'Apocalypto'

I am buried alive. In that realization, I quickly turned off the lighter's light. In that narrow box, I felt my heart running uncontrollably fast as I sweat like ice. It's already giving up with the trembling of my legs that wanted to escape. For ten seconds, I lost control and raged with random punches on the wall.

Ten seconds after. I realized that this is just a part of the game, and this tells me that I should escape. With my heartbeat still racing, I stop rushing my breaths and wasting stamina. Instead, I held my breath the longer I could.

In this state, I should be conserving air. Random panic attacks will lead me to loss of oxygen and asphyxiation. I'm not even the type of person to lose control in this situation. I spent my first minutes meditating and holding my breath so that I can extend my survivability.

How did I even get here? I didn't sleep yesterday forcibly. There must be some kind of foreign material, sleeping powder specifically, in the air ventilation. It's too sneaky that no one could notice it. Even those who aren't sleep-deprived will faint in the smell. That's the only way I could think of how they do things.

I only have a half and an hour to escape, or else I'll completely lose control and surrender myself to death. I am not fond of survival games. Even if I have a hammer or a knife with me, it's useless. Luckily, this mechanic might be in favor of me.

In the real escape out of a real coffin, one needs to force his strength to break the middle part of the coffin where the tension is high. But here, as I flick this box, this is made of material that is highly durable like those polymers covering the furniture and gadgets in my temporary home. This coffin can't be broken with knives and fists unless they're monsters.

There's no way I would light the lighter again. It already gave me the gasp at what was around me. In front of me is a puzzle that is needed to be solved, and below me are some tools that I can use to survey around. The lighter here must have any function other than lighting.

When I felt something shaped like a flashlight, I quickly turned it on and scanned my surroundings. I've seen random decals on the walls, and there are only some that are essential as I've noted.

'1d'

'2n'

'M3'

'4r'

'L5'

'Jsh6ch'

'7kg'

'8fv'

'Pb9'

'Z0s'

'shift-1*5'

These decals are spread out randomly like a tattoo. In front of me is a security device with a keypad that is turned off. A strange rope is connected beside the keypad, and it's not a normal rope but a silky one.

Other than the flashlight, I also felt a folded paper accompanying it. As I open it in the narrow space, I narrowed my eyes so I can see the small text.

"Oh, you found this paper? I hope it isn't too long already before you noticed. This game is called 'Apocalypto'. The game consists of two groups, the survivors and the zombies.

"In this game, the group of survivors must retain their base tower from the attacking zombies. They are given supplies and weapons to defend their site, but the group will be forced to explore to find resources such as food, ammo, and water. A poison fog will be spread out around the base of the survivors for the first day, and a random radius zone will be filled with poisoned fog so better avoid that. The fog will last half a day, and it will be impossible that the previous and the next poisoned area will be the same.

"As for the zombies, they will be immune to the fog. The zombies' group will be placed in each SPECIFIC coffin that will require them to escape for two hours, or else they're dead. Once they got out of their ground, they will need to find their fellow zombies to gather a greater chance of winning.

"Many complained already that it's unfair for the survivors to have the upper hand because of the lack of weapons of zombies, but no. Once you've realized the weapon you possess, you will win this game, and both groups apply this rule.

"The game will last for days and will not consider any time restrictions. If the zombies are wiped out or the five radioactive towers are turned off, the survivors will win. But if the survivors are wiped out, it's the zombies' win.

"Happy playing, survivors!

"Bottom text!"

They sure made that meme international so the text was unclear and tiny. Are they preventing farsighted people to read those? Maybe they're given SPECIFIC coffins for that. I didn't expect that the coffins will vary depending on the people in them.

For someone who plots in the future, I'm given a puzzled coffin that I could solve. Then there must be someone with a thick coffin where strength will be tested. Just as I know the mechanics, I'll just pray that those people won't panic. They will be the most helpful person that we'll need soon.

As for the intelligent people, I hope there aren't in our group. Those people completely break my plan to pitfall.

I flipped the paper if there are any notes behind, and it says:

"Saori Kitagaya, as a zombie, you will be escaping your coffin and taking revenge for those who put you there. Before the 'before' is the answer to the pin.

"To enter the code, you only have three minutes to try the possible codes you come up with. This timer will be activated if you light the rope beside the keypad. It will directly crawl up to the dynamite planted on your grave above you.

"Don't worry. The rope is covered with a metal coating to cover the fire from the dirt towards the dynamite. Once you enter the code within three minutes, the cover of the coffin will be automatically removed. You only have one chance to enter the codes or else, you will end up rotting on your grave for a millennium."

"As the zombie host, being killed by an ally will cause an automatic defeat. Like chess, the king should be the last man standing for a kingdom to fall. If a host dies, the other party will automatically win.

"Survivor's Host Name: Takeshi Nagahara."

It's a pain to find some specific person, but I should only do it as my last resort. Assassination is a coward's best friend.

The admins are the ones who put me here. Are they telling me to take revenge on them? That's my plan after all. After I've read the mechanics and based on my experience, they aren't planning on killing me. Even if I'm on the verge of death, they're still testing me.