Chapter 1 Some Hotel High-Rise in Chicago, Illinois, USA

Mule leaned against the window, looking down at the city streets below.

To call it a street scene was a bit of a stretch. At this moment, the streets of the former Seattle were filled with American citizens holding demonstrations.

They wore sunglasses and various masks, covering their eyes and mouths, dressed in bulletproof vests and protective suits, carrying rifles and weapons on their shoulders and backs, holding wooden signs and banners with slogans, as well as American flags, marching towards the city hall.

Fueled by various forces, news of the Killing Field game's upcoming update had leaked out, becoming known to ordinary people worldwide.

To prevent rumors from deviating and causing more severe repercussions, the Global Supernatural Alliance had to hold a press conference, releasing the full text of the Killing Field game update in the name of the United Nations.

But this didn't have any particularly good effect.

After so much time, most ordinary people around the world already knew the basic operating mechanism of the Killing Field game.

They were well aware that the statement in the update - "dynamically increase the intensity of regular missions" - would trigger a new round of even more terrifying anomalies worldwide.

Panic, despair, and indignation spread among the people.

No one could remain calm and composed in the face of drastic changes—this was different from the doomsday prophecies of 2012 or the millennium.

The large-scale anomalies caused by the Killing Field game were visible and tangible.

For two years, people had watched the news constantly reporting deaths and injuries, and some of their friends and relatives had been involved and died silently.

The doomsday prophecies of 2012 or the millennium were at most everyone dying together, while the Killing Field game could make people wish they were dead.

The emotions of panic brewed and accumulated, eventually creating a fatal poison, which finally erupted at this moment.

Mule leaned against the windowsill, calmly overlooking the street scene below.

More and more Seattle residents came out of buildings and apartments, joining the demonstration.

It happened suddenly, and they didn't have time to formulate unified slogans and purposes.

But as they walked, they clarified their demands in discussions and conversations.

"Open City Hall! Open the Door Worlds! Guarantee civil rights! Justice! Justice! We need justice!"

Disorganized shouts rang out in the procession.

This emotion spread and diffused along the well-connected city streets, through word of mouth.

From scattered to orderly, from weak to powerful.

"There are at least... a million people, right?"

Mule glanced at it, and her eyes, enhanced by items, quickly calculated the total number of people participating in the demonstration on the street.

This demonstration was more intense than all previous demonstrations (including the City Hall project).

Not only in Seattle, but also in other major American cities like New York, Los Angeles, and Houston, waves of demonstrations were erupting one after another.

The City Hall project, which was fair but also unfair, became the main target for venting dissatisfaction.

Only dignitaries, wealthy people, senior intellectuals, and a few lottery winners were qualified to live in the City Hall, which had a clear price tag, while others had to continue to survive elsewhere.

Although this change caused the housing prices in big cities to plummet, and ordinary middle-class people could live in the most high-end residential areas, everyone knew that continuing to stay outside would only lead to their own and their families' silent deaths.

Mule extended her fingernails and gently flicked the glass window, easily cracking the tempered glass, which fell out of the window, smashed on the ground at the hotel entrance, and exploded into a pile of glass shards.

Strictly speaking, Mule was still an American.

Contrary to what people in other parts of the world imagined, the American people were actually quite... contradictory.

On the one hand, they could start a sweeping wave of protests across the United States because a black man was knelt to death by a police officer.

They could hold demonstrations of hundreds of thousands of people to support or ban abortion.

But on the other hand, they could turn a blind eye to some long-standing bad phenomena in society.

For example, the shocking number of missing persons cases in Indian reservations every year.

For example, forty-seven out of the fifty states in the United States allow child marriage.

For example, the Benghazi incident, the email gate incident, the prism gate incident...

These events that truly twisted the spirit of the American Constitution, were not as capable as a black man being killed by a police officer, or a senator proposing to ban abortion, in attracting the attention of the American people and arousing opposition.

