2 Recognizing Reality

It had been several weeks since he came here. Five weeks to be exact.

Even if Alexei wanted to, knowing no plausible way to go back, he could only accept that he had truly transmigrated. He became another person, and a lab rat of those people everyone on the continent called abyss mages.

Setbacks often made people more mature because they compelled people to face the reality that they couldn't always stay in their comfort zone and that there would always be times when things would not go their way.

Alexei was not sure whether all the tortures and inexplicable experiments he went through could be described as a mere setback, but his temperament did change, from a goofy lad into a taciturn one.

The stupid guy who kept asking questions and courting death on the first day of his transmigration disappeared. He became quiet and learned to observe more, all for the purpose of lowering his sense of existence in hopes that the sessions he would have with those monsters dressed as humans would lessen.

'Abyss magicians, huh.'

Lying on the cold, dirty floor of his own cell, Alexei stared into the darkness and laughed satirically. His own eyes didn't seem as bright as they used to be. No part of his body was not screaming in pain after another 'session' in the lab. He was covered with wounds and if there was only a better source of illumination in the place apart from the flickering lamp outside, his unnatural purplish pale complexion would become more visible.

Recalling all the abominable things fed to him and that ominous magical power that they kept trying to assimilate into his body, Alexei just felt too tired that he wanted to die. If he looked in the mirror, would he still recognize himself? He felt that with each passing day, something was changing or dying inside him.

In the distance, cries from children echoed, accompanied by ceaseless whimpers and groans. The darkness made his other senses especially acute so he could hear it all.

The soft and weak voices coming from all directions were either begging for food or death. A few were simply sobbing without uttering anything else. If he guessed correctly, there were also kids who had completely broken down and passed their time staring blankly in the darkness or mumbling incoherently.

Alexei used to sympathize with them. And even now, he still did. Yet he knew for himself that there was nothing he could do to help them.

Entertain the thought of helping others? Laughable. If he was that capable, would he still have to ingest several types of poisonous concoctions every single day? Would he still be forcefully injected with magic powers that his body was incompatible with?

Everyone in the dark basement was helpless and going through the same torturous situation. In fact, Alexei's was probably worse since the blunder he made that day sparked the magicians' curiosity about him. More attention in this place meant more suffering.

The days that followed were dark. Considering the number of experiments being carried out and the magicians' disregard for consequences when feeding them poisons, it was just no wonder that deaths occurred every few hours.

Yet the horror did not end with that.

Alexei had a reason to fear death despite also wanting it. He did not know how they did it, but the abyss mages could actually extract souls and implant them into tall, menacing humanoid war machines. The extracted souls just looked so tragic. Their miserable cries echoed directly in the hearts of those watching.

The first time he witnessed the scene of a child's soul being implanted into the core of a robot-like creation, Alexei was completely scared out of his wits. He understood that if he died, the same situation would happen to his soul. The automaton's core would become his soul's prison which would deplete him little by little until he got replaced and then vanished out of existence. And as this happened, all his soul would be able to do was let out a wretched scream of pain. Who would want to undergo such a thing?

Right now, although he was also suffering, at least there was still hope. He still had the option not to give up on himself. What about those already fused with a machine?

Alexei feared though those large combat automatons since they really looked intimidating and evil, but at the same time, they helped him recognize where the heck he was now. That was the source of his newly found hope and confidence.

So what kind of world did he end up transmigrating into?

It was quite unbelievable but it was the world of the game that he had been playing for a year now.

Mavria, an open-world RPG game that had over a hundred playable characters with varying skills and abilities. Launched one and a half years before his transmigration, it quickly garnered popularity due to its fresh open-world system that gives players uninhibited freedom in exploration. Coupled with its breathtaking graphics, main story, and in-game sceneries, this game's player base easily reached a hundred million and it was still growing.

Alex Dixon, now Alexei Orlov , was just one of its many players. Amongst them, he used to be one of the very passionate and addicted ones who played for fifteen hours straight daily. However, when he reached his senior years in college and felt the impact of his addiction on his grades, he sobered up and rarely played unless it was the weekend or holidays. Despite this though, he could still be said loyal to Mavria because whenever a new update dropped, he would break his own rule and free up some time in the evening or the afternoon.

He remembered that the day he transmigrated was Saturday. Nothing big really happened on that day. He was reviewing for his finals in his dorm and did not even go out even when his buddies invited him to karaoke. The meals he had were all ordered from a nearby fast-food chain. There was really nothing special.

But when he had yet to adapt to the new life he had suddenly gotten, he once wondered whether he got punished by some weird god for falling asleep before his game could load.

It was such a stupid idea, he knew that.

