It was really late, and Johannes' eyelids slowly sank down, trying to meet each other halfway. Yet, many questions had been running through his mind - questions that he could not forget.
Even though he had gotten gradually more tired, stress-induced insomnia regularly checked up on him and pulled him out of his attempts to fall asleep.
It was as if it had materialized and pulled up his eyelids, almost working against gravity. Forced to stay awake, the questions kept appearing.
How would my family react if I suddenly stopped needing the tubes? And how would I be able to hide this fact from them? It was true. Johannes' body had changed, even if it was not much. However, it was enough to potentially out Johannes as an Awakened, even though he technically was not a classic one.
The grey and lifeless building he called hospital and the cold bed with its painful mattress now felt like a cage that he had no means to escape from.
His illness and the hospital were the sole reason he had to come up with an explanation for his newfound ability to breathe. Even though the nurses knew, he would not let more people know.
As he lay in his soft prison, the heavy blanket was weighing down on him as his anxiety rose. His head felt hot, and a slight headache chained him to his bed. Not that he could have stood up anyway.
A thought entered his mind as if it used his ears to climb into his brain.
What if I just go with the idea that I've been awakened? It's not that unlikely for one to become an Awakened nowadays. Nothing bad should happen as long as no authorities or social media hear of an Awakened who gradually improves.
Johannes' anxiety sunk down, and eventually, he calmed down. Because he would technically tell people the truth.
Awakened are people who have been granted the powers of skills. Their body structure appeared to be different from normal human beings. Not only was it way sturdier, but it also had much more strength than a normal person.
Johannes's only mishap in his story of awakening might be his weak body. It was nowhere near the power of those hefty Awakened builds.
Technically speaking, there had been weak Awakened. But Johannes did not want to risk more than he had to.
Furthermore, Johannes would have liked to hide his changes for as long as possible. His situation had always been rough and if at some point word came out that he was not actually an Awakened but was able to buy skills?
Man, people nowadays can be pretty terrifying, too.
With the mere idea of what could happen, his pale body shuddered. He had never heard of anyone who could buy skills inside a shop that did not use real money and use them as easily as he did. While people can technically learn new skills from skill books that occasionally appeared, they would go to hefty lengths to learn the abilities.
Because the requirements to learn such skills were extraordinarily more complex than obtaining the book. Thus, most of these books were sold to the strongest Divers to gather money for better gear. That was the quickest way to get stronger.
I am a Fighter, not a Diver. Or at least for now?
He was determined to hide that fact for as long as possible until he was strong enough to defend himself when people understood that he kept growing. For some sick reason, there are people out there who want to squash upcoming Divers in order to stay relevant themselves.
Divers were categorized into ranks, and those of higher ranks wanted to stay at the top. The categorization spanned from SSS at the top to SS, S, A, B, C, D, E, and lastly F.
At some point, the S rank became too inflationary, so they added SS. When people stronger than SS Divers appeared, they had to add yet another system to evaluate their strength properly.
Nowadays, they all get assigned numbers as well. With this, Divers can drop out of their ranks if they decline in their ranks due to either not diving or other people climbing over them.
Hence, Divers of lower ranks will do everything to keep others under their ranks.
After this really tiring night, Johannes's eyelids closed as if forced to. He could not stay awake any longer and accepted the warm embrace of sleep.
[Breathing lvl 2]
[Hint: Raise Your Levels By Breathing]
Johannes woke up to the messages of the mysterious blue screen.
Thanks. Who could have guessed that [Breathing] levels by breathing? he muttered mockingly.
Well, it's 7 AM, and nobody has been here by now. Anyway, I want to try meditation now.
He paused as if waiting to see if anyone would enter through the wooden oak door, slightly scratching his head as he continued his thought.
A confident knock hammered on his door. Johannes assumed the weekly medical round was about to be held, and he figured his room could not be skipped for obvious reasons.
- and concentrate on my breathing... Yeah, never mind that.
Johannes' favourite doctor greeted him with a delightful grin. This man looked way too young to already be a doctor; in fact, he looked around Johannes's age. His brown curly hair matched his eye colour - both could be described as burnt umber. Johannes felt envious, considering how much he had achieved at an assumably young age in comparison to him. Remembering that he had at least surpassed him in height, he threw away his jealousy.
Dr. Hof seemed to be alone today. And while he slowly walked in, he began to speak.
"My, my. Where are your tubes? I heard from the nurses, but could it actually be?"
"Good morning, Dr. Hof. Uhm. Yeah, I don't want this to get out yet. Did the nurses snitch on me?" Johannes felt slightly annoyed, his tongue clicking as he asked who had outed him.
"Don't fret about it. I've known you and your late father for a bit now. I won't do that to you. How do you feel? Did your body change?"
"In a sense, it did. For starters, I can breathe on my own. But you already saw that." Johannes had hoped Dr. Hof would stop asking questions. He neither wanted to lie to him nor did he want to tell him everything.
"I'd love to ask you about your skills and other changes, but I know this is bad taste. If you ever feel like it, though, just tell me. I'll be going to the other rooms now. Just remember that we all are happy you can breathe alone now."
Dr. Hof grinned, turned around, and left the room with a last wave from the backside of his hand.
Alright. Where was I? Meditation. Breathing. And so forth.
Now that he could finally begin, closing his eyes was the first step. A rather uncomfortable position in which he attempted to sit cross-legged followed. Ignoring the awkward pose, he breathed in and out slowly.
His lungs were slowly filled with air, growing in size. While he pressed out the air, his mind was calm. It almost went blank until he found himself standing in an infinite room full of darkness.
[You Have Entered The Dark Room], the system let Johannes know.
The weak Johannes could now see himself as he was almost floating. Mocking his own body, he gazed upon his fragile shell. Then, suddenly, a man approached him. His appearance looked like one of those dramas he used to watch.
With a towering physique that would make most Divers pale in comparison, he slowly closed the distance between them. The weakest man in the room thought his forearms looked bigger than Johannes' legs.
Strength. This man was oozing strength - that was an undeniable fact as obvious as the principles of physicality.