The Fortune System: Son Of Wealth

The FORST I

Nathan's body lay still on the ground, motionless for an enduring thirty minutes. The air held a palpable stillness, broken only by the faint ticking of a distant clock. Then, a heartbeat echoed through the room, breaking the silence like a gentle drum.

Minutes later, a more robust heartbeat reverberated, sending a subtle pulse that seemed to resonate throughout the entire room. The stillness of Nathan's form was interrupted, and the steady rhythm hinted at a resurgence of life, casting a hopeful shadow over the once-muted scene.

Half a minute crawled by, marking the arrival of another heartbeat. Soon, Nathan's pulse regained its regular cadence, but a subtle shift lingered in the air – each heartbeat resonated with newfound strength.

A gasp escaped, a breathy punctuation in the room's stillness. Then, a prolonged, deep intake of air echoed as Nathan wrestled back to life. Swiftly rising from the ground, he scurried to the wall, settling into a lotus position. Even in his seated repose, he continued to breathe fervently, the rhythm of his breaths mirroring the intensity of the moments that had just transpired.

Having danced on the edge of mortality for the past three hours, Nathan now clung to life with each heavy breath. The solution, it seemed, lay in the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest, a determined effort to ward off the specter of death.

As he continued the vigorous breathing, Nathan became aware that the pain that had gripped him earlier had dissipated. With the easing of his discomfort, the intensity of his heavy breaths waned, allowing him a moment to cautiously assess his own condition.

As anticipated, the bones that had jutted out from Nathan's body were now conspicuous by their absence, but the evidence of his ordeal lingered in the form of dried blood clinging to his skin.

Surprisingly, instead of feeling drained after the harrowing experience, Nathan found himself pulsating with a newfound energy. It surged through him, an electrifying force that demanded an outlet. Unable to contain it, he channeled this vigor into a spontaneous burst of physical activity. Starting with push-ups, he transitioned seamlessly, delivering punches with precision to the two hardened yet smooth sections of the wall. Each movement radiated a vitality that seemed to defy the recent encounter with mortality.

As the surge of energy found its release, Nathan gradually settled into a newfound calmness. Returning to his seated position, his face bore an expression of sheer astonishment.

Uncertain about the reality of the experiences preceding the fainting spells, Nathan clung to one undeniable truth. With a profound certainty, he acknowledged that he now possessed a strength that dwarfed his previous capabilities, a revelation that left him in awe of the inexplicable transformation he had undergone.

In the ongoing struggle to comprehend the inexplicable events, Nathan found himself engulfed in contemplation for several more hours. The passage of time went unnoticed as he grappled with the implications of his newfound strength.

As the clock struck midnight, marking the inception of a new week, Nathan remained wide awake, lost in his thoughts. The quietude of the late hour was abruptly shattered when the same voice that had reached him hours ago echoed once again, jolting him from his contemplative reverie.

The white panel materialized once again, echoing the words, {Please, roll the dice to begin for the week.} This visual prompt mirrored the spoken directive from before. While Nathan harbored a desire to delve into the myriad questions crowding his thoughts, an unspoken urgency compelled him to prioritize something else at this moment.

The Dice.

Nathan's eyes scanned the entire floor, a focused search underway for the dice he had casually tossed aside earlier.

The mention of the dice triggered a recollection, bringing not only their existence to the forefront of his mind but also something else that had been lurking in the recesses of his memory.

Those dice appeared to be intricately linked to whatever had transpired with him, and Nathan couldn't afford to misplace them before unraveling the mysteries of his recent experiences.

Within mere seconds, he located the dice and gingerly retrieved the two tiny cubes from the pool of blood on the floor. The significance of these seemingly ordinary objects now held a weighty importance in Nathan's quest for understanding.

"Excuse me. Who and where are you?" Nathan inquired, holding the acquired dice, finally obtaining what he had sought from the outset.

A moment of silence followed, and Nathan wondered if his query had gone unnoticed. Just as he contemplated asking again, a response to his question reached him, breaking the silence that hung in the air.

{Answering both questions will certainly consume a lot of time, and time is something we lack. The answer to those questions will be fed to your brain in the form of memories, and I'm sure you'll understand better that way.} The unexpected response was a promise, assuring Nathan that the answers he sought would be directly transferred to his mind.

Now armed with new knowledge, Nathan deduced two critical aspects. The speaker, it seemed, was female, and whatever entity or force it represented possessed the ability to transmit information directly into his brain.

The first revelation about the speaker's gender became apparent through repeated encounters with the voice. However, the second aspect remained speculative, requiring tangible proof. Before Nathan could articulate his request for confirmation, the proof manifested abruptly.

A sharp, electrifying sound—Bzzzt!—filled the air, causing Nathan's body to quiver as if jolted by electricity. Simultaneously, a searing pain surged through his head, providing an undeniable and visceral confirmation of the speaker's ability to transfer information directly into his mind.

"Ouch!" Nathan exclaimed, rubbing his temples, and was instantly assailed by a flood of new memories. These recollections weren't his own, yet they felt intimately familiar.

As the memories settled within his brain, Nathan found himself naturally equipped with the answers to the questions he had posed earlier. The unique transfer of information had not only left him physically discomforted but also gifted him with a profound understanding that transcended traditional forms of communication.

"So you're saying you're a self-aware system that only responds to a certain lineage, and you've been in existence for over a thousand years?" Nathan voiced his thoughts aloud, even though the room was empty. He harbored the certainty that his questions wouldn't be left unanswered.

{Precisely. I am the system and guide that led to the rise of your ancestors as well as their downfall. Those before you have enjoyed not only wealth but also power, knowledge, ideas, growth, and command above all human limits, but unfortunately, they all fell to greed, which led to their falls.}