A Berserker's Game (Gamer/Multicross)

[You have been chosen as a Gamer]

Looking at these words floating in front of me as I looked around, I realized I was floating in a black expanse.

[You've died in been chosen. After creating your character you will be given a new body that will replace your old one.]

What the hell happened to my old body? Trying to think back, I realized that I couldn't even remember what happened before I ended up here, or even what my name was. I could remember my life for the most part, but names, faces, and appearances eluded me.

It all felt like I was thinking about someone in the third person. I knew that those were my experiences, but I felt emotionally detached. I didn't feel upset that I had died, or that I would never see anyone from my past again. Deciding that it didn't matter since I couldn't connect with those memories anyway, I looked back at the screen.

[Converting skills from your life...

- Lvl 8/10: The skill you have with unarmed combat. Higher skill levels mean that even if you don't have experience with a particular style of fighting, you will pick it up quickly.

- Lvl 2/10: The ability to detect danger around you due to experience in combat.

- Lvl 5/10: The ability to understand various languages. Any languages not currently known will be easier to learn with higher levels of this skill. Known languages (English, Japanese, Italian)

Additional default skills added...

- Lvl Max: Prevent any form of mental disruption or intrusion.

- Lvl Max: Allows the user to make a dungeon once a day for 3 hours. This skill cannot be activated during combat.

- Lvl 1/10: Allows the user to see the general danger level of individuals around them, indicated by the colors blue: no danger, yellow: moderate danger, and red: extreme danger, with green and orange between the different levels. Also provides general information about the target.]

It looked like I didn't get Gamer's Body, so I would take damage like a normal person, but the other skills were pretty nice. The skills I got from my past life also made sense to me, from what I could remember I'd been a professional boxer for a few years before I died and had an insanely good record. I couldn't remember why I knew 3 languages, so I assumed it had something to do with my identity I couldn't remember. Maybe I was biracial or something and had learned them from my parents. 

[Starting world randomized...Sekirei selected.

Choose your starting race: Human, Sekirei, Ashikabi]

Well, that sucked for me. I'd never watched Sekirei, it was hardly a popular show and I knew almost nothing about it. I knew it was one of those generic battle-harem anime, but those tended to not have a high power ceiling, so maybe it wasn't so bad. I pulled up the descriptions of the different races since I had no idea what an Ashikabi or Sekirei even were.

[Human: A regular with no special abilities or stat bonuses.

Sekirei: A race of super-powered humanoid aliens. Physically are almost identical to humans, but are significantly more powerful and have a core that is the source of their power. Requires an Ashikabi to wing them to access the stronger parts of their power. Gives starting buffs in all stats, but stat gain is reduced until an Ashikabi is found.

Ashikabi: A human with the ability to wing a Sekirei, which forms a bond where each can feel the other's emotions, and the Ashikabi can allow the Sekirei to access greater power. Has no additional starting bonuses, but increases in winged Sekirei strength give an increase to you as well.]

Reading the three races, it was pretty easy to decide I was going for Ashikabi. Human was ignored almost immediately, there was no gain and unless the other races had a significant downside, there was no point in going for the vanilla option. Sekirei was interesting, the increase in starting stats being great, but the fact that I would grow slower until I found an Ashikabi was way too big of a limiter. I also didn't particularly love the idea of having to bond myself to another person to access my power.

Selecting Ashikabi, the screen began to change again.

[Choose your starting class. Class can be upgraded, but never changed so the choice is permanent. Each class provided different stats bonuses upon leveling.

, , ]

I was given three options, all of which had their strengths and weaknesses. Ranged was the first one I eliminated, I was already skilled in close combat, so choosing a class that focused on something opposite to what I was good at wasn't a good choice. I could try to balance my build, improving at something I was bad at, but if I was going to be living this life I didn't want to gamble on having time to improve enough as a jack of all trades. I wanted to get as strong as possible in one area, and then I could work on my weak points.

Magic was another pretty good option but was discarded for similar reasons. I'd have to start from the ground up learning magic, and it was locked behind how big my mana pool was. If I ran out of mana I was basically useless, so I'd rather save magic as a side skill and focus on what I was good at, so I chose melee.

