Paranoia!

His mother was always working on something since his father pa.s.sed away, he didn"t know if it was because she was still mourning her dearest"s death or a mother"s responsibility towards her family"s well-being.

Thus the only time he could see her face was at night, where she would deign them of her presence.

He was not mad at her though, he wouldn"t wail or whine like a lost little child because mommy was never at home. It was fine.

His older sister preferred spending her time amidst friends and clothes; mostly clothes, avoiding coming back home and endure that painful silence that seemed to remind them how their family started to alienate itself, leaving an empty s.p.a.ce that was once filled with happiness and now only good memories.

As for him? He hadn"t a clue of how to describe himself. Cynical? Indifferent? He didn"t know, not that he even cared to begin with.

He was unquestionably smart enough to not worry about his school"s grades, nor did he had problems with the fairer s.e.x. He never tried anything indecent towards his admirers though, he just wasn"t interested.

Obviously, that doesn"t imply that his s.e.xual orientation aims at another direction, he just believed that getting himself involved in a romantic relationship right at this period of time wouldn"t be healthy to either of them. So he never bothered.

Opening the door to his room he threw his schoolbag on the floor and crashed exhaustedly on his bed.

"What a day... " He mumbled tiredly.

The typical school day life you could expect from a 16 years old teenager. It was nothing special besides dealing with teachers so old that makes you start questioning yourself why they haven"t died yet. The fact that his friends were always busy chasing skirts ( and completely failing at that ) was of no help at all.

His life was slowly becoming a dull routine of diary events.

Seriously.

He just wanted something stimulating to suddenly fall on his life, allowing him to leave this monotone course of contingency that cursed his days.

With these thoughts swirling in his head he closed his eyes, letting sleepiness embrace him in her sweet world of dreams.

.

.

.

[ Welcome to Paranoia! ]

Mhh?

He dizzily opened his eyes, only to be greeted by the sight of...

[ Downloading files: 1% ]

[ It will require 6 hours and 28 minutes to complete the download. The system advises the user to sleep in the meantime to hasten the process. ]

What is that?

He squinted his eyes in the hopes that this was just his brain making fun of him or some others symptoms caused by the sleepiness.

But it was not.

He was a bit put off by the situation.

Was this a dream? Did someone purposely drop hallucinogens on his drink? Did he hit his head? Did some supernatural being finally decide to mess with his head? Did- no ok, stop that.

Mulling over what was the cause of this won"t help, he knew that. But even knowing best not to panic he was pretty sure that whatever was happening wasn"t normal, or at least out of what was humanly normal.

He took a breath.

Calm down and think.

He always prided himself on the fact that whatever the situation he always managed to stay calm in order to find a solution.

So what"s stopping him from doing the same right now?

He looked carefully at the screen in front of him. It was a black rectangular-shaped box with a red outline. It seemed nothing special if not for the pulsing effect it did every second.

Sigh.

Nope, he had no idea how to cope with this. Well, it"s not like people will go around writing manuals on how to do in case a sudden floating screen appears before you, right?

Moreover, Paranoia...

Are you serious? What is that name supposed to mean?

With a grunt he laid his head back, covering his eyes with the back of his hand.

Was he really getting ill? Maybe some kind of neurodegenerative disease?

At the thought, he began to slightly tremble. Even though he just tried to think things through it was still impossible. He couldn"t shake off the ominous feeling of something weird happening to him.

He forcefully stopped his trembling, it was embarra.s.sing and unbefitting of him. There was no f.u.c.king way he"d let his emotions take control of his body. Nope.

As for talking this problem out with his mother? He knew it"d be useless, the same goes for his sister. He may have a good relationship with both of them, but in the end, he never sees each of them enough to trust them with certain issues, let alone this one that seemed to be very troublesome.

So he decided to go along with the flow, he would wait 6 hours and see what happens. Who knows, maybe this was really some bad dream.

Yeah... hopefully.

.

.

.

It was not.

The sunshine pierced through his window, lighting the room up with a reddish glow. It was a beautiful view, overall. However, the only person present hadn"t the chance to appreciate it as he was busy looking at a floating screen in front him.

[ Downloading files: 99% ]

[ It will require 2 minutes and 14 seconds to complete the download. The system advises the user to sit back and relax. ]

"Well... that"s disappointing but not entirely unexpected."

He turned his head to the window, basking in the sunlight as he waited to find out what that screen is. With half-lidded eyes and a steady breath witnessing the rising sun, he felt like all his worries were washed away.

[ Ding! ]

[ Paranoia System has been successfully installed! ]

[ Congratulations for having being chosen as the System holder! You can access it by saying the command "Status". Some features are currently locked, you may use them as you slowly become stronger and complete quests. The existence of Paranoia shall not be revealed under any conditions! ]

He blinked, completely dumbfounded.

Is this some kind of game system?

Curiosity overwhelmed his body as he kept reading the text in front of him again and again, almost not believing that this was real.

He refrained himself though, this was suspicious. Why among 7 billion people he precisely had been chosen? Although he knew that he was better than your average teenager, he was absolutely not the best.

He narrowed his eyes and thought hard of the "whys" such miracle befell upon him.

Furthermore, there was no proof that this system was real or worked as one should. Having no alternatives plus the never-ending curiosity that threatened to burst out of his body, he did the only thing he could have done.

"Status." He said.

[ Name: Jered von Jacobs ]

[ Age: 16 ]

[ Race: Human ]

[ Cla.s.s ] [ ? ]

[ t.i.tle ] [ ? ]

[ Strenght ] [ 9 ]

[ Dexterity ] [ 9 ]

[ Vitality ] [ 10 ]

[ Endurance ] [ 10 ]

[ Intelligence ] [ 16 ]

[ Mana ] [ ? ]

[ Appearance ] [ 15 ]

[ Attribute Points ] [ 0 ] [ System Points ] [ 0 ]

[ Shop ] [ Skills ] [ Quests ]

That"s... wow.

He looked at his stats and noticed with displeasure that some of them were either average or lower, with his intelligence and appearance being the highest.

If 10 is average then we can a.s.sume that 11 is above average. Then how much is 15 or 16? Maybe the difference isn"t that noticeable as one may think.

He needed to do some tests.

Mhh... I need to gain attribute points to see if this works and if it does how will it affect me. Maybe I shou-

He was abruptly interrupted by a ding, followed by a new screen.

[ Quest received! ]

[ t.i.tle: A Caring Son ]

[ Description: Your mother is exhausted from overwork. Show her how deeply concerned you are by preparing a sumptuous breakfast. ]

[ Reward: 3 Attribute points20 System points. ]

[ Time-limit: 1 hour. ]

[ AcceptDecline ]

At this unexpected but pleasant surprise, he just smiled and clicked "Accept".

Sweet...