The Third Party

3rd Person's POV (4yr.s and 8 months old)

'Have you been checking your system lately' asked White at Ken’s side.

"No, no I haven't." he replied.

'I think you better check it.' -White-

"Hmmm, I guess." Shrugging to himself, but as he quietly walked forward, the unnerving chill of this pitch blackness itched at his mind.

‘Should I dig a hole and return back to the surface, or press on and find out what this calling is for, this is because when I looked at the cave at the left, I felt a strange pull to go in, but now I regret that decision, because it's dark in here.’

'What's with you and all this dark here, dark there,.. stuff?' looking at white angrily he exclaimed.

"That's because the darkness is scary."

'Oh please, spare me of your pleasantries, you're just being baby.' -White-

'Don't judge me.' The little boy crossed his arms and pouted.

'If you're so scared of the dark, then why don't you just make a light?' the said boy puts his hand under his chin.

‘Hmmmmmmm. I could do that. Ugh! What am I thinking of course I can do that!’ he exclaims furiously at himself.

'I wouldn't slap my face if I were you.' -White-

"What? Why?" he replied.

'You look ridiculous.' *puffs*

"Fine." Holding out his right arm with the palm of his hand facing up, he chanted…

"Light Moon Magic: Illuminating orb." an orb of light formed at the top of his hand and illuminated his surroundings, showing the path he will be taking, he held his hand at his right to situate the orb just above his shoulder so that it will follow him while it lights the way, now to open the main menu.

(A.N.: Forgive me, 'Main Menu was the name of the windows I keep mentioning in the past, I know of the concept, but forgot the name, but for those who are familiar with a window screen that shows the skills, inventory, and design of your character in your game, this is what I'm referring to, just an image of Ken won't appear in his main menu.)

'Open Main Menu.' The window of his main menu popped in front of him, presenting to him options: Notification, Quest/ Mission, Map, Skills/Spells, Customization.

3 red dots coming from hi notification caught my attention.

[Quest reminder, Map Update, Skill Upgrade.]

‘Oh that's right the quest that I'm supposed to fulfill, if I remember, I'm supposed to kill 20 monsters, if I count the monsters we killed before, does it count? Let's check it.’

[ 0/20 monsters killed.

The Northern Forest is a peaceful place, home to its Magical beast, but some monsters tend to roam far from their own territory, and their destination, the Northern Forest, wrecking havoc within, and causing problems for the inhabitants, Kill those monsters to help the Forest, and in return you will be rewarded, if not you will be severely punished.]

Chills ran down his spine when he read that last part, it seems that the system is a bit harsh.

'Punishments are necessary for your growth Ken, you will have to face them sooner or later.' said his companion.

Looking at White, he can't help but feel warm inside, since he's giving him advice. Ken smiled and looked back again to the window and said to his companion.

"You're right. *Inhales, Exhales* Okay, now on to the next message." Opening the Map Update message, a new window popped in front, and showed him what seems to be a map of the cave he is in.

It showed him the exterior outline of the cave and the entrance he was currently at, which is indicated by a white dot with his name on top, some other parts of the map are shadowed, with a curious mind, tapped the shadowed part, and a notification popped in front of his pointer finger, it says...

[Unexplored lands, cannot go.]

"Oooh, *amazement shines in his eyes* this is like Warcraft, where you're not able to go to certain places without exploring them first, although if we click on the map the character would directly travel to the point/land where it was clicked at, why won't I move there?" Ken wonders to himself.

'Do you want your body to move on its own without your consent? You are not a character of a video game.' exclaimed White.

"Uhhh... How did you know that?" he asks, confused.

'I read and watched the memories of your past life, and some information we’re useful, so I used them.' explained White.

"Wow, the way how you designed this type of window/menu system is incredible, that it's so well put together, but I gotta say, that's a bit rude for not telling me that you have read my memories." Ken replied.

'My apologies. I should tell you too, that I didn't have any say in what I would do with your memories since it wasn't my decision to look into your memories, I was just able to read them when you arrived into the 'White Plain'.' exclaimed White.

"Hmm, fair enough, since we both had no say in the matter, Okay since we're done with this, let's check the last message

'Oh and by the way, you are now able to touch the windows system with your bare hands, just so it won't inconvenience you, since you like doing things with your hands.’ -White-

*Gasps exaggeratedly*

"You did?! Oh thank you, thank you, thank you." The boy exclaimed jumping up and down in excitement and quickly tapped the last notification, another window popped in front , and it showed him that his skills have leveled up, huh? It read…

[Your Skill/ Spell ‘Forest Domain’ has leveled up.] He raised an eyebrow in question, how were they able to level up when he hasn't been using them for a while?

'It's from you're battle with the monsters from before.' -White-

......

