*Back to back chapters what?!

It's been a while, but you're getting this chapter right after the last one!*

The creatures leapt in unison, like a bunch of dolphins swimming together through the horrifically large and dangerous ocean water. Their brains were not functioning properly, not as long as they were under Abel's command. All they wanted to do was hurt people. And they had people to hurt that day.

The cult's members, all varying in sizes and capabilities, grouped up like a mob of upset meerkats. They weren't going down without a fight, even if they were outnumbered.

Luke quickly snatched Akiria who was laying on the ground and attempted to sprint back towards the group. Unfortunately, his path was cut by a dozen of those weird creatures that surrounded them. Luckily, they didn't seem all that big, at least not when compared to Luke.

He quickly laid Akiria down on her legs. "Can you stand, you okay?" She quickly nodded a few times to confirm as Luke straightened himself out and patiently waited for the creatures to strike. He wasn't going to leave Akiria's side. "Come on, fellas." He taunted them right before two creatures from both sides began charging at him.

Luke quickly pulled out two big machetes from his massive jacket and stood his ground. He swiftly ducked under a swing from a baseball bat one of the creatures was carrying. That was not it, however. The creature kept swinging at him, hoping it would land at least one hit. If a bad hit lands in a fight, the entire flow of the brawl suddenly becomes altered, and it could turn on itself completely because of that one unlucky blow.

"Too slow, freakshow!" Luke was getting tired of the creature swinging at him with such ease without being interrupted, so he quickly turned his machete and stabbed the creature through its stomach. He quickly pulled it out and decapitated it with the same machete very smoothly. The second creature had some kind of blade that Luke was able to parry at the last possible moment before it could slice through his shoulder. He adjusted his weight and used his shoulder strength primarily to bump the creature off balance, seizing the opportunity to kill the creature with a few effective slashes. He couldn't find a moment to breathe properly as a few creatures now charged at him from the front.

...

The cult was surrounded, but the creatures showed unexpected restraint by continuously circling them.

"Crap, nowhere to go." Husk gritted his teeth and scoffed. "Roach, I trust you to handle the frontlines and all the battle commands. I'm going in." Husk withdrew his massive katana from his sheathe.

"Yes, sir." Roach hesitated for a moment but approved nonetheless. "I promise you, I'll bring everyone back safely."

Husk firmly nodded with a smile before turning towards several of the creatures circling them. He let out a shout that pierced the infected air just as he dashed forward and stabbed one of the creatures through its chest. Immediately after piercing a lung, he withdrew his katana and swung it in front of him viciously. Maybe he was doing it to intimidate his opponents, or simply just to get some of the blood off of the blade of his weapon, but regardless, he pulled the katana closer to him and dashed in with tremendous speed once again. His vintage black suit was now becoming redder and redder as it was stained with the blood of the creatures. A small amount of black goop oozed out of the wounds Husk was inflicting upon the infected cretins. He could handle himself quite well, but the rest of his cult was quickly swarmed by the creatures.

Luckily, Roach was a capable commander. He had artillery of weapons at his disposal and switched from gun to gun repeatedly. Shotguns, machine guns, a sniper rifle, pistols, his rocket launcher, you name it, he used it in this fight. There were several close calls as a few members of the group became overwhelmed due to the creatures outnumbering them. Luckily, most of the cult was able to defend themselves effectively.

Juno avoided most of the conflict, but they used their powers to smite some of the creatures with divine energy. They did not have a weapon, but that doesn't mean they weren't able to contribute. Loads of wounds were healed in that fight, most of them patched up by Juno and Henri occasionally helping out.

It seems like Abel underestimated the cast quite a bit.

Several dreadfully long minutes of fighting went by. The cult was starting to win it out, with only a few major injuries that caused a few members to stop fighting. Luckily, Roach and Husk were covering most of the cult and were able to keep the situation under control.

Throughout the cult's efforts to keep things even, Luke began helping out Husk, side by side. He was able to wrap things up on his side of the battlefield.

"Long time no see, eh?" Husk joked a small bit before decapitating an infected creature that was running up to Luke's back.

"It's been a while, man!" Luke chuckled through his sentence as he threw one of his machetes straight through the skull of one of the creatures.

