The Allbright System - A Sci-Fi Progression LitRPG Story

Thea woke up excited the next morning.

The monthly reset was always a highlight for her, as it meant that the arcade would finally get updated with new versions of each of the games, but even more importantly, with new highscores that players across the sector had gained over the past month! Not only would this lead to the top 10 on each list gaining a prize and being entered into automatic drawings for further prizes, but even more interesting to Thea was the renewed sense of competition. Beating her own highscore again and again simply didn’t have the same feeling as trying her hardest against somebody else's best.

It was only around 0600 local time, so she still had at least two hours before she needed to be at the arcade for the early opening. She quickly jumped out of bed and started her morning routine.

Every morning before sunrise, Thea followed a rigorous schedule of workouts. This was something that Old Man James had insisted upon accepting her into his home and it was something that Thea had learned to appreciate over the years. More than once had her superior physical abilities saved her from unsavoury types out in the undercity. Most people living in the undercity did not pay any mind to physical exercise or any training to speak of, as their foremost thought always came back to survival. Being able to exercise like this was a luxury that Thea did not take for granted, so she poured her all into it, every morning.

Her room was a small one, barely fitting a mattress and a training mat next to each other. She loved it, however, as it was distinctively hers. Along the metal walls, many posters of games, famous UHF marines and modern technology were plastered that she had gathered over the years. If she didn’t know that this was a fully enclosed cold, dead, metal space, she could easily believe it might even be a luxurious suite with proper tapestry walls!

While the room did not have a window to the outside, it did offer a source of fresh air via an old vent duct near the southern corner opposite the door, which she briefly opened after her first set of workouts, causing it to creak and crack as if in agony. While the air in the undercity was anything but fresh, it was still much preferable to the stale air of a whole night’s sleep coupled with sweat from a half-hour workout set.

After finishing her second set, she went to her small wardrobe, barely big enough to fit a handful of outfits, and pulled out her favourite pair of synth-leather jeans, coupled with her favourite violet-coloured hoodie. Today, she needed all the good vibes she could muster. It was showtime!

Leaving her room in nothing but the pants she slept in from the day before, she quickly and stealthily rushed into the bathroom to take a quick shower to rinse off all the sweat of the night and the early workout. It was moments like these that she was thankful for Old Man James’ abode, as it came with running hot water, an absolute luxury in undercity unless one counted the irradiated steam vent outlets as such.

Once upon a time there used to be running hot water everywhere on Lumiosia, or so Old Man James used to say, but over the past few centuries the mid-worlds of the UHF have fallen into disrepair more and more, as the war efforts were intensifying across the borders. With the borders requiring more military presence than ever before, there was less and less oversight available for the planetary governments, leading to rampant corruption and worsening conditions as the decades passed.

As such, Thea was unimaginably thankful for the life she had been gifted by Old Man James. Not only did she have the luxury of being able to return to a safe place whenever she needed, but she even had access to clean, hot water to wash herself with. She always had to keep those things from her age-peers, however, as she couldn’t afford to be seen as born with a titanium spoon in her mouth. She needed them to see her as a fellow gutter-kid, down on their luck, in order to keep their fickle relationship.

Once she dried herself off with one of the few remaining towels that still stood the test of the time in their little home, she quickly threw on her outfit for the day. Her favourite deep-blue, nearly black, synth-leather jeans with tiny specks of white, yellow, orange and red on them that looked like stars, a simple grey tank top, topped with her favourite violet hoodie. It featured one of her favourite characters from one of the old retro games she often likes to play at the arcade: A fierce-looking woman with short, violet-coloured hair wielding a pair of oversized energy gauntlets, ready to kick some ass!

She mustered herself in the bathroom mirror one last time, making sure nothing was out of the ordinary.

Her strikingly cyan-coloured eyes stared back at her, appearing as if they were glowing from the inside out, as they did for all Cyans. She really liked them, despite what other people said about them. She found them to be exceedingly beautiful and mesmerising to look at, like the galaxy’s nebulas that she had often seen on Old Man James’ tour-of-duty pictures.

Her shoulder-long dirty blonde hair was properly bound into a ponytail at her back, secured by multiple rubber bands, as mandated by Old Man James due to “necessary combat readiness requirements”. She had come to accept the Old Man’s weird requirements as part of life, more often than not due to them saving her hide at multiple points, such as with the physical exercise.

There was a reason he was Old Man James, after all. He was old. While that sounds obvious enough, for undercity citizens, the age of 40 was a pipe-dream. Old Man James, according to himself, was more than 200 years old. He had to be doing something right to live that long and Thea was not about to give up on advice, just because she didn’t understand the purpose immediately. She could always stop adhering to it if she figured out it was unnecessary, but if it was necessary and she hadn’t done so and died… she’d not only violate the Golden Rule #1, but she’d also hate herself for giving up an easy advantage! As an avid gamer she could never ever give up an advantage so easily gained!

Lastly, she checked her hoodie and pants for any outstanding issues, such as newly opened holes or tears. She could not afford her favourite outfit to fall apart, especially not on such an important day!

