Jake navigated the ravaged city in his pickup truck. It’d been a few days since he’d completed the mission at the high-rise building where he’d had to eradicate replication pods and deal with the elite mutant called a whipper on the rooftop. During the last few days, he continued to explore the city, fight mutants, and do missions. By this point, he’d gotten the hang of surviving in this dangerous world. He was well-versed in locating everything he needed for survival and had honed his skills in fighting mutants.
He was now equipped with the rare assault rifle he had received as a reward for completing the mission at the high-rise building. Additionally, he carried an uncommon pump-action shotgun that he had stumbled upon a couple of days before, which was more powerful than the semi-auto shotgun he had previously possessed. In the drop-leg holster on his right hip, he carried an uncommon heavy-caliber pistol that he had obtained recently. Both the shotgun and the pistol matched his current level. The assault rifle was a couple of levels lower, but since this weapon was of rare rarity, it still packed quite a punch.
After surviving for a few days, Jake learned that while items and monsters respawned at the beginning of every day, they didn’t always appear in the same places. There were instances when a house he had previously scavenged did not replenish with new items the following day. So there was an element of randomness at play in this world. As a general rule, canned food and bottled water spawned in convenience stores, ammo in police stations, healing autoinjectors in hospitals, gas in repair garages and gas stations, and so on. He marked all these key locations on his map and would visit them whenever his supplies ran low. By now, he had established several caches in different parts of the city where he stashed his provisions.
Jake also discovered several vending machines scattered throughout the city. However, he found the prices of items sold in them to be unreasonably excessive. Given that he could acquire most items such as ammo or food through scavenging, He mostly opted to purchase only magical scrolls and mana consumables from the vending machines. These items were scarce and challenging to come by, often spawning in entirely random locations unlike other more common supplies.
He also purchased PDA upgrades from vending machines since there appeared to be no other means of acquiring them. He found the upgrades to be well worth the cost, as they provided valuable new features for his handheld computer. For example, he had upgraded his PDA to enable him to call in a common supply drop each day and to display all types of mutants in his current location.
After purchasing another upgrade for his PDA yesterday, a new tab called Crafting had been unlocked. That was how Jake learned there was a crafting system in this game-like world. Despite this intriguing discovery, he had yet to explore how the crafting system worked in this world because he was preoccupied with other pressing tasks. He planned to delve into crafting later on, but for now, he was focused on completing missions to gain XP, earn money, and obtain valuable items and weapons.
He also learned a bit more about magic. As he already knew, his mana level didn’t replenish on its own. Instead, he needed to use consumables like mana marbles or shards to replenish it. He also could not acquire magic spells on his own but had to rely on reading magical scrolls, which acted as consumable items. Each scroll provided him with a spell for a one-time use. A good thing was that he had the freedom to postpone using a spell after reading a magical scroll, giving him the option to save it for a later time. Given this liberty, he opted to read any scrolls he found immediately, rather than carrying them in his rucksack or storing them in his hideouts. This approach allowed him to have a wide collection of various spells stored in his mind and ready for use whenever the need arose.
So it seemed that one couldn’t become a pure mage. Despite the existence of magic in this game-like world, firearms remained the main means of fighting mutants while magic served as a supplemental tool. While magic was a valuable asset, it was not enough for him to rely solely on it to defeat mutants and navigate the dangers of this world. The very first spell that Jake had found was Push. Later on, he came across additional ones, amassing a collection of various spells. With magical scrolls and mana consumables being rare and hard to come by, he reserved spellcasting for dire circumstances when there seemed to be no alternative way out of a challenging situation without resorting to magic.
In the last few days, Jake had encountered several other survivors, with many of these interactions escalating into gunfights. He had realized that trust was a luxury in this lawless dog-eat-dog world, where some would not hesitate to murder you only to take your hard-earned stuff. The act of taking another person’s life no longer troubled Jake as he recognized that survival required doing whatever was necessary in this ruthless world without any rules or laws, where only the strongest prevailed.
He felt pretty calm, despite this gamepocalypse, or whatever the hell it was. It might sound strange, but the end of the world seemed to have a surprisingly soothing effect on him. Before the world collapsed, his concerns had revolved around paying bills, making enough money to cover his expenses, and other mundane worries. In his past life, he’d toiled like a working animal, yet he still struggled to make both ends meet. None of that mattered now. The world seemed to be simpler now, offering a sense of peace and clarity amid the turmoil.
Before the Collapse, Jake had no attachments—no family, no girlfriend, and no real friends. He didn’t have anything that really mattered to him. As a result, he did not miss his pre-Collapse life at all. Being introverted, he never had the need to interact with other people much. He had always preferred spending his free time alone and was content with solitude. That was why he felt relaxed and at ease as he drove around the deserted city in his truck. Being alone didn’t bother him in the slightest. He was well accustomed to it and even found moments of enjoyment in it.
In the past few days, he had completed several missions that involved straightforward and repetitive objectives like eliminating mutants, destroying replication pods, and similar tasks. His current mission was to locate and close a magical anomaly within a mall. Having tackled similar missions before, he knew the routine and what was required to accomplish this objective.
Finally, he reached his destination, pulling into a parking lot of the mall. There were a few rusty carcasses of old vehicles scattered here and there, but when he pulled up next to one of the entrances to the mall, he spotted a vehicle that seemed to be in working condition. It caused Jake to immediately tense up. The vehicle was a large white-colored SUV. He peered into the interior for a second but didn’t see any people within it. The SUV was parked near the entrance to the mall, so whoever the car belonged to should be somewhere inside the shopping complex. This was unsurprising to him—based on his recent experiences, he knew large malls often held valuable resources, attracting other survivors seeking supplies.
Jake exited his pickup truck. Holding his pump-action shotgun at the ready, he approached the white SUV, peering into the interior just to make sure he hadn’t overlooked anything. He confirmed that the vehicle was operational but unoccupied. Whoever had driven it here was currently in the mall—there was not a hint of doubt about that. He had to be real careful.
As he neared the entrance, he spotted the lifeless body of a dead survivor lying in a pool of blood. It was a middle-aged man with red hair. Bullet wounds peppered all over his body. Whoever killed him had put lots of bullets into him. Jake took out his PDA to scan the body. DEAD SURVIVOR: EMPTY. Whoever killed him must also have looted the body, taking all the valuable items the victim had on him.
Jake then accessed the recently acquired feature on his PDA to gather information about the mutants he might encounter inside the mall. The data displayed on the screen revealed plenty of walkers and leapers as well as a couple of shamblers and whippers—all the usual suspects. If the white SUV belonged to whoever killed the redhead, then he reasoned they should also be somewhere inside the mall. Pondering this, he wondered whether it was the work of a lone individual or a group of assailants.
Pocketing his PDA, he tucked the buttstock of his shotgun firmly against his shoulder and stepped into the building.