Chapter 1: Innate Abilities
Inside a temple.
"Hey, why are you taking so long? There are still people next to you! SPEED UP!" A teenager shouted at the guy in front of the altar.
"Hey. Stop shouting at me." The guy glanced intently at the teenager who was shouting at him.
"O-Okay. Sorry." The teenager was slightly scared when the guy looked at him.
"I'm really sorry, Mister Nathan, but I think the Great God have yet to recognize your achievement in life." The priest who was standing behind said, feeling sorry for the guy in the altar.
"Psh. From what I know, I've done so many things in these past two years. And yet... hah." Nathan walked away from the altar and exited the temple peacefully.
•
Nathan was walking beside the kingdom walls and heading straight towards the city. He was admiring the beauty of its largeness until he saw people who were showing off their skills to each other.
"I'm already 18 but I never saw a hint of a system interface in front of me. I don't even have the skill to use." Nathan released a heavy sigh with his frustrated look.
In this world where God gives every person a leveling system of their own by the time they became 15 years old, everyone was strong enough to live on their own. They can get new skills that were suitable for their class or job at least once a year if they had done enough achievements to be recognized by the great god.
Everyone assists people, gets a job, slays monster, or registers in a guild to complete quests with the help of their systems. But out of those people full of fortunes, there was this one guy struggling to survive normally.
Even though he did everything to make his life be filled with achievements...
He doesn't have a system.
He doesn't have the god's blessing to help him get a better life of his own.
He's barely living by leasing necessities like food and money from his good friends.
"Hm... just why did I suddenly remember my past? Anyway, I heard from the priest that Neil got his new skill. I might as well greet him." Nathan said to himself as strode towards a certain direction.
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Nathan walked passed the main city that was crowded with people and merchants and finally stopped at the two-story house made of painted and polished granite in the middle of a small town near a river. He walked in front of the door and knocked a few times to let the person inside hear him.
Creak.
"Oh! Nathan, you're finally here! We've been waiting for you, you know. Come inside." A beautiful lady with a short purple hair welcomed Nathan.
"Uh... Claire? Why are you here? Where's Neil?" Asked Nathan who was slightly surprised.
"Of course, I'll be here too. I came here to congratulate him. Tyler is also here." Claire spoke with a careless tone.
"Oh, uhm. Did you have some food to eat?" Nathan replied as he scratched his cheek with his finger.
"Pfft! Always thinking about food, eh? Of course, we have brought some! Neil was the one cooking though."
A moment later, Nathan sat on a wooden sofa opposite to Claire and his other friend with a blonde and curly hair, Tyler.
Four cups of tea were placed on top of the table in front of everyone. Soon after, a delicious-looking grilled meats, slices of bacon and four baked brown breads were placed next to the four cups.
Puff!
A guy sat next to Nathan then he looked at him with a what-the-hell expression on his face.
"Oh, what the hell! You're drooling Nathan. Yuck." The guy said.
The two people at their opposite looked at Nathan and giggled when they heard what the other guy said to him.
"Don't say 'Yuck', you bastard! You know I've always been like this when you, Chef Neil, made some good food." Nathan replied, slightly embarrassed.
"Hey. I'm no chef. You're the one who's always hungry that's why you're drooling over every food. You even eat over six times a day when we're not busy. Am I right guys?" Neil glanced at their two friends on the other sofa, wanting for an answer.
"YEAAAH!"
"Sure."
Both Claire and Tyler nodded and immediately agreed.
"Oh, come on! Anyways, let's celebrate Neil's new skill Then we eat after!" Nathan said joyously.
"Yeah, yeah. You just want to eat the fo-"
"CONGRATULATIONS...! TO...! NEIL DENVER!" Before Neil could continue Nathan already shouted his words and the other two followed him after.
•
After they ate all of their meals, they relaxed on the sofa, feeling pleased and refreshed.
"AH! Neil can you observe Nathan with your new skill. Check his stats. And ours also. I bet his attributes are now lower than us. I think he's been lazy this year. hehe."
Claire excitedly spoke her thoughts the moment she remembered that Nathan was stronger than all of them in terms of attributes the last time the priests observed his stats with the attributes orb a few years ago.
