Millions of people all suddenly awoke at the same time inside a grand hall decorated with white marble floors and endless pillars, giving off a holy aura that energized the people in the hall. Waking up here caused an incredible commotion as people talked about their situation.
"Where is this?"
"Did they really fit everyone left in the world here?"
"How many of us are left?"
Questions rang out from every corner of the hall as the people panicked at their current situation, but they received no answer to their question, at least not for the first five minutes.
[Silence. The Great Ones will explain your situation now.]
An immediate silence fell over the room, not because the people respected the system's power, but because their voices were silenced by a spell or item.
"Welcome, residents of Terra, to our, the gods' Hall of Glory. I am the lord of heaven; that is to say, your god. We've called you here to congratulate you for surviving an entire week in our little game! You can treat this as a two-day break from all the killing you've been seeing." A handsome man with blonde hair and blue eyes, who looked to be about twenty years old, introduced himself as god.
The people were skeptical at first, but when they heard that they'd be given two days as a break, they rejoiced as they looked at him. Some were skeptical, but the general sentiment was gratefulness.
'That's right! Praise me more! Revere m- huh? Who dares to look at me that way?'
Turning his eyes, he would see a masked, winged being glaring daggers at him, for seemingly no reason. And the "god" could only blink as he was stared at by the man.
'The spell shouldn't have worn off, right? Why is he unaffected?'
The others noticed the god suddenly stop speaking, and looked at each other in confusion.
"A disappointing performance for a nameless god like you."
"And here I was looking forward to something interesting. To think you'd lose your cool from a simple stare from a mortal."
"Zero points."
Three different people appeared, a white haired bearded man with a long robe and prayer beads, a small woman with fairy wings, and a beautiful woman dressed in a nun outfit.
To others, these three might seem completely foreign, but Samuel knew exactly who these three were; they were the first three people he had met at the beginning of the apocalypse— William Locke, the man, Marie Locke, the nun and their daughter Rose, the fairy.
The three noticed the shocked gaze looking at them, but they ignored it as they returned to explaining what this place was.
"The gods have granted you this opportunity to increase your chances of survival, because as of now, your world has lost somewhere around 99.5% of its human population, which makes your population equal to... forty million or so?"
When Will finished his words, the mood in the room made a complete turn, from reverence, to an intense despair as people began to cry and soundlessly scream.
Not even Samuel was unaffected, as he began to hyperventilate, expecting the worst to have happened to his family.
*Calm down, Samuel. Don't lose hope in your family's situation.*
But Samuel would not calm down, gripping his chest as breathing became more and more difficult the more thoughts ran through his mind. The hope of meeting his friends and family, which was the only thing motivating him to keep getting through the days had a very real chance of being dead.
Uncaring for the people's panic, the gods continued to speak.
"We've brought you here to give you a chance to upgrade your gear, skills, and trade skills, items, or knowledge. The ones that have shown incredible achievements in their world shall be granted points they may use to trade for items with the system's shop or other users. The more impressive the achievement, the higher the points you can get."
As Will finished his words, the hall vibrated as two doors opened far from where the transported were standing or laying down.
"Make your way to the doors in front of you to reach the trading hall. You may also remain here for as long as you wish, but just know that it takes twenty hours to get there by foot."
The magic barring them from talking was undone, and people immediately began to run in the door's direction, or summoned their mounts to get there, leaving Samuel, the gods, and a few other grieving users. The family of three was the first to leave, warping out of the area where they left the nameless god who glared at Samuel for ruining his credibility. He felt nothing but unfiltered disdain towards the man, but he knew that the gods had their eyes on him, which meant he could only swallow his pride and leave.
[You are the first being in your world to gain your god's ire. Granted achievement: God's enemy.]
Samuel could care less as he looked in his pockets for a cigarette. He gave up smoking when the apocalypse started, mostly because he couldn't find the time to smoke when he was worried about surviving for another day, but now, he couldn't help but take a single crumpled cigarette out of his pocket and light it up with his fire magic, not caring for the fear it would cause for the others.
An hour later, after Samuel's eyes had regained some clarity, which only the death knight could see, a voice rang in his head.
*Looks like you're a bit better now.*
'Death Knight.'
*I can understand you grieving because your family might have died, but it's just a possibility.*
'I don't think it is just a possibility when 99% of the world died.'
*That's still forty million people that your parents might be a part of.*
'Yeah, but...'
*But what?! If you still have doubts, there's still an infinite number of skills out there! If you want to know if they're alive or not, go get a skill to tell you!*
Samuel remained seated on the floor for a while, thinking about whether he should get up or not... and he got up and summoned the giant sky eagle, which somehow fit in this place. He climbed on top of its body and pointed forward, making the bird spread its wings and fly in that direction at a speed of 160 km/h.
As he flew, he drew the admiration of the people who were forced to get there on their feet, along with the ones with land mounts, but Samuel was too distracted to care about the gazes he was receiving.
A mere forty minutes later, Samuel and his eagle arrived at the trading center before they received a notification.
[You are the tenth user to arrive.]
Samuel did expect others to reach the place before him because he sat down to regain his composure for more than an hour before his eagle carried him here. The place was an impressively large mall lined up with stores and even rooms for people to rest in.
However, Samuel was not looking at the stores, and was instead looking at the leaderboard with wide eyes.
[Achievement Ranking:
Number 1: Samuel Zaya. 10,000,000 points granted.
Number 2: Emanuel Fernandez. 5,000,000 points granted.
Number 3: Fang Jin. 2,500,000 points granted.
.
.
.
Number 10: Aleister Drake. 100,000 points granted.]