A mocking, cold smile appeared on Mule's face.

She had a deep understanding of the strange psychology of the American people.

Under long-term indoctrination and brainwashing, the American people could only see what the upper class wanted them to see, and were only willing to see what they wanted to see.

Even if the City Hall had a clear price tag, these American people, who had long accepted the spirit of "private property is sacred and inviolable," "freedom and democracy," and "resistance to nanny-state governments," were likely to accept it submissively, admitting that rich people were more qualified than them to live in safe City Halls.

They wouldn't think about why the American government didn't formulate policies to protect the poor as much as possible.

Instead, they would think about how to become rich, how to qualify to live in the City Hall.

The American government had no power to force or instruct the people to do anything, so the people had no reason to force or instruct the government to do anything.

That's what they thought, and that's what they believed.

Therefore, Mule added fuel to the fire.

She released the news of the Door Worlds in the hands of the Americans.

This information broker coldly watched the city below.

The protesting crowd gradually gathered along the streets and walked towards the City Hall, colliding head-on with the police and military forces under security lockdown.

Conflict was inevitable.

The procession was like a thick wall of people, crashing into the barricades set up by the police.

Those American citizens wearing masks and sunglasses, holding up star-spangled banners, frantically shook the barricades, roaring loudly at the police officers behind the barricades who were on full alert.

"I worked hard for America for 40 years! I paid taxes for 40 years! Why don't you tell us the truth!"

"I'm a veteran who retired from the Afghan battlefield! I broke my leg and disfigured my face for America and won the National Medal of Honor! Look how they treat me!"

"The government clearly has a whole new world for immigration! Why don't you tell us! Why don't you let us migrate!"

"You love America, does America love you?!"

Fierce arguments echoed over Seattle and almost all American cities.

Mule tilted her head. As one of the world's most excellent information brokers, she had her own information channels.

After several twists and turns, she finally found information about the Door Worlds from the most secret military bases and research facilities in the United States.

In the last Door competition, David, as a member of the Special Incident Department of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, ultimately received a Door as a reward.

Although the Door World in his hands was not like the previous ones, a whole colony planet with a superior environment and abundant resources, where the population could be easily migrated with a little transformation, it could still theoretically accommodate a population of 500 million.

And it could ensure that all residents could live with dignity, eat and dress warmly, and not suffer from freezing and starvation, with a standard of living no different from before the Killing Field game.

The reason why the American government had been hiding the news was partly because they didn't want to expose the news of the Door World in their hands, so that other organizations and forces could make an assessment.

On the other hand, they didn't want the people to know.

First of all, the player selection rate for the Door World was only 12% of the real world.

Collective relocation meant losing future potential.

Secondly, the living space of the Door World in David's hands was relatively limited. The most ideal population model was 50 million.

Fifty million scientists, engineers, and soldiers.

Among them, there was not much room left for ordinary people (especially ordinary people with insufficient education).

Thirdly, factories, arsenals, military bases, and financial institutions on Earth could not lack sufficient personnel to maintain them.

Collective relocation was equivalent to semi-permanently giving up control of Earth's hegemony.

In addition to this, there were various reasons.

For example, some of the behind-the-scenes classes in the United States hoped to take this opportunity to make the American racial population more... pure.

Eliminate some people of color.

For example, they had developed relatively efficient and infinitely potential cloning technology, which could provide more excellent colonial talents for the new world behind the Door in the future.

There was no need for these "defective products" on Earth.

Mule integrated all the classified intelligence and selectively released the information after the Killing Field game version was updated.

The desperate American people who felt abandoned and fooled, under the impetus of Mule and some interested people, took to the streets to demonstrate.

They came from all directions, crowded under the City Hall, desperately shaking the barricades, roaring at the police officers wearing riot gear and holding assault rifles (loaded with rubber bullets).

Bang!

Finally, a gunshot broke the tipping point of the protest.

