Read I See One Second Into The Future: Loner In The Apocalypse Chapter 41 online for free - AllNovelFull
Kairos looked up towards the hole within the ceiling. He wasn't sure if he wanted to close it up right away. Though he had reassured Nicole earlier about the concern about air, he couldn't help but also have those same concerns.
But in the end, he did it.
Then, he took a look at the energy remaining on the red prism.
[Energy: 13/1000]
It was a very small amount, but it should be enough for the purposes of getting out. While before, the red prism had a fairly strong glow, right now it was very dull.
The corner of Kairos' lip twitched as he came to a realization.
"Speaking of rationing, how long is that flashlight going to last?"
Chase seemed to come to a realization as he frowned.
"…I am not entirely sure, but the most it has lasted before was ten hours. Considering I have used this flashlight before without replacing the battery, an optimistic estimate is five."
With that, he turned it off, sending the room into darkness.
Kairos sighed.
"I guess we should only use it when we need to eat. To make use of that time, I guess that we should all eat quickly and at the same time."
Tori fumbled around in the darkness.
"Um, could you turn the light on for a second? I can't find my bag."
Chase let out a hum.
"It will be less than a second, get prepared to memorize everything."
With that, he turned the flashlight on for a split second, letting everyone catch sight of the surroundings for a split second before fading away.
Tori sighed.
"Ah, there's my bag!"
On other hand, Kairos froze up.
That was because he saw Sydney that was laying down on the ground, but with her eyes wide open. They were slightly bloodshot from what he could tell.
What creeped him out was the fact she was just laying down there expressionlessly, almost like she was still unconscious.
But the fact her eyes were open told a different story.
If it wasn't for that flash of light, he never would've even known.
Kairos began considering that it might've been a bad idea to bring Sydney along so easily, not to mention without so much as a restraint on her body. He frowned, wondering why he didn't even consider the possibility that Sydney might not be the most peaceful.
Kairos did not act out right away. Instead, he began wondering what exactly Sydney intended on doing.
"Anyways… we should be careful how we step. After all, one of us is unconscious right now and lying on the floor. It would probably be an unwelcome surprise if someone stepped on her."
Nicole let out a soft gasp.
"I should check up on her."
Kairos coughed.
"Maybe not right now?"
Nicole was confused.
"Eh? Why?"
Kairos scratched the back of his neck.
"What if you accidentally poke her eye because you couldn't see? I think we should wait a little while at least."
Nicole paused for a second.
"Um, ok?"
After a bit of silence, she spoke up.
"So should we turn on the light to put everything together?"
Kairos didn't respond immediately.
"…Alright."
He said it a little solemnly, which the rest of the group caught onto, but didn't really understand. After a bit of hesitation, Chase turned on the flashlight.
Kairos had his eyes dead set on where Sydney was earlier.
And when the light came on…
She wasn't there.
Kairos' eyes immediately widened as he frantically looked around. While the light from the flashlight covered most of the room, it didn't cover all of it. And strangely enough, Sydney wasn't anywhere to be seen.
Nicole gasped when she noticed this.
"Mom?"
She looked around with confusion.
"She was just here a moment ago."
Chase frowned before wordlessly pointing the flashlight towards one end of the room, then another.
Eventually, it landed on one corner.
Tori's grip on her sword became a little tighter.
"What the…"
Sydney was awkwardly cringing in that corner. She was facing away from everyone else, while her head was lowered and pressed up against the corner. She seemed to be fumbling with her hands, but as for what she was doing, that was unclear. As for her body, it was faintly trembling.
What topped it all off was the fact her body was emaciated, making her look even more like a monster.
Nicole's eyes widened considerably.
"You're up already? Are you… ok?"
All things considered, Sydney definitely did not seem ok. However, she did seem to react to Nicole's words.
Sydney slowly turned her head around with one hand on the side of her face.
Her eyes were twitching uncontrollably.
"I… I'm sorry."
Nicole took a few steps forward.
"Sorry? Sorry for what?"
Sydney suddenly clenched the hand on the side of her face, stretching out the skin. Then she closed her eyes tightly.
"I… I tried to eat you."
Nicole noticeably flinched when she heard that. However, she seemed to get over it quickly.
"You are that hungry? Quickly, you should get something to eat!"
She picked up the bag from the floor and hastily opened it. After pulling out a bag of bread, she slowly walked towards Sydney.
From her slow and hesitant steps, it was clear she was still a little afraid.
Kairos did not say anything, but he followed Nicole from behind. If he saw something out of hand happen he would act.
However, it seemed that his concerns were somewhat needless.
Sydney began trying to back away, but since she was already in the corner, the only thing she accomplished was pushing herself up against the wall.
"No, no. No… get away from me."
Sydney covered her face with both hands, as though not wanting anyone to look at her.
Nicole seemed to be a little less afraid, and more concerned as she walked a little faster.
"You have to eat something! You aren't thinking properly right now."
Sydney shook her head violently.
"No! No!"
She reached out with her hand as though wanting to push her back, but then retracted it seemingly out of fear.
Originally, Kairos had pressing worries on how they were going to manage their food if Sydney was so desperately hungry. However, the problem quickly reversed into finding a way to get her to eat in the first place.
Kairos had seen something like this before.
Anorexia.
It was when someone desperately didn't want to eat, the most common cause being the desire to lose weight in order to look a different way. However, the cause was definitely different here. The reason why it stood out to him was that he remembered this was something that Nicole dealt with before.
It came up just when their teenage years were starting, just barely thirteen. At the time, their relationship was still really close, essentially best friends.
Kairos wouldn't often get things like candies or snacks, but whenever he did, his first instinct was not to eat it himself, but to save it for Nicole. The only time when he ever did actually eat them was when he had at least two, so that one of them could be given away.
As for why he did that, it was as simple as the fact that he enjoyed sharing with Nicole.
There was nothing more than that.
However, one day, when he offered her a tiny chocolate egg, she refused it. Kairos didn't question it, and took the egg back. But he did feel a little sad. After some time, Kairos got back home and just stared at the chocolate egg instead of eating it.
But then, that egg melted.
So he threw it away, though he did think it was a waste.
The next day, he felt the urge to give Nicole something, thus taking one of his favorite snacks, a small pack of sweet and sour candy as he went outside.
Yet, when he met up with her and offered it, she still seemed reluctant.
Kairos couldn't help but ask why, prompting Nicole to respond by saying that she was full. He did feel a little sad again, but quickly thought of a solution.
On the next day, Kairos made sure to buy a pack of strawberry flavored bubblegum using his allowance money. While it was cheap, it was also most of his monthly allowance since his parents only gave him a little bit.
Though he didn't feel aggrieved over that loss at all.
For the third day, he met up with Nicole and offered her a piece of strawberry bubblegum. Initially, she refused, but Kairos insisted.
After all, it was gum, which wasn't supposed to be eaten.
Following that logic, Nicole ended up accepting it. She still hesitated before putting the gum in her mouth and after chewing only once, she stopped.
Kairos looked at her strangely, asking if the flavor was bad, all the while chewing on one himself.
However, Nicole shook her head as tears fell down her face. It was actually her favorite flavor. Though it seemed hard to do, she forced herself to continue slowly chewing.
Kairos panicked and ended up apologizing, thinking that he forced her to eat a bad flavor, even though he himself thought it tasted pretty good.
However, Nicole quickly clarified the situation. She told him about how she really didn't want to eat, even when it became really painful. For some reason, she began thinking that she was becoming ugly.
Kairos was completely blown away by this.
He couldn't comprehend why she thought this way, and said that he thought she was the prettiest in the world. Nicole didn't believe him, but he asserted this intently. It seemed that because his thoughts were genuine, it gradually rubbed off.
Nicole seemed quite happy because of it.
He brought over the gum for the next few days and chewed it with her. Though he didn't do more than that, it seemed to cheer Nicole up.
Kairos did notice that over the days she got uncomfortably skinny, but by the time the pack of gum ran out, she didn't seem against eating.
Though Kairos was actually a little afraid of the weight that she lost during that short time. Her parents didn't notice it, but with how often he was with her, it was quite noticeable.
Although that was not the longest of experiences, it was something that stuck with him.
Kairos looked at Sydney for a few moments, cowering away from the food. He slightly narrowed his eyes. Then, he walked over to his backpack and opened up a small compartment.
On the inside was an unopened packet of strawberry gum.
He came back, peeled it open and unwrapped a piece of the gum before handing it over to Sydney. Nicole seemed a little shocked when she saw it, but didn't say anything.
In the end, Sydney didn't even look towards the piece of gum. She kept her hands in front of her face, not even looking.
"Get away!"
Kairos crouched down and spoke softly.
"It's just a piece of gum. There's no food."
Sydney slowly averted her hand, peeking out from a small gap. She ended up cowering back and shaking her head.
"I… I don't want it."
Kairos could guess the reason why Sydney was so averse to eating food. He very clearly recalled all the half eaten bunnies that rested at her feet.
It seemed that Sydney had remembered that experience. Kairos himself knew how it felt to bite down like that as he did that before in desperation to kill a monster. It definitely wasn't comfortable.
She was traumatized by the very act of chewing itself, just like Nicole.
Kairos took a deep breath and put the piece of gum in his own mouth before chewing.
Sydney flinched at the sound.
Kairos spoke softly once more.
"It's just a piece of gum, with a sweet strawberry flavor. Want to try one?"
Sydney slowly moved the hands away from her face.
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Kairos slowly held out another piece of strawberry gum with his hand while softly chewing on the one in his mouth. Though this wasn't really the time, he couldn't help but think that it tasted pretty good.
In the end, though Sydney seemed scared, she reached out to take it.
There was a strong contrast between the smooth piece of gum and her wrinkled skin. But in the end, she wasn't able to put it into her mouth.
Kairos thought this might be because he couldn't normalize it, thus stood up and pulled another one out of the pack before handing it towards Nicole.
"Do you want one?"
Nicole blinked a few times before nodding.
"Um, yeah."
She gently reached out and took it before slowly unwrapping the piece of gum. Kairos then looked towards Chase and Tori.
"What about you guys?"
Chase shrugged his shoulders.
"It's a little weird you have gum in the apocalypse, but if we are going to be down here for a while… then it would be nice to have one."
Kairos flicked one over towards Chase, who caught it promptly. He then looked over to Tori and gave her a look when it seemed like she didn't really want one.
Tori seemed to catch on, nodding with a bit of hesitation.
"Sure."
Kairos tossed another one towards her.
It did not take long for the room to be filled with various chewing noises. Sydney looked around her a few more times before looking back at the piece of strawberry gum. Then, she slowly put it in her mouth.
Almost immediately, she began violently chewing down on it, a show of how hungry she really was. In reality, it did startle Kairos slightly, but he made sure not to show it, pretending it was completely normal.
Sydney forced herself to stop and grabbed onto the side of her head, groaning slightly.
Kairos slowly asked a question.
"Is the flavor of gum bad? You seemed to like it at first."
He purposely stayed on the word gum a little longer to more clearly show she wasn't eating flesh, but rather a piece of gum, so there was nothing to be concerned about.
Sydney shivered slightly before shaking her head.
"N-No."
She began chewing again, slow at first, but rapidly became quicker and quicker.
Kairos coughed a little when he saw this.
"Ah, I almost swallowed it, but you aren't supposed to eat gum, haha."
That was a lie, but it was supposed to wake up Sydney to make her realize she was just chewing on gum.
Thankfully, it seemed to work as she stopped chewing so obsessively on it. Kairos kept his eyes on her the entire time, trying to gauge any changes he saw.
And so, he was able to notice that Sydney was sneaking glances at the bag of bread Nicole was holding. She seemed to calm down considerably but was still a little jittery.
Kairos looked over to Nicole.
"Say, I'm a little tired of chewing on the gum."
He then spat it out, letting it land to the side.
"Could I have a piece of bread? I'm feeling a little hungry."
That wasn't exactly a lie, because he was definitely hungry. Nicole nodded slowly.
"O-Ok."
She seemed to catch on to what Kairos was doing, and also made her actions slow and gentle as she gave the piece of bread.
