Level up Zombie Chapter 2: 33, a 13 tzameti fanfic

Level up Zombie #Chapter 33 The Spitter - Read Level up Zombie Chapter 33 The Spitter Online - All Page - Novel Usb

The route of their problems was clearly this new type of zombie in front of them. Skittle understood this fact, but the only thing was, he had no idea how dangerous their current situation actually was.

When the green zombie spat the strange red liquid from its mouth, Skittle assumed that this liquid would perhaps turn people or control them as it had done with the zombies, but it was far more dangerous than that.

"What is all of this stuff!" Clark said as he began to wipe it off him. The strange spit was gooey, making it hard to wipe it off the skin. However, he didn't feel anything weird. Instead, his mind felt clear, which made him unsure if it actually did anything.

However, a zombie came up to him, and its presence pulled him out of his stupor. Clark swung his stick and hit the zombie on the head, sending it to the ground, but there was another zombie behind that one, and Clark quickly realised something.

In fact, not just him, the others realised something as well. All the zombies they were fighting against seemed to no longer care about them, and instead, they were heading straight for Clark. Seeing this as an opportunity, Mark ran away to the aisle.

Cody quickly followed, and Kelly was the last one. She was hesitant, but in the end, she left as well.

"What are you guys doing?! Why are you running away? Why aren't they attacking you?!" Clark shouted as panic started to set in, although he continued to kick and hit the zombies away. Luckily Clark had inhuman strength, allowing him to fend off the large group.

"That red substance, it must be attracting the zombies…." Skittle mumbled. "We can't let ourselves be hit by that Spitter!"

Spitter was what he was calling that strange green zombie, due to the creature's large mouth and actions before.

The Spitter itself seemed to be focused on Clark as well. It hadn't moved far from the freezer and was standing in silence, staring in the direction of Clark.

"Come on, let's get out of here. We can escape this place if we open the shutters while they're all after him." Mark suggested.

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"You guys can go, but we're going to stay." Skittle replied. "You said Zain is in that room, behind that Spitter Zombie, right?" Skittle asked. "Then I'm staying until I can get him out. We figured out how to kill the zombies. We have to attack the red boils on their body. We can do this."

Mark looked at them for a while and turned his head toward where the entrance was. If they wanted to risk their lives for the others, they could be his guest. Then, leaving them all, he headed towards the shutters.

"Aim for the red mark right, and avoid getting spat on. Understood." Cody replied.

"I might not be able to be much help. So I'll just stay here and warn you guys if I see anything else." Kelly replied.

Running forward, Cody sprung into action. While the zombies were distracted, it was the best opportunity for them. Since they were all going after Clark, Cody could easily use his blades to stab the red spots.

He slid across the floor and stabbed it on the leg while heading to the next one. Skittle had his hammer from before in one hand while a frying pan in the other, making him look like he was holding some type of sword and shield combo.

Then there was Buke. With his bat, it didn't matter if they would get back up because, with a large swing, he would crush their ribs, making them worse off if they did come back up.

It seemed like he had limitless power as he swung the bat.

"When they're not attacking us, this is actually easier!" Buke said, swinging so hard that the head of one of the Zombies got decapitated and hit the wall. However, the zombie was still moving and alive since the attack hadn't destroyed its red boil.

"There's more coming out of the freezer!" Kelly shouted, warning them.

The group looked ahead, and just as Kelly said, there were more of them, but it wasn't a small number. Instead, around fifteen more were rushing out, but their bodies weren't frozen for some reason, unlike the others. They still had the boils on their body, but they ran straight toward Clark at full speed, just as fast as a normal person.

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Skittle froze, allowing them to run past him, Buke had hit one in the chest, sending it flying back, but others simply ignored him and went for Clark.

Cody also took this chance and stabbed one of them on the head where a boil was.

"Arghh!" Clark's scream resonated throughout the supermarket. His fingers were bit when a zombie latched its jaws down and wouldn't let go. After that, two more Zombies leapt on top of his body and started biting his neck and chest.

Within seconds, Clark was overwhelmed with so many zombies that the others couldn't see him anymore, and even with his super strength, there was no chance for him to survive. As they watched Clark in disbelief, Skittle noticed a zombie coming from one of the aisles and had lept to attack Clark as well.

"No..." Skittle thought as he looked back toward the entrance of the store.

——n0𝓋𝐞𝒍𝗎𝚜𝗯.𝑐0𝑀

Mark had reached the shutters and immediately pressed the door button. He was in a panic, constantly turning his head back and side to side.

"Come on! Come on! Open up!" Mark said.

In a rush, as soon as the bottom of the shutters started to lift, he grabbed it and lifted it himself. In that second, he felt great pain in his leg and all over his body as a horde of zombies was right outside of the shop, ready to pounce on him.

They could barely fit through the entrance of the door because they were that many. On the other hand, Mark fell to the floor, and his eyes turned lifeless as the zombies ate his flesh.

While a few zombies were biting on Mark, the other zombies started to make their way toward the others inside.

——

Seeing not just one but a couple of other Zombies that didn't have the strange boil, Skittle's face paled as his heart filled with regret.

"We should have run! We should have gotten out of here! That spit doesn't just attract the boil-Zombies but all of them."

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Grunts reverberated throughout the Supermarket, and now what Skittle had been the first to notice, the others were catching on as well. An unknown amount of zombies were treading down the aisles and had entered the Supermarket.

Thankfully there was one good thing on their side. The fact that most of these zombies were extremely slow. Their steps were slumped as if they could barely handle their own body weight.n0𝐕𝑬𝐥𝒰𝔰𝒷.𝓬0𝕞

Either way, the problem now was to get out of the building. It was a considerable risk trying to get out of the entrance, and judging by the banging they could hear in other corners, they knew the situation was worsening with every second.

"What do we do now?" Kelly had asked, moving closer to Skittle, who was heading towards where Buke and Cody were. It looked like the Boil Zombies were still busy attacking Clark.

Once in a while, one of the Zombies would be seen getting knocked off. For once, everyone was thankful that Clark was strong while also being big, so the Zombies were getting quite the feast out of him, but with how many more were coming over and heading in his direction, it won't be long before they were done with him.

"I have a plan! And it's quite a simple one!" Buke said, slapping the bat into the palm of his hand and turning towards the Spitter. "He's the one causing all of our problems, so I'm going to get rid of him!"

Buke let out some sort of war cry as he shouted, charging towards the Spitter, while Skittle reached out to stop Buke but was too late.

'I'm not sure getting rid of that thing is our best option. Right now, the Spitter has only picked one target, and all zombies coming in the store are heading towards Clark.

'If we kill the Spitter now, what will happen to these Zombies?'

It seemed this question didn't matter too much because the group of zombies that were attacking Clark were done with him. Noticing this, the group raised their weapons as they got ready to protect themselves.

"Are we just going to sit here and fight them? I'm not sure that's the best option!" Kelly said nervously.

Honestly, Skitlltte wasn't sure what to do either. Should they head down an aisle and find a way of getting out of here? But heading into a narrow space would mean doom for them all. There was too much on the line for him to make a decision.

That's when he noticed something. Apart from the Boil Zombies that had eaten Clark, the normal zombies were heading toward them. But, instead, they were heading back to the Spitter.

"Let's back up, Buke!" Skittle shouted. "Get rid of the boils on the other Zombies first, and then let's get out of here."

Charging forward, they went to intercept the zombies that were heading towards Buke.

When Buke came forward, it looked like the Spitter hadn't noticed him.

When he was in range, Buke swung his bat, aiming to hit the largemouth and head of the zombie.

But the Spitter jumped back, avoiding the bat, and the boils had started to light up again, getting ready to spit again.

,m 'I can't let that thing hit me!' Buke thought, immediately rolling onto the ground. Then, looking to his side, he saw that the red liquid had narrowly missed him.

'The boils on his body aren't growing as brightly as they did just now. So I'm guessing you won't be using that soon!' Buke jumped from his crouching position and had the bat over his head before he swung it down.

Once again, though, the creature avoided the attack by moving backwards, allowing the bat to crash into the ground, and the force from it cracked the floor tiles.

'This Zombie has full control of its body, it has full movement, and it's reacting even faster than me.' Buke looked up and could see at that moment that it had opened its large mouth and was ready to clamp down on him.

His instincts kicked in, and with the bat in his hand, he shoved it straight into the Spitter's mouth. Almost immediately, the inner part of the Spitter's mouth began to crunch the bat as if it wasn't metal but a cookie.

Seeing this, Buke immediately let go, and with his bare fist and in a fit of rage, he went and punched the Spitter right in the head. It flinched and slightly moved its head but didn't step away from its position.

'What the...With my newfound strength, I thought I would be able to injure it at least...but it's done nothing.' Seeing this, Buke lost hope and decided to pull back.

"I'm guessing you don't have any good news?" Cody asked as he saw Buke retreating toward them.

The others had done well. They had killed four of the Boil Zombies, but it was challenging to fight properly without getting a scratch on themselves. They all had thick clothes on, which helped, but being cautious was making it hard, and by now, many of the slow Zombies had caught up and had surrounded them from all directions.

"That thing is a lot stronger than the others. We'll at least need a gun or something to hurt it." Buke felt helpless. And having no weapons in his hands worsened the situation.

"Then I guess we'll have to pick a direction and get out of this place," Cody said. The problem was, where should they go? Since there was no easy path to get out of the store.

One of the zombies that was close mustered up the strength and leapt toward kelly, making her flinch. Both Cody and Skittle reacted, heading towards it. But just then, something strange happened.

A sharp object flew through the air and went right through the zombie's head, forcing it to the floor.

"I... won't let the same thing happen again." A voice resounded, attracting everyone's attention.

Turning to their right towards the freezer section, they noticed a red-haired young man just behind the Spitter.

"Zain..." Skittle's voice cracked a bit upon seeing his best friend. The situation felt hopeless, and many would think about what one person could do, but it wasn't long ago when he felt the same, and this friend of his had taken him out safely from an almost impossible situation.

"Help us?" Skittle cried out again.

"Of course!" Zain replied and headed straight for the Stage two zombie, the Splitter.

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Zain had healed his broken leg by consuming quite a bit of energy and was now up on his feet.

[Energy: 64/100]

However, the bigger problem was his body functionality, which had now dropped to 86 percent. As time passed, his movements were getting slower and weaker, and overall, he felt his body become less responsive. Yet, the situations the group was in were getting more dangerous by the second.

When Zain appeared, instead of targeting the humans, the Spitter Zombie turned around and focused on him. Then, it opened its mouth, vibrating all its teeth, creating a strange shriek sound.

It wasn't quite trying to let out a cry or a loud shout, but it was as if he was trying to speak. At that moment, Zain noticed that the Boil zombies, about the six of them who were still alive, also turned toward him and ran at Zain.

'So that's the Stage Two Zombie that the system warned me about. Well, at least my presence has aggroed his attention to me,' Zain thought.

The Boil zombies were fast. They weren't at the mutated zombie's level but were just as fast as a newly turned zombie.

Seeing the incoming zombies, Zain took out two mops from his back that he had turned into sharp spears. He gripped them tightly as he shoved the first one right through a zombie's head. But the zombie kept moving forward, which was weird, however, Zain didn't stop there.

With his newfound strength, he quickly lifted the metal pole with the zombie's head on top of it and swung it, crashing the pole and his body into the other zombies, sending them off to the side.

"You have to get rid of the boil marks!" Skittle's sudden shout entered his ears.

Hearing this, when the next Boil zombie came towards Zain, he whacked away its lingering arm dangling towards him and stabbed the boil right by the zombie's hip.

[You have successfully eliminated a Controlled zombie]

[2EXP]

'Only two exp, for killing something like that…but I guess I can't complain. At least killing them doesn't lower my exp.'

Now armed with more information, Zain was going in toward the boil zombies more confidently. He grabbed one of them by its head, not worried if he was to be a bit or not, and stabbed the pole through the top of the head where he had noticed a boil.

Quickly another approached from behind, and Zain whacked it a couple of times on its leg before hitting it across the head, sending it to the floor. But before Zain could finish that one off on the floor, another came and bit him on the arm.

Fortunately, its teeth couldn't chew through his thick clothing, but it wouldn't have mattered anyway. It just gave Zain a sitting target, something easy to beat. Dealing with two more and the others, he had quickly gotten rid of the six boil zombies.

[ 10 Exp]

'I knew he was strong from the video we saw…but he was really able to deal with them quickly and calmly. How can a student be like this?' Kelly thought, watching things play out. The others were too busy to notice, they had their own set of problems.

Although the zombies they faced weren't fast, they were high in number, and pulling off an attack that could pierce their skull or kill them in one go was quite difficult. Only Buke was having an easy time.

"Argh!" Buke shouted, slamming a frying pan on top of a zombie's head so hard that its head got mushed into its ribcage, killing it instantly. "Look, we're doing fine for now, but even someone like me will tire out eventually. We need a plan to get out of this place. Zain will deal with that thing, but all of these, not even Zain will be able to take these guys out."

"The back," Kelly answered. "In the back, there is a lorry which was used to move and deliver things. We can use that Lorry to get out of here, but there is one problem. The door to the outside where the Lorry is is locked by a chain. You should be strong enough to break the chain, right?" Kelly asked, looking at Buke.

It didn't sound like a bad idea. Although using a large vehicle like that would make a lot of noise and attract attention, they had already done that. At least with a vehicle, they could outrun these guys and get to a safer location than they are now.

"Alright, we will run towards the back door once Zain is done with that dangerous one. I'll break the door, and you guys drive, got it?!" Buke instructed.

Everyone nodded, but the teenager, Cody, did something strange at that moment. He charged forward from the circle the group was in and broke out of it. Soon, he used his agility to run through the zombie horde, not letting them take a single hit.

Then when reaching the aisles, he used one of the shelves as a base to push his body up and instantly got on top of the aisle. Then, without wasting any time, he ran across the top of them.

"Where is he going?" Kelly asked.

"I don't know. Maybe he didn't like the plan or something?" Skittle replied.

In the first place, a particular zombie was in their way of getting out of this store, and it was the most dangerous one. So it was all up to Zain now. With the two spear-like objects, Zain charged forward toward the Spitter.

The latter's body lit up and spat out red coloured substance. Although Zain didn't know what the red liquid could do, he was smart enough to avoid it, and then, moving to the side, he continued forward. When he was within range, he swung one of the poles and hit the Spitter on the side of its head. The attack was successful, unlike Buke's wild bat swings.

It had somewhat been heavy as well, and it looked like even the zombie was surprised by this, but so was Zain.

'I hit that thing with a full swing. It would have snapped a zombie's neck off, but this one is completely fine.' Zain thought, swinging his other hand, attempting to hit it from the other side of its head

Before it reached its head though, the Spitter lifted its arm, and on impact, the pole had snapped. The Spitter then leapt towards Zain with its mouth, and just like Buke, Zain shoved the spear directly into its mouth, assuming it might be a weak spot for the enemy.

The spear was quickly disappearing like the Spitter's mouth was some type of black hole, and much to his disappointment, the attack didn't do any damage either.

With his other hand free, Zain continued to whack the Spitter on its neck, and he had done so three times until, with a swing of its own arms, the Spitter hit Zain and sent him in the air skidding across the floor.

Zain wasn't hurt and quickly got back up, although he was surprised by its strength.n0𝐕𝑬𝐥𝒰𝔰𝒷.𝓬0𝕞

'I didn't break any bones, but it really does have power.'

"Zain!" A familiar shout suddenly attracted his attention.

Turning his head, Zain saw the hooded teenager running across the top of one of the aisles. The zombies from below tried to reach up, but Cody ran too fast for them to react.

"Catch!" Cody shouted as he pulled off a strap bag one would put around their chest. It hurled in the air, and that's when Zain understood why

He easily caught the bag with one hand. It was already torn and not really used as a back to Cary things but something else. He understood why Cody had run off to the back. In the bag were the two familiar shear blades he had with him before Clark took them away.

"Let's try this again," Zain said while holding onto one blade in each hand.

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With the shear blades in his hands, Zain felt much more confident than before. The mopes were make-shift spears and weren't very sharp and sturdy in the first place. Although the blades on the edge of the shear weren't sharp, they were good quality and heavy.

"Come on then, let's go for a second round!" Zain shouted, charging forward. The others didn't know it, but he had somewhat heard the plan they were discussing and knew it was reliant on him.

