Dante stared at the last line, rereading it again and again. He knew that things were going to change. That primal aura would flood the world, changing animals, plants, and the very earth itself. That people would live for centuries rather than decades, giving everyone a chance to find their own purpose in life.

He did not know that there would be a genocide.

It was inevitable for some people to die when the world was changing so quickly. Dante wasn’t a fool to think that everyone would just accept magic and super-human abilities without a struggle, but once the strife of the tutorial was over, the people that survived would be prepared for the gifts of the new world.

A long, purposeful life where a century of living was considered middle age was just the beginning. Sure, things would be hard at first. Monsters roaming the forests, guarding natural treasures that can provide the same benefits as years of training. Deadly plants and environments that defied logic, existing as though they were meant to be.

But then towns and cities were supposed to spring up. Humanity would wage an endless war against the beasts of the land, fighting for dominance, wealth, and power. Overcoming the three hurdles that barred the Earth from becoming an official member of the system, an F-grade world that didn’t have to worry about being recycled for parts or turned into slaves.

He did not know that there would be a genocide.

Killing one or two people that became crazy with power, sure. But he was supposed to be one of the most talented people on the planet, a potential leader of his own faction. He would have to fight and kill beasts, and in the chaos after the tutorial, he would probably have to kill several murderers to assert his authority.

To lay claim to the very land itself.

In his mind, that meant a few thousand deaths nearby and maybe a few tens of thousands in the whole of his state. Massive casualties across the world reaching a few million at most. He never thought that billions would perish, and that would just be the target the system would aim for, not the limit of how many could die.

For the next ten minutes, Dante just lay in bed, staring at the ceiling. He needed to shower, and he also needed to look after his wounds since some of them were still dripping blood. But he just couldn’t stop thinking about those numbers.

It was too many.

After doing some calculations, Dante figured out that sixty percent of the population was roughly four-and-a-half-billion people. That number was so massive to him that he couldn’t even fully comprehend its actual size. Over half the population of every country, city, town, university, high school, primary school, kindergarten, office, retirement home. Dead.

Not a natural death, either, but eaten alive by packs of wild dogs and monsters the size of cars.

No one would be spared, but the vulnerable would be the worst off. The elderly too feeble to protect themselves from wild beasts, children too young to gain skills, and the unwell or disabled a mixture of both categories. Even in the safe places that would spring up, women and children would still get preyed upon by sick predators that called themselves human.

The world was ending soon. People were going to die, becoming irrevocably warped by the changes that came with the apocalypse, and Dante knew he too would have to change with it.

Ten minutes later, or maybe it was an hour, Dante heard the doorbell ring. He wanted to run down the stairs, but his legs were scraped up and his ribs were still broken as far as he was aware. So, he shuffled down with the help of the railing, eventually making it to the door. Turning the lock, Dante rested his hand on the doorknob and took as deep a breath as his ribs would allow.

He opened the door.

“Hey, how’s it going?” Michael said, walking in with a plastic bag in his left hand. “Are you hungry? The food’s still-. What the fuck? Did you get into a fistfight with someone?”

Dante expected the shock on his friend’s face. His right eye was starting to swell, causing it to look red and puffy. He was covered in bruises, purple marks dominating most of his exposed skin. And since his school shirt had been shredded by the hawk, that meant there was a lot of skin to show.

What he didn’t expect was the guilt.

Michael slid the takeaway bag up to his wrist and rushed to Dante’s side, grabbing his arm to stop him from falling over. “Fuck, dude. Whoever you fought kicked the shit out of you. Your school uniform is torn to shreds. And is that blood?”

Michael tried to stay casual, even making jokes for his sake, but Dante could see the worry in his friend’s eyes. The slowly building panic as he found another wound, then another, and another, each one worse than the last.

“You think I’m in bad shape?” Dante laughed, wincing at the stabbing pain in his ribs. “You should see the other guy. Or was it a girl? I don’t know pig physiology too well, to be honest. Actually, I’m not even sure if boars are male pigs or if they are even the same species.”

“Are you delirious or something?” Michael asked, crinkling up his nose and leaning his head back. “And did you get into a fistfight near a sewer? You fucking reek of sweat and… I don’t even know. You remind me of the smell animals have at the zoo. And is that a tail? Why are you cosplaying as a lizard on a Friday night?”

