Chapter 1 — Dragon Sky
I woke to the taste of iron and rain. The ceiling above me was cracked and the bulb swung slow like a tired lung. My hands felt wrong — larger, callused, warm. I blinked and the world answered in shallow shards: a thin mattress, a creased photo, a bruise along a rib. Shame hit me again, like a fist I had learned not to flinch from.
Light split the dark and a tone cut the room like glass. A panel unfolded in the air, clean and bright. Letters hovered where dust used to live.
All Out — SYSTEM ACTIVATED.
"Congratulations on transferring into Blue Star," the voice said. It had no face, only cold clarity. Behind the panel a map and a star emblem rolled like a page. The words moved fast and sharp. Blue Star. Ranks. Rules. Strong take more. Weak pay.
A box glowed with WELCOME GIFT. My throat clenched. The items listed themselves without ceremony: Ex - Copy Power — copy enemy talents after defeat. Transformation Card — permanent evolution. Then the warning blinked like a pulse.
Warning: This will change you completely. Proceed? Y / N
There was no weighing. Thinking would have been a luxury I no longer owned. My thumb pressed Y as if it had always known which way to go. The panel pulsed. Time hiccupped.
It was not a sound; it was the world catching a breath. The bulb stopped mid-swing. Dust hung in the air like frozen breath. Far below a horn cut and froze mid-note. The room felt glued to the moment between heartbeats.
Pressure filled me. Heat crawled up my spine. Threads tied me to this body and something invisible began to cut them. My skin fizzled like a spent wire. Light pressed out from my arms and ran along the ceiling in bright veins. I felt the shape of me change, and a laugh formed in my chest that was not mine at first — it was the system and something older, and it fit.
Energy climbed like a coil and burst from the roof. It wrapped itself around the city and drew the clouds into a spiral. Lightning braided gold and white and the air carved into a long, living shape. The sound the dragon made did not belong to any throat I knew. It was the sound of a rule being broken.
From the street below people froze. A boy reached to throw a stone and hung like a marionette. A taxi hovered. A dog stopped mid-leap. I felt the world pause like a tide backing away.
Agents came, thin and precise. They threw bindings at the rising light. The bindings snapped like thread against a knife. The dragon formed, a body of storm and crackling brightness, and then it pushed up and bit the sky.
When it screamed the city folded. Glass across blocks splintered. The roar felt like every small thing that might have been safe being scraped away. People mouthed sounds with no voice. The dragon's head pierced the clouds and detonated in a white plume that turned night to a brief, blinding noon.
Screens lit across the city. Cafes went silent. Peaks and ships and watchtowers caught the flash. The event would be named and shouted and fed to every mouth. They would call it Dragon Sky.
On the roof the system finished its lines. You accepted the Transformation Card. You will undergo a permanent shift. Hold still.
Dark took me then. I felt myself stretch thin and gather new. The city returned like a waking thing. The bulb began to swing again. Sounds came back one by one.
When my eyes opened the world had a new edge. My body felt hard — tight muscle under skin that sat different. I looked at my hands: larger, scarred. I stood and the room felt too small. I touched my face and felt a jaw that cut sharper. A coat lay on a chair, dark and oddly made to fit. My breath moved deeper and my shame was not gone but turned into something cold.
I went to the window. The city looked small, like a net seen from a distance. The smoke where the dragon had screamed still curled in the sky. News vans already moved toward the center. Soldiers and hunters spread out. I felt nothing but a clear shape of purpose.
My face in the cracked glass did not belong to the empty boy who climbed the roof. The features were balanced and tight. My eyes held a slow light that could be soft or a blade. I smiled once without meaning to and the sound was wrong — low, clean. Something inside approved.
The system chimed. New Skill Unlocked: EX-Copy Power. Transformation Complete. Memory Sync in progress.
Riley's life poured into me like pages turned fast. I tasted the cheap bread, felt the shove into trash, held the photograph under my palm. Then other memories layered in — different alleys, other streets, a voice that moved sharp and calm, training that smelled like iron. Predator memories. A ledger of names. My mind adjusted to hold both sets of truth.
When sync finished a small file opened itself: — Temperament adjusted to improve survival. Module: Cold Efficiency applied.
Thinking rearranged. Emotions no longer landed like stones. Shame turned into fuel. Fear was a scent to track. Mercy was a small coin I could keep or discard. I felt a cold weight settle where warmth had been.
I laughed once, quiet and without surprise.
I crossed to the desk where the folded photo lay. The paper was warm. The back read "For one day, be brave." Salt rose in me and hardened to focus.
Outside, the city moved again. Faces that had mocked me looked small and busy. My parents would continue their lives on high terraces. The classmate who shoved a boy into refuse would still grin in public. I saw them as objects to be sorted.