When Zain got close enough, he swung the blade from the side, aiming right for the Spitter's head. It seemed to be the most dangerous part of the zombie. Seeing this, the zombie turned its head and spread its large mouth, ready to eat his weapon.

That's when Zain quickly pulled back, and at the same time, the other shear in his other hand had hit the Spitter's side, striking right into one of the boils on its body. It burst like a sack full of liquid, draining the strange substance down the side of its arm.

'Your skin's hard, you're strong, and you can do some weird crap. But if this is the weakness of those other zombies you created, it should be the same for you as well.'

The Spitter furiously swung his arm, but Zain had rolled to the ground to avoid the attack. Then, he spun his body and swung both shears together, pounding into the zombie's knee. It was a solid hit but only scratched the zombie's skin.

After fighting several zombies in the day, he noticed the zombie he fought against wouldn't feel any pain and could attack the enemy as long as their brain was intact, so he rolled back and jumped to his feet before the Spitter could counterattack.

'I'm getting used to this... and I won't run out of breath now that I'm a zombie. So I can keep going, keep fighting without getting tired. I have to use what I have now to my advantage!'

When he tightened the grip around the blades, visions flashed in his head once again.

A young Zain was running while huffing and panting through a dark forest at night. He was almost naked, with several scars on his body.

What was noticeable in the young Zain though, was the blood on his hands as he continued to run through the forest.

"I have been ready for this. Something like you is not going to stop me!" Zain shouted. His head was now clear as he ran forward again.

The boils on the stage 2 zombie's body lit up, and it quickly spat out the red liquid towards him. At the last moment, Zain jumped to the side, not wasting any time or movement, and as soon as his feet touched the floor, he pushed his weight and continued to head straight toward the zombie.

He slashed one of the shear blades as soon as he was within range and quickly sliced one of the boils on the zombie's chest, and without giving any time for the latter to react, he cut through other boils on its body.

The Spitter struggled against the continuous barrage of attacks, and although it couldn't feel pain, Zain's strength behind his attacks made blocking it difficult.

From side to side, Zain continued his wild swings while hitting different areas of the body. They never pierced the Spitter much, but it was enough to impair the zombie slowly, and it was then that Zain noticed something.

With fewer boils on its body, it was almost as if the zombie was starting to slow down. But the Spitter finally reacted when Zain jumped in for another attack and it had leapt onto him. However, it had missed his body but still managed to latch onto his arm.

It opened its mouth wide, and with its set of several hundred teeth, it chomped on his arm.

"Take it if you want it, but I'm not going to let you have it for free!" Zain grunted as he lifted one of the shears and, with all his strength, stabbed it down in the back of the Spitter's Neck. This time it had gone quite deep. Although not enough to go right through the neck, it was enough to force it to let go of Zain's arm.

The zombie wobbled back a bit as it tried to find the weapon in its back but struggled to get hold of the shear. Seeing this, Zain grabbed the other shear in both arms. Although the teeth marks on his arm looked deep, since he was a zombie, they didn't affect him, and he was able to regain his composure quickly.

Gripping the shear like a sword, Zain ran forward as fast as he could. The Spitter lit up the boils on its body once again and spat right at Zain. However, due to its wild swinging, the spit missed Zain without him having to avoid it.

Seeing this attack fail, it attacked him again with its large mouth, but before it could, Zain crouched down and pushed his legs, shoving the blade right through the zombie's chin.

Zain pushed it up as hard as he could until the blade was right through the top of its head. Letting go, Zain then kicked the bottom of the shear, hitting it again and shoving it through the head even more.

The Spitter finally fell onto the floor, and the boils on its body no longer emitted any light. Seeing this, Zain knew he had successfully taken out the Stage Two Mutated zombie, and then the 'ding' of the system prompt confirmed his thoughts as a screen appeared in front of him.

[150 exp has been earned]

[You are the first to defeat a Stage 2 zombie who has been given the name 'Spitter']

[500 Bonus exp has been given]

[You have successfully levelled up]

[Congratulations, you are now level 3]n0𝓋𝓮𝓛𝗎𝑠𝕓.𝔠0𝑚

[262/2626 exp]

A few more screens appeared and a few more prompts which Zain had to answer, but he soon heard a shaky voice from his side, which pulled his attention.

"What do I do?" A shaky voice asked.

Turning his head, Zain was left with his mouth hanging wide open as he stared at Skittle, now covered head to toe in the strange red liquid.

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Zain targeted the Spitter because he knew killing this second-stage mutated zombie would end their biggest concern. After that, the group would get out of the supermarket, find the lorry and escape somewhere, but the situation took an unexpected turn.

For a moment, Zain hoped that the red liquid wouldn't work. With the Spitter zombie dead, maybe it couldn't control them, but it didn't take long for Zain to know that it had worked because he could sense it.

When the red liquid landed on the floor, it didn't react, but now that it was on Skittle, Zain could sense an aroma and felt a strong urge to walk towards it. For Zain, it was easy to hold back, but for all the other zombies, who could no longer use their brains properly, they were unable to.

They had already stopped focusing on the entire group as all the zombies in the area headed towards Skittle. Since Mark opened the store shutters a while ago, over a hundred zombies were already inside.

"No..no!" Skittle's voice cracked.

Kelly instinctively stepped away from him as the zombies began to move even faster as they got closer. One of them leapt from its position even with a broken leg and jumped at Skittle.

Although he had a hammer in his hand, he was still in a stupor and couldn't react in time. Fortunately, just then, someone swung down a large bat as it hit the zombie on top of the head, breaking its skull and stomping it to the floor.

"Don't worry, Skittle, we can get out of this!" The person was none other than Buke. He was now covered in zombies' guts and was visibly sweating.

He and the others except Zain were all exhausted from defending themselves from the zombies.

Cody didn't falter though, and Kelly had come back with the second wind of confidence, a will to live.

A couple of seconds later, they heard a resounding crash in the distance. It was from past the freezer room, close to where the deliveries would come from.

A door had fallen, but fallen wouldn't be the best way to describe it. It had been pushed. As soon as the crash subsided, grunts resonated in the store, and through the door, more Zombies were coming toward them. They continued to pour in through the door, blocking the entire way to the trucks and exit.

"We're trapped. We have no way of getting out of this situation. They've blocked us in!" Kelly panicked.

Usually, in this type of situation, Skittle would have felt guilty and grumbled to himself about why he hadn't been paying attention and could have stepped away from the spit. Right now, he could only think about getting out of this situation alive, but his hands had frozen out of fear.n0𝓋𝓮𝓵𝑈𝗌𝒃.𝔠0𝚖

On the other hand, just as Buke took down another zombie, Zain stepped in and struck down two more zombies.

"We stick to the plan!" He shouted. "Right now, they are just after Skittle and me. We have to use this to our advantage. I'll protect Skittle, and we will run around this whole place. Once the hallway is clear, you guys get on that truck and get out of this place."

Although they didn't want to risk abandoning them, Zain was right. The outcome of the situation was actually better for them all. If Skittle led the zombies away, their escape would be nearly a hundred percent confirmed.

It was just no one was willing to say this. Would anyone be willing to do this, or act on this thought.

"You're planning to stay here, Zain? They're not after you, but him!" Buke shouted. "Either way, let's all get out of here!"

By now, countless zombies had already gathered around them, and stepping back away from the others, along with Skittle, Zain had his weapons out to protect him.

"Look at me," Zain replied while pointing at his arm. There was a deep bite mark on his blood-covered hand. "I was already bit by that thing. I'm not one of them yet, but I eventually will be."

"You know what I'm like. I will do everything I can to ensure Skittle survives, but it's the same for you, Buke. So get out of here!" Zain urged and started to run, and along with him was Skittle.

They had picked one of the aisles, and even this place was filled with zombies, though the numbers were considerably low.

Zain didn't hesitate to attack them while thinking about how to get out of the situation because when he reached the end of the aisle, he could see the zombies were still pouring in from the entrance.

——

Buke wanted to chase after his two friends badly, but his own life took priority in a situation like this. It didn't take long for the zombies to clear out of the path toward the freezer section, and the group didn't waste this opportunity as they started to run.

"Come on! You heard Zain. You said you trusted him, didn't you?" Kelly asked. "Then trust him one more time."

After the other two left, Buke followed them, but he couldn't help but think about what had just happened.

'Zain showed he was bit…I guess I was wrong about him. It looks like he will be turning into one of them. Goodbye, my good friend...and Skittle, I hope you can get out of this situation.' Buke took a deep breath and increased his pace.

They soon stepped out of the store and found two trucks parked near the exit. One had its door open with a body lying upside down as if someone had tried to pull it out of the truck. When they rushed over, they were relieved to find the key still in the truck.

"Does anyone know how to drive?" Cody asked. "I'm too young."

"I've never driven before."

"I have," Kelly answered. "But I'm still learning. I haven't passed yet."

With all of their options in front of them, they could only rely on Kelly. So the three of them sat inside, and Kelly took the driver's seat. With the turn of the key, the engine started, and they could feel the familiar vibration within the driver's cabin.

A beeping noise went off as the truck backed out of the supermarket. Regardless, all the zombies seemed to ignore it as they continued to enter the supermarket.

After successfully turning enough, they could now head off and onto the road.

'Am I doing the right thing? Leaving the two of them? Would they have done the same for me?' Buke thought, biting his lip so hard that it started to bleed.

There was no turning back on the road, and thinking of this, tears started to stream down Buke's cheeks. No matter how strong Zain and Skittle were, there was no chance for the two of them to get out of that.

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Running down the aisle, Skittle was following Zain's lead, as he knocked down zombie after Zombie. One leapt towards them and with a swing of his shear, he had whacked it right across the face and crashed into the shelves, causing a load of the food to drop to the ground.

He continued forward, kicking another in the face, and then grabbing one by its head and slamming it down on the floor.

[You have defeated a Zombie]

[- 2Exp]

[You have defeated a Zombie]

[- 2Exp]

[You have defeated a Zombie]

[- 2Exp]

[You have defeated a Zombie]

[- 2Exp]

'Damn it all of these messages!' Zain thought.

Level 3

[248/2626 exp]

'At least I have a lot of exp this time, but I don't even have time to check the benefits of levelling up with all of this going on.'

At the same time, as quickly as Zain was defeating a zombie, there seemed to be more and more that were gathering at either end of the aisle. If it were wider, even more zombies would have come toward them.

"Just how many of the Zombies are there, there weren't even this many people living in the area, right? They had to have come from the university." Zain commented, and turned his head to look at his small friend.

Skittle was still shaking a bit, the red liquid was still on him, and more were still trying to grab him by the second. A hand came bursting through from one side of the shelves, and went to reach Skittle but before it could touch him, there was a large object swung down hitting the arm. It didn't it off but broke it in the process.

"Skittle!" Zain shouted. "I'm going to need you to wake up. I can't fight and think at the same time, at least not to the best of my ability, so if you can't fight right now, then I'm going to at least need you to think!"

There was more in Skittle's head other than the fact that all of the zombies were after him, it was the fact that Zain had been bit. If that was the case then it meant he would be turning into a zombie. Honestly, if that wasn't the case then Skittle would have told Zain to leave him so that he could be the bate.

However, seeing Zain try so hard, there was a reason for it, and Skittle could only think it was because it was his best friend's final breath of life.

p "Let's go to where the others were, the entrance was smaller there, and if we use your body we can push through and maybe get in a vehicle of some sort." Skittle said.

Unsure if it was a good plan or not, Zain sprung into action as he ran forward and slammed the side of his arm into one of the shelving sections. It started to fall slightly but due to the number of Zombies on the other side that were holding it up, it was at a tilted angle.

The next second and Zain, had grabbed Skittle.

"Hold on." Zain ran forward placing his feet on the shelves, and when he got to the end he leapt over as far as he could to the other side reaching the top of the aisle. He nearly overshot it and fell into another aisle but after regaining his balance he was okay.

'That cody kid made it look easy.' Zain thought.

Running at a height made it hard for the Zombies to reach them, but they were aggressively pushing each other into the shelves making them wobble slightly. They were ready to topple over at any second. Luckily in his arms, Skittle was light, allowing Zain to sprint through as fast as he could.

One of the stack of shelves had fallen from the Zombies trying to reach them too much, but with a leap from his powerful legs, he cleared the distance with ease. Due to the situation, Skittle wasn't even noticing the amazing human feats that Zain was going through.

When they finally got to the end of the aisle, Zain leapt down with Skittle and they were back to the open area just where the freezer section was, only there was a huge problem. Breaking through several emergency doors, fire exits and windows, the Zombies were heavily packed in the hallway.

n0𝑣𝖊𝓵𝑈𝓈𝗯.𝐂0𝓂

"We can't force ourselves through this. If we did with Skittle, then without a doubt he would be bitten by one of them.' Clenching his teeth, Zain had to come up with a plan quickly. Although he wasn't tired, his energy was getting lower, as he continued to fight and his body functionality was getting worse.

'There's also a good chance with this many zombies coming here, that there could be another stage 2 Zombie.'

Looking around for options, Zain saw something, it wasn't really an option but it was the only thing he could think of.

"Follow me!" Zain shouted as he headed over to a large door. The fresh air could be felt as they approached the room. Skittle didn't hesitate to follow his friend and when they were finally inside, Zain slammed the door shut behind them.

Skittle was shivering and his breath was frosty, as he looekd around at all the eaten bodies inside. The two of them were now in the freezer section. Bangign from outside continued on the metal door.

Lifting the handle, Zain was able to lock it, but how long it would hold with so many outside it was impossible to tell.

"Zain, I'm so sorry! I'm so sorry for getting you into this mess!" Skittle said wiping his tears.

"Stop it," Zain said. "You weren't the one that caused all of this, to change the world so don't go blaming yourself for anything!"

Sniffling, he felt the words did reassure Skittle a little.

"But Zain you arm, because of me, you're now going to turn into one of them."

Hearing this, Zain started to pull down the wrappings that were around his neck and showed the bite mark that remained.

"Skittle I was bitten a long time ago, look at me. I'm completely fine, this bite won't do anything to me as well. This is why I have a proposal for you, and it's up to you what you want to do.

"I can bite you, and there's a chance you could become something like me, or... they get through this door and we try to escape. But I'll be honest it's unlikely you will make it out of here without being bit."

The option was now in Skittle's hands.

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Skittle was a smart boy, he was always top of his class during school and had even managed to enter the university on a special Scholarship. Although there were times when he would think too much, and it would get in the way of his common sense.

He was a nervous wreck multiple times which would cause him to fumble some of his scores at times. To put it simply he didn't do well in high-pressure situations.

Right now though, he was thinking back to everything he had seen about Zain. His skin colour slightly getting paler, his eyes changed, and the fact that even though he was stabbed in the chest and they had yet to go to a hospital, he was acting like nothing had happened.

"You were bit...from the beginning. Are you saying that you were bit when you first came to us!" Skittle asked.

At first, when he heard the suggestion from Zain he thought it was crazy. Perhaps he had been bit recently and it still hadn't taken effect on him, but Zain was completely normal despite so much time passing. Just like with a virus everyone's body would react differently and just maybe that was what had happened to Zain.

However, it was unlikely that just getting Zain to bite him would change the way the virus was, to the point it was mutated and that was if it was even a virus in the first place. There was just too much risk.

While in the middle of his thoughts, the banging increased against the metallic door, it was consistent and sounded as if it was getting larger by the second. For a moment, it looked like the door had moved slightly, meaning it was only a matter of time before they would get in.

"The zombies, they don't attack me," Zain explained. "The reason why I was able to save you guys and get out of the situation from before, was because they were never after me. I could just ditch the car and attract the zombies with the sound."

Hearing this, Skittle understood what Zain was saying, right now the Zombies were only banging and trying to enter this room because of him. If this crazy plan worked then there was a good chance that they would go away.

"Skittle, it's our best chance right now. I don't want to see you die, I don't want to do nothing, this is the best chance of survival!" Zain shouted, kicking the door behind him, shoving it slightly back, as it had been pushed forward from the others.

It was a hard hit and shove that had bent the door, making it a bit harder to open.

Skittle quickly took off the overcoat he was wearing and pulled up the sleeve, revealing his skin.

