A sigh of content escapes my mouth as I watch the green progress bar, which showed my current level, fill up on the left side of my screen. A set of drums played which brought a satisfied smile to my face. To anybody who hasn't played Fallout yet, this sound may easily be dismissed but to me, it was the sound of progress.

Opening my skill menu, the deep trumpet along with the booming sounds of drums throbbed in my headset, the familiar fifteen seconds long music, it accompanied me whenever I'm choosing a new skill. Moving through the vast skills that I've already earned, I kept on scrolling down, specifically under the 'Intelligence' column and filled up the last point for, probably the most useless, skill in the game: V.A.N.S.

Seriously, why does this skill even exist? In my numerous playthroughs with this game, never have I ever chosen this skill since all it does is make a pathway that leads to my destination. While it can be argued that it could help me get to my objectives faster, it completely eliminates the exploration aspect of Fallout, which you know, kind of doesn't work well when you realise that Fallout 4 is an open-world game and not like those linear games that follow a specific waypoint so that you could proceed with the story.

Anyway, enough about me ranting about this useless skill. I am just happy that I can add another member to my list of already maxed out characters in this game.

Hmm? Am I addicted to Fallout 4?

No, of course not. Just because I have over 10 individual character, each of them reaching max skills, doesn't directly mean that I'm addicted with the game. In fact, I'd prefer the sentence "I love Fallout 4 more than any" rather than the word addicted. I know when to manage my time, it's just that with everything that's happening in the real world, Fallout 4 is the only escape I have.

Hmm? Do I have friends?

Of course, I do! What do take me for! Before the pandemic, I hang out with my friends but these days, we're always stuck in Discord and play games. Recently, one of my friends was so focused on playing Terraria lately. I wonder why? Eh, his business isn't mine to worry about.

I leaned back and stretched; hearing satisfying pops from my bones after hours of nothing but sitting in front of a screen playing Fallout 4. Suddenly, out of nowhere, Steam notifies me that someone sent me a private message. Curious, I leaned forward once more and read the message.

Justyouraveragemoddev: Hello

DeathSlayer75: Do I know you?

Justyouraveragemoddev: No, you don't know me. However, I have been watching for you for a while.

I raise my eyebrow in question.

DeathSlayer75: Alright.. totally not creepy at all…

Justyouraveragemoddev: Haha… if you're worried that I might do something, don't. I'm not that kind of person.

DeathSlayer75: Kind of hard to prove your innocence when I barely know you.

Justyouaveragemodder: You want me to prove my innocence to you? Very well. To start off, if I wanted to, I would've looked into your browsing history right now.

A bluff perhaps?

DeathSlayer75: I've talked with plenty of 'hackers' buddy. That kind of threat isn't really solid right now.

Justyouraveragemoddev: Hm… interesting search history. Didn't know you were into lingerie… and CBT…

…OKAY MAYBE HE ISN'T BLUFFING!

DeathSlayer75: HEY FUCK OFF!

Justyouraveragemoddev: I'm not bluffing.

DeathSlayer75: Yeah, I get that now. What do you want?

Justyouraveragemoddev: A simple request. You see, I have created this interesting mod for Fallout 4 and while I was looking for prominent Fallout players, I've stumbled upon you and deemed it to give the mod to you.

DeathSlayer75: Couldn't you just post this mod in Nexusmods or other websites that offers Fallout mods?

Justyouaveragemodder: No… let's just say that I only want one person to use this mod. I have my reasons, I'm sure you understand.

Best not question the guy that could potentially leak my entire search history, am I right?

DeathSlayer75: Alright, alright… I'll take your mod. So… what? You give me the mod files or something?

Justyouraveragemoddev: No… rather, if you could just let me use your computer for a moment and I will install the mod manually. You see, my mod is rather… sensitive to any wrong inputs that you may accidentally give, so it would be best if I do it.

DeathSlayer75: You know, you're coming off as rather condescending when you put it that way.

Justyouraveragemoddev: I wouldn't consider myself to be condescending. It is just fact, trust me, the lengths I've put into developing this mod is immense and, figuratively speaking, I am too far down the rabbit hole to come out.

DeathSlayer75: Not really a mod developer here but I can see where you're coming from. Alright, I'll let you control my system. BUT if I see one suspicious thing that you're doing, I'm unplugging the socket.

Justyouraveragemoddev: Don't worry, I won't do anything else.

