"Survive thirty days together with the protagonists of this world!"
Jacob gathered the other Reincarnators in the courtyard of Fujimi Academy and announced the main quest.
What he said matched Arthur's guess exactly.
"So that's it. Handsome, do you know who the so-called protagonists are?"
Katy pressed against him, face full of flattery.
"Of course!"
Jacob curled an arm around her supple waist, feeling utterly domineering.
He looked amused at the nervous faces around him; his solemn expression cracked into a grin.
"Relax, there's more than one protagonist—four of us can split them just fine."
Seeing their relief, Jacob's smile widened.
He loved having ordinary people's emotions in the palm of his hand.
The only thing that irked him was...
...probably the way the first two had walked out on him; it had dented his authority.
Among those who stayed, one more chose to go solo.
Whatever—if you're courting death, don't blame me for not giving you a chance!
"Free activity from here on. First call: Miyamoto Rei and Takagi Saya are mine."
"The leftovers—Hisa, Komuro Takashi, and Shido Koichi—pick your own binds."
"Stay within three meters for twenty-four hours straight and the link locks; the main quest will pop up after that."
---
"So we have to go back into the school to find those story characters?"
Ellen felt her brain lagging.
"But why didn't we look for them right away?"
"And if someone else finds them first, what do we do?"
Arthur didn't care about her questions.
"None of that is your problem."
According to online intel, only the so-called 'protagonist trio' had been made public.
Namely Miyamoto Rei, Komuro Takashi, and Hisa.
Yet one of them wasn't a 'protagonist' at all.
Jacob definitely hadn't paid for info you could google.
So either he had intel on Takagi Saya, a real protagonist tied to the anime's main line...
...or he'd gone for the Shido Koichi route.
Picking Shido inevitably leads to the ruin line, but the Reincarnators had no way of knowing that.
In fact, one route hadn't been uncovered yet: the School Doctor, Shizuka Marikawa.
Arthur had wondered about it—those two characters are way too conspicuous.
But after reading some Reincarnators' public failure reports, he saw the issue.
The main reason, Shizuka Marikawa and Saeko Busujima appear late.
In the original, protagonist Komuro Takashi only comes downstairs after the long rooftop scene of shooting his best friend and comforting his just-betrayed girlfriend.
Only then do they meet Shizuka Marikawa, escorted by Kendo Club ace Saeko.
After that, they run into Takagi Saya, who's sneaking out with the chubby kid from the equipment shed.
Once other Reincarnators confirmed Komuro Takashi's group as protagonists, they wanted to buddy up right from the start.
With Reincarnators helping, Takashi's rival Hisa barely stood a chance of dying.
And with those Reincarnators calling the shots, the group never heads to the isolated rooftop, instead bolting straight off campus.
Under those conditions, how could they ever meet the other two groups?
Still, Komuro Takashi and Takagi Saya are childhood friends, so their paths do cross.
A Reincarnator hanging around Takashi would watch the girl he likes, Miyamoto Rei, stay lovey-dovey with the still-alive Hisa in this apocalypse.
Who knows when he might remember his backup, Saya Takagi?
So it's not surprising that someone could get intelligence leads from the Takagi family.
But if the timing was off from the beginning,
then the senior student and the school nurse, two groups that have no connection to the protagonist, would never appear.
Even if they were somehow dug up, Arthur still had a perfect backup plan.
Later, the loli Alice and her father, and the special forces girlfriend of school nurse Marikawa at the airport… "Ah!"
Ellen suddenly shrieked.
Arthur turned his head to look, only to see a car on the roadside crash head-on into the entrance of a small shop, with smoke rising… Arthur's eyes narrowed.
He glanced at the time on the car's display screen; it was 27 minutes until 10 o'clock.
"The plot is about to begin."
Facts proved that the modified Raptor was indeed unstoppable on the road!
And because it wasn't rush hour, there weren't many cars on the road either.
So the journey back to school was almost unimpeded.
Not long after,
Arthur had already driven back to the entrance of Fujimi High School.
At this time, there were several pools of blood on the ground at the school's main entrance, indicating that the scene where the teacher was attacked by an outside zombie at the beginning of the anime had already occurred.
So the zombies must have already infiltrated the school.
Battles were surely about to begin.
Arthur mentally called up his personal attribute panel.
A holographic projection of an attribute panel appeared before him:
ID: Blank
Reincarnation Tower Floor: 1F
Constitution: 7
Spirit: 15
Strength: 9
Agility: 9
Basic Skills: None
Advanced Skills: None
Reincarnation Points: 0
Plot Privilege Card: None
Quite a miserable panel.
Logically speaking, the average value of a normal person's four-dimensional attributes is 10 points, which is the health value of a normal male.
For females, strength and constitution might be 1-2 points lower, while spirit and agility might be 1-2 points higher.
However, Arthur's overall stats were lower than the average.
Only his spirit, which was almost useless in the early stages, was high, likely due to the influence of his transmigration.
This panel would put him at a disadvantage in the upcoming battles against zombies.
Arthur parked the car in the shade of a tree at the corner of the wall intersection, then got out.
"I'm going in to pick someone up. Are you waiting here for me or coming with me?"
"Wah! Don't leave me alone."
Ellen quickly got out of the car and came pitifully before Arthur, looking as if she was about to cry.
Anyone who didn't know would think he was a scumbag abandoning a girl.
This girl, Arthur had basically determined through this short period of interaction,
that she was indeed not very cunning, but also not stupid, and at the same time, quite talented in acting.
Whether it was natural or due to her strong mental fortitude, she had shed tears when she saw zombies killing and even eating people on the road, but now she had already adjusted.
At least for now, she wouldn't be a hindrance.
"Then later, you'll have to adapt. If you meet people, speak less, and just follow me."
"Understood?"
Ellen nodded repeatedly.
She no longer believed that this 'Blank' was some newbie.
This confident demeanor;
This chain of interconnected plans;
This handsome face… In short, he was definitely a big shot!
So, as a small newbie, she naturally had to obey all the big shot's arrangements.
Locking the car doors.
Arthur went to the back trunk, took out two crowbars, and handed her the smaller one.
This thing was a divine weapon!
And compared to weapons like baseball bats or axes, which require a lot of physical strength, this relatively slender but equally lethal weapon was more suitable for him.
After all, killing zombies only required destroying the brain or severing the spine; a crowbar packed more than enough punch.
Everything was ready.
The pair slipped through the school gate and into the academy.