Quinn was, by all accounts, a perfect soldier. At twenty-one, he was lean, whipcord tough, and possessed the lightning reflexes of a man who lived perpetually on the knife's edge of combat. He was a master of his standard-issue rail-rifle, and his speed made him indispensable for scouting and extraction.
But Quinn had no spark.
He was a Zero. He had survived the radiation without awakening any Ethereal Mana. In a world ruled by Alphas—by beings who could conjure storms or harden their skin into steel—Quinn's peak human potential was merely a baseline.
His immediate superior, Captain Vorn, was the personification of this disparity. Vorn, a cocky Alpha with a minor but flashy talent for Pyromancy, often mocked Quinn.
"Quinn, you run like a deer, but you hit like a wet sock," Vorn had sneered just this morning, watching Quinn struggle through a sparring match with a lesser Alpha recruit. "You're all speed and no punch. Unless you want to spend the rest of the war delivering tea, find yourself a shard of Mana, Zero."
Quinn swallowed the insult. He knew it was true. His desperate dream was to join the elite Iron Brigade, the heavily armored shock troops who actually pushed back against the Kaelen. But without the ability to use Combat Arts—the Ethereal-powered techniques required to pierce Kaelen armor and survive their plasma weapons—he was forever confined to the scout corps, a fast decoy waiting to be outpaced.
The Midnight Incursion
Tonight, the silence had been broken by the high-pitched, terrifying shriek that signaled a Kaelen Incursion. It wasn't an organized assault by the Dominion's armored forces, but a flanking raid by their bio-engineered war-beasts: the reptilian, multi-limbed Gore-Hounds.
Quinn and his squad were deployed to the western perimeter, a stretch of hastily reinforced scrap-metal barricades. Chaos reigned. The Gore-Hounds, fast and aggressive, were tearing through the defenses, their poisonous claws ripping apart standard-issue armor.
Captain Vorn arrived, aiming to salvage the situation with a grand display. "Stand back, Zeros! Watch the Captain work!" Vorn began channeling his Ethereal Mana, intending to unleash a Firebolt Barrage. His focus was on looking impressive, not effective.
The largest of the pack, a fearsome, mutated Gore-Hound Alpha—twice the size of the others, with bone-plates glistening purple in the dark—saw its opening. While Vorn was distracted with his channeling, the Alpha lunged.
Vorn managed to release only a sputtering flame before the Alpha slammed into him, its immense weight crushing the Captain into the ground. Vorn's Pyromancy fizzled out—an Alpha brought low by simple, brutal force. The Alpha then turned its snapping jaws toward the remaining, terrified squad.
Quinn saw the paralysis in his squadmates' eyes. He saw the Kaelen Alpha preparing for the kill. He had no Ethereal Arts, no special ability, but his discipline was absolute.
Run.
He dropped his rifle and sprinted—not away, but directly toward the towering beast, using every ounce of his raw, human speed. He launched himself at the creature's thick neck, a desperate, futile tackle intended only to disrupt its aim.
The Gore-Hound Alpha didn't even flinch. It simply brought up a massive, triple-pronged claw, scoring three deep, ragged furrows across Quinn's chest and stomach. The pain was blinding, white-hot, and paralyzing. Quinn felt the air leave his lungs as he was flung backward like a rag doll, crashing into a stack of oil barrels beside the barracks wall.
He slumped, his world tilting, the metallic tang of his own blood filling his mouth. The wound was catastrophic; he could feel the chilling proximity of death. Through his fading, blurry vision, he saw the Alpha turning its head back, its multiple eyes focusing on him for the final, contemptuous kill.
I failed. Just like every Zero always does.
The Override
As the Gore-Hound Alpha raised its paw for the killing blow, the world screamed.
Not the sound of the fight, but a silent, internal rupture. A blinding, electric-blue plasma shockwave erupted, originating not from the environment, but from within Quinn's chest.
The wave slammed into the Gore-Hound, which recoiled with a surprised, pained shriek—the plasma was pure anti-Kaelen energy. The blue light instantly cauterized Quinn's mortal wounds, knitting skin and sealing blood vessels with painful, rapid efficiency.
Then, the powerful, commanding voice that seemed to vibrate his very bones, took over his mind:
[HOST DEATH IMMINENT. COMBAT-LINK PROTOCOL INITIATED.]
[HOST DETECTED: QUINN. COMBAT POTENTIAL: HIGH (UNREFINED).]
[SYSTEM TYPE: BATTLE-FORGED REWARD SYSTEM. STATUS: OVERRIDE SUCCESSFUL.]
[INITIAL WEAKNESS: NO ACCESS TO COMBAT ARTS. STATUS: NULLIFIED.]
A tactical overlay, rendered in razor-sharp electric-blue lines, flashed into his vision. The remaining Gore-Hounds, including the Alpha, were suddenly highlighted, their weak points flickering like exposed circuits.
[WELCOME TO THE ARENA, HOST. PRIMARY OBJECTIVE: DOMINATE. NEW TASK RECEIVED.]
[NEW TASK: ELIMINATE THE ALPHA THREAT.]
[TARGET: Gore-Hound Alpha (Lvl 12 Elite). Danger Rating: CRITICAL.]
[REWARD: 100 EXP, Unlock: Primary Combat Skill Tree.]
Quinn felt the lingering pain from his wound, but it was overshadowed by a tidal wave of objective, cold clarity. The crippling handicap that had defined his life—the lack of Ethereal Arts—was gone. The System had overridden his physical limitations, giving him a path to power.
The Gore-Hound Alpha, angered by the flash of blue energy, charged. Quinn didn't run; he didn't panic. He just moved.