Chapter 135: UDM Pass

"What’s the most expensive item you got?" Fredrinn asked directly.

The sudden shift in the atmosphere was palpable. Max, Jenny, and Ash all stood frozen behind him, wondering why on earth Fredrinn was suddenly interrogating a deranged barista about pricing when they were supposed to be securing a shelter.

Billy’s synthetic smile remained perfectly fixed, though his eyes drifted slightly toward the ceiling as if scanning an unseen inventory log embedded in the air.

"That should be the UDM Pass, sir." Billy replied calmly.

"UDM Pass??? What’s that?" Fredrinn blinked.

That didn’t sound like something a cafe should have. A four-star hotel cafe selling overpriced lattes and stale croissants was normal enough, but an acronym that sounded like military hardware or a gladiator ticket had no business being on the menu.

"It’s a pass to join a death match for unique rewards, treasures, artifacts and many more, sir." Billy didn’t sound particularly excited when talking about the pass, but he had no choice. His voice had flattened out, sounding less like a cheery waiter and more like a pre-recorded broadcast forced out by a systemic script.

"Is that so? How much is it?"

Billy shrugged, "3 Zombie Cores."

Fredrinn’s eyes widened. He already needed the cores for completing his quest, but he didn’t know that those could be useful for trading as well.

Up until now, the system had simply tasked him with hunting down higher-tier infected to gather their cores for his personal growth and milestone unlocks. But hearing that they served as hard currency in a wider economy changed the entire board.

And after realizing that the cores were being used to trade, another question popped in his head.

"What else do you sell for Zombie Cores?" He asked.

Billy’s lips pressed in a thin line like he really didn’t want to be discussing about the things unrelated to his cafe, but he was bound by the duty or whatever sick magic Archive had done on him.

The man’s knuckles whitened against the edge of the register. It was obvious his emotions prioritized coffee, sandwiches, and small talk, yet the overarching rules of the Archive forced him to reveal the secret catalog when prompted directly.

"We sell Ancient Roots. Dungeon Maps. Starsteel Ingot. Beast Control Collars. And Shop Radar." Billy said briefly.

The names hung in the clean air of the cafeteria, heavy and completely alien to the modern world they once knew.

With every name that came out of his mouth, Ash, Max, Jenny and even Rose were beginning to understand that something was wrong or magical about Billy.

The idea that he was just a shell-shocked employee clinging to his old job dissolved into thin air. No broken survivor, no matter how traumatized, would start rattling off dungeon maps and starsteel ingots with a straight face.

Rose finally clapped her hands in realization, "Rose finally gets it. Oof, poor Billy."

That was all she said before going back to licking her lollipop. Her pink, heart-shaped eyes twinkled with amused pity.

Now that Fredrinn had peeled back the curtain, the succubus could easily sense the heavy, binding brand stamped onto the young man’s soul. He was trapped in an eternal corporate cage, immortal yet utterly stripped of autonomy.

"Is he like a magical itemshop like in the games???" Jenny questioned with sparkly eyes.

She leaned around Fredrinn’s shoulder, staring at Billy with open fascination.

For days, the apocalypse had been an endless nightmare of mud, blood, and decaying teeth.

Finding out that game-like elements—actual shops with magical artifacts—existed right in their backyard felt like a lifeline of hope.

"What are the death matches? And all those items sounds amazing, how can we get the zombie cores?" Max’s eyes widened. He was wasting time by circling around the cafe related questions, while a single question from Fredrinn revealed such magical things.

A surge of excitement cut through Max’s lingering grief. If these cores could purchase maps or rare materials, they held the key to pushing his strength far beyond what ordinary grinding could offer.

"Brother Fredrinn, can you ask him what the beast control collars are?" Ash asked with a frown, "We have yet to see any beasts, so does it mean that they are yet to come?"

The others realized the hidden meaning too as Fredrin decided to forward the question to Billy.

A cold chill settled over the group. If the apocalypse was evolving past simple zombies to introduce outright monsters, the current defenses of human survivors were going to be shattered in days.

Because Fredrinn was still standing in front of the counter, Billy wasn’t able to respond to other’s queries himself.

He operated strictly on the queue basis, making him ignore everyone and everything that wasn’t in front of him.

When Ash spoke, Billy’s eyes didn’t even twitch toward the boy; he remained rigidly locked onto Fredrinn, waiting for the active customer to speak.

"Beast Control Collars are used to control the beasts." Billy replied in short, uninterested in going in more detail.

"And what are beasts?" Fredrinn pushed for the answer.

"Beasts are unintelligent creatures with stronger physique when compared to zombies and humans." He shrugged.

The definition was dry, barebones, and delivered with the enthusiasm of an automated telephone menu.

Realizing that the answers weren’t really detailed and something Billy was interested to tell, Fredrinn decided to ask one final unrelated question. The question that Max had asked.

"What are the death matches?"

"Death matches are universal games that are viewed by the viewers across the Archive. You can get rewarded by artifacts and more if you win in them." Billy said.

Universal games? Viewers across the Archive?

’Lust, what do you know about these?’

He immediately reached out to the ancient entity residing in his core.

[ <LUST> recommends the host not to seek death. At current strength, host can die in the UDM. Kindly try it at a little higher level. ]

’Interesting...’ Fredrinn thought inwardly, narrowing his gaze at the mysterious shop he had stumbled upon.

He didn’t want to brag but he knew that he wasn’t weak by any means, but even then Lust was recommending him not to try?

He was a former high-tier mage from Apolasia, possessed a Level 9 Magical Circuit, commanded sound and elemental magic, and had a literal succubus as his bound thrall.

In the eyes of ordinary humans, he was an untouchable demigod. Yet Lust—an entity that rarely took anything seriously—flatly stated that he could perish in this Universal Death Match without hesitation.

That was surprising, to say the least.

Still, Fredrinn had no intention of going against Lust’s recommendation.

He knew that it wouldn’t actively try to harm or kill him, so the UDM really must be as dangerous as their name suggests. The system derived its entertainment and power from his conquests; getting him pulverized in an interstellar arena served neither of them.

Regardless, Fredrinn didn’t want to waste his time thinking over that. The death matches could wait until he farmed enough high-tier zombies and expanded his voluntary thralls. Right now, there was a much more pressing logistical question about their immediate surroundings.

"How many more ’stores’ or people like you exist in this hotel?" He asked Billy.