Once again, Adam found himself alone in the darkness. However, this time he was accompanied by pain.

  Adams' head was a mess. Now that he was out of imminent danger, the weight of the last couple hours truly settled in. Over roughly 3 hours, everything in Adam’s life had been changed. Everyone he knew was trapped in an egg of light, he and at least one other person, Professor Greymore, had been sent into a death trap where they had to run away from literal MONSTERS, he had watched multiple people die horrific and violent deaths, hell he had even managed to kill a monster! With a piece of bone!

  Being saved by Luisa in the second wave and seeing the young man in the tree gain his sponsorship changed his way of thinking and gave Adam two goals. The first was to gain a sponsorship and escape the trial, and the other was to find Luisa’s family and deliver her last words. He had no idea if he was going to be able to complete the second goal but he was determined to at least try.

  He had no idea how much time had passed since he received his sponsorship and was thus removed from the trial, but he somehow knew that time HAD passed. The excruciating pain of broken bones and open wounds was now a dull ache accompanied by an ungodly itching sensation.

  There was something else that seemed off as well. The darkness he found himself in felt… different. Rather than feeling like he was floating in the void of space with no sense of his physical form, this time, he felt like he was hovering above the ground in a dark room.

  Adam attempted to reach out for something to grab and immediately regretted it as the pain in his left arm flared from the first wound he got during the trial: the pierced hole through his bicep from the boar skull. He hissed in pain and stopped searching for anything in his surroundings. His surroundings could wait, right now he wanted to know what would happen next now that he was out of the trial. He concentrated and tried to summon the previous system message but was taken aback when the space around him lit up, showing multiple different system screens worth of information.

  So I'm a 1%er now? Adam pessimistically thought. Everyone ALWAYS loves the 1%... Other than the fancy title, does that even benefit me in any way? He went back to the first screen and checked to see if he had missed something and saw a single sentence at the bottom that he had not noticed before.

  After he read that final line, the screen faded and was replaced by one of the others, this one was the same as the screens from the trial and had a pale gold color to it.

  Interesting… The system message was oddly kind. Previously, the system seemed to just provide information, rather than advice. Maybe one of the many screens that floated before him would give him answers to some of his questions.

  Adam decided to follow the system's recommendation and held off on accepting his Sponsorship reward. With a thought, the gold screen drifted to the side to be accepted later. A new message moved in to replace it.

  This really is like the stuff Henry would go on about, he thought, Looks like I need to talk with him about this stuff when we get out of this stasis. STATUS! Adam shouted in his own mind. One second later, the screen morphed in front of him. This status was interesting because it digitized information about himself in a way Adam had never thought possible. His status read:

  Damn, I know I don’t really do much, but those stats seem really low. While some of the status was filled in, other parts were marked with glowing question marks. Some of the status was self explanatory but Things like Pursuit, Class, Physique and Arcana were a mystery.

  By concentrating on the left side of the status sheet, a series of smaller screens popped up over the top of his personal information. Adam was taken aback by the amount of information provided in each section.

  The amount of information provided by the system almost felt awkward. Why was there so much here? While Adam was obviously no expert on the system, he had noticed that so far, it left most things up to the individual to figure out for themselves.

  Then Adam had a thought. What if it gave this information so freely because it was given to everyone? So far, he had only experienced the trial to become one of the Forerunners of Earth. Becoming a Forerunner was noted by the system to be a very exclusive thing, meant for the “chosen few” as it were. Hell, throughout the trial, messages kept reminding him that the participants needed to prove themselves.

  Maybe, I have so much information because I’m a Forerunner?

  This led him to question some of the information provided. Was the system being completely transparent here? Or was it giving just enough information for an awakener to get by? He would have to keep these things in mind so he could talk to someone else about it after the stasis ended.

  Adam dismissed the descriptions provided by the system and focused on one portion of his status sheet: the Pursuit. It was the only portion of his status that was still glowing and obviously required his attention. I wonder what my options will be?

  Once he had concentrated on choosing his Pursuit, a massive screen opened. This one was structured differently from the others and was split into five different portions. Once they had stopped spinning there were five different Paths of Pursuit for him to choose between, two of which were marked as “Compatible Paths” while the other three were marked as “Chance Paths”.

  When Adam concentrated on the Compatible Paths and Chance Paths markers, an intuitive feeling washed over him, depositing an impression of the two terms directly into his mind. Compatible Paths were exactly that, Paths of Pursuit that the system had deemed compatible for the awakened being, whereas the Chance Paths were Paths of Pursuit that were a complete gamble as the system didn’t deem the awakened being as compatible with the essence of that path. Adam got the impression that while a Chance Path was a gamble, it did not mean that a person couldn’t be successful on that Path, it was just harder initially.

  Adam’s options were as follows:

  Adam was a little bit confused. When he thought about the Pursuits and Classes and stuff, he assumed that it would be really clear cut with terms like fighter or mage. After seeing that the Pursuits were classified as different Paths he again thought that things like Path of the Warrior would pop up. These five options were definitely not what he expected from such a brutal systemic change to the world they all lived in now.

  At least some of them were easy to understand. The Nurturer was clearly meant to be a supportive path in life. The Artist was confusing with its abstract nature. The Traveler was interesting because it felt like a path that was focused towards exploration. As a man that had been walking the Path of the Academic prior to the advent of the system, a Pursuit of its kind was oddly comforting. Additionally, the fact that Academics tended to produce many magic uses was a major point in its favor. However… Path of the Beast was really intriguing.

  Firstly, Path of the Beast seemed to be something that was relatively rare in the grand scheme. If Adam was interpreting the system correctly, it was a path that could only appear for those that had Compatibility with it, meaning, it could not be a Chance Path for anyone.

  The Path of the Beast also had something that spoke to Adam on a deeper level. If he were to walk this path then he would become some kind of shapeshifter. If there was one thing that he learned during the previous trial it was that monsters were absolutely terrifying when you had to face off against them. The only time when his fears had been pushed aside was at the end of the third wave when he had let his rage and primal instincts take control. When the hunger for survival was so strong that he became the aggressor.

  It had been the first time in his life that he had let himself give in to anything other than rational thought. Even when he had lost himself in sadness or fear, there was a part, deep inside himself that understood the logical reason for his sadness or fear and allowed them to rule him in those moments.

  Adam knew instantly that he wouldn’t be able to let himself take a path that the system had not deemed compatible for him. That left him with a choice between the Path of the Academic and the Path of the Beast.

  The Academic would most likely allow him to stay away from danger, maybe casting spells when he gained a class in the future, but the Beast pulled at him in a way that honestly scared him. He couldn’t help but think about the rush he had felt when he killed the scalecat just before he was sponsored.

  After thinking his options over, Adam went with his gut and chose his path.