The fall gave no warning.
It was as if someone had pulled the ground from beneath my feet — and then, nothing.
No sound, no wind, no pain. Only the dragging of lights rushing past me, like sparks torn from an ancient memory.
I saw fragments — blurred images of my childhood, faces I once loved, screams muffled by distance and urgency.
It was like falling through my own existence.
Everything was too fast to grasp, too slow to ignore.
My body didn’t spin, didn’t float. It simply… fell.
And for some reason I couldn’t explain, I understood this wasn’t a dream. It never had been.
Earth was gone. I saw it collapse. And now, it was my turn to be spat out from what I once called home.
The tunnel — if I can even call it that — ended abruptly.
As if space-time itself had grown tired of my presence.
The impact knocked the air from my lungs.
I crashed onto a green plain, flat on my back. The grass was cold and damp, and the sky above me — too blue to be real — seemed to mock what I had just gone through.
I sat up with effort, feeling every bone in my body scream.
Nothing but green all around.
Distant mountains in every direction. Isolated trees swayed in the wind, like silent sentinels of this new world.
Insects I’d never seen before zipped through the air with crystalline wings and erratic movement. And me?
I just took a deep breath and stayed there, staring at that world.
Ymir.
That’s what this was, wasn’t it?
I had no idea where I was — and yet… I did.
It wasn’t entirely strange to me. Not completely.
It was familiar like a book you read as a child and only now understand.
I stood up slowly.
Nothing in my hands. Nothing in my pockets. No weapons, no armor.
This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.
Only my breath — and the emptiness waiting to be filled.
And that’s when I heard the sound.
A digital whisper.
Something activating.
A flickering light trembled in the air before me, like a poorly rendered glitch in a fever dream. No noise. No click. Just the uncomfortable sensation of something clicking into place — as if the world around me had finally acknowledged that I existed.
> [System Y.M.I.R. Initializing…]
Soul synchronization: 100%
Access granted to bearer of the Nexus Core.
Welcome, Uthred, son of Uthred.
A translucent panel opened, floating before me. It wasn’t paper, nor illusion. It was real. It was the system — that old cliché I had read about so many times, but now it stood before me like a sentence.
---
NAME: Uthred
AGE: 24
STARTING CLASS: Wandering Warrior
STAGE: 0 (Common)
REPUTATION: Common (0/200)
COINS:
Copper: 0
Silver: 0
Gold: 0
EQUIPMENT: None
TITLES: None
ACTIVE ABILITIES: None
PASSIVE ABILITIES: None
---
I read it all. Once, twice. As if the numbers might change under the force of my gaze.
It was a miserable beginning.
The panel floated like a judgment. I looked at it with the face of someone who expected to find at least something — a spark of power, a hidden advantage, a merciful lie.
But no. It was the naked portrait of truth. And speaking of nakedness...
— I’m naked. — I muttered, as if the system might hear me.
Because, of course. Not only did I have literally the lowest status possible, I was in the middle of nowhere, naked, broke, unequipped, and stripped of all dignity. All that was missing was a thunderstorm and a lightning bolt to finish the joke.
I studied the interface again, trying to spot a hidden prank between the lines. Maybe a cosmic joke. Nothing.
I slid my hand through the air — as if I already knew what to do. And in truth, maybe I did. Years of reading stories about systems, transmigrations, summons, RPGs… part of me had unknowingly prepared for this.
I tapped on the name of my class: Wandering Warrior.
> “You were born to wander the paths.
Wthout home, without direction, without roots.
Your fate is to walk. And fight. And keep walking.”
— [Official Description from System Y.M.I.R.]
I stared at that line for a while.
Took a deep breath.
— Ah… fuck it.
If this was the start of my journey, then let it start with the truth:
I was an interstellar vagrant with a sarcastic interface and a future more uncertain than Earth’s Wi-Fi in its final days.
I let the panel float for a moment longer without dismissing it. The wind stirred the plain’s grass gently, and a few insects — strange, but non-aggressive — buzzed through the air, barely acknowledging my presence.
Wandering without direction, fighting without purpose.
Was that what awaited me?
At least now I had an identity. Even if it was borrowed. Even if it wasn’t chosen.
Uthred, son of Uthred.
The first step would be… getting clothes.
The second, maybe, not dying in a world that clearly didn’t give a damn about welcoming me with flowers.
There was no sense in standing still. The plain offered nothing but wind and crickets. And though the silence was almost comforting, it was also a sentence. Staying there was the same as waiting for death — and not the noble death of a warrior, but the stupid death of a guy who was born naked and died of sunburn.
I moved forward.
In the distance, where green met the unknown, there was a line of trees.
Tall, dark-trunked, with leaves that danced at the slightest breath of wind. A forest. Dense enough to offer shade. And maybe, with luck, some shelter. Or food. Or clothes. Or anything to make me feel less pathetic.
My feet sank into the soft earth as I walked. The ground was uneven but firm. Some moss-covered stones, signs of small animals, and roots snaking across the surface. For a moment, the wind’s sound was replaced by a quiet rustle from the vegetation.
I was entering living territory.
The temperature changed. More humid. Heavier.
Each step felt watched by invisible eyes. I don’t know if it was paranoia or instinct — or maybe the fusion of both, which I’ve learned to call “survival.”
There was something strange about that forest. Something old.
As if the trees carried memories.
As if every leaf had witnessed more than anyone ever should.
Still, I kept going.
There were no paths. No trails. No signs. And somehow, that felt right.
As if part of me already knew there would be no guides in Ymir.
No maps. No masters. No mercy.
Only steps.
And choices.
And the promise that each decision would be paid for in blood.
That’s what it meant to be a wanderer, right?
I had no destination. Ironic.
But I had legs.
Hairy ones, at that.
