Lin Feng was reviewing a quarterly report. His eyes gritty from too little sleep.
The numbers blurred on his computer screen. Lin Feng reached for his mug and grimaced; the coffee had gone cold long ago. Around him, the low thrum of keyboards and the steady sigh of the air conditioning filled the Shanghai office with a muffled energy. Just another Tuesday; same routine, different afternoons.
Then, the world screamed.
A sound like metal being ripped apart. The sound came from everywhere at once. Every computer screens in the office flashed bright white. The lights went out. Lin Feng's chair shook.
A blue, translucent screen appeared in the middle of the room. It was suspended in mid-air. The glowing text crawled across the screen.
GLOBAL ANNOUNCEMENT
[Reality Merge Protocol: ENGAGED]
[Planetary Codex Integration: Survival of the Fittest (Game Edition)]
Initialization Finished. Hello, Players.
There was silence. For three seconds.
Then, chaos
The first creature showed up in the copy room. It was a short creature. Green in color. It held a stone axe with a chip on it. Its beady red eyes surveyed the frightened office workers. It screamed.
People screamed. Chairs toppled over. A person made a run for the fire exit.
The goblin moved. It was quick. It struck with its axe and a man in a blue shirt dropped. Red color hit the carpet. The screaming heightened.
Lin Feng did not scream. He froze. His mind went blank with terror. Then, a single instinct took over.
Run.
He shoved his chair back. He did not look at the monster. He did not look at his fallen coworker. He sprinted for the stairwell door.
The hallway was pandemonium. More blue screens flickered in the air. People clawed at them, shouting. A window shattered down the hall glasses falling everywhere and a reptilian something with scales crawled through.
Lin Feng hit the stairwell door. He threw himself down the concrete stairs. One of his shoes slipped. He grabbed the railing. His heart hammered against his ribs.
He heard noises from below. Growls. Crashes. More screams.
He changed direction. He ran back up to his office floor. He burst through the door. The copy room was now empty. Just the body and the blood.
His desk was nearby. He dropped to his knees. He crawled under it. It was a poor hiding spot. But it was cover.
He pressed his back against the wall. He pulled his knees to his chest. He tried to breathe quietly. He listened.
The office was a symphony of horror. Distant crashes. Muffled cries. The ripping, wet sounds of flesh being torn apart.
A personal blue screen flashed in front of his face. He flinched.
[Player: Lin Feng]
[Level: 1 (Civilian)]
[HP: 100/100]
[Stats: STR 5, AGI 6, VIT 7, INT 9, PER 8]
[Inventory: Empty]
[Skills: None]
So it was true. All of it was true. The world had become a game now. A deadly one.
A quest notification popped up.
[New Quest: Survive the Initial Onslaught]
[Objective: Do not die for the next 24 hours.]
[Reward: 500 EXP, Title: 'The Lucky']
[Failure: Death.]
Lin Feng felt a cold laugh bubble in his throat. Do not die. That was the quest. His new purpose in life.
A shadow fell across the opening under the desk. Lin Feng held his breath.
He saw two green, clawed feet. A goblin. It sniffed the air. It was looking for something. For him.
Lin Feng's hand closed around the only thing near him. A heavy, metal stapler from his desk drawer. It was pathetic but It was all he had.
The goblin crouched. Its ugly face peered under the desk. Its red eyes met his.
It grinned. A string of saliva dripped from its yellow teeth.
It reached a clawed hand for him.
This was it. He would die under his own desk. He would be a footnote in the first hour of the apocalypse.
Despair washed over him.
Then, a new sound. Not from the world. It came from inside his head. A soft, static chime. A second screen, layered behind the first, flickered into existence.
The text was a sickly, neon green.
[Anomalous Energy Signature Detected...]
[Scanning Host Neural Patterns...]
[Compatibility: 99.7%]
[Administrator Override Accepted.]
[Deploying Sub-System...]
The goblin's claws were inches from his face.
[Welcome, Host.]
[The Idle Apocalypse System is now online.]
Everything stopped.
The goblin froze. The sounds of the dying office faded to a dull murmur. Time seemed to slow.