Kairos took it before slowly and deliberately chewing.
After taking a bite, he spoke up.
"Does anybody want one?"
Sydney practically instinctively raised her hand.
"A-Ah… I-I."
Kairos tilted his head to the side.
"Oh, you want some?"
He turned to Nicole.
"Why don't you give her the bag so she can take as many as she wants."
In response, Nicole nodded hurriedly.
"Yes!"
Sydney grabbed onto the bag with both hands a little tightly. She reached in and anxiously took one, but before eating it, she let the piece of gum fall out of her mouth slowly.
Sydney slowly raised one bread up to her mouth, before taking a small bite. Then, she began eating ravenously, no longer holding back. She ate it quite messily, holding onto multiple pieces and clenching onto them tightly.
Considering that it did not even take a minute for her to finish the entire bag, it showed how hungry she was. By the end, she began panting slightly, but it seemed to be out of relief.
A few seconds later, she let out a gasp.
"Ah! I'm… I'm sorry…"
Kairos shrugged his shoulders.
"It's fine. You were just a little hungry."
That being said, he couldn't help but feel a little jealous that she had eaten the whole bag when that was what he wanted to do. Nonetheless, he just continued to eat the piece that he was holding onto.
Kairos then walked back over to the others and looked over his shoulder, towards Sydney.
"Are you going to come back now?"
Sydney held onto the side of her head uncomfortably, but seemed to be more or less fine now.
"Ah… ok, ok."
They went back together as a group back near the center. Upon reaching there, Chase ended up scratching the back of his head.
"Um… what now?"
Kairos scratched his head.
"I guess turn off the light and catch up on some sleep. We were trying to sleep before all of this, after all."
Tori chuckled.
"Ah, that's convenient. Now I won't have to take watch."
Kairos cracked his neck.
"Just don't make too much sound, and we should be fine. Remember we are hiding, because of…"
He narrowed his eyes.
"The Red Priest we pissed off earlier."
Sydney's eyes widened slightly.
"Eh? What happened before?"
Kairos rolled his shoulder.
"There was a giant red eye that looked down at us. The reason we are hiding out here in the first place is in hopes that they don't find us. If we stay down here long enough, they should stop looking and we can probably leave."
Sydney seemed slightly taken aback.
"So… we shouldn't be eating too much…"
Kairos sighed.
"We should be rationing food, but not starving ourselves to death. Eating when we really have to is natural."
He massaged his temple.
"Anyway, we can talk about this later. I still didn't get much sleep. Since we won't have much to do, this is the best opportunity for us to take some rest. Who knows how long we will have to wait later on?"
With that, he laid down on the floor, shifting uncomfortably. His head was aching slightly, making him just want to lay down.
Chase seemed to more or less agree as he had turned off the flashlight and also laid down on the ground.
A few snoring sounds filled the air, coming from Tori and Sydney. It seemed that they were both quite tired.
A little while later, Chase had fallen asleep as well.
Kairos yawned and was about to drift off along with the rest of them, but Nicole grabbed onto his hand before he did so.
She whispered to him.
"Th-Thank you for helping my mom."
Kairos closed his eyes with a slight grumble.
"No problem."
He rested his head against one of the red veins that were on the floor and fell asleep before Nicole could say anything more.
…
Kairos saw himself walking home from school. At the time, he was walking home with Nicole, but there was a slight frown on his face, displeased about something.
On the other hand, Nicole had a really excited expression.
She hugged Kairos tightly and giggled.
"Let's go to the park! We haven't been there since last week!"
Kairos did not respond at first.
Nicole lowered her head and peeked at his face.
"Is that a yes? Or…"
Kairos shook his head.
"We still have to do our homework, don't we?"
Nicole seemed taken aback.
"Ehhh? But we didn't even get that much, and we haven't been to the park in so long!"
Kairos clicked his tongue.
"We aren't kids anymore. Instead of playing, we should be working."
Nicole visibly recoiled before shaking Kairos a little.
"Earth to Kairos? Are you there? You must've been replaced by an alien!"
Kairos narrowed his eyes.
"I'm right here in front of you. It seems like you are the one that needs glasses."
Nicole pouted slightly.
"Gah… Why are you being so uptight? It's not like we are actually adults! When we grow older it's going to be all boring all the time, we should play around while we have the chance!"
Kairos continued walking forward, not even sparing her a glance.
"Being a kid is more than just being young, and being an adult is more than just being over eighteen. It's also about changing as a person. And I have changed to not wanting to go to the park anymore."
Nicole let out an unsatisfied grumble.
"Then let's just stay kids forever! I don't want to grow up!"
Kairos lowered his head.
"Growing up isn't a choice you get to make. It just happens."
He frowned.
"Plus, it's already too late. I said this before."
Kairos adjusted his glasses.
"We aren't kids anymore."
…
Kairos woke up, feeling uncomfortable.
And soon enough, he found the source.
Someone's leg was on his chest.
He furrowed his brows and pushed it off. Soon after, Tori let out a groan.
"Hmm…"
After the sound of rustling and a yawn, she spoke once more.
"Why are you pushing me around? That's rude."
Kairos clicked his tongue.
"Why did you think my chest was a good place to put your leg? It made it awkward to breathe."
Tori grumbled.
"Hey, hey, I can't help that I move around a lot in my sleep, but you didn't have to push me."
Kairos rolled his eyes.
"Just because you didn't mean to do it, doesn't change the fact that you did."
Tori chuckled.
"Oh, so what if I told you that I meant to put my leg there? I'm sure that would change how you felt, no?"
The corner of Kairos' lip twitched.
"…Fair enough."
Their conversation ended up waking the others up. Nicole sat up and let out some satisfied grunting noises as she stretched.
"Good morning!"
Chase grumbled.
"Is it even morning?"
Kairos let out a soft hum.
"Our internal clocks are probably going to get really messed up by this."
Sydney let out a random comment.
"My hands feel quite strange… My face feels a little strange as well."
Kairos' eyebrow twitched.
"Um… you lost a bit of weight when you fought earlier."
Sydney gasped.
"I did?"
After a few rubbing noises, she exclaimed once more.
"Oh, dear… I did. But I've done exercise before and it hasn't been that drastic."
Kairos couldn't help but open his mouth with the urge to ask, 'Do you not remember what you did?'
However, he also thought that might trigger a bad memory, thus he shut his mouth.
Tori let out a dissatisfied sigh.
"It reeks of blood."
Kairos raised an eyebrow.
"It always reeked of blood."
Tori mumbled.
"But this is different… if we were in the middle of a battle then it would at least help pump up the adrenaline, but now it's just stinky."
Kairos rolled his eyes, not responding to it.
Sydney spoke up, but in the form of an embarrassed mumble.
"How will we decide when we eat?"
Chase responded fairly promptly.
"Considering that we have at least eaten somewhat regularly beforehand, we shouldn't eat for quite a while."
Kairos brushed off some dried blood that had formed on his knuckles.
"And why is that?"
Chase let out a soft hum.
"Well, right now our bodies expect a normal amount of food intake and are operating off that basis. If we continue to do so, they will also operate on the same capacity. If we want to make the most of our food, we first have to stop eating."
Kairos nodded.
"For how long?"
Chase sighed.
"We shouldn't think about how long. If all of our thoughts are about food, then it will quickly drain us and make us even more tired than before. The way I survived starvation before was distracting myself."
Kairos put a finger on his chin.
"Fair enough. What should we talk about?"
Tori let out a soft gasp as though she had been enlightened.
"Oh, what about how to use our points?"
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Kairos hesitated on the sentiment of using points. However, he already trusted these other people to a certain extent. He at least dared to sleep in a completely dark room with them. Though that was more because of the circumstance rather than actual trust, since nobody tried to take advantage of another's vulnerability, Kairos thought it was ok.
"…I guess we can share each other's stats."
Though Kairos couldn't see anything in the darkness, he could still feel that Chase was surprised just from the silence.
Tori didn't seem to realize this, and opened up her status panel straight away.
"This is mine."
[Status]
[ID: 133543657645]
[Rank: F]
[Objective: Survive]
[Proof Of Perfection Points: 27.2]
[Strength – 2.7
Agility – 4.9
Endurance – 1.5
Willpower – 4.9
Mana Capacity – 0.0
Magic Affinity – 0.0]
[Special Abilities: N/A]
[Hide]
Though there was still no light, that panel glowed enough to be visible, but just didn't light anything else up.
Kairos was a little surprised at how readily she shared the status panel, but decided to just look at all the stats first. Something that really stood out to him was her staggeringly low endurance, despite her other stats being high.
He pointed this out.
"Um, why did you max agility and willpower when you hardly had anything in endurance?"
Tori raised an eyebrow.
"Why would I do that? If I put it all into one, then the values go super high! If it's all spread out, then they are all so low."
Kairos couldn't help but furrow his brows.
"Specializing in something is normal, but you can't lag behind in other aspects too much or they will become crucial weaknesses."
Tori shrugged her shoulders.
"Alright, alright. It's not like I didn't add anything at all to it, I gave a bit. Plus, I was going to do it, but then you told me not to because of food or something!"
Kairos blinked a few times. It didn't occur to him before, but he couldn't help but think that Tori was a little weird. As he thought back on the past experiences he had with her, this feeling of weirdness became stranger.
Perhaps that should've been clear when she took a hostage to become allies with the group that opposed her.
It just really… didn't make sense.
Though the more jarring thing to Kairos was how easily Tori trusted them. Even Chase woke up with a nightmare just sleeping next to them, and wouldn't go to sleep easily himself on the first day.
However, Tori didn't even slightly care, sleeping as though there wasn't even an apocalypse. If they wanted to kill her, it would've been incredibly easy. And there was a perfectly good reason to, her katana.
Sydney let out a soft hum.
"The maximum points is just a little away from five?"
Kairos cleared his throat.
"Yes, until you evolve it seems."
Chase let out a soft hum.
"It looks like you have enough to max them all out to have over twenty left over."
Kairos nodded.
"Evolving will take twenty points, so that works out nicely."
He took off his glasses for a moment, trying to see if there would be anything different.
There were two changes.
[Rank: 46/100 Evolution Energy – 50 required for Rankup]
[Inborn Abilities: N/A]
The first thing Kairos noted was that she seemed to have a lower total evolution energy compared to him. He wasn't sure if that just varied from person to person, or if one of them was an exception. Though after seeing the others, it would probably reveal the answer to his question.
The lack of inborn abilities immediately made Kairos come to the conclusion that her ability to disappear into mist should come from the katana.
At least, that was what made the most sense.
Tori seemed to feel pretty good about her points.
"Heh, I've basically already caught up to you, Kairos!"
Kairos shrugged his shoulders.
"I guess."
Tori let out a soft hum.
"So after I max out all my stats, I can evolve, then I can increase my agility even further."
Kairos blinked a few times.
"There's something else you need to evolve."
Tori seemed surprised.
"Eh? What is it?"
Kairos paused for a moment.
"I'm not sure, but it seems related to all that red stuff that always shows up."
Tori seemed a little upset.
"…Oh."
Kairos rolled his eyes.
"You will probably get the option sooner or later."
Chase let out a soft hum.
"Hey, why does your objective say survive?"
Tori seemed confused.
"Um, I don't know."
Chase waited a few seconds before opening his own status panel.
[Status]
[ID: 734513523564]
[Rank: F]
[Objective: Survive]
[Proof Of Perfection Points: 15.2]
[Strength – 3.8
Agility – 4.2
Endurance – 3.5
Willpower – 4.0
Mana Capacity – 4.9
Magic Affinity – 4.9]
[Special Abilities: N/A]
[Hide]
Chase seemed a little surprised.
"It appears that my objective has also changed to be the same."
Tori gasped.
"You have so many points in mana and magic."
Kairos couldn't help but look at the maxed out mana capacity and magic affinity.
"You were able to add points into your magic stats?"
Chase sounded confused.
"What? Are you not able to?"
Kairos furrowed his brows.
"…I was only able to after evolving, because it gave me a tenth of a point in each. Without it, I wouldn't have been able to cast anything."