"And you can also remember things super clearly, right? This is gonna be interesting!"
"Ah, yes! I remember that we checked all our stats when we were fifteen and Nathan had the highest attributes just by crazily training so hard back then." Neil chuckled.
"But unfortunately for Nathan, he somehow didn't get a system like we did," Tyler said.
"Eh?! Hey, why do you have to be so bitter?" Claire said, quite confused as to why Tyler said something so opposite to the cheery atmosphere.
"No, it's fine. Tyler has always been straight forward with his words and what he just said is also the truth."
Just as Nathan said that, a smile formed on his face.
"You can check my whole stats now, Neil."
"Uhm... Okay! I'll read it one by one so listen carefully, alright?"
Neil replied while his eyes were like shining with a blue tint before he continued, "Oh, wow! No way! This is... Nathan, did you train hard this year again?"
"Huh? I barely even moved my body. All I can remember this year so far was eat, drink, and sleep. Nothing more." Nathan said honestly.
"Really? Then why is your Strength changed from what it was before? I remember clearly it was 64 a few years ago but now it's 126, Your Agility was 68 to 131, Stamina was 71 to 139, Endurance was 61 was 119, Mana was 6 to 23, and your Luck was 3 to 12."
Neil said as he used his highly superior autobiographical memory to remember Nathan's Attributes.
"What!? How is that possible–"
"OH! Nathan, you're training even without having a system. You're really determined to become a strong adult!" Claire said, interrupting Nathan.
Looking at her excited face, she was obviously happy for Nathan.
"Uh but I really didn't do anythi-"
"Hm? Nathan, you are actually good at this. I think you're gonna catch up to us in no time. If we're going to do nothing forever that is." Tyler said with a straight face and once again Nathan got cut.
"Hey. I told you guys that I wasn't training in these few yea-"
"Uhm-hm. N-Nathan. Y-You..." Neil said while he was observing Liam's stats.
"Ugh. What is it now?" Nathan annoyedly asked.
"You got... skills," Neil said while he don't know whether to be happy or be confused.
"What? Don't joke on me like that, Neil. I'll tell you, it's not funny." Nathan said helplessly.
"I-It's true! It said here that it's an innate ability. The first one was Quality Hider and the second was Gluttony." Neil said.
Nathan jumped from his seat and looked at his friend beside him.
"WHAT!? Really! T-then what can it do? Please tell me. Tell me the details!"
"Sure. The first one can completely hide a person's... achievements in life and skills to all the unknown species." Neil said, quite confused by the skill.
"What!? Then... Then even The Great God didn't give me a system and skills because... Even god can't see my achievements... What the hell is wrong with that skill!"
Nathan's expression turned gloomy as he realized that, but it instantly changed back into a cheerful one.
"Ah! Just tell me what's the next skill!" He said hurriedly as he couldn't wait anymore.
"Gluttony, absorbs every food that the user eats, which has a strong body and mind before it died, will make it into increasing the user's attributes. When you kill a monster or a..."
Neil suddenly paused for a moment before he continued to read it again.
"When activated, you can absorb one of the target's skills and a small quantity of every attribute it has."
"I-Is that really true, Neil?"
"How can I lie when it might hurt your feelings."
"HOLY CRAP! THIS IS REALLY GOOOOOOOD!!!"
°
Nathan was complimented for almost half an hour by all of his friends including Tyler, who was always straight forward with his words, was happy for Nathan, then he decided to go into the forest immediately to kill some weak monster.
"Okay, guys! I'm off! I'm gonna catch up to y'all!hehe!"
"You greedy bastard. Don't eat all the monsters there. That's gross." Claire followed up.
"I'm not really gonna eat them with my mouth, you..." Nathan said.
"Also, Nathan, remember this, don't tell the monarch's soldiers or the authorities of the kingdom about your innate abilities," Tyler said with a serious face.
"Sure, I'll remember that. I'll be leaving now then." Nathan immediately agreed.
Seeing someone with a serious face like Tyler right now, he can't just accept what he just requested.
Nathan soon left and closed the door, then Neil glanced at Tyler with a confused look.
"Why did you tell him that?" Neil asked.
