They took my charger. My charger.
Shizuku and Reika retreated victoriously, solar charger held like spoils of war. Both wore that smug, satisfied grin that said they would absolutely do it again.
Sighing, I casually reached into my pocket, and pulled out another one. After I reconnected my phone, I angled it toward the sunlight again.
Silence.
“Why do you have another one!?” my father demanded, sounding genuinely affronted by the mere existence of a second one.
“Where were you keeping that!?” Shizuku snapped. “Just how deep are your pockets!?”
I ignored the ninja daughter and turned to my father. “Hey,” I said, shrugging, “why don’t you have another one?”
Yep. That just made it worse.
Before I could protest, Arthur, Trayn, Taka, and—traitor that he was—my own brother Wills didn’t even bother trying to wrestle me this time. They just calmly plugged their phones into the extra connectors like this had always been the plan.
It’s not like I could do anything about it. My right side still hurt like hell, and I wasn’t about to start another round of slapstick combat with half my limbs screaming at me.
“Thanks, Vi,” Trayn said with a grin. “Knew we could count on you.”
Wills nodded. “Yep. Appreciate it.”
Heresy. Madness. Sparta. Betrayal. Absolute betrayal.
Arthur clapped his hands together, cheerful as ever. “Alright, everyone—you all could share that charger over there. We’ll be fine with this one.”
“Fine he said, wenyenye-wenyenyenye. Some hero you people are turning out to be. Not slaying demons. Not saving kingdoms. But stealing my charger,” I grumbled under my breath. I said all that in a tone that was complete mockery of Arthur’s voice.
Instead of getting angry it made Arthur laugh and the other three snicker instead.
What kind of isekai, shitty bargain-bin plot thing was this? Weren’t they supposed to be hyper-focused on leveling up? Grinding stats? Chasing destiny and the power of friendship? Instead, here we were, fighting over charging priority like commuters at an airport.
I’d been robbed. Robbed, I tell you. Anime lied to me.
I hopped—hopped, because walking normally was still out of the question—to another chair and collapsed into it. Injured. Pants recently violated. And now, against my will, running a public charging station.
Fantastic.
I sat there watching them argue back and forth about who was going first, which batch would use which charger, who needed their phone more. I supposed it couldn’t be helped. Those stupid little glowing rectangles were the last tangible link to the lives they’d all left behind.
That still didn’t mean they had to be vultures about it. Like this week couldn’t possibly get any worse.
Getting isekai’d was bad enough. Then less than a day in, my right eye, right hand, and right foot felt like they were on fire. Then came the bed rest and the apothecary.
I shuddered from remembering. Whoever decided that man was qualified to practice medicine deserved jail time. Or exile. Preferably both. I sighed and stared at the ceiling.
Yeah. Definitely not the heroic journey I was promised. Then again, I was never promised anything. I sighed again, sinking further into the chair. The events these past few days while I was bedridden wasn’t something to talk about as well.
My skill leveled up. Instead of
[Rare] Identify (10) ??????????
Now it’s
[Epic] True Sight Identification (2) ??????????
I didn’t have to say anything out loud anymore. No more awkward declarations, no chanting like some discount wannabe chuuni-wizard. I just had to focus, think the keyword—sight—and a screen of blue and gold popped up along the left edge of my vision.
The irony isn’t lost on me that I got this skill again. I laughed to myself. The fact that the skill that started it all was now back with me is just poetic irony. And I’m the fucking punchline.
To pass the time and get my mind of that line of thought, I tried it on a few people nearby. Most of them hadn’t gained any levels. No surprise there. Then I stopped.
Name: Annamaria Reyvidaneo
Level: 3
Experience: 25/655
Master Class: [Engineer]
Job Class: [Civil Engineer]
Subclass: [None]
ATTRIBUTES
HP: 373
MP: 426
Stamina: 444
Movement: 32
Stat Rating: 478
STATS
Strength: 48
Agility: 48
Endurance: 96
Intelligence: 149
Will: 67
Arcana: 70
SKILLS (ACTIVE)
[Rare] Design Creation (6) ??????????
[Rare] Mineral Analysis (0) ??????????
[Rare] Ground Survey (0) ??????????
[Rare] Foundation Survey (0) ??????????
SKILLS (PASSIVE)
[Rare] Expert Cooking (6) ??????????
[Rare] Expert Sewing (4) ??????????
[Rare] Expert Barber (3) ??????????
[Rare] Surveyor’s Intuition (7) ??????????
[Rare] Rapid Analysis (5) ??????????
[Rare] Rapid Calculations (7) ??????????
[Rare] Living Language Translation (10) ??????????
BONUS
[None]
DEBUFFS
[None]
TITLE
[Summoned]
My mom had leveled up twice. She gained +2 to Agility, +4 to Endurance, and +6 to Intelligence. Also, her cooking skill had gone up by one—which honestly made sense, considering she’d been feeding an entire small army for days.
