He didn't stop until he reached a quiet alley beside the Association.
Only then did he lean against the wall.
His knees felt weak.
He slid down until he was sitting on the pavement, with his backpack beside him.
For a while, he simply stared at his hands.
E-Rank.
He had known he wasn't going to receive an S-Rank result.
He wasn't delusional.
But some foolish part of him had hoped for something better. A D-Rank. Perhaps a C-Rank if the universe was feeling unusually generous.
Something that would allow him to enter the Hunter profession without being laughed out of the room.
Instead, the Association had confirmed what his body had been telling him for years.
He was weak.
He was sick.
And he was running out of time.
Alex covered his face with both hands.
A short, broken laugh escaped him.
"Of course."
His shoulders trembled.
"Of course, it would be E-Rank."
He tried to stop laughing, but the sound kept coming.
It wasn't funny.
Nothing about this was funny.
He pressed his forehead against his knees.
For one terrible moment, he wanted to be angry at his sister.
If she hadn't been so determined to save him, perhaps she would have had more money. Perhaps she wouldn't have needed to accept dangerous raid assignments. Perhaps—
No.
He immediately crushed the thought.
His sister had never forced him to live.
She had given him everything she could.
She had worked double shifts when he was younger. She had skipped meals and claimed she wasn't hungry. She had sold her favorite necklace to buy him a course of expensive medicine.
When he had apologized, she had flicked his forehead.
You can pay me back when you're rich.
He had promised her he would.
Now he couldn't even pass a simple assessment.
Alex dragged his hands down his face.
"I'll do it," he whispered.
His voice shook, but he continued.
"I don't care what rank I get. I don't care if I have to start at the bottom. I'll become a Hunter."
He looked toward the sky.
"You hear me? I'm not giving up."
His chest hurt.
He couldn't tell whether it was his illness or the pressure building behind his ribs.
"Just…"
He swallowed.
"Please let me save her."
The alley remained silent.
The world continued moving beyond its walls.
And somewhere inside a hospital, his sister lay unconscious, unaware that the person she had spent eighteen years protecting was sitting on a dirty pavement, begging the universe for a chance.
By evening, Alex had returned home.
He had spent the afternoon at the hospital, sitting beside his sister's bed and listening to the steady rhythm of the monitoring equipment.
Her condition hadn't changed.
The doctors had used the word stable.
Alex hated that word almost as much as he hated the word E-Rank.
Stable meant she wasn't getting worse.
It also meant she wasn't waking up.
When he had asked about advanced treatment, the doctor had explained the options. There were mana-based therapies, specialized recovery chambers, and expensive medicines capable of improving the chances of recovery for certain injuries.
None offered a guarantee.
All cost more money than Alex possessed.
He had left the hospital with his hands clenched so tightly that his fingernails had left marks in his palms.
Now he sat on the edge of his bed, staring at a small collection of glass bottles.
Health potions.
Mana potions.
Cleansing potions.
Antidotes.
A few other low-grade consumables his sister had brought home over the years.
They weren't valuable.
Most were the cheapest products available on the market, and some had been purchased close to their expiration dates.
Still, they represented months of careful saving.
His sister had always kept a small emergency supply because Alex's condition could worsen without warning.
He knew exactly how much he was supposed to take when his symptoms became severe.
One dose of the prescribed health potion.
Wait.
Drink water.
Rest.
If the symptoms continued, contact a medical professional.
Simple.
Routine.
A life reduced to managing the next flare-up.
Alex picked up one of the bottles, then placed it back down.
His eyes drifted toward the clock.
11:48 p.m.
Twelve minutes remained until midnight.
The beginning of his eighteenth birthday had brought him an E-Rank assessment.
The end would bring his Player awakening.
He had spent years reading about awakenings. He knew the usual process. At midnight on their eighteenth birthday, eligible individuals received their initial Player interface, along with information about their attributes, traits, and abilities.
For most people, the process was straightforward.
The System appeared.
The person awakened.
Their future began.
Alex pressed his palms together.
"Please."
He wasn't even sure what he was asking for anymore.
A good class? A rare ability? Enough strength to survive a low-level dungeon?
He would take anything.
Anything that could help him save his sister.
At 11:59 p.m., he stood in the middle of his bedroom.
His legs trembled.
He ignored them.
At exactly midnight, the room went silent.
The distant traffic seemed to fade.
A familiar pressure settled over his body, followed by a faint sensation of warmth spreading through his chest.
Then a translucent window appeared in front of him.
[Player Awakening Initiated.]
Alex stopped breathing.
Another line appeared.
[Analyzing individual characteristics…]
His eyes widened.
It was happening.
