Chapter 2 -The First Number
973 Words
Chapter 2- The First Number
The hill was silent.
Kael stood before the tree, staring at the strange numbers floating above it.
Durability: 19
He blinked.
The numbers remained.
He stepped backward.
They remained.
He closed his eyes.
When he opened them again, they were still there.
“What… are you?”
The question left his mouth almost as a whisper.
No answer came.
Instead, something inside his mind seemed to respond.
Not with words.
With understanding.
Numerical System.
Kael’s breath caught.
The phrase appeared in his thoughts as naturally as if it had always belonged there.
He looked back at the tree.
The number 19 suddenly felt… incomplete.
As though it were a piece of information he had been given without being told what to do with it.
Then another thought appeared.
Increase.
Kael hesitated.
He didn’t know how he knew what it meant.
He simply did.
Slowly, he reached toward the tree.
Nothing happened.
He frowned.
“Increase.”
The moment he spoke the word, something shifted.
The number above the tree changed.
19 → 20
Kael froze.
A strange sensation passed through his hand.
The tree itself hadn’t changed visibly.
But somehow, he knew.
Its durability had increased.
His heart began pounding.
He stared at his palm.
Then at the tree.
Then back at the number.
“That’s impossible.”
He stepped closer.
His fingers touched the bark.
Solid.
Normal.
But underneath his fingertips, Kael could feel something different.
The tree was stronger.
Only by one.
But it was stronger.
Kael swallowed.
He had spent fifteen years being told that he was ordinary.
Broken.
Useless.
The Ghost.
The boy who had failed to awaken.
Yet now he was standing alone on a hill, staring at a power that seemed to ignore everything he had been taught about magic.
He smiled.
Just slightly.
For the first time in years, Kael felt something he had almost forgotten.
Hope.
Then the number changed.
His smile disappeared.
20 → 19
Kael stared.
“I didn’t do that.”
The number changed again.
19 → 18
A cold feeling crawled down his spine.
“Stop.”
It didn’t.
18 → 17
Kael stumbled backward.
The tree groaned.
A small c***k appeared along its bark.
“Stop!”
The number froze.
17
Silence returned.
Kael’s breathing became heavy.
He hadn’t touched the tree.
He hadn’t spoken Increase.
Something else had happened.
He looked around the empty hill.
Nothing.
No one.
Just the wind moving through the grass.
Then he noticed something.
The moment he had panicked, his thoughts had become scattered.
And somehow, the number had followed his thoughts.
Kael stared at the tree for several seconds.
Then he whispered:
“Decrease.”
The number dropped.
17 → 16
His eyes widened.
“So I can control it…”
He tried again.
16 → 15
Again.
15 → 14
He stopped.
His excitement faded.
There was something wrong.
He could change the number.
But he didn’t understand how far he could change it.
Or what would happen if he pushed too hard.
Kael looked toward the distant lights of the town.
He should return.
Tomorrow, people would expect the same Kael Ardyn.
The quiet orphan.
The failure.
The Ghost.
Nobody could know.
Not yet.
He turned away from the tree.
Then something appeared in his vision.
Not above the tree.
Not in the air.
Inside his mind.
A single line.
Understanding: Insufficient.
Kael stopped walking.
“What?”
Another line appeared.
Increase and Decrease require understanding.
He stared at the words.
So there was a limit.
He couldn’t simply think of a number and change everything.
He needed to understand what he was changing.
Kael slowly smiled.
“That makes sense.”
For once, his weakness didn’t feel like a weakness.
If understanding was the key…
Then he would learn.
He would study everything.
Magic.
Mana.
Monsters.
Weapons.
People.
The human body.
The world itself.
If everything possessed numbers, then perhaps everything could be changed.
And if that was true—
Kael looked back at the tree.
The number 14 hovered above it.
His smile disappeared.
A single thought entered his mind.
What happens when I reach zero?
The Numerical System gave no answer.
But somewhere beyond the hill, deep inside the forest, something opened its eyes.
Kael didn’t notice.
He didn’t hear the distant movement.
He didn’t see the shadow between the trees.
But the creature had sensed something.
Something it hadn’t sensed in years.
A strange fluctuation.
Small.
Weak.
Yet completely unfamiliar.
The creature lifted its head.
And for the first time in a very long time—
it smiled.
Back in town, Kael quietly entered the orphanage through the side door.
Most of the children were asleep.
He moved silently through the hallway and reached his room.
Mira was already asleep.
Kael sat on his bed.
He should have been tired.
Instead, his mind was racing.
He raised his hand.
Nothing happened.
He focused.
A tiny number appeared.
Mana: 3
Kael stared at it.
His heartbeat quickened.
He had mana.
Everyone knew humans possessed mana.
But people who awakened could manipulate it.
He had never been able to.
Until now.
Kael slowly clenched his fist.
The number remained.
3
Then another thought occurred to him.
If mana was a number…
Could he increase it?
He hesitated.
The memory of the tree cracking flashed through his mind.
He shouldn’t.
Not yet.
He needed to understand what he was doing first.
Kael lowered his hand.
Tomorrow, he would begin.
Not as the Ghost.
Not as the failure.
But as someone who had finally found a way to change his fate.
Outside the window, the moon disappeared behind a cloud.
And far beyond the orphanage walls, something whispered a name that Kael had not heard in years.
“Ardyn…”
The voice was ancient.
And afraid.
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