"Zain, you have been a good friend to me, you and both Buke helped me when I was getting bullied. You helped me get my items back from those guys, and ever since you continued to protect me.

"I know, even now you're trying to protect me. If what you said is true you could have left this place a long time ago. I know you have had your own troubles, and I was unable to help you back then, I was unable to see what you were going through. But this time I can do something, and won't be a burden to you!"

When Skittle said these words, it reminded Zain of a certain moment. Once again visions started to flash in his mind. The freezer had turned into an incredibly dark room. Once again, there was blood on his hands.

'You will fail again...now you're going to kill your friend as well. You once again are useless, unable to help anybody.' A voice was heard echoing in his head.

'No.' Zain shook his head. 'This will work, it has to work!'

Skittle ran forward, closing his eyes not slowing down, he had made a decision but didn't want to back out of it.

"Zain, if it's out of you or them, then I would rather take a chance with you. Please if anything happens to me...just make sure my family and Buke are okay!"

As Skittle reached him, Zain pressed his hand against his forehead stopping him. Skittle was so hell-bent on running he nearly crashed into Zain.

Zain grabbed his friend's arm next and could see he still had his eyes closed.

Even now while holding Skittle he could feel his whole body shaking.

'Please, whoever is looking over me, whoever created this damned Zombie system and is looking over me, make this work!' Zain opened his mouth, and with his teeth bite down.

Screaming in pain, Skittle quickly put his shirt in his mouth to bite against and take in the pain. Still, Zain didn't let go, he could feel something coming through his teeth. It was as if blood was being drawn out of him from the bite, and was entering Skittle.

Whatever had turned him this way, he wanted to turn Skittle as quickly as possible. It seemed like it was working as the colour of his veins could be seen darkening through his skin.

It was running up his neck, and soon had reached his eyes, turning them paler by the second.

'Is it working..is it really turning him into something like me!' Zain thought.

Suddenly, his eyes had gone hollow, and the banging on the door behind them started to stop. Zain could no longer smell the attractive scent that had been placed on Skittle. Like a chemical reaction, the red liquid seemed to only work on humans which meant one thing.

[Congratulations! You have successfully turned your first victim]

[1/10 Zombies in your current horde]

[New skills have been unlocked]

[10 exp has been granted]

Now letting go of Skittlehsi teeth marks had been made deep on the arm, blood dripping from it, but the real question remained.

"Skittle...Skittle...are you okay, can you hear me?" Zain asked.

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It was a tense moment for Zain. In truth, he would have liked to test what he could do and what turning someone would do, which was why he had come to such an area in the first place. There was Barbara, but who knew what had happened to her.

In the end, the circumstances meant that his friend would be the first one to get turned.

"Skittles, speak to me!" Zain shouted. "Say anything if you understand?"

Slowly Skittle turned his head. He looked at Zain and tilted his head to the side for a second. Then opening his mouth, he let out an incomprehensible gibberish.

"Ahh gragk!" "Ahk! gragk!"

"No! No, no!" Zain panicked. "Skittle shake my hand if you understand me?"

Skittle titled his head to the other side and made the same noises again, and Zain's hand was left hanging in the air. Helpless, Zain fell to his knees, and his head slammed on the floor.

"Damn it! Damn it! Damn it!" Zain grunted out as he punched the hard floor over and over again. "Why…why didn't it work..why didn't he turn into something like me!"

Just then, a shadow was cast over him as the Zombie Skittle moved closer. It didn't say anything and just stood there. The truth was, Zain knew there was a good chance that something like this was likely to ensue. Both knew the risks, and it was highly likely that the outcome wouldn't be in their favour.

'Wait, maybe there is something in the system that can help? It said I gained new skills or something, right?'

Thinking about this, Zain opened his system panel, and an entirely new section of the system interface opened in front of him. There was a tab called Horde, and when clicking on it, a picture of Skittle's zombie state appeared on the next screen.

Next to his name were a bunch of stats just like what Zain had on himself, although they were slightly different.

[Name: Skittle]

[Type: Undead]

[Hunger: 99 percent]

[Level 1]

'He has a level as well. So does that mean that Skittle can level up?' Thinking about this reminded him that he also needed to check what levelling up would do for himself, but for now, he was more focused on Skittle.

'There's no energy stat like mine, but there is a hunger stat.' Zain thought. 'I assume it works the same way as my energy stat does, which means at some point Skittle will have to eat.'

When clicking on Skittle's name, Zain found the new skills that had been unlocked.

[Horde Skills]

[These Skills can be used individually or as a group]

[Follow: Those in the Zombie Horde will follow the Head. If the Head attacks a certain individual, members of the Horde will Auto attack the last target the Head has hit unless further instructions are given]

[Stay: This instruction forces the Undead to stay in its place.]n0𝓋𝓮𝓵𝑈𝗌𝒃.𝔠0𝚖

[Attack: The Horde will attack a target that has been selected]

[Protect: The Horde will do its best to take any damage coming towards the Head]

[Freeroam: This lets the Undead act on their own.]

[Note: If the hunger of a zombie reaches below twenty percent, they can no longer follow commands until it goes above twenty once again and they will make finding food their priority]

The skills were interesting, to say the least. Although Zain's favourite games were survival-based, he would play others from time to time, and the skills and instruction commands he gained from the system reminded him of those other games he would play, so he understood the concept.

The only thing was, he would perhaps be willing to use these skills if it was just a regular zombie rather than his best friend.

Either way, Zain needed to test out how it worked. It looked like, at the moment, Skittle had the command-follow set. So wherever Zain would go, Skittle would go, and the latter could keep up with him as well.

Skittle was running at the pace he would have done before he even got turned. After that, Zain tried the other commands and even tried the [Attack] command on one of the dead bodies in the room.

Surprisingly Skittle went towards it and started hitting it, despite it being dead already.

,m So, all in all, Zain tested every skill apart from the [Protect, but then again, he would never want to use this skill with Skittle in mind.

One plus was there was no need to access the system to use these commands. Instead, he could just subconsciously think of commands with the zombie in mind, and it would work. How this would work when Zain had a bigger horde, he didn't know.

After his testing was complete, Zain felt a little glum. Although Skittle wasn't like the other Zombies, he couldn't think for himself. He was doing whatever the system from Zain told him. It was almost as if he didn't have his own will anymore.

"Skittle, I promise I will do everything I can to find a type of Cure, a way to bring you back to normal. I won't fail again...I won't fail another time!" Zain said, putting his hand on his friend's shoulder, who seemed to respond with the same incomprehensible gibberish.

The only good thing was that there was some control, and he believed he hadn't fully lost his best friend.

Now, with no more zombies outside, they weren't in any immediate danger, and it was time for him to plan his next step. However, before that, he needed to do one more thing. Earlier, he had heard the notification of levelling up, and now it was time to check how much stronger he had become and what he had gained after getting to Level Three.

When he opened his stats panel, he noticed a small upgrade icon next to his name.

'Was this here before?' Zain thought.

There was nothing else he could do, and it looked like his only option was to click this before deciding something. In the end, Zain clicked it thinking what the worst that could happen was.

[After successfully levelling up, you may now choose from the following.]

[Please choose your upgrade and what type of Zombie you wish to be.]

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[Picking the type of Undead you would like to be will greatly affect your evolution path. So please read each option carefully, as once you have chosen your evolution path, you can no longer revert this change.]

Reading the message was just making Zain think of the whole system even more so like a game. So far, his experience from gaming had helped him well with the system and surviving in the real world, but he also learnt that in real life, there were a lot of variables that one couldn't control, which had put him in this type of situation in the first place.

'Let's see what you have for me.' Zain thought.

[Aggro Path: The Undead that focuses on this path will concentrate mainly on themselves. It will increase the strength of the Undead through power, speed, resistance and more, with all things focusing on the Undead's own body.

[These types of Undead are usually the most powerful in a one-on-one situation and are aggressive in nature]

Reading the system message, Zain realised that it wasn't going to be as clear as he wanted it to be, and that was because this was just a path and not the evolutions themselves. At times, after building a character in a game, he would wish he had made it a different way.

In a game, one could reset their character so they could fix the mistakes they had done before, and he had done this many times, but there was no option to do that here.

'Body improvements, from what I have seen, people like Buke and Clark should come under this. But do humans have this type of path as well?' Zain thought.

[Control Path: This Undead controls the might of other Undead to handle the situation. Its strength spreads to the ones that it controls. The user of this path must be able to keep his composure and have a clear and calm mind.]

n0𝒱𝗲𝑳𝑈𝕊𝒃.𝗰0𝔪

The control path was interesting, making him wonder about the Stage 2 Zombie he had met. After Zain upgraded himself, would he also be a Stage 2 Zombie? The ability of the Spitter zombie he had fought with was similar to the Control path, and he knew how dangerous that could be.

[All-Rounder Path: This type of Undead doesn't solely focus on oneself or those they control and turn. It's a mixture of the two other paths. It's neither strong in one department or weak in the other. It allows the user to mix their way to fight and survive.]

Those were all three of the different options that Zain could choose from, and he was sure, based on the description, that later on, he could further refine these options to suit his needs more, but the question was, what should he choose?

'I know this is real life, but I have no experience of being in an apocalyptic situation before other than the games I have played. If it was a game, and it was my first run, then I would have picked the All-Rounder Path.

'That way, I could see what I liked and didn't like, and on the next run-through, chose one of the other options, but this isn't a game, and I only get one choice.'

From his experience, the fastest role with one strong attribute usually won out in most situations. But, at the same time, he could try to make up for what he lacked by using his head. So he wanted to select either the Aggro or Control path, instead of their combination.

After thinking for a while, Zain finally came to a decision.

'If I was a human trying to survive in this world, I would pick the Aggro path. So there's no doubt I will pick the Aggro path if this situation arises in a game with a human character.

'Making me the best I can be, but unfortunately, I'm not a human. I'm trying to live my life as a Zombie, and there's Skittle too. I can't let him remain like this forever. So the best choice that I have is... control.'

After selecting the option, a confirmation screen appeared in front of him, and with Zain having made his choice, he hit confirm and didn't want to look back. In the next moment, a light appeared around his whole body for a few seconds and soon quickly disappeared.

It was strange because it was one of the first times that he felt a slight difference in his body, a feeling even. Earlier, he hadn't felt anything except losing the sense of pain and urge to kill.

'What is all of this? I can sense things straight away. I can smell better, all the different scents coming toward me. It looks like my vision veil has widened, and my hearing has also improved.'

When he clenched his fist, there seemed to be no change in his body strength-wise, so he threw a punch to test one more thing and found no change in his speed either. Rather, it was as if his perspective powers had increased overall.

[You have selected the Control Path]

[Your maximum Horde Size has expanded.]

[Horde: 1/15]

[Undead under your control can turn humans into Undead that will become part of your Horde. If there are no more slots remaining, they will just become regular Undead unless the leader wishes to make space by setting one of their own Undead in their control free]

'I'm guessing this means, if Skittle bites a human, then it would become mine...but it makes me wonder if I can set Undead free, is there also a way I can get other Undeads to join my Horde, not just the humans I or my Undeads turn? Maybe what I did to Barbara would have worked now...and maybe I can obtain a Stage 2 Zombie in my Horde.' Zain thought.

[1 Stat point has been given for each level up.]

[Strength: 0]

[Agility: 0]

[Intelligence: 0]

[Endurance: 0]

[You have two available stat points.]

[Please note, Although you have selected the Control path, your evolution will depend on how you decide to distribute your stats.]

There were no skills or anything special he could do like that of the Stage 2 Zombie, so perhaps he wasn't at that level yet, and that's what he needed to do, to level up so he could eventually evolve. To be honest, he was thankful because he didn't want to turn into something as ugly as that. For now, looking like a human was to his advantage.

'This whole thing is about surviving, so I know what I want.'

[Your endurance has increased by 2 points]

Immediately, he felt a strange tingling feeling all over his skin. He recalled how tough the Stage Two Zombie's skin was. At least it means now, if an enemy stabs him, it wouldn't hurt as much, and he would need less energy to heal himself..

[1/15 Horde]

"I won't let the same situation happen again. Let's go, Skittle." Zain said as he opened the door for the room, and the two of them left the place.

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Upon exiting the cold freezer and stepping back into the supermarket, the scene that came in front of them was as per Zain's expectations. The whole store was now scattered with zombies, although it didn't seem as packed as before as the zombies tended to roam and scatter around.

They would just walk aimlessly until the human scent wafted into their nose, urging them where to go next. One good thing was when walking around, they noticed that the zombies weren't attacking either of them.

'Well, at least my plan would have worked if Skittle had ended up like me.' Zain said to himself, trying to reassure himself that he had made the right decision.

He decided not to leave the supermarket just yet and began to walk around to look for a few items. First, they headed to the clothes section of the place and decided to change from their bloodstained clothes into something else.

The only thing was that Skittle wasn't really able to take off clothes on his own, and since there was no command for that, Zain had to do it for him.

'I should be able to do this much after turning you into this.'

It was similar to getting a child out of their clothing, as his limbs were quite stiff, but after a struggle, Zain had finally succeeded. Soon, the two of them were in a new set of clothes. Zain was wearing a dark red hoodie, if someone's blood did get on it, then it wouldn't be too easy to notice. On top of that, he had coiled a soft scarf around his neck.

As for Skittle, he was wearing a large black shirt, brown overcoat, black pants and brown boots. He now looked the same Skittle Zain would see every day during normal times, only it was impossible not to tell Skittle was an undead. His skin was much paler than Zain's, and his movements were weird, to say the least, and the most troubling thing was he couldn't even speak.

Still, if the two of them ran into people, no doubt they would be caught straight away. There wasn't an immediate solution to this, and one never knew who or what they would face, so Zain decided to deal with it as it came.

They then took a few more things and soon had two backpacks filled with necessities. Zain's shears were done for, and he couldn't quite find good long weapons, so he had to make do with a pair of sharp kitchen knives he came across in the cutlery aisle.

'A permanent weapon would be a better solution, and maybe we should head to a place where we can get one.'

A certain shed's image flashed in his head, with a wall full of different tools. Shaking it off, he tried to forget that memory.

The bag was also filled with canned food and more, not for them but for who they might possibly meet in the future. It was mainly filled with items that would become valuable as time passed, and he could use them to bargain with others.

However, nearly all of the food was kept in Skittle's bag, while anything which would be used as weapons were with Zain.

"Hey, will you look at that? You are now much stronger than you were before." Zain said, amazed that his friend could carry such a large weight and move with ease. Just like him, Skittle must have gained some sort of exceptional strength boost, which not all zombies seemed to have.

"You understand that I'm the main fighter of this group, so I need to be as light on my toes as possible. You just have to carry that and stay out of trouble. Alright?" Zain asked.

"Krak ka!"

"I'll take that as a yes."

Talking to someone, even if it was his undead friend who most likely didn't understand his words, was the only thing that was keeping him somewhat sane in this situation and helping him evade the guilt.

Finally ready to leave, the two were heading towards the exit when something strange occurred. One of the Zombies in the aisle suddenly turned its head to look at them. It hadn't happened so far before, but it was clearly looking their way.

Zain stood in front of Skittle, and it was a good thing he had done because the Zombie immediately started to rush toward them. It ran forward with its arms dangling out.

[A mutated Zombie]

Pulling out one of the knives at the right time, Zain threw it right at the Zombie's knee; it didn't slow it down but caused it to walk strangely, which was enough time for Zain to give the zombie a hit with his strong fist.

Knocking his head back, the Zombie fell to the floor, and now with Zain's foot on top of its chest, it was wriggling about, unable to move. It grabbed onto Zain's leg, but it didn't have the strength to rip through his skin or pull him off.

'The endurance stat has worked out quite well for me.' Zain thought. 'But why do you guys just attack us and not any of the other Zombies in the Supermarket? Can you somehow tell that we're different, just like I can tell about you?'

While seeing the Zombie struggling on the floor, Zain had an idea. He stomped on his arm, breaking it in the process, and then lifted him from behind, holding his two arms in place.

"Skittle, Attack this guy. Come on, you're going to level up as well!"

The order was heard, and in an instant, like flicking a light switch, Skittle started to run over and started to punch the Zombie, hit after hit; it didn't tire him out, especially with Zain holding him, it was making his job easy.

"Go on, Skittle, come on, hit him, take it, attack!" Zain encouraged the little Skittle. He had hardly seen his friend fight before, and for some reason, seeing this excited him a bit. In the end, the zombie fell to the floor.

