1 Prologue - A Diary

[1st January 2021]

It has been a week since the apocalypse.

To be honest, I'm not really sure about what actually happened myself. I was just a normal high school student that you can find anywhere. I'm not even sure why I decided to write this. Maybe I just want to leave something as proof of my existence. Or maybe I just want to do something to distract myself from this reality. Or maybe I simply wanted to pass this story on to someone else. So, here goes nothing… my version of the apocalypse.

It all started with a blackout in the middle of the night.

I was playing online games with my friend when everything around me turned dark. Like… very dark. The only source of light was the meager amount of moonlight coming in from my tiny window. I was a bit surprised but not panicked, thinking it will probably last a few minutes before the power comes back on. It didn't.

What followed after was the feeling of vibration below my feet. That's right, an earthquake. I'm not too worried though, since earthquakes are not that rare of an occurrence around here. Well… at least not until I heard the first plate breaking.

"Hide below the bed!" I heard my mom shout, snapping me out of my daze. And like any other good kid, I followed her advice.

Not to mention stopping, the shaking has gotten more intense. I don't actually remember much about what happened after this since I lost my consciousness. The last thing I remember was the sharp feeling of pain at the back of my head as the ground below shook hard. The next thing I knew, it was morning.

I woke up with a bad headache and another hit to the back of my head. It was my fault for forgetting where I was.

I couldn't help but swallow hard at the first thing I saw. My house was gone!

That's the idea I got after a glimpse of the scene from below the bed. I should count myself lucky for not being buried under all the rubbles and even given enough space to crawl out. However, luck wasn't on my parent's side. They were buried under the rubbles. Along with the bed they used to take cover with.

That was the first time I knew that I could shed that many tears.

[14th February 2021]

Happy Valentine!

It's been a while since I last wrote something. I'll probably just write whenever I felt like it. Anyway, I've finally arrived at a survivor base!

If it's not clear from my previous entry, the whole city is in a state of emergency. Many people died on the apocalypse day since most of the buildings are basically in the same state as my house after the earthquake. Luckily, some of the higher-ups survived and the military was still intact. They built a survivor base and made some rounds to find and rescue the survivors. That's also the reason I could meet them in the first place. I should really thank them for finding me…

Sigh…. Who am I kidding? I'm actually writing this because I need somewhere to vent.

Life at a survivor base is not great. It's actually even worse than the one-month camp I had at the convenience store. At least, I could fill my stomach then.

Here? I could only eat a bowl of gruel for my 2 meals. Street fights are a daily occurrence and no one is doing anything about it. I have even seen someone getting beaten to death from ruining a bowl of gruel by accident

I'm scared. What if I'm next?

[3rd March 2021]

Honestly… when will help come?

No one is telling us anything! It has been ages since I saw the higher-ups announce something. It's like we're being left to die. I don't even have any idea of what is happening to the world right now.

Oh! If I haven't mentioned it, we can't even access the internet or make a phone call. Rumor has it that there might be some problem with the satellite and it can't receive or send any signal.

Yes, even an idiot will understand that something had happened to the whole world by now.

No help for over 2 months. No outside communication. No food.

Just great…. Is this really the end of humanity?

[27th March 2021]

Finally! There's news from the higher-ups.

Apparently, a group of military scouts came back from an expedition and they brought back the corpse of an elephant-sized boar.

Crazy right? I won't even believe it if I didn't see the thing myself.

Continuing with the report. After some tests, the meat of the boar is actually proven to be safe to consume and they will be distributing the meat for our next meal. The best piece of news in 3 months!

The military is now recruiting some volunteers to form a hunting squad. They plan to hunt those giant creatures to solve our food shortage. With the reward being a full belly, many volunteered.

I was one of them.

[6th April 2021]

I killed my first prey.

After a week of training, I was dispatched for a simple mission of hunting a 2-horned boar, the name we gave to that elephant-sized boar.

There's nothing too fancy. It ended in an instant. One shot of a 7.62 bullet to the head was enough to end its life. Weirdly enough, I felt nothing from the act of taking other's life.

[17th April 2021]

Now, this is bad news.

This is part of classified information for the hunting squad but… it seems that the 2-horned boar was not the only new creature out there.

One of our scouts managed to spot a saber-tooth tiger-like creature during one of the expeditions. Judging from the situation, we can't rule out the possibility that there might be other unknown predators out there. There's a need to strengthen our military force.

In the end, we decided to classify these creatures as 'monsters'. Of course, with a simple reason of how scary they look. I personally think it suits them.

[1st January 2031]

Happy New Year!

It has really been a long time since I last wrote something.

The apocalypse still felt like yesterday to me but 10 years have actually passed since then. Oh, and everyone decided to refer to the apocalypse as the Global Outbreak now. The name was derived from the new lands and lifeforms that came along with it.

I'll give a quick recap of what happened during the last 10 years. For starters, I've become the vice-captain of my squad.

Then, there's the exploration project. I think it was around 9 years ago that someone brought back an unknown vegetable, which turns out to be edible. Naturally, we decided to try agriculture to procure a stable food source, which ended up solving our food problem.

The government decided to push an exploration project to find more of these new plants or anything that might seem useful for the base. The plan was accepted and life at the base became a bit better.

A few weeks into the project and we found out that there are some other changes. There are lands where they were not supposed to, meaning that we can't use our old maps to explore anymore. There are even some weird theories to explain this phenomenon. The most popular being 'our city was transported to another world'. I know, funny right?

It was soon broken though. By an astronomer with proofs that we're still on the same planet from analyzing the night sky. I didn't really care though.

Five years later, we were shocked to discover another survivor base. Okay… a 'survivor base' is an understatement here. We discovered a city. Yes, you read that right. A motherf-ing city with a working economy. I don't even know where I can vent my frustration at.

We were living out there, trying to stay alive as long as possible and there's actually a city still standing? Arghhh I'm speechless.

It was only a few days later that I found out that the global outbreak moved our city away from the mainland. No one has any idea about what happened so the government never sent a scouting team. They were busy taking care of other 'important' matters since my city is not the only thing missing.

I also found out at that time that the country has entered an agreement to form a union with Korea and Japan, named JKC Union. And yes, the 'C' stands for China.

Our base then decided to rejoin the country, becoming part of the union.

[17th January 2031]

There is a weird rumor going around.

They are saying that some of the 10 years olds can wield magic-like abilities. Creating fire from nothing. Freezing others with a simple touch. Those kinds of crazy stuff. I don't buy it though.

[14th May 2035]

Well… shit.

The rumors were actually true. I saw my neighbor's kid destroy a human-sized boulder with a single punch!

Not even I can deny something I witnessed with my very own eyes.

There's even a new religion going around promoting the abilities. I believe they're called 'Glicthen'. They are saying that the abilities are gifts from God.

[22nd August 2038]

Now, this might be the worst news since the outbreak.

There are sightings of a monster gathering nearby. We suspect that it might be signs of a monster horde and our city seems to be on its path.

The first thing the government did was to order an evacuation, prioritizing those who are younger. However, everyone understands that there's not enough time to evacuate everyone and something must be done to deal with the monster horde.

An emergency call was issued to the JKC Union. Fortunately, they gave a positive reply.

However, one thing I can't stand is that they are sending some 17 years old brats to the front lines. Yes, those brats are the ones with the Gifts but I still can't justify using them in an emergency situation. That's just kind of messed up.

Anyway, I'll just try my best to protect those kids from getting killed.

Wish me luck