He then thought of the inborn abilities, thinking that it could be because of that.
[Rank: 45/100 Evolution Energy – 50 required for Rankup]
[Inborn Abilities: Hero (Null)]
However, the moment he saw the ability name, it just didn't seem to be the cause. Considering that it was grayed out and the strange 'Null', it made Kairos feel that whatever it was, that the effect shouldn't be active.
Chase took a deep breath.
"Huh. Now that I think about it, I believe I know the cause."
Tori sounded excited.
"Oh, I would like to have magic in advance too."
Chase stammered.
"Uh, I don't think it will work like that."
Tori sounded upset.
"Huh? You're not going to share how you did it?"
Chase responded calmly.
"I will share, it simply isn't easily replicable. When the red sun first came, a bit of sunlight shone from the window and onto my chest. It was extremely painful for my heart, and seemed to change it on a fundamental level."
He sighed.
"I always thought it was useless, but I suppose I shouldn't complain since it gave me early access to magic."
Sydney seemed a little lost.
"…The red sun?"
She ended up opening her own status panel.
[Status]
[ID: 423632551433]
[Rank: F]
[Objective: Evolve]
[Proof Of Perfection Points: 10.2]
[Strength – 4.3
Agility – 3.7
Endurance – 4.9
Willpower – 4.1
Mana Capacity – 0.0
Magic Affinity – 0.0]
[Special Abilities: Gnawing Hunger (F-)]
[Evolve]
[Hide]
Tori spoke out first.
"Why are your excess points so low? You killed so many things. Were you adding them while we weren't looking?"
Sydney sounded confused.
"What?… No, I haven't been. These are much higher than the ones I remember."
Nicole let out a soft mutter.
"Gnawing hunger?"
Sydney gasped.
"What? When did that get there?"
Kairos furrowed his brows.
"It seems like you somehow created an ability for yourself. Though it really does seem like you should have more extra points on you."
Sydney was a little exasperated.
"But… I really don't remember adding those points. Seriously!"
Kairos took off his glasses.
[Rank: 97/100 Evolution Energy – 50 required for Rankup]
[Inborn Abilities: N/A]
"I do believe you, but somehow or another, you seem to be using up your points."
He came to the conclusion that she either genuinely forgot that she did add them, or they were somehow used up automatically.
Kairos felt that the second option was more likely, especially because of the gnawing hunger ability.
Though one thing that made him more concerned was the extremely high evolution energy that Sydney had. Even when Kairos stood next to the red rain for extended periods of time, his total amount didn't reach close to Sydney's.
He didn't think that there was anything that should've increased it so dangerously other than her exposure to the red sun. Unless… the incident where Sydney rushed out to all the bunnies was to be considered.
Nicole let out a soft gasp
"The objective is to evolve, and there is even a button…"
Kairos frowned slightly.
"You have the option to evolve, so you should save your points and evolve once you can."
Chase disagreed.
"But wouldn't it be better to increase the other stats for immediate gain? Then she can also gain more points when killing other things. Or does evolving present some other boon, other than costing so many points?"
Kairos narrowed his eyes.
"I just… have a feeling."
He didn't know how else to explain the anxiety that the 97/100 gave him. Kairos thought about the people transforming into monsters and how Sydney herself mentioned she almost tried to eat someone.
There seemed to be some correlation to transforming and a high amount of evolution energy.
Maybe if someone exceeded their cap, then that would start the process that turns them into a monster.
Sydney seemed rather casual about her situation.
"I think it will be fine. My stats are already close to the limit, so increasing them won't matter too much."
Nicole coughed.
"Um… should I show mine?"
It was a question meant for Kairos, but Tori spoke up first.
"Why not?"
And so, under that pressure, Nicole shared hers.
[Status]
[ID: 934783245676]
[Rank: F]
[Objective: Survive]
[Proof Of Perfection Points: 20.5]
[Strength – 4.8
Agility – 4.9
Endurance – 4.5
Willpower – 4.8
Mana Capacity – 0.0
Magic Affinity – 0.0]
[Special Abilities: N/A]
Tori spoke up and seemed confused.
"You already added all your points? When did you do that?"
Nicole seemed flustered.
"Eh? I added a little…"
Kairos' eyes widened considerably when he saw the panel. All of the stats were almost at max. It immediately made him think of the red watch.
As dots connected in his mind, he quickly realized that the watch seemed to increase points somewhat based on the amount of things killed. That was what let Nicole get so many points naturally.
He couldn't help but wonder if the red watch should be rotated around so that they all could get this benefit.
…Maybe in the future, but now was too soon.
Kairos looked at her status panel without the glasses.
[Rank: 37/100 Evolution Energy – 50 required for Rankup]
[Inborn Abilities: Lost (Null)]
The rank was normal, but Nicole also seemed to have some strange ability, but it was grayed out like Chase's.
Chase spoke up.
"It seems that our group is going to have a few E ranks soon."
Then he let out a soft sigh.
"Anyways, there's only one person left we haven't seen."
Kairos blinked a few times.
"…Here is mine."
[Status]
[ID: 345315364923]
[Rank: E-]
[Objective: Survive]
[Proof Of Perfection Points: 7.4]
[Stats –
Strength – 4.9
Endurance – 4.9
Agility – 4.9
Willpower – 4.9
Mana Capacity – 5.0
Magic Affinity – 3.0]
[Special Abilities: Fire Spell (F), Pulse Spell (F)]
[Hide]
Kairos' immediate thought was that his available points were pitifully low for how many things he had killed. Everyone else had points in the double digits, and some far into that amount.
Then Chase spoke up.
"…So I was right."
Kairos clicked his tongue.
"Yeah, yeah."
Nicole furrowed her brows.
"Eh? Right about what?"
Kairos pressed his lips together.
"It doesn't really matter."
As for what Chase was looking at, it was Kairos' ID. He recognized it because he had seen it before. After all, when Kairos first encountered him, Chase was repeating his ID.
Chase laughed.
"You really… stand out, huh? I wonder what-"
"Quiet."
Kairos furrowed his brows.
Chase clicked his tongue.
"Hey I-"
"Seriously."
Kairos narrowed his eyes.
"…Don't make a sound."
Everyone fell silent by Kairos' request.
And at first, there was only silence.
But then, there were these strange, but familiar, bristling sounds. After a few moments, it became quite easy to make out numerous of these sounds coming from almost everywhere around them.
They were quite hard to distinguish, as they didn't exactly sound like anything recognizable. It made the actual meaning of the sound a little confusing.
Then out of nowhere, there was an abrupt slam that came from above them before a loud screech. It seemed that whatever was above them, knew that they were down there.
Countless more slamming noises resounded as more aggressive screeching rang out.
The ground had begun shaking, and that could be clearly felt by everyone involved. Everyone had fallen silent due to fear, but this prompted Kairos to frown as he felt that it was too late.
This process had continued for over ten minutes, just relentless banging and screaming. However… it eventually died down.
Yet, while those sounds gradually disappeared, the bristling sounds were still there. They were quite hard to make out and extremely muffled, but they were still there.
Kairos spoke quietly.
"Get closer to the center so we can talk without as much noise."
Whatever was above them didn't seem to be triggered by that noise. As they shuffled closer, someone ended up banging into someone else, but they only let out a faint grunt. However, they were able to make it to the center.
Kairos spoke softly.
"Now, let's sit down."
With a few shuffling sounds, everyone did as told. He then let out a gentle sigh.
"All of us were negligent and forgot the reason why we were here in the first place, to hide."
The breathing sounds coming from everyone were quite heavy. This paired with the bristling sounds that still came from above them made the atmosphere a little scary.
Kairos pressed his lips together.
"From now on, we need to be quieter. Much quieter."
Nicole took a slow and deep breath.
"What was that?"
Kairos closed his eyes, which didn't really change anything considering it was all black. But he recalled that vision he had of those strange monsters with hair on their back.
"Probably a special kind of monster."
From what he could guess, it was probably just the things from his vision.
Though Kairos wasn't sure how they had gotten here, he didn't think that the monsters finding out was life-threatening. At least, not directly.
After all, it seemed that while the monsters were strong, they couldn't seem to damage the material that the red prism had created.
At this point, given how little energy was left in the red prism, there wasn't much option for them left. They either had to continue hiding, or get out and fight.
Frankly, Kairos did not believe that they would be able to fight the monsters, especially since they would have to come out one at a time, and immediately be surrounded by whatever they were.
He took in a shaky breath.
"At this point, we have committed to hiding. The only thing that we can hope, is those things think that the sound was just some sort of coincidence."
Chase seemed a little distraught.
"Though I expect it from other people, I never thought I would be this negligent."
Kairos massaged his temple with the tip of his finger.
"I imagine it is because all of us felt quite safe in this room, away from all the other things. However, in reality we are not all that safe."
Tori spoke up with hesitation.
"I still hear that strange sound."
She was referring to the bristling. Nicole's voice was shaky as she said her piece.
"Are we going to die?"
Sydney's breathing had become erratic.
"We were found out."
Kairos took a deep breath.
"Don't panic. They might not know just yet."
He pressed his lips together.
"Let's just stay silent now."
With that, the group fell quiet.
However, those bristling sounds indicating the presence of monsters did not go away. Nonetheless, everyone stayed quiet.
Once a few minutes passed, everyone started to get a little anxious.
After twenty minutes, they got even more worried.
And after an hour, a few people were beginning to lose hope.
The bristling sounds were still there.
Tori took in a shaky breath.
"Am I really going to die like this?"
Kairos let out a soft sigh.
"If one of us speaks up too loudly, then probably yes."
Though he was trying to keep his composure, he was also feeling quite aggrieved as well. The constant bristling sound was beginning to wear him down. It didn't help that the stench of blood had become revolting and they were in a completely dark environment.
At this point, Chase spoke up softly.
"…We can't keep going like this. I said before that if we only think about food, we will be mentally drained, but if we stay like this in fear the entire time the result will still be the same."
Kairos lowered his head.
"Then what should we do?"
Chase seemed to be at a loss for words, however, he spoke up eventually.
"We can very quietly share stories. Get to know each other better."
Sydney let out a soft groan.
"I don't think I can get myself in the mood for telling stories right now."
Chase took a deep breath.
"Then… how about listening?"
Sydney muttered.
"I suppose I don't have a choice in that matter."
Chase sighed.
"Let's just convince ourselves that we are camping, and sharing stories with each other. The reason why we are quiet is because we don't want to wake the others up from sleeping. As for those sounds, it's just grass being blown by the wind."
Tori stammered.
"Th-That sounds much better."
Chase let out a suppressed chuckle.
"Do you want to start with the story then?"
Tori hummed.
"Why not?"
A few rustling sounds came from her direction, probably because she was repositioning herself.
"Hmm. What kind of story should I tell? Something funny, or maybe my life story?"
Chase seemed to not be as fearful anymore, responding cheerfully.
"That's the beauty of it, you can do whatever you want. Just make sure to be quiet so you don't wake up the others."
Tori seemed encouraged by this.
"Then I will just say whatever comes to mind."
She already seemed to forget the situation they were in.
"My dad owns a dojo, though I never really knew why. He always complained that it was so much work and hardly got any money, but whenever the topic of selling it or giving it away was brought up, he would ignore it."
Tori sounded a little exasperated.
"But it wasn't enough for him to just manage to dojo by himself, he would always bring me along. Because of that, I spent almost all of my childhood just in the dojo, swinging around a wooden katana."
Kairos raised an eyebrow.
"So that's why you can swing that thing so easily."
Tori seemed a little embarrassed.
"Haha, I'm still nowhere close compared to the better people at swordsmanship. Though I did practice nearly everyday, so I'm still not too bad."
Nicole let out a faint gasp of amazement.
"Wow, I bet you had a lot to talk about with your friends."
For some reason Tori didn't respond for a while.
Nicole sensed this awkward tension.
"Um, I'm sorry, did I say something wrong?"
Tori let out a suppressed giggle.
"I, um. Never had any friends."
Sydney seemed quite surprised.
"Eh? Not even one friend? There must've been at least one person, right?"