[Melee class options...

: A class focused on combat wielding a sword. Leveling provides an additional +3 in Dex, +2 in STR, and +1 in END. Starter class skills are focused on swordsmanship, parrying attacks, and striking quickly.

: A class focused on stealth and quick attacks with smaller weapons. Leveling provides an additional +4 in Dex, +1 in STR, and +1 in MAG. Starter class skills are focused on invisibility and bleeding wounds.

: A class focused on taking damage to deal more damage and can use most weapons. Leveling provides an additional +3 in STR and +3 in END. Starter skills are focused on increasing damage dealt at lower health and battle-healing.

: A class focused on unarmed combat, enhancing the strength of strikes to pierce through armor and magic. Leveling provides an additional +2 in STR, +2 in DEX, and +2 in MAG. Started skills are focused on channeling mana into your fists to deal damage through defenses.]

The four melee classes all had interesting bonuses, but my eyes were instantly focused on two of them. Swordsman was out instantly, I was good at using my hands and had no idea how to use a sword. Assassin was similarly out, along with the fact that I wanted to be able to be up close and personal and Assassin was another class focused on kiting in and out. 

That left me to choose between Martial Artist and Berserker. At first glance, Martial Artist seemed better since it was a class that specialized in unarmed fighting, but my interest was more towards Berserker. Being able to use mana to pierce defenses was good, but it had the same issues as a Magic class since it seemed like some kind of hybrid.

Berserker fit exactly what I wanted; survivability and damage. It was a riskier fighting style since I would want to take damage to have a stronger output, but if I could level the starter battle-healing skill enough I would be like Wolverine, constantly healing as I fought. With my mind made up, I picked Berserker and finally finished my character creation.

[Character Creation completed. Displaying starting status]

[Name: Sosuke Suoh

Level 1 - 0%

Race: Ashikabi

Class: Berserker (+3 STR, +3 END per level)

MP: 100/100 (10 per 30 seconds)

STR - 13

DEX - 10

END - 13

MAG - 10

MPR - 10

Free Points - 0]

It looked like the game chose a name for me. I didn't particularly feel one way or the other about it, so I guess it would have to do. Most of my stats were ones I saw when I was choosing my class and they were pretty self-explanatory. STR increased my physical power, DEX increased my reaction time and movement speed, END increased how durable I was, and MAG increased the power of my spells and abilities that used my mana pool. The only new stat that hadn't been an option from the classes was MPR, which was the speed my mana regenerated. I assumed it would have popped up if I had chosen to pick a magic class instead of a melee one.

It also displayed an image of what my appearance would be. I was tall for someone who was Japanese, standing at 6'2. My hair was black, with a short taper around the sides and back leading into more length on the top, my hair parted in the middle. I was clad in a white button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up, a black vest, and pants matching the black tie under the vest. 

The last things I got were the starter skills for my class.

[ - Lvl 1/10 (Passive): Taking damage during battle causes you to gain increased STR and END. Gain 10% of STR and END every 60 seconds you fight while injured, capping at 50%. More severe wounds increase stat gain. Exiting combat for 30 seconds resets bonuses, or being healed by something other than .

- Lvl 1/10 (Passive): Passive healing of wounds while in combat. The rate the wounds heal scales off the level of the skill and END. Cannot regrow limbs or organs.]

[Character Creation complete. Welcome to the Game. Have Fun.]

With that last message, my vision went black.

----

Opening my eyes, I was surprised by the brightness that appeared in front of me. Blinking away my disorientation, I found myself sitting on a park bench. A myriad of people walked past me as I got my bearings, my background in this world automatically filled in my memories.

I was eighteen, having just finished high school, and was supposed to be taking my entrance exams for university before I decided I didn't want to deal with more schooling and decided to get away from my family and ended up escaping to Shinto Teito, which was the re-named Tokyo after Mid Bio-Informatics, or MBI, a company based here bought a large majority of the real estate. I was currently staying in a hotel, but I'd decided to get some fresh air and came to the park.

I had 0 desire to try to interact with any family members, so I was glad the past version of me had decided to skip town. I barely knew them, even if I had the memories the emotions didn't transfer over, so I had no reason to feel attached to them.

