One and almost two more days passed, and Ultima got to learn the many relationships he had with every soldier since he learned their names. Some respected him, some feared him, but all of them didn't dare to step over the line like Jackson did. He decided to keep that title hidden, but the accomplishment he felt from getting it was nice, and it didn't have any benefits, but who didn't like being called something cool?

It was one hour until midnight, and he was watching the server countdown, lying down in bed as he watched it ticking. He had wondered even more in the past two days when he had free time to think what would happen, how many players would join, and how badly they would affect this world. He didn't remember his last life clearly, but at the same time he remembered it well, up until his death. Compared to that, this life was more interesting. He wasn't sure if he could call this world home yet, but there would hopefully be a time where he had lived here longer than he lived before.

Arron was still up even as the clock ticked closer to midnight, his eyes watching Ultima through the monitor. The entire day he had been staring off and in deep thought, which he normally only did at his desk. Now he wasn't even sleeping, he had been staring at the ceiling from his bed for several hours. Asking about this only prompted Ultima to reply that he felt uneasy about something. Ultima, who should feel nothing, felt uneasy about something. No matter how much he tried, it was only something from him, and he couldn't elaborate further on it. Which is why he decided to stay up with him, incase something happened to him.

Gareth was at a meeting that was going into the late hours of the night, too late in his opinion as he watched the clock in the room tick closer to midnight in boredom. Recently this uneasy feeling welled up in his chest, like something was about to happen, but whenever he tried to think about it he found nothing wrong. It was getting stronger, but by now he was ignoring it. Gareth didn't know his status, but if he did, it would be seen right away that he had a very special skill to him 'Main NPC' and this was why he felt uneasy recently. It was if from across time, space, or whatever this world was, he felt that something would soon happen that would change his life forever.

Ultima's countdown struck zero, the clock on Arron's computer hit midnight, the clock Gareth watched hit it at the same time in strangely perfect sync with the other two. A bell rung in Ultima's head as the numbers changed into letters and lines and words, the alarm on Arron's computer went letting him know how late it was, and Gareth heard the clock strike twelve times to remind everyone in the meeting room how late it was.

Ultima watched as a server list appeared, as to be expected from the menu option, he checked his server as it appeared named 'Larian' and found that there were thousands already connecting to it. He didn't have access to a forum, but he did have access to all the players connecting, and finally learned the name of his new reality as it was proudly displayed over every single server. He stood up as the seconds ticked by, and he looked to the camera in his room.

"Reality Dive, welcome to your new reality"

At first, one person appeared from thin air in the open woods next to a small settlement in the nation of Saris, across from the continent The Ark Organization dominated, then another appeared in the snowy mountains of a very well organized nation known as Taren to the north, one more in the islands of Jumbala, and it slowly grew. Dozens appeared at a time, covering woods, plains, mountains , and coasts in people of varying skin tones and plain clothing, equal mix of both men and women. There were so many options to be good on Larian, chaotic, lawful, or neutral. There only existed one truly evil option though that was presented to them, and despite the fact it was lawful evil of all things, it being the only evil option made it popular.

Compared to the trickle of dozens, at least two thousand people suddenly appeared in the woods and roads leading to the main HQ and largest base of The Ark Organization. They appeared suddenly on cameras and on satellite equipment, recording this all to see. 

Seconds, ticked by, and all of them collectively looked at each other, some waving to one another, some embracing, others beginning to cause trouble and fight. However, that all changed as alarms blared across the entire world. The detection of many people appearing at once out of thin air of course caused alarm. Regardless of their intentions, troops were rapidly sent out.

Ultima stared at the camera as a sudden and piercing alarm broke out, he turned away from it and stared at the door, before moving over to his bed and lying down.

Arron flinched as he received word about what just happened and the alarm was pulled which caused him to jump, he looked to Ultima's monitor and saw him already asleep now. He stood up and ran out of the room to quickly go meet with everyone else in the emergency meeting.

Gareth was shocked as the report was read out, and more were still coming in, it wasn't a one time thing. An emergency meeting was called quickly that dozens of officers and scientists flooded into. Gareth looked around the crowded room and made his way to Arron, who even compared to everyone else seemed the most nervous "Doc, what's up with you, this is crazy right?" he asked him, trying to touch his shoulder.

