“Crisis is just another opportunity.”
A famous saying, but one I can’t agree with.
In the face of overwhelming crisis, there is no opportunity.
No—perhaps a crisis where you can even look for an opportunity isn’t a real crisis to begin with.
“F*ck.”
The curse slips out on its own.
In this chaos, the only thing I can do right now is swear.
And with it comes fear.
Not just because of this situation.
But because of the countless branching futures that will unfold after this.
“…This is insane.”
Under normal circumstances, I’d be no different from the panicking citizens around me.
But instead, my mind is eerily calm—cold, even.
Is it because of the message floating in front of me?
I don’t know.
[Survive the Inevitable Destruction.]
[Difficulty: Final (LAST)]
Familiar, yet alien.
No—because it’s familiar, it feels alien.
A combination of words I’ve only ever seen on a screen.
This is the only thing vaguely explaining my current situation.
That I’m inside the game I’ve been playing all this time.
‘Final difficulty…’
The biggest difference from what I usually see on-screen is the difficulty.
This is a difficulty I’ve never seen before.
And that’s why a hollow laugh escapes me.
“Heh…”
A reality I can’t easily accept.
Is this really not a dream?
Slap!
Without hesitation, I strike my own cheek—the sharp pain radiating to the back of my skull.
The pain only brings greater confusion.
Which leads to an unconscious action.
Like a man possessed, I scan my surroundings through blurred vision.
‘No mutants have appeared yet… What do I do?’
No matter how I look at it…
This isn’t a gameplay moment.
This is the prologue—the cutscene explaining the world before the game even starts.
Which makes it even harder to understand.
Why am I here, now, at this exact moment?
There’s a significant time gap.
And because of that, the psychological pressure hits even harder.
The discomfort of being in an environment I’ve never played before.
That alone makes my head spin.
So, the solution I choose is—
A temporary way to stop thinking.
Looking around more carefully, the scene is chaotic.
Countless things are happening at once.
Collapsed figures clutter my vision.
“D-Dorothy!”
“Move! We need to get to the repair center!”
No—not people. Androids.
Their internal circuits burned out, frozen mid-smile.
Grotesque.
And among them, someone sprints past, carrying one of those eerie dolls on their back.
When our shoulders collide, the world slows to a crawl.
Thud.
“Agh!”
“Uh…?”
“Hey, asshole! Watch where you’re—sorry!”
A dull pain lingers as the other person glances at me, startled, before quickly vanishing into the crowd.
That pain serves as a full stop to all my thoughts.
‘This is real.’
I have to accept it now.
This isn’t a dream.
I even slapped myself to be sure.
A dream wouldn’t feel this vivid.
This is another world.
A world both familiar and unsettlingly foreign.
Earth, 100 years in the future.
Apocalypse City.
The City of the End.
Something clicks in my mind.
Do I even have time to stand around like an idiot right now?
Even after witnessing the inevitable events unfolding in this world, am I still unable to grasp the situation?
Or is this actually an opportunity?
The prologue—a scenario I’ve never played before.
If I act now…
“Maybe I can change things.”
My feet move more easily than expected.
“I have to go.”
Even if my mind is still reeling, I have to move.
Now.
But where?
How?
If this is the prologue…
There are only 12 hours left until the first mutant appears.
This is the starting point.
Maybe I can alter the difficulty from the very beginning.
A world lifted straight from the screen.
No—more accurately, I’ve been lifted into the screen.
But the important thing is that finding my way isn’t as hard as I thought.
Seven years of playing this game lets me navigate even without a map, despite my blurred vision.
Thanks to that, I weave through the frantic, panicking crowds with purpose.
‘This is Rosen 3rd Street.’
A little further, and I’ll reach the heart of the city—Weilris HQ.
Honestly, I don’t even need to know the way.
The towering skyscraper is impossible to miss.
Seeing it in person is surreal, but the acrid smoke in the air keeps me grimacing as I push forward.
“I-It’s collapsing!”
“Aaaah!”
“Stop pushing!”
BOOM!
‘Too many obstacles.’
The setting is a cyberpunk era.
A world where electronic civilization has advanced to extremes.
In the modern day, a widespread EMP would already be a catastrophe—but in this era, where machines dominate daily life, it’s the opening of hell’s gates.
Above, aircraft crash into buildings, debris raining down as people scramble in terror.
After the androids collapse, it’s humanity’s turn.
Those with artificial organs begin dropping one by one.
Unfortunately, I don’t have the luxury of pity or sympathy.
I have a destination, so I move fast—though my own panic isn’t much different from theirs.
Besides, the real disaster hasn’t even started yet.
The real disaster won’t be this forgiving.
Mutants.
I joked earlier that the EMP opened hell’s gates.
But the moment they appear is when true hell begins.
So I have to prepare.
‘It’s absurd, but I have no choice.’
This intense urgency burns in my skull.
No matter how much I shake my head to clear it, I still can’t fully process my current situation.
Not that it’s something I can process, but I force my mind into submission.
‘I’ve done this thousands of times. Thousands…’
Overthinking won’t help.
The best I can do is move toward my goal.
And yet, I still regret it.
‘Goddammit, why did I pick a swordsman build…?’