Anxiety suddenly entered my body when I noticed my mouse suddenly move with my arm moving it. Knowing now that this person has successfully controlled my system, I held my breath and watched as he tampered with all of my files. Looking at it now, watching people getting hacked feels a lot different when you're on the receiving end of the joke. The fact that I have no control as to what is happening to my system while an anonymous individual manipulates everything that is in my systems is quite terrifying.

A few more minutes of waiting before I was finally given back control. Immediately, I checked all of my files, especially the most important ones to see if this anonymous individual had done anything that could potentially harm me. Fortunately, there was some weight behind his words, and I felt completely relieved when there wasn't anything wrong, missing or corrupted in my system.

Steam pinged me once again, telling me that someone messaged me.

Justyouaveragemoddev: I have completed the installation. You should be able to open Fallout 4 with the mod already installed. I will return eventually and ask you about the mod. Until then, do enjoy it.

DeathSlayer75: Thanks, I guess.

With our conversation done, I decided that I had enough games for tonight. Clocking in for the night, I close my eyes and drift off to sleep. The mod will be future me's problem.

Alright, time to see what this mod is all about. I moved my mouse the Fallout 4 icon and opened it. As of now, nothing out of the ordinary. Orchestral music blared through my headset, playing the classic Fallout theme. Choosing the 'load' option in the main menu, I am greeted with plenty of names; to be more specific, all of the characters that I've created over the hours I've lovingly played this game.

Damian Thule

Darwinian Learning Algorithm

Nate Na-te

Power Armor Only

Juliano Bailey

Apollo Eleven

Skaarf

Brad

Fred

Nate 1

Nate 2

Lyra Bodewig

Seems like the anonymous mod developer/hacker also didn't tamper with all of my saved characters. That's good. If what the mod developer is saying is true, then I suppose I should just play the game. I moved my mouse and chose the latest addition of my list of characters that have reached max skill tree, 'Lyra Bodewig'.

The best way I could describe Lyra's is that she is fairly young. Perhaps around her early 20s since I've designed her that way. Golden blonde hair fell from her head down to the back of her shoulders. She had bright blue eye because her right eye is whited out, giving anyone the impression that she is half-blind with the cause of her blindness being a large gash that crossed her right eye. She had normal sized, rosy tinted lips and also normal sized ears.

I loaded up the most recent save file and waited for a moment. After playing around with the limited interactions of the loading screen, I am once again greeted by the Commonwealth wasteland. Immediately after, a pop up appeared on the left side of my screen.

A Wastelander and the Walking Dead

So, this is the mod? A quest? Opening my Pip-boy, I hovered my mouse over to the quest and read its details.

"Greetings user, this is the installed mod that I have worked very hard on for a couple of months. What makes this mod special is that it is almost equivalent to a DLC because it has its own map with its own main quest, side quest and such. If you are ready, I suggest you head over to the C.I.T. ruins or if you haven't destroyed the Institute, pay them a visit. More details will be shown soon."

Interesting introduction. I suppose I should follow what the message says. I navigated to the Pip-boy's map and clicked the C.I.T. ruins to fast travel. After another moment of waiting, I loaded back in and I was immediately greeted with a block of text.

Mod: A Wastelander and the Walking Dead

Warning, you are about to initiate the mod, are you sure you want to proceed?

(YES) (NO)

I chose (YES)

What is gooding my puddings! It is me. At long last, I finally finished the first chapter for the promised, Highschool of the Dead crossover with Fallout 4. For 1.5k words, some of you might think:

'Don't you usually post longer chapters than this? What took you so long!?'

You did not think about that? Hm… at least I implanted the thought in your brains so technically, you DID think about it.

For more serious announcements, I am still busy with college and my semester exams are coming soon. I need to study for that. However, after the semester exam, I get a break on August so expect some frequent updates during that time.

As for the concept of this story, imagine if a person who is playing a game were to have their avatar, not the player itself, the avatar transported to an entirely different world. The world that they are transported in is considered 'real' by the residents of that world, however, to the eyes of the player, they believe that they are still playing a video game.

What do you think will happen?

Well, all of you should know what might happen, after all, you guys play video games! Or at least most of you. What do you think YOU would do if you were thrusted in this kind of situation, not really know that you are affecting the lives of characters all because you believe that what you are seeing AND playing is simply a video game?

Anyway, that is all I have for you, I hope you enjoy this story as much as I had fun brainstorming all of the possibilities that could happen. With that said, I bid all of you adieu.

Peace~