1 Chapter 1: I hate him!

"You've got to be kidding me!" I screamed while closing my phone's browser. "How could he waste that kind of power!?"

I was in a bad mood. Scratch that. Bad doesn't begin to describe what I'm feeling.

"And he has the nerve of calling himself a gamer!" I stood up from the bench I sat on. "The story implies, no, it stated he gained his powers because he played an obscene amount of games if I understood right!"

I began to walk to my home after getting tired of waiting for a bus at this hour of the night. It was 10 for crying out loud!

"The Gamer!?" I said, sarcastically while making it sound like a question. "More like The Waster!" By this point, I was already aware of how much disturbance I was causing with my screaming.

I had a stupid day, yeah, that describes it well enough. What happened? I had to take a flight for one. It was delayed. But that isn't the worst part. The worst part is that the airline moved my flight to next week! The nerve with these people! However, we could come to an understanding. Which included that a private plane was going be my private limousine for some time in exchange of me no suing the hell out them

Who am I that a big entity like the airline would be willing to go that far so that I don't sue them? I am a lawyer. Well, not anymore because I left that life behind. I am also an Engineer, but I only focused on personal projects nowadays. But that still doesn't explain the reason the airline reached an "understanding" with me. Well, when your company is being threatened by the Lawyer that sued the government every chance he got and won, plus sued some big names companies to the ground, you might do anything to get him off of you. That's me.

I started my law career with a bang. I was a full-time Lawyer for about five years. The five years of hell as some of my colleagues called it. I worked some people to the bone. But I'm getting sidetracked.

As of this moment, I'm angry. Why? Because of a web novel called The Gamer! I stopped reading it years ago because of a slow release rate. I picked it back up, hoping that things got better. But no, the MC of that story is a moron. He obtained a power that makes life be a literal game for him. He even has the body of a game character. He can improve himself with stats and leveling up like a game. What does he do with that? He becomes a mage of course. Don't get me wrong, I love mages. But he has the bleeding fucking power to become a jack of none, master of all kind of guy. Heck, he hasn't even explored what the limits of his power are.

Yeah, a story with an OP character that can do everything can become repetitive at some point. But for fuck's sake, he lives in a world where the top of the power scale are not Gods. A world where almost everyone is out to get him because of his power. And he becomes a bloody mage! The kind of mage from games that are horrible at close combat or fighting with no mana for the sake of game balance. So if he runs out of mana-which the MC made it close to impossible for that to happen because he literally placed ALL his stats points on INT-his mana is sealed, or anything that can stop him from using mana for a spell, then his fucked. Heck, some guys that only used close combat where very close on getting the drop on him when he was full-on Merlin with his magic.

If I had his power, not even Gandalf the white would take me lightly. And haven't even gone over how many advantages the MC has with his powers. Nor have I mentioned the most irritating part about the MC.

The most irritating part about him is his complete utter lack of deduction skills! How? He once looked at other people stats and saw they were higher than their level. Did he put two and two together and realized that one can gain stats by exercising and training? Nope. As a matter of fact, he never brought up that point again. Well, at the part that I stopped reading at least, but that doesn't matter. As a gamer, he should've guessed he could gain stats by training instead of leveling up like crazy! Why? Because there are a bunch of games where you gain INT stats by reading! Or STR stats by exercising!

"But he mainly invested his stats on intelligence! How on earth did he not realize that!?" I was about to throw my suitcase because of anger until I heard something.

I looked around me and noticed there were no people around me. I was alone, on the street, at night and in a bad part of Los Angeles. I started to get paranoid and walked quicker.

"It is bad to walk around these parts at night." I heard a deep voice, but I didn't know where it came from. My walking speed was just short of being running speed.

"You could get robbed." I heard another voice, this one no as deep as the other.

"Like this." Two grown men jumped out of nowhere. One has the same skin tone as me. The other has lighter skinned and had features that identified him from El Salvador.

I raised my hands when I noticed that man from El Salvador had a gun on his hand, pointing at me. I looked at the guy with darker skin. It was kind of hard to see his face, but I could see some similarities with someone I know.

"Max? Is that you?" I asked.

"I told you he realized it was you. You should've used a mask." The man from El Salvador said.

"Max, what the hell are you doing? You gave me a heart attack." I lowered my hands with a sigh of relief.

"You shouldn't have done it, Nero. We had a good thing going on." Max said, ominously.

"You mean that deal? You all knew I wasn't one of those guys." I had a bad feeling about this. "My limit is just some minor lawbreaking and guys that had been forced to do things against their will, Max. Like you"

"Yeah, I know, but the boss didn't listen. He is used to things going his way." Max close his eyes. "Now he is going to make an example out of you."

"What the hell, Max!" I raised my voice. "Moreover, you shouldn't even be working for that elusive boss of yours anymore. We made a deal."

"Yeah, you did," Max replied. " I don't work for him anymore, but he has my family, Nero. I have no choice in this."

