The group immediately gave their Mama a call, and they were rested assured when she told them that she was fine and were fortifying it up with a few veteran friends.
"Ayy, our mom is so cool!" Christian exclaimed.
"Apparently, the currency featured in this app is called Nirvana Credits, and you can view your wallet in the profile tab," Elon said,
"Oh what, it's already linked to our bank accounts, and there's an exchange rate as well, 10 USD to 1 credit..." Alex added.
"Hey, this supplies tab is pretty cool, it's like Amazon, but I wonder if they will get the right shipping address if we are always on the move..." Christian, the shopaholic, was intrigued by this new market.
In the profile section, it basically had a run-down on the stats of each survivor, including the party they were in, which was the default "USA" for them.
"Oh hey, I'm already at a couple credits now!" Alex was intrigued by the new currency system.
Clicking on the number, he was led to a page that displayed the recent transaction history, which indicated a +1 for every zombie he killed.
Hearing Alex's remarks, everyone quickly went to check what number they were at.
Jay - 19 credits, Elon - 8, Christian - 13, Alex - 2.
"This is so f*cking unfair, yo is this like PUBG all over again? Where we actually match in damage output but you guys KS the crap out of me?!" Alex was getting a bit salty after seeing his score.
But now that the internet's back, the group immediately went to their desktop computer to see what was happening. Of course, first and foremost, they immediately went to close that glass wall that paranoid the crap out of them when the power was cut.
There were already news reports on the sighting of zombies and the governments officially addressing the situation. They are just feeding the usual BS about how they have it under control, and that FBI and homeland security are going to find out who's behind all of this and bring them to justice. They also mentioned that reinforcements have been dispatched towards every corner of the United States, and that they would not yield to terrorism.
"Maybe because of all the movies I watched, but I have a feeling that every time the government says that, they would get f*cked, and then solo heroes would come out and save the day," Christian exclaimed.
"Lol, same." The group agreed.
Ding~
An update popped up on the home page and a count-down timer was attached.
[Next Wave: 4-hour count down.]
"Wait, it's 5 PM right now, so the next wave of zombies or whatever is coming at 9 PM tonight. We should probably prepare ourselves for that," Jay suggested.
Just at that moment, a loud voice through a speaker could be heard from the water direction, accompanied by the loud rumbling noise of speedboat engines.
"All survivors on Sunset Island, please make your way towards the neighborhood gate bridge on Island #1 and Island #4, we will be escorting you guys to safety. I repeat..."
One of the speedboats seemed to get closer to the beach house, and from the boat jumped down four soldiers in full gear. They made their way over to the front of the house and knocked on the doorbell.
From the phone, the boys could see the soldiers by their front door, since their smart doorbell could be accessed through an app on their phone. They cautiously got to the door and answered it.
Upon opening the door, Sarah immediately recognized one of the soldiers. "Charles! Have you seen my husband? Is he alright?"
"Yeah of course, he was dispatched to gather the survivors in another area and he told us to come over and make sure that you are safe. I got your note from your house and came over."
Hearing that her husband was fine, Sarah was finally able to let out a sigh of relief, as if a huge boulder was finally lifted from her heart. "Thank God, will I be able to meet him in a bit?"
"Is your stuff ready? We can escort you back to the camp on our boat. Oh and you guys, thank you very much for saving Sarah," the soldier immediately turned to Jay, who was standing in front of Alex, Christian, and Elon, and expressed his gratitude. "You guys should get to the bridge as well, we will be escorting everyone to safety. If you have your things ready, you are welcome to come onto the boat with us."
While Christian and Alex were both exhilarated by the offer, but Jay thought for a second and politely declined, "We will finish packing and meet you guys at the bridge. Take Sarah and her daughter first, keep them safe."
The soldier didn't insist, and the squad left with Sarah and her daughter, who expressed her most sincere gratitude to the boys before leaving.
"Wait, Boss, why didn't you take that guy up on his offer?" Christian was a bit confused, and so was Alex.
"Were you thinking what I was thinking?" Seeing that Elon wasn't surprised by his decision, Jay turned to him and asked.
"Probably. Thinking back to the announcement we read earlier on the app's home page, it said that the enemy wave difficulty will vary depending on the population density in that area as well as the level of firepower the population is armed with. If that is indeed true, then we should be actually safer if we are away from populated areas," Elon analyzed the current situation, immediately reminding Alex and Christian.
