My Mastery of the Vampire System

"Don’t die by falling over, David!" a boy yelled down the hallway. David continued walking down the school corridor. Though harassment was a daily ordeal for him, it still affected him deeply, and he found it hard not to respond. He stopped to adjust his glasses, which had slipped down his face. They were old, taped up, and poorly fitting. David turned around and gave the boy the middle finger. "I bet you don’t even know how many fingers I’m holding up!" The boy clenched his fists and ran towards David. "You level 1 piece of trash! When will you learn you don’t belong here?" The boy then formed a green ball of light between his hands. As he approached David, he hurled the light forward. David had no way to escape. The beam of light struck him, lifting him into the air and slamming him into the corridor wall. Nearby students whispered, "What’s going on? Are they fighting on the last day of school?" A crowd quickly gathered, intrigued by the commotion. A girl ran to the damaged wall to check on David but, upon seeing him, quickly backed away and joined her friends, who laughed at her. "I can’t believe you tried to help him," one friend said. "I didn’t see who it was," the girl replied, her cheeks flushed. David stood up, retrieved his glasses, and noticed one side had fallen off again. "Damn it. Not again..." It was the last day of school, and David wished for a day without trouble. He was exhausted and not the type to ignore mistreatment. He had seen others who endured worse by keeping quiet. David left the school early, bypassing the groups of students socializing. He wasn’t part of their farewells and didn’t want to be. At home, David entered his small single-bedroom apartment, which had a bed, a desk, and a wall-mounted TV he used for background noise. The government provided the apartment since he had no relatives and was only sixteen. On his bed lay a suitcase with all his belongings. David went straight to his desk, where he kept a large, black book with a ring design on the cover. "Let’s try again today," he said, placing the book on the desk. He retrieved a test tube with clear liquid. "Test 112, Hydrochloric acid. Let’s see how it goes." He poured the liquid onto the book but saw no reaction. After emptying the test tube, the book remained undamaged. "Another failure. Why won’t you open? Why did Mum and Dad even have this?" David had tried 112 methods to open the book, including burning, cutting, and melting, but it remained intact. Frustrated, he lay on his bed, turning on the TV for distraction. The news was reporting rising tensions with the Dalki, a race that had demanded Earth's resources thirty years ago. Their advanced technology had nearly defeated humanity until special individuals turned the tide, leading to a fragile peace. David’s parents had fought in the war and died when he was ten. The government provided his apartment but nothing else. An agent had given him the book, the only item his parents left behind. "Why is the world so unfair?" David lamented. He returned to his desk, picked up his slightly broken glasses, and tried to fix them. He pushed a lens back into place, but it shattered, cutting his thumb. "Why does the world hate me?" As David cleaned up the glass, a shard landed on the book. When he removed it, a drop of blood from his thumb fell onto the book, causing it to glow and lift into the air. "What the hell is happening!" The book shone brightly, shaking uncontrollably, and opened. Pages turned rapidly, and although the text was in an unfamiliar language, David felt he could understand it. As the last page turned, the book began to disintegrate, and David’s vision blurred. His body grew weak, and his eyes closed. Just before losing consciousness, David heard a final message: "Congratulations, you have been granted the Va...." Unable to stay awake, David passed out. Slowly David’s eyelids began to lift, and his vision started to return. His head felt heavy, and his body was slightly sore. As he lifted himself off the ground, he touched his head to check for any injuries. "Why does my head hurt so much?" After ensuring his skull hadn’t cracked from the fall, David went to pick up his glasses from the floor. Though there was only one lens now, David, out of habit, put the glasses on. Suddenly, he felt a bit disoriented, and his vision was slightly blurry. He took them off and noticed that his vision only became blurry when wearing the glasses. David rushed to his desk to grab a pencil. He drew the letter "A" on the wall and stepped back until his back hit the room wall. "What, but how?" David thought. Somehow, David’s vision was now perfect. He had lived his entire life with poor eyesight, but now he could see clearly. Flashbacks of what happened before he lost consciousness began to flood his mind, and he could think of only one thing: the book. David looked around the room in a panic. "The book! Where the hell is the book?" David searched everywhere for the book, but it was nowhere to be found. It couldn’t have vanished in such a small room, and its disappearance was driving David mad. "Maybe it’s like my socks—they always go missing? Ugh, that’s ridiculous; we’re talking about a book, not a sock." David then tried to recall what happened just before he passed out. He remembered the book lifting into the air and, just before his eyes closed, he heard some words. "What was that? It sounded like some sort of system message." As soon as David thought about it, a status screen appeared right before his eyes. user: David Sol race: Human level 1 0/100 exp HP 10/10 Strength: 10 Agility: 10 Stamina: 10 "Wow, it’s like those really old games people used to play all the time." David noticed additional tabs at the top of the status screen. Without doing anything, just reading the tab names in his mind, the screen switched automatically. Skills 0 skill points available Skill locked???? Skill locked???? ... On the Skills tab, David found little information. Most items were locked and slightly greyed out, so he quickly moved to the next tab labeled "Shop." Shop Unlocks at level 10 "Can I do anything?" The final tab was the Quest tab, which, unlike the others, wasn’t locked. Main quest Reach level 10 Daily Quest: Drink two l****s of water Reward: 5 exp After exploring the system’s features, David simply thought about closing the screen, and it vanished. Whenever he thought about reopening it, the screen would immediately appear before him. David could only think of one thing: the book his parents had left him was an ability book. Such books were typically expensive, available from the military, companies, or even the black market. However, David had never heard of an ability book that vanished and granted a system like this. Ability books were meant to be learned from, not something you could just pick up and instantly use. A smile slowly spread across David’s face. This was excellent news. He had always been a level 1 ability user due to the cost of ability books. Now, he had something, and his next step was to test his new abilities. "Fire, fire, come on!" David said, thrusting his palm forward. "Okay, next... Water, water out!" he repeated, but nothing happened. After trying various abilities, David found he couldn’t perform any of them. "What the hell is this useless thing? Is it really just a system ability?" David thought for a moment. If it worked like a game, completing quests might make him stronger and unlock more skills. Unlike ordinary ability books that focused on a single attribute, this system was different. Typically, ability books focused on one attribute. Choosing the first ability book was crucial because a regular human body could only support one ability type. For instance, a transformability book would only lead to other abilities related to transformation, and the same went for elements like fire. David then opened his mini-fridge and began drinking the bottles of water inside. "How much is two liters? My stomach feels like it’s going to burst." After finishing his eighth bottle, a new notification appeared. Daily Quest complete, 5 exp has been granted 5/100 exp "Well, at least I know the system works now." Suddenly, there was a loud knock at the door. David quickly opened it to find a large, muscular, bald-headed man in a black military uniform adorned with several medals. His name, Sergeant Griff, was prominently displayed on his chest. "Boy, it’s time for you to vacate your room immediately. The vehicle has been waiting outside for five minutes." David had forgotten about today’s event amidst all that had happened. "It’s time for you to head to military school," Griff said.