My System Doesn't Give Power

On the opposite side of the crimson snowy wasteland lay another region entirely, supposedly called the bluish hellfire wasteland. It stretched endlessly beneath a gray sky.

At first glance, the place looked as if it had been buried under layers of blue-white snow and shining frost. But anyone foolish enough to touch it would quickly learn the truth that it was actually a burning hell disguised as a snowy tourist spot.

Marty sat on a blackened rock with burn marks all over his uniform. His face looked exhausted, beaten, and scared into silence.

Daniel stood nearby, rolling his shoulders while checking the edges of his spear. It had burn marks and cracks on it too.

Adrian stood beside him, wiping imaginary dust from his sleeves as if he had not just been chased across half the wasteland by a horned beast.

Shobin, on the other hand, stood quietly a few steps away, staring at the small green plants they had found while running for their lives.

The plants looked completely ordinary, with thin stems, small leaves, and no flowers. They looked fresh, as if someone had plucked them from a peaceful garden and accidentally dropped them into this wasteland.

The fresh, gentle fragrance coming from the plants felt completely alien compared to the strange burning land around them.

Marty looked at the plants, then slowly turned toward the others. "So, we risked our lives and got what? These plants?"

Daniel crouched and carefully touched one of the leaves. His eyebrows lifted slightly. "It’s warm."

"Maybe because I’m the one carrying them," Adrian said immediately.

Marty gave him a tired look. "You only wanted them near your body so you could smell as good as them."

Adrian paused for a beat, then coughed lightly. "A good fragrance is also a weapon."

"A weapon? If anything, it’s an attention puller that gives away your location to every beast roaming this wasteland."

"You’re just jealous of how good I smell."

Daniel picked up one of the plants and examined it, but he still did not dare to crush or break it. There were too many questions.

Why were the beasts guarding these plants? And why did something that looked so ordinary give off such an appealing fragrance?

Shobin spoke quietly, his eyes still fixed on the plants. "These might not be ordinary."

Marty leaned back on the rock, tiredly. "Shobin, nothing in this realm is ordinary."

He pointed at the ground around them. "This entire place is white and blue. There’s no normal vegetation anywhere. Even the beasts here look like they belong to this land. Their bodies, their breath, their skin, everything matches this place."

Then he looked back at the plants. "But these? They’re completely green and out of place. Plus, they oddly smell good."

Marty rubbed his forehead in frustration. "When I first landed here, I thought I was surrounded by snow. But when I touched it, my hand almost got cooked."

He lifted his palm, where the skin was still slightly red. "These things aren’t snow. It’s fire pretending to be innocent and blue."

Daniel glanced toward the narrow streams flowing nearby. They looked like blue crystal water, shining sharply as they moved between the rocks.

"And the water," Marty continued. "It looks pretty, doesn’t it? Like something nobles would put in their garden."

Adrian nodded in approval. "It does have elegance."

"No, it’s boiling. Like the kind that runs through volcanic mountains." Marty pointed at it. "That thing is not water. It’s magma wearing makeup."

He let out a breath. "And the beast... don’t even get me started on that thing."

The moment he mentioned it, all three of them went silent.

Suddenly, in the distance, a deep rumble rolled across the wasteland. Immediately, all four of them got into their stances, ready to run.

But after a few moments, the sound faded.

Adrian slowly lowered his hand from his chest. "Do you think it’s still nearby?"

"God, I hope not," Marty said, staring into the distance. "That thing looked like a tank but moved like a racer. Seriously, how can something that big move so fast?"

Daniel tightened his grip on his spear. "It’s way above our league."

"Obviously," Marty said. "The moment I saw it, every part of my body started writing my last will."

Adrian lifted his chin. "I knew it was dangerous from the beginning."

Marty turned toward him. "You screamed before you even saw its whole body."

"That was not screaming."

"And what about when you yelled, ’Why does it have horns on its horns?’"