Tori let out a soft grumble.
"N-No. Apparently I was known as the weird girl."
Sydney didn't seem to believe this.
"Maybe not in school, but surely you met others in the dojo?"
A few rustling sounds came from Tori's direction.
"The only people that came for lessons were guys. They did try to talk to me at first, but after I lost a spar with my dad pretty badly, none of them really talked to me anymore."
Kairos blinked a few times.
"Why would losing a spar make them stop talking to you?"
Tori began rubbing the tip of her finger against the ground, making a barely audible rubbing sound.
"Um, he said that nobody should be as weak as a girl, so they needed to be at least at my standard. And um, if anybody lost a spar to me, then they would be expelled."
Sydney seemed quite offended.
"How could your own father do that?"
Chase interrupted the conversation.
"Remember we don't want to wake the others up, it's the middle of night after all."
Sydney apologized.
"Sorry, sorry."
Tori let out a grumble.
"I don't think my dad had any bad intentions. He's usually really nice, but I think he wanted to encourage the others. Nobody sparred with me unless my father forced them to."
She sighed.
"And each time, they wouldn't hold back in the slightest, even using dirty tactics if they needed to win."
Kairos tilted his head to the side.
"Ah. That's why you wanted to join a team so badly."
Tori seemed confused.
"Eh? How is that related?"
Kairos blinked a few times, wondering if he should really say it.
"I guess it just sounds like you were lonely."
Tori stammered.
"We-Well… only a little bit."
Sydney reached out and patted her on the back.
"You may not have had friends then, but you have them now. All of us are here now."
Tori sounded embarrassed.
"A-Ah. Yeah."
She seemed to cheer up quite a bit.
"What about you guys? Do you have any stories to share?"
There were a few moments of silence. Just before it got too awkward, Chase spoke up.
"I suppose I can go next. There was a time when I did not know much about archery…"
He suddenly trailed off.
With his future vision, Kairos could tell Tori was going to ask why, so he dashed forth and covered her mouth tightly with his hand. He could feel Tori struggle, but did not relent.
Muffled voices came from above.
"They aren't here, second disciple. What do you have to say about your failure today?"
"Priest. I. Am. Sorry."
Kairos couldn't help but furrow his brows. As for Tori, she seemed to understand the situation and stopped struggling.
The voices continued to speak.
"And how is sorry supposed to help?"
A loud smack resounded.
"What kind of performance is this? The church of evolution's ultimate goal is the pursuit of perfection, yet you can't even succeed in your mission? How are you supposed to be perfect this way?"
"I. Will. Not. Make. Same. Mistake."
There was the sound of a deep sigh.
"There better not be. Do not forget that I did not have to give my blessings to you. Someone else can receive them on your behalf, and become the new second disciple."
"Understood."
Although things were a little too close, Kairos still felt a sense of relief.
They did not find them.
Unfortunately, that didn't stay for long.
"Keep the minions stationed here! Until we find a method to retrieve the holy stone, nobody may set their foot on the ground created by the blessed prism!"
He muttered the last part.
"Even if the ones that created it were heathens…"
There were very faint sounds of footsteps leaving, however, the strange bristling sound remained this entire time. Kairos had almost deluded himself into thinking that it was just the wind blowing by grass.
But it definitely wasn't that.
Everybody sat there in silence for a while. Kairos slowly removed his hand away from Tori's mouth, and couldn't help but feel a little aggrieved.
Sydney whispered as softly as she could.
"Are we safe now?"
Kairos clenched his fist.
"They are guarding this place. If we leave now, we will get captured by them."
It seemed that their stay underground wasn't over just yet.
Report chapter
They were back to only hearing those strange bristling sounds. The immediate threat of The Red Priest finding them was gone, but they still didn't exactly have a way out. Chase was no longer really in the mood for storytelling, and nobody else really cared to listen.
In the end, they sat around for hours with a strange tension.
As for time, there was nothing that they could use to tell it. At some point, Nicole couldn't help but speak up.
"I don't have to eat, but I would just like to say I feel really hungry."
Chase took a deep breath.
"We should still wait. Just a little bit longer."
Sydney hesitantly spoke up.
"How long are we going to wait for?"
Kairos massaged his temple with the tip of his finger.
"We don't exactly have the best measurement of time. The only thing we have is to guess."
Sydney stammered.
"S-So how long do we wait?"
Kairos shut his eyes.
"How about this? We will each take turns to wait, and when that person feels it is time, is when we have a small meal."
Chase hummed.
"But we also have to limit how much we consume. If not, it will naturally incline people to eat as much as possible."
Kairos furrowed his brows.
"I suppose we will just have to trust everyone on that front. We can use the alphabet and the order of letters in our names for this order. That means Chase will be the first, and I will be second."
Tori could not help but speak up.
"…What if we just all evolved and tried to fight against all of the things above us?"
Kairos lowered his head and thought about it.
"The only issue stems from how fast the red priest guy and his lackeys. I don't doubt that we would be able to clear whatever he referred to as minions, but the same can not be said for the others."
Tori sounded a little aggrieved.
"It can't be that bad, right? We are stronger now."
Kairos sighed.
"And they probably are too. If you remember what happened before, we all tried to fight against them, but each time they were far stronger than us. If they didn't just let us pass, then every single one of us would've lost our respective battle."
He narrowed his eyes.
"Then there's that strange ability that the red priest himself has. It seems to restrain us based on our mutations."
Tori muttered.
"So we just have to wait here?"
Kairos shrugged his shoulders.
"If it really comes down to it, then we can try that tactic. But regardless, we have to wait for now. That red priest is probably nearby."
Tori paused.
"I guess it can't be helped."
With that, a looming silence fell down on the group. More hours passed by as the only sound was the strange bristling coming from above.
Nicole began panting.
"I… I really want to eat something."
She spoke as though she was slightly drunk. As for Kairos himself, he was also feeling a little dizzy, but his willpower stat was enough for him to push through it.
But then, he recalled that Nicole's willpower was basically the same amount.
If she was really feeling this way, then it must actually be pretty bad.
After a moment of deliberation, Chase sighed.
"Alright, I guess we should start now."
He turned on the flashlight, making everyone squint due to the sudden exposure to light. And once their vision did clear up, it revealed Tori already eating something. When Chase saw this, he couldn't help but get incensed.
Kairos saw in his future vision that he would begin yelling, so he quickly grabbed onto his shoulder.
"We have to be quiet."
Chase had just taken a deep breath, but hearing that, he let it out slowly. Right afterwards, he began interrogating Tori.
"Why did you already start eating something?"
Tori blinked a few times obliviously.
"It was just a little snack!"
Chase clenched his fist tightly, until veins began popping out, but quickly relaxed.
"A small snack will essentially be an entire meal for us while we are down here."
Tori flinched.
"What? I thought we were rationing, not starving ourselves to death."
Kairos sighed.
"We can just say you started eating early, just don't do it again."
Tori nodded.
"Um, ok."
Chase began opening up the bags, taking out a few packages.
"If we want to go on a starvation diet, I believe you eat about six hundred calories a day. That way, the body is forced to slow itself down. However, since we obviously need more food than usual, that means a general estimate could be three times that, two thousand and four hundred."
Kairos scratched the side of his head.
"Guess we follow the labels on these things."
With that, the group began to eat their fill. Everyone more or less followed the guideline set, eating just two thousand and four hundred calories. However, nobody seemed even slightly satisfied.
Kairos felt a little better, but was still a little dizzy.
"…Felt like I just ate air."
Chase furrowed his brows and held onto the side of his head.
"Yeah, that's normal."
Sydney seemed to be holding back her drool.
"Can we… really not eat any more?"
Chase scanned the various bags.
"From what I can tell, unless we start eating raw rice, we are going to run out of food in three days. That is, unless we are willing to start a fire and sacrifice something to burn for the sake of cooking this rice."
He narrowed his eyes.
"And that is with how we are eating right now."
Kairos clicked his tongue.
"I didn't think our situation was this bad. Our bags were almost full…"
Chase sighed.
"It doesn't seem like we can wait it out. We will have to decide on either tomorrow or the day after to get out."
Kairos took a deep breath.
"I am pretty sure I can only make a relatively small hole above us to get out. So perhaps we should discuss how to deal with that."
With that, people began proposing various ideas, but nobody was into it. It seemed that the lacking meal they just had made it hard for anyone to feel enthusiasm.
Eventually, Kairos just sighed.
"Maybe we should just try to sleep the time away."
It didn't seem like anyone was against it. Though nobody was too sure how long ago they had slept, they also didn't care enough.
Another few rough hours passed.
Kairos eventually woke up, but felt like he hadn't slept at all. It seemed that most of the others had a similar sentiment.
Nicole was breathing heavily.
"Has it… has it been a day yet?"
If Kairos was to say whether or not it felt like a day, he would say it felt like two. However, he didn't think a full day had actually passed.
"I don't think so."
Sydney began biting the edge of her thumb.
"But we have been sleeping for so long. If anything, it should be more than a day, right?"
Chase took a deep breath.
"I don't remember feeling this bad, even when I went on the starvation diet before. I must've miscalculated how much we actually needed."
Kairos massaged his temple with the tip of his finger.
"Then maybe we can eat a little earlier than usual."
In perfect honesty, he did not want to say that. However, he could also feel his own thoughts become muddled. Kairos felt like if he didn't eat soon, he would be teetering on the very precipice of death.
After a few moments of silence, Chase turned on the flashlight.
Everyone began eating once more, hardly able to wait. However, as they were looking at the various packages, the flashlight began flickering.
It stabilized a moment later, but soon died off.
Chase cursed, trying to flick the switch on and off. Though it would occasionally light up for a second, that was it. He began shaking the flashlight too, but in the end it didn't really work.
He sighed with a bit of frustration.
"Try to judge how much you should eat by yesterday's standards."
There was a moment of silence after he said that. It seemed that countless thoughts were rushing through each person's mind. However, everything felt relatively tame at first.
Yet, just after a few moments, it became clear that everyone was eating more than they should. Even Kairos couldn't stop himself, as he kept thinking that maybe he could just have a little more.
Chase eventually decided to try and stop this.
"We can't eat anymore. This is already too much."
Though he said that, there were still sounds of people eating.
Chase got incensed.
"I said… we have already eaten too much."
Sydney's breathing was heavy.
"But… Tori had already eaten more than me! Just after I get a little more."
Kairos clenched his fist.
"All of us already went overboard, that is something we can acknowledge. Let's just stop here."
For a second, there was no noise. But then, a soft sound of packaging being torn filled the air.
Chase began screaming.
"DID YOU NOT HEAR?"
Nicole screamed as well, for the first time in a very long while.
"I'M GOING TO DIE WITHOUT ANY MORE."
Her voice sounded hoarse, showing how unhinged she got. It was pretty clear that she was tearing her throat as she was saying this. Kairos normally would have stopped this, but he was simply too pissed off to do so.
It very quickly devolved into everyone screaming at each other.
Everyone seemed to forget that they were supposed to remain silent, and didn't even pick up on the sounds of bloody battle above them.
Eventually, through all of their screaming, another voice rang out.
"Hey, Kairos? Is that you?"
Nobody noticed this voice at first, but after a good few thumps on the ground, everyone seemed to notice something was different.
"Kairos? You should be down there, right?"
Kairos furrowed his brows, taking a few breaths with his hoarse throat.
The group collectively fell silent, and looked up with trepidation.
"Hey, why aren't you responding? You are there, right?"
Kairos felt a bit of difficulty believing what he heard.
Nicole panicked.
"Who… who is that? We were too loud!"
Tori began biting her nails.
"Shit! Shit!"
Sydney began trembling.
"No… No…"
Chase held onto the side of his head.
"I didn't even realize."
Kairos stood up and called out.
"Dad?"
A muffled laugh resounded.
"Ah, so you are there, Kairos. Can you guys get out of there?"
Kairos lifted up his red prism, hesitating for a moment. He took off his glasses and began creating a small hole at the top, keeping close watch on what he saw in front of him.
And… as is cleared, it was indeed the face of his dad, smiling confidently.
