The next two hours were tense but manageable.
Sarnav organized the awakened survivors into a watch rotation. Hafiz took the main entrance with his lightning, Madam Chen covered the emergency exit with her stone skin, and two other awakened with minor abilities filled in the gaps. It wasn't much of a defense force, but it was better than nothing.
The unawakened helped where they could. Some tended to the injured. Others rationed the limited food and water supplies. A few just sat in corners, staring at nothing, too shell-shocked to function.
Sarnav understood. He'd been there himself, not so long ago. The difference was that he didn't have the luxury of breaking down. Not with his mother depending on him. Not with ninety-four lives hanging in the balance.
[SURVIVORS REMAINING: 94/94]
[TIME UNTIL DAWN: 2 HOURS, 3 MINUTES]
[NO IMMEDIATE THREATS DETECTED]
Two hours. They could do this. They could make it.
"You should rest."
Sarnav turned to find his mother approaching. She'd cleaned the blood from her face and tied her hair back, looking almost like her normal self despite the torn suit and the exhaustion in her eyes.
"I'm fine."
"You're running on fumes. I can see it." Mythili sat down next to him against the wall. "You've been going nonstop since you got here. Before that, you crossed half the city through god knows what. Even with your abilities, you need sleep."
"I'll sleep when we're safe."
"And when will that be? Tomorrow? Next week? Never?" She shook her head. "The world isn't going back to normal, Sarnav. This is our life now. You can't stay awake forever."
She wasn't wrong. His stamina had recovered to about 60% thanks to the lull in activity, but his mind was foggy with exhaustion. Every blink lasted a little longer than it should.
"One more hour," he said. "Then I'll rest. Promise."
Mythili studied him for a moment, then nodded. "One hour. I'll hold you to that."
They sat in silence for a while, watching the survivors. Families huddled together. Strangers who'd become allies through shared trauma. Children sleeping fitfully in their parents' arms.
"I keep thinking about your father," Mythili said quietly.
Sarnav tensed. "Mom..."
"I know. I know we should focus on survival. But I can't stop wondering." She was staring at her hands, her voice carefully controlled. "Was he scared? At the end? Did he have time to be scared, or was it instant?"
"I don't know."
"I should hate him. After everything he did, everything he put us through. I should be glad he's gone." She laughed, a small bitter sound. "But I'm not. I just feel... empty. Like there should be more. More grief, more anger, more something. Instead there's just nothing."
Sarnav didn't know what to say. His relationship with his father had been complicated at best, antagonistic at worst. Vikram Kish had been demanding, distant, and unfaithful. He'd pushed Sarnav into a career he didn't want, criticized him constantly, and spent more time with his mistresses than his family.
But he was still his father. And now he was probably dead.
"He wasn't a good man," Sarnav said finally. "But he was ours. We're allowed to mourn that."
Mythili reached over and squeezed his hand. "When did you get so wise?"
"Read a lot of novels. Some of them have good life advice between the fight scenes."
She laughed, a real laugh this time. "Of course. Those trashy books you're always reading."
"They're not all trashy. Some of them are very sophisticated trash."
The moment of levity faded as quickly as it came. There was too much weight pressing down on them, too much uncertainty about the future.
"What happens now?" Mythili asked. "After tonight, I mean. Where do we go? What do we do?"
"I don't know. Find somewhere safe. Build defenses. Connect with other survivor groups." Sarnav ran a hand through his hair. "The world's going to reorganize itself around power now. The awakened will be on top. We need to make sure we're in a position to protect ourselves."
"We. You mean you."
"I mean us. All of us." He gestured at the basement full of people. "They're going to need leadership. Structure. Someone to tell them there's a plan even when there isn't one."
"That sounds like politics."
"It is politics. Just with superpowers and monsters instead of elections and lobbyists."
Mythili was quiet for a moment. "You've thought about this a lot."
