Chapter 4

  Waking up in a very comfortable bed, Theo stretched. Beyond his morning routine, he opened one of the dressers and saw the clothes, which were garishly colored. He thought of changing them to blue jeans and T-shirts of various shades, as well as dress shirts and dress pants. And Gehenna did so. He got dressed in very comfortable blue jeans and a black T-shirt. He ended up in the kitchen. For Christ’s sake, the kitchen looked modern to an extent, but everything was gold, purple, and red; Theo changed the countertops to granite and the appliances to a bluish-silver metal. Cooking a simple meal of eggs, toast, and something similar to bacon, he returned to the office where the bag and armor were. And the system was sitting in one of the chairs.

  “Good morning, Theodore,” the system said.

  “Morning, system,” Theo said.

  “Would you like to be in a solo or group tutorial? I recommend a solo to help hide your advantages; you can always go to a random group tutorial after the solo,” the system said.

  “What's the advantage of going solo?” Theo asked.

  You receive better rewards, and it’s a more challenging task. Before I forget, since you are pseudo-immortal, if you die, you’ll come back here and have to wait until Earth opens. You get one chance in the tutorial like everyone else,” the system said.

  “Fair enough,” Theo said.

  Theo stepped through the portal, feeling a sensation of vertigo, accompanied by a horrid stench that smelled like rotten eggs, mingling with a pungent odor of death and decay.

  A notification popped up:

  “You are losing five HP per minute.”

  “What the fuck?” Theo thought,

  Theo used Cure Wounds and Healing Touch, which felt like forever. Theo takes periodic breaks to let his mana build up. It had only been a couple of hours since his health had finally started improving. Looking at notifications, he skipped through the heals and cures.

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  “You have been affected by multiple poisons and substances: miasma, rot, and corruption.”

  “Mentally clicking on the words, “miasma” miasma is a dark haze that’s visible by the site that is created from the undead or an artifact that emits miasma; “rot” is a poison that rots the flesh; “corruption” is a poison that corrupts the flesh for it to be easier for necromantic energies to take hold.”

  “Fuck you, system! Seriously, an undead city?” Theo yelled.

  Because of in the distance, where he landed from the road he stood on, a city was surrounded by a dark haze.

  “This is such bullshit; no one wants to deal with a zombie apocalypse!” Theo yelled at the system,

  and there was no response from the system. After multiple minutes of cursing the system's lineage, he sighed and opened the other notifications.

  Congratulations.

  healing Touch, Common Novice 0 to 3

  cure wounds Common Novice 0 to 4

  resistance Common Novice 0 to 6

  closing the notifications, thinking this may work to open task or quest log

  solo tutorial description

  you were in a forgotten overrun city of the undead

  objectives survive three months remaining

  sub-objectives

  ………?

  ………?

  ……….?

  “Well, that is extremely helpful,” Theo thought in a sarcastic tone

  Walking further down the road, next to the road, the ground began to shift, and a zombie began to wiggle its way out of the dirt.

  “Oh, fuck this,” Theo thought,

  summoning the cane sword and unsheathing it. While the cane sword was connected to the chain, he threw it towards the zombie. The goal was to pierce the zombie's head, but he missed it by a foot to the right. Thinking of locking in the chains and then going to the left, he swung the whole thing at the zombie, which cut its arm. With that, the zombie popped up. Theo retracted the sword again, aimed for its head, and missed again. While the zombie was shambling towards him with a sigh of frustration, Theo retracted the sword, and this time, he lifted his left hand towards the zombie, using the chain on his left arm to wrap the zombie in chains. The chain lengthened to stretch that far, but it was thinner; with the zombie bound and with the momentum, it fell face-first to the ground. Theo walked up towards the zombie. The chains became thicker as there was less distance between him and the zombie. With the cane sword in his right hand, he finally pierced its head; his face twisted into a smirk.

  Ding

  “You have killed a level one zombie.”

  “Well, I am entirely dog shit. Just because I know how to use a sword does not mean that my muscles, hands, and eye coordination are up to par with wielding the weapon. Theo grumbled in his mind.

  Heading back to where he came from, away from the corpse, Theo started doing sword forms and working with his chains.