It was hard enough to find good quality clothing this deep in the undercity, much less for a girl her size. While she wasn’t exceedingly different from most people at first glance, her combined attributes had caused quite a lot of trouble in trying to find the proper clothing for herself over the years.

At the current age of 15, she stood at around 168cm tall. While not really tall for a human woman, for an undercity girl, she was essentially a giant. Most girls her age would only come up to around 145-150 cm at best, with some rare outliers scratching the high 150s. Even most undercity boys her age would only rarely manage to catch up to her in height. Old Man James had blamed it on her genetics, figuring that her parents had been fairly tall themselves and potentially not been from undercity at all, as well as her good physical education from him. He had always made sure to provide a balanced diet of nutrients for her, even through tough times. This was something that essentially no undercity citizen could ever hope for, but as a UHF veteran, he was given a certain amount of credits every month as a stipend.

Her height would not have been a problem in itself, as she could have simply worn adult clothes, but she was also extremely well built for a mid-worlder. Due to her constant training regimen over the past decade coupled with her apparently decent genetics, she was very lean with lots of muscle-mass and a fairly low body-fat percentage, although some of which had recently started accumulating around her chest.

These points put together had made it difficult to find clothes in the undercity that were both appropriate for her height but also for her wider-than-average size on extremities such as thighs, legs, arms and shoulders.

Having finished her morning routine, she quickly left the bathroom, threw her dirty pants haphazardly into her room and darted for the front door, to get a jump-start for her day.

Just as her hand reached the datapad to unlock the door, she heard Old Man James come out of his room.

“Ah. Good Morning, Old Man! I’m about to head out for the big reset! Super excited! Look, I even brought my lucky outfit! I’m SO gonna beat ‘em all up today, I can’t wait!” Thea bubbled towards Old Man James, who merely stepped towards her with a determined stride.

“Thea…” he started, with an uncharacteristically troubled look on his face.

“Make sure to bring my old plasteel knife. You promised you’d be sure to take it with you on reset days. We never know who might be out for your credits, especially after all the highscores and prizes are revealed.”

Looking a bit perplexed, Thea lightly tapped the hilt of her right boot. “I... I always have it with me, you know that. What’s wrong with you?” she stepped a bit closer and mustered Old Man James’ face carefully before adding “Is everything alright?”.

Likely realising that his attitude had a severe effect on Thea’s mood, Old Man James immediately forced a smile on his face and waved her off “Ahh, don’t worry about it! This old man is simply realising that the passing of time is indeed faster than anticipated. Truly, it is nothing to be concerned about. I was just worried for your health, is all.” he finished with a more genuine smile.

While not entirely convinced, Thea backed off towards the door again, figuring that Old Man James would tell her if something truly important was going on. There was no reason for him to keep secrets from her, after all.

“Oh, but one thing before you go. Promise me this:”, Old Man James’ face turned hard, causing Thea to slightly shrink away from his gaze. “Absolutely go for the high score. Don’t be happy with mediocrity. Get the #1 spot.” he uttered with a steel and vigour in his voice that Thea had not heard in a long time.

Severely taken aback by this sudden turn of events and the odd request, Thea took a moment to centre herself. This was something she had been taught by Old Man James as well: ‘If you get overwhelmed, find your quiet place and reboot. A panicked mind is the precursor to a dead one.’

After several moments of quiet contemplation and calming, she met his gaze head on, gave him a firm nod and replied, “Yes, sir. I will!”

She unlocked the door with the datapad and before stepping outside threw one last glance back and added, “I always do.” before sprinting off into the early-mist of the undercity.

As the solid metal door closed behind her, James stood by himself in the middle of the living room slash kitchen. He gave himself a slight chuckle, quietly thinking to himself “If nothing else… that, you do...”

He pulled up his old datapad from his time at the UHF once again and opened the message he had received the night before to look at it again.

“It’s all in your hands now, Thea… Give ‘em hell!”, he declared to no one but himself, while giving a heartfelt UHF-style salute to the closed front door.

Thea raced through the misty alleyways of Lumiosia’s Undercity on her way to the arcade.

Neither of the two suns that Lumiosia orbited around had risen quite yet, but the sporadically functioning street lamps provided enough ambient lighting for most undercity denizens to make do. Unlike late at night, the alleyways, streets and stores were bustling with people.

While they mostly stayed hidden at night in fear of the local gangs and marauding packs of wild beasts, the early mornings were considered a protected timeslot, in which the local gangs and the undercity government agreed upon a sort of truce, in order to keep a semblance of normalcy and a figment of business going.

As such, Thea had to take a slightly different route than the one she chose the previous night, as some alleyways had been blocked by foot-traffic or the occasional market-stall. For her, this was not an issue, however. She knew the undercity better than anyone else. Nobody could beat her at hide and seek, nor could anyone escape from her if they tried. No hidden nook or cranny existed in her local area of the undercity, that Thea did not know about. She spent countless hours exploring throughout the locale, after all!

