Chapter 16: The Rule

Julius typed his reply smoothly into the interface:

[Julius (Rank 456)]: "Why? Because I’m a reasonable person. As long as you don’t threaten my primary home, I don’t care if you live or die. Those eight regional citadels are fully automated. They have independent nuclear reactors, deep geothermal power, and vertical farms that produce fresh vegetables and fruit every single day. The medical bays are stocked with tens of thousands of doses of antibiotics, surgical gear, and clean water filtration systems."

He paused, letting them imagine it. He let them picture the dry beds. The hot showers. The smell of fresh bread baking in an automated oven. The safety of four-foot-thick steel doors standing between them and the freezing, muddy water.

Then, he dropped the hammer.

[Julius (Rank 456)]: "However... there is a catch."

— [IronHide]: "A catch? What catch?! Just tell us!"

— [Bloodhound]: "I knew it. Nothing is free with this guy."

— [Titan_01]: "Say it, Vance! What do you want?!"

Julius’s fingers danced across the glass:

[Julius (Rank 456)]: "Those bunkers were designed as high-efficiency, closed-loop survival lifeboats. Their atmospheric scrubbers, water recycling units, and food stores are strictly calibrated to maintain a specific balance. They cannot support hundreds of people. If too many enter, the air scrubbers will choke, the power grids will trip, and everyone inside will suffocate."

He paused for effect before typing the final rule:

[Julius (Rank 456)]: "Each bunker has an automated life-support cap. Exactly thirty people. Not thirty-one. Not thirty-two. Once thirty living bio-signatures enter the primary blast doors and clear the decontamination chamber, the outer gates will drop, the hydraulic seals will engage, and the system will permanently lock down. Nobody else gets in. Ever."

The silence in the chat was deafening.

[Julius (Rank 456)]: "There are 488 of you left alive on the mainland. Across eight bunkers, that is exactly 240 spots. That means about half of you can have a warm, dry bed, hot food, and medical treatment for the rest of this Trial. The other half... well, you’ll have to keep treading water."

Julius added a small smiling emoticon at the end of his message:

[Julius (Rank 456)]: "The doors are unlocked right now. First come, first served. Good luck, everyone."

He sent the message and closed the app.

For about ten seconds, nothing happened. The world chat sat completely motionless, as if all 488 players had been struck by lightning at the exact same moment.

Then, the chat exploded with such frantic intensity that the message feed looked like static:

— [GaleForce]: "Two hundred miles! I can make that! I’m moving right now!"

— [ThunderG]: "Get out of my way! Anyone heading toward the Canadian bunker is dead! I’m taking the first spot!"

— [Titan_01]: "Shut up! My leg is bad, but I have an armored truck! Anyone who tries to pass me on the highway gets flattened!"

— [NightCrawler]: "Wait! Don’t you guys see what he’s doing?! He’s pitting us against each other! It’s a trick!"

— [Viper]: "Trick or not, there’s food and dry clothes in those mountains! Are you going to sit here and drown just to prove a point?! I’m going!"

— [Bloodhound]: "I’m ten miles from the European site! Back off, all of you! That bunker belongs to my team!"

— [FlameLord]: "There are only thirty spots! Kill anyone who gets close! DON’T LET THEM REACH THE DOORS BEFORE US!"

Just like that, the "grand alliance" against Julius Vance vanished into thin air.

Nobody was talking about hunting down the rich boy on his island anymore. Nobody cared about making rafts to cross the North Atlantic. All the fiery speeches about brotherhood, shared suffering, and punishing the hoarder were burned away in a single second of raw, animalistic desperation.

There were 488 players left on the planet.

There were only 240 spots in the shelters.

It was simple, brutal math. Every player who made it inside a bunker was safe. Every player who was one second too late would be left outside in the rain to rot.

Friendships that had formed over two months of shared misery broke apart in minutes. Teams that had promised to protect each other began eyeing one another with quiet, murderous suspicion. If your teammate had a broken leg, they were just dead weight that might take your spot among the thirty. If someone was faster than you, you had to kill them before they reached the mountain pass.

Julius set his phone down on the table, picked up his fork, and cut another piece of his steak.

He didn’t need to lift a finger. He didn’t need to fire a single missile or deploy a single combat drone. With just a few lines of text and eight sets of coordinates, he had turned the entire surviving player base into a pack of starving wolves tearing each other to pieces.