridge.
A legacy.
A way to bring his family to a world where we could truly live.
The puzzle had been his final test: If you can solve it, you can control it.
I had figured out the cube's mechanics eight years ago, but the diary had finally shown me where the actual lock was hidden.
On the final page, one line was underlined:
Seven days in Alexia pass in the same time as twenty-four hours on Earth.
Thanks to mana, you will age far more slowly there.
I closed the book.
"Nox," I said quietly.
"Open my status window."
A new panel appeared.
[Status]
Strength – 22
Charm – 14
MP – (No mana detected in host body)
Intelligence – 98
Skills:
Martial Arts (C)
Poker Face (C)
Master of Self-Defense (B)
Special Skills: N/A
(Special skills require mana to activate or obtain.)
Normal skills could only be improved through physical training.
Magic was impossible without MP.
I studied the numbers for a long moment, committing every detail to memory.
"Nox.
Open the portal to Alexia."
Warning: The portal to Alexia may only be opened twice per day due to insufficient mana in the current world.
Continue?
I stared at the warning.
Twice a day…
Better than never.
I pressed continue.
The air in front of me began to ripple, faint blue light gathering into the faint outline of a door that wasn't there a second ago.
Well, as long as I could return, I didn't see any problem.
With that thought, I stepped through without hesitation.
The moment I crossed the threshold, the portal snapped shut behind me like a door slammed by an unseen hand.
The forest air hit me first—thick, alive, humming with something I had no name for yet.
Then the warning exploded across my vision.
Warning.
Excessive mana influx detected.
System stabilizing consumption.
Hold for sixty seconds.
My lungs seized.
It felt like I'd been plunged underwater and forced to breathe liquid fire.
My throat burned, my chest tightened, and black spots danced at the edges of my sight.
I dropped to one knee, clawing at the mossy ground, but I held on.
One minute.
Just one minute.
Stabilization complete.
User now possesses infinite mana.
Dormant memory integration fully unlocked via mana presence.
New special skills acquired:
Mana Matter (EX)
Description: The user can freely alter the state of their mana—gas, liquid, or solid.
Mana Sharer (S)
Description: The user can transfer their mana to any object or living being.
I blinked hard, breathing in the rich air.
With the system fully powered by the environment, the dormant knowledge my father had planted in my brain finally unspooled.
The instincts hit me all at once—how to shape mana, how to breathe it, the names of the dangerous beasts that roamed these woods, and the etiquette of the races that called Alexia home.
It filled the gaps the diary couldn't explain.
EX and S?
Aren't those supposed to be the rarest ranks?
[Info: These skills were pre-equipped within the Noxford System. The presence of ambient mana simply activated them.]
Ah.
That made sense.
My father really had thought of everything.
But… infinite mana?
"Nox," I said, voice steadying.
"Yes, Master?"
"Is infinite mana normal in Alexia?"
"No, Master.
The Creator designed the System to both consume and generate infinite mana for the user.
Mana is required to keep the System fully powered."
I let out a slow breath and looked around.
Ancient trees towered overhead, their leaves glowing faintly with veins of silver light.
The forest floor pulsed with quiet energy.
"Nox.
Where exactly am I?
And… does my father—or the Founder—still exist in this world?"
"Analyzing coordinates…
We are currently in the Forest of Elves, Kingdom of Dian.
Locating the Founder is beyond the System's current capability.
However, a unique signal is emanating from the northeast sector of the kingdom.
Would you like to proceed in that direction?"
I had no other destination.
"Might as well."
But first, I needed to test what I could actually do.
I raised my right hand and focused.
A sphere of mana coalesced above my palm—shimmering, translucent, the consistency of thick slime.
Not too runny, not too firm.
I willed it harder; the surface hardened until it gleamed like polished steel.
Then I softened it again until it flowed like mercury.
I concentrated once more.
The metallic orb melted, then boiled and jumped in my hand like living liquid.
I pictured a sword—long, straight, perfectly balanced.
The mana obeyed instantly, stretching and solidifying into the exact blade I had imagined.
To test it, I swung at the nearest tree.
Thud.
The sword bounced off without leaving a scratch.
I'd forgotten the edge.
I narrowed my focus, sharpening the blade until its cutting surface was so fine it would be invisible even under an atomic microscope.
Then I swung again.
The sword passed through the trunk like it was slicing warm butter.
For half a second nothing happened.
Then the entire tree slid sideways with a soft, clean shhhk and toppled to the forest floor, the cut surface mirror-smooth.
A chill ran down my spine.
The power I now held was absolutely terrifying.
I started toward the signal on foot, but after only a few strides the thought hit me: Why am I running barefoot like an idiot when I have infinite mana?
"Nox.
Do I have any abilities for flight or enhanced speed?"
"No, Master.
You do not currently possess any skills specifically designed for flight or rapid travel."
I scanned the descriptions of my new skills again.
Mana Matter for shaping.
Mana Sharer for transfer.
Simple.
Then why not coat my entire body in mana and move myself with it?
I could probably reach insane speeds without tiring.
The only problem would be balance.
A second idea clicked.
Use Mana Sharer on my clothes.
Let them act as stabilizers.
I poured mana over my skin, then extended it into the fabric of my uniform.
The first few meters were a disaster—I face-planted twice, tumbling through ferns and moss.
But I quickly found my center of gravity, adjusted the flow, and suddenly I was moving.
I shot forward like a shadow, feet barely touching the ground.
From forest floor to low branch to higher branch, I bounded through the canopy at blurring speed.
Air resistance slid off the thin outer layer of mana like water off glass.
Trees blurred into streaks of green and silver.
Twenty minutes later I slowed to a stop at the edge of a sprawling town nestled against the northern hills of Dian.
Zutopia.
Even from a distance, I could see the banners—deep crimson and black, bearing the exact same sword-and-thorn crest that had been etched into my father's ring.
The town was under the direct control of the Noxfords.
I took one step toward the open gates.
"Master…
the unique signal has locked onto a single individual inside the town.
They are moving directly toward you.
And they are carrying the exact same crest."
My blood ran cold.
Someone here already knew I had arrived.