After eighteen years, it was finally happening.
His lips parted in a disbelieving smile.
"Come on…"
The window flickered.
[Physical Condition: Abnormal.]
Alex's smile faltered.
[Negative Trait Detected.]
His heart began to pound.
[Trait: Curse of Illness.]
For several seconds, Alex simply stared at the words.
Then his expression changed.
"No."
The word came out quietly.
He leaned forward as if moving closer to the screen might somehow alter what he was reading.
"No, no, no…"
[The trait has been present since birth.]
[Its influence has severely impaired the host's physical development.]
[Additional analysis required.]
Alex's hands began to shake.
The Curse of Illness.
That was what his entire life had been reduced to.
Not a mysterious disease.
Not bad luck.
Not some unfortunate combination of medical conditions.
A trait.
Something recorded by the System itself.
Something that had followed him from birth.
He felt a strange sensation in his chest, as if a hand had closed around his heart.
All those hospital visits.
All those medicines.
All those nights when his sister had sat beside his bed, trying not to look frightened.
Had it all been because of this?
And now, when he finally had the chance to awaken, the System had decided to announce it as though it were reading the weather.
Alex clenched his jaw.
"Fine."
His voice trembled.
"Fine! You found it. Congratulations!"
The window flickered again.
[Unique Ability Detected.]
He froze.
Another line appeared.
[Unique Abilit: Extract.]
Alex blinked.
Memory?
What did that even mean?
Before he could consider it, the window vanished.
For one heartbeat, he thought the awakening had ended.
Then a new notification appeared.
[ERROR.]
The word flashed red.
Alex's eyes widened.
[Player Awakening Process Interrupted.]
[Unable to complete initial registration.]
[Recalculating…]
The room filled with a faint, unpleasant vibration.
Alex staggered backward.
"What?"
[ERROR.]
[ERROR.]
[ERROR.]
The notifications began appearing faster.
[Conflicting conditions detected.]
[Trait analysis incomplete.]
[Unique ability registration failed.]
[Initial awakening sequence compromised.]
Alex stared at the growing list.
His hands were cold.
"No. No, don't do this."
He stepped toward the interface.
"Just finish it!"
The window flashed.
[ERROR.]
"Finish it!"
His voice cracked.
He had endured eighteen years of illness.
He had swallowed medicine that made him nauseous. He had spent nights awake because his body hurt too much to sleep. He had watched his sister work until exhaustion because neither of them had anyone else.
He had endured the pity in doctors' eyes.
The whispers of classmates.
The way strangers looked at him and immediately decided he was weak.
And now, when he finally had something that might change his life, the System was malfunctioning?
Was this some kind of joke?
Alex struck the wall with his palm.
Pain shot through his hand.
He barely noticed.
"WHY?"
His shout filled the tiny room.
"WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT FROM ME?"
The interface remained unchanged.
[ERROR.]
He grabbed the edge of his desk.
His breathing grew ragged.
"I'm not asking to be the strongest person in the world!"
His voice broke.
"I don't want to be famous! I don't want a legendary class! I don't care about any of that!"
Tears blurred the interface.
"I just want to save my sister!"
The words came out of him with a force he couldn't control.
"I just want her to wake up!"
His knees gave way.
He sank onto the floor, gripping the edge of the desk to keep himself upright.
"I promised her…"
His voice had fallen to a whisper.
"I promised I'd take care of her."
He could see her face in his mind.
The way she smiled when she was pretending not to be tired.
The way she scolded him for apologizing too much.
The way she had stood in front of him when they were children and an older boy had mocked his appearance.
If you want to pick on someone, pick on me first.
She had always stood in front of him.
And now he couldn't stand in front of her.
He couldn't pay for her treatment.
He couldn't even complete his own awakening.
Alex covered his face.
For several seconds, he couldn't hear anything except his own uneven breathing.
Then the interface flashed again.
[ERROR.]
Something inside him snapped.
Not his body.
Not his sanity.
Something quieter.
Something that had kept him polite when people pitied him, patient when medicine failed him, and hopeful when every sensible part of him had advised him to stop.
He was tired.
Tired of being careful.
Tired of measuring every breath.
Tired of being told to wait.
He wanted one thing in his life to work.
Just one.
His gaze fell upon the bottles on his desk.
The healing potions.
The mana potions.
The cleansing potions.
The antidotes.
He had been saving them for emergencies.
What greater emergency could there be than this?
Alex pushed himself to his feet.
His hands trembled as he reached for the first bottle.
"This is supposed to be my awakening," he whispered.
The red error messages continued to flash.
"Then awaken!"
He uncorked a low-grade health potion and swallowed it.
The familiar warmth spread through his stomach.