"It's pretty much the standard setup for every apocalypse novel ever written. Society collapses, new power structures emerge, factions form and fight for territory." He shrugged. "I've basically read the playbook a hundred times. Might as well use it."
"And what does the playbook say about our chances?"
Sarnav considered the question. "Depends on a lot of factors. How fast I can get stronger. How many allies we can gather. Whether we can find a defensible location with resources. Whether the dimensional rifts keep getting worse or stabilize." He paused. "But if I had to guess? We've got a shot. Better than most."
"Because of your abilities."
"Partly. Also because we're not starting from nothing. You've got leadership experience, legal knowledge, organizational skills. I've got the power and the genre savvy to navigate this new world. Between the two of us, we can build something."
Mythili looked at him with an expression he couldn't quite read. "You really have grown up."
"Apocalypse will do that to you."
The moment was interrupted by a commotion near the main entrance. Voices raised in argument, the sound of a scuffle.
Sarnav was on his feet instantly. "Stay here."
He pushed through the crowd toward the disturbance. Hafiz was blocking the doorway, electricity crackling around his hands, facing off against a group of newcomers trying to enter.
"I said you can't just barge in here!" Hafiz shouted. "We have protocols!"
"Fuck your protocols! My people need shelter!"
The speaker was a big man, Chinese-Malaysian, with the build of someone who'd worked manual labor his whole life. Behind him were maybe twenty people, all of them looking rough. Dirty, bloody, desperate.
And at least five of them had the telltale signs of awakening. One woman's hair was floating around her head. A teenage boy's skin had a metallic sheen. Another man's eyes glowed faintly in the dim light.
More awakened. More potential threats. Or potential allies.
"What's going on?" Sarnav stepped up beside Hafiz, projecting as much authority as he could.
The big man sized him up. "Who the fuck are you?"
"Someone who just killed a D-rank monster with a fire extinguisher. Who the fuck are you?"
That got the man's attention. His eyes narrowed, reassessing. "Name's Tan. Used to run a construction crew in Bangsar. Now I'm just trying to keep what's left of my people alive."
Bangsar. Sarnav's stomach tightened.
"Bangsar's gone," Tan continued, his voice heavy. "Whole district, just... gone. Impact crater took out everything within two kilometers. We're the only survivors from our area. Been walking for hours trying to find somewhere safe."
[INFORMATION CORRELATED WITH EXISTING DATA]
[BANGSAR DISTRICT: CONFIRMED DESTROYED]
[VIKRAM KISH'S LAST KNOWN LOCATION: WITHIN DESTRUCTION RADIUS]
[STATUS UPDATE: VIKRAM KISH - DECEASED (CONFIRMED)]
The notification hit Sarnav like a punch to the gut.
Confirmed. Not unknown anymore. Confirmed deceased.
His father was dead.
"Hey." Tan was frowning at him. "You alright? You look like you just saw a ghost."
"I'm fine." The words came out automatic, distant. "Just... I knew someone in Bangsar."
"Sorry, kid. If they were there when it hit, they're gone. Nothing left but glass and ash."
Glass and ash. That's what remained of Vikram Kish. Not a body to bury. Not a grave to visit. Just particles scattered across a crater where a neighborhood used to be.
Sarnav forced himself to focus. He could process this later. Right now, there were decisions to make.
"How many of your people are awakened?"
Tan blinked at the change of subject, then recovered. "Five. Maybe six. Hard to tell with some of them."
"Any combat abilities?"
"My nephew can turn his skin to metal. One of the women can make things float. The rest are still figuring out what they can do."
Metal skin. Telekinesis. Those could be useful.
"Alright." Sarnav stepped aside, gesturing for Hafiz to do the same. "You can come in. But you follow our rules while you're here. No fighting, no stealing, no causing trouble. We've got injured people, children, civilians. Anyone who puts them at risk answers to me."
Tan studied him for a long moment. Then he nodded slowly. "Fair enough. We're not looking for trouble. Just shelter."