[10 exp has been gained]

[A member of the Horde has helped with the kill]

[Exp has been granted to those that have contributed most]

This was what Zain was expecting to see; with the type of Path he had chosen and for not just him to survive, he needed to not ust level up himself but level up Skittle as well, and soon he would have a whole army that he would be levelling up.

n0𝒱𝑒𝑙𝑈𝚜𝑏.𝓬0𝓂

There was a problem though, and that was their hunger and energy; without food and flesh, they would soon run out of energy, and Zain's body functionality was getting worse. The levelling up did nothing to resolve that problem.

Which was why the two of them needed to head out of the store and look for something they could eat. When exiting out of the door, Zain turned around to make sure Skittle was following him, and that's when a certain smell entered his nose. Turning to the direction of the smell, he was now looking in front of him.

Standing there was a human, but not just any human, one that was large in size with a black leather jacket, that and tears coming out of his eyes.

"Buke…what are you doing here?" Zain asked. But this was not the sentimental meeting the two thought they would have.

"What….What happened to Skittle." Buke asked.

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The large truck was riding on the highway road with the others inside. It was easier for them to travel along the roads than they thought. Some believed that the streets would be blocked and filled with stagnant cars trying to enter the city.

However, that wasn't the case at all. The vehicles were far and few between. Some had crashed, pulled over, or driven into the ditches and side rail, but there wasn't significant traffic, at least not yet. Perhaps it was because they weren't in the city.

"You're going to the city?" Buke asked. "Zain said that most likely they have the most Zombies there." When speaking, it was in a disheartened voice, as if he had no energy to say those words.

"I mean, at the same time, that's where most people will be right. Maybe all of the military force is concentrated there. We should be able to find someone, and where else can we go?" Kelly replied. "What's surprised me is how clear the roads are...for something like this to happen, it's almost as if the whole event happened at once. When those meteor strikes hit the planet."

Buke would have guessed the same thing, and many would have come to the same conclusion, but there was one problem with that. Buke knew because of Skittle that there had been reports of Zombie attacks already on the dark web.

He had refused to listen to Skittle at the time, even though he was right like always; he was right about most things.

"Stop!" Buke suddenly said.

"Huh, what do you mean stop?" Kelly asked.

"I said stop, stop the car!" Buke repeated.

Seeing the look in the student's eyes, Kelly thought that she was going to get hit if she didn't listen to the order. Cody felt this as well, but there wasn't a lot of space for him to manoeuvre or use his agility to his advantage. He had seen how strong Buke was.

In the end, the truck had come to a halt on the highway, and Buke had jumped down, walking away.

"Wait, what are you planning on doing?" Kelly asked.

"I'm going back for the other two. I can't just leave them like that. I'm not asking you guys to come with me, you're just strangers, but it's different for me." Buke said. "Don't worry, I'll make my own way there."

Cody and Kelly looked at each other and started to remember the scene that they had seen before leaving. They had narrowly escaped death, and to head back into the same place, their bodies just wouldn't let them do it. They were already shaking, thinking about the thought. All they could do in their heads was wish him good luck.

It was because of them after all, that they had managed to survive.

'Maybe we will end up running into each other in the future.' Kelly thought.

———

Finding an abandoned car that worked, driving all the way back, and avoiding as many zombies as he could while he parked away from the Supermarket, Buke had done all of that to come back to the two of them, and he finally had done.

When he arrived though, seeing Skittle, his mouth open and dribbling, his incredibly pale skin, it was clear he was too late. He had already been turned.

'If only I had come sooner. If only I hadn't left, maybe Skittle would have been okay?' Buke thought.

That was when something wasn't processing in his head, though, why was Zain, who looked to be fine, standing right next to him, and how did Zain manage to get out of the whole mess rather than Skittle?

"Buke listen, I can explain!" Zain said as he moved closer, slowly, and Skittle followed behind him. "Me and Skittle were not like the other Zombies."

Zain pulled down his scarf and showed the bite mark on his neck.

"You were right, I was bit back then, but I have been fine. I'm not like the others. I can speak and think for myself…we were in trouble back there, so I thought that I could make Skittle like me. I thought if I bit him, he would turn into a type of Zombie like me." Zain was speaking with passion and pain in his voice as he released the mistake he had made at the time.

After hearing what Zain had to say, Buke's whole body was shaking.

"So you're the one that did this Zain, that you were a freaking Zombie this whole time while travelling with us!" Buke shouted back. "You said you tried saving Skittle. Look what the F*ck you did. You turned him into one of those damned monsters.

"Those damned monsters, you didn't even let him live in peace and instead turned him into this!"

"You don't understand!" Zain shouted back. "We had no choice, and maybe there is a way to bring him back. He can understand me; he isn't like the others!"

Memories of the fun times Buke and Skittle had together were flashing through his head. When he was on the brink of helplessness, wanting to leave the university and during his darkest times, how Skittle was there for him.

n0𝓥𝐄𝗅𝔲𝐒𝕓.𝒸0𝓂

Skittle had practically saved Buke's life more than once, and he didn't appreciate it or ever get the chance to say thank you. The reason for that was because of the Zombies, because of the undead that were crawling through the country and turning people.

"You say you're not the same as Zain, you and Skittle, but your bite still turned Skittle into a Zombie, so answer me this…do you need to eat humans to live? I remember what the Clark guy said, about what he saw on the video.

"Do you and Skittle need to eat people to live?" Buke asked.

Zain was nervous. He didn't speak immediately because he didn't know how to answer, to answer it in a way so it didn't look bad on him.

"The fact that you didn't give me an answer, is an answer in itself," Buke said, lifting his head. "I vow that I will get rid of every freaking zombie in existence and get rid of this plague that is running the world, and I'm going to start with you two."

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Buke pulled out what looked like a fairly large pipe from his back. It was a solid piece of metal he had picked from one of the cars. Buke had noticed many such things lying on the ground beside corpses on his way to the supermarket. Clearly, the people had brought them for protection, but unfortunately, they couldn't survive. Among the various weapons, he found a pipe. It was similar to the bat he previously had, but this one felt lighter in his hands for some reason.

"So this is what you've decided? You've decided to kill your friends?!" Zain shouted back.

"Friends? Both of my friends are dead. There is a new world out there, and I must protect myself and make sure you two can rest." Buke retorted as he ran forward.

Thinking quickly, Zain needed to know what to do, he had knives, and with only a pair of short weapons on him, he was at a disadvantage.

'First, I need to get Skittle out of here. I vowed I would protect him.'

Using the system, Zain set Skittle to attack one of the dead bodies. Skittle moved out of the way and walked towards one of the cars. After, he quickly gave the stay command, making him stay put. At that moment, Buke had already reached Zain and swung the pipe down.

Zain lifted his forearm to block the attack, and when the metal pipe hit him, it bent around his arm. An attack like this before would have broken his arm, but his evolved body and the increased resistance seemed to have done the trick.

"I see you've gotten stronger. You must have also realised it, but you're not the only one!" Zain dropped his knives onto the ground and kicked the large teen in the stomach. It caused Buke to lean forward slightly, and seeing this opportunity, Zain threw his arm underneath, delivering an uppercut right to his chin.

Buke stumbled back, but he quickly got up from the ground. The blow rattled his head a bit, but he recovered fast.

"Can't you see I don't want to hurt you? Why do you think I dropped my weapons?" Zain asked.

Immediately, Buke got up from the floor and charged forward, going for a tackle. In a battle of strength, even though Zain had a lot of it, he wasn't sure who would win, so at the last second, he spun to the side and avoided the incoming attack like one would avoid a bull.

The momentum of his body had carried him forward, and with his upper body weight moving forward, Buke stumbled once again and crashed into one of the car doors, leaving a deep dent. Seeing this made Zain thankful that he hadn't taken that head-on.

"Are you not even listening to me anymore?" Zain asked.

Buke stood up while shaking his head. And then looked towards the door, found its side, and began to pull.

"Everything I'm seeing right now is proving more and more that you're a monster!" Buke shouted, pulling the broken car door off its hinge and ready to throw it at his old friend.

'He thinks I'm the monster? Does he not even see what he's doing right now? I'm afraid that...Buke might be too far lost, but I don't want to lose another friend.'

Zain began to run forward and saw that Buke had lifted the car door above his head. And without hesitation, he hurled it towards Zain.

There was no time to dodge, so Zain moved his body so the door would collide against his shoulder. The door bashed against Zain, pushing him off his feet, and after a long while, the familiar system prompt appeared in front of him again.

[Your shoulder is broken]

[Would you like to use your energy to heal your wounds?]

'I have to. I can't take it easy in this fight. In some ways, this is more difficult than the stage 2 Zombie because I don't want to kill him!'

[40/100 Energy]

'After all this fighting, I lost a lot of energy. The wounds from before, then during this fight, and now this, I…I need to this fight right now!'

Zain pushed on the door, lifted it, and threw it to the side. His strength was still there, but his body wasn't responding as fast as he would have liked.

[Body functionality: 74/100]

,m Once again, Zain ran forward, and as he did, he leaned down, picking something up off the ground.

Buke decided to stay next to the car, waiting for the right moment to tackle the former. When he threw out a fist, Zain threw something out of his hand, and a knife passed right through the palm of Buke's hand.

"There's a big difference between you and me; I don't feel pain anymore!" Zain noticed that Buke had flinched.

He charged forward and punched Buke in the chest, shoving his back against the car. Zain then stepped on his knee and jumped up, gaining additional momentum. When he was in the air, he punched Buke right across the face, sending his head spinning to the side with a mouth full of blood. He laid on the ground and breathed heavily.

Zain looked at him for a while, and it didn't look like he was going to get up. He was far too hurt.n0𝑽𝗲𝓵𝑢𝓈𝑏.𝗰0𝑀

"I already lost a friend today. I don't want to lose another…but you forced me to do this. Whatever happens to you from now is up to you." Zain said as he walked away, and Skittle followed.

In a blurry vision, Buke saw his two friends exit the car parking in the distance.

"I already lost all my friends…and it was because of these damn Zombies like you…I will make sure to get rid of every single Zombie in the world no matter what I have to do!"

It had been a while, but both Zain and Skittle had long gone out of Buke's view, and suddenly the sound of growls resonated throughout the car parking lot, which could only mean one thing, that zombies were coming towards him.

"I…I can't die like this. I won't die like this!" Buke said to himself, and something strange started to occur, a complete change in Buke's body. It felt like bugs were crawling all over him, and looking at his arm, something strange was happening.

"It's happened a bit sooner than I thought, but it looks like someone was a success." A male voice was heard, and Buke could see the shoes of a man. "It looks like the other one is doing better than I thought as well. We will see who was right in the end."

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In a high-rise building that was still intact, Zain peaked out of the window and could see three people entering one of the shops on the ground floor. Many of the buildings in the area had been destroyed by the strange meteorite strike but not all of them.n0𝗏𝐄𝑳𝔲𝑆𝓫.𝑪0𝕞

Even if there weren't people to keep the building maintained and such, it would still stand for several years before anything happened. Usually, Zain would advise against trapping oneself in a building like so, but that was if they weren't a zombie.

"But the two of us are Zombies, isn't that right Skittle?" Zain said out loud.

"Krak ra!" Skittle replied back.

A total of three days had passed since Zain had woken up and the whole world had changed. So much had happened in that time that the unique zombie boy had to get his head around it.

For one, the strange system that only he seemed to have. A system that would help him get stronger as he levelled up and gave him odd quests from time to time, such as surviving the first night.

Currently, Zain was still only a level three but had gained quite a bit of exp.

[Zain Talen]

[Level 3]

[558/2626 exp]

This was thanks to surviving the first night quest, after that though, Zain never gained any other exp for surviving the next nights, it seemed to be a one-day thing. On top of that, during their current journeys once in a while they would come across a mutated Zombie which was easy for him and Skittle to deal with together.

However, they were still relatively rare, and Skittle had yet to level up himself, still being a level 1 undead.

There was a reason why Zain was starting to keep a close eye on the system, because it was perhaps one of the ways to getting Skittle better, at least to the point where both of them would be the same. Regardless, Zain's character did not allow him to just think of one way or stick to one plan, he needed to know more and have a few backup plans.

If he really wanted to help Skittle then they would need to find a cure for this thing. They would not be the only ones trying to fix the current problem, there were laboratories, militaries and governments all over the world.

To get this information, or find out what was going on, they needed to head to a place with people, and that's why they had decided to enter the City. The city had a high population of around 6 million people.

This was why Zain wanted to avoid the palace at all costs, but strangely it didn't seem like there were that many Zombies when they had entered the place. There were a lot, but nowhere near to the number of six million.

Either way, it allowed for more people to stay in the city, and at the same time for Zain to focus on his second goal. He wanted to head to where one of these meteors had hit. It was what people claimed had started all of this. Although Zain didn't believe that, he still thought there had to be a link to the two events.

"They've been in that shop for a long time. Maybe they found something this time?" Zain said, and seeing this, he started to head down the stairs of the apartment building with Skittle following him.

The truth was, Skittle and Zain had been following the group of people for an entire day. When arriving in the city and overhearing them, Zain didn't introduce himself to them.

He had learnt what kind of troubles that had caused before. He wouldn't make the same mistake again. Still, he followed them closely, listening to their conversations and more. It was how he learnt about the different theories people talked about and how all of this started.

His senses were improved and Zain could even somewhat tell where they were without seeing them since his field of vision had increased as well. There was a reason as to why they were following them.

During the trip, both Zain and Skittle were able to find relatively fresh flesh in the city. In the apartment buildings, there were those that had died not too long ago. Consuming their flesh both he and Skittle had their energy bar and hunger bar come back to what they were.

Zain had even pulled out part of the knife in his chest and healed himself, meaning he no longer had to wear bloody bandages. Still, there was a major problem and that was, the body functionality.

[Body functionality currently at 33 Percent]

Zain had been putting it off for a while, but no matter how fresh the flesh would be, it looked like it wasn't restoring his body to how it was and he began to notice some side effects. At times he would just forget things, forget where he was, who he was.

There would also be black-out phases, where he suddenly lost control of everything as if in a deep sleep not knowing what was going on. When waking up he would then suddenly be in a different place. It was clear that this body functionality wasn't just affecting how well he could use his body, in terms of physicality, but also mentailiy.

Slowly, he was becoming a mindless Zombie like the rest of them, and he needed to do something fast. There was a solution to his problem, and it was the reason why he had been following these people for a while now.

The three ran out from the shop, and one of them could be seen, getting grabbed by the leg. The man fell to the floor, he tried his hardest to crawl away but a great pain was already felt in his leg, and soon a few more Zombies had climbed on top of him, consuming him on the spot.

"F*Ck they got Dillan!" One of the men shouted.

"He's gone, we have to get out of here!" The other man shouted, but when turning around, they could see a human figure in a red hood standing behind them.

"I'm sorry, but I need to live as well," Zain stated.

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The truth was, at the moment, Zain couldn't bring himself to kill humans just so he could survive. Letting people die and killing them himself was a distinction he had made in his head.

If people were to die in front of him, even though he could help, he would say to himself that it was meant to be, and they were meant to die.

It was somewhat a cruel and strange way to think. Zain knew this very well, but it was what he had to tell himself in this current situation. Which was why he was able to twist his views a little more to do what he needed.

The two men were startled for a second when they saw the red hooded figure, but they decided to ignore the person and continue to run forward, but that's when the zombie who had leapt through the air spread his hands and was ready to grab the human.

"You guys are a good distraction!" Zain said as he ran past the two men and held his knife firmly as he stabbed it right through the head. The knife pierced through its skull and killed it on the spot.

[Mutated Zombie has been defeated]

[ 10 exp]

'It would take quite a bit to defeat a mutated Zombie since my movements are much slower than before. But when he had to choose between a human and me to attack next, it went after a human, which is good for me.'

"You saved me!" the man said. "Come on, let's get out of here before the others catch up!"

"Hey, there's a zombie in the way. Let's get rid of this one and get out of here." The other said.

The zombie in question was standing still. These men each had a weapon in their hands, a crowbar and a bat, to be specific. The one in the front gripped his crowbar and swung it to the side of the zombie's head.