"Then what? You're here to threaten me into something?" I asked.

"We both know that a mere threat won't work with you." He waved his right hand. "Who would dare do that to the Kingpin?"

"You know I hate that name, Max " I narrowed my eyes.

"Yeah, you do," Max said while playing with one of his long, dark braided hairs. "I've been ordered to dispose of you."

Everything felt colder once the words I feared would come came out Max's mouth.

"And you going to pin it on a robbery gone wrong, I suppose," I replied, as calm as I could while I thought of a way to get out of this. I was still holding my suitcase. I could throw it to the guy holding the gun.

"There you are. No losing your cool against adversi-" Max was on the middle of saying, but stopped abruptly when he saw my suitcase flying towards the guy with the gun.

The suitcase hit the hand with the gun. A shot was released when my suitcase made contact. I tried to run, but I hear four more gunshots. I was surprised. I was falling. My chest hurts in four different places. I hit the ground. The pain didn't allow me to move. It was hard to breathe.

"I'm sorry, Nero." I hear Max's voice. He then showed up in front of me, holding the same gun the other guy dropped.

"How?" I said aloud with difficulty. "I saw the gun….fall far away enough."

"There are things about the world that you don't know, Nero." He paused. "And will never know." He pointed the gun to my head and shot.

*****

Everything went dark for me since that day.

I have been floating inside this darkness since then. "It feels as if I'm floating on water," I said.

I didn't know how long I've been floating around here, but I guessed it has been a long time. I couldn't feel my hands or feet. It was like I didn't have them, which I reckoned was the case. I have read a lot about not having a body when one dies in novels, so I wasn't surprised.

However, I was surprised about something else. The darkness around me that was like water, I could control it. Bend it to my will. So I played around with it due to the fact I couldn't do anything else.

****

It took me a while, but I found a way to see. Not how I used to when I was alive. If I had to compare it with something, then it would be to how slimes from fantasy novels see. No eyes, but they can see all around themselves. I could see I was in some kind of empty space. It was white, I think. I was also able to see what became of me.

I was a shining blue light. At first, I thought it was my soul. But I dismiss it due to the fact I didn't have a ghostly body. I arrived at the conclusion that what I was, went deeper than the soul. My essence or spirit. Something that is protected by the soul an then the body.

"Maybe this space is the inside of my soul." I guessed.

I was confused. If this was the inside of my soul, then what was the energy I've been bending to my will in all its forms. Yeah, forms. I came to realize that the water-like thing that surrounded me was some kind of energy once I could see again. I was even able to control this space once I felt that this energy was transforming into it all around me.

It reminded me to something a science teacher taught me when I was in high school. Energy cannot be created or destroyed, all converted. The same applies to mass.

It took me a while to understand the implications of that sentence. When wood is burned, is it really destroyed? No. It converts to something else, charcoal. When water is heated, is it erase? No. It becomes vapor, gets trap in the clouds and becomes water again.

In conclusion, whatever this energy is, it can be converted into a soul.

***

I've kept myself busy playing around my soul space. I discovered that I will the energy to become basically anything I want. So I decided to call it Mana. As that is the only kind of energy I know that acts the same way.

So, with this discovery, I created a planet. Yeah, a planet. I have a fuck load of time, ok. I have been doing some tweaks here and there to make it seem as real as I could.

I even created a big chair on top of a mountain to look down at what I created. Not that I can seat on it anyway. But I can still hover low enough and make it seem as if I'm seating.

"How I wish I had The Gamer's power when I was alive or any power if it could have saved my life," I said. I don't know how I can speak if I'm being honest. I just accept the fact I can.

"Now that I think of it, why haven't I gone crazy already? Or I already am? No, crazy people don't question when they have lost a few screws, I think.

***

I have been re-thinking many things that happened in my life. I was surprised I could remember them with such clarity. It was as if I was watching a video of my own life. But it all came down to one thing.

I hate him. I hate The Gamer. I already made my case as to why. There are more things I could add, but I prefer to keep my health...mental health. Even though I doubt it would matter in my current situation.

***

Something weird has happened or is happening.

You have died

A weird game notification showed up in front of me reading; you have died.

"Of course, Sherlock. I have been dead for a while now." I said, for my own amusement.

I didn't think I was dreaming. Why? Because I don't sleep of course. I'm dead. The dead don't sleep, I guess.

How did this happen? Well, I ended up complaining about The Gamer again. I went along the lines of wishing I had that kind of power. I complained vividly until I realized that the Mana all over the place, which was more than before because of the planet I created, was moving wildly all over the place. It was like a storm. A storm that came crashing down on me. I thought I was going to die, again. But the only thing that happened once that storm of Mana crashed against me, was the appearance of the game notification that is in front of me.

Reviving into a safe location

"What!?" I said as the Mana from all around the moved wildly and surrounded. I felt as if I was in the middle of a tornado. Then everything went dark.