24 hrs until I get tased!

By the time I got back home, my legs felt like strawberry jelly, wobbly and unstable. 

I kicked off my shoes, shuffled into my room, and collapsed face-first onto my bed.

The hoodie bunched under my cheek and the cap fell off causing my blue hair to spill everywhere.

“Okay,” I mumbled into the pillow. “New plan. I’m going to nap for a few hours. And when I wake up, I'l deal with all this nonsense.”

My stomach, now filled with Ruru Ramen and false hope, agreed.

This was sensible, it was a responsible decision.

This was—

[SYSTEM NOTICE]

The message appeared so suddenly that my whole body jolted.

A tiny crackle snapped near my fingertips and I slapped the mattress like that would stop electricity from existing.

“—Oh my God,” I hissed. “Can you not?”

The system did not care. The message expanded in cold, clean text, like a corporate email written by someone who hated human joy.

[SYSTEM NOTICE] ADAPTATION WINDOW PASSED. MISSION STARTING
Time Remaining: 24:00:00
Requirement: Enter a Gate or Tower Instance
Failure Penalty: Neural Correction (Excruciating)
Note: Avoidance will be treated as refusal.

I stared at the message then blinked. Then I stared harder, like my eyes could physically deny it.

“Neural correction,” I read aloud slowly. “What kind of—what does that even mean?”

The system, as usual, refused to elaborate.

My phone buzzed on the side of my bed at the same time, the Hunter Forum notifications lighting up like nothing was happening, like I wasn’t currently being threatened with what sounded like torture disguised as a software update.

“Hold on,” I said, holding my hands out like I was negotiating with a wild animal.

“Hold on. You’re telling me I have to enter a gate within twenty-four hours.”

No response.

“And if I don’t…” I swallowed. “You’re going to… neural correct me.”

No response.

I stared at the message like it was going to disappear.It didn’t.

I pressed my palms to my face and dragged them down slowly.

“I hate this system,” I muttered.

A spark popped near my wrist. I took a breath and forced my thoughts to line up in something resembling order.

This wasn’t a suggestion or any type of recommended content, instead it was a forced tutorial, except instead of press W to move, it was enter a dungeon or we'll tase your soul.

The phrase adaptation window sat in my mind like a threat.

Adaptation to what?

My new body? My powers? The fact that I was now apparently a walking hazard?

I looked down at my hands, slimmer fingers and softer skin, the faint sensation of static that came and went depending on my mood.

The system had given me a single days to… what? Stabilise? Prove myself? Commit to this new existence?

My jaw tightened.

“Fine,” I whispered. “Fine. You want me in a gate. I’ll go in a gate.”

Then I paused, I had just realised something very important.I had no ID no form of identification to enter one of the verified safe controlled government gates, which meant that I would have to enter a rogue gate.

A rogue gate meant that I wouldn't know its class, wouldn't that be just spelling disaster, surely there was another way. 

I scrambled to the desk and pulled my chair out, sitting down like I was about to take an exam.

I opened Moogle, typed fast, then backspaced, then typed again opening up the Hunter Forum next.

It loaded instantly, like it had been waiting for me.

The site was a mess of rankings, gate reports, guild drama, and veterans arguing in comment sections like always.

'The forum never seems to change.'

Well except the fact that somewhere in the middle of it all, I had been yanked into a dungeon by an anonymous sadist over a forum argument.

I still wanted to tase that guy ten million times.

But first: survival.

I searched for “adaptation window.”

A handful of threads popped up, most of them locked. Some deleted. Some with titles like:

[QUESTION] What triggers adaptation windows?
[DISCUSSION] Is an adaptation window a sign of high potential?
[REMOVED BY MODERATION]

I clicked the least dead-looking one.

The first post was short, written by someone who sounded terrified.

Got a system notice. Adaptation window 72 hours. Had to enter a gate or face “correction.” Is this normal?

The replies were a mix of people mocking them and people being unsettlingly serious.

User_Gojo: Normal? No. But it happens.
User_FarmGoat: Don’t ignore it. Correction is real.
User_TotallyNotATerrorist: If you got an adaptation window, you’re flagged. You're screwed!
User_GateWatch: Stop fearmongering. It’s just a prompt.
User_ActualMedic: It is not “just a prompt.” Some patients come in screaming talking about excruciating pain.
User_WardenHopeful: Looks like your system likes you congrats, you need to enter something low-risk immediately. Don’t try to wait it out, trust me...

I felt cold spread through my stomach.

Screaming, patients, so it wasn’t metaphorical.

Neural correction wasn’t a fancy way of saying you’ll be sad, it was a fancy way of saying we will cause you pain so intense you learn obedience.

That was… comforting.

I scrolled.

Someone had posted a system screenshot asking another question and my eyes locked onto it.

