Extraction

Dark Zone's tutorial was brutal.

That was one opinion shared by virtually everyone among the game's hundreds of millions of players worldwide, and the fifteen million concurrent users who logged in every single day.

Beyond the objective of reaching a specific location, beginners were handed nothing but a handful of magazines, one rifle, one pistol, and a few grenades. What awaited them on the other side was wind whipping around buildings, snow accumulating in silence, and enemies that shot at everything they encountered while walking through it all. Pushing through all of that with just one or two people wasn't merely difficult — it instilled a profound loneliness, as if walking alone through a dead world.

So countless players poured out their thoughts about it, sometimes competing with each other to prove they'd overcome harder trials than anyone else. Some even debated what conditions would make reaching the destination the most difficult, and whether those conditions were even realistically achievable.

But one thing was certain:

"Aren't we all just going to get wiped out like this? The flare's way too visible!"

"Stop whining and calculate the expected impact zone for the grenades."

"Ahhh, this guy is so scary…!"

Whoever they were, they'd had an easier time than Harmony, who had been handed a fantastic all-in-one gift set simply for partying with a hardcore user.

There were many ways to acquire firearms in Dark Zone. The standard methods included purchasing new weapons with in-game currency called credits, completing missions to obtain weapon blueprints and stockpiling materials to craft them, or entering the contaminated zones — also known as Dark Zones — opening weapon cases inside, and escaping with the firearms intact. Those were the methods available to ordinary players.

But perhaps out of some minimal sense of decency, hardcore users didn't need to rely on those. More accurately, alongside all the methods listed above, there existed another option entirely.

That option was, quite literally, looting.

Simple, but devastatingly effective. It could be done anywhere, at any time, and neither enemies nor other players were exempt from it.

And for precisely that reason —

These two had picked up so much loot that they'd barely have time to hide before the Uncontrolled Area was lifted — yet here they were, wandering openly in the open.

A small, blood-red sun rose above the black sky. It drifted lazily through the void, slowly burning, before consuming itself and vanishing completely. But the enemies drawn to it like moths proved through their very existence that this was not an ending — it was the beginning of something new.

And in other words:

"S&S Precision Plate Frame, MP7 with ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠wrist monitor, drone bag and…"

"…Who's that guy?"

"PMC affiliated with Artemis Technology. Drone operators. Those crazy bastards throw drones that cost over three thousand dollars each at people."

"That gun he's holding… ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it's really small and nice. Looks easy to carry around."

"Really? If the equipment survives a grenade hit, they haul all of it away."

If you could get your hands on them, they were literally walking golden goblins.

And because they'd been partying with a hardcore user, such people weren't just arriving — they were arriving in considerable numbers and variety.

One fortunate development, however:

"What's going on? Why are they fighting each other?"

"They're hostile to each other, duh."

Russian landing infantry on one side, and PMCs employed by a drone manufacturing company on the other. One side were invaders who had come to conquer the country; the other were people half-fragmented by the worsening pandemic, surviving by the law of the jungle. From anyone's perspective, there was no way to see each other as anything but enemies.

On that side, they were cooperating with each other…

Of course, Eugene was the only one who knew that irony.

The two of them, hidden on a second-floor balcony of a nearby building, peeked out just enough to observe the situation outside bit by bit. The countdown was ticking down, and the sound of rotors was growing louder from the distance. No hostiles had approached them yet, but that didn't mean they could let their guard down. Harmony rolled her eyes around and glanced sideways at Eugene.

"I can hear your eyeballs rolling."

"Ah, um… did you notice? Hehe."

"Take a little break. I'll keep watch outside."

"Oh, thank you…"

Haa.

It wasn't actually cold, but the world inside Dark Zone was chilled to the bone. After exhaling a thick puff of breath from her mouth, Harmony finally broke out of her immersion and remembered she was a streamer.

She had temporarily closed the chat window and viewer count display during the countless combat situations they'd faced. Now she popped them back up and began thinking about what kind of excuse she should spin for her audience.

Of course, reality differed greatly from her expectations.

"Everyone, I'm so sorry. I was so distracted I didn't even know how many people had donated… Hah! Why are there so many people right now?!"

10,513.

The number displayed beside the red button indicating the stream was live wasn't a four-digit number. It wasn't even close to five thousand. It was firmly, unambiguously, five digits.