Then he discovered, that time, the idea only crossed his mind because he had yet to fall into despair and had some free time to think of trivial things.

Now, when his survival was being threatened every single second spent in this place, would it still make sense for him to spare energy on useless musings?

'Alexei. Currently 15 years old. One of the many playable characters in Mavria, released two months after launch.'

'Unique for having a boss counterpart.'

To distract himself from the noises outside and the pain torturing his nerves, he closed his eyes and recalled everything he knew about his current identity.

The world of Mavria was vast and home to several species and races. Humanity amongst them stood above all mortal races due to being favored by the gods. This favor manifested as magical gem-like items called Gifts which enable their owner to harness the power of the elements.

Currently, there were seven known elements. Light. Darkness. Water. Lighting. Fire. Earth. Wind. These elements could further be fused to produce interesting reactions. Mortals usually could not use these elements to conjure or perform anything magic-related, but thanks to Gifts, humans and other humanoid subspecies could.

But aside from Gifts, every major human kingdom had the backing of a Sovereign.

Legend had it that all Gifts bestowed to mankind were handed out by them. They were deities, but because they loved humankind so much, they still walked the land and lived with mortals.

Yes, Sovereigns were gods.

However, despite possessing memories of growing up in a kingdom under the jurisdiction of the Sovereign of Ice, Alexei could not understand why lofty beings like them cared so much about humans.

Anyways, 'Alexei' was from the northernmost part of Mavria, protected by the Sovereign of Ice who was also the Queen of the kingdom. Born in a normal household, his childhood days were ordinary. However, his storyline frequently mentioned that his father used to be an adventurer. The latter's tales of adventurers sparked something in his young heart, making him yearn for the same experiences.

Sadly, Alexei's current predicament was actually a result of his predecessor's moment of impulse. The young lad took on an adventure by himself, wanting to prove something to his father. However, due to inexperience, he got captured by the madmen from the Dark Palace who later on experimented and abused him.

In the story, Alexei stayed as a lab rat for two years before finally escaping. Yet, the place he escaped to was the abyss, a place suspected to be an entirely different world or plane that happened to be connected to Mavria. There, the playable character Alexei turned into a really strong person capable of fighting devils and abyss mages with his just two fists.

A year later, he returned to Mavria and became involved with a high-ranking general of the Snow Army, a military force created by the Sovereign of Ice. By this time, Alexei had completely like a different person. He constantly craved for battles, and was no longer naive and simple-minded. He knew how to scheme and was very adept in various types of weaponry. One of the Sovereigns recognized his talents and bestowed him with a Gift that enabled him to control water.

When the game plot started, Alexei was already a military diplomat sent to the kingdom of Yekary. Players first encountered him there and because he loved to treat people to luxurious meals and hand gifts, the overall impression was good. However, the next arcs revealed that his reason for staying in the kingdom was impure, and that behind his warm smiles was a horrible plot.

Alexei was called a villain because, in order to force the rulers of Yekary kingdom to hand over a special relic from their deceased Sovereign, he did not think twice about reviving an evil god hostile towards Yekary's late Sovereign. He did this despite knowing that countless families would die.

Of course, his attempts failed and no casualties occurred. After all, even though he was first introduced as a boss, he was meant to be a playable character. At the end of the battle, he was seen repenting for his actions. But because of the difficulty of the boss fight, the playable version was still not very well-liked by most of the players, and pretty much those who spent money to get him were fangirls fascinated by his design.

Several updates after that, people's impression of Alexei barely changed. Many predicted that he would be the first playable character to die in the story. And while it was first said by those players that disliked him, the theory was actually not that far-fetched since, in the boss fight, Alexei used powers that clearly did not originate from the gods. Many subsequent arcs also foreshadowed this. People said that the character Alexei would likely die to divine punishment or self-destruct from running two types of opposing powers in his body.

Then came the latest patch before Alex's transmigration. The character 'Alexei'did die, in the hands of the Sovereign he swore allegiance to no less.

Remembering all of this, Alexei's eyes regained a bit of luster. He did not care how the game plot proceeded after he transmigrated. He did not bother remembering the spoilers and data-mined details of the upcoming patch. All his focus was on the clues he pieced out from 'his' backstory.

'There is hope.'

Alexei did not want to die. And to not die, he had to escape this place. The story of his playable self gave him hope because it revealed that two years from now on, there would be an opportunity for him.

He had to seize that chance.

And actually, he had a hunch about what that opportunity would be.

While deep into his thoughts, Alex forced his body up and stared outside of his cell through the gaps of the iron bars...

His gaze could seemingly pierce through the walls before him. He kept staring in that direction until fatigue took him into a pitch-black, peaceful dreamland.