Every time Michael’s head flicked to another part of Dante’s body, he could see him looking at another wound. There was worry, even fear on his face, but it wasn’t a fear for his own safety or even something like a fear of blood. His expression was one of deep empathy and concern.

And it was for him.

“I’m fine. Just take me upstairs to my magical medicine trunk of goodies and I’ll -,” Dante said, stopping when he saw the increasingly distressed look on Michael’s face. “Okay, maybe I shouldn’t phrase it like that since it makes me sound more delirious, but I do have medical supplies upstairs that can fix me up.”

Dante’s heart ached at the sight. He had been timid and cowardly at the start of the tutorial, but now he was being too reckless. All of these injuries were because he wanted to fight the boar when, in reality, he probably could have run straight through the doorway while it was asleep.

“No way, mate. Your clothes are literally ripped to shreds. And why do you have a chunk missing out of your forearm? That definitely needs surgery. Come on, my parents are still parked outside. They can take you to the hospital.”

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Dante pulled back, freeing himself from Michael’s supporting hand. “I’m fine. Come upstairs and we’ll talk about why I’m like this.”

“You’re seriously fighting me on this? You have a literal chunk of flesh torn out of your arm. What do you have in your room that can do a better job of patching you up than a literal surgeon in a hospital? Now, come on. We have to get you to a doctor before you literally die.”

Michael grabbed his arm again and began to lead him out the door, but as his hand closed around Dante’s arm, a surge of annoyance erupted from the egg. It felt like his blood was heating up inside him, forcing him to breathe more quickly as the fiery emotions built and built and built, until...

“Enough,” Dante shouted, waving his free hand at the door. A thread of soul force surged out of his mind, breaking apart into a gust of wind the second it was out. The door slammed shut as the air whistled in Dante’s ears, even ruffling Michael’s clothes.

Michael froze, his eyes widening by the second. “What- What was that?”

“I’m sorry, I-I didn’t mean to do that. I’ve been a bit exhausted lately… Just, come upstairs and I’ll explain.”

Michael stood there while Dante slowly pulled himself up the stairs, but when he turned to look down at him, Michael quickly ran up the stairs to follow. After that, Dante sat at his desk and devoured the takeaway while Michael sat on the bed, his back straight.

“Fuck, this food is so good,” Dante muttered through a mouth full of fried rice, shovelling more in as he spoke. “I haven’t eaten anything seasoned for three weeks. Makes me feel like an English peasant dining with royalty, but they were serving Thai food for some reason.”

Michael licked his lips, looking around the room as the words danced across his tongue. “So, uh. What was that magic trick you pulled downstairs? Something with wires and an air cannon? It’s kind of weird that you’re cosplaying, learning magic, and getting into fights.”

“Okay, listen,” Dante said, swallowing the food in his mouth as he put the takeaway container on his desk. “I have something very important to tell you, and I needed to tell it to you in private.”

“Really?” Michael said, sitting up on the bed. He looked relieved for some reason, almost like a weight had been taken off his shoulders. “You know what, I think I know what you’re going to say. I’ve had my suspicions, but now I know for sure.”

“You do?” Dante said, feeling a surge of relief flooding through him. Maybe things really had started cropping up in the last few hours. Strange news stories and weird posts on the internet would always be treated with scepticism since CGI and deep fakes were a thing, but maybe Michael had noticed something in the meantime. He had always been an intelligent guy.

“Yeah, I’ve been thinking about it for a while, but now I’m certain.” Michael looked over Dante’s shoulder at the white singlet underneath his maths textbook, then looked at the box of essence stones on his nightstand.

“Okay, sweet,” Dante said, smiling and nodding with relief. “So, I’m just going to come out and say it. I’m -.”

“Gay,” Michael said, a gentle smile plastered on his face.

The silence was palpable as Dante processed what he had just heard.

“What?” After thirty seconds, that was the only thing Dante managed to say, his brain short-circuiting. “Are you fucking with me?”

“Woah, relax,” Michael said, raising his hands in surrender. “Don’t go all hostile on me, man. I won’t say anything unless you want me to. I’m here for you, no matter what your lifestyle is.”

“…What?”