"Then welcome to the Kuala Lumpur High Court survivor camp. Such as it is."
The newcomers filed in, looking around the basement with a mixture of relief and wariness. Twenty more people meant twenty more mouths to feed, but it also meant more hands to help, more awakened to defend.
[SURVIVOR COUNT UPDATED: 114]
[OPTIONAL OBJECTIVE ADJUSTED: PROTECT SURVIVORS UNTIL DAWN (0/114 ALIVE)]
[NOTE: INCREASED NUMBERS INCREASE BOTH DIFFICULTY AND POTENTIAL REWARDS]
Great. More people to keep alive. Just what he needed.
Sarnav found his mother in the crowd. She'd seen the newcomers arrive, was already moving to help integrate them with the existing survivors. Efficient as always. Even in the apocalypse, Mythili Kish knew how to manage people.
He caught her eye and nodded toward a quiet corner. She understood immediately, excusing herself from the conversation she'd been having to join him.
"What is it?"
"Those people are from Bangsar."
Mythili went very still. "Oh."
"The whole district is gone. Impact crater. Nothing left."
She closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them again, they were wet, but her voice was steady. "So it's confirmed then. Vikram is..."
"Dead. Yeah."
They stood in silence, letting the weight of it settle. Around them, life went on. People talked, moved, organized. The business of survival continued regardless of personal tragedy.
"I don't know how to feel," Mythili said finally. "We were married for twenty-five years. He gave me you. And now he's just... gone. Like he never existed."
"He existed. He mattered. Even if he wasn't perfect."
"He was far from perfect." She laughed bitterly. "He was cheating on me when he died. Probably in bed with that woman. And I still feel like I should be sadder than I am."
"Grief doesn't follow rules. You feel what you feel."
"More wisdom from your novels?"
"More wisdom from being human."
Mythili pulled him into a hug, sudden and fierce. He hugged her back, letting himself feel the loss for just a moment. His father was dead. The man who'd raised him, criticized him, pushed him, failed him in a hundred different ways. Gone.
He wasn't sure if he was sad or relieved or some complicated mixture of both.
"We're going to be okay," Mythili whispered against his shoulder. "Whatever happens, we're going to be okay. We have each other."
"Yeah." Sarnav held her tighter. "We do."
[EMOTIONAL BOND STRENGTHENED]
[MYTHILI KISH - RELATIONSHIP: MOTHER (DEEP)]
[NOTE: FAMILIAL BONDS CANNOT BE CONVERTED TO HARMONY ESSENCE WITHOUT BLOODLINE SEVERANCE]
[THIS IS PROBABLY FOR THE BEST RIGHT NOW]
Sarnav mentally told the system to shut up.
The final hour before dawn was the worst.
Not because of monsters or rifts or dimensional horrors. Because of humans.
Tan's group had integrated reasonably well with the existing survivors. There was tension, of course. Strangers thrown together in crisis always had tension. But it was manageable. Controlled.
The problem came from outside.
It started with shouting near the main entrance. Then screaming. Then the unmistakable sound of fighting.
Sarnav pushed through the crowd to find chaos erupting at the barricade they'd set up. A group of men were trying to force their way in, at least a dozen of them, and they weren't asking nicely.
"Move aside or we'll fucking move you!"
The speaker was a young guy, maybe mid-twenties, with the wild eyes of someone who'd snapped under pressure. He was awakened. Sarnav could tell from the faint glow around his fists, some kind of enhancement ability.
Behind him, his gang was a mix of awakened and baseline humans. All of them looked desperate. Dangerous.
"There's no room here!" Hafiz was shouting back, electricity dancing between his fingers. "We're already overcrowded!"
"Then make room! Kick some of these people out! We don't give a shit, we're coming in!"