Nothing changed.
He grabbed a mana potion.
Then another bottle.
His movements became increasingly frantic. He wasn't thinking clearly. He was barely thinking at all.
He drank a cleansing potion.
Then an antidote.
Then another potion whose label had faded so badly that he could hardly read it.
His sister had always told him not to waste medicine.
She had also told him to stop trying to solve every problem alone.
He could almost hear her voice now.
Alex, you absolute idiot. What are you doing?
He let out a broken laugh.
"Trying to live, sis."
He swallowed another potion.
"Just trying to live."
The bottles were nearly empty.
His stomach twisted, and an unfamiliar heat spread through his body.
He should have stopped.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, a faint voice told him that combining so many different potions was a terrible idea.
But the System was still malfunctioning.
His sister was still unconscious.
And he was still the same sick boy who had walked into the Association that morning, hoping for a chance and receiving nothing but an E-Rank verdict.
Alex seized the last bottle.
His fingers slipped against the glass.
He stared at the red interface.
[ERROR.]
"Then take it!"
He drank.
The bottle fell from his hand and shattered against the floor.
For one moment, nothing happened.
Alex stood motionless.
Then a violent surge of heat erupted inside him.
His eyes widened.
A strange light flickered beneath his skin, and the air around him began to tremble.
He dropped to his knees.
"What…?"
His voice was barely audible.
The pressure intensified.
It felt as though every potion he had swallowed was fighting against every other potion inside his body. His heartbeat thundered in his ears, and his vision blurred.
He reached for the desk, but his fingers slid across its surface.
Then he saw something impossible.
The red error messages had stopped.
Every notification hanging in the air had frozen.
A thin crack appeared across the center of the interface.
Alex stared at it.
Another crack spread from the first.
Then another.
The red light flickered.
Once.
Twice.
The entire window trembled as though something on the other side were trying to break through.
Alex forgot to breathe.
The cracks multiplied, spreading across the interface like fractures in glass.
A sharp sound rang through the room.
CRACK!
The red error window split apart.
For a moment, countless fragments of light hung suspended in the air.
Then they began to move.
They spun around Alex, forming a strange circle of silver and gold.
A deep, unfamiliar sensation swept through his body.
The pain in his chest abruptly stopped.
The tightness in his lungs eased.
For the first time in his life, breathing didn't feel like work.
Alex inhaled.
Then inhaled again.
His eyes widened.
He could breathe.
Really breathe.
He had never understood how much effort it took simply to exist until the effort was suddenly gone.
He placed a trembling hand against his chest.
His heartbeat was steady.
The dizziness that had followed him for as long as he could remember was fading.
He looked at his fingers.
They weren't trembling anymore.
A new interface appeared before him.
This one was different.
Its surface resembled polished silver, with fine golden lines running through its edges. There were no red warnings, no flickering symbols, and no repeated errors.
Only a single notification.
[Anomaly Detected.]
Alex stared.
The notification changed.
[The awakening process has encountered an unprecedented contradiction.]
[A negative trait that has shaped the host's entire existence has been challenged by an unregistered chain of consumable interactions.]
His mind struggled to process the words.
Unregistered chain?
Consumable interactions?
Had the potions done something?
He remembered the heat in his chest.
The sudden relief.
The way the interface had cracked.
A new notification appeared.
[Evaluating the host's actions…]
The silver interface went completely dark.
Alex's breath caught.
Then a faint golden light appeared at its center.
It expanded slowly, revealing a symbol he had never seen before: a vast circular pattern filled with countless lines, each one connecting to another in an intricate web.
It looked ancient.
Endless.
As though it had existed long before humanity had discovered the System.
A message appeared.
[The Akashic Record has acknowledged an unprecedented achievement.]
Alex's mouth fell open.
The Akashic Record.
Every Player had heard of it.
The mysterious mechanism believed to record extraordinary events and preserve the world's most significant achievements.
Most Hunters encountered it through achievements, hidden quests, or special titles.
But this…
This felt different.
The golden symbol rotated once.
[Achievement Recorded.]
[You have challenged a fate imposed upon you since birth.]
Alex's heart began to pound again.
The next notification appeared slowly, each word forming with deliberate precision.
[Title Acquired: The One Who Defied Fate.]
Alex stared at the message.
He didn't understand what it meant.
He didn't know what the title did.
He didn't even know whether his awakening had succeeded.
But for the first time that night, the System wasn't rejecting him.
It was acknowledging him.
The golden symbol shone brighter.
A final line appeared beneath the title.
[The consequences of this achievement will now be recorded.]
Alex's eyes widened.
The light filled the room.
And then—
Everything went white.