The first trace of the awakened dated to the time the first plague struck a large city and consumed it with everyone there.
The plague in question was a gate where monsters resided in and used to pass into our world. However, a plague was much different and more dangerous.
It was a situation whereby a large section of land, probably a large section of a city, or maybe even the entirety of the city, was consumed by a domain.
In this domain lay a barrier that caged the section it consumed, allowing none to enter but monsters to leave through it.
From the few plagues that had opened around the world, with only a few cleared, there was little to no information about plagues known to the public.
But thanks to being an original, I learned that within the dome of a plague, there are about dozens of massive portals and an army of monsters waiting to pour out and end humanity.
To some extent, this is no different from my original world...
"Wake up." Drake felt a violent tug on his arm, causing him to wake from his deep thoughts.
With a yawn, he stared at a male right beside him.
It was a young man, red-haired, having bold dashing features, a friendly gaze, and wearing a dark battle suit provided by the academy before their departure.
It took time before Drake gathered his thoughts, taking a long stare around the entire vicinity.
He was in a large bus used to convey many of the students to the dungeon they were going to clear. Right now, he was sitting with fellow originals, which meant he had been separated from Tessa.
Turning to his side back to the red-haired boy, Drake smiled, "Thanks, Darwin."
Darwin formed a crooked smile on his countenance, taking his time before speaking, "Your ability is SSS Rank."
Drake nodded in response.
"They are summoning-type abilities. Don't they mean they are weak?" Darwin asked in the nicest tone he could muster.
He was a nice person after all, maybe even the nicest among the originals, so none of his words were perceived as a threat, only mere concerns.
Drake had no reply for Darwin's question. Simply, he nodded and turned away from him, taking his gaze to the window right next to him and watching the buildings as the car went by them.
'Sorry, but I don't have the time to wallow in my incompetence, I have to find a way around it.'
Summoning the interface once more, Drake swiftly went through the information again, and when he did, he noticed something he hadn't seen before.
A section that had not been visible to him up until now.
'Was it because I was in a rush earlier—or did it just appear out of nowhere?'
{Talent Description: Only the dead can control the dead.}
You can summon dragons to become your anchor to the underworld.
{Number of dragons: 1}
{Army: none}
{Draconic Body: 0}
{Evolution: none}
'What is this? Evolution? Draconic body?' Drake's entire being froze as he read the last parts of the interface again to confirm his eyes had not been deceiving him.
However, it was not.
In a normal system interface everyone possessed, according to the textbooks and all he had seen, it only displayed information on the person, talent, and description.
However, he had never heard of a system that stated anything about evolution.
'What does all this even mean?' Drake asked himself, letting out a frustrated sigh from his mouth.
'I have no way to know what this means unless I ask someone high up.' For a moment, his mind swayed to asking his father, but as quickly as the thought came, he dismissed it. 'No—'
The Headmaster was another choice. 'I'm close to that old geezer. When I get back from the hunt, I hope he'll still be alive to answer my question.'
As if on cue, the bus they were in came to a halt, its tires sending a screeching noise in reply to their ignorance of over-speeding.
Soon enough, the other bus made the same sound right behind them, and the doors of the bus swung wide open.
One after the other, the students were ordered to alight from the bus, and they did. The originals, trained to their core, marched out with confidence.
The same could not be said about the other bus of students.
Drake was one of the last to alight from the bus, his shoes landing on the torn-up pebble-like floors.
Raising his gaze from the ground, he scanned around the place.
It was an environment, a cityside long abandoned and destroyed until there were little to no structures around. The sky looked superficial, or more appropriately put, there was a thick layer of purple-like smoke in the air that blocked out the sunlight, turning the world into a twilight-hued atmosphere.
And there was something about the place that reeked, a stench Drake, despite smelling for the first time, was unnervingly used to.
—The stench of death.
'So this is what a dungeon really looks like.' Drake felt a knot in his stomach as his gaze finally landed on a large purple circular portal in the distance, swirling endlessly and exuding a loud crackling sound, like thunder.
Kresha, who was one of the instructors that had come with them for the dungeon hunt, walked to the front of all the students. "This will be your first dungeon raid, hunt, whichever you pick.
And for this, the academy has selected an E-rank Bronze dungeon for you all to clear. You are expected to help one another and adhere to the Headmaster's instructions."
He turned around dramatically and pointed at the large swirling portal in the distance. "That is a dungeon, a place where many will die, a place where the law is not honored. So any you call friend can choose to show you a much different side to them in there—"
At this point, his eyes fell to the originals, in particular Drake, with a sinister glee on his expression. "So if I were you, the monsters there wouldn't be my only worry."