Richard blinked. The message was still there, suspended in the air as if defying all logic.
[You have acquired the System of Ancestral Magic]
He swallowed hard. He sat up slightly on the hospital bed, his eyes scanning the room for an explanation: a hidden projector, a mirror, a drug-induced hallucination.
Nothing.
The message didn't flicker. It didn't move. It made no sound, but it was there. Fixed, immutable. As if it had always belonged in that space.
"This makes no sense…" Richard whispered.
And it didn't. He wasn't a superstitious person. He had never believed in horoscopes, tarot, or conspiracies. To him, history was a science built on evidence. Legends were just that: cultural interpretations of a confusing past. So how could he explain what he was seeing?
The door to the room opened. A young nurse with dark hair and a kind expression entered with a doctor. They carried a digital clipboard and wore professional smiles.
"Hi, Richard, how are you feeling?" the nurse asked while checking the monitors.
"A little… confused," Richard replied, his eyes still fixed on the floating message.
"That's normal with a concussion," the doctor said as she checked his pupils with a flashlight. "You were unconscious for a few minutes, but your vital signs are stable. You should be back to normal in a couple of days."
Richard nodded slowly, but his mind was elsewhere. How was it possible that they couldn't see the message? It was right there, floating above his bed, and yet… no one reacted.
Only he could see it.
He tried to interact with it. He cautiously raised a hand. Nothing. No change, no response.
And then, without warning, the message disappeared. It didn't explode or dissolve. It simply ceased to exist.
As if it had never been there.
The following hours passed with the absurd normality of everyday life. He was discharged in the afternoon with a light splint on his arm and a list of recommendations. He walked slowly back to his apartment, the sun hitting his face harder than usual, as if the city were trying to convince him that nothing extraordinary had happened.
But he knew something had changed.
Even so, he said nothing. Not even when he met his friends that evening at their usual spot: a café near campus, decorated with warm lights, soft jazz, and exhausted students.
"You slipped on an oil slick?!" Jake laughed, shaking his mug of hot chocolate. "That is so classic you!"
"I'm glad you're okay," Emily added with a smile that hid genuine concern. "When they said you'd been taken to the hospital, I almost had a heart attack."
"It was just a fall," Richard said, downplaying it. "Nothing serious."
"Are you sure?" Elliot asked, arms crossed. "I mean, it's not normal for you to look more lost than usual."
Richard chuckled weakly. The truth was, he couldn't stop thinking about that message, but he was still convinced it must have been a product of the fall. Maybe a hallucination. Maybe a form of extreme stress. Maybe…
Monday arrived, and with it, the final presentation of their comparative mythology project. Richard, still with his arm immobilized, stood in front of the class with his friends and began to speak with the precision of a surgeon and the passion of a true history lover.
His section focused on the interpretation of magical elements in ancient cultures and how certain symbolic structures repeated themselves, especially in Mesopotamian civilizations. It was there that, almost unintentionally, he mentioned the Sumerian tablet.
The professor, visibly impressed, congratulated him.
"Your analysis of mystical narratives in terms of symbolic power is exceptional. A perfect score for the group."
The others celebrated. Emily even gave him a light hug, to which he responded with a forced smile.
But inside, Richard felt no joy. He knew how much effort it had cost him: sleepless nights, frustration, obsession. And still, the tablet's enigma remained unsolved.
The last class of the day took place in the university's central auditorium. The Ancient History professor, an older man with gray hair and a deep voice, presented a digitized collection of texts recently discovered by archaeologists in Turkey.
"Some of these books are completely illegible. Others, however, contain writings that defy our translation systems," he explained while projecting ancient images. "This one, in particular, was found in what appears to have been a pre-Babylonian sanctuary…"
The image froze on a dark cover with arcane inscriptions and a spiral that was all too familiar to Richard.
It was then that the message reappeared, right in front of his eyes:
[New mission available]
Objective: Find information about the Book of Ur-Kigal
Reward: Access to the First Level of the System
Richard froze.
Not only had the system returned.
Now it was giving him a mission.
And that word… Ur-Kigal… wasn't part of any known database. It didn't appear in any of the hundreds of books he had read, nor in any tablet he had studied.
It was something older. Something… out of place.
And for the first time, Richard Wonder felt that everything he believed about the world was about to change.