Chapter 1 – Transmigrated Into the Apocalypse

Eliana Lopez slowly opened her eyes while a painful headache pounded inside her skull. For several moments, she simply stared at the ceiling above her, trying to understand what had happened. The last thing she remembered was the truck rushing toward her at full speed while she crossed the street.

She could still remember the terrified screams, the blinding headlights, and the feeling of death rushing toward her. By all logic, she should have been lying in a hospital bed right now. However, the unfamiliar ceiling above her immediately told her something was wrong.

Frowning, Eliana pushed herself upright and looked around. Instead of a hospital room, she found herself inside a small apartment that looked old and poorly maintained. A worn sofa sat beside the window, a cheap wooden table occupied the center of the room, and the walls showed signs of age, making the entire place look like it belonged to a struggling college student.

"What kind of hospital is this supposed to be?" Eliana muttered before swinging her legs off the bed. The moment she stood up, a strange sense of unfamiliarity washed over her, and even her body felt different. Before she could think further, a smartphone resting on the table suddenly lit up.

The lock screen displayed a name.

Audrey Wilson.

Eliana's brows furrowed as she stared at the screen. The name felt familiar, but before she could figure out why, a violent pain exploded inside her head as countless memories flooded her mind. Images flashed before her eyes one after another, showing childhood memories, school memories, family memories, and years of experiences that did not belong to her.

When the pain finally subsided, Eliana stood frozen in place. She slowly raised her head, staring at the phone as her lips parted in disbelief.

"Audrey Wilson..."

Her voice trembled as she repeated the name. It wasn't merely familiar; she knew it far too well because Audrey Wilson was a character from End of Humanity, her favorite online web novel.

The realization struck her like lightning. Without hesitation, Eliana rushed into the bathroom and stared into the mirror, only to find a stranger staring back at her. She saw black hair, a young face, and a thin build, and for several seconds, she remained completely silent.

Then Eliana slowly sat down on the edge of the bed. Her hands trembled as she stared at her reflection, desperately trying to understand how she had ended up in someone else's body.

"I got hit by a truck..."

She looked at the reflection, hoping that what she was seeing would somehow disappear. However, the unfamiliar face remained exactly where it was.

"...and woke up inside a novel?"

Eliana stared at the reflection in the mirror, unable to believe what she was seeing. Her hands immediately grabbed her hair, and she started pulling at it in frustration, desperately trying to find a reasonable explanation for the situation.

"What the hell is happening to me?"

She was just an ordinary office employee who spent her days working, paying bills, and trying to enjoy life whenever she had free time. She had never expected anything extraordinary to happen to her, much less something as impossible as waking up inside a fictional world.

So how had she ended up inside a novel? Was this some kind of joke, a prank, a dream, or was she already dead? The questions kept spinning inside her head, but no answers came.

The more she thought about it, the more confused she became. Everything felt impossible, yet the face staring back at her wasn't her own. That terrifying realization made her heart sink.

Unfortunately, that wasn't even the worst news because Eliana remembered exactly who Audrey Wilson was. Audrey wasn't the protagonist, a future hero, one of humanity's strongest warriors, or even a relevant supporting character.

She was an extra.

A forgettable background character who died during the first day of the apocalypse.

A future corpse.

A character so unimportant that most readers forgot her name after a few chapters.

The realization hit Eliana so hard that she felt her legs weaken. She stared at the unfamiliar reflection in the mirror while her thoughts spiraled into complete chaos, desperately wishing that she had somehow made a mistake.

Everything that had happened since waking up sounded ridiculous, yet every piece of evidence pointed toward the same impossible conclusion. The unfamiliar apartment, the memories inside her head, the face in the mirror, and the name displayed on the phone all told the same story. Somehow, after getting hit by a truck, she had awakened inside the world of her favorite web novel.

"No... this has to be a dream."

Eliana shook her head repeatedly as if doing so could somehow wake her up. Refusing to accept reality, she raised her hand and slapped herself across the face.

Smack!

A sharp pain immediately spread through her cheek.

"Ouch! Damn it!"

She grabbed the side of her face and winced. The pain felt completely real, not like the dull sensation of a dream, and the stinging sensation lingered for several seconds before slowly fading away. Eliana stood there with an increasingly ugly expression, growing more frustrated with every passing moment.

"This doesn't make any sense."

Unable to stay still, she hurried toward the nearby window and pulled the curtain aside. Bright sunlight immediately poured into the apartment, illuminating the worn furniture as she looked outside.

The city appeared completely normal. Cars moved along the roads, pedestrians walked along sidewalks while talking with friends, restaurants were open, and shops were busy. The sounds of everyday life drifted upward from the streets below, creating a scene that seemed no different from any ordinary day.

