Inside a small office in an electronics store.

"Yes, correct, everything seems to be in order" says a man as he receives and closes a folder with several documents that he received from what appears to be an employee.

"Well sir... if everything is in order I'm going to open the store then... if you allow me" says the employee.

"ah yea, go on"

Then the employee leaves the office.

"Ahh... so tired in the morning, Daniel son of a bitch i would have quit already if it wasn't for... nah fuck it even without what i owe you..." mutters the exhausted subject once the employee leaves the office. Even being honest with himself, even though he manages the company that his boss and friend Daniel has until exhaustion, and when the pay is very little, he would not quit his job in a long time.

"(After all I have to launder the money somehow...)"

Samuel Carter did not have several companies like his acquaintances from District Zero, he had to start somehow and it was Daniel who would provide that start, after all for more advanced technology and supernatural powers used by people who have come into contact with District Zero, it was still a secret to the world, he could not enjoy the money he earned every day without problems, the bank at some point would ask him to declare the origin of the funds, and he couldn't just say 'ah that... well, i got it from district zero after killing some orcs' in the best of cases they would block his bank account, and in the worst would end up with a psychiatrist treating him as ezquisophrenic, even both.

-You have received a message from... 'Dan'

After making sure no one was around, Samuel takes a 'break' and leans back on his chair.

"Display it"

Before his eyes a kind of screen with data is shown, no, the data was already there, it has been there for many months after entering District Zero, and he hasn't stopped seeing it since then. In any case, Samuel fixes his attention on the message that his personal assistant shows him while he mutters "a very robotic voice is not very well understood... but I like it. Now let's see what the boss wants"

After a short pause, he shows an expression between enthusiastic and confused. The message was very short 'If you are in the New York Store leave someone in charge and come immediately to the district , I'll wait for you at the northern viewpoint in 20 minutes'.

In short, Daniel would never have taken him out of his job to go to district zero if it weren't for something important, that or some favor that would reduce what he called his 'sentence', which was rather his debt.

---

15 minutes later...

In the underground parking lot of a nearby mall, Samuel was inside his car.

"......"

The reason for his being there, was because there should be no people nearby or anyone watching him the moment he entered district zero, which was not the case 3 minutes ago, when he tried to enter district zero he received an alert from the assistant indicating that a security camera was recording him. Samuel had used that spot several times before, but it seems that they had installed a security camera looking at that spot a few days ago, since then he had already looked for several blind spots where to park, but without success; people can only try to enter every 30 seconds, if the transfer was canceled you had to wait another 30 seconds to try again, and the truth was that Samuel thought that was extremely stupid, not because he was in a hurry at the time, it had always seemed silly to him, and it was because he was the only one who usually failed the transfer.

Stolen story; please report.

"If there was a ranking of failed transfers due to interruption or so, I would be on the advertising screens in the district! like Daniel or other people with best records" he says desperately. Had no way of knowing if that was true, since said statistics were not measured, but it was true, of the people who had been in contact with district zero for about a year, he was the one who had failed transfers the most, who knows if it was due to luck or because he chose bad locations, maybe even both.

"Transfer to destination...again..." says the moment the counter reaches 0.

-Transfer initiated.

While he saw with joy that the world finally began to distort around him in a few seconds, he was already listening to the voice of the assistant who welcomed him, this time with a woman's voice, which seemed indifferent to Samuel's liking, because the district welcome spots always had cold voices.

-Welcome to district zero, North American division, player Samuel Carter, current location, lower area of Northern Viewpoint, currently the weather...

"just tell me if there is rain or not" interrupts before he gets the full weather report.

-The chances of precipitation are 3.5% for light rain-

"Perfect" says quietly and leaves.

Northern Viewpoint is a huge building located on top of a hill with views to the south, where the city is located, it was a building that seemed to be taken from a science fiction movie, maintaining a classic design, it had an imposing presence that Samuel liked and although everything seemed very clean, organized and beautiful in the middle of nature, he was annoyed by the fact that there were never people. Except for the few human-like androids, there were no people just now, other than himself and Daniel who was in the viewpoint area that had views of the city.

Although he was excited at first because he could shorten his 'sentence' a bit more. A few seconds later, it seemed that the world was destroyed, metaphorically speaking, due to the firsts words that his friend said to him.

"..." stays Samuel in silence.

"...The update will be announced at some point, people are supposed to get the news soon....huh...Samuel?"

"Eh? what? oh that's okay, it's not like what you just said involves the lives of thousands of people..." he says sarcastically but it didn't really sound like sarcasm.

"Do you care about others? or about yourself?"

"Starting with, how do you know there will be an update? No! Wait better I don't want to hear it"

"Sure, better not"

"I get there and you say 'the district is going to update' damn, there hasn't been an update in ages... well, not that much, but there hasn't been an update in a long time"

"I said, 'the district is going to be modified, due to updates' I didn't say it was 'just' an update"

"Dan, you sound like the district's artificial intelligence, please explain it in mortal's language, if you don't mind."

"Did you eat clown as breakfast? Listen, it's not just an update, it will be more like a reboot or something, now you understand?"

Samuel managed to understand at once... so so, but that didn't help him calm down at all.

"I think so, is there a bar nearby? I'll check with the beer"

"You are on business hours"

"...Shit!"

For Samuel, Business hours can only be counted on District if he enters in a mission on Tartarus or going to PvE maps, but who would risk their lives if there were no need? Only people like Daniel and his rival Sasha would do that, or at least he thought...