Core Level: Bronze
Core Capacity: Silver III
Stability: Good

Core level and core capacity, they seemed important.

I searched core level and opened a pinned thread that looked like it had been reposted a thousand times.

It was written in the tone of someone who was tired of explaining the same thing to idiots.

[Title: Core Explanation For Dummies. By User: Noobsplainer455]

Your rank is a social label. Your core is what matters.
Core levels determine output capacity and survivability.
Bronze → Iron → Silver → Gold → Platinum.
Platinum-level awakeners are nation assets.
Most people never reach Gold.

Capacity is your ceiling where your level is your current state. Don't even think that you can increase it, its impossible. If you have a Bronze capacity, congratulations you were born to be fodder.

I leaned forward, reading faster.

So core level wasn’t skill. It wasn’t how good you were, instead it was literally how much power your body could contain, akin to a human battery rating.

"What are the conditions to upgrade? Does being part of a lower capacity hard limit an awakeners stats? There was still so much I didn't know."

Great.

I tried searched my own system UI instinctively.

Nothing appeared.

I tried again, focusing, like I was calling a menu, but it just yielded the same results.

“Of course,” I muttered. “I get a death timer but not the part where it tells me what I am.”

A spark snapped near my thumb, I exhaled through my nose and forced myself not to spiral.

Okay. If the system wasn’t going to show me a neat panel, I had to trigger it. Or test it. Or… something.

I pushed my chair back and stood in the middle of my room.

“Alright,” I said to myself. “We’re doing science.”

I held my hands out in front of me and tried to calm my mind.

No sparks, good.

Then I thought about the system message again, about correction, the screaming patients.

My heartbeat jumped and a faint crackle crawled across my fingertips.

“Okay,” I said quickly, forcing myself to breathe. “So strong emotions triggers my powers a bit.”

I tried anger next, imagining the anonymous veteran’s face, him typing with smug little fingers, him laughing while I got chased by an eel in a cave.

My jaw instantaneously  clenched, as a sharp arc snapped between my fingers with a bright crack.

I flinched and dropped my hands instantly.The arc fortunately didn't hit anything, but the sound echoed through the room like a warning.

“Right,” I whispered. “Let me calm down a bit."

I toned in my anger and tried again, tiny sparks fizzed around my knuckles, like static.

Not too dangerous or explosive.Controllable.

I stared at my hands, fascinated despite myself.

So lightning wasn’t something I could just turn on at the moment, it was something more akin to what my core did when my emotions hit certain levels.

Like my feelings were plugged directly into a wall socket.

That meant one thing. If I wanted to survive a gate, I couldn’t just have power.

I needed control and control meant stability. Stability probably meant… feeding the core.

I went back to the desk and searched more.

“How to level core.”

Another pinned thread by the same user popped up, this one more technical.

It had diagrams, disclaimers, and the kind of language that made it clear someone had died learning these rules the hard way.

[Title: For The Idiots Who Didn't Get The Earlier Explanation. By User: Noobsplainer455]

Core growth requires monster core intake meaning that you have to defeat monsters inside Gates or Tower instances. Once that's done you can extract the monster core. Note that the intake is bound to contribution. From my studies:

Solo kill yields maximum return.
Team returns split and are diminished.
Do not attempt extraction without a stable core.
Do not attempt intake above your level!

.......

I read the key line twice ignoring the rest of the long explanation.

The important parts that stuck to me were that solo kill yielded maximum return, whereas team kills returns were split and diminished.

“Of course,” I murmured. “The system is literally pay-per-kill.”

So if I went alone, I’d grow faster. If I went with a team, I’d survive more easily, but I’d grow slower.

'Not like I have much of a choice, I have to go solo I don't have an actual identity right now.'

Either way, I had to enter a gate within twenty-four hours.

I glanced at the clock. It wasn’t even noon.

Twenty-four hours sounded like a lot until you remembered how fast time moved when you were scared.

I opened a local gate listing site, one of those semi-official databases that showed public gate alerts, classifications, and recommended teams.

Most gates were already claimed by guilds.

Some were restricted and others had Association Oversight tags.

My eyes narrowed looking for low risk beginner gates, the ones that new awakeners used for safe exposure.

And of course all of them were monitored by the Hunter Association.

I leaned back in my chair, staring at the screen, feeling my mind weigh the options.

Right now it was impossible for me to enter a gate under the Association, but if I entered some unclaimed gate alone, I could avoid attention… but I might die, and the system didn’t care which option I chose, as long as I chose one.

A quiet crackle stirred at my fingertips again, like my body could feel the pressure building.

“Okay,” I whispered. “One step at a time.”

Then an idea popped into my mind. It was such a great idea, honestly I was surprised that I didn't think of it earlier.

If you wanted to gain access to things that the government didn't want to you, where would you go to?

There was only one place.

"The Black Market!"