"That was an observation."

"You also yelled, ’I’m too handsome to die.’"

"Still tactical. I was trying to distract it while we made a strategic retreat."

"You mean while we ran for our lives?"

"Same thing, different branding."

Marty let out a long breath and looked up at the pale sky. "I knew I shouldn’t have trusted that bastard Zac."

Daniel frowned. "What does Zac have to do with this?"

"He said the Academy was probably just trying to scare us. That this whole punishment realm thing was a scare tactic." Marty pointed toward the direction where the horned beast had disappeared. "Does that look like a scare tactic to you?"

Shobin tilted his head slightly. "To be fair, Zac didn’t know we would drop near an A-rank beast."

Marty’s face stiffened. "Don’t try to save his face." He paused. "So you’re telling me that beast we saw was on par with the teachers at the Academy?"

Shobin hesitated for a moment. "I’m not completely sure, but based on the pressure it gave off, it felt like standing in front of Miss Matilda when she was angry."

Marty let out a small laugh. "Is that so? I’m sure she’ll be thrilled to hear you compared her to a beast."

"You won’t breathe a word about it," Shobin said quickly, fear slipping into his voice.

Marty closed his eyes, thinking back to what had happened. "I had just been teleported into the realm. When I opened my eyes, the first thing I saw was the giant eye of an even more gigantic beast staring at me like I had killed its children."

Adrian gasped. "At least you found us before dying."

"Found you?" Marty opened his eyes and stared at him. "I was running for my life."

"Yes, and through your heroic retreat, you discovered us."

"I didn’t discover you. You were standing in plain sight, taking selfies with the small beast you killed."

"Self-publicity is the best publicity," Adrian said proudly.

Daniel looked at Marty and Adrian. "You two ran past me after that. At first glance, I knew you were running from something dangerous, but I didn’t expect it to be that big."

"You should have run immediately with us," Marty said. "Instead, what did you say? ’Don’t worry, I’ll save you guys.’"

Daniel looked away in embarrassment.

"If you had just run the moment you saw us, your spear might have survived."

Shobin raised his hand slightly. "And I was the last one."

Marty turned toward him. "And you were sitting under a blue tree."

"I thought it was safe."

"That’s the problem with this place," Marty said. "Everything looks safe and beautiful. But the moment you touch it..."

He stopped and rubbed his face. "Don’t even make me start on that again."

Marty stood up from the rock and looked at the green plants again. "All right, jokes aside, we need to find a safe place first and figure out what we’re going to do next."

"And what are we going to do about these plants?" Adrian asked.

"Let’s just take them," Marty said. "If the beasts are guarding them, there must be something valuable about them, or at least they can be used to make perfume."

Shobin crouched near the plants, still deep in thought. "If these were growing near the beast path, there might be more around this region," he said. "Maybe the beasts are guarding them, or maybe they gather around places where these plants grow."

"Then collecting them won’t be easy," Marty said.

Adrian adjusted his sleeves and asked, "So, what’s the plan?"

Daniel thought about it for a moment. "Remind me again. Why do we need to collect these plants? We don’t even know what they’re used for."

Marty looked at the plants. "First, we need to figure out what these things do."

Immediately, all three of them turned and looked at Shobin.

Feeling their gazes land on him, Shobin blinked. "What?"

"Well," Marty said, "you’re the nerd among us. So, what are your thoughts?"

Shobin frowned. "Why does everyone keep saying that about me?"

"Because it’s true," Marty said. "Daniel has a spear, Adrian is a narcissist, and I’m a defense warrior. You have books."

Shobin let out a sigh and slowly muttered to himself, "I have better things too, you know." His eyes narrowed slightly as he touched one of the plants and fell into thought. "I think we should test it."

"We know that," Marty said. "But how are we going to do it?"

Shobin looked up at them. "Why don’t we just try eating them?"

The other three instantly froze.

"Wha...t?"