I moved with rhythmic, steady steps, leaving a grisly trail of carcasses in my wake. To a bystander, it would have looked like a dance of death; to me, it was cold mathematics.
Unlike the wolves, which possessed a predatory intelligence that forced me to remain in a state of constant, high-alert tension, these hyenas were almost docile by comparison.
Their lunges were telegraphed, their aggression predictable. I could read the twitch of their muscles and evade their snapping jaws with minimal effort, ensuring that not a single point of my precious stamina was wasted on unnecessary movement.
My sudden, violent appearance at the rear of their formation caused their ranks to buckle. In an ideal world—one where my stamina bar was limitless—I would have preferred to dismantle them from the outside, peeling their numbers away layer by layer like an onion. But I was a realist. Standing against a swirling tide of two thousand or more monsters meant that a war of attrition was a death sentence.
I chose the direct path. I moved in a straight line, my sword carving a path through the centre of the swarm.
Every hyena that dared to close the distance was silenced with a single, precise hit. I didn't even need to exert significant pressure; I simply let the momentum of my stride carry the blade into their soft underbellies or the hinged joints of their jaws.
As I pushed deeper into the heart of the horde, the atmosphere changed. The frantic cackling of the hyenas was joined by the low, guttural growls of wolves.
"They're coming for me," I muttered, narrowing my eyes.
Facing hyenas was a chore, but facing wolves was a challenge. Facing them both at once, acting in an unholy, unintended coordination, was a nightmare. The wolves began to push through the smaller monsters, their yellow eyes locked onto me.
"Let's pick up the pace, then," I growled.
I flooded my muscles with a burst of speed, transitioning from a measured walk into a blurring sprint. I stopped focusing on the kill, choosing instead to evade. I left dozens of monsters alive in my wake, ignoring their snapping teeth as I focused entirely on narrowing the two-hundred-meter gap between myself and the museum's grand stone steps.
"Howl!""Howl!""Howl!"
They caught up to me when the distance had shrunk to less than half. The wolves were faster than I had anticipated, their paws thundering over the pavement.
"Eager to die, I see," I hissed. I kept my sword in a fluid, defensive guard, constantly shifting my centre of gravity to weave through the closing net of fur and fangs.
"Roar!"
"Screw you!" I barked as a wall of snarling hyenas suddenly shifted their weight, physically blocking my path and forcing me to take a wide, looping detour that added precious meters back to my journey.
I could feel the burn in my lungs. My primary concern wasn't the monsters themselves, but my own biological limits. Ten points of stamina was a pathetic reserve when trapped in the centre of a localised apocalypse. There was nothing reassuring about the rapid depletion of my energy.
Should I do it? I hesitated, my hand twitching toward the hidden card I had been saving. I leapt to the side as a set of fierce claws whistled past my ear, the displacement of air cold against my skin. I didn't think; I just reacted, my sword burying itself in the attacker's neck in a reflexive counter-strike.
"I'm killing them fast, but they're gathering faster," I gritted out. The fatigue was no longer a dull ache; it was a heavy weight settling into my bones. For the past several minutes, I had been a lone island in an ever-growing sea of mixed monsters.
Just as I prepared to trigger my trump card, a thunderous shout echoed from the museum entrance.
"Make a path!"
A group of twenty youths suddenly burst through the museum's heavy doors, charging into the fray with surprising ferocity. They were a ragtag unit, but well-equipped; many held sturdy swords or reinforced shields, and a few even wore segments of actual armour that looked like they had been looted from a historical display or a high-end security locker.
Their timing was impeccable.
"This way!" one youth shouted. He wore a heavy helmet that obscured most of his features, his voice sounding metallic and muffled. The group worked with a desperate sort of synergy, carving a temporary wedge into the monster tide.
I didn't need a second invitation. I sprinted toward the opening they had created, my eyes scanning their technique as I ran. The monsters behind us roared and howled, enraged that their meal was slipping away, but my focus was entirely on the youths.
They don't know how to properly fight at all! I thought, a frown deepening on my face.
They were brave, yes, but their form was atrocious. They were waving their heavy weapons at the thickest parts of the hyenas' fur, wasting massive amounts of energy on strikes that barely drew blood. They had no understanding of monster anatomy, yet somehow, they had survived the first quest. How?
The gap they had carved was already beginning to collapse under the weight of the surrounding swarm. The youths quickly transitioned, forming three overlapping lines of defence to block the monsters from following us back to the museum doors.
"They won't be able to hold," I realised. Charging with the wind at your back was one thing, but holding a static line against a crushing pressure was a different beast entirely.
Without saying a word, I stepped into the front line. I moved with a speed that made their clumsy swings look like they were moving through water. I targeted the soft spots, the weak points, the gaps in the monsters' natural armour.
Watching me fight from such a close distance seemed to shock them. They saw how my blade didn't just hit the monsters—it deleted them.
"These monsters... they actually have a weakness?!!" the youth in the helmet gasped.