But before it reached, he felt a sharp pain in the back of his leg. It wasn't just one of them, but both men felt intense pain. Blood trickled down their legs, and the man with the crowbar stumbled. Before he could understand what was happening, the zombie in front had taken a swing and hit him right in the head, sending him to the ground.

"Andrew!" The last man yelled. Turning to look at his leg, he could see a relatively large blade punctured in it, and it was the same for his friend.

"What are you doing? Why are you helping the zombie? Oh, now it makes sense, it was you! You were the one that threw that knife at us. What are you trying to do? We're on the same side!" the man shouted.

Zain shook his head while slowly walking toward the man.

"The mutated zombie would have caught you, and then this small horde would have caught up and killed you. Besides, I've watched you guys for a while and heard what you said. And I concluded you aren't good people at all… let's leave it at that."

The man gulped as he started to remember the few words he had had with the others, but he was sure no one was around them then, so how could this person know? Nothing made sense.

"And you're wrong about another thing," Zain said. "I'm not on your side."

Just as the man heard those words, he felt someone biting on his neck, and it was none other than Skittle, having attacked the man from behind. In seconds he started falling to the floor, and blood was making him bleed out.

To make his death quicker, Zain stabbed him in the head. He didn't look away, he was conscious of what he was doing, and he realised that the more his body functionality lowered, the more he detached himself from his human-like emotion and feelings, which had been gradually changing since he turned. n0𝑣ℯ𝑙𝔲𝒮𝐛.𝐂0𝑀

"You did a good job, Skittle, but no eating yet, not until I figured something out," Zain said.

Based on the system message, Zain had a good idea that the brain would be what restored the Body Functionality stat. The only thing was that every dead body they came across, which wasn't a zombie, had its brain already consumed by the other zombies.

As for these two, they had both died before the attacks from Skittle could have any effect on turning them. Or at least that's what he hoped. However, their bodies still looked normal, so he had to act fast.

Using his hands, Zain smashed the skull's top as if it was a big coconut. His strength allowed him to, and blood started to ooze immediately. This was harder for him to do than he thought, even though he was detached from it.

Still, if he wanted to survive in this world, it was something he had to do. An essential task. Grasping whatever was inside, he used one hand and shoved it into his mouth.

Not thinking about what he was eating, he chewed and swallowed. He was glad that his sense of taste seemed to have somewhat faded. After the struggle, he finally heard the system prompt he was waiting for.

[50 percent of body functionality has been recovered]

[Body Functionality: 71 percent]

Zain sighed a relief upon seeing the prompt, and thankfully, the percentage gained was large enough that it wasn't something he would have to worry about, unlike his energy stat.

After consuming the second brain, Zain's functionality was back at 100 percent, and the strange fog in his mind he had seemed to have disappeared.

'That's good, and it's good that I won't have to do it again if we spot more people, ' Zain thought.

It was time for Zain and Skittle to either try to find a large group of people now or find a meteorite to complete one of his objectives. The thought of turning the two in front of him into a part of his horde had crossed his mind earlier, but since Zain planned to meet others, he didn't think having to be responsible for more was a good idea, and he had the other problem to deal with first.

"You did a good job, Skittle. I hope you level up soon. Then I wouldn't have to worry about you so much." Zain commented with a smile.

BANG * BANG * BANG

Just then, several loud shots were heard, and they didn't come from too far away. It was constant noise, and it seemed to be attracting the attention not just of him but others as well. Without a doubt, these were gunshots.

'Who could it be?'

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There were constant bangs resounding throughout, and it was clear now that these were guns, and they were coming from more than just one person. In Zain's country, only three types of people would have access to firearms.

The police force, the military, and gangs. The number of gunshots that resonated made it seem like they were either the police force or the military.

'It would make sense for the army or police force to create a stronghold in the city. They would focus on saving most from here…but the problem is the weapons themselves.' Zain thought as he looked at his hand.

Although his resistance had improved and his skin was tougher, sharp blades could still cut his skin, making him think a bullet would kill him without a doubt. No matter how good his healing was, a shot to the head would cause him a problem and Skittle.

'Still, I have to find out what's going on, and I should check out the situation for myself.'

It was quite easy for the two of them to figure out where the shooting was coming from. The gunshots could be heard throughout the whole city, and the zombies roaming in the shops and streets had started to come out as well and were in that direction.

'As I thought, using guns isn't the best idea. It's just telling them to come towards you.'

In the end, the zombies had formed a horde down one of the streets and started to run in a certain direction. It was hard for Zain to smell if there were humans on the other side or not since the other scents, such as gunpowder, were too overwhelming.

Suddenly, he saw a zombie fall as a bullet hit its head and jerked his whole body back.

'Let's try looking for a safer place.'

Looking at the buildings around them, Zain headed inside one of them and went up the staircase. The elevators in the apartment blocks would usually be full of dead bodies and out of order. Although the electricity was still working in some places, the last thing Zain wanted was for him to get stuck in the elevator of all things or fall to his death.

Eventually, they had reached the fifth floor, which gave both of them a good enough height to see what was going on.

'That's…strange...I wonder how long they have been here. And what started all of this?' Zain thought.

He noticed a few military men with sandbags in front of them. They were in pairs and had adult rifles, firing out at the zombies. They seemed well trained because they were aiming well and quickly taking out the zombies.

In total, there were ten in army uniform, but they weren't alone. Behind them was a larger force of what looked like the police—just standard police who had handguns. There were around fifteen of them, and they were also constantly firing out and reloading.

Looking harder, Zain could not see any Civilians, so it didn't look like they were here for a rescue mission of some sort.

"More and more are coming!" One of the army men at the front shouted, "We have enough ammo to survive around an hour. Tell them to hurry up!"

On the way here, Zain had seen some swat forces that had been killed. They seemed to be more trained than the police officers, which was why he thought the two groups' meeting had to be a coincidence of some sort. The police force also clearly followed the orders of what the soldiers said.

"Kwak Ka!" Skittle made a few noises as he did from time to time.

"No, Skittle, we're going to stay here and watch. It's not best to help them until we know what they're here for. They seem to be guarding the building and have it somewhat barricaded, it has to be for something important if they're not here to rescue or escort civilians. What building is that even?'

It wasn't a police station or a government building. It looked like just a normal apartment block like the one they were in, only it was more destroyed by the meteorite.

'Wait, don't tell me, are they after the meteorites? Do they have something to do with all of this after all?'

Guns seemed to be very effective against the zombies. Even a couple of mutated ones were dealt with just as easily as the others, which only confirmed Zain's thoughts even more.

Although the guns attracted a lot of attention, they were certainly handy in an emergency situation, and seeing the results, he wanted some for himself.

'They haven't slipped up so far, though. They're doing well and not letting the zombies get close. While one person is reloading, another is firing. Maybe they'll eventually move and leave something behind? That's the only thing I can hope for.

'But if they plan to stay here one hour, there might be another problem.' Zain thought.

A system screen appeared as if someone was watching over his thoughts, confirming his worst fears.

[A Stage 2 Zombie is in the area]

[Quest: Defeat the stage 2 Zombie]

Due to him being in the area, the quest had appeared, but Zain had no interest in fighting another Stage 2, not with Skittle with him in that state. Instead, he wanted his friend to level up first. Still, it would be interesting to see how this small squad fairs against Stage 2.

Looking out the window, Zain was trying to spot the Stage 2 Zombie and was expecting to see a Spitter. However, what he saw walking down the other end of the street, with heavy footsteps, was nothing like a Spitter.

It was twice the height of any other Zombie. Its skin was almost a dark black, and it looked to be encased in concrete of some sort. Its eyes were sunken in and glowed white, and the road below his feet cracked with each step.n0𝑽𝔢𝐿𝗎𝒮𝚋.𝚌0𝔪

'This…it must be one of the three types, an Agro type Stage 2 Zombie.'

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Based on what Zain knew from the system, he himself was yet to be a stage two Zombie. For one, he had no special abilities apart from being able to control other zombies. Although, then again, he was different to the other Zombies, so it was most likely that he worked differently compared to them as well.

Still, the system had confirmed that this was a stage 2 zombie, which meant that it was most likely to be at the same level as the Spitter. Yet, they looked completely different. Looking at its body, Zain felt the need to call it a Titan.

[A name has been attached to the Stage 2 Zombie 'Titan']

'So we have a Spitter and a Titan. I wonder how many stage 2 zombies there are, and if I'm guessing correctly, there will be those above stage 2 as well. If they evolve like me, it's too early for that to come yet.' Zain thought.

"A big one, 9 o'clock!" One of the soldiers shouted. Immediately, the two closest turned and started to fire their guns. The bullets went through the Zombies in front of them, but when they hit the Titan, they had immediately fallen to the ground.

'It's skin is even harder than the Spitter, I should have guessed though.' Zain thought.

The two continued to fire their bullets at the Titan, who continued to move towards them. It was slow in its moment, but at the same time, they weren't slowing it down, and it would only be a matter of time before it got to them.

"He's not going down. We need something stronger!" The soldier shouted.

Instead of focusing bullets on the Titan, they continued to fire at the Zombies around it. Meanwhile, one of the soldiers had moved from his sandbag to head back into the building.

"Cover the front and do a good job, or I'll shoot you myself." The soldier ordered the policemen.

Doing as they said, they concentrated their handguns at the front, but the police were a worse shot, and more Zombies were coming to the front.

At the same time, seeing the Titan almost reach them, the police changed targets and started to fire at the Titan. Bullets hit its head but did nothing as they fell to the floor.

"What are you doing!" The soldier shouted. "Fire at the Zombies!"

At that moment, the Titan was right in front of the sandbag and had lifted its giant fist. It threw it down, and the soldiers rolled out of the way. The fist destroyed the sand bags, chucking sand everywhere, and the fist pounded into the ground, creating cracks in the road.n0𝒱𝓔𝔩𝔲𝓈𝔅.𝓒0𝓂

"If that thing hits us, it's going to kill us! We have to get out of here!" The chief of police that was with them said. They started to move back, forgetting about the front, and at the same time, Zombies were starting to come into the perfect barrier wall that had been created.

The soldier towards the front stayed at his post, continuing to fire at them all, backing away slowly, but one of the Zombies that were crawling on the ground grabbed his leg, pulling him, and immediately the horde started to consume him.

"You useless bastards!" One of the soldiers shouted. The police and the soldiers had nowhere to run. The armoured vehicle they had arrived in was on the side of the Titan, and there was no way they were getting past that.

The Titan started to move forward again, heading towards them, but at that moment, something flew past their heads and hit the Titan right in the body, exploding on impact. The soldiers turned around and could see their Commander had an RPG on his shoulder.

"Haha, that's our commander!" The soldiers cheered. "But the Commander knew it might not be enough to take out the giant Titan.

It was already back on its feet. Part of its hard skin had been ripped off, showing a fleshy muscle tissue interior, but it was alive. From his belt, he pulled a few pins and threw what looked like a small can toward the Titan.

"Clear the way!" The Commander ordered.

As the items thrown touched the floor, they exploded into flames, lighting up the Titan. They weren't grenades but incendiary bombs instead.

Still not sure that the Titan would die, the Commander grabbed his rifle that was by his side and continued to fire bullet after bullet towards the Titan, and eventually, someone in the area received a notification.

[Quest failed]

[Stage 2 Zombie has been defeated]

Watching everything play out, Zain was left stunned.

'That Stage 2 Zombie, if we met that instead of the Spitter in the supermarket. It would have been impossible to kill. A grenade launcher, bombs and guns, and it still took all of that to take it out.

'But then again, maybe we would have been able to outrun it. It was incredibly slow. I guess each stage 2 type zombie has its advantages and disadvantages.'

There was something playing in Zain's mind, although he didn't have to worry about the Titan, he did try to think how he would have dealt with it, if he had been the one to come across it.

In the end, the Zombies that had surrounded them were still gathering.

"Everyone move out! It's a dud!" The Commander shouted.

The soldiers got in an arrow-like formation and started to fire their guns as they went toward their vehicle. They all got on one by one in the back and continued to fire.

"Wait, what about us!" The police chief shouted.

"You…you abandoned your post. You couldn't even do the job you were asked. You're a liability, which means you are useless to us." The soldier replied as the vehicle drove off.

It didn't take long, even with their hand guns, for the rest of the Zombies to finish off the policemen who had been abandoned.

'This world…has become cruel.' Zain thought. Waiting for the Zombies to eventually clear the area, he saw his chance.

'Let's see what they were trying to get.'

[New quest received]

[Find a meteorite]

'Oh, this is nice. I was already doing that anyway.'

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After waiting for a while, most of the zombies that had amassed started to disperse. They moved away from the building, and a couple of police officers in the group had risen, now as zombies, while the others had their brains chewed out.

'I still can't figure out how the zombies choose which ones to eat and which ones to turn to. Can they sense something that even I can't? Or is it just because I haven't started to really eat people yet.' Zain thought.

Another thing he noticed in the zombies' movements was that some seemed to be heading in a specific direction. They were slowly walking away, heading towards the outskirts of the city.

'Maybe if I followed the Zombies, I might be able to figure out that quest. Find out what the Zombie's goal is in all of this. Maybe the answer to that question is why there aren't so many in the city either.'

In the end, before doing any of that, Zain wanted to check out the building first. So, both Skittle and Zain began to move. With the [Follow] command, Skittle stayed a good two metres behind him, but before entering the building, there was something else he wanted to do.

Walking to the corpses, the student zombie picked up a couple of handguns. He also went ahead and collected the magazines from the officers and took off a belt so he could wrap it around himself and carry more ammo.

There were still more guns, and that's when Zain had come up with an idea.

"Try holding this." Zain handed a gun out to Skittle.

He managed to hold onto it but just kept it in the palm of both of his hands.

"Krak ka!" Skittle replied back.

"Try holding it like this." Zain held the gun showing a pose, and then pulled the trigger a few times.

Skittle just tilted his head, not understanding what to do. The last resort for Zain was the attack command, and he hoped he would use the gun in his hand. However, as soon as he gave the command, Skittle dropped the gun and sprinted towards the body.

"I guess it won't work out. We'll have to get you stronger some other way." Zain smiled.

With the rest of the guns, it wasn't easy for others to find them Zain took them off the policemen and tried to hide them under other bodies. While holding one gun under a dead body, his head started to ring, and an image appeared in his head.n0𝑣ℯ𝑙𝔲𝒮𝐛.𝐂0𝑀

The whole scenery changed in front of him. It was dark out, the moon was shining brightly, and one could see the stars just above the tip of the trees. Then, turning around, he noticed he was in a forest, and looking at his hands, they had gotten smaller again.

'Are these memories, but I don't remember any of this…the other stuff I tried to forget but this..are they mine?'

Standing next to him was a fairly large figure. He was wearing a camo uniform as if he was in the army, but when his face turned, it was nothing but blue. There were no distinctive features, so Zain had no clue who this was.

"Why do I have to learn to use this?" A voice said, but not just any voice. It was coming from the body Zain was currently in, and suddenly a gun appeared in his hand. "Where did you get it from?"

"I'm not letting you keep it, so that's unimportant." The blurred man's face said. "This world is getting worse and worse every day. People can't see it while they're being distracted, but in the end, we will be too busy fighting each other that we won't be able to see the real threat.

"When the time comes, I want you to be able to protect yourself. Now just follow what I do and listen to my words." The man lifted up his gun and started to explain a few things.

The different parts of a gun, how it worked, and how to aim and fire. After showing an example, it was now Zain's turn to use the weapon. In the forest, someone had stuck targets on the trees in different places.

It was hard to see, almost impossible to see due to the dark, but Zain, using the tips he had heard, tried again anyway. After letting out a few bullets, he was surprised that he could use the gun far better than he imagined.

"Good, you did better than last time, but try again until you can do it properly." The man ordered.

After changing the magazine on the gun, Zain aimed once again, but this time, he decided not to fire. For a while now, it was almost a movie. When Zayn was watching everything happen, he wasn't the one in control, but now he was once again.

Turning to the man with the blurred face, Zain gulped for a second.

He didn't know why but this strange fear was consuming him.

"Who are you?" Zain asked.

There was a pause for a second from the man as he stood absolutely still, then his head turned to look at Zain.

"What do you mean? Who am I?" The man's face still couldn't be seen, and he took a step forward. "Now I see…who are you?! Get out of here!" The man started to shout and stepped closer.