The panel reminded me: You have one trait: EX-Copy. Copy requires defeat. Defeat requires fight. Fight requires action.
I clenched my fist until the knuckles cracked. The noise pleased me. Sirens wailed in the distance. Dragon Sky flashed across every screen. Enforcers would scan for anomalies. Men in high chairs would look for who made a dragon from a rooftop.
I left the apartment and people looked up like the world had misplaced its sun. Whispered questions curled in the air. I did not answer. I walked with the slow, steady stride of someone who measured life in breaths, not seconds.
The Valen name burned like a card stamped on my shoulder. My panel confirmed it: Parentage — Valen Clan. Origin — Pinnacle Five. Hidden Trait Detected: Copy Affinity — rare. Advice: Avoid immediate detection. High-tier clans will react.
Valen. One of five clans that tilted the city. They bowed to strength and crushed the weak. Their heirs learned to hurt before they could be hurt. The Sovereign sat higher still — SSS rank — and you did not speak against him. Being born a Valen gave me a ledger of enemies and a target on my chest.
The Academy was the next place to go. It was a stage where heirs and rookies danced and knives clattered in pockets. I stepped through the plaza where banners and armor shone. The Valen standard hung above a ring of tall children wearing bright threads. One boy with a scar like a blade narrowed his eyes at me. He remembered the rumor of a failed Valen, or at least that was his plan.
At the registration desk a tired D-rank official asked my name. "Riley. Valen." My voice was steady.
The drone over the crowd clicked and a small icon lit on my collar: Origin — Valen. Flagged.
That little flag would call hands I did not want pulling strings. For now it burned like a coin in the dark.
I signed for the basic talent test. The system whispered: Objective — Register for District Trial. Reward — Rift license and trial entry. Secondary Objective — Tower of Trials application.
The plaza filled with noise. A drone announced the national competition soon, the top scorer able to choose any university. The Tower of Trials would come later, the class change at graduation would sort Warriors and Mages and rarer things. The city swallowed the names it liked.
Inside the classroom a boy pushed a chair and grinned. "You got the wrong room, boss. This is a classroom."
I looked at him like he had spoken to a stone. "Do you think I'm illiterate?" I said, cold.
His face moved like a puppet with the strings cut. He stammered and fell back, fear blooming in him. The room shifted. Murmurs rose: "Is that the loser?" "No, look at him." Girls leaned forward with open mouths. Someone whispered something stupid and the air tasted like absurd desire.
The teacher arrived, eyes wide, then sharp. "Who are you?" he asked.
I told him who I was. Silence fell. The teacher's face tightened and then flared. He mocked me, thin and loud: "Don't get full of yourself. This is only a small change."
He reached for a pen and flicked it with force meant to sting my ear and teach me my place. The pen flew faster than I thought possible. I caught it like a habit and threw it back. It struck the left side of his ear with more force than it should have carried. He staggered, shocked.
He folded his shoulders and drew a line of power around himself — an aura turned visible, a C-rank mark. People around him fainted as the field pulsed. The class melted away into silence and collapsed bodies. I stood without expression.
He increased the force step by step as I approached. His voice tried to rise but came like a thin wire. I walked until I was close enough to breathe his fear. I put my hand on his throat and lifted. The bones and muscle of him hung like a bag. I could have broken his neck with a slow twist.
That was when the principal and guards burst in, breathing hard. They did not know me and treated me like a threat. I let the teacher slide back onto the floor and he slumped, dazed and pale. They took him away to the infirmary.
Later the principal found the truth about my name. He came with a face that tried to be calm and asked me to forgive the mess and to let it go. "We will investigate," he said. "Whoever is responsible will be held accountable."
I told him my life had been on the line. A single apology would not fix what had been done. He offered what he could: money and a place in the national competition. I named a price that made the room go cold.
"Five million units and a guaranteed entry," I said at first.
He bristled and tried his rank on me — a faint aura; a look that said he could end me. I did not flinch. "Five million was for a C-rank," I said. "Make it fifteen million and include my entry, or we will find out who is right."
He almost smiled with a blade hidden behind it. "Do you know what you ask?"
"Then let us test that," I said. The room held like glass.
He swallowed. He agreed.
Money, a place in the competition, and another mark on a list. The world moved its chess pieces. I left the office with the smell of paper and fear on my hands.
Outside, the city went on. I folded the photo and put it back in my pocket. The system pulsed: Daily Task issued. Mission queued. The hunt had begun.
Find them all, the voice said.
© 2025 Kael Virell. All rights reserved. This work is the original creation of Kael Virell. No part may be copied, reproduced, adapted, or distributed without written permission. Unauthorized use will be pursued legally and removed from platforms to protect the author's rights. Immediate enforcement.