The darkness that swallowed the Grand Ballroom was not merely the absence of light. It was an oppressive, suffocating void that smelled of clinical death and chemical intervention.
Salim lay face-down on the thick, plush carpet. His cheek was pressed against fibers that reeked of expensive cleaning agents and stale dust. He couldn't move a finger. His body was completely paralyzed, as if his motor nerves had been systematically unplugged from the central switchboard of his brain. Yet, terrifyingly, his consciousness refused to fade entirely.
He could still hear.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
The sound of bodies collapsing echoed through the vast hall, rhythmic and heavy, like overripe fruit falling from a tree during a storm. Dani, Rizki, Salma, Udin... all of them were now nothing more than helpless piles of flesh scattered across a ballroom floor that had transformed from a gala venue into a silent slaughterhouse.
Through eyes that remained half-open—their lids too heavy to close completely—Salim watched as the staff access doors swung wide. Blinding white light spilled in from the corridors, carving through the Ballroom's gloom. Silhouettes emerged. They were no longer dressed in neat hotel waistcoats or tailored suits. They wore bright orange Hazmat (Hazardous Materials) suits, complete with full-face gas masks that rendered them faceless and insect-like.
They didn't panic. They didn't call for ambulances. They moved with a chilling, structured efficiency.
"Sector A, secure the Alpha Subjects," a deep voice rumbled from behind a gas mask, distorted into a metallic rasp by a voice modulator.
"Sector B, transport. Ensure no one chokes on their own vomit. Tilt their heads," another voice commanded.
Salim felt a hand encased in thick, industrial rubber grip his shoulder. He wanted to scream, to lash out, to tell them not to touch him. But his tongue was a useless lump of meat in his mouth. He was rolled over roughly. A medical penlight was flicked on, its beam piercing straight into his pupils.
"Subject 27-E. Pupillary response: sluggish. Sedation: 95% effective," the guard reported.
"Take him. Load him into Transport Unit 3."
Salim felt himself being lifted. Not onto a stretcher, but hoisted over a shoulder like a sack of grain. His head dangled backward, staring at the darkened, ornate ceiling of the ballroom as it receded.
As he was carried out, he witnessed a sight that would haunt him for the rest of his life. Hundreds of his classmates—the pride of Rajawali High—were being dragged, carried, and stacked onto iron freight trolleys. He saw Maya on one of the carts, her light blue summer dress disheveled, her long hair trailing on the floor. Rinto was being dragged by his feet by two guards, his head thumping against the doorframe, yet he showed no reaction.
They... they are treating us like livestock... Salim thought, a roar of fury erupting in his mind, only to be trapped behind his paralyzed vocal cords.
They were carried out of the building. And as the outside air hit his face, Salim realized the magnitude of the lie they had been living.
There were no lush tropical gardens. No cascading infinity pools.
The "Sanctuary Hotel" was nothing more than a massive, hollowed-out hangar. The interior had been meticulously designed to resemble a luxury resort. The glass walls of their rooms had been high-resolution LED screens displaying a loop of fake ocean views.
Outside the hangar lay a desolate concrete pier, illuminated by harsh industrial floodlights. Rows of green canvas military trucks waited like predatory beetles. And at the end of the pier sat the rusted cargo ship Salim had seen in his "dream" on the bus. The hull was marked with a chilling designation: P-27.
Salim was tossed into the back of a truck, landing on a pile of other students. He felt a soft but firm weight beneath him. It was Rehan's back.
The truck jolted into motion. The vibration rattled Salim's skull, and his consciousness finally began to fray at the edges. The Nano-Machines in his blood were beginning to override his core brain functions, forcing him into a state of deep hibernation for the data synchronization process.
Sleep, Salim... a voice whispered in his mind. It wasn't human. It was the voice of the system.
Salim's world dissolved into a cascade of binary code.
THE INTERPHASE (SUBCONSCIOUS MAPPING)
The dream was bizarre. There was no plot. No monsters or angels.
There was only a Loading Screen.
Salim felt himself floating in a lightless vacuum. Around him, mathematical formulas and complex equations swirled like bioluminescent fireflies.
Integrals... Fibonacci Sequences... Game Theory...
The concepts he had studied in the dry confines of a classroom suddenly pulsed with life. They weren't just ink on a page anymore. They glowed, throbbed, and merged with his neural pathways.
Logic Synchronization: 78%... 89%... 100%.
Strategy Module: ACTIVE.
Emotional Suppression: ACTIVE.
Elsewhere in the same void, Udin was dreaming of muscle and bone. He saw his own muscle fibers being reinforced, his bones coated in a metaphorical alloy. The years of agonizing karate practice were re-indexed, replacing pain with perfect muscle memory.
Alya dreamed of anatomy. She saw the human body as a transparent map where every vital organ glowed red. The placement of the carotid artery. The exact location of the heart. The weak points in the cervical vertebrae. Her medical knowledge was being reformatted—not for healing, but for survival.
They were unaware that as they slept, their bodies were being physically manipulated. Inside the hold of the cargo ship as it cut through the violent waves, their luxury attire was stripped away. The silk pajamas and designer dresses were gathered and tossed into incinerators like garbage.