Up close, the voice was unmistakable. The leader wasn't a boy, but a girl. Her tone was sharp and commanding, the voice of someone who had been forced into leadership by the weight of the world.
"The lower part of the neck," I said, my voice cold and focused as I cleared five more hyenas in a flurry of silver. I felt the pressure on the retreating line ease instantly. I looked her in the eye—or at least where I assumed her eyes were behind the visor. "That's their deadly spot. Can you hit it, or are you just going to keep tickling them?"
"Don't look down on us," the girl snapped, her posture shifting from defensive to a sharp, commanding arrogance. She didn't wait for my rebuttal; instead, she turned toward the struggling line of survivors and raised her voice to a deafening, authoritative pitch: "Listen up! Those big hyenas have weak spots just below their necks. Hit them there, and you'll be able to kill them smoothly! Aim for the soft tissue!"
I took the opportunity to retreat further into the museum's shadow, leaning against a cold marble pillar while panting heavily.
My lungs felt like they were filled with hot ash, and my legs trembled with the aftershocks of the sprint. I calculated my reserves; I needed at least two to three minutes of absolute rest before I could even think about resuming the fight with any degree of efficiency.
"Who are you?"
I looked up. The girl had approached me while I was busy scanning the faces of the youths around us, trying to decipher the secret of their survival. She stood close, her tone dripping with a suspicion so thick it was almost tangible.
Smart girl, I thought, noting the way she kept her centre of gravity low and her sword hand steady. She wasn't just a leader; she was a predator.
"I came from the Great Lawn," I replied, my voice raspy. I pointed a thumb toward the west, indicating the dark expanse I had just traversed. The girl didn't even flicker her gaze toward the direction I pointed. She kept her eyes locked on mine.
"I know where the Great Lawn lies," she said coldly. "And I didn't ask where you are from."
Her face was almost entirely obscured by a heavy, Spartan-like helmet, leaving only her eyes visible through the narrow slit of the visor. I could see a dangerous gleam in them—a sharp, obsidian intensity that suggested she was ready to drive her blade through my chest if I didn't provide a satisfactory answer within the next few seconds.
"I'm Hye," I said, forcing a smile onto my face as if we were just two old friends bumping into each other at a cafe rather than survivors in a blood-soaked museum.
"I didn't ask for your name," she countered, her attitude remaining ice-cold.
"You asked who I am," I shrugged, leaning back against the pillar. I made a show of being relaxed, projecting an air of indifference toward her threatening gaze. In truth, if I were actually worried about my immediate safety, I never would have ventured out into the park alone in the first place.
"Then let me be straight here," she said, her voice dropping an octave. She slowly raised her sword, the tip hovering inches from my nose. The group of twenty warriors from the breach moved in unison, forming a tight, claustrophobic circle around me. "What business do you have with us?"
In the blink of an eye, the atmosphere had shifted. I had gone from being their unexpected saviour to their primary enemy, and for the life of me, I couldn't figure out why.
"Don't give me that look," the girl said, her tone as sharp as her blade. "A youth like you, walking alone in the middle of the darkness without being torn apart by monsters... how can that be possible? Only things that belong to the dark walk through it so easily."
"I'm strong," I said simply, my tone light and airy. I pointed to my tattered, gore-stained clothes. "And as you can see, I wasn't exactly walking peacefully out there. I had to earn every meter."
"And what says this is monster blood?" she asked.
"If it's not monster blood, then what the hell do you think it is?" I was starting to lose my patience. Stalling for stamina was one thing, but I didn't like where this interrogation was heading. I needed to know if these people were potential allies or just another obstacle to be cleared.
"It might be human blood," she answered.
The response caught me completely off guard. I looked at her as if she had suddenly sprouted a second head. "What? Are you going to try and fake a reaction now?" she added, her voice laced with a bitter, all-knowing sarcasm.
"What the hell are you talking about?" I asked, genuine confusion finally breaking through my mask. It couldn't be what I thought, right? There was no way a random survivor in the first week could have deduced the truth.
"A human walking in the turf of monsters as if he is one of them, covered in human blood, and able to see perfectly in the pitch black," she listed, stepping closer until our helmets almost touched. "C'mon. You should have worked harder to conceal your stinky breath from me. I can smell the rot on you."
No fcking way.* I stared at her, a single, jarring thought dominating my mind. She knows about the traitors. It seemed impossible. How could a girl in a museum at this stage of the game know about the corrupted humans? That knowledge was supposed to be a closely guarded secret of the System and the Guides. Unless...
"Don't give me that look! I hate it when you try to deceive my eyes!" she barked, her anger flaring.
"How come you know about the traitors?" I asked, my voice turning lethal. I didn't wait for her to move; I brandished my sword in a lightning-fast motion, pointing it directly at the slit in her visor. "Are you a traitor yourself? Is that how you recognise the scent?"
"Traitor? That's a cool name you have for yourselves," she chuckled, a dark, mirthless sound.
