"We only have one mission: protect our own horse."
Late at night, the last light still glowed in an office draped with a massive banner. Sean, whose dark circles rivaled a panda's, lifted his head and pinched the space between his brows.
"Finally done. The last supporting character..."
"Cheryl 3.0"
Staring at the burly in-game model holding a gilded chainsaw, Sean felt no sense of accomplishment. All he wanted now was to burn incense for the operations team.
"Wasteland: Rise of the New World", a massive sci-fi ARPG game developed by their studio, featured millions of words in its branching storylines, clever gameplay systems, and wildly diverse world paths. Still in beta, the game exploded in popularity the moment it dropped, receiving glowing reviews.
But after the money rolled in, the brilliant operations team insisted the first major update nerf popular builds and introduce expensive microtransactions—promptly drawing massive backlash.
If not for loyal fans of Three Kingdoms Kill, the game might've become the most downvoted product in the store.
To salvage their reputation—and their jobs—the company scrapped the microtransactions and doubled down on content production. As a founding member (read: eternal scapegoat), Sean was obviously roped into hellish overtime.
"Once I finish this, I'm adding that adults-only mod as a treat…"
That little fantasy made the corner of his mouth lift. He downed the last of his large coffee in one gulp.
Just as he got up to stretch and hit the bathroom—bam! Darkness.
Who turned off the lights?
---
"Mmm… what time is it…"
The howling wind rushed in. Sean groggily stirred awake.
What's that… ratatat sound?
Playing CS without me? he muttered, half-asleep. He vaguely remembered still being in the office.
Must be morning already. Someone hammering on a mechanical keyboard? Sounds like blue switches…
Wait, what did I do after I finished work last night?
His sense of smell kicked in late—and something was off.
Did the office cat pee in the ashtray again?
And why does my neck feel so heavy—did that dumb cat throw its leg over my face again?
He instinctively reached up—then froze.
He touched something soft and cold: a hand.
It was draped across his neck.
He opened his eyes.
What he saw was a pale, curvy back, long wine-red hair cascading across his face, tickling his nose.
Wait… I'm not in the office… Did a catgirl come to reward me?
"Hmm?"
Just as he tried to sit up, he noticed something between her shoulder blades: a tattoo of a demon mask.
It looked familiar…
But focusing on tattoos was pointless. Sean cautiously sat up—he needed to see who this girl in his arms was.
But as he moved, the strange smell he'd caught earlier hit harder, fouler.
He frowned and looked in the direction of the odor—and what he saw made his breath hitch violently.
Right in front of his waist, half a body lay on the bed, mangled and torn. Blood and organs drenched half the mattress.
He recoiled in shock. The cold hand slipped off his neck.
The woman was dead.
"Holy sh—!!" He shoved her body away, heart hammering, and scrambled back. Only then did he realize—
He was lying in a bed, in a room he didn't recognize, with a woman who had been cut in half.
The ceiling light—a dim pink flush mount—flickered with sparks.
BOOM!
An explosion outside flashed fiery light into the room.
They were high up, in some tower. One of the floor-to-ceiling windows had a gaping hole blown through it. The night wind blew in, carrying an acidic stench that mixed with the reek of death—Sean gagged.
In the light of the blast, he saw a figure tumble down from the building.
Near the shattered window, a lithe figure sat sideways on the floor.
Everything overwhelmed Sean's mind—and finally, it hit him.
Did I transmigrate?!
The absurdity of the realization almost made him weep—Death by overtime? I just finished that big project. I just bought a full-price condo back home…
I was two years away from retiring!
Most importantly—if I transmigrated, where the hell is my system?
No glowing blue screen. No voice of a wise old man in his head. Just the stench of death and the chill of corpses.
Sean instinctively backed away. In his panic, he fell off the bed with a thud.
The figure by the window turned her head.
A faint blue light flickered, letting Sean see her clearly.
Waist-length snow-white hair fluttered in the wind, soft and weightless.
She wore a short black jacket and a collar around her neck. Her black skirt revealed one leg resting casually on shattered glass, the other dangling out the window.
She tossed a metallic sphere with intricate carvings that glowed faintly blue inside. Her ruby-red eyes studied Sean with an eerie calm, her face a breathtaking mix of beauty and danger.
Sean tried to keep his cool. His hand fumbled around until it grabbed something cold.
He looked down—it was a knife buried under a pile of clothes.
Now slightly emboldened, he hastily threw on what he assumed were his own clothes and hid the blade behind him.
Did she do this? But… she doesn't seem hostile.
As he finished dressing, the woman turned her head, gaze fixed on the explosion outside.
Suddenly—whoosh—a jet-engine roar echoed.
The woman raised her hand, and the blue glow from the sphere pulsed outward rapidly.
A flash of light.
The roar above silenced instantly.
It was replaced by the thud of something heavy falling.
CRASH!
The wind howled, drowning out the sound of a skull hitting the floor.
That fall seemed to trigger something—suddenly, dozens of fiery streaks lit the sky. Gunfire erupted in bursts.
Still, the woman didn't move—but the air around her warped unnaturally.
Bullets, rubble, shards of glass—and even Sean—all froze midair.
Several bullets hovered just inches from Sean's face before they, along with him, fell uselessly to the floor.
The moment they hit—
VRRRRRROOOOM!!
The chainsaw roared.
One of the walls shook and burst open. A three-meter-tall brute wielding a gilded chainsaw smashed his way inside.
He roared and charged the woman—but she only tilted her head slightly.
Flash.
A line of blood appeared on his arm.
His limb—and the chainsaw—fell to the floor.
Sean's heart pounded violently at the sight. He instinctively gripped the knife tighter and backed away.
His hand slipped into something wet and sticky—he turned to look.
It was blood from the woman on the bed.
He tried to shake it off—then realized—
The blood was flowing backward.
Up ahead, the brute, now one-armed, snarled and ripped off his metal jaw with his remaining hand.
A faint red ripple surged through the room. Flesh began writhing. The brute's massive frame swelled.
At the same time, Sean felt a strange heat in his own blood—like his flesh was cheering.
Reviving...? Sean's thoughts froze.
The blood on his fingers left him and flowed away.
The bisected woman on the bed sat up, organs and blood rapidly being sucked back into her body, reassembling her.
Sean's pupils shook violently.
Reviving flesh… even triggering nearby reanimation… This power—wasn't this the one I designed?!
Could it be…
Suddenly, the reassembled woman shrieked with a mad laugh. Her nails extended as she dashed forward in a bizarre, contorted way, flanking the white-haired woman from the left.
The brute attacked from the right.
In that chaos, Sean noticed—the woman's eyes never left him.
Even though her expression was pale and twisted, she seemed… familiar.
She tilted her head slightly.
Sean, almost reflexively, tilted his head to match her.
Who was she…?
A blinding blue flash exploded.
Left to right, the room froze.
Sean flinched—something had just grazed his scalp.
Roars and shrieks fell silent. Blood froze midair, then erupted.
The brute and the woman split into four uneven pieces.
So did the wall next to Sean.
Half the building, cleaved diagonally, slid away and crashed down with a deafening boom.
Blood splattered on Sean's face.
The brute—now bisected from shoulder to hip—struggled to turn his head, his eyes filled with desperate confusion.
The stench of sulfur and blood mingled in the air.
And for the first time, Sean recognized his face.
"Cheryl…" he mouthed.