Loren felt something again—like a drowning man suddenly breaking the surface to breathe fresh air, his whole being surged back to life.
Slowly, sensations began to return: first the warmth of sunlight spilling across his body, then the soft touch of a breeze brushing against his skin.
He tried to open his eyes, but all he could make out were hazy blurs of color, impossible to identify.
He willed his arm to rise and rub his eyes, but to his horror, his body would not obey. A cry escaped his lips, high-pitched and helpless—not words, but the wail of a baby.
Thoughts tumbled through his mind:
"Am I dead? Or was I rescued?"
"I can still feel… so I'm probably not dead. If this is what death is like, then the dead are truly miserable."
"Could it be I'm paralyzed? Or trapped as a vegetable?"
Confusion wrestled within him until a wave of exhaustion washed over. Overwhelmed, Loren slipped into deep sleep.
…
Through trial and error over the following days, he discovered the truth—he had become a baby. Life was inconvenient in every possible way.
Infants required massive amounts of sleep, sixteen to twenty hours a day, to sustain their growing bodies and developing brains. But Loren, with his restless thoughts and still-maturing mind, remained clear-headed for even less time than normal.
So he focused his limited energy on the basics: eat as much as possible, move his body whenever he could, explore the world with a baby's clumsy hands. External stimulation, good nutrition, and active thought—these became his tools to accelerate his own growth.
Over time, the effort paid off. He gained longer stretches of wakefulness, greater control over his movements.
But as the years passed, Loren encountered a serious problem.
He was born in a place where people spoke English. Yet for some reason, he could not learn it.
All he had were scraps of American English from his previous life, barely enough for daily conversation. He could pick out a handful of words, but nothing more.
By the time Loren turned two, his situation had become clear. He lived in a small town where his parents owned an inn called "Angus's Cottage."
From the windows he could see the town outskirts. Behind the inn loomed the faint silhouette of a ruined castle, leading him to suspect he was somewhere in Europe.
His name was "Loren Angus." His father: "Joel Angus." His mother: "Nona Angus." These names he pieced together from his remnants of English.
From a calendar, he deduced the year: 1982. Beyond that, he knew nothing.
Though healthy enough to dress, wash, and feed himself, he could barely speak. His parents worried. Town gossip soon spread—"The Angus couple has given birth to a dull child." After all, what kind of healthy two-year-old could run and jump, yet not understand words or form sentences?
Joel and Nona tried everything to teach him to speak, but it was no use. To him, their words were garbled noise. Worse still, when Loren tried to speak English, they only half-understood him.
In truth, he realized, the problem was comprehension itself. He couldn't process the language.
Loren prepared himself for the worst: if he could never learn English, he would spend his life relying on gestures—effectively a deaf-mute.
One night, he secretly tested his Mandarin. To his relief, it flowed fluently. But he dared not reveal it.
After all, what would people think of a child raised in an English-speaking household who couldn't speak English but spoke flawless Chinese? If Chinese even existed in this world, he would end up as the subject of endless experiments, his condition named after him as some bizarre new syndrome.
That night, tossing and turning in bed, Loren admitted the situation was dire. But he still had one final card to play.
"System… are you there?" he called out in his heart. After all, wasn't every transmigrator supposed to awaken a system?
"Ding! Sensed host's summons. Detecting preliminary brain development… System is now officially active."
A panel appeared:
Name: Loren Angus
Class: None
Skills: Driving (Beginner), Fitting & Assembly (Beginner), Cooking (Beginner) … \[expand]
(Skill levels: Novice, Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced, Mastery, Transcendent)
Talents:
1. Strange Knowledge: Your mind is filled with odd bits of knowledge. You never know when they might come in handy. (PS: Most of this will never be useful—pray it stays that way.)
2. Chaotic Thinking: Your mind operates in a unique state of disorder. It cannot be influenced—whether for good or ill. (PS: Are you a sane man disguised as a madman, or a madman disguised as sane?)
System Evaluation: A somewhat peculiar child.
"System, do you have a name?"
"Ding! System has no name."
"What can you do?"
"Ding! The system records skills, helps break through limitations, and grants talents or abilities depending on the world. Details are left for the host to discover."
"Where do you come from?"
"Created by the Great \*\*\*\*, designed to nurture the host's growth, to provide inspiration for the Great \*\*\*\*'s transcendence."
"Do I get a newbie package?"
"Ding! Request submitted. As the Great \*\*\*\* is slumbering, request redirected to subordinate entities."
"Ding! \*\*\*\*\*\* has accepted the request."
"Ding! Beginner's gift pack received."
Congratulations, Host!
Talent: Universal Language Mastery
Talent: World Feedback
Message: "We look forward to you joining our banquet, to serve alongside us in honor of the Great Lord—\*\*\*\*\*\*."
Loren's panel updated:
Name: Loren Angus
Class: None
Skills: Driving (Beginner), Fitting & Assembly (Beginner), Cooking (Beginner) … \[expand]
Talents:
1. Strange Knowledge (omitted)
2. Chaotic Thinking (omitted)
3. Universal Language Mastery: Since your native tongue is Chinese, everything you see and hear is automatically translated into Chinese. Everything you say or write appears in the appropriate language to others. (PS: To you, the whole world now speaks Chinese.)
4. World Feedback: Each world is unique, but every world bears shadows of others. Now, the strange knowledge in your head may find use. Find the shadows, uncover their echoes, and gain feedback from those worlds. (PS: A treasure hunt between worlds—a guaranteed profit if you succeed.)
System Evaluation: A child with potential.
Lying in bed, Loren carefully considered his situation. The system appeared safe—at least on the surface—but there was always the chance it was lying.
He drafted a plan, prioritizing what mattered most:
1. Tomorrow, speak to his parents and prove he could talk. At two years old, it was time. This would ease their worries and stop them from dragging him to a doctor.
2. Confirm the exact year and location. He had only guessed so far—1982, somewhere in Europe.
3. Identify what kind of world this was. If the system was right, it contained supernatural power.
4. Survive and grow quietly. No reckless risks until he matured.
Satisfied with his plan, Loren nodded to himself.
Still, ever since the system appeared, he felt the old madness stirring. Those dangerous urges whispered, tempting him to gamble, to "court death" once more.
But he clenched his resolve. "Survive first. Grow strong. Don't be reckless." Right now, he had no capital to gamble with—recklessness could truly get him killed.
Calming his thoughts, Loren closed his eyes. Tomorrow would be a new beginning. He had work to do.
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