novelraw Chapter 44: Opening the eyes
Chapter 44: Opening the eyes
Darkness.
For a long moment, that was all Jack had. No pain. No weight. No sound.
Then—
A small sound pierced the void.
Ding.
Followed by another.
Ding. Ding.
[Recalibrating...]
[You have completed recovery.]
[Your body has experienced great stress and pain.]
[You have achieved a threshold.]
[You have leveled up.]
[You have leveled up.]
[You have leveled up.]
[You have leveled up.]
[You have leveled up.]
[You have leveled up.]
[You have leveled up.]
[You have leveled up.]
[Multiple skills have improved.]
[Multiple stats have improved.]
Soon, Jack heard the steady thump of his own heartbeat—like a distant machine restarting after years of silence.
Then his eyes opened.
A white ceiling came into focus, its sterilized glow almost painful. Thin strips of LED panels hummed quietly overhead. The light was so clean, so perfect, that shadows barely existed—everything flattened, washed in clinical brightness.
A faint chemical scent—antiseptic mixed with something metallic—invaded his nose.
He was no longer in the metal chair. He was lying on a bed, wrists free, clothes changed into a loose, pale-blue hospital gown. The sheet beneath him was crisp and cool, edges tucked so tightly it felt like lying on a slab.
His entire body felt... weightless. Empty. But intact.
The system whispered inside him, calm, mechanical.
[Recovery Time: 54 Hours Completed.]
[Full Recovery Achieved.]
[Urban System online.]
A new line blinked faintly.
[You have various notifications.]
[Multiple levels achieved.]
[Due to great stress and pain, you are now granted access to more high-level skills.]
[+ Skill Appraisal have improved to Level 5.]
[+ Skill Basic Fighting have improved to Level 5.]
[+ Skill Speed Reading have improved to Level 5.]
[+ Skill Last Surge have improved to Level 5.]
[+ Skill Mind Resistance have improved to Level 4.].]
[Strength: + 20.]
[Speed: + 21.]
[Stamina: +25]
[You have unlocked MP. You can now use Mana Point Functions.]
Jack blinked slowly.
The fog in his brain was gone. His thoughts were no longer soft or scattered. Something inside him had hardened—like a blade drawn from a sheath after a long sleep.
His fingers curled slightly, feeling the fabric, the mattress, the weight of his own limbs.
Just then, the door hissed open—an airtight seal releasing pressure—and a draft of colder, filtered air swept in.
Doctors wearing the standard lab coat stepped inside shocked at what they were seeing. Two more staff members followed, their footsteps soft but sharp against the polished white floor.
"He is alive...." Shad’s mouth opened subconsciously.
The monitor beside the bed displayed heart rate, neural waves, and a column of data Jack couldn’t read from this angle—but the doctor’s eyes darted over it with growing confusion.
"Vitals stable... neural activity normal..."
Swallowing his saliva, he then opened his mouth.
"Do you know yourself?" he said.
’He is afraid?’
Jack stared blankly, letting his gaze drift without purpose, letting his face remain slack and unfocused.
He remembered the man’s voice and the conversations while he was in the chair.
Jack slowly blinked twice and exchanged glances. He did not smile or do anything with his face.
’I will just pretend like an idiot then.’ He decided.
"It seems that we have succeeded," one then whispered.
"Should we contact Dr. Riza?"
"No," Shad then said, waving it off. "She’s busy with the prototype. For now, we just need to confirm his cognitive baseline."
He stepped closer, leaning down so his face was inches above Jack’s. At the same time, Jack detected from his stance that Shad was no ordinary man, and was already preparing to strike if he seemed hostile.
"Can you tell us your age? Your school? Your family?"
Jack turned his head toward him with slow, mechanical stiffness—like an obedient drone reacting to input.
A beat of silence.
Then, very faintly, Jack parted his lips.
"...I don’t."
The doctor stiffened. The other two froze mid-breath.
"...You don’t? Then how come you can speak to us?"
Shad was speaking calmly, but Jack was seeing all panel systems alerting him of danger.
"I do not know." He then said. "I know how to speak but I do not know anything about myself."
’It fits with the neural wipe pattern. He’s lost his prior identity completely.’ Shad then thought, similarly with the other doctors.
Jack blinked again. Empty. Hollow. Compliant.
Internally?
He laughed and was already imagining tearing off their heads.
It wasn’t the first time Jack had heard of the ability to wipe memory off someone. The government uses it a lot on normal citizens, however only with a certain range in order to protect them from the awakened world.