Double. Twice the average number of regular viewers who typically tuned in when she turned on the stream had suddenly flooded into the broadcast.

Even so, this was completely outside her expectations.

But as she stared at the slowly blinking red dot and the five-digit viewer count beside it, she gradually began to calm down. Viewer numbers could fluctuate for many reasons, and Harmony had been in the broadcasting industry for quite a long time. From that perspective, what mattered wasn't being swayed by the numbers — it was not losing her pace.

She steadied her voice and carefully soothed the viewers who were clearly worked up.

"…As you all know, the situation right now is a bit… well. We got caught in an Uncontrolled Area and all that, so I'll check everything at the end of the broadcast."

"TampoPo, thank you for the ₩10,000 donation… I'm sorry. But if I react and get a hole punched in my head and have to start over from the beginning, that'd be worse, right?"

The chat was pouring out like a waterfall.

As she read through it quietly, the reason for the surge in viewers began to make sense, piece by piece. In short, they were all going wild in every direction because of Eugene, the user she was partying with.

But when she looked more closely, some comments and donations that had received recommendations remained pinned at the top, un-deletable.

When she focused on them, they auto-played.

The first one was a donation that had come in over an hour ago.

Here too.

And over there too. Everyone was talking about hardcore to the point of neurosis.

It was only a matter of time before Harmony's heart dropped all the way to the bottom of her chest. Her head whirred like an un-oiled machine, and she turned to look at Eugene.

"Um, teacher…?"

"Are you done with your work?"

"By any chance… how's the calibration going?"

Mint-colored and blue eyes met each other.

But the latter responded with indifference, mounting the machine gun.

"Something got messed up, and a message popped up saying calibration procedures and sliders were skipped and hardcore mode was automatically set. Does that answer your question?"

"…Guh."

With a feeling as if darkness had swallowed her vision, Harmony collapsed flat on the ground.

…But wait a moment.

Now that I think about it, does it really matter that much…?

Whether the user was hardcore or not, if that person hadn't been there, wouldn't she have been repeating cold embraces with the Manhattan pavement a few times by now?

And besides, after examining the chat more carefully, it turned out she wouldn't be facing people like that for the next thousand years.

She had been forced to confront an uncomfortable truth by her viewers, but her stance hadn't changed much.

"Ugh…!"

"If you've gotten your head back together, let's start getting ready."

"Yes."

That instant.

The sound of a steel pipe railing scraping against the forward Picatinny rail of a grenade launcher mixed softly with the winter wind. As the propeller noise grew loud enough to hear without straining, bullets poured toward a helicopter that had flown over the building, lights flashing.

Two people watched the chaos from a construction site dozens of meters away. The trajectory shifted slightly with just a small twist of the wrist. A hologram flickering before Harmony's eyes displayed the grenade's arc, impact point, and estimated blast radius. She confirmed that two enemies were perfectly positioned within the fifteen-meter kill zone, and gently applied pressure to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the heavily weighted trigger.

───BOOM!

An explosion of flame, dust, and screams erupted in the middle of the city. Over the percussive sound that struck her chest like a drumbeat, Eugene began pouring out bullets at a rate of seven hundred rounds per minute like rain. The enemies gathered at the transport location were utterly panicked — some were riddled like honeycombs while trying to scatter or take cover, others were caught in the blast and became ghosts.

After confirming there were no more grenades left on the trigger, Harmony roughly shoved the handle to the right and raised the muzzle. Six spent casings clattered to the ground with a sharp sound. She flipped the weapon upside down, opened the grenade pouch, mechanically loaded six grenades into the cylinder, wound the spring, and repeated the mounting and aiming sequence.

Meanwhile, relentless suppressive fire continued from the side, hot enough to turn the barrel red. Even enemies hiding behind cover that 7.62mm NATO rounds couldn't reach were picked off one by one by ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠precise grenade fire.

Amid all of this, Harmony felt a strange emotion.

This… feels like…

Explosions and flames flashing over the darkened city, people flying through the air like puppets with their strings cut by a single trigger pull, the relentless sound of gunfire tickling her eardrums. And on top of that, a perfect rhythm that matched without needing to speak to each other at all.

Only when the impact against her shoulder felt like a light tap from a hammer — barely registering — did the grenade launcher finally begin to feel like her own.

A small smile spread across her lips like ink.

In this moment, she had found her partner.