[THREAT ASSESSMENT: HIGH]
[HOSTILE AWAKENED COUNT: 4]
[HOSTILE BASELINE COUNT: 9]
[LEADER ESTIMATED RANK: E+]
[COMBAT PROBABILITY: 87%]
Thirteen hostiles against maybe seven awakened defenders. Bad odds, especially when most of their awakened had non-combat abilities.
But fighting wasn't the only option.
Sarnav stepped forward, past Hafiz, putting himself between the two groups. "Hold on. Everyone just hold on."
"Who the fuck are you?" The gang leader's glowing fists tightened.
"The guy who decides whether this ends with talking or with bodies." Sarnav kept his voice calm, reasonable. The opposite of how he felt inside. "You want shelter. We've got shelter. Seems like there should be a deal in there somewhere."
"Deal?" The leader laughed. "Here's a deal. You let us in, or we kill everyone in our way."
"And then what? You take over a basement full of terrified civilians? Congratulations. You've won a concrete box with no food, no water, and no defenses against the next rift that opens."
The leader hesitated. Not much, but enough for Sarnav to notice.
"We've already survived one monster attack tonight," Sarnav continued. "D-rank void hound came through a rift right above us. Want to know how we killed it? Teamwork. The awakened here worked together, combined their abilities, took it down." He gestured at the gang. "How many of you have actually fought a monster? How many of you know what to do when reality tears open and something from another dimension comes through?"
Silence.
"That's what I thought." Sarnav took a risk and stepped closer to the leader. Close enough that those glowing fists could easily reach him. "You're scared. I get it. Everyone's scared. The world ended today. But attacking other survivors isn't going to make you safer. It's going to get you killed, either by us or by the next threat that comes along."
"So what? We're just supposed to trust you?"
"You're supposed to be smart. We need fighters. You need shelter and organization. That's not a conflict. That's a partnership."
The leader stared at him. His fists were still glowing, still ready to throw a punch that would probably take Sarnav's head off. E+ rank against F rank wasn't a fight. It was an execution.
But he didn't swing.
"You've got balls," the leader said finally. "I'll give you that."
"I've got survival instinct. Same as you."
A long pause. Then, slowly, the glow around the leader's fists faded.
"Fine. We'll try it your way." He looked at his gang. "Stand down. We're negotiating."
[COMBAT AVOIDED]
[DIPLOMATIC RESOLUTION ACHIEVED]
[+500 HARMONY ESSENCE]
[NEW SKILL UNLOCKED: NEGOTIATION (BASIC)]
Sarnav let out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding. His heart was pounding so hard he could feel it in his throat.
That was too close. Way too close.
The next thirty minutes were tense but productive. The gang's leader was named Marcus, a former bouncer who'd awakened during the impact with some kind of strength enhancement. He was aggressive and temperamental, but not stupid. Once he understood that cooperation was more advantageous than conflict, he fell in line.
His people integrated with the existing groups, adding thirteen more bodies to the survivor count.
[SURVIVOR COUNT UPDATED: 127]
[TIME UNTIL DAWN: 23 MINUTES]
[NO IMMEDIATE THREATS DETECTED]
Twenty-three minutes. They were so close.
Sarnav allowed himself to relax slightly. The hardest part was over. They just had to hold on a little longer.
"You handled that well."
He turned to find Mythili watching him, an odd expression on her face.
"Got lucky. He could have easily decided to fight anyway."
"But he didn't. Because you read him correctly. Knew what to say, how to say it." She tilted her head. "You've changed, Sarnav. Even in just a few hours. You're not the same person you were this morning."
"The world's not the same world it was this morning."
"No. It's not." She was quiet for a moment. "Your father never could have done what you just did. He was good at giving orders, but terrible at actually connecting with people. At making them want to follow him instead of just forcing them."
"I'm not Dad."
"No. You're better." She smiled, tired but genuine. "I'm proud of you."
The words hit harder than they should have. Sarnav couldn't remember the last time either of his parents had said they were proud of him. His father had been too busy criticizing. His mother had been too busy surviving her marriage.