The hairs all over Zain's body started to stand up on his arms. Although he couldn't see the expression on the person's face, he knew he was in trouble. Immediately Zain turned to run through the woods.

Before he could do anything, two bangs were heard, hitting him right in the back of the leg and causing him to fall to the floor on the leaves. When he looked up, the faceless man's head was right in front of him.

"GET OUT!" The man said, placing the gun on Cain's forehead.

BANG

"Don't come in here again.."

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n0𝑣ℯ𝑙𝔲𝒮𝐛.𝐂0𝑀

The scene in front of Zain blurred again, and when his vision refocused, he found himself back on the road with the gun in his hand.

His heart felt pounding, and the sweat drenched all his clothes, but it was all in his head and wasn't true.

After turning, his heart had stopped beating, and sweat wasn't really something his body seemed to release, but why did he feel that way?

Standing up, Zain looked around, wondering how much time had passed, but Skittle was still next to him, and there were still plenty of zombies roaming the streets.

'Ever since that change, I've been having strange visions. They appear all of a sudden and seem like flashbacks…and at the same time, all of them feel so real.' Zain thought. 'But this new one, it was so strange, and why couldn't I see that man's face? My head is beyond messed up.'

When he pulled the gun out from the holster around his belt, Zain suddenly remembered everything he had learned in the vision, and now he felt a strange confidence in using this weapon. Before the vision, the only times he had held guns in his hand were in RPG and zombie hunter games.

Although he had trained for survival, guns were something that, at his age and with his connections, almost impossible to get. Yet why did the weapon now feel so familiar in his hands?

Trying to forget about what he had seen since there was no way of figuring it out, he placed the gun away and grabbed a couple of the police batons. Physical weapons were still king in this world.

It was then that Skittle and Zain headed into the apartment's main reception area, and it took a second for Zain to take everything in.

'I can't even imagine what happened here.'

Bodies upon bodies were piled up all across the floor. There were so many of them that he could hardly see any spot to put his feet on. From looking at them, it was clear that it wasn't a zombie attack either. In fact, nearly all of them in the apartment building looked to have been zombies at one point, but instead, there were several holes in their bodies made from bullets.

'I guess what happened outside was just the tail end of what actually went on in this place. Were they inside for a while then?' Zain thought as he looked at the boarded-up windows making it harder to see in the palace since it was dark.

Although there were patches of light coming out from the sun through cracks in the ceiling, the exhaust fan, and from the back of the reception, where someone had made a large hole.

'There are even dead soldiers among them. So it looks like this place really was important to them.'

When Skittle and Zain walked forward though, they noticed that a few Zombies had come out from behind the reception desk, and a few from hallways that led to other rooms.

Then, behind the large reception desk, there was a large hole leading into the community garden that would be shared by all those who lived in the apartment. A few Zombies could be seen coming through there as well.

[Mutated Zombie has been detected]

The messages kept on appearing. It was the first time he had encountered such a massive number of mutated Zombies in one place. However, Zain just saw this as an opportunity as he pulled out both the batons.

'It's good that my body's functionality is at its best. Let's see what I can do!'

There were around 11 Mutated Zombies that had entered the room, and immediately once they got close enough, these zombies started to run toward him and Skittle.

Zain moved to the side and hit one of the dangling Zombie's arms up with his Baton. The hit bent the arm strangely, but the Zombie didn't stop there. Zain knew it wouldn't, which was why with the other Baton at the same time, he hit it right in its knee with his full strength causing it to fall to the ground.

"Skittle, attack!" Zain ordered the Zombie he had just Immobilised while going towards the next one.

In kicking, punching, and speed, Zain was now no longer on par with the mutated Zombies. He was beyond them. However, when attacking, he wasn't aiming for their heads. Instead, he tried to immobilise them by breaking their bones. He had even grabbed one of them and threw them over his back on the hard concrete floor, snapping a part of their spine.

He noticed that the Zombie was struggling to move after that but still was yet to be killed. With each Zombie, he symbolised he allowed Skittle to finish them off after, and frequently he would hear the exp prompts from the System.

[Level 3]

[668/2626 exp]

In the end, he had defeated all of the Zombies.

'That was a good batch of exp, but it looks like if I want to level up more, I'm going to have to find an entire group of these guys or start going for the stage 2 Zombies, but I don't want to do that just yet.'

It was then that Zain saw there was a new notification, and this was what he had been waiting for so far.

[A member of your horde has levelled up]

[Skittle is now a Level 2 Undead]

The reason why he had been allowing Skittle to finish off the other undead was simple: to make him stronger. Allowing him to worry less about Skittle in a fight and, of course, increase his own power.

[You may now upgrade one aspect of your Horde member 'Skittle' You can not revert this change.]

[Please choose wisely]

[…..]

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[Each time an Undead in your group levels up, a stat point will be granted for the Undead]

[If an undead reaches the maximum level cap, they can evolve to the next stage]

[Evolution will be dependent on the Undead itself and the stats given]

Just as the System prompts appeared, Zain decided to open Skittle's profile. When the new screen flashed, he noticed the new changes. Now not only did a hunger bar appear, but there were also a few new stats.

[Strength: 0]

[Agility: 0]

[Intelligence: 0]

[Vitality: 0]

'The stat options are the same as what I have as well, but he doesn't have a path type unlike me.' Zain thought.

Out of all of the available stats, there was one that stood out, and that was intelligence. Zain wanted to place the stat point in it immediately when he saw it. This stat was most likely the answer to Skittle's problem, but he had to be realistic about the current situation.

One point of intelligence would barely amount to anything for now. It was unlikely to show great effect, and in a fight, this stat would be useless if it's low. He had not increased his own intelligence either because he felt there was no use for it at the moment himself.

'If we're thinking about survival, then vitality would make sense. I'm guessing that's similar to health in a game. He doesn't have the endurance stat like me, vitality the closest thing to it...but it won't help Skittle much in being independent.'

In the end, he had a choice of either strength or agility. In the future, Zain imagined himself controlling a horde of Zombies, and he knew it would be best to balance out his little army to have those that specialised in certain things.

Then the balancing act would be on his army itself, which was why he was to select one of these two options.

'At the moment though, I don't know what we'll be fighting against more. Is it the Zombies? Or will it be Humans?'

Looking at Skittle's small body, Zain had made his decision and decided to put the stat in strength.

[Strength 1]

Skittle was not good at anything sports-wise, running, lifting anything. So his speed was comparable to his strength. When looking at Skittle, one would never expect him to have immense power, which was why Zain was going for the element of surprise.

"Hey Skittle, let's have a little match."

Zain was wondering if this would work or not. He had never tried it before, but it was worth a try. Using the System, he had set the attack target on himself. Skittle started to turn his head, and the next moment he came right for Zain.

'I have to be careful. I don't want to hurt him and just want to test out his strength.'

The zombies were a bit mindless when attacking. They would dangle their arms out towards their opponent and just swing, with no form or anything. Then if times got desperate, they would sometimes use their legs and, lastly, their mouths.

Skittle was no different in this aspect, so Zain went to grab his arms and tried to push him back. The two were pushing against each other, with neither one of them winning.

"Stop!" Zain ordered, and Skittle immediately halted.

Zain was quite surprised by the outcome. Skittle was now comparable to Zain with just one stat in strength. He had superhuman strength. Although Zain didn't have any stats in strength, it was still relieving to know that if Skittle went up against a regular Zombie, he would most likely win.

This small spar was enough for Zain to conclude. Now, it was time for them to head to the real task at hand. Walking up to the reception, Zain crouched down and went through the relatively large crack. Now he stood in the Community Garden that residents of the apartment building shared.

It was an ample square garden space similar to a courtyard. The sunlight reached the ground from the left half of the building, which had been hit and destroyed. The floors had collapsed on each other, and some of the apartments in the corner seemed missing.

As for the reason behind all the damage and wreckage, there was a deep crack in the apartment building, like a large object, around the size of a car, had crashed through it.

When he followed through the paths, he saw a large rock in the middle of the courtyard. It had destroyed the area around it, burned the grass in the area, and created a huge crater where it laid.

The only thing was the size of the meteor itself. It was nearly the same size as someone's head.

'Is that it? Are these the rocks that cause so much trouble?'

Moving closer, Zain instructed Skittle to stay back. He was afraid that it might react in some way. Heading down into the crater caused by the rock, Zain got closer and could visibly see lines in the rock, a strange pattern with a faded green colour through the rock.

It certainly looked like nothing from the earth.

'Is this it? Is this the reason for the Zombies? Maybe one of these crashed here first, and then many came soon after?' Zain thought.n0𝑣𝚎𝗅𝓊𝔰𝓑.𝗰0𝑚

Reaching out slowly, Zain eventually touched the head-size rock, expecting something to happen.

[The meteorite is no longer active]

[New quest received]

[Please find an active meteorite so it can be analysed by the System]

'Not active…and another quest? What are these quests that the System keeps giving me? I feel like. Someone is just making me do their bidding for them.' Zain thought.

Next to the large head-sized rock, Zain grabbed a small piece that looked to have broken off, placed it in his pocket just in case it was important and started walking away with Skittle.

'Come on, let's get out of here.'

———

In one of the many apartment buildings on the street, looking into the building, a figure was keeping an eye on it. They soon saw a man walk out, but following after him was something else.

'Is that…a zombie following a human?'

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Stepping out in the street, Zain wondered what their next move should be. First, there were the military personnel. He could try to find their base and follow them, but what would happen if they spotted Skittle?

He could look for other survivors, but that would likely turn into a mess, and then there were the two Main quests he had received. First, finding a live meteorite and what the Zombies' goals were.

He had looked around the city and noticed plenty of areas covered in smoke, which meant there was some fighting going on there, or like this spot, it was due to the wreckage caused by the meteor strike.

Just when Zain decided to head in the direction of what he judged as the least probable to encounter someone, Zain noticed a zombie next to the large dead body of the Titan.

[Mutated Zombie]

'I guess if there is nothing else to do, I can always level up.' Zain pulled out his baton and was ready to charge forward, but suddenly, he noticed that the mutated Zombie was acting weird.

It had bent down and stuck its whole head into the Titan that was already dead. Zain also heard the crunching noise, as if someone was eating ice. When the Mutated Zombie lifted its head out of the Titan's body, Zain noticed blood could be seen all over its clothes and was still dripping out of its mouth, but the most significant change was in its hollow eyes.

'Don't tell me..'

It was too late. Suddenly, the veins on the mutated zombie started to bulge. Its eyes were sinking deeper into the back of its skull. Soon, its muscles began to expand, and the skin texture started to change.

Everything was happening so quickly that Zain knew he had to act fast. He ran forward while the zombie was growing in size and swung his baton hitting its arms, but it felt like he was hitting it against a brick wall as the rebound deflected it back.

Trying to find a soft spot, Zain brought out the other baton and used both, hitting the zombie everywhere he could. Still, unfortunately, the evolution was complete, and he could not do anything to stop it.

[A stage 2 'Titan' has appeared]

From the second it started to turn, Zain knew what the outcome would be. He didn't know why or how, but a bad feeling kicked in.

Immediately, the Stage 2 Titan threw down its fist, attempting to hit Zain, who rolled backwards and avoided the blow. However, when he stood up, the ground below his feet was shaking, making him stumble before he could regain his balance, and that was when he saw the damage the Titan had done to the road.

'Even if I had ten points of resistance, I don't think I would survive that.' Zain thought. 'But if I found some way to kill it, I would be able to get exp points to level up.'

Seeing the Titan fight before, Zain knew it wasn't going to be an easy task to defeat it, but the black skin that covered the zombie's body looked to have little cracks, revealing the fleshy interior that one wouldn't notice or hit unless they were up close.

However, in the current area, Zain wasn't alone, as someone else was nearby and observing the whole fight.

'I thought this person knew what they were doing, but they didn't take the crystal out of the Titan. The best thing to do now is just get out of here. But, should I help?' the stranger pondered.

He was expecting Zain to run away, but he soon saw the latter doing something entirely different.

"I'm fighting to survive!" Zain shouted as he ran toward the new Titan. He inclined himself and slid underneath its legs when he got close enough. Then, before the new Titan could turn around, Zain jumped on its back and pulled on a large portion of black skin on his back.

It was as Zain had felt. The skin was more like armour. Then, using his hands, he pulled it with all his might, severing the muscular flesh from its skin.

"ARGHHH!" The Titan screamed as if it was in pain. Which was a surprise since Zain believed the zombies couldn't feel pain.

Since the strength of his arms alone didn't seem to work, Zain then proceeded to stick the baton in the small gap he made and tried to use its hardness as leverage as he pulled his body weight on it. He had to weaken the mutated zombie as much as possible. But just then, something unexpected happened.

The next second, the zombie jumped and lay flat on its back, crushing Zain on the ground. The zombie was too heavy for Zain to use his strength and push it off, and he could only fight with willpower against the crushing weight.

[Several bones have been broken]

[Would you like to use emergency healing?]n0𝑽𝔢𝐿𝗎𝒮𝚋.𝚌0𝔪

The zombie was slowly getting off Zain, and as it did, he immediately used the emergency healing function.

[-40 Energy]

Because the number of bones that were crushed was too many, hence he needed a lot of energy to heal himself and have the ability to fight back. But Zain's legs were also destroyed, which heavily affected his movements, so the healing wasn't working quickly.

'I need a distraction. I can only use Skittle.' Zain sighed. He didn't wish to use this plan, but thinking of the Strength stat point he had added, he felt Skittle would have a good chance of survival in this clash.

As soon as he commanded Skittle to attack, the latter had run forward like he always did when set for an attack command, and Zain's plan seemed to have worked. Unfortunately, however, it seemed to work a little too well. The Titan stood up from its feet, ignored Zain, and threw a powerful punch straight toward Skittle's head.

"Skittle duck!" Zain shouted.

Skittle didn't understand and continued forward until someone from the side swept him off his feet. Then that person pulled Zain up and placed him down. Before they could react to what happened, the two of them were standing on the street near an alleyway in front of the stranger.

"If you can get up, I suggest you follow me." The man said.

Zain noticed something strange was happening, but the fact that this man saved Skittle and the Titan was trying to kill them made him more inclined to go with the man. His legs had healed, and he had given up on the idea of defeating the Titan. It was just too risky, and it was better to get out of there if they didn't have to fight that zombie.

Sprinting towards the alleyway, Zain followed the man into it, and Skittle wasn't far behind either.

'Now that I'm close, I'm sure of it, this guy...he doesn't smell like a human.'

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n0𝐕𝗲𝗅𝑢𝓈𝒷.𝑐0𝔪

Unlike Zain, it was clear that Skittle was a zombie. His eyes were hollow, and his movements were usually rigid. When giving the attack command, it was most obvious as Skittle would just charge in dangling his arms.

Caught up in the moment, Zain didn't really think about it, but no one would choose to save Skittle because it was obvious what he was. Currently, all three of them were going through an alleyway, and he was trying to get a good look at their saviour.

The man was dressed in what oddly looked like a suit. As if he had just come from a type of wedding event. It was clearly a man by the body structure, one that looked quite lean and tall and his long black hair, that he looked somewhat like a rockstar ready to get on stage, and the balaclava face mask that covered his whole face was just part of his strange costume.

The most important detail about him that Zain had noticed was his scent. He didn't have the sweet scent like that of a human, the one that he was able to detect in others.

'I'm pretty sure this guy is like me.' Zain thought. 'He has to be a Zombie. If that's the case, then how can he move? And I'm sure I also said something when he pulled us.'

After taking several turns through different alleyways and more, the person leading them in front eventually stopped. The original entrance they had come in through was wide enough for the Titan to fit into, but these next set of alleyways were small.

The alleyways were also small, and having already run quite a distance, they were sure that the Titan would no longer be on their trail.

"So, are you going to tell us who you are?" Zain asked with his hand around his waist, holding onto the newly acquired gun he had received. He had not quite pulled it out but was ready to, at any time. He and Skittle were standing far from him, believing a hand-to-hand confrontation would have a lot more risk than just putting a bullet in the enemy's head.

Zain never did understand those videos he used to watch, where the person holding the gun was directly in front of the person, just asking for them to be snatched or stopped. A bullet could travel distance much faster, so there was no need to get up close.

"Ah, great!" the man replied. "I saved you and your little pet, and this is how you treat me?"