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
I stared at her and after a while she noticed.
“…What?” she asked, tilting her head.
“Mom,” I said slowly, “you leveled up?”
She blinked. “I did?” Then she muttered the word status under her breath.
“Oh,” she said after a moment, sounding surprised. “I guess I did. I never noticed.” She looked back at me. “How could you tell?”
“That. Uh,” I scratched my cheek. “One of my skills leveled up. Identify turned into something else. Now I just—look at things, and information shows up.”
Trayn whistled. “Damn. That’s useful.”
“Really, you can tell just by looking?” Arthur asked, clearly impressed—and interested. Even the queen had gone quiet.
“Yeah,” I said, shrugging. “Something like that.”
I didn’t elaborate or rather fortunately I didn’t need to.
Before anyone could press further, the conversation nearby took a turn. Aika was arguing heatedly with one of the three idiots, voices rising fast enough that their teacher stepped in between them, hands raised, trying to calm things down.
The room’s attention shifted.
But even as everyone’s attention was turned to the arguing people, from the corner of my eyes, I can still see the queen. She was still observing me. Possibly, more intently than before.
Instead of focusing on her, I let the voices wash over me and sink into background noise as I leaned back, staring vaguely at nothing in particular and letting my thoughts drift.
They wandered back to the events of yesterday. My childhood, specifically, to Professor Rami’s lectures during my time with the Order was memorable enough. Especially the one about the ancient rivals of the Order. The ones who relied on systems.
Most system-based skills, he’d said, required practice. Repetition. And almost all of them needed to be activated explicitly—spoken aloud, tied to intent and familiarity.
Which raised a very obvious question.
How the hell had my skill leveled up while I was stuck in bed?
Simple.
I abused it. Relentlessly.
“Identify.” Chair. A wooden chair.
“Identify.” Bed. A decorated bed.
“Identify.” Ceiling. A decorated ceiling.
“Identify.” Cup. A glass cup.
“Identify.” Chamber pot. A decorated chamber pot.
“Identify.” Spoon. A silver spoon.
You get the idea. Why did I do it though?
Because there was nothing—to do!
I was bedridden. In pain. And worse, bored out of my skull. The books that crazy apothecary brought me—half alchemical nonsense, half religious rambling—I burned through them in no time. After that?
It was back to Identify. Again. And again. And again. And again. And again.
After doing that a prompt appeared.
[Skill: Identify has leveled up.]
[Skill: Identify level cap reached. Evolving.]
[Congratulations. You have acquired a new skill!][EPIC] True Sight Identification
Yeah. That happened.
<
A cool, melodic, slightly robotic British female voice echoed inside my head.
I groaned.
Yeah.
Her.
The other problem. Aside from the near ghostly wails that kept telling me to come find them.
Since continuing to spam Identify nonstop felt like a one-way ticket to actual insanity, I decided to investigate the other thing that I gained during our one-way summoning. The extra skill. The one that didn’t show up in the detector thingy that they used before.
It sat there in my status like a joke with no punchline.
[!*#$] Blank Core (0) ??????????
No description. No activation prompt. No helpful tooltip.
A blank core. Which of course the first thing that comes to mind, obviously is that it was meant to be filled. The thought had barely finished forming in my mind when a prompt appeared into view, hovering patiently in front of my vision.
[Would you like to upgrade Blank Core?][Y / N]
The voice that accompanied it was old. Ancient. Weathered. It sounded like it had watched civilizations rise and collapse out of boredom.
Either Gandalf. Or Saruman.
I’m betting Saruman. Definitely Saruman.
I didn’t hesitate.
Yes.
The moment the thought crossed my mind, the prompt expanded—unfurling into a dropdown menu so long it made my head hurt. Categories stacked upon categories. Concepts. Absolutes. Names that felt heavy just reading them.
Things like Sun, Rain, Earth, Sky, Land, Lightning, the list went on. The classics were there, of course. The Seven Sins like anger, lust and everything in between. Their opposing virtues was also present. And then things escalated. Azathoth. Cthulhu. Chaos.
So many things that sound all like a copy pasted Chuuni protagonist would pick. Or names that sounded like they’d been ripped straight out of some chuuni power fantasy written at three in the morning by someone hyped up on energy drinks and coffee.
Honestly? Half of it felt like shit. And I was bored just looking through the list. Bored out of my mind, half-broken, and itching for something to happen—even as the entire right side of my body protested the idea.
That was the danger though. Because choosing wasn’t just clicking a button.
It meant breaking and betraying something in equal measure.
The oath. My oath. The one I’d made long ago. An oath etched into my soul—not sworn to a god, but to beings that could only be described as God. Singular concept. Plural existence.
Something worse or better.
I couldn’t even remember which anymore.
Was it the oath that made me who I am? Or was it because of who I already was that I made the oath in the first place? Back then, I’d been so sure of myself. So proud. So angry. I had suffered loss deep enough to nearly shatter my soul.
