He heard a voice, it was a gentle sounding voice that belonged to a woman.
"Mas...R.land...."
"Pl.as....you...mu..wak....p...."
He felt strange like his whole being was getting pulled somewhere. He continuously heard the voice, it was calling out to him but he didn't recall the name that the woman was saying.
'Roland?'
The voice that seemed distant started getting closer and he started feeling nauseous and tired. The only saving grace this time around, he felt something. He tried moving but his body felt sluggish, he could barely wiggle his finger.
"H-he... he moved! Master Roland moved, oh thank the gods!"
He felt sick like he was having a really bad case of the flue. His head was spinning and his body felt heavy.
"Did I survive those trucks? Is someone called Roland with me in here, is this the hospital?"
He couldn't see well, his eyes felt just as heavy as his body. He forced them open, they took a while to focus. The blurry world started taking shape and he saw an unfamiliar looking wooden ceiling.
'That looks shabby... am I in some kind of shed or something?'
He finally saw the woman that was previously shouting. She looked like an older lady, her body was somewhat wrinkled up. The thing that caught his eye the most was what she was wearing.
'I-is that a maid uniform?'
She was wearing the whole shebang. A black dress, a white apron, and a cap of some sort that was holding her hair. He felt something cool be placed on his forehead, which was a damp cloth that this lady placed. From the looks of it he was still alive but ended up in someone's house instead of a hospital.
The strange thing was that the lady looked kind of big, was she over two meters tall or something. The bed he was in also seamed to be uncharacteristically large compared to his body. The problem wasn't with the furniture or the old woman though, as he leaned down he noticed that his body looked a lot different than before, for one he was a lot shorter.
He felt really weak and couldn't move, the woman that looked like a Victorian maid tended to his sick body. Not long after some kind of old man walked into the room. He looked to be some kind of physician, but for some reason he didn't even give him an examination. He just stared at him while holding onto a monocle.
'Wait... why is that monocle glowing?'
The man harrumphed while turning to the maid that was standing in the corner, visible concern on her face.
"Why did you call me here, he is fine, his status is already recovering, don't call me for trivial things, I need to tend to the other young masters!"
The old man shouted at the maid as if she did something wrong. The old woman just bowed and took the verbal abuse, but the moment he left her face looked a lot brighter.
"Thank the gods young master, you had me worried sick."
She smiled while replacing the damp wet cloth for a new one. She didn't stay there for long though, saying that he should sleep for now and that she would be back in a couple of hours to check on him.
After the coast was clear, Roland managed to raise his upper body. He looked at his hands, they were soft and small. His body looked think and slightly malnourished but that wasn't the main problem here.
'W-what is this? Did I become a kid?'
Everything in this room wasn't big, he just was small. He had turned into a child for some reason.
'Wait... am I really this Roland? ... what is this, what's going on... who is this... where is this...my status is recovering?'
While he was desperately clamoring for answers in his head something happened, a screen popped up in front of his face. His eyes bulged wide as he started reading what was written there. This wasn't all, the moment the window popped up he felt information rushing into his brain. It was as if thousands of needles poking his head, the information that he was receiving concerned the boy named Roland Arden that he was occupying the body of.
"So that's how it is..."
Roland kept looking at the status window, he was someone versed in computers so he knew what those meant.
'Am I stuck in some kind of game world? Did someone put me into virtual reality?'
He pinched himself to see if he was feeling any pain and to no surprise he did.
'Did I really die... is this the afterlife...'
He was shocked, not too long ago he was tinkering in the computer repair shop and now he woke up in a young boy's body. He even knew who this child was as he regained all of his memories and what the child knew about this world. The place he was in was called the Kingdom of Caldris and he was the 4th son from the house of Arden. His new father was a Baron and he was the youngest son, besides that he even had two sisters one being younger than him.
'This kid... his family doesn't really think much of him, does it?'
He looked at the shabby room he was in. He knew from his memories that he wasn't really in contention for the noble title of this house. This 'honor' belonged to the firstborn, maybe the second-born still had a shot at it if he was especially talented. But he was only the 4th in line, unless all of his brothers died he had no chance.
He wasn't sure what this boy's fate would be in the eyes of his family. He was too young to know how the political structure in this world worked. He only knew that he was the son of a noble, so it was probably still better than being a commoner.
'I should be safe here for the time... not sure what the age of adulthood in this world is, but the bigger question is...'
He looked to the hovering window in front of his face, it looked like some kind of status screen of an RPG character. It had things like strength and endurance, just like in games that he used to play. Most of his stats were low, but some of them stood out.
'My intelligence is quite high, so is my willpower and dexterity. Aren't the first two mage stats?'
He needed more information first, he needed to figure this status screen out. This was something that the people leaving in this world saw as natural, the boy's memories reflected that as he could recall him using it.
'Okay, I need to think status and it should show up...'
He strained his thoughts, the game-like screen appearing in front of him again. He could see all of his main stats, if he guided his gaze to the desired option he could even get some flavor text to give him an explanation.
Strength: Indicates the physical power of an individual, increases attack damage, and stamina slightly.
Agility: Indicates how agile and nimble a person is, increases speed, quickness, and stamina slightly.
Dexterity: Indicates skill in performing tasks, especially with the hands, increases attack damage with finesse weapons and attack speed.
Vitality: Increases health points, defense, physical resistances, and the life span of an individual.
Endurance: Increases an individual's stamina, stamina regeneration, and health points slightly.
Intelligence: Increases an individual's mana points, magic attack, and learning speed.
Willpower: Increases an individual's resistance to elemental attacks, status effects, and mana points slightly.
Charisma: Indicates an individual's charm. A measure of personality, persuasiveness, leadership.
Luck:
Increases the chance or critical attacks and other various skills related to chance.
He started reading the short explanations for the attributes and looked at his own to see what he was good and bad at. Most of his stats were quite low but some were uncharacteristically high compared to the others. For one, his intelligence stat was really high at a whopping 35. Followed by willpower at 18 and then dexterity at 15.
'Intelligence increases my mana and magic attack... am I a mage or something? I'm resistant to status effect and good with my hands?'