Lin Feng stared at the green text. He did not understand.
A new menu opened. It was simple. Clean. It showed a top-down, schematic map of his immediate area. He saw a yellow dot labeled [Host - Lin Feng] under Desk-04A. He saw a red dot labeled [Hostile - Low-Grade Goblin] right next to it.
At the bottom of the menu, a single command pulsed.
[Deploy Idle Asset?]
[Asset Type: Basic Zombie Clone]
[Cost: 0 (First Deployment Waived)]
[Y / N]
Lin Feng had no time to think. The goblin was unfreezing. Its snarl returned.
His finger, trembling, moved in the air. He tapped the glowing YY.
On the schematic map, a new green dot appeared. It materialized in the hallway outside the office door. The label read [Idle Asset - Zombie Clone #001].
A log fell into the corner of his vision.
[Command Acknowledged.]
[Deploying Zombie Clone #001 to Host Location.]
[Estimated Time of Arrival: 8 seconds.]
The goblin lunged.
Lin Feng did the only thing he could. He threw the stapler.
It bounced off the goblin's forehead. The creature hissed, more annoyed than hurt. It swiped at him.
Lin Feng scrambled back. His head hit the underside of the desk. Nowhere to go.
The creature crawled into his hiding space. Its smell was overwhelming. Rot and copper.
Seven seconds.
The goblin raised its stone axe.
Six.
Lin Feng closed his eyes.
A new sound. A slow, dragging shuffle. A guttural moan.
The goblin stopped. It turned its head. It forgot about Lin Feng.
Lin Feng opened his eyes.
Standing in the aisle between the desks was a zombie. It was exactly as the name suggested. Pale gray skin. Tattered office clothing. One arm hung limp. Its eyes were milky white.
[Zombie Clone #001] had arrived.
The goblin shrieked with excitement. Fresh meat. It scrambled out from under the desk and charged the zombie.
The zombie clone did not charge. It stood its ground. It raised its working arm.
The goblin swung its axe. It bit into the zombie's shoulder. Rotted flesh tore. No blood flowed. The zombie did not react.
It grabbed the goblin with its good hand.
The goblin struggled. It was quick. The zombie was slow. But the zombie's grip was like iron.
The zombie brought its head down. It sank its teeth into the goblin's neck.
The goblin's shriek became a wet gurgle. It flailed. Its axe dropped. Its movements grew weak.
The zombie held on. It did not let go.
Thirty seconds later, the goblin went limp.
A notification popped up on Lin Feng's main screen.
[Combat Concluded.]
[Your asset, Zombie Clone #001, has defeated Low-Grade Goblin.]
[EXP Gained: +25.]
[Loot Acquired: Crude Stone Axe, Goblin Finger x3.]
The zombie clone dropped the corpse. It stood still. Waiting.
Lin Feng stared from under the desk. His heart was a drum in his ears. He looked at the dead goblin. He looked at the motionless zombie.
He had not thrown a punch. He had not cast a spell.
He had just clicked YY.
A strange feeling bloomed in his chest. It was not quite hope. It was the absence of total despair.
The green system screen updated.
[First Blood Achieved.]
[Idle Point Generation Unlocked.]
[Current IP: 10.]
[New Command Available: Assign Task.]
Lin Feng tried to crawl out from under the desk. His legs were weak. He couldn't stand up. The zombie clone stared at nothing.
He looked at the green menu. He looked at the map. He saw other red dots moving in the building. More monsters.
He was not a hero. He knew that. He was just an office worker.
But he had a new employee. One that worked for free. One that never complained.
He selected Zombie Clone #001 on the map. A task menu opened.
[Assign Task to Selected Asset:]
[1. Guard Host.]
[2. Patrol Area.]
[3. Farm Resources (Requires Resource Node).]
He chose option one. [Guard Host].
The zombie clone took a heavy step closer to him. It positioned itself between Lin Feng and the door. It stood sentry.
For the first time since the blue screen, Lin Feng took a full, deep breath.
The world had become a game of survival.
His game, it seemed, had just switched to idle mode.