Doing more would just damage the brain. Thus, if one had been exposed to the awakened world too much, it was much better to include them in such world even if that meant changing their career.
However, the doctors in front of Jack intended to wipe every memory from his mind concerning his life. If it was not for the system, they would have succeeded.
’Amnesia, I will act then if that’s what helps you all to drop your guard.’ Jack told himself, as he memorized all the faces of the doctors and their information using the appraisal skill.
Moreover, he couldn’t help but grin.
His system had leveled up so much!
The reason was clear!
The organization had put his body and mind into an extended session of suffering.
While he did not feel most of it due to the system’s protective barriers, Jack was the angriest he had ever been.
’To them, I need to look harmless—soft—freshly brainwashed.’ Jack thought.
But behind his eyes, the System hummed with lethal clarity.
The doctors relaxed, shoulders easing, breaths softening.
"Looks like the reset succeeded far better than expected," one said, scribbling notes.
"In that case... should we release him? Let him roam around with the others. It’ll help us test voluntary motor ability."
Jack’s pulse remained steady.
’Others? They abducted more people? What about the vice-captain and James?’
He sat up slowly when the doctor gestured. Back straight. Chin down. His movements smooth and obedient—like the perfect puppet.
But inside, Jack could now sense it. It wasn’t just his system that had changed. No, it was exactly because his system had changed that every cell and muscle felt like newly forged steel.
One doctor patted Jack lightly on the shoulder, fingers briefly squeezing flesh.
"Good. Very good. You’re adapting well."
Jack reacted like a child who knew nothing about the world, making him throw up inside.
But he watched. His appraisal skill had done almost all the work.
Now, the appraisal did not just give him stats, levels and lineages. It measured their height. Their reach. Even their allergies and tendencies.
Jack also used the skill on their ID cards clipped to their belts. The small black passcodes on their hip consoles. He also took note
of the cameras on the ceiling which rotated every three seconds.
Which guards outside the door shifted their weight from boredom.
Without even turning his head, the system help him store everything enter his mind like puzzle pieces falling into place.
Even the map feature had changed somewhat.
[Map Activated.]
[Mapping Facility Layout...]
[Weak Points Identified.]
The biggest change was that it now not only showed the grid black lines, but also showed the location of people, even though they were not enemies, in the map.
As the doctors unfastened his last restraint—a soft click of metal sliding free—Jack lowered his head, expression blank.
His fingers curled under the blanket, gripping the fabric.
The doctors didn’t notice the subtle shift in his breathing. The fraction-too-slow blink. The faint tension in his jaw.
"You are now called 444. Let’s take you out into the ward," Shad then said as he turned away. "Let him walk. Let the conditioning settle."
They turned their backs.
And for the first time in nearly three days...
Jack smiled.
A slow.
Cold.
Silent smile unseen by anyone.
He stood up from the bed, the sheet falling off his legs in a whisper of fabric. His posture remained slack, his gaze unfocused—but his mind razored and awake.
Two guards stepped in, escorting him. Their boots clacked on the white tiles, and one yawned mid-stride, not even bothering to look Jack’s way.
Perfect.
The recovery ward was wide and frigid. Long rows of beds lined the walls, separated by thin partitions. Light panels glowed like artificial daylight, bleaching every color into pale variants. Surveillance cameras hung at each corner like metal spiders, rotating in smooth, mechanical arcs.
Jack’s gaze wandered lazily—blank, almost sleepy.
Inside?
His vision sharpened every angle, every blind spot, every potential escape route.
[Urban Analysis: Active.]
[Scanning surveillance patterns.]
[Calculating guard routes: 12 total, rotating on a 90-second cycle.]
[Identified 3 blind corners and 2 unsecured terminals.]
[Probability of detection during movement: 85%.]
Jack’s mind locked onto these details, storing them instantly.
They soon arrived into what seemed to be a training facility with multiple high-technology treadmills, a doctor then jerked a thumb toward one of the treadmills.
Similarly, the other runners who was in a similar state to Jack could be seen running. They were all awakened but at the same time, they were all acting like puppets.
"Go on. Just take a lap. Don’t fall," he muttered, already checking his holster and looking bored.
Jack nodded meekly.
’Does he understand already?’ Shad thought, ’If he understands just by looking at the other runner, that would be fast.’
And then he began his "lap"— slow, harmless, docile.
While running?
He could see how insanely fast he had gotten. Before he was only that fast when his body activated the Last Surge Skill, now it was his default condition.