Standing up from the bench, my immediate thought was to use and start grinding. I could only use it three hours a day, and I wanted to get started right away. Making my way off the beaten path away from the bench, I made my way into the mass of trees and activated the skill. 

[Select Dungeon: Zombie, Skeleton, Goblin]

I chose zombies since I didn't have any form of hand cover at the moment skeletons would probably suck to fight and goblins were more agile so I'd need to get my DEX up first.

My vision blurred and when I could see again I found myself in front of a destroyed village. The houses were partially on fire and all had parts that were destroyed or decayed. I readied myself mentally and walked through the village gate. Immediately, my pinged, letting me know about the zombie that was walking out from around the corner of the building. It wasn't particularly fast, with parts of its body being see-through from the holes that riddled it. Using , it was displayed in a blue color so I knew it wasn't a particularly big threat

It suddenly opened its mouth, screeching loudly before it started to run towards me. It wasn't superhumanly fast, pretty much moving at the speed of an average adult running, so I waited until it got close and dodged its swing. Quickly throwing two punches, one with each hand, I followed it up by pivoting on my toes and uppercutting the zombie, knocking its head off.

[Level 1 - 10%]

Seeing the experience gained and how easy that was, I figured that for now I'd be fighting weak zombies. Its call had drawn more to me as they shambled my way, picking up speed as I tried to weave around the many that started coming for me. I killed two more in quick succession before finally getting hit, a small cut on my arm from one of the zombie's protruding bones.

From there I continued to pick up small wounds as I fought, a minute passing as my STR and END increased by 1.3. The boost didn't feel all that significant at the moment, but once I leveled the skill I was sure it'd be more impactful. Killing another zombie, I killed a few more zombies and got the popup for a level-up.

[Level 2 - 0%

STR - 16(+3.9)

DEX - 10

END - 16(+3.9)

MAG - 10

MPR - 10

Free Points - 5]

With a thought, I quickly dumped my five free stat points into my DEX. I was already going for a frontline-focused fighting style, so for the moment I was going to ignore my magic stats and just get my physical ones as high as possible. My STR and END grew naturally due to my class, so I wanted to make sure my DEX could keep up.

Feeling the stat boost, the zombies became a lot easier to react to as I picked up fewer wounds. The ones that I already had were slowly closing, the smaller cuts I got at the start having closed now that three minutes had passed. I still had a bigger wound on my side I had picked up from one particularly strong zombie, but I was quickly falling into a rhythm as I fought.

Clearing the rest of the zombies surrounding me, I was finally given a moment of downtime as a popup appeared.

[First-Time Survival Bonus: choose a growth-type weapon.]

This would have been nice to get before, but I guess I would have to make do with only having it now. Looking at the options, I couldn't see any particular stats and was just given the different weapon types. Looking through the all, I quickly made my choice.

[Weapon Selected: Gauntlets and Greaves]

[Item Name: Beowolf

Growth: 0%

Weapon Type: Gauntlets and Greaves

Special Effect: Echo - each hit made with this weapon lands an additional time for 25% of the damage.]

Equipping my new weapon, I now was adorned with a pair of gauntlets that resembled a wolf's head, with claws for fingers. The greaves looked like a pair of clawed legs and they glowed a light white color.

A grind spread on my face as I bounced lightly on my toes, watching as a new hoard of zombies made their way toward me.

"Oh, these will do. These will do nicely."

----

When I exited my the sun had already set and it was now night in the park. I'd spent the entire three hours fighting almost non-stop, letting me keep going with only small breaks to heal some larger wounds enough to fight again. Looking at my stats, I could say that it was a well-spent three hours.

[Name: Sosuke Suoh

Level 7 - 4%

Race: Ashikabi

Class: Berserker (+3 STR, +3 END per level)

MP: 100/100 (10 per 30 seconds)

STR - 31

DEX - 40

END - 31

MAG - 10

MPR - 10

Free Points - 0]

My stats were certainly unbalanced, but until I felt comfortably able to survive I wouldn't be focusing on my magic stats. Better to be skilled in one thing and be able to fight stronger people than mediocre in everything.

