Chương 1: Vehicles & Skills

[Welcome to the Endless Plains.] [This is a migration for all of humanity, and an escape without an end.] [You will never return to your previous life, not even in death. So don't hold any optimistic thoughts of a possible return.] [The plains in front of you stretch endlessly, but beyond your four cardinal directions exists nothing but desolation. Do not waste time or resources by going there.] [Resources are precious and scarce, use them wisely.] [Your background doesn't matter. Whether you were once a billionaire or a street beggar, at this moment, you will all be given an equal starting point—one vehicle, one skill, one life.] [Whatever vehicle you possess, you will automatically acquire the corresponding driving skills and physical faculties.] The black-haired boy, with equally dark pupils, eyed the cluster of notifications listlessly.

"Wha—where am I?" he asked, only for the vast, flat terrain of knee-high grass to answer him with a gust of wind to the face.

"Plains? Wasn't I back at my house, playing Pokémon?" Nyx was only seventeen. He had little business being somewhere as raw as the scenery in front of him. He'd just woken up on Sunday morning and settled onto his couch with coffee to play Pokémon. And now here he was, still in his trousers and white t-shirt. He'd barely eaten anything. He looked around, turning his head left and right. Nothing—there was nothing for as far as he could see.

Except for the small swarm of flies buzzing a few meters away, annoyingly persistent. He reread the notifications hovering in a panel of blue hologram. He touched the projection, and it felt neutral—neither cold nor warm, with a distinctly glassy texture. It floated right in front of his face, and as he turned left and right, it followed him.

"The hell, is this even a hologram? I don't remember our projection technology being this advanced." He'd studied at one of the better, more expensive colleges. And even there, with its cutting-edge tech, he'd never seen a teacher use projectors like this. Nowhere close, in fact.

"These notifications read like some survival game's opening lore." He considered them for a moment, like any normal person would, before reaching up to pinch his own skin.

"Ouch… that hurt?" To test whether he was really dreaming, he broke into a run. Scenery blurred past him as the tall grass whipped against his legs, one stride after another. He eventually stopped, his heart finally catching up to his reality as panic began to set in. But before he could sink further, another notification popped up, shoving the others aside. [Players have all now been successfully assigned the system interface. You may call up your personal status with the command "status."] Before his mouth could form the word, his mind had already recited it. Immediately, a long screen of sky-blue text snapped into existence. Status Name: Nyx Race: Human Attributes Strength: Hits harder. Dexterity: Better motor control. Agility: Runs faster. Vitality: Heals faster. Endurance: Runs longer. Toughness: Hard to hurt. Willpower: increases mental energy capacity. Skill: Supernatural Abilities. Inventory: Place for storing and preserving items indefinitely. Regional Chat: Can be used to chat.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. Exchange: Marketplace for buying and selling items.

Nyx's gamer instincts immediately grasped most of it. The explanations were clear enough. But the moment he understood, and blinked, the status shifted into something else entirely. Status Name: Nyx Race: Human Base Attributes Strength: 6 Dexterity: 7 Agility: 12 Vitality: 9 Endurance: 5 Toughness: 3 Willpower: 10 Talent: N/A Inventory: N/A [Regional Chat] [Exchange]

"So these are my stats, huh." The numbers felt oddly familiar—maybe the only thing that did, in this strange situation he'd landed in.

"Regional chat." He clicked on it almost without thinking. The current window shattered into fragments as a new one replaced it. Regional Chat [Hey, where am I? Is this a dream? What is this place!] [Look, another crybaby.] [Shut up, man, he might be one of the younger ones. Stop being a jerk.] [Ignoring the jerk, to answer your question—we've basically been dropped into some kind of survival game. I've been here about an hour, tried all sorts of ways to confirm whether it's a dream. It's not.] [As someone with a degree and field experience in psychology, I agree with the guy above. This isn't a dream. Though it's hard to accept it as reality. I was just out walking my golden retriever, and now I'm here, and my dog's nowhere to be found.] [That's rough, man. Hopefully you get him back somehow.] [I'm a she, by the way. But thanks for the well wishes.] [Well wishes won't mean much—the system message clearly said we can't go back.].... Nyx closed the tab with a single thought.