*Realizes*

“Oh! Okay! Wait, why are all my skills different from before, they look, arranged in some way.”

'That's because they are, I categorized those skills with the same type into a single skill, where you are able to open and examine all the skills that you used or newly created, this won't affect your casting since this new system are just for organizing,

I have separated your active ones to the passive ones, since it would be a hassle to check every single one and not being able to know where it is and forgetting about where it is located once you've used customized it.' explained White.

"Mmm, okay, thank you."

Scrolling through and checking every passive and active skills that he has, he deduced that they've gone 1 level up, but they're just level 1, for now, except for the mastery of elements since it's already maxed out.

"Now to get on with the mission…” Takes a few steps forward, but abruptly stops. “Wait, wait, let me do something to these windows first. Concept: Concept of System, Merge Windows."

After chanting the spell all three windows including the windows he didn't open, merged into one, creating 5 tabs on one window, the first one being the 'Customization', second the 'Skills/Spells', Third the 'Missions/Quests, ‘fourth the Map’, and fifth the 'Notifications'. Great!

'Good job merging those windows Ken, now go and finish the mission.' -White-

"Okay! But before that, I'm going to turn on the notifications tab, to alert us of any updates on the system by opening a window at the side of my peripheral vision, but let's turn off the notifications on skills for now, I fear they may pop out one after the other if they level up."

Ken then proceeds to turn off the notification bells on his skills manually.

" .... And Done! Let's go!"

----------

Walking deep into the cave, Ken noticed a subtle change, little holes are appearing the further he walked into the cave, light poured out on them, so he dispersed his orb of light as the surroundings became brighter.

He’d encountered monsters lurking around on this cave, so far, it has been the same monster that he fought, a big snake the size of the one him and his friends fought back outside the entrance of the forest, and he noticed that they have glowing red eyes, even though their scales are colored white.

He killed ten of the snakes, which made all the levels of his skills rise by… no level at all. Other types of changes that he’d noticed is that plants are starting to appear, most particularly, moss, he do not know why, but he suspect there's a body of water nearby.

*Hisssssss*

‘Are you kidding me right now? Another snake?’ Turning around to where the sound came from , a snake crawled forth from a fairly big hole from the side of the cave, and with the light from the holes, Ken could see its color, which is green.

This snake is quite long, and bigger than the one's he’d fought before but since the cave is humongous -a bit of an exaggeration-, it was still able to move freely inside the cave,

It only took a long time for its very, very long body to come out of the hole it came through, which made it a painstaking moments of wait for Ken, the guy’s prepared here now, with his scythe and garments intact, and all the spells he has ready to be casted.

‘Oh no wait, why am I waiting for my enemy to get done preparing when I can literally attack them and be done with it -Apparently it's etiquette to let your enemy finish preparing in order to face its adversary, to be fair and polite kind of way-,’

Noticing that the snake was almost done preparing, it turned its head towards Ken, and correct him if he is wrong, but, did it just flash its eyes at him?

‘I CANNOT STAND IDLY BY!!!! It's time to strike!!!!’ he tightened his grip on his scythe.

"Lightning magic: lightning bolt!" he used his scythe as the casting point as it created a magic circle -the color of yellow- that summoned a lightning. The lightning strikes the long green snake creating a massive thundering sound.

*BOOM*

*ROOOOAAAAARRRR* Making it scream in agony, -try imagining the roar with that of king ghidora getting beaten up, have you seen Godzilla King of the Monsters? no? okay.

*yellow crackles*

Jumping back a good 10 meters away and putting a distance between them, Ken watched as the snake writhed in pain, trying to disperse the electric shocks on its body,

It's quite intelligent if he might add, as it struck its tail on the ground in seconds, nullifying the effects of the lightning, the snake turned to his direction, a menacing glint on its eyes, but the boy just smirked.

"Momentum magic: Flight.” he floated in the air as the magic circle the color of grey behind him glimmered, it’s machinations infusing his body with the spell. He flew to the wall of the cave.

Going at the side of the circumference of the cave, he can see how big this part of the cave was now compared to when he came inside.

Without sparing Ken another chance of thought, the snake coiled on itself and launched itself towards the boy’s direction, a gasp stuck in his throat as he dodged clumsily, but he evaded the snake’s attack nonetheless.

‘That was close! I could have been eaten alive, the mouth was so near, good thing I dodged in time. Oh no it's doing it again. ‘

"Arcane magic: Blink Zone." Blinking away from the jaws of the snake, and appearing behind it, gave Ken the ample time to strike.

"Earth and Nature Magic: Piercing Thorns!" A combination of earth and vine spear-like pillars, with a size nearly half of the circumference of the snake, shot from the earth around the snake impaling it's sides, drawing blood, and caging the snake inside the vertically aligned spikes,

But not on the center of its body, it's scales seem to be stronger. ‘Well then let's see if it can handle this.’