The traits I chose.
Their implications surface now.
I can’t be sure yet.
Maybe the traits haven’t been applied.
But that hope crumbles quickly.
My unfocused vision.
This alone is proof.
If only I had corrective lenses, but I’m in no position to find any right now.
And if all the traits are active?
This is a world where firearms are the primary weapons.
It hits me now.
What a terrible mistake I’ve made.
[Legendary Swordsmanship Talent]
[Humanity’s Strongest Weapon]
[Mechanical Cardio]
A few overpowered traits.
And then—
[Firearm Phobia]
[Implant Incompatibility]
[Damaged Immune System]
[Dyslexia]
[High Metabolism]
[Poor Eyesight]
Traits I shouldn’t have picked.
A truly hopeless future.
I chose melee weapons because the one swinging them was just a character on-screen.
Can I really move like that in reality?
Even with game-breaking traits like [Legendary Swordsmanship Talent] and [Humanity’s Strongest Weapon], what if my real self is just an unemployed, game-addicted loser?
“Tch…!”
But.
Even so, I can’t say for sure.
Nothing’s been verified yet.
The only silver lining is that, at this point in time, I still have a chance to adjust before things go to hell.
That’s why I’m rushing toward Weilris HQ.
‘I need to fix at least those issues first.’
Then—
It starts.
Slowly.
“Ugh… Gack…!”
“W-What the?!”
“Blegh—!”
Right in front of me.
A well-dressed woman clutches the ground, retching violently.
‘Early signs of mutation.’
The urgency sinks in deeper.
Coincidentally, a massive poster looms over the area where the mutant is about to emerge.
[NH-03, AGING IS A DISEASE.]
The text is garbled—likely due to my [Dyslexia] trait.
But it doesn’t matter. I already know everything about this world.
I’ve played it enough to remember even minor details.
The message is simple:
Humanity has conquered aging.
In this world’s lore, they have.
NH-03.
A genetic modification procedure that defies the natural order of aging.
Until now, there were no side effects.
But then—
“Why the hell did they develop this sh*t…?”
The problem is now.
The moment the Megaflare’s unique radiation interacts with the modified genes, mutation begins.
I can’t check the time, but roughly 11 hours remain.
Before one-third of humanity turns into mutants.
“Ugh…”
Lost in thought, I force down a sigh and shake off my distractions.
I’ve arrived.
Weilris HQ.
Pandemonium.
That’s the only word for it.
The chaos is becoming familiar now, with more and more people collapsing.
But my focus locks onto one point.
The entrance to the HQ.
That’s where I need to go.
Beyond it lies the top floor—where I can obtain the Master Key, the single most critical item for survival.
A sudden thought occurs.
If the entire city is blacked out, what use is a Master Key?
I recall an old forum post from the game’s early days asking the same thing.
It was quickly dismissed as ignorance.
EMP—electromagnetic pulses—can occur even from nuclear explosions.
And the way to block them is surprisingly simple.
Shielding.
Complete enclosure with conductive material.
For example, storing electronics in a sealed metal container protects them from EMP.
So, in a world where nukes exist, EMP countermeasures do exist.
Major facilities have shielding.
This place is no exception.
Not the entire Weilris HQ, but critical sections—like the top floor—are shielded.
The Master Key that controls these facilities is the first step to altering survival difficulty.
And the first thing to do after obtaining it?
‘Shut down the reactors.’
With the Master Key, the top priority is creating a survivable environment.
Eliminating the worst hazards lowers the difficulty.
So the power plants—especially the nuclear fission facilities—must be deactivated.
Right now, the reactors are still operational.
Their shielding kept them running.
And that’s the problem.
The power lines are fried, but the plants keep producing electricity.
Then mutants appear.
Then infected multiply exponentially.
And within hours, the reactors become impossible to manage.
Once the cores melt down and radiation leaks—
The surrounding areas become wastelands.
Dead zones.
The range doesn’t matter.
Every major facility within it will be rendered unusable.
‘If the city gets irradiated, it’s another apocalypse. I have to stop it.’
Organizing my thoughts calms my mind slightly.
Some of the chaos inside me settles.
But then—
I lock eyes with someone.
“H-Hey, you!”
Unexpectedly, they run straight toward me—grabbing my arm with a frantic expression.
“Can you help us?!”
The man I’ve never seen before keeps glancing behind him.
There, a group of people are breaking the HQ’s entrance.
Bashing their bodies against it, kicking—total chaos.
“Dammit, the blackout locked the doors, and people are—!”
For a second, I’m stunned.
Why pick me out of the crowd?
But looking around, most people are already occupied with their own struggles.
Then it hits me.
‘This is…’
This situation feels familiar.
“You look strong! If we all work together, we can break it open!”
And then—
Familiar text arranges itself in my vision.
[Encounter Triggered]
In the chaos, I’d forgotten about this system.
I’m probably the one who understands it best.
‘…I forgot about encounters.’
[People Trapped in Weilris]
Amid the unprecedented blackout disaster, people in distress are appearing everywhere. Someone has asked for your help.
(Help them) Requirement: Strength LV3
(Don’t help)
In this unexpected moment—
The first choice of this world appears.