His face was covered in blood, but that was considered something very normal to everybody at this stage.
Sydney's eyes widened.
"Sam?"
Kairos' first reaction when he saw his father wasn't to greet him, but to question.
"How did you know we were here?"
His father, Sam, shrugged his shoulders.
"I got a pretty convenient ability that just told me."
Suddenly, his nose twitched.
"Oh god, that smell."
He took a closer look at the people underneath and raised an eyebrow.
"You guys are in bad condition, aren't you?"
Kairos sighed.
"Yeah, pretty much."
He picked up his backpack before throwing it up.
"Catch."
Sam caught it deftly and set it to the side. Kairos proceeded to do the same thing with the other backpacks as well as the black carapace. Everyone else also began jumping out. Though it was a little high, it was nothing difficult with their bodies enhanced by their stats.
Then, he jumped up as well, almost feeling blinded by the dimly lit room.
Kairos greedily gasped for air, basking in its freshness.
They were finally free.
For a few seconds, Kairos and the others regathered their bearings. They had gotten out of the house and recouped themselves. The early rays of dawn were coming from a hole above them.
Both within the house and across the closed-in field, were countless corpses of these strange monsters, torn apart into two pieces messily. They look somewhat like people, but their limbs were repositioned to be like a horse's, perhaps to make it better for four-legged running. On their backs, were strange long black things sticking out of their backs.
It seemed to be like hair but was also too thick and sturdy to be normal hair.
As for the killer, Kairos' Dad, he had neat black hair like Kairos, but a short beard on top of that. He still had a suit on, but it was torn by the seams. He had a long bone that had been sharpened in his hand as well as two other sharpened bones attached to his belt.
Considering how it was covered in blood, that seemed to be his weapon of choice, and the surrounding bodies showed that it worked.
Kairos and the others ended up eating the rest of their readily available food, avoiding the topic of the argument they had earlier. Looking at the bone weapons his father had, Kairos couldn't help but ask for one as well.
"Hey, could I have one of those bones as a weapon?"
Sam, or Kairos' dad, reached smiled.
"I can actually create one right now from these corpses."
He reached out with his free hand towards the thigh of one of the monsters, keeping it straight. A faint white light appeared around his hand, rotating almost like a chainsaw.
When Sam's hand was about ten centimeters away, it cut apart with almost no resistance. It took him only a minute or so to retrieve the bone and cut it up so that one end was sharpened like a sword.
Chase nodded with his chin in his hand.
"That is a pretty strong ability."
Sam laughed, holding onto the newly sharpened bone proudly.
"It works pretty well when I use it with a weapon."
Then, he tossed the bone to Kairos, who promptly caught it. Kairos couldn't help but raise an eyebrow.
"If it really is that easy, then do you mind making Sydney one as well?
Sam nodded.
"Alright."
After another minute, he made another sharpened bone and gave it to Sydney.
Then, Sam looked at his son and spoke up.
"You seem like you've been through a lot. What happened?"
Kairos sighed.
"My first action was to meet up with Nicole and group up. From there, we went to grocery stores as pit stops on the way to the wilderness. Along the way, we met Chase, Tori, and a cult leader. Along the way, we lost someone."
He indicated who Chase and Tori were through pointing. Kairos then shrugged his shoulders.
Sam thought for a moment before bowing.
"…My condolences for Harold."
Sydney and Nicole both seemed rather distraught but did not break down. As for whether that was because of their high willpower stat or because they accepted it, it wasn't so clear.
"As for how effective the plan of going to the wilderness was…"
He adjusted his glasses.
"I'm sure you can see the mistake I made."
Sam laughed.
"It seems like it has been hard."
Kairos massaged his temple with the tip of his finger.
"And how about you? It seems like what you went through quite a bit."
Sam sighed.
"To be honest, that text you sent me basically saved my life, so thank you for that. At the time, I didn't really think much of it, but decided to listen anyway. Your instincts seem to be extremely strong since you were able to predict it so accurately."
Kairos pushed his glasses up.
"More or less."
Sam chuckled.
"Anyways, as you know the place I work for is in the city and quite high in the building. There are windows almost all over, so it was actually a little hard to find someplace that was far away from all that."
His eyes narrowed, while his tone dropped.
"And it also meant that nearly all of my coworkers turned into those monsters."
He shook his head.
"At first, it was hard for me to believe what was happening, but seeing a giant overbearing red-skinned figure lunge at you sort of awakened me by force of panic. I ran, trying to flee the building, but then thought of your mother."
Sam smiled.
"And so, I rushed up to where she worked, and it seemed that she had the same idea."
He pressed his lips together.
"Unfortunately, while we were reunited, that didn't mean the monsters behind the both of us would go away. While I ended up panicking, your mother seemed to… have another idea."
Sam furrowed his brows.
"She threw herself into a room that had glass panels, fully exposing her to the red sunlight."
He paused for a moment.
"I had no idea what to do."
Kairos looked down slightly.
"Is mother dead?"
Sam clenched his fist.
"No, if she was only dead, then perhaps I could accept it."
His eyes widened slightly.
"She immediately began screaming in pain and smashed everything within the room violently."
He took a deep breath.
"While I was frozen in fear, the monsters closed in on me. I knew that I was going to die soon, and began to give up. But then, several red tendrils shot out of your mother before slamming into those monsters."
Sam swallowed.
"She smashed them into pieces and tore them apart so easily. My body was immediately covered in so much blood, stunning me."
He wiped away a tear before it formed on his face.
"Your mother… she began approaching me, but she wasn't the same anymore. Her irises had become red, as did her long hair that used to be jet black. If it wasn't for all the red tendrils coming out of her back, squirming with minds of their own, then it would've just looked like she got colored contacts and dyed her hair."
Sam smiled bitterly.
"But in the end, she saved my life. Though she changed, I couldn't help but be worried for her and rushed over. I trusted that she wouldn't kill me, but…"
He paused for a second.
"She changed. There was a strange smile on her face, almost like she was dreaming. When I got close, she grabbed onto my shoulders tightly and dislocated both of them. But… she seemed to notice what she did and popped them back in.
Sam held onto the side of his head.
"I tried talking to her, but it seemed like she couldn't hear me. Instead, she began humming this strange tune as she carried me with her, saying something about the joys of killing."
He blinked a few times.
"Whenever we came across a monster, she would rip off all its limbs, then make me kill it. She broke off one of the chair legs and gave it to me as a weapon. Though I felt like this wasn't right, I still did it in the end."
Sam paused for a moment.
"But what I didn't realize was that she wanted to kill more than just the monsters. Even when we met with completely untransformed people, instead of saving them, she would dismember them as well."
He frowned.
"I… couldn't bring myself to kill them, which seemed to make her really angry. She… grabbed onto my arm and made me kill them."
Sydney let out a faint gasp.
"Oh, dear…"
Sam sighed.
"Like that, she rampaged throughout the building, killing many people and constantly bringing one for me to kill."
He rubbed his forehead.
"It went on for… so long. By the time we got out of the building, the real sun was already halfway in the sky. She charged off to kill some of the many monsters on the street."
Sam blinked a few times.
"And I ran."
He laughed.
"But it was only a few seconds later did I realize how stupid that was. She reached me in just a moment, easily slaughtering hundreds of monsters as she passed by. There was a sad look in her eye as she brought me in closer."
Sam scratched the back of his head.
"Then, she ran away, leaving me alone. I… apologized, but she was already too far away to hear me."
Kairos let out a soft sigh.
"But in the end, Mother is alive, right? That's a good thing."
Sam laughed quietly.
"I just… think she is in a lot of pain."
A painful smile formed on his face.
"After all, the husband she went through so much pain to save ran away from her."
As Sam lowered his head, Kairos reached out with his finger, pushing against Sam's forehead and lifting it back up.
"If you feel so bad, then live long enough to apologize to her face."
Sam smirked.
"Hah. Why are you trying to cheer me up? I am your parent, not the other way around."
Kairos shrugged his shoulders.
"Maybe stop acting like a kid then."
Sam rolled his eyes.
"If anything, you are acting too much like an adult."
A small smile formed on Kairos' face.
"Anyways, we really should get out of here before those people come back."
Sam raised an eyebrow.
"Who?"
Chase sighed.
"Crazy cult leaders."
Sam nodded.
"That does sound like something we should avoid."
Kairos took the lead, leaping up through the meter wide hole and landing on the roof with the black carapace in one hand and a sharpened bone in the other. Soon after, everyone else followed.
He looked towards them.
"Before we go, let's refill our water bottles in the river and wash our hands a bit."
There were no objections, so the group promptly did as he said.
As Kairos picked the black carapace and the sharpened bone up with his wet hands, he sighed.
"If the wilderness isn't exactly safe, then is there just no place that is safe?"
Sam screwed on the cap of a plastic bottle before putting it in Kairos' bag.
"The city should be pretty safe."
Chase raised an eyebrow.
"Isn't that where the population density is the highest? There should be many monsters there, right?"
Sam nodded.
"Yes. But my wife killed almost every single monster there, and the ones she wasn't able to, ran away from the city. Even monsters really far away from her seem to have some sort of instinctual fear, making them run. So at least as of now, there are little to no monsters there, but many supplies."
Kairos rubbed his chin with his thumb and forefinger.
"But monsters are attracted by blood, so those corpses will surely lure a few there. That is, assuming that mother has already left the city to go somewhere else."
He tilted his head at the same time.
"But at the same time, we really need to get some more food, and it would also help us catch wind of where my mother went."
Tori looked over.
"So you are saying we should go to the city?"
Kairos adjusted his glasses.
"Though I don't think it's the safest option, it's probably better. If the city really was massacred, then that means most of the shops should still have food in them. Maybe we will even get some canned stuff."
Tori smiled slightly.
"I did always want to check out the city, but never had enough time before."
Sam chuckled.
"The city is really not what it's cracked up to be. You see many tall buildings, but really it's just an empty husk covering a long dead place."
Tori pressed her lips together.
"Well, I don't think it could be very alive during the apocalypse anyway."
Chase laughed.
"That is true."
With that, the group set off towards the city, with Sam leading the way.
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At first, the group ran away for fear of the cultists catching up to them, but once they got a large amount of distance, they began to walk.
They were still in quite the abandoned area, so there were hardly any monsters nearby. And the ones that were, ran at the first sight of them.
Kairos massaged his temple while furrowing his brows.
Sam noticed this, and spoke up.
"Is something bothering you?"
Kairos sighed.
"I'm just a little ticked off. I thought everything would be fine once I got to the wilderness, but there really isn't anywhere safe."
Sam raised an eyebrow.
"Don't you have that red block that can create those super sturdy walls? That should work fine, right?"
Kairos clicked his tongue.
"Unfortunately, it's basically out of energy. Also I remember tucking that thing away, how did you even know I had it?"
Sam sighed.
"Shame it has no energy. As for how I knew, it's related to this weird ability I have."
Chase raised an eyebrow.
"Does it let you see through walls, like some sort of x-ray vision?"
Sam waved his hand dismissively.
"No, no. It's nothing too special, really. It's just if I lay my left hand down on a surface and concentrate, then I will see what previously happened. That's how I was able to find you guys."
Kairos' eyebrow couldn't help but twitch.
"Huh. That sounds quite useful, though not in fights."
Sam nodded.
"Yeah, it is pretty useful. At first, the reverse of time is slow, but it gradually picks up. I'm pretty sure I can see things that happened long long ago, but it will also be difficult for me to see as it will pass by too fast."
Chase cracked his neck.
"Makes sense."
As they were walking, a group of two monsters spotted them, but they quickly fled into the forest once they did.
Tori frowned.
"If only we had a gun, or something. That way we could make use of all those walking points."
Sam laughed.
"I… wouldn't put too much trust into guns?"
Nicole blinked a few times.
"Eh? Why is that?"
Sam took a deep breath.
"I thought that maybe the military base was a good place to go, but when I reached there everyone was dead. It didn't exactly make much sense to me, but I used my hand to find out what happened."
He narrowed his eyes.