Arron looked at him "U-Ultima, Ultima...Ultima said he felt something coming, and then, then this happened!" he yelled, speaking too loud. Causing attention to turn to him, and the higher ups who just arrived at the meeting were the first to ask "What did he say?" amidst the sea of people who didn't know about project Ultima. 

Arron gulped at the question and realized he said too much "T-today, Ultima said he felt uneasy, he did! When I asked him to elaborate he only said it felt like, s-something was about to hap-happen" he choked out, watching the blonde and blue eyed superior turn to his other equals. They all exchanged looks "Arron, go get Ultima" the one man said after a few moments "Gareth, prepare your special unit for deployment. Your goal is to make contact with them all, from now on, this is to be named Operation: Appearance Act, got it?" he said. Gareth saluted and left, as Arron shuddered and ran back out.

Arron ran to Ultima's room and threw the door open, causing the soldier to only quietly stir and then sit up "Come with me right now Ultima! Something's happened!" he said, panting, his body aching. Ultima quietly stood up and began to follow him, managing to walk behind the tired man who attempted to continue running.

Ultima was already awake again before Arron arrived, as he just received a brand new mission for himself, the first one in awhile, and it gave him some information about what was going on.

Ultima walked into the room of mats and walked up to stand by officer Gareth, and he felt something strange as he stood by him, but he silently cursed his luck, how was his luck zero? This seemed to be a joke, because it would only serve to make him fall behind his own Officer in terms of finding good Players

He ignored the rising anger and remained neutral as Gareth explained the situation, hearing about the thousands of people who appeared and were beginning to congregate, their mission was to go and make contact with them. While he talked he took in the uniforms of everyone, they were all fully equipped and ready to fight, while he still had on his normal and plain clothes which were simple and not at all intimidating. Not to mention every single one of them had guns while he had no weapon, at least didn't appear to right now. 

Once he finished addressing everyone, Gareth turned to Ultima "Ultima, your orders are different from the others. I want you defending my flank incase any neutrals get too close to it, got it? Now go get suited up, your stuff is over in the corner, the higher ups want you to be a bit more protected than the other soldiers" Ultima nods and went over to the corner, where there was a small duffle bag of things.

He put on a heavy vest at first, and then some armored pants that were still comfortable despite the defense of them, it was still pretty lightweight, and just seemed like a bit better than what everyone else had. That was until he picked up a mask, rather than black, it was a muted rainbow color and left his eyes exposed. The second thing, and the more interesting to him, was a custom looking helmet, it depicted a unity symbol of the three primary colors on it's front, and other than that was an iridescent black. He put it on and walked back over to Gareth, able to see out of the clear glass in front with his cloud eyes still.

"Ready everyone! Move out!" he ordered, marching to the front and leading the way out of the HQ, Ultima following close behind him. He watched his flank as he ordered, they walked up four flights of stairs, and for the first time since arriving in this world, Ultima got to see the night sky, full of stars, but none recognizable to him. 

Other units were running around and preparing to defend HQ, but he followed Gareth and got into the shotgun seat of an armored van. Gareth got into the driver's seat and took off once everyone else was secure in the back. He stared out at the sky, watching not focusing on the blurry trees rushing by as they tore off down the path.

Ultima spoke up "Permission to speak sir?" he asked, and Gareth never heard him give this request before, Ultima usually didn't say anything unless asked to clarify or something "Permission granted" Gareth said.

"That uneasiness, you felt it too, didn't you?" he asked flatly. Making Gareth look over to him for just a second before turning back to the road "Yeah, I did, I still do" Gareth answered.

"So do I sir, I will defend you thoroughly" he said, despite the lack of emotion it sounded firm coming from the normally neutral soldier.

Gareth nodded "Thank you, Ultima. I'll try and keep you safe too. Whatever the hell is going on, we will both face it then. Hey, great minds think alike right? Maybe great minds also feel alike" he chuckled, nervous about all this. Ultima answered with a nod only while Gareth continued to drive, observing the updated relationship.

He quietly sighed as the lights finally picked up people, Gareth stomping on the breaks as they shone on dozens of people already, who were all looking at the armored van. Ultima took a deep breath before looking over to Gareth, who was moving to get out. Time to meet the players then, huh? Came quicker than he would've liked.