Possibly I was riding a wave of righteous fury and teenage angst. Which is not a good combination in retrospect.
And now here I was again. Given a skill that started everything and another one that threatened to unravel everything I’d sworn to uphold.
Was this world fucking with me? The thought lingered as I stared at the list, memories surfacing—words I hadn’t spoken in millennia, yet remembered with perfect clarity.
If I want knowledge, I will learn it. If I want wisdom, I will seek it. If I want power, I will strive for it. I was not taught to be so weak that I would gladly take shortcuts when it is convenient. Much less proclaim things gained through such means to be my strength.
I sighed back then as the list waited patiently. Silent and unjudging.
By now, you already know what I chose. Back then, though, I withdrew into myself, into my domain—trying to justify it. I told myself that instead of accepting whatever this thing was offering, I would learn it. Make it part of something new. Something I didn’t yet understand.
Fortunately, Lantern raised no objections. It was still and silent. It was a good sign. I was not about to break that oath.
[Warning: Upgrading Blank Core is irreversible. Do you wish to continue?][Y / N]
In retrospect, I wish I hadn’t been warned. I wish I’d been reminded. Because knowing my luck, anything labeled irreversible was guaranteed to be some unholy combination of absurd, broken, catastrophic, and dangerous—in any order.
The warning should’ve said something like: Remember who you are! Or what happened last time!
The menu finished initializing, and a series of prompts came one after another.
[Congratulations. Blank Core has been upgraded successfully!]
[You have gained a new skill][!*#$] Knowledge Core [X]
[Warning: Knowledge Core can be integrated with a skill.]
[Would you like to integrate Knowledge Core with a skill?][Y / N]
This was the part where I really wished my personal preferences mattered. Because despite my choice, the world immediately followed up with—
[Warning: Knowledge Core cannot be integrated with skill: Master Cooking.]
Of course it couldn’t. You know, we had the chance to make this story about cooking but nope.
[Warning: Knowledge Core can only be integrated with an active skill.]
[Would you like to integrate Knowledge Core with a skill?][Y / N]
I sighed so deeply I was sure my ancestors felt it like I’d blasted hot air straight into their graves.
Fuck. There had only ever been one possible skill. So why the fuck not?
[Congratulations. Knowledge Core has been successfully integrated with skill: True Sight Identification]
[Skill: True Sight Identification has leveled up.]
[Knowledge Core has leveled up.]
[Knowledge Core has gained an ability: Retort.]
I sat there, in silence, staring, wondering what the fuck had I just done, for I believe was a long time.
Then she spoke. Her voice arrived like an uninvited, unwanted angel, one no one had summoned and no one certainly needed or even asked for.
<
“Motherfucker!” I screamed. Fortunately, no one was there to hear me.
If that was the “Retort” part of the upgrade, then I immediately regretted every decision I’d made in the last… ever.
I checked my skill.
“Identify,” I said, staring at the door. Nothing happened.
“…True Sight Identification.” Still nothing.
I tried a few more times, irritation and anger rising with every failed attempt.
<
I clenched my jaw, swallowed my pride, and did as—instructed. I focused, stared at the door, and thought sight. A prompt appeared and her voice read the prompt.
<
…Okay.
I breathed in. Then out. Deeply. Then I looked down.
<
Alright.
Then my eyes drifted—
<>
I screamed.
“FUCK!”
Yeah. That happened.
I exhaled slowly, rubbing my face. Just remembering the events these past few days was enough to make me tired. Yeah. I have a crap ton to deal with now.
First, it’s getting isekai’d. Then there is a risk of my family getting hurt. A busted right side. Some ghost people that kept insisting that I find them. And a sarcastic skill and a voice in my head that had opinions about my life choices.
Wonderful. I am having an absolutely wonderful week. I sighed. Then I noticed something. No one was talking anymore. I looked up.
Every single person in the room was staring at me. Mouths slightly open. Some eyes were wide. Some concerned. A few were confused.
I raised an eyebrow.
“Who are you talking to?!” Shizuku half-shouted from where she sat.
Ah.
“…Did I say any of that out loud?” I asked, as innocently as possible.
Arthur pointed at me. “You were mumbling to yourself! For a long time!”
I sighed again. Great.
Now I wasn’t just injured, pants-violated, and hosting a sentient system—I was officially that guy.
The guy everyone pretended not to notice while quietly moving sharp objects farther away.
This world was definitely gearing up to ruin my life in increasingly creative ways, wasn’t it?
Maybe—just maybe—if I threw a gravity bomb, it’ll all go away?
<
“…I didn’t ask,” I muttered.
Unfortunately, that only made things worse.
“See!” Shizuku said, throwing her hands up. “You’re doing it again!”
“I, am thinking!” I snapped. “Which is something I highly recommend the rest of you try!”
That earned me a few snickers, a glare from my father, and one very focused look from the queen.
When will this chapter end, I wonder.