There were no monsters, no portals, and no signs that humanity was standing on the edge of extinction. Everything looked peaceful, as though nothing terrible could ever happen in this world.

"Everything looks normal... But that's exactly the problem."

A chill ran down Eliana's spine as memories from End of Humanity surfaced one after another. She remembered the opening chapters very clearly because she had reread them several times over the years. Before the apocalypse began, the world looked exactly like this: peaceful, ordinary, and completely unaware that disaster was only hours away.

Nobody knew that crimson portals would soon tear open the sky. Nobody knew that monsters would begin flooding into cities, and nobody knew that billions of people would die within the first few weeks. The world was about to change forever, and the people walking along the streets below had no idea that their peaceful lives were about to end.

"How the hell did I get inside a novel?"

Eliana began pacing around the apartment, trying to think of a reasonable explanation. Every answer she came up with sounded ridiculous, and the more she thought about the accident, the less sense the entire situation made.

"I was just going home after work. I wasn't doing some strange ritual. I didn't find a mysterious artifact. I didn't get struck by lightning. I got hit by a truck!"

Her voice echoed throughout the apartment. She stopped pacing and looked toward the ceiling, as though someone might appear and explain what had happened to her.

"And why the hell, out of everyone in the entire novel, did I become Audrey freaking Wilson?!"

The moment Eliana remembered that detail, her expression changed. She immediately grabbed the phone and checked the date, hoping that she might have arrived at a different point in the story. Her heart sank when she realized the date matched the novel perfectly.

The apocalypse would begin tomorrow.

Tomorrow, crimson portals would appear across Earth. Tomorrow, monsters would flood the world, and humanity would receive the System. Tomorrow, civilization would collapse, and countless people would lose their lives before they even understood what was happening.

And tomorrow...

Audrey Wilson would die.

Eliana's hands tightened around the phone as she recalled the scene from the novel. Audrey was nothing more than a minor character who had no chance of surviving the first day, and if the story followed the same events she remembered, she would be killed before she even had the chance to understand what was happening.

Just as Eliana was processing this horrifying realization, the phone suddenly vibrated. The screen flickered, and a familiar blue holographic window appeared in front of her.

Not on the phone.

In the air itself.

Exactly like the novel described.

[END OF HUMANITY SYSTEM ACTIVATING...]

[Synchronization Complete.]

[Scanning Humanity...]

[Awakening Talent...]

Eliana immediately stood up, her eyes widening as she stared at the floating notifications. She recognized the messages from the novel, and seeing them appear in front of her made the truth impossible to deny.

"The System..."

Her voice carried disbelief as she slowly reached toward the holographic screen. Her fingers passed through it without resistance, but the glowing blue window remained suspended in the air, displaying the same messages she remembered reading.

Several seconds later, another screen appeared.

[Talent Acquired.]

[F-Rank Talent: Weak Body]

Eliana froze. Then she reread it, hoping she had misunderstood the words, before reading them again to make sure. Unfortunately, the words didn't change.

Weak Body.

The weakest Talent in the entire novel. A Talent so worthless that many readers joked it was better to have no Talent at all. While others would awaken fire manipulation, sword mastery, lightning control, regeneration, or powerful combat classes, Audrey Wilson had received Weak Body.

A Talent that literally made its owner weaker than normal people. In a world where physical strength could mean the difference between life and death, it was a terrible disadvantage.

"Seriously?"

Eliana stared at the screen, unable to believe her luck. She had transmigrated into a character destined to die on the first day of the apocalypse, and now she had received the worst Talent imaginable.

"Of all the Talents in existence, I got this garbage?"

Her heart sank as the reality of her situation finally settled in. The apocalypse was starting, monsters were coming, and she possessed the weakest Talent in the entire world. She had no powerful abilities, no combat experience, and no guarantee that her knowledge of the novel would be enough to save her.

Then another notification suddenly appeared.

This one wasn't blue.

It was gold.

Brilliant gold.

Unlike the previous System windows, this notification radiated a mysterious pressure that made Eliana's heart skip a beat. The golden light grew brighter, illuminating the small apartment as a new set of words appeared before her eyes.

[Unique System Detected.]

[Infinite Evolution System Activated.]

[Survive.]

[Adapt.]

[Evolve.]

Eliana stared at the golden screen, unable to speak. For the first time since waking up in this unfamiliar body, she felt a small spark of hope because this mysterious System might be the only thing standing between her and the terrible fate awaiting Audrey Wilson.

Suddenly, the golden screen flickered, and a new message appeared beneath the final notification. Eliana's brief hope vanished as she read the words, realizing that the System had detected something she had never encountered in the original novel.

[WARNING: HOST'S LIFE EXPECTANCY—23 HOURS, 59 MINUTES.]