3. System is scam!

(Hah!)

(So I get rewarded for getting struck by lightning? Nice.)

But before I could even begin investigating my shiny new achievement, there was literally a gaping hole in my roof now, and rain was pouring in fast.

Luckily, there was no furniture inside to ruin. But still… it felt deeply invasive. Like the storm had casually violated my personal space.

(Hmm… Don’t I have a skill for this?)

“System, open!”

The familiar blue screen bloomed instantly in my mind’s eye. I scanned the menu until I found the relevant entry.

[Self-Repair (Level 1)]

(Now, how exactly do I activate it?)

(Self-Repair!) I shouted mentally.

Nothing happened.

Maybe yelling the skill name like a noob protagonist in a beginner tutorial wasn’t the right move. Maybe I had to will it into existence.

Thus, I focused hard on the jagged hole in the roof, visualizing the broken stone and shattered slate knitting themselves back together piece by piece…

[Not enough material! Could not initiate self-repair process!]

[Material required: 1x Stone, 1x Wood]

(Huh?)

I stared at the cold, unhelpful message.

(Did I just get scammed by my own System?)

(Material? How do I get material now?)

Sure, there was a literal endless forest surrounding me on all sides, packed with trees and rocks. But how could I possibly gather any of it when I couldn’t move a single inch from this clearing?

(Wait… I do have materials!)

The lightning strike had blasted chunks of my own roof clean off. So the damaged material had to be lying somewhere out in the courtyard, right? Maybe I could just… reabsorb them?

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

I switched to external view, scanning the rain-lashed yard.

But to my growing surprise, I couldn’t find a single piece of debris.

(Huh? Am I crazy? Where the hell is the debris?!)

Frantic now, I flipped my vision to the exact spot where I had broken that window hinge during my short-lived percussion career days.

(It has to be right under the window, right? It couldn’t have gone far.)

And to my horror…

Gone!

The pieces had simply vanished into thin air. Not a single shard, not a splinter, not even a tiny chip of wood or fragment of glass remained anywhere in sight.

A cold, sinking realization settled deep into my foundations.

(So… let’s get this straight…)

(If something breaks off me… it just disappears? Erased? Deleted from existence like it never belonged to me in the first place?)

(Damn… Then how the hell am I supposed to repair anything?)

Sure, I could survive this one storm easily. But what about the next one? And the one after that? And the hundred more that will inevitably come over the years? Do I really have to accept my fate and just let nature slowly blast my body apart, bit by bit, until nothing is left but crumbling ruins?

The thought sent another sharp wave of terror rippling through me. But right at that moment, the system flared to life once more.