"There were many monsters. They were attracted by the sounds of gunfire, but also died quickly. The various soldiers got their various weapons to fend them off. There was even a mounted minigun that one of them used."
Sydney let out a sigh of relief.
"Ah, I thought you meant guns wouldn't work on the monsters."
Sam laughed.
"They work… that's for sure. But their guns began transforming into something else."
Chase's face twitched.
"Wait, the guns transformed?"
Sam nodded.
"All of the guns were becoming a little redder as they killed monsters, especially so for the mounted minigun. At some point, flesh shot out of the minigun as it consumed the person using it. Then, it began shooting everywhere, killing both people and monsters. I nearly jumped even though I knew it was a vision, haha."
Nicole shivered.
"Even random things can turn into monsters? …What if our clothes transform into monsters too?"
Sam laughed.
"I don't think that will happen… probably."
Kairos looked at him.
"What do you mean?"
Sam hummed.
"From what I saw, the gun's transformation was pretty proportional to the amount of monsters that they killed. I believe what was happening was that the guns were getting the evolution points instead of the soldiers using the gun."
Chase frowned.
"My bow doesn't work like that though, thankfully. I get all of the points."
Kairos' eyes widened slightly when he heard that.
"Huh… so it seems a gun is too complicated for whatever is judging who gets the kill, so it considers the person firing the gun not doing enough to be credited with the kill."
Nicole held onto the fire axe a little tighter.
"That is… weird."
Tori looked at her red katana.
"Huh. If our weapons were credited with the kill instead of us, then humans in general would probably go extinct, huh?"
Kairos shrugged his shoulders.
"At this rate humans are probably going extinct anyway."
Sydney muttered.
"…Everything really has changed."
Nicole smiled gently.
"But that just means it can change for the better too!"
As they continued to get closer to the city, the buildings became more frequent. A group of four monsters charged towards them, but Sam was able to tear all of them apart with just one strike using his sharpened bone.
It seemed like the number of monsters were about to increase, but it instead decreased. Instead, they were replaced by corpses instead. This was considered a rather rare sight because most corpses would be consumed promptly after they formed, meaning it would be hard to see this many laid out.
One thing to note was that each and every one of them were brutally murdered. There were several instances of the top half of a monster's body laying down on the floor while its shattered rib cage peeked out.
Other than the monsters smashed into pieces, there were also ones with massive holes in their body, predominantly being their chest. Almost like they got stabbed by a large tendril of some sort.
Sam let out a soft sigh and turned to Kairos.
"This seems to be the work of your mother, though the bodies look a little old."
Kairos looked up, towards the scene in front of him. Far up ahead he could see various skyscrapers fighting each other to be the tallest. Though the streets were littered with blood, there was a strange silence within the place.
It was almost like the place was frozen in time.
Kairos rubbed his chin.
"You said that the monsters would run away from her? How far was that range?"
Sam blinked a few times.
"The only thing I recall was that it worked even when the monster was a few hundred meters away. I wasn't able to find any specific limit."
Kairos looked down at the bodies.
"It seems that the monsters still don't dare approach, because these corpses are untouched. In other words, Mother should still be close by, and this should also be a safe place to be."
Nicole put a finger on her chin.
"Wow, that sounds really convenient."
Chase stretched out his arms.
"Then what are we waiting for? Let's loot one of those grocery stores."
Kairos narrowed his eyes.
"Wait."
He couldn't help but recall how close Sydney was to reaching her maximum evolution energy gount.
[Rank: 97/100 Evolution Energy – 50 required for Rankup]
Though he was curious what would happen, he didn't want to see it happen just yet. If they really did go into a place devoid of monsters, then Sydney wouldn't be able to get points to level up, thereby risking her becoming a monster herself.
Kairos pushed up his glasses.
"I believe it would be better for Sydney to collect points required for her evolution to a higher rank, that way she can use the food to support her own evolution."
Sam nodded.
"That makes sense."
Kairos stood in place, thinking for a moment.
"How about you guys go secure one of the grocery stores while I help Sydney get the points she needs?"
Sam raised an eyebrow, but pointed towards a building soon after.
"Well alright, I will go secure that grocery store. You guys come back later and we should have a meal prepared."
Kairos nodded before looking to Sydney.
"Follow me."
Without waiting for an answer from anybody involved, he left.
Nicole called out.
"Stay safe!"
Kairos waved dismissively.
"It will be fine!"
Sydney hesitated, but soon followed after him. Kairos looked around for a moment before leaping up onto one of the houses, landing nicely on the roof. He walked towards the center before scouting the area.
There was a fairly large group in the distance, prompting him to call out while pointing in a direction.
"Let's go over there."
Sydney hesitated before jumping onto the roof as well, then looking at where Kairos was pointing.
"A-Alright."
Kairos was focusing heavily on Sydney's eyes. This was because he had seen earlier that she was looking intently at the corpses laid across the ground. Considering people would normally be disgusted, he didn't think that was a normal response.
However, her eyes seemed normal… for now.
Kairos leaped across the roofs of the houses and Sydney followed after him. After a few moments, they got closer to the large group of monsters and saw what they were doing.
They were each holding onto the limb or head of a person pierced onto a piece of bone, lifting it up and down while chanting something. It looked rather gruesome, prompting Kairos to furrow his brows.
"…They seem to have their own culture."
Sydney blinked a few times.
"Maybe they were all part of a group before the apocalypse?"
Kairos adjusted his glasses.
"Maybe…"
He then leaped off the roof.
"Regardless, you will be killing all of them."
Once his foot landed on the ground, all of the monsters noticed his presence. They dropped the bones they were holding onto before charging forth. Kairos looked up to Sydney that was about to jump off to him.
"Get behind them. I will distract."
Sydney stopped herself and circled around before jumping off. She attracted the attention of a few monsters, but it wasn't a big deal for her.
As the monsters rapidly closed in on Kairos, he swung his sharpened bone, taking off legs one after another, forcing them the monsters to crawl. Sydney did the same, except it was taking off heads. Though the monsters attempted to kill her, she was just a step ahead, able to dodge and take advantage of the length of the sharpened bone.
There was the occasional surprise of a monster lunging towards Kairos, but his future vision gave him more than enough time to react.
As for Sydney, she continued hacking through the monsters, already dealing with half of them. But there was a sudden shift at this point.
Most of the monsters gave up on Kairos altogether before rushing to surround Sydney. Though Kairos wanted to help, there were still seven monsters that remained, blocking his way forth.
Kairos ended up hesitating.
But then, he heard Sydney scream.
He quickly decided to force his way through, gathering mana in his hand for the pulse spell.
Then, a second later, he let it loose.
With a bang, all seven monsters exploded into pieces.
[Killed Creature – 0.1 points awarded] x 7
Kairos rushed forth gathering the mana for another pulse spell… but quickly stopped himself.
Sydney's eyes were wide open and bloodshot. However, she was tearing through all of the monsters around her. The only concerning thing was a rather large gash on her shoulder, but it was already healing.
Before long Sydney had ripped through all of the monsters and began panting heavily.
With his future vision, Kairos could see that she would lunge towards one of the corpses. He had a strange premonition that letting her do so would probably be bad, thus dropping both the sharpened bone and black carapace in his hand so he could restrain her.
Kairos held onto her shoulders, and almost immediately, there was a lot of resistance. Sydney desperately tried to bring herself closer to the corpse on the ground, opening her mouth wide and even screeching.
Kairos frowned before hooking both his arms around her shoulders, forcing her to remain upright.
"Calm down!"
Sydney raised her head high and let out a guttural roar, almost like she was a monster herself.
Then, she moved her head to the side and opened her mouth wide, attempting to bite down on Kairos' arm.
She lost her rationality.
Kairos saw in his future vision that Sydney would bite down on him, thus he stopped restraining her to avoid it. Sydney bit down, but only got air and stumbled a few steps forward after being let go.
Almost immediately, her vision snapped towards one of the corpses as she lunged towards them once more.
Kairos frowned before rushing forth once more, wrapping one arm around her neck and pulling her back. Sydney immediately retaliated by trying to bite down on the arm, but he pushed up her forehead with his other hand to stop her from doing so.
"Can't you see what you're doing? Wake up!"
Sydney let out a low growl as she threw herself side to side violently, trying to break free. Kairos furrowed his brows, wondering if there was some other way to get through to her.
He got right next to her ear and began shouting.
"You are not a monster, you are a person! Can't you remember that?"
The only response he got was a guttural roar, but he could still feel that there was a tiny part of her still inside, trying to fight it.
Kairos grit his teeth.
"Open your status panel! If you can still hear me, open up your status panel!"
At first, nothing happened, making Kairos think that this was going to be hopeless. He even saw other monsters closing in, making it so that the time that he had to try and wake her up was limited.
But then, her status panel appeared in front of him.
[Status]
[ID: 423632551433]
[Rank: 99/100 Evolution Energy – 50 required for Rankup]
[Objective: Evolve]
[Proof Of Perfection Points: 21.6]
[Strength – 4.5
Agility – 3.9
Endurance – 4.9
Willpower – 4.3
Mana Capacity – 0.0
Magic Affinity – 0.0]
[Special Abilities: Gnawing Hunger (F-)]
[Inborn Abilities: N/A]
[Evolve]
[Hide]
He looked at it by raising his head at an awkward angle, letting him see it without his glasses.
The first thing that jumped out to him was her evolution energy, just one away from reaching one hundred. This caused him the most panic. Though this was also an extremely intense situation, he still noticed that Sydney's stats had increased slightly.
But he very clearly remembered that Sydney never added any points.
Kairos decided to think about that later. Thankfully, she had more than twenty points, which also meant there was enough for him to carry out his plan. He kept one arm wrapped around her neck and used the other to shoot towards the evolve button.
Kairos was betting quite a bit, as he wasn't sure if he would be able to interact with another person's status panel, but decided to try anyway.
However, he saw that in his future vision, Sydney would viciously bite down on his arm if he tried to do so.
And so, he pulled back.
The gash Sydney had earlier had fully healed up, and that was when her status panel changed all on its own.
[Status]
[ID: 423632551433]
[Rank: 100/100 Evolution Energy – 50 required for Rankup]
[Objective: Evolve]
[Proof Of Perfection Points: 21.0]
[Strength – 4.6
Agility – 4.0
Endurance – 4.9
Willpower – 4.4
Mana Capacity – 0.0
Magic Affinity – 0.0]
[Special Abilities: Gnawing Hunger (F-)]
[Inborn Abilities: N/A]
[Evolve]
[Hide]
The first thing he noticed was the evolution energy had jumped up to one hundred out of hundred, making him panic a little. As a side thing, he noticed that she lost 0.6 points, but only gained an overall of 0.3 points in her status.
However, now was not the time for theorycrafting.
Sydney's skin began to redden, almost like she herself was transforming into a monster. And that was when Kairos decided to risk it all, pressing down on the evolve button.
Right after, his arm was bitten down on. He could feel Sydney's teeth rip through his flesh, sharper than what he remembered.
However, as bad as it was, Kairos was internally letting out a sigh of relief, because he was able to interact with the status panel.
[Use 5 points for stable evolution? Yes/No]
[Use 10 points for natural ability? Yes/No]
[Use 5 points for Fire Spell or Earth Spell? Fire/Earth Yes/No]
[Confirm]
For whatever reason, the option to evolve stably was grayed out. And so, Kairos forced himself to press on the yes option. Since natural ability was already automatically selected as yes, he went down towards the two spells.
In an ideal world, he would've deliberated over whether or not the fire or earth spell would be better, but the situation didn't really allow it. While feeling Sydney's teeth rip through his arm, he selected the earth spell simply because it was something different.
And then, he pressed confirm.
The status panel disappeared, while Sydney suddenly stopped moving. Kairos' breathing was heavy, wondering if it was still not too late. Sydney was still biting down hard on his arm, but her jaw gradually slackened, letting go.
A few faint cracking sounds came from her body as she became slightly taller.
She seemed to be in a daze, but was no longer in her frenzied state.
As for Kairos, he now had a long gash ripped across his arm. Blood spilled out and splattered onto the floor, but it did not take long for the wound to stop bleeding. As for when it would heal, he wasn't sure, but it wasn't too bad, all in all.