Mostly because he couldn't stand to keep reading. It all felt too real, too alive. But things kept happening around him. Another notification arrived. [Drawing 'Vehicles' for all players… Successful.] A ball of light formed in front of Nyx, and as it slowly descended and dissolved, it left behind a bicycle—cold black frame, sleek gears. One of those electric bikes. Another notice followed, true to the earlier promise. This one concerned skills. [Drawing skill for all players… Successful.] [Congratulations, you have Awakened the unique skill, Usurper.] Nyx sat down beside his e-bike and rested his head on his knees for a minute. After several minutes of quiet contemplation, he stood back up.

"Let's treat this like a game," was his first decision.

"If it turns out to be fake, a dream, I'll just wake up and that'll be that. If it's real… I'll keep going." Either way, he had no real choice in the matter. He'd been handed a bike, of all things, in what was supposedly a survival game. If he spent his energy imagining every possible horror that might come of it, he'd never stop worrying. There'd be no end to the list. If the endlessly optimistic protagonists of the shows he'd watched had taught him anything, it was to stay positive. That kept the mind sharp.

Fear only clouded things. With renewed focus, he threw himself back into this new world. He'd been transmigrated, handed a vehicle and a skill as his only tools. He looked up again and spotted another notification. [There is a wooden box a few steps ahead of everyone. Go and claim the items within.] Nyx walked forward a few paces and found a reddish-brown box nestled in the tall grass, only its corners peeking out. He picked it up, flipped open the lid, and a string of notifications immediately flashed forward.

[Obtained Gold x3, Fuel x1, Universal Bullets x100] [Obtained Glock 20 x1] Before Nyx could fully process the items, one more notification arrived—and this one felt final. [With that, all initially necessary items have been distributed. From henceforth, your life rests on your own capabilities.] [Regional Population]: 100000 / 100000 [Mission: Survive in the Endless Plains for six days and nights. The plains are full of dangerous creatures such as zombies and other mutated beasts. But they're also full of treasure and opportunity. During the day, you're advised to search for treasure chests scattered across the land. They come in a range of rarities: Wood, Iron, Bronze, Silver, Gold.] [Tip: You are advised to remain within the safety of your vehicle once night falls. The dormant zombies of the daytime enter a berserk state after dark and will hunt and devour anything living. The nights will also grow progressively more extreme and violent. It is advised to gather resources proactively and prepare accordingly—because on the Seventh, the first cataclysm will arrive.] Nyx sighed. It confirmed his suspicion.

"This really is a survival game—like tower defense." Except he had no tower to defend, or hide behind. He summoned his inventory, and a panel with twenty slots opened before him. He pulled out the Glock 20. The cold weight of the gun materialized in his hands the moment he claimed it. It was heavier than he expected, and his hands shook faintly as he gripped it.

"Seriously, now I've been handed an actual gun? Hah." He laughed, self-deprecatingly.

"I was holding a controller a few minutes ago, and now I'm holding a real killing machine." Surely life couldn't throw anything bigger at him than this. Or so he thought—until he opened the regional chat again. Regional Chat [Yooo, what the fuck is this? Why's my unique skill related to farming?! Am I supposed to farm here??] [Lol, bro, your unique skill's just as trash as my mining skill. Though my situation is even worse, I've gotten myself a freaking pickaxe from that chest instead of a gun. At least i have a Roofless jeep for my name.] [Imao, and here I am, sitting on my humvee, wondering if I'd even need to worry about the night.] [Holly cow, a humvee? Here I thought it was only me who'd gotten a military vehicle, I've pulled a tank.] [No way, y'all are super lucky bruh, I'd only gotten a sedan and a unique skill that lets me summon infernal legions to fight on my behalf… oops, shouldn't have revealed that XD.] [???] [????] [Then there's people like me, stuck with a crappy mini off-road vehicle with barely any armor. How am I supposed to survive? I swear the devs are playing favorites.] Nyx calmly closed the tab, though if he could, he would've smashed the system interface to pieces. He looked back at his vehicle.

"An e-bike. Seriously, a f*cking e-bike??!!" He felt like shooting his bike, then shooting himself, just to end this miserable excuse of an 'equal' starting point—until he heard a rustling sound from the tall grass behind him.