In their place, they were dressed once more in their Rajawali High School Uniforms.
The white-and-gray attire. Complete with the neckties, the belts embossed with the school logo, and the standard black shoes.
Why the uniforms?
Because for Mr. Adrian and the architects of this game, there was no symbol more poetic than watching the innocence of youth—embodied by a school uniform—stained with blood and mud in a primal arena. The uniform was their identity. The identity of a victim.
21:30 WIB – POINT ZERO (ISLAND 0)
A sea breeze carrying the sharp sting of salt and the rotting scent of fish hit Salim's face.
It was cold. Wet. Harsh.
It wasn't the climate-controlled air of a hotel. It wasn't the stale breeze of a classroom fan. This was the breath of the wild.
Salim snapped awake.
He didn't open his eyes slowly. They snapped open, as if a switch had been flicked. His heart immediately began pumping blood in a combat rhythm. He sat up with a start, his breathing coming in ragged gasps.
The first thing he saw was darkness. Only a sliver of pale moonlight managed to pierce through the dense, sprawling canopy of leaves above him.
A jungle?
Salim felt the ground beneath him. Damp soil. Sand mixed with humus. A gnarled tree root jutted out near his hip. He looked around and realized he wasn't alone.
To his left, Salma was struggling to stand, clutching her head. Her usually perfect hair was a matted mess, with dry leaves caught in the strands. To his right, Udin was already in a low defensive stance, his eyes darting through the gloom even though his balance hadn't fully returned.
Rehan lay flat on his back, staring at the night sky with a hollow, vacant expression. Alya sat nearby, hugging her knees, her entire body shivering from the cold.
And they were all in their school uniforms. The white-and-gray clothes looked ridiculous and fragile in the middle of this untamed wilderness.
"Where... where are we?" Salma's voice was raspy, breaking the silence of a night filled only with the chirping of crickets and the distant, rhythmic roar of waves.
Salim stood up. His legs were steady. There was no vertigo. No nausea. His body felt... upgraded. He checked his pockets. Empty. His wallet, phone, and spare change were gone.
He checked his wrist.
The paracord bracelet Maya had given him was still there.
Salim let out a small, sharp breath of relief. At least one thing from the real world remained.
But then, his eyes caught something glowing on the ground, positioned precisely in the center of the circle where the five of them had been placed.
Five flat, rectangular objects. Their screens glowed dimly in the dark.
Tablets.
They weren't the high-end consumer tablets they used for gaming. These were thick, industrial-grade devices encased in matte black, shock-proof rubber.
Salim walked forward and picked one up. On the lock screen, a name was displayed in stark white letters: SALIM NUR HIDAYAH – GROUP 27.
"Take your tablets," Salim commanded. His voice sounded different to his own ears. It was colder. More clinical. The emotional suppression of the Nano-Machines was working without him even realizing it.
His teammates obeyed. They each claimed their device. The moment Rehan's fingers touched his screen, all five devices chirped in unison.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
The screens bled into a deep crimson. A logo appeared: the Rajawali High Eagle, but its neck was now entangled in a wreath of barbed wire. The school's symbol of excellence had been mutated into a brand of slavery.
Then, scrolling text appeared:
WELCOME TO ISLAND 0.
STATUS: ALIVE.
TIME: 21:30 WIB.
ACTIVE PARTICIPANTS: 200/200.
GROUPS REMAINING: 40.
PHASE 1 MISSION: SURVIVAL.
CORE RULE: DO NOT DIE.
"Do not die?" Alya whispered, her voice trembling with horror. "What kind of sick joke is this?"
Rehan, who had been silent until now, began tapping his screen with frantic speed. He was trying to bypass the settings, looking for a system back-door.
"Locked down," Rehan muttered. "Custom OS. No internet access. No Bluetooth. It's a closed-circuit intranet connecting all these tablets to a central server."
"A central server?" Udin asked.
"The Hive Mind," Rehan replied. "Someone is controlling us from somewhere on this island."
Suddenly, the deafening roar of a loudspeaker shattered the jungle's silence. The sound originated from a camouflaged watchtower hidden among the trees, not far from their clearing. It was the same female voice they had heard in the Ballroom.
"Attention, Assets of Batch 27. The simulation has commenced."
"You are currently on Island 0. Total area: 15 square kilometers. Perimeter: Open sea. Attempting to swim beyond the boundary will result in automatic execution by patrol drones."
"Your supplies are zero. Your weapons are zero. All you possess are the uniforms on your backs and the tablets in your hands. Those tablets are your lives. If a tablet is destroyed, the collar around your neck will detonate."
Salim instinctively reached for his throat.
There was a collar.
A thin, metallic choker was wrapped snugly around his neck. It was cold. A small indicator light on the side pulsed with a rhythmic green glow.
Panic erupted as everyone felt their own necks. Salma tried to tug at the metal, but it was seamless, locked with a mechanism that offered no leverage.
"Your goal is simple: Survive until sunrise on the seventh day. However, resources