Before she could finish, one of the older women among the survivors suddenly let out a sharp cry. Shaw’s brows darkened and she snapped to the troublemaker. The woman was in her forties, and she could distinctly see a metal cross trinket around her neck. For some reason, she thought it would be a good idea to raise her voice and cut Shaw off.

On the other side, still with her gun in hand, Emily frowned as well. She saw the older woman praying before this young woman showed up, but she never thought she would be foolish enough to challenge her in a time like this. They just saw the girl somehow making her sword disappear! What if she was another monster like that giant spider? This stupidity could get them all killed!

“You!” The old woman repeated as all the eyes snapped to her. “You are an agent of the Devil! An agent of Lucifer! What you just did...that’s not human! That's not possible!”

Shaw wasn’t a fan of getting interrupted. She was willing to back down if the stakes were too high, but a random religious woman? The old fool wouldn’t last a day in the apocalypse even without her intervention.

Alas, it wasn’t worth her time to be worried about a nutjob. Giving the woman another threatening glance, she turned back to the others, mainly the officers.

“Again, my name is Amy Shaw.” She repeated. Once again, she glanced at the handguns aimed in her direction. “You can put your weapons down. I am not your enemy. We are on the same side in this war, and our enemies are the NPCs outside.”

“Lies!” Once again, the woman shrieked.

Once again, Shaw ignored her. If they were alone, she would’ve gladly silenced her the same way she eliminated that shop owner not long ago, but this time, she wasn’t alone. Something told her slaughtering one of the survivors wouldn’t help her image in the eyes of the others.

The officers exchanged a glance. They still had some doubts, and saying that they trusted Shaw would be lying, but Shaw had shown some trust when she pulled back her weapon and walked in here, and she refrained from attacking even when provoked by the woman. Perhaps there was some merit to her words.

One by one, the three officers gently lowered their arms, much to the anger of the woman.

“NPCs?” Emily, the only female officer among the three, first raised the question. “That term sounds familiar…”

“Non-player character.” Shaw could see everyone in the room turning to her and waiting for her explanation. She silently sighed. It would take a while, but she believed it was time well spent. After all, she still had some use for these survivors. In a few minutes, she did her best to explain the Launch to the survivors as quickly and concisely as she could. Just the basics, of course. These survivors didn't need to know too much.

As she finished, Shaw used the opportunity to gain some information from these survivors. For one thing, she finally figured out why the survivors never even discovered the player interface. When the Launch occurred, the students in her high school were trapped and without protection. Many of those with no options left were forced to engage the NPCs in melee combat, and those that survived were able to level up. In that sense, the brutal massacre within the school halls was a blessing in disguise...for those that lived.

These survivors in the McDonald’s were different. They were mostly out in the open during the Launch, and when the monsters struck, they ran. Many of them also enjoyed the protection of the officers they encountered, who put down the initial monsters with their sidearms. The officers, in turn, had the luxury of not having to fight the monsters in hand-to-hand combat. They could kill an army of NPCs with firearms and not receive a single exp.

In the end, over one hour into the Launch, not a single survivor in the McDonald’s reached level 1.

Shaw, on the other hand, had reached level 4 already. If she wanted, she could kill everyone in the room without taking a single wound. The three officers could shoot at her all they wanted, and as long as she was careful, they wouldn’t land a shot on her. Their reflexes would be too slow to threaten her.

As Shaw finished explaining, the survivors were sprung into chaos. Many of them frantically slapped themselves on the chest and gasped when they saw the transparent interfaces pop up in front of them. Others collapsed into their seats. They were still engulfed in denial, and if they didn't recover quickly and adjust their mindsets soon, their chances of survival would be dangerously low.

The three officers were equally surprised, but while her colleagues took an extra long time to process things, the female officer, Shaw soon learned that her name was Emily, reacted to the news the best.

After seeing the level 0 on her profile, she turned to Shaw.

“So...how do we level up again? Kill the...the things out there?”

“Indeed. Your first kill brings you up to level 1.” Shaw answered quietly, and Emily had to admit she was a little uncomfortable by the way this young woman looked at her. It was a sense of...attention, but the officer had no idea what she did that warranted such attention.

“I’m sorry…” She couldn’t help but post the question. “Do I know you?”

“No.” Shaw tilted her head before denying, and that was technically true.