My skills had also leveled from constant use, and going up a level while and going up two. I could feel the growth in effectiveness in most of the skills, with , in particular, changing to give 12% of my STR and END every 50 seconds. Based on that, I figured it would go up 1% in stat gain and down 5 seconds in the required time for every level it was raised.

Making my way back out of the bushes, I was surprised to find a person sitting on the bench I had woken up on. Looking at her, her appearance immediately made me cautious. She only wearing a white lab cloak from what I could see, with splashes of blood marring the originally pristine color. She had short, light-brown hair with a large red mark on her forehead, peeking out from under her hair. The most worrying part of all of that was when I looked at her with and she was coated in orange, which meant she was borderline extreme danger to the current me.

[Name: Akitsu

Race: Sekirei

Threat: Orange

Current State: Distressed, Broken]

The extra level in gave me some insight into her current state, but I was wary of dealing with an unstable Sekirei. I turned to walk away, but I heard a soft exclamation of "Ah" from the woman, forcing me to look back as I saw her staring at me with a blank face. I was cautious, but since she had already noticed me I figured I might as well try to figure out what was going on.

Making my way towards her, I raised my hand in greeting and called out "Hey, you alright? You're bleeding."

As I got closer to her, she just continued to stare at me before she responded "Ah, not my blood."

I felt like that wasn't something you should admit outright, but I continued towards her, sitting down on the bench beside her and trying to ignore the fact she could probably kill me. If she had wanted to, I doubted the current me was strong enough to stop her so there wasn't a real point in constantly stressing about it. Now that I was closer, I could also see that the lab coat was the only thing she was wearing, flashes of skin peeking out as she shifted.

"Well then, whose blood is it?"

Looking down at her lab coat, Akitsu lifted the bloodstained part, uncaringly flashing me as she did so, and replied "My adjustor's."

"And why is your adjustor's blood on your lab coat?"

"He broke me, so he attacked me," Akitsu's unhelpful reply came.

I quickly realized she wasn't exactly the best conversationalist, but at this point, I realized she wasn't a threat for the moment so I wanted to figure out what exactly was going on. This was the first Sekirei I had met, but apparently, it was a "broken" one.

"Well what's your name, and how exactly are you broken?"

Akitsu's normally blank face took on a somber look as she said "Ah, Akitsu. I wasn't adjusted properly, so I can't be winged. I can never have an Ashikabi."

That certainly cleared up what broken meant, but before I could say anything else to her, I shot up from the bench, my pinging from down the walkway. I could see a figure walking towards the two of us slowly. It was a tall woman with light grey hair tied back in a ponytail. She was clad in a black top and miniskirt with a belt wrapped around her waist and a grey haori over her shoulders. She had a pair of black stockings and boots on, but my eyes were drawn to the nodachi in her hand. A grin was on her face as she walked towards us. eyes first looking towards me before flicking to Akitsu and back.

"Well, aren't I lucky? I came to find you, and I found the scrapped number at the same time."

Shit, she was here for me originally? I thought she was trying to find Akitsu, but if she was saying I was her original target then this was bad. I hadn't interacted with anyone since I came here, and from my memories from before then I had never interacted with Sekirei or this woman, so I had no idea how she knew who I was. Using , I was just presented with more worrying information.

[Name: Karasuba

Race: Sekirei

Threat: Red

Current State: Bloodthirsty, Intrigued]

Turning to Akitsu, I quickly asked "Akitsu will you help me?"

She looked up at me with some surprise. "Ah, you want me?"

Ignoring the innuendo, I quickly nodded my head.

"I don't know why she's after me, but even if you can't be winged we can still fight her as Ashikabi and Sekirei."

Karasuba just looked on at our exchange, an amused grin on her face as she stopped a small distance from us.

Akitsu looked at my face for a second before nodding her head and standing up next to me, her bloodstained lab coat flapping in the wind.

"Thank you, I'm pretty sure I was dead without you," I said, hoping that together we might at the very least have a chance to escape.

Equipping , I saw a surprised look appear on both Akitsu and Karasuba's faces, before Karasuba's sadistic grin grew.

"Well then, let's see what you can Mr. Ashikabi," Karasuba said.