[LIVE BARRAGE COMMENTS]
"THE ISLAND IS SINKING"
"HOLY SHIT"
"THEY HAVE THREE DAYS"
"THREE DAYS BEFORE THEIR CAMP IS UNDERWATER"
"This is BRILLIANT instance design"
"Brilliant and TERRIFYING"
"Time limit makes sense now"
"Seven days until complete submersion"
"They can literally WATCH it sinking"
"The DREAD"
"No wonder everyone's panicking"
"What happens if they're still on the island when it sinks?"
"They drown"
"Or become zombies"
"Or BOTH"
"REPLACE - the zombies are former investigators!!!"
"OH SHIT YOU'RE RIGHT"
"Everyone who dies becomes a waterlogged zombie"
"That's why there are so many"
"Multiple failed investigation teams over YEARS"
"This island is a DEATH TRAP"
Panic spread through the group like wildfire.
"We have to leave NOW—"
"Leave to WHERE?!"
"The cave! Maybe there's an exit in the cave—"
"Or maybe it just FLOODS and we drown faster—"
"We need to THINK—"
"There's no TIME to think!"
"EVERYONE SHUT UP!" Ah'Ming shouted.
To his surprise, they did.
He took a breath, organizing his thoughts. The viewer commentary was buzzing in his skull—theories about zombies, about the island's mechanics, about escape routes—but he pushed it to the background.
"Okay," he said. "Okay. Here's what we know. The island is sinking. We have three days before our current camp is underwater. Seven days before the whole island is gone."
Nods. Terrified, but following along.
"We also know the zombies are waterlogged. They attack in the forest but avoid the lake. The water can't be stored in inventory, but it doesn't smell or behave like normal water."
"What's your point?" Min demanded.
"My point is: everything is connected to water. The sinking island. The waterlogged zombies. The immobile ocean. Even the prophet's words—sink, REPLACE, surrender."
"Replace," the prophet echoed. "The zombies replace the living."
"Exactly. Which means..." Ah'Ming's eyes widened. "Which means the zombies are probably former investigators. People who died here and came back wrong."
Horror rippled through the group.
"That's—that can't—" Someone stammered.
"It makes sense," Kael said grimly. "Multiple failed investigation teams over the years. All those personal belongings on the beach. The different levels of decay on the zombies we've encountered."
"So we're fighting dead investigators," Darius said flatly. "Great. Love that."
"And if we die here," Yuki added quietly, "we become them."
Nobody argued.
"Which means we can't afford to die," Ah'Ming said. "And we can't afford to stay at the lake. The camp will be underwater in three days."
"So we move to higher ground," someone suggested.
"And where exactly is higher ground?!" Min threw her hands up. "We've explored most of this island! It's flat! There's the beach, the forest, the lake, and the cave! That's IT!"
"The cave," Ah'Ming said. "We go to the cave. We figure out what the turtle paintings mean. Because I guarantee you—GUARANTEE—that they're related to getting off this island."
"You don't KNOW that—"
"Yes I do!" Ah'Ming's voice was fierce. "Because that's how instances WORK! There are no random details! The turtles mean something! The aboriginal markings mean something! The three words from the prophecy mean something! We just have to FIGURE IT OUT!"
Silence.
Then Kael spoke: "He's right."
Min turned to him, betrayed. "You can't be serious—"
"I'm completely serious." Kael's jaw was set. "We've been running in circles because we're too scared to actually INVESTIGATE. But that's literally our job. We're detectives. We're supposed to solve this."
"By looking at turtle paintings while the island sinks beneath us?!"
"By finding the PATTERN!" Ah'Ming insisted. "Sink, replace, surrender. Turtles. Water that doesn't move. Zombies that were investigators. It's all connected. We just have to find HOW."
The prophet laughed—a wet, pained sound. "He's absolutely right, you know. We've been so focused on survival that we forgot to actually solve the mystery."
"Survival is KIND OF important when zombies are trying to kill us," someone muttered.
"Survival without understanding just delays the inevitable," the prophet countered. "The island is sinking. In seven days, it'll be gone completely. We either figure out the escape route, or we drown. Those are our options."
More silence.
Then, slowly, people started nodding.
"Fine," Min said, though she looked like the word physically hurt her. "FINE. We investigate the turtle cave. But if we die because we spent too long looking at paintings, I'm haunting ALL of you as a zombie."
"Deal," Ah'Ming said.
"AH'MING LEADERSHIP MOMENT"
"He actually convinced them!"
They spent the next hour collecting resources from the beach.
Coconuts—forty-three of them, divided among the group's inventory storage.
Useful debris—pieces of metal that could be weapons, rope that was still intact, a tarp that was waterproof.
And samples.
Ah'Ming insisted on taking samples of everything. Water from the ocean (in a coconut shell since inventory wouldn't store it). Sand from different tide lines. Fragments of the waterlogged debris. Even a piece of zombie flesh from their earlier kills, carefully wrapped in leaves.
"Why?" Min asked, watching him collect things with manic focus.
"Because we need data," Ah'Ming said, labeling each sample in his mind. "If we're going to understand the water mechanics, we need to study them."
"You sound like a scientist."
"I sound like someone who doesn't want to become a zombie."
"Fair."
Kael organized the group for the trek back to the lake camp. "We move everything useful to higher ground near the cave entrance. Set up a new base camp there. It's farther from the water, and we'll have access to the paintings."
"What about the zombies?" Someone asked nervously. "The cave might be full of them."
"Then we clear them out," Kael said simply. "We don't have a choice."
As the sun began to set, painting the sky in shades of blood-red and violet, the group prepared to leave the beach.
Ah'Ming took one last look at the ocean.
The water was still perfectly flat. Perfectly still. Reflecting the dying light like a mirror.
Beautiful and wrong in equal measure.
He checked the markers they'd placed earlier.
All of them were now underwater.
In one hour, the island had sunk approximately thirty centimeters.
"Steve," he whispered. "How much time do we really have?"
|Calculating based on current rate of submersion... |Camp at lake elevation: 2.4 days |Island peak elevation: 6.8 days |Margin of error: ±0.3 days
"Less than seven days."
|Correct |System recommends broadcaster solve this quickly
"Working on it."
|System knows |System has faith in broadcaster |...Surprisingly
Ah'Ming smiled despite everything. "Thanks, Steve."
|System maintains this is merely statistical analysis |Not faith |Definitely not affection
"Sure it is."
As they walked back toward the forest, the sun finally set, plunging the island into darkness.
And in the darkness, Ah'Ming could have sworn he heard something.
Not voices. Not viewers.
Something else.
A sound like water moving where water shouldn't move.
Like something vast and ancient shifting beneath the waves.
Like the island itself, groaning as it sank.
"Three days," he muttered, clicking his fidget cube faster. "We have three days to figure this out."
Behind them, the ocean remained perfectly still.
Above them, stars appeared in a sky that seemed too clear, too perfect.
And below them, the island continued its slow, inevitable descent into the deep.
The countdown had begun.