System, please just shut up

Boom. Boom. Bang.

Those were the only sounds that echoed across the shattered battlefield.

The sound of spells exploding, earth breaking, ribs shattering, bones snapping.

The Guardian didn't just kill anymore.

It tortured.

It dragged students screaming across the field.

Bit off half their bodies.

Left limbs twitching on the ground.

Broke bones and let the writhing corpses bleed out slowly.

It was a slaughterhouse.

And worst of all?

It was having fun.

Its reptilian eyes gleamed with sadistic glee as it hunted for its next prey.

Not because it had to— But because it wanted to.

Thousands had been reduced to barely a hundred.

And those still alive?

They were hiding.

Scattered.

Curled in pits and under craters, praying they weren't next.

Even knowing they'd respawn at the Academy after it was done with them, no one wanted to die.

Not like this. Not when it felt so real. So slow. So cruel.

Kael crouched beneath a jagged slope of black stone, barely covering his small frame.

Dirt and blood smeared across his face, stinging his eyes.

He hadn't seen the others in hours.

They had separated during the initial chaos.

He had no idea if they were dead or not.

His hands shook.

Every distant scream twisted his stomach into knots.

Every crunch of bone?

He imagined it was his.

This wasn't a battle. It was a massacre. And worse—

He knew the Guardian was playing with them.

He squeezed his eyes shut, pressing his head against the cold rock.

Stay low.

Stay quiet.

Don't move.

He kept repeating to himself.

But silence can be worse than sound.

Because suddenly—

There was nothing.

No screaming. No footsteps. No breathing.

Just stillness.

Unnatural. Heavy. Wrong.

'Did it already kill everyone?' he wondered, a chilling thought.

Tempted, he leaned forward just a little, peeking through a crack in the stone.

What he saw was an empty field.

There were no students, and worst of all no beast in sight.

'Where did it go?'

He leaned closer trying to figure out where it was hiding.

But that was a bad idea considering that he was someone who had watched a lot of horror movies.

Because in the next moment, an eye stared back at him.

His field of vision was overshadowed by a big reptilian eye.

A massive, slit-pupiled eye.

It blinked once.

Kael's heart slammed into his throat, a frantic drum against his ribs.

He scrambled backward in a blind panic, gasping, stumbling, desperately trying to put distance between himself and the monstrous gaze.

The eye slowly vanished behind the rock.

Then silence again.

BaBUM. BaBUM. BaBUM.

His heart thundered against his ribs.

He didn't dare to move.

His nerves where all over the place.

He barely even had the courage to breathed.

He just sat completely still in the dirt for what felt like an hour, sweating, shaking, eyes wide and fixed on the spot.

Yet nothing happened.

'May It left.' Where the thoughts that began going through his head.

And those thoughts caused his heart rate to go back down to normal again, and his nerves began stabilising.

The moment it felt like he was relaxed again— The rock wall exploded inward.

Kael was sent flying backwards like a ragdoll, lifted by a sudden, devastating impact.

CRACK!

His skull slammed against a boulder.

Blinding pain tore through his head, a white-hot agony.

He tried to open his mouth and scream, but no sound came out as that only doubled the pain.

His body landed with a rough bang as he continued to roll, hitting more rocks as he went backwards.

Kael had felt a lot of pain from different sources since arriving at this world, but what he felt now was on an entirely different level.

The pain was so much that his body decided to shut itself off to protect his mind.

But that didn't last for too long as he was awakened by a sickening pressure settling on his now mangled body.

His body was broken, blood seeping into the sand beneath him.

A crushing pressure pinned him down.

He forced his eyes to look up—

And there was the Guardian was standing on him.

One massive, clawed foot pressed into his chest.

CRACK!

His ribs screamed, a chorus of breaking bone as the guardian increased the pressure on his body.

Kael gasped, spitting a mouthful of blood.

"Ju… just do it already… you bastard…" He managed to say through his clenched teeth.

The Guardian tilted its monstrous head, its empty eye sockets brimming with something chillingly human.

Disappointment.

As if Kael wasn't enough of a challenge.

And then as though accepting his request, it pressed harder.

Kael's vision blurred, the world tilting sideways.

This was it. The end.

He clenched his jaw, his face twisted not in fear, but in pure, impotent rage.

He couldn't even a proper fight.

The level of humiliation he was experiencing was too much for him to take.

So he made a promise to himself then, a silent, burning vow as death loomed:

This would never happen again.

He'd never feel this helpless again.

Never crawl beneath an enemy's heel.

Never stare death in the face and feel nothing but shame.

Weather he got into the Academy or not, he was going to make sure that he never experienced this kind of feeling again.

Just when he felt he was about to pop like a balloon….

Bing.

A screen flashed before his eyes:

[WARNING! Changes are being forced upon your records by an external force…]

[Congratulations. You have learned a new skill – Wrath of a Dying God]

[First activation requirements met.]

[All stats increased by 210%]

[Pain reception reduced by 40%]

[Rationality reduced by 10%]

Kael blinked slowly as the information settled in.

The crushing pressure was still there.

But it now felt distant. Faint. Manageable.

And something inside him was shifting.

A fire. A rage. A whisper from something older. Something dormant.

Something not entirely… human.

He slowly opened his eyes.

And smiled