Doomsday: My Football System In The Apocalypse

Sunny almost stumbled on his seat when he saw what the man had done to the boy. He tried his best to keep himself from shouting and held his mouth shut.

'What?'

Now it all made sense to him. This is what they do to those who fail to awaken every year. But why? Why are they killing them? Sunny could only guess that they didn't want weak people in this world because the future held no good. But what right did they have to kill innocent kids? They should let them live to see and face what the future had to offer.

"We won't tolerate weakness in our world. We only need strong people who can protect us from future calamities."

He suddenly remembered the speech made by one of the big families. Is that what they mean by not tolerating weakness in the world? It didn't make sense.

"Now I understand what that stinky old man always tells me."

He didn't have time to think much, though, because Emmy was on the sixth bed, and it only took that man a couple of minutes to do his dirty job. Sunny had just ten minutes to save his brother from meeting the same fate as his friend.

With his useless ability, Sunny could get into the room in mere seconds, but he needed shadows to do that. The room was well-lit, and there were almost no shadows available. The only shadows in the hall were cast by the great pillars, but he couldn't use them as they were surrounded by the crowd. So, he excused himself and acted as if he was heading to the restroom.

He moved out of the great hall and walked through the alleyway the awakeners had passed through. He quickened his pace and started looking around for any shadow that could transport him to the room.

He walked fast and steadily, trying his best not to look suspicious. He walked for about eight minutes before finally finding a source of shadow that could transport him to his brother. He quickened his pace and approached the source.

Funnily enough, the shadow he found happened to be cast by the girl who had first performed the awakening ritual—the girl whose hair had changed to silver. She happened to have come out of one of the rooms when Sunny found her, probably the room she was taken to.

Sunny walked faster and approached her from behind, trying his best not to look like a stalker or raise suspicion. But it also seemed like the girl had noticed him, as she kept throwing furtive glances behind her. Her shadow was slightly behind her, so Sunny had to get close enough before using it.

The girl suddenly quickened her pace, and as Sunny noticed this, he didn't hesitate. He broke into a run and chased after her. Then, when the girl turned around, probably to confront him, he simply sank into her shadow and vanished.

"Huh? Where is he?"

She looked around in confusion. She had clearly seen someone following her from behind. But why had he suddenly disappeared?

"I'm sure it was that guy staring at me in the hall. But why did he disappear? Am I seeing things?"

---

Back in the room, the man had just finished doing the same thing to the person on the fifth bed—injecting her with the serum and placing two pills in her mouth. Then, he moved to the next person on the sixth bed. But just as he was about to touch him, he suddenly sensed movement among the shadows of the equipment gathered at the edge of the room.

Before he could register what was going on, a human shadow emerged. What followed next was...

"Don't touch my brother!!!"

The man didn't have enough time to react as the shadow suddenly shouted. What followed next was a punch to his head. Thankfully, he was able to block it with his hand, but the momentum still sent him reeling back.

Before the figures hiding behind the door could move, the young man who had emerged from the shadows grabbed the boy on the sixth bed, then they both vanished.

"Get them! They must not escape!!"

The man shouted, his body shaking with both fear and disbelief.

'Who was that? How did he find out?'

He thought, trying to get on his feet.

'I must report this now.'

---

"Someone did what?!"

A bald-headed man shouted as he smashed his fist on the table. He was the same bald-headed man who had given the speech earlier before the awakening ritual began. He was currently sitting with six other people around a spherical table—five men and one woman, with him making seven in total.

There was also someone else in the room. He was on his knees, shaking and sweating profusely as he spoke.

"I didn't know how he found out, but he took one of the boys with him,"

The man said, his voice shaking.

Of course, it was the same man who had been with Emmy and the others who had failed to awaken their abilities. He was currently in the room with the leaders of the seven big families in the world.

The bald-headed man, an old man with a round face and long red hair, red puppy eyes, and a very young man with a sharp face and blue flowing hair. There was another older man with wrinkles all over his face. He had gray hair and a calm yet distant expression. The last two men had yellow and white hair respectively, with nothing remarkable about them apart from the somber expressions on their faces. Lastly, there was the only woman among them. She had long black eyebrows, a delicate face, and a black veil covering her features. Her hair was neatly tied back, and a black feathered hand fan rested on her arm.

These were the seven pillars of humanity alongside the government.

The bald-headed man spoke again.

"Could you describe that person?"

He asked coldly, making the man shiver.

"I didn't get to see him clearly as he appeared unannounced. But he came through the shadows, and the boy he saved was the one who spent several minutes in front of the great pagoda but did not awaken an ability,"

The man explained, his gaze falling.

"Interesting. To think that the one we should have discarded a couple of years ago would come back to give us a problem,"

The red-haired old man said.

"Yeah, I remember we found nothing about that ability,"

The woman said, blowing herself with the black feathered hand fan in her hand. She then looked at the youngest man among them and asked,

"Weren't you the one who said not to get rid of him?"

The man looked around, then pointed at himself and smiled.

"Me? Well, just because we didn't get anything about his ability doesn't mean he's completely useless. We could still exploit his ability in the future and can easily discard him if it turns out to be useless,"

He said with a gentle smile.

"Also, why do you all seem disturbed by the fact that someone knows we are behind the fate of those who fail?"

The man asked.

"Should we not be disturbed? Nobody knows we are doing this to help them and prepare for the future. If those weak people get to witness the descent of the Deathspawn, they will not only die miserably but also become a burden. And you know that if word of what we are doing gets out, the world will see us as villains,"

The gray-haired man said.

The young man with blue hair smiled again and said,

"Let them see us as villains. It's not as if they dare to go against us. And since when did you all start caring about what the world thinks of us?"

"You surely lack experience as the young master of the Empyrean family. Do you know that the world would be scared to attend the awakening ceremony or send their children here if word gets out? It would affect the future,"

The bald-headed man said in a cold voice.

"Well, it's not entirely bad that the boy found out. We can use it as an opportunity to clear off any suspicion the world has about us. I mean, only a fool would not suspect we had something to do with those deaths. But now that the boy found out, we should spare those students who haven't been injected. Let them live and attend the ceremony again next year. "

"If the world sees that they live, they will believe what we want them to believe without suspicion. And the boy who boldly infiltrated the lab? We should keep an eye on him."