"Thanks, Mom."
[TIME UNTIL DAWN: 15 MINUTES]
Fifteen minutes.
The basement was quiet now. People were settling in, finding spaces to rest, beginning to believe that they might actually survive the night. The tension that had been coiled so tight for hours was finally starting to ease.
Sarnav found a spot against a wall and let himself slide down to the floor. His body ached. His mind was foggy. The stamina pill had long since worn off, and he was running on pure willpower at this point.
Just a little longer. Stay awake a little longer.
[TIME UNTIL DAWN: 10 MINUTES]
His eyes were so heavy. Just resting them for a second wouldn't hurt.
[TIME UNTIL DAWN: 5 MINUTES]
The darkness was warm. Comfortable. He could feel himself drifting.
[TIME UNTIL DAWN: 1 MINUTE]
Stay awake. Stay...
[DAWN ACHIEVED]
[QUEST COMPLETE: SURVIVE THE FIRST NIGHT]
[CALCULATING REWARDS...]
[BASE REWARD: +5,000 HARMONY ESSENCE]
[BONUS (FAMILY RESCUE): +1,000 HARMONY ESSENCE (PREVIOUSLY AWARDED)]
[BONUS (SURVIVOR PROTECTION): +5,000 HARMONY ESSENCE]
[BONUS (127 SURVIVORS - EXCEEDS BASE 100): +2,700 HARMONY ESSENCE]
[BONUS (DIPLOMATIC RESOLUTION): +1,000 HARMONY ESSENCE]
[TOTAL ESSENCE GAINED: 14,700]
[HARMONY POINTS GAINED: +200]
[SKILL UNLOCKED: LEADERSHIP (BASIC)]
[ITEM RECEIVED: BASIC SURVIVAL PACKAGE]
[ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: FIRST DAWN]
[YOU HAVE SURVIVED DAY ZERO]
[WELCOME TO DAY ONE]
Sarnav's eyes snapped open.
Light was filtering through the cracks in the basement ceiling. Real light. Sunlight. The first dawn of the new world.
They'd made it.
He pulled up his status screen with a thought.
[STATUS]
NAME: Sarnav Kish
REALM: Awakened (F-Rank)
CULTIVATION PROGRESS: 18,200 / 10,000 Essence
[BREAKTHROUGH AVAILABLE - FOUNDATION REALM]
HARMONY POINTS: 300
Eighteen thousand essence. More than enough to break through to Foundation realm.
But the notification said something else too. Something that made Sarnav pause.
Breakthrough available.
Not automatic. Available. A choice.
"System," he murmured quietly. "Why isn't the breakthrough happening automatically?"
[BREAKTHROUGH REQUIRES CONSCIOUS DECISION AND SUITABLE ENVIRONMENT]
[BREAKTHROUGH PROCESS CAUSES TEMPORARY VULNERABILITY]
[DURATION: APPROXIMATELY 30 MINUTES]
[DURING THIS TIME, HOST WILL BE UNABLE TO MOVE OR DEFEND]
[RECOMMENDATION: FIND SECURE LOCATION BEFORE INITIATING]
Made sense. Cultivation breakthroughs in the novels were always dangerous moments. The protagonist would find a cave or a secret room, set up defenses, then enter a trance state while their body transformed.
Trying to breakthrough here, in a basement full of over a hundred people, some of whom he'd just met and didn't fully trust? Bad idea.
He'd find somewhere private later. For now, he had other things to deal with.
Sarnav pushed himself to his feet, his muscles screaming in protest. Around him, people were waking up, blinking in the early morning light, slowly realizing that they'd survived.
His mother was already awake, talking with some of the other de facto leaders. Organizing. Planning. Being Mythili Kish, the woman who handled everything.
She caught his eye across the room and smiled.
They'd made it through Day Zero.
Now came the hard part.
Building something new from the ashes of the old.