Blinks away, and appears above the snake, quite near the ceiling of the cave, drawing his scythe.

"Wind magic: Scythe cut!" together with the swing of his scythe, a big wind blade the size of 1/4 of the snake’s length, bursts forth, and aimed vertically towards the snake’s body.

*BOOM*

'Gotcha!'

*ROAR!*

The snake's scream bellowed around the cave making it quake noticeably, small rocks fell from the ceiling and unto the ground, Ken’s gaze frantically shifted everywhere trying to find the snake-

*SMASH!*

"UGGGGHHHH!!!!!!" Ken get's toppled to the side, but before he could recover-

*SPEW*

Flame bursts from the mouth of the snake

*Blink*

Thankfully his blink spell is still active, if not, he would have been roasted alive, looking back at the snake by the corner of the cave he’s at, it's still spewing flames from its mouth from where he was moments ago.

The snake's flame breath falters, then stopping completely, then starts wiggling out and biting of the earth, and vine cage

‘Now's my chance, and without it noticing, let's give him, a single target skill, but this time, it'll finish it.’ he strapped his scythe unto his back and held both hands in front, with the palms facing up, in a position of begging, but in this case, it's more of preparing another skill.

Conjuring a fire at the top of his hands, he concentrated its intensity with his magic, turning the once orange flame slowly, into blue, then finally into white, its energy coursing around in white lightning crackles.

"Follow the path unto the sun, may your legions become undone, burn the path set before me, ignite your light to let it all free."

Revealing himself to the snake, he held his hand out with the ball of white fire, making the snake look his way, it screamed a viciously worried roar, as if it's both angry and anxious, making it bite off and wiggle out of the cage faster, - well too late for that-.

"Fire magic: LAGUNA BLADE!"

*BLAST*

A quick burst of white lightning from the ball of white crackling fire from his hands struck the green snake, hitting it in the face, creating a loud boom, then burning and peeling off its skin down to its bones in just a few seconds as the white lightning consumed it's head and quite possibly 1/4 of its upper body, incinerates it into oblivion.

(A.N.: before anyone could sue me for copyright purposes, because I used a familiar skill from a popular game, I just want to say that I am a fan of Warcraft and, and was awe-inspired by their choice of words when naming a skill and it's visual representation.

I became even more fascinated when DOTA 2 came into public, it's visual representation of the skill "Laguna Blade" by the hero "Lina" made me extremely happy -even if it's just a worldly satisfaction- and think 'that I just had to use and see this hero in action' and after playing the game and using her for quite some time,

I became satisfied, and it is only now that I remembered to use her skill as a reference to the skill used by my character in this story, I am not saying all rights belong to me seeing as I had only copied it, it belongs to the producer and maker of the game.)

Finally, that last skill left Ken gasping for air as the extensive use of mana wore him out, good thing he cultivates and trains his magic by using too much spells in a day that he’s able to deal with the backlash of using such a high tiered skill, and he’s not even a teen yet! Just a toddler, but when one’s mentality age is over 20, then they can achieve great feats....

‘Enough chitchat, I need to get a move on, but first, I need to heal, myself.’

"Healing magic: Regeneration." Ken sighed in relief from the cool and calming sensation coursing through his body.

‘I'll have to take a rest for a while, since the magic I used took quite a huge chunk of my mana pool.’ situating himself unto an indian position and laying his scythe in front of him, hands clasped together,

he slowly but surely filled back his mana pool, while also increasing the proficiency and efficiency of his magic, as well as inserting a little bit of training for his magic, to enlarge his mana pool.

-A few hours later-

One thing he noticed after he finished recovering however, is the blinking red dot of his notifications. Checking it moments after, greeted him with the increase of… are those points? For his skills? His level ranked up thought, but what’s with the points or something?

It read like this.

[ Fire Magic: Laguna Blade Level:1 Points: 10/200 ]

‘But wow, that's quite surprising, since I hadn't noticed it before in my character stats, or did White add another feature, hmmmmmmmmmmmm...........’

'Before you get anymore second thoughts, yes, I had added a new feature to your status window, one that will keep track of your development in all aspects, not quite all but the majority of it.' -White-

"Oh thank you, and seeing as my status window dictated that I am at level 10 with my stats over 20, I think that fight with the green snake, really did its job." Ken nodded approvingly.

'Right, but be on the look-out for new things, I have a feeling there's a much greater battle you will be facing on ahead.' said White, concern dripping from his voice.

"Okay, but just so I can reassure you that I will be fine, I'll definitely find another way to survive if I have to come across a battle greater than what I had faced." The boy replied to the ball of white, determined to survive for the sake of his mission and purpose here on this planet.

And to find out why he has that points thingy on his skills.

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