They kept protecting each other's backs back and forth, with no intention of backing off from their position.

Eventually, Roach began guiding the cult out of the battlefield zone as soon as he saw the opportunity to move backwards safely.

He willingly stayed back to clean up the rest of the creatures that were still alive. They managed to get a few swings on him, but it wouldn't stop him from blowing each and every undead brain out he possibly could. After taking a small breather, he quickly made his way out of the danger zone. Only a few creatures remained, but they still had the tiniest bit of willpower they needed to retreat.

"Roach, are you okay?!" Husk quickly ran up to him to help him out.

"I'll be fine, just a little shaken up." Roach coughed a few times before spitting on the dead concrete ground beside him. Juno walked up to Roach and quickly analyzed him with their eyes. They put their hands over him after a few moments as their expression became intense. Their hands lit up bright yellow as Roach's body was enveloped in a bright aura. He was healed after a few moments.

"You should be okay now. I wasn't able to cover all of the wounds, but you'll be healthy enough to treat them yourself." Juno spoke up in a serious tone.

"I owe you one, Juno." Roach sincerely thanked the angel.

This bittersweet moment suddenly came to an abrupt end as an armoured truck could be seen and heard driving down the main road of the city. It managed to stop before running over several people. A few familiar figures walked out of the truck.

Camo, Lits and Ba.

"Luke, you asshat! You didn't invite us to your scavenge!" Ba began shouting at the massive lad.

"Looks to me like you don't need an invitation." Luke began laughing slowly. "Good to see you guys."

Lits began inspecting some of the cult members around her. "What the hell happened here?"

"I'll tell you on the way home. It's a bit of a long story." Luke began walking up to the truck to prepare boarding supplies and people on it.

"Are we going back already?! But we haven't done jackshit yet!" Ba began shouting in a more frustrated tone now.

"Put a sock in it, just look at everyone around you." Most of the people around the group were wounded or severely tired. "People of the village come first, we can worry about supplies later."

Ba scoffed as she walked back to the front of the truck alongside Lits and Camo.

Luke quickly turned his attention towards the injured cult members. "Everyone, board the truck, we're heading home. We had a decent scavenge, so don't worry about that. We got some supplies. Now, board the truck before I put your sorry asses in there myself!"

The cult members began moving as they shared a short laugh.

...

About a handful of stories and interactions in the truck later, Juno was starting to pass out due to the exhaustion of excessively using their powers. It was a much needed and deserved rest for them.

"You're shitting me." Ba's voice had a higher pitch to it. "Some religious bloke suddenly was immune to rockets and had a bunch of zombies at his side?! I don't believe that."

"Believe what you want to believe, these wounds aren't fake." Luke quickly nodded towards the rest of the cult behind him.

A few seconds of silence went by. "How much longer until we're back?" Lits curiously asked.

Camo was behind the wheel. Even his expression showed some emotion as he began getting closer and closer to the village. But not due to excitement, happiness or any other positive emotion.

His eyes were covered in flames.

The sight of their village burning was something nobody expected to visualise outside of their worst nightmares...

But there it was.

The village known as Whitt's End was slowly and slowly deteriorating as countless buildings and people turned to ash and smoke.

It was a horrific image that didn't need to be burned into everyone's memories.

Unfortunately, that's how this world works.

...

The next day, most of the village was burned down to the ground, apart from a few important buildings. Luke's bar received some damage, but as he entered his beloved pub, he found a single body inside of it on top of lots of wet rags that were used to put the flame out.

He immediately recognised the body and clenched both of his fists. Luke slowly walked over to it and crouched down to make sure this was the man he was thinking of.

It was.

Gams was dead.

He died protecting the pub, and probably some of the villagers within it.

A single tear fell on Gams' corpse as Luke shut his burned eyes so Gams could rest well.

...

Things weren't looking so good for the village.

This fire caught them during a time when they were slowly ascending in terms of income, food supply and everything in between. The villagers needed some time to recover from this, mentally and physically.

One big lad had to do something about the whole situation. Lamprey walked into the lonely pub a few weeks after the fire.

"Just the guy I needed to see." Luke didn't have a hint of sarcasm in his voice, even if Lamprey was a bit of a laughing stock in their community. "I need your help, Lamprey."