“You’re gay, right? The jewellery box on your nightstand? The new furniture? The tank top that only a gay man could wear on your desk? Come on, don’t chicken out now that I know. No judgement. No anger. Let’s just be open and honest with each other, okay? As best friends, I’m here to support you.”

“…What?” Dante shouted, looking at the new additions to his room. “I- I don’t even know where to begin.”

How had he possibly gotten that from magically slamming the door closed and the new boxes in his room? Then again, the wooden box of essence stones on his nightstand did look like a jewellery box… And it was filled with precious stones. Not to mention the singlet on his desk was so thin it was almost transparent.

It kind of looked like one of those fishnet tank tops you would see stereotypical gay men wearing on television.

“How about we begin with that tank top on your desk? Whose is it? Someone I know, or maybe it was left here by a late-night visitor? Oh, don’t give me that face. I won’t tell anyone, so don’t worry. Your secret relationship is safe with me.”

Michael’s excitement was almost bubbling out of him, but that just made Dante feel weirder since he was completely, utterly wrong. How was he supposed to go from this discussion to one about an impending apocalypse?

“And how did you come to the conclusion that any of this stuff is mine? Or that I’m even into men?” Dante sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration. “Do I give off a… I don’t know, a gay ‘vibe’ or something?”

“Oh, did I get it wrong?”

“Uh, yes,” Dante said, nodding his head. “Very wrong, Michael. Very, very wrong.”

Michael looked horrified for a moment, even letting out a little gasp. “Fuck, sorry man. I didn’t mean to say anything hurtful. So, are you transgender or bisexual, or what? I don’t know everything yet, but I’ve been doing my research. Whatever conclusion you come to, I’ll support you all the way, bro.”

“Wait, no,” Dante said, leaning back in his desk chair. “I- How did you even come to this conclusion if you’ve been doing research for my sake?”

Michael looked confused for a moment, but he eventually stood up from the bed and answered. “Lilian asked you out at the end of last year, didn’t she?”

“Yeah, I told you that already. What does that have to do with anything?”

Dante had a strict teacher for chemistry that always used seating plans to separate the more annoying kids, so by sheer luck, he was put next to a girl he had a crush on, Lilian. She struggled a lot with the new semester, so Dante eventually ended up helping her at the library after school. One thing led to another, and they even started hanging out on the weekends.

“Bro, she’s like a sculpture,” Michael said, looking up to the heavens like an angel had really descended. “I didn’t even know human beings could be so attractive until I saw her in our school’s sports uniform. Those tiny shorts and her huge-.”

“Yeah, I get it. But what does that have to do with me being gay?”

“She’s as sexy as a model, and you turned her down. I’ve literally heard Greg say that he would become a paraplegic just to cop one feel, and you turned her down.”

“That doesn’t make me gay?” Dante said, leaving Michael to stand as he looked up at him.

I just don’t have anything in common with her. Besides, she’s kind of annoying and self-righteous. Do you know where we went the first time I hung out with her outside of school? A homeless shelter to help prepare food, but she didn’t even tell me what we were doing. Her mum just drove us there.”

“And?” Michael said, sitting on the trunk at the base of the bed. “I think that’s a much better alternative than losing the use of your legs.”

“She wasn’t there because she wanted to help the homeless; she was there to puff up her own ego and inflate her pride. She practically moaned in pleasure whenever someone praised her selflessness. It creeped me the fuck out, so I realised it wasn’t worth it to be with someone like her.”

“Oh, that sounds kind of hot. Do you know when she goes to the shelter? What’s the address?”

“Focus, please. I actually do have something to tell you.”

“And it’s not that you’re gay?”

“For fuck’s sake, Michael,” Dante shouted, standing up and grabbing Michael by the shoulders, literally shaking him despite the protests of his ribs. “The world is ending! Apocalypse! Armageddon! Rapture! It’s fucking happening this year, and we need to get ready!”

“Oh, fuck. That’s not good.” Dante could see the gears turning in Michael’s head. There was worry mixed with concern, but his expression kept alternating between shock and fear, growing more severe by the moment.

“No, it isn’t,” Dante whispered, letting go of Michael’s shoulder. “There will be a number of-.”

“Let’s hope it’s not a rapture, or else you might get left behind. Quite a few religions aren’t very… keen on your kind.”

“My kind?”

“What?” Michael shrugged. “You never said you weren’t gay, just that the world was ending.”