Life Of A Nobody - as a Villain

Reminisce, a rune that once activated, lets the target feel the feelings and sensations the castor/user is reminiscing about.

A special something Rio had his system prepare, just to let anyone who left him to die, experience his pain atleast once before he kills them.

The guy who was screaming his lungs out, banging his head on the concrete floor, hoping to pass out and survive the torture, was currently going through how it feels when you're surrounded by hundreds of monsters in a stampede, when you couldn't move, couldn't dodge and can only hold your head and bow down as blind beasts run all over your body and crush you from all side.

Every moment a new hit, a new injury, getting inflicted on your body, so much pain in so little time that even an awakened human's brain start legging and failing to comprehend.

That's what Rio reminisced about as he closed his eyes.

The heartwrenching screams lasted for a full whole minute and no one dared to move during this time, all staring in shock at the guy who seemed to have gone mad. And when finally the cries of agony stopped, the 'madman' didn't even have the heart to lift his fingers, let alone participate in the game again. If not for the little movement of his chest moving up and down every few seconds, people would've even doubted if he was still alive or not.

Opening his eyes, Rio took a glance at the student lying limp below, and then turned to look at the professors. "Humm, I told you something was wrong with the ball, you don't listen. Guess this is normal now, right?"

His words were met with silence as no one knew how to answer.

Professor Hakan had a ferocious expression like someone just forced him to eat shit, while Elder Xander had a frown on his old heroic face.

Unlike the eerie silence and doubtful eyes of staff, the viking elder had a bright smile on his face. And looking at everyone's expression, he just burst out laughing.

"Ahahahha hahaa what a good match." He said and walked towards the barrier.

He flicked his hands and instantly the comatose student got pulled from the barrier and flew outwards, finally falling in front of the team of medics standing in a corner, like a dead dog.

"Why did the match stop, keep playing."

Seeing that everyone was just standing frozen and staring around dumbly, the viking elder seemed a little dissatisfied and shouted. His heavy tone instantly bringing everyone back to their senses.

Rio looked at the elder dressed as a barbaric viking, with the aura of a primitive hunter radiating from his body, and then glanced at the other elder, dressed in clean white clothes looking like a big immortal from a cultivation world manhwa - and couldn't help but smile in his heart.

'Big helps pull bigger opponents, my dear Apollo. You might be a God, but you don't know the taste of authors writing novels.' Rio said and laughed heartily imagining the scene where Apollo is biting his nails in depression over the exaggerated changes happening here.

Ignoring them, Rio turned his attention back to the game and smiled at Pandya, who was staring at him in confusion. This guy probably knew their cheating failed or something this serious wouldn't have happened to their team.

As one member was down and out from this game, another stand in player from fourth years took his place and the game began again.

"Make a pair and grab a guy, I'll handle the rest." Rio said to his team and flew away, ignoring the sneers of dissatisfaction from the monkey's chosen. Apparently everything is always about pride for him.

Unlike him, others weren't so high on arrogance, knowing the difference in levels and physique few members did follow his orders and formed a pair of two to hold back and interrupt a senior.

Obviously Valtor, Moksh, Amelia and Heath were alone, while though a little annoyed Qingyue paired with Rebecca and chose to hold back Millie.

Rio was still surrounded by five students, led by Pandya, but this time they weren't as arrogant or aggressive as before. They clearly had their guards up since now there wasn't professor Hakan saving their asses.

Rio didn't disconnect the professor's control from the ball completely, he just chose to change the runes and trajectory every time the ball was passed to him. Surprisingly each time he hit someone, the same scene of madness would follow.

Reminisce, Resonance and Revenge - these 3 runes were getting used at every turn and his old buddies were banging their heads heavily trying to hold on for a minute till the penalty passes.

Professor Hakan had a twisted expression on his face, as he tried to fight for the control of ball, yet failed again and again, while Pandya was sweating buckets on his back every time he saw the smile on Rio's face.

This time the tides seemed to have finally changed a little as the match didn't look like a one sided bullying now. Rules were getting broken every passing minute from both teams and screams were echoing through the skies every now and now.

Though the previous rounds lasted for more than half an hour each, this time the scores were already 10:13 in the first five minutes.

After losing 4 more members of his team Pandya finally couldn't take it anymore, as he could feel some of his teammates were even thinking of losing the game so they don't have to suffer whatever their friends went through. New members even stopped coming in now, after seeing that the ones who entered before only left the game looking like a corpse.

So Pandya gritted his teeth and charged forward, ignoring Rio and going for the goal. Hoping to score points fast so they won't lose the game at least. And shame themselves any further.

But bad luck, as Amaya who seemed like a lazy lump thrown into a pile of energetic sheep finally got serious. The ball which was shooting towards her like a speeding bullet seemed to be as slow as a snail in front of her eyes.

She just waved her hand, sending the ball away, and before the fat fuck could even follow the track of the moving ball, a wooden bat smashed onto his head, knocking him back a few steps, as a streak of blood slid down his cheeks.