"Pet?" Glancing at Skittle, Zain could only assume he was talking about the latter, but why did he call him a pet? "I haven't pulled out my gun because you saved my 'Friend', not pet. And I'm sorry, I'm not really in the mood to trust people with what's happening here. So tell me, who are you? Or should I ask, what are you?"

When asked this question, the man went to pull his balaclava down, revealing a horrid smile.

"It seems I was right about you, but it's the first time I've seen one of us look so human, so I wasn't quite sure." The man replied.

For the first time in a while, Zain was getting quite excited. The man in front of him was a zombie, and he now understood why the former covered his face with a balaclava mask. There was quite a large hole in the side of his mouth. It was hard to tell if it was a bullet or a scratch mark.

The wound looked rotten, with the area around the wound looking red as if someone was constantly scratching it roughly.

Also, if Zain had not misheard the man from the way he was speaking, there were others that were like them.

"The name is Kun, and now that you have seen that the two of us are the same, I hope that you don't see me so much as a threat anymore?" Kun replied, holding his hands up to show he meant no harm.

Deciding it was for the better, Zain placed his hand away from the gun.

"Thank you for saving my friend."

"Don't worry. I understand that times are hard with everything going on, so you have the right to act that way." Kun smiled again. He seemed like quite the laid-back and optimistic character.

Something hard to come by in the current world they were in.

"But seriously, how do you look so human?" Kun walked closer, lifting up the suit on his arms, revealing more bite marks and parts of his flesh missing. "They were chomping the sh*t out of me when I got turned."

With how open and friendly Kun was, it was hard for Zain to keep his barriers up, and in the end, he gave out a big sigh, pulling away the cloth wrapped around his neck.

"That's it, you only got one little tidgy bite, man, you're lucky," Kun stated. "But seriously, if it wasn't for the fact that you pe- I mean, that zombie friend of yours was following you, I would have never thought that you were like us."

It was actually nice for Zain to hear this because that was the whole idea in the first place. Kun and Skittle could never pass as humans, but this was the reaffirmation he needed, and once again, Zain had heard Kun use a specific word.

"So, um, am I going to have to ask for your name?" Kun asked, pulling the latter out of his thoughts.

"The name is Zain," Zain replied. "And, when you were talking earlier, you mentioned the words' us' and 'we' a few times. Does that mean there are more like us?"

Zain wanted to ask many questions, whether he also had a system or if he had evolved and what they had seen, but this was the most pressing thing on his mind.

"Run!" Kun suddenly shouted in panic.

Confused, Zain turned around and saw the Titan was looking at them through the alleyway. It had followed them till here. Immediately Zain pulled away Skittle and pushed him behind himself, and faced the Titan.

Just then, the Titan sent a giant fist straight toward him.

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The giant fist smashed through the alleyway walls as if they were nothing, and now, after recoiling, it came straight toward Zain. He moved his head at the right time, causing it to miss him completely. The attack was powerful, and one could feel a gust of wind as it moved Kun's hair.

"F*ck F*ck F*ck. Do these things follow you? If that's the case, we can't go back to the base like this." Kun started to pull his hair when he looked back to see what was happening.

However, Zain was wondering something else. How was the Titan able to sneak up on them? Before, when it walked, its footsteps were so heavy that they could feel the ground beneath their feet would shake, but now it seemed to have come out of nowhere.

Noticing how its punch didn't work, the Titan bent back and pulled its arm out again. It was still too large to go through the small alleyway gap. Getting its shoulders in, it started to get ready, and the next second it began to run right after them.

Its shoulders were breaking through both sides of the solid wall, not slowing it down even for a second. The bricks falling on the ground were crushed by the Titan's feet, and it looked like the zombie was even picking up speed.

Kun had started running a long time ago, and Zain had set the [Follow] command on Skittle and made him follow the former, since one thing Kun seemed to be good at was running.

While running down the alleyway, they could see its other end, which opened to the main street. All three of them ran as fast as they could, but the sound of the wall breaking and bricks getting crushed was getting closer and closer.

,m "Don't look back. Just keep running. Don't look back, don't look back!" Kun turned his head and saw that the Titan was now just a metre away. Something that looked slow had caught up with them. "Why did I turn around!"

"Jump!" Zain shouted as he could feel that the Titan was on their backs. All of them leapt forward, and while jumping, Zain turned around to see the Titan right in front of him.

He took out the baton and placed it in front of him, but the Titan threw his punch right into Zain and sent him flying across the street, all the way through a glass window of a shop.

Skittle and Kun got up from the floor, and the latter wondered what to do. He soon heard the cracking of glass from behind them to run left or right.

Zain had gotten up, glass pieces were pierced in his body here and there, while the impact had twisted his arm, and even his baton was now bent to the point where it was useless.

[Energy has been used to perform healing]

[-25 Energy]

"You damned Titan!" Zain shouted as his arm healed and his bones began to get attached back into place. The laceration on his skin also began to patch up as well. "I wanted to kill you the last time we met, but then you followed us and hurt me again. Now I'm pissed."

Stepping over the shop's glass window, Zain jumped out of the window with a fierce look in his eyes.

'What is going on? Who is this guy? How could he just heal like that?' Kun thought. 'Never mind that, is he really thinking of fighting an evolved Zombie on his own? I would….never do something like that.'

Looking at himself, Kun noticed a couple of weapons on himself, but in a situation like this, a knife and a make-shift molotov cocktail wouldn't be able to do much. They were not designed for situations like this, and Kun had seen how strong the armour was on this thing when it took out the military.

The incendiary grenade only worked because the rocket launcher had taken out the armour on the outside.

Before Kun could make up his mind on whether to help or not, he saw that Zain had already run past. The latter stopped dead in front of the Titan. The next second the Titan lifted its large arm and went for a punch.

It was powerful, and to most, it might have been considered fast, but to Zain, this one was slow. He easily moved out of the way, and the powerful punch slammed into the ground. Then Zain started to climb up the Titan's arm and swung round its back like a monkey.

Zain held onto the large back piece of armour the Titan had, the hard skin he had tried to pry open earlier.

"I won't be on here long, so you can do the same thing again," Zain said as he pulled out one of the guns and placed it right in the gap, tilting it.

Immediately, Zain fired, shot after shot, and the Titan shrieked in pain. The bangs resounded throughout the main street, and it was starting to gather the attention of the other zombies. He knew this was a risky move because the higher the density of regular zombies, the higher the chance there were Stage 2 types amongst them, but the only solution he could think of right now needed him to use these guns.

'I know I told myself only to use these in an emergency situation, and I'm just going to have to count this situation as an emergency situation!" Zain quickly switched guns before he had to change magazines on one of them.

There was no clicking sound. It was as if he instinctively knew how many bullets one could hold in a gun like this.

The Titan was now writhing in pain. With the other gun, Zain decided to fire down its back again but was now aiming for the joints, where the armour was connected to the skin tissue.

As he fired downward, the flesh would rip away from the armour, and it was becoming loose by the second. Zain continued to fire more and more again, and then, putting the gun away, he pulled its back armour with all his might, ripping it off the Titan and throwing it to the ground.

Quickly clenching his fist, Zain didn't hesitate as he went towards its back and shoved his entire arm right through its flesh. However, he didn't stick it the whole way as he knew he wouldn't be able to pierce through it to the other side.

He then grasped a hand full of flesh and organs and ripped them out from its body.

'I noticed, for some reason, this guy feels pain unlike me and the others, but I am sure, just like the other Zombies, I have to go for the head to take him out.'

Now that there was a hole in its back, Zain again put his hand in. However, this time, he had his gun with him. The Titan was in too much pain to react, and Zain simply did everything too fast. He placed his hand in the hole with a gun pointing upwards and began to shoot, bullet after bullet.

From inside, the bullets went up the Titan's head, where there was no armour, and it didn't take long for the system prompts to appear.

As he pulled his arm out, the Titan fell to the ground, and Kun witnessed everything in disbelief.

"You really killed it…all on your own."

[You have successfully killed a Stage 2 Zombie]

[You have levelled up]

[You are now Level 5]

Thank you everyone for supporting LUZ so far, and I hope you can continue to support LUZ in the WSA journey by voting for the story! Please continue to use your Stones and Tickets!n0𝐕𝗲𝗅𝑢𝓈𝒷.𝑐0𝔪

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[You have successfully defeated a Stage 2 Zombie, 'Titan']

[You have gained 2000 exp]

[First-time kill bonus has been added: 5000 exp]

[You are not the first to kill a Titan.]

[There will be no other rewards]

[You are now level 5]

[208/10,005 exp]n0𝐕𝗲𝗅𝑢𝓈𝒷.𝑐0𝔪

[2 Stat points have been awarded]

Zain was surprised by the amount of exp he had obtained. He thought it would be a standard amount across the board for all stage 2 type Zombies. Similar to how every mutated Zombie gave him two exp as well.

However, that didn't seem to be the case at all, and it was hard to tell what the pattern exactly was.

'So, defeating a new type of Zombie I have never faced before gets me more exp, and then there's the first to kill bonus, rather than the first time bonus. That was obvious as early in the day he had seen the army kill one, and who knew what was happening across the world.'

Just as Zain was about to decide where to put his two stats, he could hear the growling from nearby streets. The zombies were approaching, attracted by the sound of gunshots.

"Hey, we really need to get out of here!" Kun cried, getting out of the stupor, "The gunshots attracted all of these guys. And with more zombies, there's a higher chance of one of them being an evolved."

Kun was right. Zain himself had come to the same conclusion before, and looking to his left and right, he noticed the zombies were gathering by the second. They hadn't started running yet because the typical humans they would usually see weren't here.

'This is why the gun should only be a last resort.' Zain said as he put the two guns away and was ready to run away with the others, back through one of the alleyways.

Zain was going to follow Kun, but he noticed the latter was doing something strange. He had gone to the large Titan that Zain had killed not too long ago. So he knelt down and began to search for something.

Kun was ripping parts of its body the next second with his knife.

"Come on, where is it? Where is it? I can't find it anywhere?"

This scene reminded Zain of when he saw the mutated Zombie kneel down earlier. Just what was he looking for?

"Ah, screw it! We're just going to have to leave this place!" Kun said

The three had run out of the area where the attack had occurred. They ran for a good fifteen minutes to ensure they had cleared the area. Still, all they could see were apartment blocks in the sky.

It made Zain realise how much of the modern-day city he disliked. He would have much rather lived in a suburban area with houses and a neighbourhood, a county they could go by, and a nice forest nearby.

'Forest...why do I think about the forest...I never thought about that before. I didn't care where I was unless it was at home playing video games.' Touching his head, Zain was starting to worry a little bit.

"Alright, it's probably getting dark in around half an hour, so we should probably head inside," Kun said.

Zain didn't mind too much. Although it was hard for them to feel tired, he had used much of his energy. Taking a break to recover his mental state would be good. They went into the closest apartment building, which hadn't been affected as much by the zombie attack or the meteorite strike.

,m Once inside, they walked up to the second floor and went through the doors to look for a nice and safe apartment for the night. While walking through the hallways, they encountered quite a few dead people. Kun went up to a middle-aged female corpse slumped on the floor with blood splattered against the wall behind her.

The first thing he did was check her head, where all three noticed a cracked hole, but there seemed to be nothing inside. He gave out a sigh as he proceeded to pull out his knife.

"Hey, so you know what I'm going to do, right? I need to eat. Is this okay for you? There have been some people that were uncomfortable with this." Kun asked, just to make sure.

"If you weren't going to do it, then I was," Zain shrugged. He didn't mind this, and saying no to the former would make him a hypocrite.

This was some sort of comfort between the two of them. They both knew what they were doing was wrong. And it was quite ironic that they would have been dubbed as monsters for doing such things if it was just a week ago.

Never in their wildest dreams could they have imagined they would be doing the things they were doing right now. After cutting off a few parts, Kun handed some over to his ally.

He then proceeded to look away as he began to eat the food, and out of respect, Zain did the same, looking away as well. This was an embarrassment to them. They were no longer in the society they were in before, and neither of them had fully gotten used to the new state of the world.

However, Zain found it easier to accept things like this. His emotions dulled, acting like a human was getting harder, leaving him with a strong will to survive and protect his now only friend.

After getting some food, Zain's energy had gone up to 60 percent. It still wasn't full, but he didn't want to say anything to Kun. It made him wonder if Kun was full or if Zain's body just had a larger appetite.

After that, they broke the door to one of the closed apartment buildings. It looked like no one was inside or had broken in, so the entire apartment appeared rather clean.

"We hit the jackpot!" Kun said as he jumped and lay down on the sofa. "I guess these guys weren't home when the attack happened. There's no reason for the Zombies to come in here, and it's good that it was on the second floor."

Zain nodded, but before relaxing, he started to put the chain lock on and grabbed a chair, placing it at an angle underneath. He also moved a cupboard easily and put it in front of the door.

"What are you doing? If we get attacked, how are we going to get out?" Kun asked.

"We jump. It's only the second floor. Your body can handle it, right?" Zain replied.

"That might be the case, but I want to make something clear, me and you are not the same," Kun said.

Zain was a little taken back by this because he didn't understand.

"That super-healing power you had back there. That... I've never seen that before. So you need to explain yourself a little bit to me."

Sitting down on a chair not too far from Kun, Zain was wondering what to say, as it was time for them to have a talk and find out the circumstances they each had.

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Hearing Kun's words, Zain had just learned that not all of those like him could heal as he did. Which made him wonder if he was different from the person across from him and how much he should tell the others if he was different.

"I'm just a student who was bitten in his room. I've been through a few tough situations, and this is how I am. My body keeps on changing as time goes on."

Kun was staring directly at Zain. He then raised his finger and scratched the wound on the side of his mouth but soon stopped himself before he did so.

"Sorry, I'm just a bit jealous, that's all," Kun replied. "I forget everyone has their own story, things they have gone through—lives of close ones that they lost along the way. You see, I was in a band, playing a gig when this all kicked off.

"I was the only one out of the others that ended up like this after being bit. I don't know why either. I don't even know how my family is doing, at least they don't live in the city. Maybe it hasn't reached that far yet…at least that's what I tell myself, but even if they are safe, how would they react when they see me? I'm sure you understand what I'm talking about."

There was an intense look on Zain's face when Kun said those words.

"I don't have a family anymore, only that guy," Zain replied, pointing to Skittle, who was just standing in the room obediently.

"I have been meaning to ask, why is that Zombie following you? I mean, he's not like us, right? And it seems like he listens to everything you say." Kun asked curiously.

"You know the system, the game screen?" Zain mentioned.

"Huh, what are you talking about?" Kun replied.

Zain stopped there, he had thrown out a few words to see how Kun reacted, but his reaction seemed genuine. So the two of them weren't the same after all. At least not entirely.

"Sorry, I was just saying that the two of us played games together all the time. We have a close bond, and it seems to have stayed after an accident turned him as well." Zain was careful to give out limited information.

If others found out he was the one that turned him, then word could spread, and there would be people after him. So it was best to keep the information to a minimum, asserting everything to be a mystery.

"I wanted to ask you a few questions too." Zain leaned forward in his chair, looking toward Kun, showing his seriousness. "After killing that Titan, you said you were looking for something. What were you looking for?"

Since the topic seemed to be quite serious, Kun, in return, sat up, no longer lying on the sofa.

"It's strange for someone as strong as you not to know much about the Evolved Zombies."

Zain had gathered that the zombies that the system had referred to as Stage 2 Zombies were the Evolved Zombies that Kun was referring to.

"A lot happened in four days. The whole city was in chaos, with the military police force, special SWAT teams and others trying to combat whatever was happening," Kun explained. "So, I have seen my fair share of those guys, and just like you saw, the military is capable of taking out the large guys."

"Titans." Zain interrupted him. "I named them titans."

"Okay?" Kun replied. "I saw the military take out these 'Titans', But what happened was regular-looking Zombies would come over and find this small crystal inside the Titan and eat it. Then, seconds later, they themselves would turn into a Titan."

Hearing this, now Zain knew what had happened earlier and how the Mutated Zombie had turned into a Titan.

"I was looking for that crystal, so there was one less thing on the streets for people to worry about, but I couldn't find it anywhere. I didn't have much time to look, to be honest, so maybe I just missed it, but the crystal is usually contained in the upper half of the body.

