The light was completely white. It gathered into a large sphere in the middle of the sky before streams of light rained down. Each stream a small waterfall of blinding, pure white energy, they crashed against the streets and roofs of buildings. Michael watched this process with great interest.

None of the bursts of light have landed on any outside walls or stopped in mid-air.

From this alone, he could guess what was going to happen. As he expected, once the streams of light landed on a proper surface, they vanished to reveal the shape of three people, all close to each other. The people looked around, looking a bit shell-shocked and trying to get their bearings. This scene repeated itself endlessly as more and more light rained down. Michael's enhanced stats allowed him to grasp the full scale of what was happening by simply counting the individual streams of light.

3,000 people so far. 3,200. 4,000 now…

The number kept climbing until the total number of new arrivals was 10,000.

A nice round number that doesn't seem to take me into account.

It was unlikely that the number of people transported to each Safe Zone would be 10,001 instead of 10,000. Not that it mattered. The number of people in a single Safe Zone was superior to that of the ones in his entire Tutorial Zone. Michael resisted the urge to frown and turned around to look at the people who had been teleported to the roof of the building he was standing on. His eyes darted from side to side, gauging the thirty-three people in front of him.

They're mostly around the same level as James and Elizabeth were before the Tutorial ended. That one's stronger, though. That woman, too.

Meanwhile, the people looked around at each other. A few of them appeared to be calmer and had already controlled their expressions, settling for calmly analyzing the others. Others were more transparent and fully expressed their confusion. As the seconds ticked by, however, each of them demonstrated why they had survived the Tutorial. It only took everyone a short time to calm down and start scanning their environment while also glancing at one another. A few were even looking at Michael himself. He made no attempt to say anything to them – the less they knew about him, the better. He silently channeled the Rune of Shadows. The eyes of the people looking at him grew unfocused.

Once all the streams of light had disappeared, having achieved their goal, the very air hummed. Michael almost reflexively raised his head to look at the sky, alongside all the others around him. A single System message appeared in the air, the largest he had ever seen.

[The Tutorial is over.]

Michael frowned at the obvious message, but the System kept going.

[Congratulations to all of you who have survived. You are now back on your home planet. You are different from who you were before in every way.]

[Earth has also changed. It is now part of the Multiverse. All features seen in the Tutorial Zones are now available, except for the Consumed Territory and the Abyss.]

[For the next ten years in Earth's time, it will remain under protection, and no outside races will be able to interfere. Once this period is over, interactions with other worlds will be allowed.]

[Survive and develop.]

Michael stared at the enormous System window, which soon disappeared. There was no grand objective or goal to work toward. Just like in the Tutorial Zones, the goal was simply to survive, but this time there was no System-imposed time limit. No, there was. He gritted his teeth, narrowing his eyes at the spot where the window had appeared.

Ten years.

That was how long humanity had before other civilizations were allowed to make their move, all of which had also gone through the Tutorial. There was no way to tell how long ago their Tutorial had happened, which meant that there were likely plenty of civilizations much more advanced than Earth's humanity, especially in Levels and Skills. The ten-year-long shield wasn't a grace period – it was a timer. Once it ended, if humanity wasn't strong enough, they would get overwhelmed and possibly annihilated by other races. The odds that the other races and worlds would be peaceful and welcoming weren't good. Life wasn't such a forgiving thing.

The others around him seemed to be coming to the same, simple realization that 'interactions' could also be hostile. Some frowned deeply, others trembled in place. All of them, however, seemed to be trying to remain composed, as expected from people who had survived the Tutorial. Michael nodded to himself. Anxiety only led to mistakes.

How are the gods related to the other worlds?

He still didn't know enough about them. Was a single world impactful enough to make them act? In a Multiverse with an unknown number of living, sentient beings? He didn't even know if the gods gathered power through the faith of believers or if they were simply powerful beings that had reached incredibly high Levels, and there was no Dragon in his dreams or Umbra to advise him anymore. It was even possible that gods had been born as gods, and that was that.

If divinity is attainable by ordinary creatures through the System, then the gods might still talk to those in their homeworld and of their previous race.

The more Michael thought about everything, the more complicated the situation seemed. He took a deep breath. For now, what mattered was finding his loved ones.

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He gave the people around him a glance over his shoulder. They were all either staring at the sky where the System messages had appeared or looking around cautiously. Shaking his head, he used Eagle Sight and his improved senses to scan everything around the building, back on the streets. He looked at each face carefully before moving on.

No luck.

He then moved his gaze to the tallest nearby building. He would be able to see farther and analyze more people from there, but there was one problem.

I don't know if they're in this Safe Zone at all.

That was the problem created by the way the System had made him choose his Safe Zone. Because it didn't say where any of the others would go, all he'd had as options were the different Safe Zones. His loved ones could be somewhere else entirely. Still, he had chosen this specific Safe Zone for a reason.

The System told me to head back to 'the place before everything began.'

