Raga sprinted through the dense forest, where the low-hanging branches seemed determined to claw his face off. His breathing was ragged, his lungs burning like a stoked furnace. What drove him even crazier was his outfit: a stained white tank top coated in gray cement dust, battered cargo pants torn at the knees, and a pair of steel-toed work boots missing their soles.

"S.I.N.I.! Can you hear me?!" Raga shouted as he leaped over a massive fallen log. "Can't you hook me up with a decent skin or outfit? Is the kingdom's heroic savior really supposed to smell like sweat and wet concrete? People are going to think I'm a vagrant fresh out of rehab!"

[System Response: Apologies, Raga. The 'Wardrobe' feature is locked at Level 1. Your avatar is currently calibrated for maximum 'Realism: Day Laborer' aesthetics. Besides, your construction attire is iconic. It projects an 'Out of the Box' vibe—or more accurately, an 'Out of a Job' vibe.]

"Screw you!" Raga spat. "This isn't an aesthetic! This is visual assault! Do you know how construction works back home? Laborers get proper company gear—at least a high-vis vest with a logo! Look at me! I look like a rogue trespasser!"

[System: Calm down, Raga. Fashion is subjective in this realm. But rest assured, your cement odor could double as a chemical weapon to neutralize hostiles. Side effect: Potentially lethal to the opponent's olfactory nerves.]

Raga cursed under his breath. He stared at the translucent blue interface hovering beside his head, which pointed the way with a glowing, obnoxiously bright neon arrow.

"S.I.N.I., be honest with me. Are you actually a support system, or just a troll who somehow scored access to another dimension?"

[System: I am an AI entity evolved from leftover late-night internet data. Therefore, sarcasm is my native tongue. Oh, look ahead. Target acquired. And yes, your combat proficiency remains firmly at 0. Recommendation: Run or die.]

Raga skidded to a sudden halt, ducking behind a thick, thorny bush. Ahead of him, the dense canopy opened into a small clearing. There she was: a young woman in a torn pale-blue silk gown, running breathless and terrified. Princess Naria.

Right behind her, three iron-masked men wielding razor-sharp longswords closed in, moving like predators enjoying the hunt.

"That's her..." Raga whispered. "But S.I.N.I., look at those guys! They're decked out in full armor with real swords! All I'm holding is a pair of yellow rubber gloves! Are you trying to get me killed?!"

[Warning! Target Status (Princess Naria): Critical. If you fail to intervene within 10 seconds, you will incur the 'Existential Erasure' penalty, and your real-world bank account will automatically reflect a negative balance.]

"A negative balance?! Don't you dare touch my account!" Raga panicked.

[System: Oh, look at that. Princess Naria just tripped over a rock. It appears she made a fatal error. Oh wait, that wasn't her fault—that was gravity's fault. How tragic. Would you like to keep watching, or step in and play the cement-scented hero?]

Raga stared as Princess Naria collapsed onto the jagged stones. One of the rebels cackled, raising his sword high into the air.

"Dammit!" Raga snatched up a heavy wooden branch from the ground.

[System: Impressive. Using a piece of timber against forged steel. Is this the 'Reckless Handyman' technique you picked up while fixing leaky roofs? Truly inspiring. I rate your foolishness a 2 out of 10.]

"Shut your mouth, you bloated piece of malware!"

Raga burst out of the bushes. "HEY! YOU COWARDS!" he roared at the top of his lungs.

The three rebels froze, turning to assess Raga from head to toe. Their eyes narrowed in utter confusion at the sight of a dirt-smeared stranger wearing filthy clothes and wielding a piece of forest debris.

"Who are you?" one of the rebels demanded in a gravelly voice. "What beggar hole did you crawl out of? Did you come here to beg for scraps?"

Raga swallowed hard. His heart was hammering violently against his ribs, his voice shaking slightly, but he forced his face into the fiercest scowl he could muster—the exact face he used back home when shaking down a crewmate who hadn't paid back borrowed cigarettes.

"Me? I'm the guy who's about to ruin your career!" Raga shouted, having no idea where that sudden surge of bravado came from.

[System: 'Ruin your career'? Wow, Raga. I thought you came to rescue a princess, not to open a job listing on LinkedIn. Very corporate of you.]

"STOP TALKING IN MY HEAD!" Raga screamed back at the system internally.

The rebel burst out laughing. "Unbelievable. We're dealing with a lunatic."

One of them stepped forward, swinging his sword casually, treating Raga as nothing more than a brief warm-up before executing the princess. Raga had zero sword-fighting experience, but he knew one fundamental truth about structures: every load-bearing frame has a weak point.

As the blade sliced toward him, Raga didn't execute a graceful dodge. He did what he always did on the job site: he ducked, executed a sloppy slide through the mud, and swung the heavy branch with all his weight straight into the rebel's unarmored shin.

CRACK!

The sharp sound of wood slamming into bone echoed through the clearing. The rebel groaned, dropping to his knees in a distinctly un-elite fashion.

[System: A crude hit, but effective. Combat Level: 1. Congratulations, you have officially upgraded from 'Dust' to 'Annoying Dust'.]

Raga gasped for air, sweat pouring down his face. He stood firm between the terrified Princess Naria and the remaining, now furious rebels.

"Princess!" Raga yelled without turning around. "Run toward two o'clock! Don't look back, or you'll see just how hopelessly underqualified your savior really is!"

Naria stared at Raga with wide, disbelieving eyes, unable to comprehend how anyone could be brave enough—or foolish enough—to challenge armed men while looking completely unheroic.

"Who... who are you?" Naria whispered.

"A handyman who got delivered to the wrong address!" Raga shouted back. "S.I.N.I., tell me now! How do I handle the other two?!"

[System: My recommendation? Start crying. It will confuse them for approximately three seconds. Use those three seconds to pray, because I don't feature a 'Resurrection' option at this time.]

Raga rolled his eyes, tightening his grip on the wooden branch. This was only the beginning, and he could already tell that earning a chest of gold in this world was going to be infinitely harder than hauling fifty-kilogram bags of cement every single day.