The summer solstice, 2077.
The city's neon lights still flickered, and traffic on the elevated highway was backed up into a glowing river. Lin Ye had a cigarette between his lips as he leaned against his aging pickup, staring at the rising gas prices on his phone and swearing under his breath. A freelance mechanic, he made a living modifying cars. He wasn't rich, but his life was steady enough.
Then a crimson rift tore across the sky.
Without warning, the clouds turned blood-red. From a fissure stretching across the heavens, countless misshapen monsters poured out with a roar. Their limbs were twisted, their mouths lined with sharp teeth. The moment they hit the ground, they ripped apart pedestrians in the streets. Screams, gunfire, and explosions swallowed the entire city in an instant.
"The apocalypse... it's really here?" Lin Ye stubbed out his cigarette, his pupils contracting. He watched as a monster known as a "Scythe-Claw" tore a bus in half. Three meters tall, it left the windows splattered with blood.
Instinct drove him to leap into his pickup. The moment he turned the key, the engine gave a hoarse roar. His tires crushed scattered rubble and bloodstains as he wrenched the steering wheel, smashed through a warped guardrail, and sped toward the outskirts of the city.
In his rearview mirror, the once-prosperous metropolis was rapidly falling, becoming a hunting ground for monsters. Lin Ye gripped the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white. He didn't know where he was going. He only knew that staying alive was his sole goal for now.