"On a side note, did you guys notice the change in that Charlie guy's tone?" Jay suddenly asked.
Ayy, we actually filmed an embarrassing game of us playing PUBG during our daily slacking-off time, welcome to check it out and roast us.
youtube.com/watch?v=s_XLv6W4Wcs
"No, why?"
"I think Charlie lied. But I can understand. I can imagine that the toughest job was telling the family of soldier's death," Jay slowly said...
"Wait, what? What made you think that? He said Sarah's husband was fine though..." Elon was confused.
"Well, for a moment there I think his memories were projected into my brain. I don't know how to explain it, but I saw his experience in my head for a brief second. It wasn't his thoughts, but the images in his head. I think I saw through his eyes how Sarah's husband died..."
"Wait, what do you mean you saw through his eyes? Like from his perspective?" The group was a bit shocked.
"Yeah... Apparently, their station was hit really hard by a lot more zombies in comparison to what we went through. A lot of people died, and Sarah's husband got bit as well as they were retreating to their last line of defense. He asked the Charlie guy to put a bullet in his brain so he doesn't turn into a zombie, and he asked Charlie to take her wife to safety," Jay explained the scenes that flooded into his brain when his eyes met Charlie for a brief second.
"Are you sure?" The group was still skeptical.
"I don't know... But the scenes were really vivid, it seemed like his memory was projected into my brain rather than my imagination running wild." Jay was quite convinced because it felt so real, and he told the group how that suspicion was confirmed when the soldier purposely changed the topic when Sarah asked if she would be seeing her husband soon.
Still a little skeptical, the group decided to just drop it because it all had nothing to do with them.
Fortunately, Sarah allowed them to keep the weapons and supplies they brought over from her house since it was assumed that wherever they were going would have tons of supplies, weapons, and ammunition.
There were still a few hours left until the next wave, so the group began preparing. This time, knowing that killing each zombie could earn them 1 credit, which is the equivalence of 10 US dollars, they were all pretty hyped, as they all had their eyes on something to buy from the supply shopping tab on the Nirvana app.
Apparently, in the profile tab, they have a level and title, which was showing 1 and n/a for all of them.
"Oh hey, there's a hidden note on the top corner of the 'n/a'," Alex shared his discovery.
"Oh cool, what does it say when you put your finger on it?"
...
[Too weak, go KYS]
The group was speechless upon seeing the note left by the developers.
Anyway, so apparently, as you level up, you can unlock more supplies to order. The found the basic shopping list to be quite similar to the items they could find in PUBG, and they could buy the standard weapons, weapon attachments, ammunition, armor, and healing supplies at their current level.
They already got tons of weapons from Sarah's house and enough bullets. If they were to order more weapons, they would consider getting a few pistols just in case, and some throwables for different purposes. Currently, they don't see a need to spend money on bolt-action snipers, since they are also painfully expensive on the app.
The zombie wave would be coming again in airdrop fashion, so it would be very difficult to predict the landing and find one place to fortify. The "game master" (GM), which the group referred to that creepy robotic voice as, did mention in the app that the zombie wave difficulty will vary depending on the level of concentration of weapons and population.
Who knows. Maybe just as the group fortified the house, the GM would just drop a dozen boxes on their property. Theoretically, fortifying and camping at one location would place the squad at a positional advantage, but the drops could completely turn that against them and force them to react passively if the enemies were to drop right in the squad's territory.
In addition, it was still unknown the size this zombie wave would be. If they were to camp at one spot, the situation could only get worse and worse if all zombies nearby continue to gather and sige their house as the gunfire keeps drawing attention.
Thus, after some careful consideration, the group decided to play it out guerrilla warfare style, where they would primarily use hit-and-run tactics and stay on the move.
It could work because as far as they know, the zombies thankfully couldn't operate firearms or launch long-range attacks, thus giving the squad a significant advantage over the zombies. In addition, the group would be mobile, thus any attention and aggro drawn by the shots could be potentially dropped if they just kept moving and stay low for a bit.
However, the downside to this strategy would be ammunition and supplies. Being constantly on the move meant that they had to pack light, thus bullets could become a problem if they ran into a lot of enemies.
After some more discussion, the group came up with a hybrid plan which could help minimize the vulnerability that came with completely adopting guerrilla style.
Sorry guys, this update took awhile since I had to plan something out ahead of time. In the future I will try to stock up some chapters so the release schedule will be more stable.