'It's already getting dark. It's been so long since the government talked about dropping nukes and I'm getting doubtful but I can't take the risk of it being true. I'll get out of range of the possible blast radius first.' Though Silva thought this, he had slowed down and was looking for a place to rest. He had reached the farmland that existed outside the city and the wide open area made it hard for him to hide.
'I have to rest. I'll find a safe place to stay and bunker down for the night.' Silva found a farm house but walked right past it. There were rotting carcasses around the place and his domain detected a monster underground. Frisbee killed the monster as he passed by but the rotting stench prevented him from staying there.
It took a while but he finally found a place to stay in. The house was wrecked as though a giant monster took a bite out of the roof. The only saving grace was that there wasn't a single carcas near the place. Whatever monster attacked the place was very thorough. Silva took his time scouring the place and eventually decided to change out of the torn swimming trunks. After the fight against the hounds and the crabs, there was barely enough fabric to cover him.
Silva found some clothes that were a little tight but not enough to make him uncomfortable. He even found a shattered mirror to look at his new outfit. 'Damn! I look like a hobo.'
His outfit consisted of a black vest and jean shorts that barely made it past his knees. He wore a pair of leather sandals that were a size smaller and a blue hoodie. The clothes were dirty and covered in dust since the room he got them from was greatly damaged. He wore a dark green cap to cover his uncombed hair that was twisted into knots.
'The hat can cover my eyes from the sun and the hoodie is good for chilly nights. The sandals will protect my feet on land and I can easily put them in my inventory when heading for water. I'm a genius.' After that Silva left the house and roamed the farm as darkness set in to ensure the entire place was clear of monsters. He ended up finding some tomatoes in the garden behind the house that survived the destruction.
Silva made himself comfortable by filling the empty bathtub with blankets he had picked up. He would have preferred to rest in one of the bedrooms but most of the second floor was destroyed. Silva refused to take the risk of staying in the wide open living room. In the end he settled down in the bathroom .
Silva slept lightly, his domain, that covered almost 25 meters radius, alerting him to even the lightest movement. A dull quake awoke him. He tried to use his domain to sense the source of the quake but detected nothing. Silva was about to go back to sleep when he heard a familiar voice.
"Congratulations!!! The planet Earth has succeeded in forming a planetary connection." The system voice sounded strangely cheerful. "Planetary achievement unlocked. Safe zone establishment achievement has been granted. The planet Earth will become the sixth battle planet of Invader's Paradise. Issuing planet wide rewards for successful and early planetary integration."
"The first reward is given to the planet itself. 1,000 bastions will be automatically established and filled by the citizens of Earth. The second reward goes to the soldiers of earth. They will receive basic access to the system's functions and invasion points will be quantified. The final reward is given to the invaders that left earth to fight in the enemy territory. Invaders now own the portal they used to cross to the otherworld. Rewards granted. Wishing Earth a successful invasion."
The system voice disappeared soon after but Silva was definitely shocked. He had a lot of questions to ask but there was nobody to provide answers. He thought of the system functions he was supposed to have unlocked and a holographic screen appeared in front of him. The display was exactly the same as the status display in the game. Even the character maintaining a T-pose was the same as the game.
'This should represent my stats. Unlike most games where you have to keep track of individual stats, Invader's Paradise automatically balanced your stats as you level up. The only two things that determined true strength was the level and synergy of abilities. And the second is the total Battle Power (BP). BP was the best indicator of just how powerful and how well someone can use their power.
'With a high enough BP, you can toy with someone who only focused on improving their abilities. My abilities directly increase my fighting capabilities meaning that I have to focus on improving my BP. The best way to do so was through learning and mastering techniques. In the game, everything could become a technique once you reach a certain proficiency in it. '
'First let me check what my current BP looks like." Silva checked the screen and saw 8,635 written in sparkling yellow. 'It's disappointingly low. I remember the top three players having over ten billion BP. Those guys could technically solo a planet but there were also NPCs strong enough to keep them in check. It's why we failed to completely invade even one of the planets.'
'Wait. If everything from the game has become real then that means that the same NPCs that kept those guys in check exist. Earth is doomed if that's the case. Best case scenario is that all the planets don't have anyone that powerful yet and they'll appear later on.' Silva sighed and tried to clear his mind and get some rest.
Daybreak found Silva wide eyed and exhausted. He spent the night thinking of the future and planning for it. Currently he had one goal, finding one of the safe zones of earth. The system said that only the most basic functions were unlocked but even those were a heaven send in the current situation.
The feature Silva especially enjoyed was the map function. It worked exactly like the game in that there was absolutely no map. The only thing it provided was two directions. One was towards the portal Silva owned which was the clean crab portal. The other direction was towards the closest safe zone.
Silva collected every edible item from the farm house and left the area. He went back to his previous routine of a killing sprint. His speed was inhumane and his stamina instantly recovered with every life reaped within his domain. He even encountered a monster wolf similar to the one Rose controlled back in the city. Frisbee couldn't cut its skin when it was covered by smog but it managed to injure its unprotected paws.
Silva knew that he could kill the wolf if he took the time but he only crippled it and kept running towards the safe zone. He maintained the same rhythm each time he faced a monster he couldn't kill in two or three strikes. He was making great progress until he saw them. From their reaction, they had spotted him too. Silva slowed down as he carefully approached the small group of people.
"I'm human, I'm unarmed and I'm just trying to reach the safe zone." Silva announced with caution. As happy as he was to finally meet other people, he also knew how dangerous people were. In the game, he had died more times to other players attacking him than to the NPCs. Silva understood that in the current world, there were no laws or authority to keep people in check.
"Hello there. I'm Henry. What's your name?" One of the four men, a man with long white hair spoke up.
"I'm Silva. I'm honestly happy to meet other people. It feels like an eternity since I last spoke to someone." Silva answered with a genuine smile on his face. His mind was entirely different. It was gathering as much information as it could. 'The three men must be players. They're all the same height and their eye and hair color is unnatural. Also, I can sense fluctuations similar to the killing intent of the clean crabs. The woman is entirely normal. Based on the torn clothes and the way she's standing, she's scared of the men.'
'These guys must be treating her either as a slave or a sex toy or maybe even both. I could kill them if I use Frisbee to launch a surprise attack but then what. I can't take the woman with me since she'll be a burden. I can't leave her behind since she won't survive alone with the roaming monsters. It's actually safer for her to stay with them. They don't know if they can get another woman so she's precious to them.'
"You said that you were heading to the safe zone right? You can join us since we're heading there too. We could use the company. And it's safer to travel in groups. " Henry suggested with a smile that looked very sincere.
"I'll be happy to join you guys." Silva said with a fake smile.