White everything, everywhere, all at once. It wasn't a warm white either—it was clinical. There was a sterile feeling to it, as if every sense except for sight was needing to be removed to maintain the purity. The only thing that was present was this sense of 'being' there and that's all. No urges.

"You died," a feminine voice stated. It came in softly, but echoed several times over as the depth and tone increased in severity.

Events replayed like some poorly made highschoolers Television Production Class. There he was, opening his wallet to pay cash for street vendor food, and refusing the change. Brown hair, cut short, and brand named business casual attire—a polo, some black khakis, and some new sneakers, plus the work bag. In hindsight, watching from an over the shoulder perspective, maybe he wouldn't have walked through the alley by himself, at night, while snacking, if given a do-over. He watched as someone—he never saw who—came up behind and smacked him in the back of the head with an aluminum baseball bat. That shouldn't have killed him—but then he went and landed head-first on a broken pipe. That'd do it. It would've been comical if the resulting Ctrl+Alt+Delete didn't cause the attacker to just abandon the corpse without taking anything. Panicking people make for terrible thieves and graverobbers apparently.

"You died... for nothing," the voice stated.

"No fucking shit—" he said, suddenly able to think and speak. "Wait, what?" He could move now too. He looked at his hands as he brought them up and turned them over several times, clenching and unclenching his fists. "I can move again."

"The reaccountment is complete. Temporary stasis is required until revision of death is finished," the voice stated.

"And who are you? A system? Computer 2.0? Is this the matrix? Am I in a simulation?"

"No."

That was it. Nothing else. No explanation, exposition, or elucidation. Just 'no.'

"Oh, just 'Nope!', that's it? Nothing else? No 'and now here's what happens'? Where are 'you' anyway?"

A silhouette slowly appeared. It was a woman's figure with 'average' proportions—or at least as far as he could tell. It was like line art that could move. She—it, moved in a flutter, floating around aimlessly.

"Oh great, she has a sense of humor."

"You will be my hero."

"No, the fuck, I will not. I don't know what this 'hero' nonsense you're talking about is, but keep me out of it. Double it and send it onto the next guy."

A square screen appeared in front of him. It was like something out of a video game. It was a holographic blue box with 'Do you accept the role of Hero?' Two boxes, smaller, were below it and had the choices 'Yes' and 'No' available. Without any hesitation he clicked 'No.'

There was an error sound and a smaller box appeared telling him as much. It was red and had text displayed that read 'Error! Selection Invalid!' He clicked the 'No' again. A second error box appeared. He clicked it again, and again, and again, harder and harder each time, producing yet another error box.

"I said 'No' damn you." He said with frustration.

The woman floated over and reached out, her hand extending a single finger. She clicked 'Yes.' It went green, a cliché celebratory music erupted, and gaudy music that could've belonged to the first ever Role-playing Game began to stream from everywhere. She smiled—he knew because she suddenly had a whole face that looked exceptionally coy and smug.

"Listen here you—"

Then darkness. She was gone, the music was gone, and so was the interface. Even his entire sense of self was once more absent... and then a new screen popped up. It read one single word 'NAME' with a single flashing underscore.

The input was immediate. DERICK. A single thought he didn't even remember thinking came and went in a split second. It slowly went from blue to green as if it were a loading screen, filling in from left to right. It then produced a single giant green checkmark and disappeared.

'Congratulations Hero!' appeared in its place. It began a retro-styled scrolling as it began a slow info-dump. It told about a world filled with monsters, magic, demons, and every other cliché he knew existed in these tropes. It promised adventure, romance, and fulfillment—alongside every other possible clickbait adjective. By the end of it there was a prompt that asked for him to choose his abilities. He could choose three—since he was the 'Hero.' It made him wonder if everybody else got one or two.

Thinking was enough to select one of the three boxes that had a dull grey 'Choose your ability' within it. It was instant. What was not instant was the selection process. It had every possible ability anyone could've possibly thought up in an alphabetized list with a Search menu too. Some of them were just outright ridiculous like 'Fishing', whereas others seemed to just be broken nonsense like 'Immortal.' Every ability had some associated AP—ability points—that it cost. He had 10 to use and broken abilities each cost anywhere from 6 to all 10.

Derick didn't know how long he took, but he felt like he may have set the longest record for how long someone probably took. In the end he chose three abilities: Skill Mastery, Limit-Breaker, and Absorption. They all added up to a perfect 10 AP cost. He had absolutely no idea what they'd do synergistically, but if video games taught him anything, it's that you can't go wrong mastering everything, breaking beyond normal limits, or being able to 'absorb abilities.' Whatever that actually meant could go any direction, but he'd figure it out later.

A new screen popped up reading: Confirm your choices. Derick selected 'Confirm' and once again everything went black. He had an abrupt sense of self again. He felt the urge to blink and gave into the sensation.

When he opened his eyes he was no longer in a dark abyss, but was instead in the woods. It was a deciduous forest and it was warm, but not too hot. The sounds of insects buzzed incessantly and the shriek of a bird of prey unseen overhead gave the impression was either spring or summer.

"Great... Just great." His stomach growled. "And I'm hungry. I died hungry and reincarnated hungry too. Is this a joke to you?"

There was no response.

"Fine, fuck you too. Let's go with the staple of this genre... Status."

An interface appeared before him. He looked at it. It was extensive... pointlessly extensive. It had every possible attribute type: Strength, Endurance, Toughness, Intelligence, Perception, Wisdom, Agility, Dexterity, Speed, Mana, Mana Regeneration...

"What is this? Did they just mash every RPG together and call it done?" Derick exhaled an annoyed sigh.

He looked at the top of the UI. There was his name, his title, and his... level.

"The fuck you mean level 'Zero'?! What does that even mean you broken piece of—"

The Apathetic 'Hero' — Chapter 10: The Slow Grind

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