No one knew who fired the first shot, and no one knew why it was fired.

After the gunshot, sporadic gunshots rang out throughout the city.

The long-term proliferation of guns, as well as the fueling of private arms dealers like Mule, allowed ordinary people to have firepower no less than the military.

They fired at the towering City Hall, at the shops that had long been closed on the roadside, and at the fully armed police and military.

The conflict broke out.

The rubber bullets, tear gas, and high-pressure water cannons, which used to be invincible, were useless in the face of the fully upgraded people—some of them were wearing full-coverage protective suits.

Some people even drove in single-person mechs produced by the European Heavy Industry Group, resisting the rain of rubber bullets fired by machine guns.

"It's like a carnival."

Mule casually put down the leg pressed against the windowsill, bent down, and crawled out of the window, standing on the inch-wide windowsill.

Just as the intelligence merchants assessed, the conflict did not show a one-sided trend.

The American police and military, who maintained law and order, were well-trained and well-equipped.

But the equipment of the protesting people was also upgraded, holding a large number of heavy weapons.

Some of them had swallowed genetic potions and temporarily possessed extraordinary power.

Gunshots, artillery fire, explosions, roars, and wails.

The protest scene, which was still orderly just now, turned into a battlefield.

The blood from countless people merged together and flowed into the sewer pipes on both sides of the street.

"Tonight, and for the next three days, people will die all over the world, many, many people will die."

Mule silently gave an assessment in her heart, stepped on her feet, and jumped onto the roof of the hotel.

The wave of conflicts that erupted across the United States successfully contained the attention of the Special Incident Department of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other intelligence agencies.

All monitoring satellites were closely monitoring the conflict scene.

Most American transcendents were urgently mobilized and dispatched to key positions to protect American national interests.

No one noticed that Mule drew a uniquely shaped heavy sniper rifle from the void.

[Name: Formulaic Revenge Gun]

[Type: Weapon Consumable]

[Quality: Perfect]

[Attack Power: High]

[Effect: Fires untraceable, unstoppable, and indefensible magic-breaking bullets at enemies who have a feud with the user]

[Consumption: 500 Spirit Power]

[Cooldown: None]

[Usage Requirement: Level greater than or equal to Lv25]

[Note: Multiple magic-breaking bullets can be fired simultaneously, with the power depending on the spirit power invested. The bullets are invisible and intangible, and the farther the distance, the faster the flight speed]

[Note: The user needs to know clearly the location of all enemy targets. After firing, the Formulaic Revenge Gun will be automatically destroyed]

[Note: The noblest revenge is forgiveness. But unfortunately, I don't want to be noble]

The sniper rifle was pitch black, with an extremely bulky silencer installed at the muzzle.

Mule took a deep breath and took out a list and twenty-odd character photos from the void.

The paper on the list was crumpled and looked many years old.

It was filled with many, many names.

Most of them had been crossed out, and the remaining names were all high-level figures in the United States today.

Director of the Central Intelligence Agency Strategic Services Office, New York State Federal Senator, Member of the Internal Review Committee of the Treasury Department, Director of the Attorney General's Office...

And those character photos were also "survivors" on the list.

Mule silently put the sniper rifle on her shoulder and placed it on the edge of the roof.

Her thoughts were churning.

She remembered her dead family, the big figures who caused her family to be ruined, and the injustice she had encountered over the years.

After years of operation and long-term planning, she finally waited for an opportunity.

An opportunity for all high-level American figures to hide in underground shelters to take refuge because of the sudden national protest wave.

"...Wish me luck."

Mule slowly exhaled a breath of turbid air, glanced at the photos for the last time, and resolutely pulled the trigger.

Bang!

A bright red flame burst out of the muzzle of the heavy sniper rifle, and dozens of invisible and intangible bullets flew out of the muzzle, flying towards all parts of the United States with the Chicago hotel roof as the center.