"That's for earlier." Amelia said and stepped back, waving the bat in her hand, splashing the few droplets of blood and hair still stuck on its edge. "And this is for my brother." She said, hitting the ball with her feet like a football.

She got a little penalty of blindness for the next minute, but it was better for her to not see what happened next.

As Pandya, who saw the black streak of flash coming straight to him, ducked and jumped away. But the ball still hit his leg, breaking the magical shoes which helped him float all this time, and shattering his soles into meat paste.

Like a kite whose strings had been cut or a bird who lost his wings, Pandya flailed around in the air like a headless fly, trying to balance himself on one foot, while constantly moving away from the enemy court.

He even had the urge to curse out loud and break his zen of silence due to the immense pain he was feeling. The penalty he got seemed to be something like enhanced senses or feelings, since with every passing second he felt everything even more clearly. The gusts of winds felt like blades cutting his skin and the imbalance from his left leg felt like someone tied a mountain down there and asked him to keep dragging it. All the while the veins and bones in his bleeding leg felt like being frozen in ice and burning in fire.

"What happened fatty? Don't tell me you lost your edge." Rio said as he walked slowly towards him, waving his hand as the ball in hands of Katherine, changed direction and moved towards fatty's shoulder. Changing its shape to a thin scale in mid air, before hitting him, causing a large straight wound that went straight from his shoulder to the tip of his nails.

Blood spurted out like a fountain, dying his entire arm red, a scream like a dying pig escaped from his mouth, as Pandya held his hand and started crying in pain.

Ignoring the eyes of everyone, Rio kept walking towards him and said something coldly. "Do you remember what I told you two years ago?"

[Don't ever go after people close to me, or I'll send you straight to sunlight.]

Pandya remembered a warning Rio had given him, during a simple mission exam after he fought with Lisa two years ago, and a chill went up his spine. If before he was pressured and afraid of pain, then now looking at Rio walking towards him with a cold look, he was afraid for his life.

He tried to speak, to shout surrender, to seek help, but something seemed to be holding his neck, as not a single words escaped his mouth.

Seeing no chance he hurriedly tried to back away, running on the limp leg while holding his broken hand,he kept pushing his teammates in front of Rio to give himself some time to run away.

But every time someone tried to block Rio, the ball being passed around others would change directions mid air and hit that person. Giving them a penalty that brought endless pain. One guy was penalized with 'hunger' and he literally started chewing on his fingers until he tore it off and gulped it down.

This rune was called 'Recollect' and Rio the caster based it upon the feeling of hunger he felt when he used his gluttony to survive in the dungeon. It wasn't complete nor real, just a fraction of what he felt after a year and half in the dungeon, when he lost all his food resources and had to starve and find 'other' methods to survive. A simple recollection of that one passing moment for him in the dungeon, was enough for the guy in front to turn into a cannibal.

Next one who appeared started suffering from thirst so high, he simply turned around and plunged his teeth into his friend, drinking his blood like a mad hungry vampire.

The guy getting drained of blood till his face paled, didn't even scream or bat an eye or showed any expression as he just stood there like a lost man, staring at the sky with hopeless sighs. His head going through the feeling of complete loneliness, where his soul simply gave up on everything.

Similar scenes appeared again and again, no matter who hit the ball, no matter where it was targeted or where it was headed, the moment someone appeared to block Rio, an invisible force would trigger some mechanism that pulled the ball to help clear his path.

Although professor Hakan tried his best to snatch back the control of the ball and save his minions, he couldn't do anything except watch from the sidelines. Rio couldn't feel any struggle or notice any changes, but he could see the effects the professor used after noticing the increase in his points disappearing every second. System was working hard to handle these idiots while he played his game.

Rio knew the whole fiasco of torture wouldn't last longer, as even the audience who just joined could tell something was wrong with this game. No matter how you see it, final year students who had gone through dozens of missions and finished hundreds of training programmes, losing their cools and screaming in pain after just one hit was no ordinary situation.

So he just decided to end it.

Rio turned his attention back to the professor Hakan and swung his bat. He was just hitting the air, but all of a sudden, the ball which was dozens of meters away from him appeared in front of the bat and made contact on itself. The force behind the swing was too much that even the preservation runes of the bat failed and the artifact broke in pieces.

"I told you something was wrong with this ball, why won't you listen." Rio said again, throwing the broken wooden handle in his hand down and walking away.

Behind his back was Pandya, kneeling on the ground with a giant hole on his chest, and pieces of his heart and the gaming ball splashed across the floor. Disbelief and horror still written clear on his face as he kept looking at Rio's back, remembering the words from two years ago.

[Don't ever go after people close to me, or I'll send you straight to sunlight.]

He cursed himself for the attempt to attack Amelia earlier, yet there was no medicine for regret.

He was dying now.

Before he completely closed his eyes for forever, he noticed a streak of sunlight coming towards him at high speed. Pandya raised his hands trying to reach the light, but sadly darkness engulfed him sooner.

Drowning his entire existence in a shadow of death and taking his soul for eternal slumber.

[Game over]