I am lucky.
Not the kind of lucky people talk about when something good happens to them. Not winning the lottery or stumbling into success. Just lucky enough to be surviving.
Lucky enough to be living on my own despite how bad the economy has gotten. Lucky enough to afford a small apartment at the edge of the city, even if it comes with a commute that eats up nearly two hours of my life every single day.
The place is nothing special. One bedroom. A cramped kitchen. A living room that doubles as a dining area because there is no real space to separate the two. The walls are thin enough that I can hear my neighbors argue and thick enough that they cannot hear me exist. It is quiet when I need it to be and lonely when I notice.
It is tiring. It is unfulfilling. It is repetitive.
But it is mine.
This has been my life since I turned twenty-two. Four years of waking up before sunrise, riding packed trains, staring at screens, and coming home too exhausted to do anything meaningful with what little time I have left. My job does not follow me home, mostly because it is not worth bringing back with me. Somewhere along the way, I stopped thinking about what I wanted to become and started focusing on what I could realistically maintain.
This is the life meant for me.
At least, that is what I told myself.
I am normal by most metrics. No exceptional intelligence. No athletic talent worth mentioning. No inherited wealth or powerful connections. I used to have dreams, once. Big ones. Loud ones. But dreams are fragile things, and mine cracked quietly over time until I stopped noticing the pieces under my feet.
I gave up on them a long time ago.
Still, even a life like mine can change.
Especially when the world itself decides to stop being normal.
The first rift appeared on the other side of the world.
That is what the news said, anyway. A tear in the sky that cameras struggled to focus on, hovering above a city whose name trended for days before everything else began to collapse under the weight of panic. Experts argued. Governments reassured. Commentators filled the air with speculation.
Then more rifts appeared.
Not just in the sky, but in the ground, in the ocean, in places where reality itself seemed to thin and peel back. Things that should not exist stepped through. Creatures pulled straight from mythology. Demons that laughed at bullets. Beasts whose bodies ignored physics. Even advanced civilizations that treated our technology like outdated toys.
The impossible became real.
And the world responded.
Not with unity or preparation, but with something else entirely. A system. A safety net, as some would later call it. A mechanism designed to preserve the inhabitants of this reality.
It manifested as status screens.
As gifts.
As power.
People began awakening abilities that defied logic. Fire bending to their will. Strength that bent steel. Magic that rewrote the rules of combat. Those who awakened early became the first fighters. The first defenders. The first heroes.
And the first to die.
Not everyone received their gift at the same time.
Most awakened near the beginning.
I did not.
When the rifts finally reached my city, the change was immediate and violent.
Sirens screamed without pause. Smoke climbed into the sky from places I used to recognize. The streets emptied, then filled again with people running for their lives. I watched from my apartment window as flashes of light tore through familiar intersections. Fire bloomed where cars once waited at traffic lights. The sounds that followed were not ones I had words for.
I did not wait for instructions.
I read the writing on the wall.
I drained my savings account in less than two days. Food. Water. Medical supplies. Batteries. Anything that did not spoil and could keep me alive if the outside world collapsed completely. While others debated evacuation or waited for rescue, I shut my door and locked myself inside.
If the world was ending, I would let it end without me in the streets.
The news stations fell silent one by one. Internet access became unreliable, then sporadic. But I could still see them from my window. The awakened. People fighting back against creatures that should have slaughtered them effortlessly. Some wielded magic. Others moved faster than humanly possible. A few shone like living weapons.
I watched.
And I waited.
Days turned into weeks.
By the third week, hope had dulled into resignation. I began to think that whatever system governed this new world had simply passed me over. That I would remain what I had always been, a bystander surviving on caution and luck until one of those ran out.
Then it happened.
I was sitting on the floor of my living room, my back against the couch, counting cans out of boredom and habit. It was a pointless exercise. I had already memorized my supplies days ago. Still, it gave my hands something to do.
The air in front of me shifted.
Not violently. Not dramatically.
It simply changed.
A translucent screen unfolded into existence, floating just within arm's reach. There was no sound. No light. No pressure. Just words, sharp and unmistakable.
[Unique Gift Acquired]
My heart slammed against my ribs.
I stared at the screen, afraid to blink.
[Past Life Embodiment]
Understanding followed immediately, pouring into my mind like water filling cracks I did not know were there. Not learned. Not explained.
Remembered.
[Past Life Embodiment]
A diminished derivative of the legendary Past Life Summoning skill.
Rather than manifesting past incarnations as independent entities or guiding others into their former selves, this ability turns inward. The user draws upon fragmented memories, instincts, and experiences from their own previous lives, temporarily embodying a selected past self.
Each embodiment overlays the user's current body with the mentality, skills, and combat habits of that incarnation. While physical attributes remain bound by the user's present limits, proficiency, decision-making, and specialized techniques reflect the chosen past life.
Upon the first successful embodiment of a past self, the user permanently inherits one skill from that incarnation. This inherited skill may be passive or active, but is always a degraded or incomplete version of the original ability. It scales with the user's growth rather than the past life's peak strength.
Subsequent embodiments of the same past self deepen mastery but grant no additional permanent skills.
Due to its incomplete nature, embodiment is unstable and mentally taxing. Only a limited number of past selves can be accessed, and switching between them requires focus and recovery time.
Repeated use improves synchronization, unlocking clearer memories, longer durations, and stronger resonance. With sufficient mastery, this ability may evolve closer to its legendary counterpart.
Current Limit:
• Maximum of 3 distinct Past Selves
• One embodiment active at a time
• One permanent skill gained per Past Self
The screen faded as quietly as it had appeared.
I sat there in silence, my hands trembling in my lap.
No fire danced across my skin. No surge of strength lifted me from the floor. There was no immediate transformation, no sign that I had become one of the heroes I had watched from my window.
Just me.
And something else.
An echo. A pressure at the edge of my thoughts. Memories that were not mine pressing gently against my awareness, waiting to be acknowledged. Lives lived under different skies. Battles fought with different stakes. Knowledge earned through paths I had never walked.
For the first time in years, my heart raced with something that was not fear.
It was anticipation.
Maybe this was not the life meant for me after all.