Inevitable Quest System

That day, having just finished his exams and soon on summer vacation, Roman had to face an unreasonable reality.

Even though his intentions were good. Roman did not understand the reply he had to receive.

Usually, after school, Roman would walk. From school to home, the distance that needed to be taken was quite far. His usual path would pass through a bridge. There, Roman saw three young men cornering a girl who seemed to be the same age as him. Suddenly, Roman ran towards them.

"Stop!"

Hearing that exclamation, the three youths turned towards Roman. From the expressions on their faces, it was obvious that Roman's presence was disturbing.

"Wow, there's a hero here..." said one of the youths, looking at Roman with displeasure.

"Ah, so unlucky. The hero is coming..." The other chimed in with a mocking tone.

Roman was not offended by being laughed at by the three young men. Or, Roman was actually more focused on paying attention to the girl who was scared, cornered on a pillar at the base of the bridge. After Roman found no injuries to the girl, he breathed a sigh of relief.

"Yeah. I am the hero who will beat you up..." Roman said after a small snort.

Roman's words made the three young men furious. No more bullshit, two young men came forward to confront Roman, while the other guarded the girl from escaping.

Without fear, Roman also advanced.

The fight was inevitable. Coincidentally, it was quiet there. Only with the presence of two parties who would immediately fight and also the helpless girl, no one could stop the fight.

Two against one, Roman seemed to have no trouble facing his two opponents. It was not without reason for Roman not to be daunted when his intention ended up being a fight, he had practiced martial arts for quite a while. Even though he wasn't proficient, Roman still knew the basics of fighting. Thus, facing two delinquent youth was not too big of a problem.

Seeing that his two friends couldn't beat Roman, the other young man joined the fight to help his friends.

Facing just two opponents, for Roman, he was unable to perfectly block or avoid their punches and kicks, one could say it was difficult to dominate the fight. With the addition of another young man, Roman was slowly being pushed into a corner. Roman was a bit more able to put up a fight than facing three young men at once. Roman received more and more attacks, making it difficult for him to move more freely because he started to feel pain in many places on his body.

Roman realized that the end of this fight would make him very battered and lose. That way, in between fights, Roman ordered the girl who was still frozen to quickly get away from there.

The girl was hesitant to go, worried about Roman. But after being urged by Roman to leave immediately, she finally chose to run away from there in the hope that Roman would get help and be able to teach the delinquents a lesson.

The delinquent youths wanted to stop the girl who was the reason for them to fight, but they were not let go by Roman. They cursed Roman in their hearts that the young man who came to bother them was actually stubborn even though he had been pretty battered.

Both Roman and the two young men who had fought earlier were quite battered, whereas the young man who had just joined the fight had only a few bruises on his face. They thought they would be easy to beat Roman. In fact, no. Roman was tougher than they had expected, to the point that they had to use numbers to dominate the fight.

Roman kept stepping back and stepping back. There was no time to pay attention to where his feet stepped. His feet eventually stumbled on a protrusion on the edge of a multilevel bridge. It made him step back faster to balance his posture.

His body unbalanced, Roman received a kick to the chest. Suddenly, Roman was pushed backwards, causing him to crash hard into the iron railing of the bridge.

Seeing their chance, they dropped Roman without hesitation from the bridge into the large river. With a river that looked quite calm, any one who saw it could be sure that the river had a deep riverbed.

Roman was actually dropped by them into the river. Fortunately, Roman was able to swim so well that it didn't take long for him to reach the river bank.

"Ugh!"

Soaking wet. Breath heavy. Roman let his body lie on the bank of the river.

'Very hurt...'

Looking up at the cloudy sky, Roman still didn't notice anything odd. The pain in his body and the body that was running out of energy, Roman wanted to immediately lay down on the bed to sleep. But Roman realized, he still had to walk to get home. Or before that, Roman needed to get up first from his rest.

Roman didn't have the energy to just speak, asking for help from the people around him.

His eyelids were getting heavy. His vision slowly became more blurry. At times, Roman would force himself to stay awake. But, Roman was increasingly difficult to resist the drowsiness. Until finally, Roman fell asleep there.

...

A woman's voice echoed, but Roman couldn't understand what she was saying.

The bone-chilling gusts of wind woke him up immediately. As soon as he opened his eyes, Roman saw a night sky full of stars without clouds. So clean. His attention was immediately diverted because his body shivered again when the wind was blowing quite hard.

Roman remembered the incident he fought with three young men before. His body now ached just to move a muscle a little.

"I have to go home..." Roman forced himself to stand up even though it hurted so much that he winced a little hard. His breath was again hunted. "I hope it's not too late at night..." Roman muttered, afraid to worry the people at home.

After all, Roman was still a student at the senior high school. Although his parents were unknown, Roman had a family. More precisely, Roman was adopted by a small family that had no children. With the love that his adoptive parents gave him, Roman also gave the best for them. So, Roman didn't want to make them worry about whatever happened to him.

So far, Roman had still ignored the hologram screen floating before his eyes. Roman thought, maybe he was still half dreaming. But after some time had passed and Roman started walking slowly, he was still looking at the screen.

"Quest System? What is this actually?" Roman wondered. In fact, the screen had written an explanation about the Quest System in the form of a holographic screen.

Roman tried to ignore the screen first and preferred to hurry back home. That was what Roman wanted to do. However, his steps soon stopped. Roman froze as he realized he was in an unfamiliar place. Completely foreign, to the point where Roman thought he might still be dreaming.

After pinching the skin of his face hard enough, Roman winced a little.

Not a dream. Roman even felt that he had been very conscious since earlier. Both the holographic screen before his eyes that had suddenly appeared out of nowhere and the environment he had woken up in, were all real. Roman couldn't believe it, but there was no denying the strangeness.

Thinking that he should stay calm, Roman chose to read the words on the hologram's screen.

According to what was written in large font on the screen, that screen was the Quest System. It was a power created by someone for the purpose of helping him become stronger. As for the reason Roman was now in an unfamiliar place, according to the Quest System, he had been sent to another world.

"But, why did this Quest System choose me?"

That said, the Quest System was a mysterious power that was programmed to help someone. With a complex algorithm embedded in it, the Quest System would select someone according to the criteria set by its creator.

The screen didn't say why Roman was chosen by the Quest System.

After the Quest System introduced itself, another screen appeared. It said [Character Window] which became the new title with new screen contents as well.

The [Character Window] contained information on various matters related to Roman. In fact, the [Character Window] also listed the levels of movement speed, muscle strength, fitness, and intelligence, using a numerical method.

"Like in a game, huh?" Roman chuckled.

With the Quest System in place, Roman felt quite comforted in this confusing situation. Even though he wanted to go home, in an unfamiliar place, Roman thought he needed to understand the situation well first. Because as the Quest System had told him, Roman was currently in another world. It's hard to believe it, but Roman didn't deny that fact.

When Roman had calmed down a bit, the Quest System displayed a new screen again.

[Quest]

Objective: Save the Shackled Heroes (0/7)

Reward: [Return home] [Make wish 3X]