4 First Round (1)

"Zombies? What the hell?"

"I thought we had to fight each other!"

"We don't even have any weapons!"

Most of these 'professional' criminals lost their minds as soon as they heard the zombies slowly inching closer to the market square they were at. While some remained indifferent. Aryan was one of them, but he could understand why these people were panicking so much.

He remembered the first time he logged in to play Devil's assassin. People were going crazy even though they knew it was only a game.

'So far, this looks like an exact copy of DA. I should better start preparing for the second round than focusing on the first.'

The first wave of zombies would last for thirty minutes. During which it wouldn't matter how many zombies they killed, their numbers wouldn't go down.

In other words, as soon as a zombie was killed the game would spawn a new one to take its place and the zombies would only disappear once thirty minutes had passed, not a second before.

As for them not having any weapons... it was simply because they didn't need one. After all, it was a survival quest, not a quest to hunt the zombies.

In a way, the game wanted the players to survive by running around and also... betraying each other if necessary. At least that's what regularly happened in the tutorial of Devil's Assassin.

Since they were criminals, it wouldn't surprise Aryan a bit if they began using the weak players as meat shields to protect themselves from the zombies. While they wait for the timer to pass.

That being said, it didn't mean they couldn't kill the zombies or they didn't have a way to do so. If Tartarus Online was completely based on Devil's Assassin, then Aryan knew there were bound to be hidden caches spread across the map that would provide them with weapons, armours, and more importantly blueprints.

Being a mechanic, possessing rare blueprints was like possessing the key to success. But these blueprints rarely appeared apart from boss drops, which is why the mechanical class wasn't super popular back in the day as it was really tough to get a blueprint to start crafting, in the first place.

'Worrying about getting blueprints wouldn't do anything beneficial to me.' Aryan snapped back into reality, 'I have to find a couple of caches to at least get a weapon. After all, the tutorial was also known as the stat point farming grounds. Killing zombies should give us free stat points that will be crucial for survival in the next round.'

With that in his mind, Aryan ran away from everyone else. To find a cache and also to prevent himself from becoming someone's meat shield as he was pretty sure he was down at the bottom amongst the players there as none of them seemed to have taken either Nimble Mechanic or the Virtuous Healer class.

In other words, all of them had offensive classes, while he could only depend on his agility, evasion and intelligence to clear the tutorial.

'I can't die here... not before I find out why everyone betrayed me like that... no, let's change that.' Anger shrouded Aryan's face, 'I will make them pay regardless of what lame excuses they might have for doing something so brutal to me.'

However, Aryan wasn't aware that he was being watched by someone within the crowd. Someone who recognised him as their in-game appearance was an exact replica of how they looked in real life.

"Snake, let's follow him. I have a feeling he knows something we don't." The violet-haired lady remarked before rushing behind Aryan.

She wasn't alone though, the man called Snake rushed after her. He was a silent guy who rarely spoke a single word and for some reason had the lower part of his face covered with bloodied bandages. Apart from that, the scars on his somewhat strong body told the story of his struggles in their own way.

"Who... he...?" Snake asked as he caught up to the girl.

"Ah, I don't remember his name but he is I think he is supposed to be good at games or some shit." The girl replied before turning toward the crowd they had left behind, "If we are lucky, he might even agree to team up with us. Either way running away is a far better option than, sticking around such a big crowd as would only attract more zombies, lowering our chances of survival."

***

Once Aryan began running, he didn't stop. He knew doing so would be equal to committing suicide.

Zombies might have been slow, but if he stopped to take a break, they would catch up to him and without a weapon, they would kill him easily. However, it seemed like he wasn't the only one who had the idea of running away.

"What the hell? How did someone get ahead of me?" Aryan was confused when he saw a bloodied corpse in front of him.

Huge chunks of the corpse were missing, leaving it in such a state that it was difficult to say whether the corpse was of a man or a woman. But Aryan had something entirely different to worry about.

"P-Please, let me go!" He heard a man crying at some distance.

There were around six people in front of him at some distance, all of whom were ganging up on someone who was on his knees, grovelling before them. But something was off... they were binding the man to a lamppost, just like the corpse Aryan had seen a minute ago.

It was clear what those men were trying to do. In an attempt to slow down the zombies, they were using the people as prey while the rest of them run away.

Since it was happening in a game he was used to playing, Aryan was used to witnessing this level of gore on a regular basis. But knowing that they were essentially killing someone in real life was a bit... unnerving.

"Tch, why am I feeling sorry for a criminal? He must have killed dozens of people before, and now it's his turn. That's all there is to it." Aryan mumbled and began looking for something, "Come on, the trash can has to be somewhere around- found it!"

The secret caches wouldn't be so secret if they didn't blend in with the environment so well. That's why they were hidden in plain sight of the players in the form of things they wouldn't even consider touching in midst of zombies chasing them.

As soon as Aryan lifted the lid of the can, he received a notification.

[Congratulations! You have earned a new title!]

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[Title Name]: Tutorial Explorer

[Title Rarity]: Rare

[Title Effect]:

>> The number of stats points earned during the tutorial would be doubled for the duration of the tutorial.

>> The amount of gold received for slaying zombies would be doubled for the duration of the tutorial.

>> You will receive uncommon or higher tier loot for the duration of the tutorial.

(The title has been automatically equipped.)

__

Aryan ignored the notification as he already knew he would get that as long as he was the first one to discover a cache. He was only interested in what he would find inside the cache.

'A cache would randomly spawn three to five items. If only I can get a melee weapon or a melee weapon blueprint my life would be a bit easier.'

[You have found Medical Kit (Low) x2]

'Okay, not bad. Next...'

[You have found Scarp Metal x1]

'... next.'

[You have found: Scrap Metal Gun (blueprint) x1]

[The cache has been emptied.]

'Damn it! Guns are useless in this round. Using them would do more harm than good to me as they don't deal a lot of damage and are awfully noisy.' Aryan got up to leave, 'I'll have to look for another cache-'

"Look what do we have here boys," a man suddenly grabbed Aryan by his nape and threw him in front of the rest of them, "I found a rat lurking around. You know what we do with rats, don't you?"

"We kill 'em!"