She didn't know the officer personally, at least not in this life, but she had heard of Emily’s name...a long, long time ago.

Emily Dayne. Several months into the Launch, she would become one of the most powerful players at the time and a leader of a settlement. Her career was Warrior while her class was Valkyrie. Legend said that she would ride into battle on a winged horse with white, spotless fur. Shaw never had the fortune of meeting her or seeing her fight, but the Valkyrie should be a few levels higher than her at the time.

From what Shaw heard, Emily was a brilliant leader. She was well-loved and well-respected, especially compared to the numerous high-level players who would rather drink and whore than lead. She also stood up for the female survivors in her camp who high-level players loved to torture and rape, a move that was rare among the leaders at the time. In the eyes of most leaders, sacrificing a few powerless low-level girls was a fine price to pay for the loyalty of high-level players of great value. This was simple math. Simply logic. Yet Emily refused to abide by this logic and instead did her best to protect even the weakest and most worthless members of her camp. By all accounts, she was a hero.

But this was an age where being the good guy was a curse.

Like many other heroes, Emily didn't have a good ending. Shaw never really discovered what happened, but one day, during a siege on her settlement by the NPC forces, the young leader was killed on the battlefield. Rumors said that she was assassinated by her own people. Others suggested that she simply ran into an NPC who was too much for her to handle. Either way, she was killed. Not long after, the NPC forces poured into the settlement and massacred most of the survivors within. The beacon of hope that she spent months building was put to the torch in just one day. All the people she saved and sheltered? Slaughtered.

As Shaw found herself looking at the future leader who was still in her earliest days, she couldn’t help but feel a little intrigued. The young officer had potential. Yes. She would be killed eventually, but that didn't mean she was weak. That simply meant she was unlucky. If she had the fortune of surviving until the later years of the game, perhaps Emily could’ve been as powerful as Shaw, if not more.

That being said, everything Shaw knew about Emily was nothing but her potential. Nothing but a single possibility that might or might not happen. This time, maybe she would be dead in an hour. Maybe she would survive decades into the Launch. No one knew.

Despite Emily's potentials, Shaw’s attitude to Emily was similar to everyone else in the McDonald’s. She would work with them, and if they proved to be valuable assets, perhaps she would pay them more attention. But if they proved too weak to survive, then she had no intention of babysitting any of them. Her focus, as always, was still herself.

It took the survivors a few minutes to recover from what Shaw told them. Finally, just as Shaw’s patience was stretched to the brink, the 23 civilians and 3 officers finally came together once again to discuss what to do now.

“We need to escort these people back to our precinct.” Emily first offered her input. Even at a time like this, she still remembered her duty. Her oath. To protect and serve. Neither the monsters popping up across every corner nor the fact that they were players in a real-life game could change that.

The other survivors nodded in agreement. The protection by the CPD sounded a lot better than waiting here in an abandoned restaurant with a handful of officers as protection. However, all of them remembered what drove them into this building in the first place. The monsters...especially that spider. In their current condition, venturing outside was a death sentence.

“Can’t you people call in a helicopter or something?” One of the survivors in a suit turned to the officers. “Evacuate us to safety that way.”

“Oh really? You think we didn't think of that?” Before Emily could say anything, one of the two male officers suddenly snickered. “In case you haven’t noticed, everything is down! How are we gonna call for help, huh? And did you see all the cars that died out there? What makes you think the choppers are gonna be working? Use your mind before you talk, you idiot!”

“Hey!” The survivor in the suit snapped back furiously. Sure, his idea was very stupid in hindsight, but that didn't excuse the way the officer was talking to him! “Mind your tone!”

Shaw chuckled darkly as she watched some of the survivors get worked up. None of them were in a good mood. All of their friends and families might be dead, and they themselves could soon follow. Asking them to be polite was stupid. Still, she took a step forward and interrupted the bickering that was nothing but a waste of time in her eyes.

“The officer is right. If we want to bring you back to your precinct, the only way is to go back there on foot.”

“But the things out there…” One of the men protested. He sounded like a terrified child.

“That brings us to something else I must emphasize.” Shaw cut the man off. “As I said before, the NPCs out there won’t be going away. In fact, as time goes on, these NPCs will get more and more powerful to a point where firearms will be useless against them. The only hope of survival you have is to level up yourself, and to do that, you must kill these NPCs yourself, without using your firearms.”