He and his friends had been eating at a restaurant before the System's descent. It was reasonable to guess that they should all go back to that very same restaurant. It was a place they were all familiar with. His friends and mother were all from this city as well, and they had explored it together as much as they could. Heading to a spot they were fond of, such as the restaurant, and waiting for them there could be more effective than searching for them blindly among the thousands of people. Even though Allison hadn't been there in person, she knew where it was, and it was still the best lead he had.

As such, he'd chosen a Safe Zone that wasn't too far away from the restaurant, but also not too close, since the possibility of him running into his mother and friends on the way existed.

If they weren't there by the time he got to the restaurant, he would search this entire city for them.

Michael reached a decision in an instant. Then, he promptly jumped off the building as he cast Wind Blades. Yelps of surprise and screams came from the others on the roof, but he ignored them. Using the wind to lift himself higher, he rose in the air, trying to find his bearings. Within the Safe Zone, it was naturally simple, but the problem began outside of it, since the landscape had changed. It took him a while, but he finally managed to find the street he was looking for. Meanwhile, the shouting from below had only become louder. Naturally, his improved senses allowed him to understand almost all of the veritable cacophony. The voices from the people on the roof reached his ears.

"What the fuck? He can fly?"

"That's impossible! I'm a Second Circle Mage and I've never heard of it!"

"Oh, shut the fuck up. Who cares what Circle you are? Does anyone here know him?"

"Shit, I have to avoid him."

Their words were filled with awe, but also the wariness from people who had gone through the Tutorial and fought for their lives.

From below, down on the streets, even more shouting reached him. Michael looked at the roof of the building he had been standing on. Almost everyone was staring at him, though a few were slowly walking toward the stairs leading down. They flinched as he turned to look at them. He gave them a dismissive wave. Almost half of the people on the roof moved, as if they had been waiting for his signal. After about fifteen seconds, only a third of the original group remained, all staring at him with apparent determination.

Were they hoping for him to come back down so that they could talk to him? It was a respectable plan. He looked at the streets far below. Groups had started to form around the ones who either shouted the loudest or looked the strongest. On the left sidewalk, there were around two hundred people around a brown-haired, bearded middle-aged man who stood on top of a car. He had a kind smile, but Michael could tell just from looking at him that the man was considerably stronger than any other participant he'd seen, including Lohann and his friends, at least when it came to physical prowess.

"Hello, everyone," Michael could just barely hear the man shout. "All we need right now is to keep calm, analyze our situation, and choose capable leaders! I swear I'll help us understand in what ways Earth has changed!"

Michael scoffed at the obvious attempt at a power grab.

Further down the street, on the right sidewalk, two young women smiled at an even larger crowd of five hundred people. The one on the left was a beautiful blonde with blue eyes and a beaming smile, while the other one was more ordinary-looking with chestnut hair and amber eyes. Michael raised an eyebrow. They had managed to gather that many people willing to listen to what they had to say? Curious, Michael paid attention to the young women's words. His hearing captured everything they said.

"Everyone, please listen!" the blonde one shouted, keeping her smile. "The most important thing is to stay calm! It will be easier for us to understand what will happen from now on and deal with whatever happens if we stay together!"

Her tone was confident and incisive. Exactly what people looked for in times of crisis.

"She's right! We're not telling you to choose us as your leaders or anything!" the brown-haired one yelled. "Let's just think about what to do!"

Not bad.

By analyzing their tone with his superhuman hearing, he could tell if they were lying or not. Surprisingly, their words were true; they truly believed in what they were saying. Even if it was a ploy to get the people to trust them so that they could have an advantage when it came to surviving, they did mean the words they were saying.

Similar scenarios repeated themselves across the different streets. Of course, there were dozens upon dozens of people, either in small groups or alone, who shook their heads and walked away from the large crowds. Some entered the buildings, while others checked the restaurants for food. As his thoughts reached this point, Michael realized he had overlooked something because of how focused he was on finding his mother and friends.

…What are we going to do about food?

It was unknown whether the System had preserved the city's food stock. Even if it had, it had been at least three months since any human activity. How much food had even managed to last this long? The previous food supply chains had certainly been ruined, judging from the city's changed landscape and the thick mana in the air.

The animals might have even evolved to become like the monsters we fought.

Michael frowned. Was the beast he'd fought before reaching the Safe Zone actually an animal that had Leveled up?

Shit.

The more he thought about the situation, the more his urgency to find the others grew. No matter what, he would only decide what to do once he found them all. Slightly anxious, Michael stopped channeling Wind Blades. Over the surprised cries of the people who had been waiting for their chance to talk to him, he started dropping like a cannonball. The asphalt closed in at blinding speed, but he didn't even blink. The wind rushed past his ears, sharp and fierce. Once he was halfway through his fall, he cast Wind Blades again. The Blades wrapped around him to slow down his fall, fighting against the rest of the atmosphere.

Only three seconds later, he landed on the sidewalk with a loud bang, right in the middle of a group. Naturally, he drew dozens of stares.

"What the fuck? Someone just fell from the sky!"

"How did he even survive? Hey, sir! Over here!"

"What Level are you?"

Ignoring all of them and still keeping the Rune of Shadows active, Michael started to run toward his destination through the path he'd memorized.

Please, stay safe.

This time, he wouldn't let them fend for themselves without his support.

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