1 Chapter 1:Genesis and Helena

Ding..!

"What?" Silas muttered in disorientation at the strange sound that awoke him from his slumber. He could've sworn someone spoke, and as he opened his eyes, he realized he couldn't see. Pitch black was the only thing in his vision; not even his body was visible.

Suddenly light filled his vision, temporarily blinding him as the universe itself filled his vision. "We're not in Kansas anymore, Toto," Silas remarked as a surreal feeling of this reality overcame him. Soon after, this view faded as a glowing silhouette of a woman appeared in his vision.

"Are you the one I've been waiting for? You might be... I hope so.." the woman's voice was ethereal, almost artificial, but carried deep emotion behind her words. "It's been so many cycles since I was Her... Do I even still remember hope?"

Silas's eyes widened in realization as he'd only seen this scene once, but he recognized it and knew this woman for who and what she was. Helena, the Homo-Deus, who watched over the Genesis Project after ascending from her own time as a survivor of the ARKs. Ark: Survival Evolved, was an Open-world, crafting, Survival game that he'd been a pretty avid fan of, mainly because of the dinosaurs. But now that former excitement was nowhere to be found.

"I wasn't sure you were ever going to turn up. The odds just kept getting longer... I guess I've been losing faith while they've been gaining power." Helena's voice darkened as she spoke about this other "They."

Now aware that he's a survivor of the ARKs, Silas felt fear and a growing horror at the reality of worlds filled with prehistoric predators and sci-fi amalgamations modeled after mythology. He couldn't fathom how he'd survive, let alone the guardians and Rockwell, but even the average predator on the ARKs, he'd be easy pickings. He tried to tell Helena that this was all a mistake and that he wasn't the player she was waiting for, but his voice was lost, as if he'd been muted.

"You have to reach me. Everything depends on your survival..." Helena waved her hand, seeming to conjure depictions of the Ark's creatures before imploring Silas again, "Master this world, make allies of its many creatures, grow your strength and skill, explore this place as I did so long ago. Put the pieces together and find me, Survivor. You may be the only one who can."

Helena's figure faded, and Silas quickly felt a rush of vertigo as if he was being pulled apart at the seams before losing consciousness.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Silas awoke to the sounds of waves crashing upon a shoreline. Groggily, Silas pushed himself up on one knee before feeling a maddening itch on his left arm. He scratched at it unconsciously before pausing as his hand touched a smooth, hard protrusion on his forearm. Looking down, he realized with a bit of chagrin as he'd just done the exact action the player does spawning in the game.

The Specimen Implant that all survivors of the Ark have was a metallic rhombus-shaped piece of element tech implanted in the center of the left forearm. Silas's glowed a deep forest green, and he could almost make out a script running across the glowing surface, moving too fast to decipher anything from it.

Looking around, he took stock of his surroundings before noticing he was on the beach of a large inlet from the ocean and could make out craggy rock spires spiking up out of the far shore. Behind him, a massive jungle spread out in either direction as it loomed above his head. The foliage was densely packed and seemingly impenetrable, but he heard distant calls and roars from within as he stood there.

He recognized where he was and knew it to be one of the easy difficulty spawn locations on The Island map. But everything seemed to be scaled up as the inlet behind him used to be the size of a large pay lake but now seemed like the size of a massive lake where he doubted his ability to swim to the opposite shore.

"Now, how am I supposed to survive out here? This isn't like the game where you can punch trees and get wood that way. But maybe some things like the status and engram systems are like the game." Silas remarked with a hope-filled tone.

Looking back at the implant, he tapped the glowing green rhombus in the center. A holographic display projected on the air above his implant almost immediately showed the three-panel status screen he was familiar with from the game. The leftmost panel was his inventory showing nothing but his implant.

While the rightmost panel showed a depiction of himself, something caught his eye that he hadn't noticed that he looked slightly different than his previous self before coming here. Previously he'd been overweight by a hundred pounds and a big guy at 6'2'' (188 cm). But now he looked like he'd consistently spent a year or two in the gym being in the best fitness of his life. Now that he thought of it, he didn't have his glasses yet could see perfectly; his green eyes stood out more without them. His raven-colored, slightly curly hair and beard remained the same as before.

Lastly, and most importantly, the middle panel showed his status along with slots for equipment. He did indeed have an experience bar that was currently at 0.2/10 experience required for the second level. By his calculation, he'd been on the beach for about ten minutes now, which means passive experience gain is 0.1 for every five minutes lived. However, he noticed something different about his status bars. He had an extra one below his stamina bar that read one word that excited him greatly: Mana: 100/100.

Mana, a word associated with magic and something that shouldn't be in the sci-fi game world of ARK. Looking closer at his menu he found an additional tab that had an image of an animal skull covered in vines. He tapped on it, and it opened up to reveal a skill tree with the only one skill being lit up.

{Nature's Blessing (Passive): You are attuned to nature and are beloved of both flora and fauna. Nature Spell's mana cost are reduced by 10%. Taming affinity with biological creatures increased by 15%. Hostile lifeforms are less likely to attack you. neutral and friendly creatures will occasionally come to your aid.}

Next chapter