"Say the word, big guy. But I don't see what you would need *my* help with." Lamprey sat down comfortably and lit a cigarette. "Get me a beer, would you?"

"Sure, I'll get it for you." Luke quickly grabbed a bottle and a big glass and instantly poured an appropriate amount into the glass. He passed it to Lamprey with little effort. "You wanna hear me out?"

Lamprey waved his hand towards him as he took a big sip of beer. "Go on, I'm listening."

"You remember that 'all-knowing' lad you kept mentioning to us a few months back?" Luke questioned with a serious tone in his voice.

Lamprey quickly darted his eyes towards Luke after taking another sip of beer. "Sure, I do. I've spoken to him recently, to be fair. What is it?"

"I need him to investigate a guy for me." Lamprey's expression was entirely focused on Luke. "His name is Abel."

Lamprey took a few seconds to think if he had heard that name before. "Doesn't ring a bell...do you have any additional info?"

"Sort of a big lad, really loud, a religious bellend. Has some kind of magical necklace and commands an army of infected people."

"Am I listening to a real story or a kid's imagination?" Lamprey joked for a second but instantly reverted to a serious tone. "Sure, I could ask around. I know a couple of guys that'll surely know something."

"You're a huge help, you know that?" Luke began polishing a few dirty glasses.

"How many times have you saved my ass?" Luke looked deep in thought in regards to Lamprey's question. "Yup, way too fucking many."

The men laughed together as Lamprey swayed the talk into a more casual conversation.

"Whatever happened to Been? I don't hear from him anymore?"

"He probably has his hands full at the infirmary. I haven't seen him in weeks myself. In fact, you're pretty much the first regular outside of Lits, Ba and Camo who I've seen come to the pub recently." Luke's expression turned into a more depressing one as he finished polishing his glasses and putting them on the shelf.

"That's a shame. I'm sorry, man. Look, maybe a story about some dumb shit that happened recently with the biker gang will cheer you up." Lamprey's expression remained positive as he began waving his hand frantically.

"Toyota? The fuck did that jackass do now?" Luke became intrigued.

"Some funny shit, listen to this..." Lamprey began rambling on.

After a solid conversation, loud laughter could be heard coming from the pub.

...

Things were busier than usual at the church. Henri was working on a contraption which wasn't all that unusual at all, but they kept it up for a few sleepless nights now. They constantly asked themselves loads and loads of questions, either regarding the device they were creating or their past studies. Henri was orphaned at birth and left on the doorstep of a cult that was worshipping and studying most religions from the golden age of the world. Mostly Christianity, though. The story Abel was chatting about seemed more and more familiar as Henri continued to study the ancient texts of the religions. Even his name rang a bell inside of Henri's mind. The contraption was almost complete. The question was if it worked or not. If it were to work, it would be a huge step in the right direction for everything the villagers or anyone else in that world knows about science and engineering.

That is a big "if", though.

...

Juno and Akiria slowly lived out their lives less optimistically than before. They certainly had a lot less energy and drive doing basic tasks and helping people out. Akiria even managed to brighten up a small bit by living with Juno and helping people out medically for a while. They weren't the main focus of today, however.

Husk was going over all the supplies the cult had. It didn't amount to much. He called for Roach. "Roach, come here for a moment."

Roach quickly appeared. "Yes, Husk?"

"I need your honest opinion on our rations. We desperately need a scavenge or some kind of delivery to happen." Husk paused for a few moments. "I can't possibly ask this of you."

"Anything, Husk, I'm loyal to you until the very end." Roach obediently replied.

"Well, here goes." Husk deeply inhaled and exhaled once before raising his voice once more. "I need you to explore that building in the city we went to. The giant one with black goop seeping out of it."

Roach's eyes widened, but he had a feeling it was something dangerous.

"I'll do it!"

No hesitation in his voice. Husk remained stationary, completely shocked. He eventually smiled with pride and patted Roach on the shoulder.

"I somehow knew you'd be up for it."

...

*End of chapter 3!

It felt fun writing this, even if the chapters are a bit shorter than what I'd like. It's a fun little side project to keep working on whilst I'm getting ideas for the Assassin's Creed story. Thank you for reading!*