1 Chapter 1

31/12/21 22:00

Luca is lying in his bed trying to blend out the sound of the riots outside his tiny apartment.

'C'mon shut up I'm just trying to sleep', he thought to himself as he tried covering his ears with his pillow. After a few minutes he gave up and stood up. He walked to his beloved bookshelf and admired his collection. There were at least 150 books. From Sci-fi to Romance to History books, everything was neatly sorted. He went to the War Section and grabbed "The art of War" by Sun Tzu.

'I read this book probably 20 times by now' he mused as he went back to bed and started reading.

"Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt."

"In the midst of chaos, there is also opportunity"

"Move swift as the Wind and closely-formed as the Wood. Attack like the Fire and be still as the Mountain."

"If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle."

"The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting."

"Appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak."

'And then there's my favorite quote of this book. It probably saved my life multiple times.' He thought as he remembered the countless times in the past years when he had to play the Weak Guy to protect himself. Luca is 1.85 with a muscular stature. Since Young, he was trained in Martial arts. He was a black belt in Aikido and taekwondo, as well as the Runner-up at the 2018 World Kendo Championship. His father, who was a Navy SEAL, also taught him Survival and Weapon Skills. But when you are unarmed and have a face-off with 3 armed guys, you can't play the strong tough Guy, or they would just shoot you. So he played the weak guy, got them in his Attack zone, and knocked them out. He took their guns and supplies and ran away.

He wanted to forget that memory again. It reminds him just how fucked up the world got after the harmless virus from Asia ran amok and the people went crazy. He turned around and continued reading.

01/01/22 00:00

Luca was turning the page when suddenly a weird box appeared in front of his vision.

[Test of humanity failed.]

[Activating last chance protocol]

[Evolving VOME-19 → VOME-22]

[You have failed the Test of Humanity. Humanities last chance has arrived.]

As he read in Shock he got startled when another box appeared

[You must Survive the VOME-22 Virus for 500 Years.]

[Success: Humanity will evolve.]

[Failure: Humanity will cease to exist.]

[Good Luck]

He jumped from his bed and whispered to himself:

'What the fuck?'