The moonlight poured over the infected ruins of Raccoon City, casting an eerie silver glow across broken streets, shattered glass, and the shambling silhouettes of the undead. You could almost mistake it for peace—if peace smelled like rotting flesh and corporate corruption.
But tonight, the air crackled with something new. Cosmic energy hummed beneath the surface like static building before a storm.
Me.
I stood on the rooftop of a semi-collapsed apartment building, arms crossed, struggling — absolutely struggling — not to blow the whole place sky-high by accident.
"Okay… Deep breath…" I whispered to myself, though air wasn't strictly necessary for someone like me anymore.
The HUD pinged again:
Mental Discipline: 26/100 — You're barely holding it together.
Power Mastery: 16.00% — Keep trying.
Auto-Cleaning: Maximum. You sparkle under moonlight.
Hostile Thought Trigger: Still active. No homicidal fantasies allowed.
Below me, the street swarmed with zombies — hundreds of them. Groaning, shuffling, smelling like the back of an Umbrella lab fridge. But honestly? The real threat wasn't them. It was me.
If I lost focus for half a second… if I thought too hard about vaporizing them… there went the city. And judging by my mental discipline score? Not looking good.
A voice crackled in my head — God, casually breaking into my neural bandwidth like always.
"Remember, Daniel," He chuckled, "ten million alive. That's the deal. No overkill. Balance the books."
I sighed, eyes scanning the crowded streets. "Right. Gotta balance the undead economy. Thanks for the reminder, Boss."
The good news? I could blow up zombies with precision. The bad news? One stray intrusive thought — poof — goodbye city.
Alice's voice crackled over the earpiece. "We ready to clean house?"
"House? More like… mop an entire graveyard." I adjusted my coat. "I'm going in. Mode: Death 2.0 activated."
The HUD updated:
Mode: Death 2.0 — Selective Purge Engaged.
Warning: Overthinking may cause mass extinction. Proceed with cosmic caution.
With a flick of my wrist, the first wave of zombies exploded in a satisfying burst of violet light. No blood, no guts — just neat, sparkly particles fading into nothingness.
Alice's eyes widened from her perch across the street. "You can do subtle."
"Hey, I'm growing," I winked, even as sweat trickled down my temple. Don't think about vaporizing the whole block. Don't think about vaporizing the—
BOOM.
A car three streets down disintegrated into atoms. Whoops.
"Sorry, sorry, my bad—mental discipline's still trash," I muttered, swiping at the HUD. "We're good, that's within acceptable loss margins, right?"
God pinged in:
"Daniel… No more cars."
"Copy that, Boss." I inhaled deeply, focusing.
Zombies poured in like floodwater, groaning and snarling. I flicked a finger — another controlled burst of violet light erased a cluster near the gas station.
Wesker's smug voice buzzed through comms, probably from some dark Umbrella hideout. "If you slip up, you'll be wiping the map, Death-boy."
"Thanks for the vote of confidence, sunglasses indoor enthusiast," I snapped, vaporizing a zombie mid-lunge without blinking. "Maybe focus on not being next on my cosmic cleanup list."
Alice dropped from a balcony, landing beside me, pistols blazing. "You still struggling?"
"I'm a cosmic nuke with anxiety issues, what do you think?" I fired back, reducing another wave of undead to sparkling dust.
My HUD pinged again:
Mental Discipline: 28/100 — Small victories. Fewer accidental city wipes.
Population Alive: 10,000,342 — Careful, we're near the minimum.
Zombies Eliminated: 4,512 — Keep it neat.
Explosions bloomed in the distance as Leon and Chris fought their way through, trying not to get splattered by rogue bio-weapons.
Alice elbowed me. "What happens if you completely lose control?"
"Whole continent? Gone," I admitted, wiping my brow. "Maybe the moon. Depends on the mood."
She smirked. "Let's avoid that."
"Yeah… but can we keep the zombie confetti thing? That's growing on me."
The battle raged, but my focus sharpened. No stray thoughts. No catastrophic accidents. Just controlled cosmic death.
For now.