Volume 1 Chapter 2 A World with Dungeons (II)
When dungeons appeared in the world, there were also big changes in the human body.
This meant that all humans got the ability to have 'levels' and 'skills,' which are superhuman powers.
Moreover, when people thought "status" in their hearts, a feature called 'status' showed 'their level and skills' in their minds.
That's how it was.
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Yuuki Takeru
Level: 1
Skill: None
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At that time, the whole world was in an uproar, saying, "A game-like world has appeared!"
It's not surprising.
After a while, people who raised their levels and got skills started to appear on TV.
Then, those people who had raised their levels and gained skills showed superhuman abilities like movie heroes on TV, making those who were worried shout, "This is a great evolution of humanity!" "It's a blessing from the gods!"
And so, everyone in the world was excited and worried about this suddenly appeared mysterious ability.
In fact, more and more people appeared who raised their levels and got skills, and everyone became crazy about getting abilities.
As a result, the craze became a worldwide movement, and the sudden appearance of 'dungeons' and the mysterious abilities such as 'levels', 'skills' and 'statuses' that suddenly appeared among humans were all accepted.
* * *
'Level' is a numerical representation of one's current strength. The higher the level, the higher the physical ability will be and the more superhuman strength will be obtained.
By the way, 'Level 1' means the physical ability of an average human being, from children to the elderly.
Therefore, if you can reach level 2, you will gain power that exceeds the physical ability of an ordinary person.
...well, 'at least'.
To be 'clear', raising the level from 1 to 2 is much harder than you might think.
To explain how hard it is, you need to defeat monsters in the dungeon to get something called 'experience points' which helps you level up.
In other words, you can only level up by defeating monsters in the dungeon.
This means that if you do things outside the dungeon, like 'working out' or 'training,' you won't gain any 'experience points,' so you won't level up.
What's more, it means that 'people who can't enter dungeons can't get the benefits of human evolution.'
Additionally, it's still unclear why, but it has been found that the experience points needed to go from level 1 to level 2 are much higher compared to other level ups.
Simply put, 'it takes unusually high experience points to go from level 1 to 2.'
To give you an idea of how unusually high, the experience needed to go from level 2 to 3 is 'one-third of the experience' needed to go from level 1 to 2.
Even just this makes leveling up from 1 to 2 really hard, but there are more problems too.
For example, the first floor only has monsters that can be defeated even at level 1.
So if you keep defeating monsters on the first floor, you can gain experience points and eventually level up from 1 to 2.
However, to level up, you need to spend '3 hours every day' in the dungeon, hunting monsters on the first floor, and it is said to take '1 year' to achieve this.
Of course, if you stay in the dungeon for more than 3 hours and keep hunting monsters, you can reach level 2 in less than a year.
However, the effort required is considerable, and a strong body and mind are required to carry it out.
At least I can't.
By the way, the monsters on the second floor are too strong to be defeated at level 1, so a level 1 person who cannot advance beyond the second floor will have to retire here.
By the way, this 'difficulty in going from level 1 to level 2' is called the 'level 1 wall.'
But, ironically, thanks to the 'level 1 wall', it is said that there were no 'extra deaths' in the end.
In other words, it worked as a system to make those who dream of being dungeon seekers give up easily.
By the way, whether this 'level 1 wall'... no, whether dungeon creation itself happens naturally or by people is still not clear.
However, some say... "If the 'level 1 wall' was set up to prevent extra victims, then 'dungeons' must be good for humanity."
So, there are 'seekers' with superhuman powers, seen as 'human evolution', all around the world.
However, even among those seekers, there are naturally 'gaps in power', which are mostly divided by 'level difference'.
However, some can cover or even exceed that 'level difference' with their 'skills'.
For this reason, each country's government made one world-level measure based on the 'level, skills, and achievements' of the seekers.
That is the 'Seeker world ranking'.
And, in terms of personal strength, Japan was 'quite far behind' compared to other countries.
This is the biggest weakness for 'energy superpower Japan'... the 'lack of seekers'.
* * *
Thanks to the dungeon that appeared 20 years ago, I am now being bullied by 'dungeon seekers', who can be called 'evolved humans'.
This is absolutely the worst.
What's even worse is that Sagawa is good at hiding the fact that he's bullying me from everyone around him.
Therefore, Sagawa was seen by his teachers as a 'model high school student seeker with good behavior.'
Everyone in my class knew that Sagawa was bullying me... but no one told the teacher about it.
Well, that's understandable.
Because if I did that, I would just become a target of bullying.
I often feel angry about people who ignore bullying, but I don't think this way.
Because if I were in their shoes, I would do the same.
No one wants to be a target of bullying.
It just happened that I became the target... that's all.
I know it's unfair.
But the world is full of unfair things anyway.
So, I guess I have to accept it, right?
Because if I don't, my heart will break, right?
* * *
However, it seems my heart was more broken than I thought.
When the first term ended and summer vacation started, I kept thinking about 'how to die easily'.
And after summer vacation ended.
On the first day of the second term.
I noticed a girl in the same school uniform almost getting hit by a truck that was coming onto the sidewalk, so I ran to her and 'pushed her' out of the way.
As a result... I got hit by the truck.
The normal me, before being bullied, would never help her.
Because everyone values their own life.
But at that moment, I pushed her away to save her... well, it was probably because I thought about 'wanting to die' every day.
After all, the real me is a person who hates self-sacrifice.
My heart was broken and I was tempted by the devil.
Well, if you look at it from another perspective, I was emotionally broken and tempted to do something that was uncharacteristic of me to 'help people.'
Still, I don't think I'm kind enough to go to heaven for such a small act of goodness.
I'm a person who hates self-sacrifice.
"I guess nothing good happens after death..." I thought to myself as I was run over by a truck and left in tatters. As I was thinking this, my consciousness gradually faded, and then... I quietly took my last breath.
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