The monsters around Kairos continued to close in, but he wasn't afraid. He picked up the sharpened bone, lunged forth, and slashed at a monster's neck, ripping it off.
[Killed Creature – 0.1 points awarded]
He was about to do the same to the other nearby ones, but then a figure flashed by in his vision, and that monster's head flew off.
It was Sydney.
Her eyes were wide open, and her breathing was intense. Right after taking that monster's head off, she put one hand on the headless corpse's shoulder, then pushed in the sharpened bone and ripped it apart.
Right afterwards, she yelled.
Kairos looked over and blinked a few times.
"Are you ok?"
Sydney grabbed onto the side of her head with her hand, speaking in between heavy breaths.
"Sort… of."
A few of the monsters charging towards them suddenly stopped in their tracks. Sydney's eyes abruptly snapped towards a small group of them.
Her hand clenched tightly against the bone, shaking erratically.
Then, she ran towards the monsters.
"AHHHHHHHH."
Seeing this, the monsters began running away. However, they hesitated for a moment, giving Sydney enough time to catch up easily. She ripped into the first monster, but didn't stop so that she could catch up to the other ones.
It took only a few moments before all of them had fallen.
But she didn't stop there. Her mouth opened wide, making Kairos a little nervous, but she closed it soon after, without biting into the corpses.
Instead, Sydney began ripping into the monsters with her sharpened bone.
"RAAAAAAAAHHHHH!"
Her screams were tearing her throat. Her eyes were widened and bloodshot. She continued to bash the corpses even when they turned into mush.
If Kairos squinted hard enough, he might've seen a kid playing in a puddle of water.
Well, maybe not.
Eventually, Sydney calmed down, but her breathing was still intense. Her clothes that were dry before were now drenched in blood and covering up the entirety of her forearm and some of her upper arm.
In all honesty, Kairos thought that most of Sydney's desire for violence and eating flesh would dampen greatly after evolving. But that wasn't exactly the case. Her sanity had definitely recovered to a great extent, considering just a moment ago she was biting into Kairos' arm.
However, the damage was not fully undone.
Kairos guessed that he was a little late in clicking that evolution button considering the shade of red that appeared on her skin. His original thought was that he made it in the nick of time, but it seemed he had actually been a bit off.
Kairos slowly walked up.
"Have you got it out of your system?"
Sydney shut her eyes and began shivering.
"I… think so."
She took in several deep breaths one after another, before shakily getting up to her feet. Then, she had a closer look at the mess below her.
"What… have I become?"
Kairos let out a soft sigh.
"The fact you have the capacity to judge yourself for it, means you are more sane than you think."
He didn't say the last part of his thought, which was, 'though that doesn't mean you are sane by any means.'
Sydney continued to take deep breaths, trying to meditate her emotions. Though, it seemed that those emotions were spilling out of her from how she was trembling.
"I don't… understand. I'm usually not the type of person that lashes out like that."
Kairos shook his head.
"I don't think any of the monsters thought they would be the type of people to kill others either."
Sydney grabbed onto the side of her head and shut her eyes tightly.
"Am I going to become… a monster?"
Kairos shrugged his shoulders.
"I can't say for the future, but you are fine for now. Evolving seems to have the effect of increasing your tolerance of the strange red energy. Because you evolved, you don't have to worry about becoming a monster any time soon."
He said, 'at least, not physically,' in his mind.
Sydney blinked a few times.
"Do I… need to tell the others? About my breakdown?"
Kairos looked at her for a moment.
"That's your choice. I won't tell them, so if you want it to be a secret, then you can just keep it one."
Sydney's mouth twitched a couple times, showing her hesitation. Eventually, she sighed.
"I don't really want to think about it right now. Maybe later."
This immediately set off a flag in Kairos' head. Namely because Sydney was very willing to share the fact she had been mutated by the red sun before. Yet, now she was a little more hesitant.
After a few seconds of deliberation, he decided to watch a little instead of acting out.
"Do you mind if I take a look at your status panel?"
Sydney nodded a little absentmindedly.
[Status]
[ID: 423632551433]
[Rank: 0/1000 Evolution Energy – 500 required for Rankup]
[Objective: Gain 500 Evolution Energy]
[Proof Of Perfection Points: 5.6]
[Strength – 4.7
Agility – 4.1
Endurance – 5.0
Willpower – 4.5
Mana Capacity – 0.2
Magic Affinity – 0.2]
[Special Abilities: Gnawing Hunger (F), Temperance (F), Earth Spell (F)]
One thing he noted was that the evolution consumed all one hundred of her evolution energy, but he considered it to be a positive thing. Less evolution energy meant being farther from monsterization.
As for her special abilities, he was a bit surprised to see that her 'Gnawing Hunger' ability had risen from F- to F, but didn't look too much into it. The temperance ability made him curious, but he decided that it was better for Sydney to get something to eat before any experimentation.
"Anyways, let's get to the grocery store where the others are. I'm sure you are really hungry at this point, no?"
Sydney suddenly snapped to attention when she heard hungry.
"Um, yes."
With that, they began running back, though it felt more like a brisk jog to the both of them.
It did not take too long for them to reach back to the grocery store that they said they would come to. The immediate sight they were greeted by was a pile of bodies.
Not monsters, but people.
Their wounds were noticeably different from all the corpses outside. Instead of being brutally smashed or pierced, they were ripped apart.
At one end of the place was Chase, who spotted them.
He gave them a small nod before continuing to eat on his own.
Kairos and Sydney walked over to see the others with several scattered packages across the ground. Sam was the first to look up and speak.
"Were you able to finish your business?"
Kairos nodded.
"Sydney was able to evolve, yes. What happened on your side?"
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Sam put a finger on his chin.
"As for what happened, while there weren't any monsters in the place, there were quite a few people residing here. We asked if we could have some of the food, but…"
Chase swallowed a piece of ham.
"They wouldn't let us in."
Nicole seemed to be a little out of it, but was still eating normally like the others.
"Then we… killed them."
Sam shrugged his shoulders.
"I did consider negotiating with them further, but I decided to check what they had done before in the past."
His eyes widened ever so slightly while the smile on his face disappeared.
"And… they don't deserve to live."
Kairos blinked a few times before sighing, deciding to not question it.
"Anyways, we should eat and stock up on some food here. I assume most of you have already added points and eaten to make up for the energy, right?"
Nicole gave a small nod, while Tori gave a thumbs up while stuffing her face with almost expired bread. As for Chase, he simply smiled, which was enough to tell Kairos that he did.
Sydney looked over to a nearby milk carton. She picked it up and furrowed her brows.
"This cost seven dollars? What kind of scam is this?"
Sam laughed.
"That's just how things are in the city. Why do you think we would always join you in shopping over on your side, rather than here?"
Sydney put the milk carton back with a bit of disgust.
"Ugh… it looks like the city was already in the state of an apocalypse before."
Sam laughed, and the others either chuckled or smiled a little.
As for Kairos, his lip turned up, but it suddenly dipped back down. He narrowed his eyes and looked at Sydney.
"Hey… aren't you hungry?"
In response, Sydney flinched. She scratched the side of her head.
"Oh. I thought that I was? But it doesn't feel too bad right now."
Kairos blinked a few times.
"…Well since we are already here, why don't you eat something anyway?"
Sydney nodded a little absentmindedly and leisurely picked out a few things. While that was happening Tori grumbled.
"I have all the points I need to evolve, but can't do it. What do I need to even do?"
Kairos sighed as he got something for himself to eat.
"It should only be a matter of time. I'm pretty sure you will be able to evolve soon enough even if you just wait around."
Tori clicked her tongue.
"Hopefully…"
Kairos had the instinctive urge to only open up his status panel in secret, but soon remembered he had already opened it up next to everyone except his father, so just opened it anyway.
[Private Announcement]
[First Ten Daring Kills (Ninth – by ID: 064245313420) – 10 points awarded]
He blinked a few times, just staring at the screen in front of him. For whatever reason, he forgot about the existence of the panel like this. Kairos began to wonder what he should say if the people around him questioned him, but…
"Are you ok, Kairos? You're just staring at the air."
Sam spoke up with a bit of concern, attracting the gazes of the others.
Kairos simply coughed.
"Sorry, just thinking about something."
He then repeated both this id along with refreshing his memory of the last one using the usual technique to memorize numbers. From there, he went to look at his status panel.
[Status]
[ID: 345315364923]
[Rank: E-]
[Objective: Survive]
[Proof Of Perfection Points: 8.2]
[Stats –
Strength – 4.9
Endurance – 4.9
Agility – 4.9
Willpower – 4.9
Mana Capacity – 5.0
Magic Affinity – 3.0]
[Special Abilities: Fire Spell (F), Pulse Spell (F)]
[Hide]
There were 8.2 points to distribute. Kairos was either planning on putting it into his direct physical stats, such as strength, endurance, and agility, or into his magic related stats, such as mana capacity and magic affinity.
Sam looked over and nodded.
"Those stat points are pretty high! Especially if you were the one that earned all of the points yourself."
Kairos rubbed his chin gently.
"Yeah. Do you guys think I should put my points into raising my physical abilities or raising my magic capacity?"
Tori tilted her head to the side.
"Magic seems really strong, right? Your magic power is only three, but the spells are still so deadly."
Kairos nodded.
"It is very powerful, that's for sure. However, depending on how powerful I want to spell to be, it will take more mana, and not a small amount either. Though I can increase my mana capacity, the mana regeneration seems to stay the same."
Nicole stopped eating in order to listen in more closely. Then, she proposed a question.
"So what about increasing the physical stats?"
Kairos cracked his neck.
"That would be far more reliable given that our stamina isn't going to run out in just a few attacks. However, the actual effectiveness doesn't even come close to the power of the spells."
He narrowed his eyes.
"I suppose the best way to handle this is to have some of us focused more on the physical aspects to be reliable killers, while we have others be the trump card in case something far beyond our league shows up."
Kairos raised a finger.
"We need at least one that can kill a giant horde, in case the numbers become too massive."
He then raised a second finger.
"And another one that can kill an extremely tough monster, in case one so happens to show up."
Sam nodded.
"That makes sense. I didn't exactly specialize my points into magic, but with my spells I should be able to deal with a sizable crowd."
Kairos looked at him.
"How so, exactly?"
Sam raised his hand and held it out straight. A faint white light appeared around his hand, then extended out to become a meter long.
He whipped his hand off to the side, and with a bang, a large incision appeared on the wall next to him.
"If I put in more mana, I can make it longer, and if I use it with one of these bones, it will increase my reach slightly. The only cost being that the bone would crack apart after one swing."
Kairos nodded.
"How long can you make it, and how many attacks can you make?"
Sam thought for a moment.
"It should reach about eight meters, nine in total with the bone. As for how long it will last, it should give me about one second of swinging. So… about three to four full swings."
Chase raised his hand leisurely.
"Though I haven't evolved yet, my mana arrows are pretty effective against a single monster. Once I do get the chance to evolve, I should be able to take care of them."
Kairos took a deep breath.
"But that will still be a little while. My spells can play both parts fairly well, so I should probably focus on magic for now. The physical specification can wait."
Nobody disagreed, and so, he added the points.
[Mana Capacity 5.0 – 9.0 Points 8.2 – 4.2]
[Magic Affinity 3.0 – 7.2 Points 4.2 – 0.0]
Kairos let out a refreshing sigh after adding the points. The sensation of adding more into the magic related stats felt like he was breathing in the freshest air that purified his body.
Then, the hunger began settling in, prompting him to eat some more.
As they were eating, Sam eventually sighed.
"If only we had a lighter. Then we could actually have something hot to eat."
Kairos turned to him.
"Did you not see my status panel? I have a special ability called the fire spell. We just need something to burn, then we can cook something up."
Sam let out a small gasp.
"That's perfect then! There's a clothing store just across from here, let me get some of that stuff to burn."
Kairos stood up.
"I'll go with you."
Sam chuckled.
"Alright."
Nicole raised her hand high and waved.