"I once heard from the high priests that someone with an innate ability, will likely to receive a very high treatment from the authorities or the barons, and on the other hand if the innate ability is something they cannot consider to be good for the kingdom, the person with that innate ability will be detained in the great prison for their whole life."
"W-what are they thinking?" Claire said.
"And right now, Nathan has two Innate Abilities. We also don't know how powerful his ability is so we can just hope that the authorities won't find out about his innate abilities."
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Around the corner of the forest.
Nathan was hiding behind a tree while peeking at the green slime that was jumping aimlessly in the small grassland surrounded by thick trees.
"Okay... This is my chance!"
Nathan jumped out and swung his wooden sword towards the slime, but the slime suddenly bounced and dodged in the nicked of time and landed towards his face.
PWHACK!
Nathan was pushed back before he saw the slime flying towards his face once again. He panicked and swung his sword in the air aimlessly. Luckily, he hit the slime and it was forced to slam on the ground.
With his strength of a below-average adventurer, he can surely kill the slime with ease if he has a weapon or so. As soon as Nathan saw the slime not moving in an inch, he heaved a sigh of relief.
A moment later, Nathan crouched and moved his body near the slime.
"So uhm how do I do this? It says glutton, right? Probably open my mouth?" Nathan said before swallowing a dry saliva as he knew that his idea wasn't good.
While Nathan actually did what he said by slowly moving his head towards the slime, a tiny little red ant was sneakily crawling towards his right leg and suddenly, it bit him really bad.
"OWW! What the hell!"
Nathan lost his balance and fell forward. He accidentally touched the slime with his right hand for a moment but he pulled it back again.
Suddenly, an eerie feeling crept in his body. He felt like something was crawling in the middle of his right hand's palm, he first thought that it was the ants again, but when he saw it, he was shocked and fell on his butt.
A deep, dark-red mouth without a lip but with sharp teeth and tongue was formed in his palms. It looked devilish and demonic.
"Ho-Holy Sh!t!"
Nathan shouted at the top of his lungs as he looked at it more. While he was shocked-silly and busy moving his hands away from his face, he noticed that a dark air was slowly moving towards his palm.
Nathan realized that it was the slime that was being sucked by the mouth in his palm. He was reluctant at first, but he now thought that it was his skill's process of doing the absorbing part, so he moved his hands near it.
The slime got dark for a moment then it dispersed and got sucked by the mouth in his palm.
"This... No way. I learned something."
Nathan didn't believe it at first, then realized that he really learned a skill. It was like he mastered it for months and it just became a part of his memory.
"Bash'? Is it called Bash?"
Yes, it is Bash. He learned to bash. Bash... with greatness and strength.
"So I can bump the target with it or headbutt with it. 'Kay! Even though it sucks a bit, I finally learned an offensive skill! HAHAHAH-!"
He then wiped the blood coming out from his nose because of the attack from the slime earlier, he even scratched the spot where the ant bit him.
'Oh! I also felt an energy of strength flowed inside me earlier. Perhaps it was the attributes.'
While he was in deep thought, suddenly, he felt like the demonic mouth in his hand opened again but when he looked at it, nothing has changed.
It was just his smooth palm.
A second later, something carved into his mind.
It was a new skill!
"WHAT!? Don't tell me it's... from the ant? Finger Stinger? What in the actual hell is that?"
Once again, Nathan learned a new skill. Finger Stinger. It sure was a great skill. You can poke anyone or anything and made them go 'OWW! It stings!' respectively.
He was still deep in thought. He was understanding about how the hell does the skill he got was considered a skill. Nathan didn't know that something unimaginable was going to happen soon.
But let us focus on the present for a moment because Nathan was still lurking deep in the corner of the forest.
"Hmm? Why are the birds flying away from the city?" Nathan was surprised as he saw flocks of birds flying
quickly away from a certain direction.
Then his question seems to have an immediate answer...
When suddenly...
BOOOOOOOM!
The air rippled and the earth shook.
Nathan lost his balance and fell on the ground. He quickly turned around to see where the explosion came from, but when he saw the direction, his expression immediately turned grave.
"Its... The city..."
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Pyurnt
Pyurnt Better watch out...
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone