[Congratulations! You have been selected to compete in the King’s Game. Welcome to the King System.]

 

That was the message Grey Auburn was welcomed with around ten minutes into his walk back home from school.

 

Today had been the first day of finals and he was utterly exhausted, having played video games early into the morning last night despite knowing there were tests waiting for him the next day, and was just ready to go back to bed, made even worse that he didn’t have the money for any sort of transportation so he was forced to walk to and from school.

 

He stared at the words in front of him tiredly, wondering if he’d finally lost his mind.

 

“What in the world…”

 

However, before he could properly understand what exactly was happening, a flash of white blinded him, and he quickly fell into darkness.

 

…

 

Grey awoke with a blinding headache, unable to even open his eyes, but a flurry of words appeared in front of them anyway, visible even behind his eyelids.

 

[Player information collecting… Collection complete. Displaying information:

 

Name: Grey Auburn

 

Age: 19

 

Gender: Male

 

Strength: Extremely Weak]

 

Excuse you? What’s with this “extremely weak”?

 

[Starting at level 0. Player is weaker than normal. Commencing terrain building...]

 

At those words, the ground beneath him shook, forcing him to open his eyes, ignoring the pain brought on because of it.

 

He looked around, watching in awe as the reddish brown dirt he was lying on broke apart and jutted upwards; large chunks of red-brown rock and dirt floating around before connecting to a place completely separate of where it was taken from; everything broke apart and stuck itself back together until he was not sitting in an open area surrounded by large mountains.

 

“What- how-” He sputtered. “Where am I?”

 

[Terrain building complete. Red Mountains Area complete. Deploying monsters suitable for Player’s current level…]

 

Grey’s eyes widened as he watched slimes pop up from out of nowhere, small, round creatures slowly shuffling about.

 

[Jello Slimes deployed. Please select a starting weapon.]

 

Grey stared dumbly at the weapons that surrounded him from out of nowhere, hovering above the ground and slightly transparent.

 

He was greeted with the standard weapons such as a shortsword, broadsword, longsword, gloves, dual blades, wand/staff, axe, bow and rapier. Unsurprisingly, there was no firearm to be seen, but, like in most fantasy games, guns and the like usually aren’t an option.

 

Grey looked around at the weapons before looking back at the slimes. Was he actually transported into a different world to compete in some game?

 

“Uh, system?” He began hesitantly. “Like, this is cool and all, but I’d really rather go back home…”

 

[Player request denied. Please select a starting weapon.]

 

“Wha- denied? You didn’t even think about it!” He shouted. “I want to go home.”

 

[Player request denied. Please select a starting weapon.]

 

He clicked his tongue. “You know what? Fine. I’ll play your stupid game.”

 

Glaring at the weapons, he angrily selected the dual blades. Call him basic, but he’s always been a fan of the assassin type classes and the like.

 

Upon touching the transparent weapons, the blades materialized and weighed on his hands nicely, not too heavy but not too light.

 

The rest of the weapons disappeared upon his selection and the system gave another notification.

 

[Player has selected dual blades. Daily Quest has updated.]

 

Daily Quest?

 

[Daily Quest:

 

Pushups, 100: 0/100

 

Situps, 100: 0/100

 

Random Monster Eliminations:

 

Kill 10 Jello Slimes: 0/10]

 

… Wait, are you serious?

 

[Failure to complete the daily task will result in a punishment fitting of the Player’s level.]

 

Hold on, hold on, hold on- you can’t possibly be serious!

 

“Now wait a minute!” He snapped. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”

 

[Become the King. You will stay in the training area until deemed fit to begin the game. Good luck.]

 

With that, the system disappeared, leaving him all alone.

 

He stayed sitting there, frozen in shock, the sound of the slimes’ slimy bodies moving about the only other thing he could hear other than his own breathing and heartbeat.

 

Grey opened his mouth and closed it a few times over, unable to speak due to anger, looking like a fish. Finally, he fell back down, letting out a loud, “fuck!”

 

No one was around to hear him anyway.