This was another one of Old Man James’ influences on her. Golden Rule #5, to be specific. “Always know your AO”, while her home was not exactly an area of operation, it could be considered as one, at least according to Old Man James.

She had done her best to have a painfully accurate map of the entire local undercity in her head from personally exploring and visiting every conceivable alley, hole and broken down ruin over the years.

The undercity this morning felt more excited than usual for Thea. Maybe it was due to her own excitement, but the overall atmosphere seemed less oppressive than usual. The mist hiding the lower parts of the angular metal and rockcrete buildings that came in the same depression-grey colours no matter where you looked, definitely helped in her mind.

While she absentmindedly ran through the undercity like her favourite ninja from Old Man James’ movies, she continuously was on the lookout for anything out of the ordinary.

While Old Man James had assured her nothing was going on, she could not help but feel slightly anxious at his weird behaviour before she left home this morning…

Around fifteen minutes of running, dodging and jumping through the drab, dirty and sometimes downright filthy undercity alleyways and streets landed her in front of the local arcade. Her second home, so to speak. She actually ended up spending more time here than at her actual home with Old Man James, but who really counted.

The arcade was located at an old entertainment park, which by now had mostly dilapidated into just another ruined section of the undercity. It was the last remaining vestige of a better time for the mid-world known as Lumiosia in the local undercity.

Not only was it one of the few buildings in undercity still somewhat in shape, with a neat, red-white striped coat of paint on the outside, but it even featured holographic 3D advertisements of popular games at the front, which currently basked the near-solid looking mist in a mesmerising mixture of colours.

Known locally as a sort of get-together place for all generations, usually teenagers and adolescents during the day-light hours, followed by adults and fossils later in the evening to night-time, it was a popular establishment, by undercity metrics.

The monthly reset was sort of like a mini-festival every month, as many avid game aficionados tried their hands at the high scores for each month, hoping to win a prize or two to get one up in life for once. Following that, a lot of people had already gathered in front of the doors of the arcade. If Thea had to take a quick guess, she’d say there were about three dozen or-so people waiting to be let in after the arcade finished its monthly update.

Thea, however, did not need to wait. She banked right before the waiting masses and went towards the back entrance of the arcade, swiping her bracelet over the datapad at the door, to be let in. Once inside, she placed her bag into one of the arcade employee lockers and headed towards the front desk to see what Thomas had been up to so far.

Just as she crossed the doorframe leading from the back rooms to the front of the arcade, she saw it.

Right in the centre of the arcade, where Thomas had previously displayed his myriad showpieces ranging from old-world technology to retro video games and more, stood a giant metal square.

It was roughly 20 metres wide and long and around 10 metres tall, nearly reaching the ceiling of the golden-age architecture arcade. It was painted matte black on all sides and featured no discernable indicators to Thea for what it might possibly be. Nevertheless, it practically screamed new-gen technology at her.

Something she had never seen in her entire life. The newest piece of technology she had ever seen was the old, worn datapad that Old Man James had in his locked drawer. But even that one was nearly one and a half centuries old at this point. This in front of her right now, however, was definitely new-gen tech.

Fully enthralled by the giant black cube in the centre of the arcade, she slowly approached it, her cyan eyes darting frantically across it, as if to try and find an imperfection in its shell to dive right into its interior. She tried to figure out what material the cube was made out of, but came up empty. She had never seen such a smooth finish on a matte painted metal before.

Even plasteel, one of the galaxy’s most reliable and well-regarded metal alloys, generally held imperfections that would come to light at larger sizes, such as this cube.

But the cube before Thea right now, was perfect. Not a single imperfection could be seen, no matter how much she tried to find one.

Excitement rose up in her chest, as she quickened her steps towards the cube. If she could just touch- In this moment, the lights to the arcade suddenly flared up and ripped Thea from her enthralled state. She quickly spun around to see what happened.

“Thea..? Why are you here in the dark…? You’re early too. That’s good tho, ‘cause we had some issues with the updates last night, a couple machines could use a bit of your magic touch, if you don’t mind.” Thomas stated as he stepped away from the main breaker located behind the front desk and pulled up some information on his datapad.

With a feeling of dread starting to build, Thea had just realised she had completely forgotten to turn on the lights when she entered the arcade. Not that she needed them, as she had always been able to see perfectly in the dark, after all. What this did signify however, was that she had lapsed in her usual routine… Something she was not used to, at all.

‘Routines keep you going. Routines keep you alive’, was something that Old Man James had drilled into her since she was barely able to run and she had taken it as sort of a life-motto. While not quite a golden rule, it was damn near close to one for her. For her to break such a motto was unheard of, yet all it took was one look at the matte-black cube. No matter how she tried to justify her earlier decisions, there was no excuse she could find for her lapse in routine that could realistically satisfy her.

Looking at the cube had felt like a sort of invitation to her.

An invitation she would, - no.. she could not refuse.

With a feeling of anxious dread, she slowly turned towards the cube behind her. It towered half a dozen metres over her, casting a deep, black shadow that doused her in darkness. The ceiling lights of the arcade above were blocked out, making her feel isolated and alone in her confrontation with the unknown cube…