I didn't like her. I didn't like the heavy, paranoid atmosphere of this place. I didn't like anything about this situation. "Speak or die," I growled. I didn't care that I was surrounded by twenty armed youths. I had centuries of combat experience etched into my soul; these were just children playing with toys.
"Stop or we'll kill you!" A chorus of shouts erupted from outside the ring.
I looked past the warriors and saw the rest of the survivors—hundreds of them—watching the confrontation. The hatred directed at me was visceral, a wave of pure, unfiltered animosity. It was bizarre. No normal human should be able to identify a traitor this early unless they were one themselves.
But as the crowd began to shout in her defence, the mystery only deepened.
"Angelica is our hero! She stood alone and protected us from the monsters while you were hiding!"
"Without her, none of us would be standing here! She's the only reason we're alive!"
"She even found the human-like monsters hiding among us and killed them all before they could turn on us!"
"Don't you dare come near her, or we'll tear you apart!"
I scanned the faces of the crowd, wondering if there was some sort of mass-illusion skill or mental manipulation active this early in the apocalypse. To my experienced eyes, these survivors seemed almost brainwashed, their devotion to this girl bordering on the cultish.
"Can you really find the traitors?" I asked, looking directly at the slit in her visor. I was already considering the possibilities—if she truly had a method, we could work together.
"I'm the one asking the questions here, traitor," she snapped. Her stubbornness was like a wall of iron. However, unlike her, the people surrounding us seemed eager to talk in her stead, their voices rising in a feverish defence of their leader.
"She is a real hero! One blessed by the power of the heavens itself!" one youth cried.
"Even her name tells you of her essence—an angel with the name Angelica!" another shouted.
"She has psychic powers! Real psychic abilities that enabled her to fight against the monsters and win every time!"
"She used those powers to detect the humanoid monsters hiding among us back then. She killed them all to keep us safe!"
Psychic power… what an interesting lie, I thought, scratching the back of my head. Why didn't I think of using a reason like that before? It would have saved me so much trouble with my own team.
"So, traitor," Angelica said, her voice dripping with an arrogance that suggested she believed she could actually harm me. "What do you want to say in your last moments?"
It was pathetic. She was acting as if she had already won, unaware that I was merely humouring her.
"How can you deem me a traitor before actually testing it out?" I asked. I made sure my voice was flat, showing her that her threats carried no weight.
"I'm sure of my guess," she said firmly. "How else can you explain what you did out there? How else could you survive the darkness alone?"
"My reasons are mine alone," I said, my tone hardening. "Now, test me. Let's bring this useless show to an end so we can focus on the monsters outside."
She hesitated for a moment. I watched her closely. Wait, does she actually have the power to detect them? I wondered. Don't tell me she really does.
"Bring me a drop of your blood," she said slowly. As she spoke, I noticed a strange device in her hand. It was shaped like a compass, a specific design I had only seen in ancient drawings and high-level archives in my past life.
This… It's the Race Detection Gear… My entire perception of the girl shifted the moment I recognised the fist-sized compass.
This gear is worth over ten thousand coins alone! I screamed internally. Besides the initial cost, every single use requires a fee of around two thousand coins. How could someone at this stage of the apocalypse possess that kind of wealth? No, more importantly, how did she even know it existed in the hidden shops? This is beyond suspicious!
That compass told me more about Angelica than any interrogation could. Even I, with all my future knowledge and the coins I had harvested from the Alpha wolf, hadn't considered buying such a thing yet.
It was a tool used to differentiate between races, but its true power was terrifying: it didn't just identify biological origins; it could determine a being's fundamental allegiance to the warring camps of this world.
"I need a drop of blood voluntarily," she threatened, "or I'll behead you right here and take all the blood I need from your corpse."
She looked fierce, and for the first time, I began to reassess her as a genuine threat. I didn't want to fight her—not yet.
"Here," I said. I extended my arm and used my blade to make a small, quick cut in my palm. As the blood welled up, I stared into her eyes, trying to see past the helmet.
She was the most heavily equipped person I had seen so far, as if she were terrified of being targeted. Her possession of that compass meant she hadn't just stumbled into survival; she had planned for this from the very beginning.
Was she like me? I wondered. A regressor? Someone from the future?
I let a single drop of blood fall into a small aperture in the compass. The device was intricate, with the names of all known races—including Angels—engraved on the outermost ring. Inside that was a series of concentric circles colored red, green, and white.
In the logic of the device, Red meant Enemy, Green meant Ally, and White meant Neutral. The moment my blood touched the sensor, the two metallic arms of the compass began to spin at a blurred speed. After a few tense seconds, they clicked into place.
"Human and Ally," I said, reading the result before she could.
My comment caused her expression to shift from a dark, murderous intent to one of pure, unadulterated shock.
"H… How do you know that?!!" she stammered. She clearly hadn't expected a "random survivor" to understand the interface of a high-tier artefact.
I shrugged, a small, knowing smirk playing on my lips. "I told you, my reasons are mine alone. Unless, of course, you want to share yours with me first."