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“I’ll have to hang up, it seems like my flight is here. Hope you’re looking forward to the souvenirs which I brought for you.” Arthur spoke with a cheerful smile on his face, bringing the end to the call on his phone with a flick of his thumb. It wouldn’t be that long before he’ll finally be on his plane back to the united kingdom, there was always something about one’s home that would leave a sense of longing and after around three weeks in this place he was certainly feeling a bit of that homesickness. [break][break]

Sounds of chatter, announcements and flocks of crowds from the airport had suddenly vanished upon the rather abrupt appearance of a blue screen in front of the bespeckled man.[break][break]

┌

[earth·​to·​Arthur Holmes ] [break]
"Psst, hey, hey. Come closer- !! [break]
🚬 !! [break]
Aww you scared? I'm sorry- [break]
🚬🚬🚬

┘

Excuse me? Arthur took quite a long moment to register what he saw, turning from a state of surprise to squinting. What was this, a new form of spam message? Did google already advance so far that they were able to infect our brains? Part of him felt urked as he read it, with the emoji of the cigarettes being there turning his once smile into a frown showing a bit of discomfort. But that didn't last for long, his attention shifted with his sense of smell bombarded by the stench of decay, the kind of smell that would come from a butcher's cold storage that hasn't been opened in years. Hell. It might even be even worse than that. That message that was floating in his face was the least of his worries as he shifted the scarf that was wrapped around his neck further up to help muffle out the smell.[break][break]

Nostrils finally recovering from the foreign assault, it allowed Arthur to finally be able to look around himself. Huh? Where was he even? Brown hues could barely look around the area with the fog that concealed everything that was in the distance, but that didn’t stop him from being able to make out that he was in a location one could only describe as a post-war ruined city. Buildings toppled over and broken, the streets completely trashed and eerily empty. It seemed like a location you’d see in a post-apocalyptic game.[break][break]

Seemingly on cue with that thought the blue screen made another surprise return, this time with a different message.[break][break]

┌

The System has offered you the choice of these three classes. Please reply with the name of the class you wish to play as.[break]
1. Chef[break]
2. Butcher [break]
3. Connoisseur[break]

┘

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“Well I’m obviously a chef-” His words stopped in his tracks, realizing his mistake as with the reply the message disappeared after the first option was highlighted. Fuck. If this situation was just like a game then he realized that what he just picked could’ve actually screwed himself in the ass. His face scrunched up for a brief moment, before sighing and shrugging. What’s done is done, there’s no need to rattle himself about his choice, it may have ended up being a good one after all.[break][break]

Instead his attention focused on the rather urgent matter at hand. Being stranded in a desolate place. It gave him the heebie jeebies, being stuck in a silent fog, it was as if something would jump out one moment behind him. Feeling a chill along his spine from the spooky atmosphere, he took a gander once more, noticing a rather colossally built and equally intimidating looking man with the polar opposite, a malnourished little girl clinging close to his leg. Father and daughter? Would this happen to be the "gap moe" thing his sister talked about? Approaching the duo, he was greeted by another message appearing once again.[break][break]

┌

Welcome to the Tutorial[break][break]

PROTECT THE CHILD.[break][break]

11:56:45[break]

┘

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Hm? Did it mean the man's daughter? Protect her from what exactly, the man? He hoped not, he looked like he could bench press ten Arthurs at once. Seeming to be already on the ride for whatever was going on whether it was some kind of game or not, he continued walking to them, one hand still trying to muffle the foul smile with the other doing a friendly little wave. "Aint you a big one, hello. Are you two perhaps in the same kerfuffle as me?" Arthur then kneeled down, briefly shifting his scarf down to show the child a friendly smile as well.

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Clothing suited the wearer quite well one might say, as intimidating as the man that was before Arthur looked, his expressions and manner of talking didn’t help one bit leaving the chef to feel moderately unnerved. [break][break]

“Huh?” He immediately responded when the responsibility of the child was pushed onto him out of the blue. Being this close to both of them, it was pretty easy to tell that they didn’t have any traits resembling one and another. ‘Guess she isn’t his kid.’ It was probably better that this was the case as the condition the child was in, if he was a parent then he would be a terrible one. That thought brought to mind an image of his past momentarily, causing his mouth to curl into a frown for the briefest of moments.[break][break]

That moment of displeasure was soon erased as a sigh exhaled out from his mouth. Moving his hand over to the girl, who shivered in response probably expectant of something bad, Arthur patted her head a bit before scuffling her hair. “Fair enough, don’t worry, I'll watch over you for now.” Reaching into one of his pockets he pulled out a bag of jellybeans, tearing a little hole and handing it to the girl. “Looks like you could eat something, don’t have much other than this treat i was saving until later, hope that you like it.” [break][break]

Cautiously the child reached in, taking the smallest of bites of a green bean, perking her instantly before continuing to take a bite of another- and another. [break][break]

Happy that his gesture seemed to temporarily stoke the fears of the little one, he rose back to a stand, cleaning the fog from his specs. “So, wonder what we’re supposed to be protecting her from?” He queried after looking around once more. Seemingly on queue with his words, there seemed to be sounds in the distance, groaning along with a shadow that looked like a human in the mist- though something wasn’t quite right.

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Surveying his surroundings, Arthur heard the other individual’s words, though his interest got piqued by the lone word that followed after. “Did that actually work, it can’t be that simple can it?” Arth questioned, though it seemed that Vladimir’s attention being in front of him seemed like it very well did. Naturally wanting to test it out himself, he spoke “Menu” as the screen flashed up in front of his face to answer his call.[break][break]

Woah, he wondered how this was actually possible. He was half joking about his mind being infected by some kind of google program but perhaps he wasn’t that far away from the truth. Well his intellect wasn’t he forte and he hardly knew much about machines and programs to even remotely guess something that was plausible. “Name?” He spoke in response, Arthur was a bit surprised, the man didn’t look like the social type. Then again he probably wanted his name for the sake of them needing to work together. “My name’s Arthur. Arth for short if you want something that rolls off the tongue better. Mind if I ask of yours too?”[break][break]

Scrolling through the screen that was in front of him, jumping from menu to menu to get more of an understanding of the situations and options available to him his eyes got sight of quite a lot of interesting stuff. “Really is like a game isn’t it. Class, skills, it’s got the whole load. I don’t really play RPGs a whole lot, any experience on your end?” He didn’t look like the type to play games, so Arth figured if that was the case he might need to give him a few pointers. Although, while he might know a bit, looking at the menu brought a question to his mind. How exactly was he meant to use all this stuff?[break][break]

The shadows in the mist grew closer, albeit quite slowly. It gave the group enough time to make out what they were before the things were in any matter of a close range. A pack of three zombies, humanoid beings with rotten skin and ripped clothing. While their skin seemed damaged, their limbs were all intact. The most notable thing was that they moved slowly, limping almost but for some reason with each step they took they left an imprint on the ground they stood on. Most likely being an indication of their strength and their durability.[break][break]

Perhaps because Arthur didn’t quite register the dangers of the scenario at hand or because he was that much of a relaxed person it didn’t phase him much. Instead his eyes sparkled with a fair shake of inquisitiveness. “Didn’t expect zombies, at least they’re the movie kind. Slow and all. Heh, wonder if they’ll bite us will we be infected?” Part of him honestly wanted to test it out, but he wasn’t that dumb nor wanted to become something of a mindless husk. The girl who was munching away at her jellybeans was now behind Arth, clearly shaking and frightened.