"Stay safe!"
Sam rolled his eyes.
"You guys are acting like we are leaving the country, it's just across the street."
Nicole blushed slightly and turned away.
With that, Kairos and his dad left the place and went into the clothing store opposite to them.
Sam went to check out the tags on the clothes and picked out a few that were cotton. Kairos looked at the variety of clothes around.
"Since we are already here, why don't we get a change of clothes for everyone."
Sam smirked.
"Since when did you become so considerate of others, Kairos?"
In response, Kairos rolled his eyes.
"Fresh clothes improve our hygiene and will get rid of some of the blood that will attract monsters. It's just being logical."
Sam laughed.
"Alright, alright. That makes sense."
Kairos picked out a change of clothes for himself. He gave his father a glance as he picked out a few.
"Do you think Mother is still… herself?"
Sam looked a little despondent, but continued to pick out a few clothes.
"I… I'm not sure. But there is one thing I can count on, is that even if she has changed, she still cares. Despite having many opportunities and excuses to gravely injure me, she never did. Even when I ran away or refused to kill people, your mother never hurt me too badly."
Kairos narrowed his eyes.
"Why… why do you think this happened to Mother, but not to any of the other people that transformed into monsters? Was it really just a one in a million chance that she was special?"
Sam laughed loudly, without restraint.
"To me, finding your mother really was a one in a million chance."
His smile relaxed slightly.
"But I don't think that this was because of something special. When your mother threw herself right in front of the glaring rays of the red sun, I didn't feel afraid. Not even when I knew everyone else had transformed."
Kairos furrowed his brows.
"What? You weren't even slightly concerned?"
A smirk formed on Sam's face.
"You probably don't know this, but there are times when your mother has this strange look in her eye. It is one filled with complete confidence, a will that will never break."
He took a deep breath.
"I saw that look in her eyes before she lunged forth, and even when she screamed in agony, that look never left her."
Sam shut his eyes while a small smile formed on his face.
"She did that because she was determined to save my life. Even if she… became something scary afterwards, your mother would always stay true to her resolve."
He slowly opened his eyes and looked down.
"Your mother was always strong like that."
Kairos slung a set of sweatpants over his shoulders.
"Then why did you try to run?"
Sam smiled bitterly.
"While I knew she wouldn't hurt me, it truly was too scary. I didn't want to continue killing innocent people."
He paused.
"But most of all, I was scared. Scared that your mother… forgot."
Kairos raised an eyebrow.
"What is that supposed to mean?"
Sam chuckled.
"Um… I'm not too sure myself."
Kairos was about to ask another question, but then his head suddenly snapped to the side.
He saw… a red minigun through the glass walls.
It was very slowly sliding across the street, moving slower than even a snail. It seemed like it was struggling to even move that much. There was a shield at the front, which was normally for protecting the person using the minigun, but in this case, there was nobody for that.
Upon coming across a corpse, the barrel of the minigun expanded into a giant mouth, before swallowing it whole.
Grotesque chewing sounds ensued as it slowly turned towards them.
Kairos frowned and raised his finger.
"…Good thing I put my points into magic."
A tiny fireball formed at the tip of his finger.
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The red minigun paused for a second, as though trying to observe the scene in front of him. Sam had already ducked behind a counter, taking cover. However, Kairos decided to take off his glasses and strain his eyes to remain open.
Sam panicked when he saw that Kairos was still standing out in the open.
"Take cover! That thing has far too much firepower!"
Kairos did not listen. Instead, he grit his teeth and continued to channel mana into the fireball.
"Don't worry. I will be fine."
The fireball continued to slowly expand, causing some of the nearby clothes to start smoking.
As for the minigun, it continued to stare at the scene in front of it, almost like it was trying to comprehend what exactly was in front. Kairos fully intended on taking advantage of the lack of response, and was confident he would be able to dodge if it did begin firing with the one second of warning he would get.
The fireball expanded to a diameter of one meter, then two.
Despite it becoming so large, Kairos still felt like he could make it a decent amount bigger, and that it took less than a third of his total mana capacity to cast.
But then, Kairos suddenly felt his head go blank.
He could feel his waist getting torn in two along with an unbelievably loud blaring sound. Kairos instinctively knew what this meant, and was prepared for it.
Right when this pain came, he let loose of the fireball and threw his body to the side. Just a moment later, that blaring sound of gunfire ensued.
The bullets shattered the glass windows and pierced through the fireball cleanly. They then smashed against the structure that held all the clothes, sending them flying and spinning up into the ceiling. The bullets were far from weak, that was for sure.
However, while the bullets pierced through the fireball, it was unable to hinder the momentum. And as such, the fireball continued forth, though some of it was being ripped apart.
A deafening explosion ensued, sending out rushing flames from the point of impact, causing most of the clothes to catch on fire. On top of that, strong gusts of wind threw those clothes on fire across the store.
Kairos immediately threw the clothes he was carrying away, but it didn't help that much given there were several sets of burning clothes drifting down towards him right now. He was tempted to get up in order to avoid them, but if he did that, he would be torn apart by the bullets.
The minigun was ripping through the store, scattering plaster and whatever else the walls were made of all around the place. Thankfully, it only chose to shoot at waist level instead of going lower, else they would have to do more than just lay down to dodge.
Kairos clicked his tongue as he realized that the fireball he sent out wasn't able to kill the thing. As for the flaming clothes, he was initially a little anxious, but quickly relaxed. A large beam of water suddenly shot towards the roof, hitting it with a loud thump, though the sound was drowned out from the gunfire.
Its initial momentum was quite frightening, but most of it was dispelled after it hit the roof and scattered across the place, putting out most of the fires.
Kairos was splashed with some of the water which made him feel uncomfortable, but at least it put out the burning shirt that was on his leg.
He shot a glance towards the source of the water, his dad, who gave him a small smirk despite the unfavorable situation.
Kairos sighed and began considering his options.
It seemed that the fireball wouldn't work, and even if it did, the time it took to charge was too much. That left the pulse spell, but he would have to get up close to the minigun.
Kairos looked down at the black carapace he brought with him and decided he could try it. But while the black carapace was definitely sturdy, he wasn't sure if it could stand the bullets for long considering the destructive power.
With that, Kairos decided to continue lying down on the floor and advance with the black carapace in front as insurance.
Like this, he went onwards almost like a snake. However, due to the width of the black carapace, it frequently got caught on the various debris that was thrown about from all the destruction earlier.
Kairos frowned and pushed through forcefully. It wasn't any trouble to make it through, but it definitely delayed him. Though he wasn't all too concerned since it seemed that the minigun was still only shooting at waist level for some reason.
There should still be plenty of time.
But as though that thought was a jinx, his father shouted.
"Shit! We have to get out of here!"
Kairos furrowed his brows and looked behind him, about to ask. But he soon shut his mouth as he saw the reason for it.
Turns out, the minigun wasn't just randomly firing. Or at least, it just so happened to have some other use.
The bullets were able to pierce through the walls, and along with the extremely high firing rate, the wall was gradually being destroyed.
In other words, the top of the building was going to fall over soon enough as there was nothing to support it. Kairos cursed under his breath, wondering if he should continue forth or try to break out the side of the wall and escape.
The adrenaline running through his body made it hard to focus on logical thinking, but he forced himself to do so anyway.
Perhaps if he thought about the most likely way to survive, his mind would jump towards escaping. However, he was focused on finding a way to kill this thing.
If the building collapsed, then it would also interfere with getting closer to the minigun once more. Frankly, Kairos really didn't want that thing to continue firing, wanting to stop it as soon as possible. For one, it may begin focusing on the grocery store, and even if nobody was harmed, most of the food would be ruined.
On top of that, that sound could attract monsters.
He wasn't afraid of the smaller ones, but the problem was that most smaller ones seemed to avoid this area.
Only monsters big enough to not fear whatever was making them afraid would come here, and that loud sound acted like a flare.
With that in mind, Kairos decided to rush in, while holding the black carapace in front of him.
The minigun was just about to finish tearing through the walls, but froze in place for a second when Kairos popped up. Right after that moment of hesitation, the minigun snapped towards him and began firing.
Kairos immediately felt a strong force bash against his arm, threatening to snap it off directly. He tilted the black carapace to the side so that the bullets would ricochet off instead of directly smashing against him, but the force was still overbearing.
The black carapace held on, but it was trembling violently as a few cracks formed on its side. As though the situation couldn't get any worse, the building began collapsing. Although the minigun was no longer shooting the wall directly, what remained was unable to keep it up.
The building first teetered, letting out a loud metallic creaking sound before falling over entirely, coming down towards the minigun.
Kairos grit his teeth and arched his back, using all his strength to move forwards just a little bit faster. Suddenly his head snapped upwards as he raised one hand up towards the building coming down on him.
With a bang, the pulse spell was released, shattering the wall, giving Kairos a gap.
Right afterwards, the building slammed down onto Kairos, and the minigun just a few meters in front of him. They were abruptly sent into darkness from the lack of the sun, but the light from the fire of the minigun continued lighting up the place.
Considering it was now all of nothing, Kairos began gathering all the mana he could towards the palm of his hand, preparing the pulse spell.
He pushed forwards against the minigun. There were now visible cracks on his black carapace, showing that it could break at any moment now. However, it had already done its job.
Kairos had gotten next to the minigun, and his hand was trembling violently from the excessive mana gathered in his hand. It held almost all the mana he had left and was just pretty close to its maximum power.
Though he hadn't cast it yet, just the chaotic rumbling of mana in his hand let him know that it was going to be powerful.
The black carapace shattered into pieces.
But Kairos knew this would happen.
He lunged to the side before raising his hand towards the minigun.
It was glowing so brightly, that it was as though another sun was next to him.
Kairos narrowed his eyes.
"Die."
Everything seemed to fall silent, but only for a moment.
A thundering explosion ensued, followed by a relentless rumbling sound.
The ground shook violently.
The wind blew.
And the darkness was pushed away, revealing the bright red sun.
The building around Kairos was blown away, smashed into tiny pieces, and thrown in every direction. Along with that, a massive crater had formed underneath him, with countless cracks snaking across the pavement.
As for the minigun, it was launched like a cannonball. The barrel was severely deformed along with the shield, bent like a wrinkled piece of paper.
It slammed into the grocery store, firmly planting itself in one of the aisles.
The other people in the group had gotten near the entrance, trying to help, so the minigun had landed quite close to them.
All of them looked at the scene in front of them with widened eyes.
Nicole trembled as she took in a deep breath.
"That was amazing!"
Everyone seemed quite excited.
However, Kairos still had a big frown plastered across his face.
After casting a mana spell at nearly full power, there was a strong sense of vertigo, one that threatened to take his consciousness the moment he stopped concentrating.
Kairos immediately realized why this was the case.
While his magic was enhanced high in order to cast this devastating spell, the rest of his body was not strong enough to sustain it. After all, it seemed like the actual casting process was closely tied to his body.
Even if he wanted to focus more on magic, he should at the very least increase his endurance along with it. That way, the burden suffered from casting such a spell would be decreased.
But all of this wasn't the reason he was frowning.
As bad as the situation was, he was not in any lethal danger right now, so it would be a rather petty thing to be upset about at this point.
No, the reason why he was frowning…
Was because he didn't get a system notification telling him that he killed the minigun.
In other words, it survived.
Kairos tried to force his voice out, but was having difficulty. So instead, he pointed towards the minigun, prompting the others to look as well.
Tori laughed.
"Yeah! We saw! It was pretty damn cool."
Kairos shook his head as a mouthful of blood burst out of his mouth. The others immediately shifted from smiling to concerned expressions.
Chase furrowed his brows.
"Are you alright?"
With a heavily distorted voice, Kairos yelled.
"RUN AWAY!"
The group panicked and started to look around, wondering what threat they were supposed to run from. Only Chase connected the dots together quickly before dashing out of the way from the minigun.
Seeing as the rest of them still hadn't gotten the message, Kairos tore his throat to scream once more.
"IT'S STILL ALIVE."
Expressions of fear appeared on everyone's faces as they turned back to the minigun.
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