"They are also not the only ones with the crystals inside them. Some Zombies have them as well. Although it's impossible to tell which ones do or don't just from looking, they tend to attack us if we get close, which is a clear sign."

Without a doubt, Zain knew that Kun was referring to the Mutated Zombies he had seen. What was interesting to note was that they had no way to tell which ones were mutated, but Zain did.

His system would inform him when looking at a Zombie if it was a Stage 2 or a mutated one. Zain had never attempted to open a zombie's body after killing them, so maybe this crystal inside their body could be significant, and the system would be able to analyse it and use it somehow. It was a test he wanted to try out, so opening the sliding floor to the balcony, Zain looked out.

"What are you doing?!" Kun panicked and pulled Zian back inside immediately.

"I was just going to try and see if there were any zombies with those crystals you were talking about. It sounded interesting." Zain replied.

Facepalming, Kun felt like he had befriended a loose cannon, but due to the former's strength and healing abilities, he didn't want to lose this person either.

"Look, there is one rule in our group that you should know and follow no matter what, and it's for your own safety, so I'll tell you," Kun said, looking directly into Zain's eyes, "Never ever go out at night if you want to live."

It was strange to hear this. Zombies were out on the streets at night, and although it was harder to see, Zain didn't understand the problem. But just then, he remembered the quest on the first night- Survive the night.

'Is there something about the night that I don't know?'

"Just rest up for the night, and tomorrow morning I'm going to take you somewhere special," Kun smiled and returned to the sofa. "I'll take you to meet the others, the ones that are like us."

n0𝑣𝑒𝒍𝑈𝚜𝓑.𝓬0𝗆

Thank you everyone for supporting LUZ so far, and I Hope you can continue to support LUZ in the WSA journey by voting for the story! Please continue to use your Stones and Tickets!

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From the conversation, Zain concluded that Kun was a zombie that had yet to evolve. Although he did seem fast, it wasn't to the point where one believes it was super speed.

The fact was, Zain didn't know if Kun was even capable of evolving or levelling up like him, he needed more information, and perhaps this group of other zombies similar to him would be the place to find it.

Observing Kun, Zain noticed that he was a bit paranoid about things and wouldn't bother to explain why. He insisted on turning off all the lights and asked him not to stay as far away from the window as possible.

Although zombies didn't need sleep, resting appeared to decrease the energy depletion rate, and Kun refused to talk and put his finger on his own mouth every time Zain spoke, signalling him to remain silent. With all this, the latter had stopped there.

'I wonder why he's so paranoid at night. What is the big threat at night that we have to worry about? I mean, is there really something out there that's scarier than the Titan we fought against?' Zain wondered.

Honestly, Zain disliked doing nothing, if he were left to himself and his own thoughts, bad memories and visions would start to emerge, so before that could happen, he needed to distract himself with something else.

Hence, to keep himself distracted, he decided to think over how to best use his newly acquired stat points.

'After fighting that Titan, I doubt no matter how high I put my endurance stat, I wouldn't have armour as strong as that. Each path type has to have its advantages and disadvantages. If the Titan is an Aggressive type, then I shouldn't be able to reach that level. Otherwise, why even have the other types in the first place?' Zain believed.

Thinking about this, he wanted to put his other two stats in a different area.

'Should I go for a well-balanced character, or maybe I should..' There was one particular stat that intrigued him.

Intelligence.

Zain considered himself quite the clever guy when it came to things to do with Survival. Although he wasn't book smart like Skittle, intelligence might help him in other ways.n0𝑣𝑒𝒍𝑈𝚜𝓑.𝓬0𝗆

[1 point has been added to Intelligence]

He felt a strange tingling sensation around his head, but other than that, everything seemed normal until another System notification prompt materialised in front of him.

[Your intelligence has increased. Now your body functionality will decrease at a slower rate.]

'This is…this is good.' Zain thought.

[Body functionality is at 88 Percent]

Energy didn't seem to be much of a problem for Zain. There were plenty of dead bodies on the street with their flesh left. However, for body functionality to stay up, he needed brains, which were almost impossible to come by.

The zombies would only eat that bit while leaving the rest of the body behind. This meant only fresh kill off someone who was uninfected or recently killed after being bitten could be used.

However, if increasing intelligence slowed down this process, he had more time to solve this problem.

'The only thing is, it doesn't say how much an intelligence point actually affects the decrease. A percentage of something would have been nice. I doubt it's a large number unless I placed a lot of points in it.'

The other thing was that intelligence at the moment felt like it had no further effect. While they were facing things like Titans and more, and with only Skittle by his side, he would need to make sure he was strong enough.,

[1 Point has been added to the strength.]

'For now, being a well-balanced character won't matter too much. After all, my evolution path focuses on controlling others.' Zain looked at Skittle. 'More strength would have done me well in the last fight, so I just went with that.'

With passing time, it seemed like Zain was treating this like a game, but he was good at games, so maybe it would do him well.

——

The following day had arrived, and the sunlight was shooting from the large glass panel windows and through the curtain gaps. Kun had somewhat dozed off on the sofa. He didn't go to sleep, but it was almost as if he had shut his mind off for the duration of the night.

That was when he suddenly heard an odd creaking noise coming from one of the other rooms. His eyes instantly shot open as he looked around, only to notice he was alone in the room.

'What is that, and where are the other two?' Kun thought as he pulled out a knife and pulled his balaclava over his face.

He started to creep over towards the source of the noise, and it was coming from one of the rooms. Slowly he opened the door and could finally see what was making the strange noise.

"What are you doing? Have you been doing that all night?" Kun asked as he looked on the floor and saw Zain topless doing push-ups.

One would think that Zombies might not have sweat, and Zain would have said the same thing before since he could do things without tiring, but that was not the case because sweat was dripping off his body.

All that energy from eating flesh had to come out of the body somehow, one way or another.

Zain stood up now that he had completed his quest, and his whole body was in view, glistening from the sunlight entering the room. Maybe it was because of the sweat or that he had just worked out, but Kun could see how defined his muscles were for the first time.

What was also surprising though, was that there were quite a few scars on his body. It was hard to determine where they were or how old they were, but some were long and others small in different places.

"Were you doing that all night?" Kun asked. "I did hear some noise, but I decided to just ignore it, and why are you even doing this stuff."

Reaching one of the towels he had taken from the bathroom, Zain wiped the sweat off his body while replying.

"It's routine. I used to do the same thing before. I don't really know how our bodies work. I wonder if they are similar to how they were before. But I don't want everything I worked for just to go away.

"Fortunately, it looks like I'm in better shape than ever. I was never able to do 500 push up in one set before. It makes me wonder if I can naturally improve this body as well. Have you tried this?"

Honestly, Kun didn't really know what Zain was saying, and he was starting to think, for a student, this person was quite strange. Five hundred push-ups in one sitting, Kun believed that would be impossible for him even in his current state right now.

"Didn't you say you were a student?" Kun asked. "Why do you have a body like that? Why are you training so hard? Now that I think of it, how do you even know how to use a gun so well? Are you actually special ops, a secret agent or something? You can tell me if you want. We don't care about your past."

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Putting on a shirt after wiping himself down, Zain was getting everything else ready. Next, he placed his belt on, his two serviceable guns, two knives, and the one good baton he had left. After that, he wore a tight-fitting sports shirt from the closet that allowed him more unrestricted movement.

However, he still had a piece of what looked like black cloth tied around his neck to cover the bite mark.

"I had a dream," Zain replied as he went past Kun to get a few other things, such as his bag that he left in the main room.

"Wait, what? So, you had a dream? I thought you were about to make some grand speech about wanting to be a soldier or something when you were younger." Kun followed.

"No," Zain replied, putting the backpack back on Skittle, who could carry things more conveniently now that his strength stat had increased.

"I learnt how to use a gun in a dream."

"But, Zombies don't have dreams, at least I haven't since the day I have been bit."

There was no more response from Zain, so it meant there was not much Kun could do.

Either way, he still wanted to introduce him to the others. He couldn't wait to see their faces when he told them about them taking out a Titan, although, without the crystal, it would be incredibly hard for them to make others believe their story.

Before heading out to the streets to follow Kun, Zain had requested to search the upper floors. In doing so, he wanted to find some more flesh. Since he had been working out throughout the night to keep his mind occupied, his energy was a little low.

Kun was fine with this since he wanted to eat as well, only this time Zain wasn't holding back. He went on to eat until he was full, and seeing him eat so much flesh made Kun feel a little queasy.

'Why does he eat so much? After just a bit, I feel full. He's not that much bigger than me either. But he is different, especially with that super healing as well. He reminds me of Boss. I hope the two of them can get along at least.' Kun thought.

When entering the streets, they noticed the usual zombies roaming around, although the streets looked a bit emptier than before. Regardless there was enough for Zain to test out what he wanted.

While looking around, the system had prompted that there was a mutated Zombie in the distance. Immediately, Zain ran past the other two and went towards it. Leaping up in the air, he held his baton and whacked the mutated zombie on its head.

A single blow had cracked the skull and killed the zombie on the spot.

'That one point of strength feels like it's made quite a difference.'

[10 exp has been gained]

"Hey, what are you doing? Why are you just killing Zombies randomly, you know that doesn't help us at all, and it could attract others," Kun shouted.

"You said last night that these guys sometimes have crystals, right? Well, do you mind checking?" Zain asked.

The chances of someone finding a crystal in a zombie were incredibly rare, so Kun felt like it was useless, but he decided to do it just this one time anyway. Carving out the body and searching in the end, Kun could not find anything.

"It's empty. As I said, it's only some Zombies, and it's impossible to tell which ones," Kun replied.

'That's strange. Was I wrong? I thought that the Mutated Zombies and the stage 2 Zombies would have crystals inside them. In fact, we can even look at the Mutated Zombies as a type of Stage 1, and the regular zombies a stage 0. Unless…'

"Do you mind if we try something else?" Zain smiled.

Walking through the city streets again, with the parked cars, the trees on the sidewalk and zombies just walking around. Zain eventually spotted a zombie woman holding onto a tree.

"Alright, can you kill that one?" Zain asked.n0𝗏𝚎𝓁𝑈𝑆𝒷.𝓬0𝓂

Kun looked a bit nervous and didn't see the point in this, but he had done things like this before. He got closer, sneaking up to the zombie, and then suddenly sprinted from his position. He was using his advantage of speed and surprise.

When getting close, he stabbed the knife right through the back of her head—killing the zombie woman in one hit.

'Oh, he's quite good. I guess he had to be to survive all of this, even if he is a Zombie.' Zain thought.

Since Zain wasn't involved in the kill, he didn't get any system prompt regarding gained exp, and once again, he had told Kun to search the zombie for a crystal.

"Look, I'm telling you, you can't; just pick out and choose… there's a crystal inside!" Kun said, pulling it out from the zombie's stomach and lifting it in the air. It was small, about the same size as a ring. It was almost see-through with a tint of green as well.

"You lucky guy!" Kun said, coming over to Zain and patting him on the back.

The thing was, it wasn't luck, and Zain somewhat understood now. The crystals were not appearing in the dead Zombies' bodies because they were the ones he had killed. So for one reason or another, he gained Exp instead.

Maybe the crystals were the things that were causing him to evolve as well? Just like it did other Zombies? But why was it automatic for him? Maybe it was because he had the system? Looking at the crystal closely, Zain felt like it looked familiar, and looking down at the necklace around his neck, everything had hit him.

'Is it this, is this what gave me my system? The thing that stopped me from turning into a zombie? That woman I bumped into had this on her.' Holding the crystal around his neck, he didn't know whether to be thankful or not.

It was only a theory, but it was also the only one he had and was quite convincing at that.

'So who was that woman? And what does she have to do with this whole thing?'

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Zain and Skittle followed Kun without knowing where he was taking them. Along the way, they hunted any mutated zombies they came across, and at the same time, Zain was also experimenting.

Through killing Zombies, or at least mutated ones, he found out that if he or Skittle were involved in killing a mutated Zombie, he would gain exp, and there would be no crystal. However, if Kun killed the mutated zombie, there would always be a crystal.

Zain did want to analyse the crystal, but Kun seemed to be quite possessive of the crystals he gained and placed them in a little pouch inside his suit's blazer. Zain had a thought, or more like a theory, that maybe if he touched the crystal, it would tell him what he needed to do with it to gain exp or at least a new set of information.

However, it wasn't worth getting into an argument over the crystals, so he decided to put this matter at the back of his head for now. Without a doubt though, it was the system that was causing the crystals to disappear and turning them into exp.

"I can't believe it. How is someone able to tell who has a crystal in them and who doesn't?" Kun wasn't yet used to how Zain was able to judge accurately and find the Evolved Zombies, "I mean, you didn't get any of them right when you were hunting, but I hit the jackpot almost every time, wait till I tell the others about this, haha!"

Hearing this, a red flag popped up in Zain's mind.

"It was just luck. I mostly guessed them and tried to see if I could tell the difference or not, but as you can see, it was a string of bad luck for me. I was unsuccessful, and as you said, it's impossible to tell."

,m Kun and his group had to be collecting the crystals for a reason, and if they found out there was someone like him who could tell Evolved Zombies apart from regular zombies, without a doubt, they would try to use him in some way, which he definitely wanted to avoid.n0𝓋𝑒𝗅𝐔𝗌𝓑.𝓬0𝑀

They had eventually entered one of the rough neighbourhoods. There were hardly any large skyscrapers with fancy designs or giant shopping malls with several floors in this part of the city.

Instead, the streets were filled with litter, there was graffiti on the walls, and places had been boarded up before the whole Zombie attack had started. There were still Zombies here, but they just seemed to be fewer in number.

"Well, here we are, the Roka Cluck Club!" Kun said excitedly and spread out his arms as if he was showing something impressive.

From the outside, the building was square-shaped, and it looked small due to it being right between two apartment buildings, but one would imagine it was actually big inside if it was a single venue.

Right above the door, there was a sign with the club's name, but it wasn't in the best condition. From the word 'Cluck', the L had fallen off, and someone had spray painted the U into an O, spelling out an entirely different word.

"I see you are not impressed, but trust me, the inside is a lot better than the outside, and this is the place I've been talking about, so why don't we go in and say hello to everyone," Kun suggested.

Walking up to the entrance, Kun knocked on the door. The knocks weren't direct, and there was a set of patterns, which Zain instantly noticed. The former had knocked on the door twice, then paused, and knocked once again three times, and at last, two times again after another pause.

"We had to keep it simple...because, well, you will see what I mean," Kun said with a slightly embarrassed expression.

After a few moments, the unlocking and unwinding of locks were heard from the other side, and the door was pulled open. Kun walked in without hesitation and looked to his right, a little up.

"Thanks for that, Jelly," Kun said. "Oh, and I have two guests, so be nice, alright?"

Waving his hand, Kun was telling the two of them to follow. Usually, Zain wouldn't have done such a thing, entering a place without confirming the risk, but at the moment, there was no reason for them to trap or trick him. He was entering a place where they were all like him.

Moving forward, the two stepped through the door, and now Zain knew why Kun was looking up because there was a man as large as Buke in height. As for his body mass, he certainly was a huge person. In comparison, nearly twice the width of Buke.

His clothes had been torn, revealing the skin of his belly, which looked to have been bitten and chewed on. In addition, he was bald, which just made his head and belly look even larger.

"Alright." Kun clapped. "This is one of the venues that my band used to play at, and in fact, Jelly and I have known each other long before the zombie apocalypse. He was one of the bouncers. You know those guys who decide who goes in and out of the club. But just keep in mind he had a bit of an anger issue, though he has been working on it, haha!"

Jelly chuckled, and his large belly was jiggling, moving up and down.

"I was actually the one that recommended this to be our base of operations, and when we came in here, we found Jelly, although he seems to have memory problems, which is why we gave him that name."

The zombie man named Jelly looked at the person who had entered the door.

"He looks human." Then, Jelly asked, "Why did you bring a human here?"

"He's not human. Do you think with you around, I would bring a human here? You would probably eat him before even saying hello." Kun rolled his eyes.

Not wanting to cause trouble, Zain took off the scarf around his neck, showing the bite wound.

"You should be able to smell. I'm not like them." Zain eventually said.

Jelly sniffed the air around Zain for a few seconds.

"You're right. This one is not a human."

It was quite impressive seeing another zombie talk. And what was interesting, though, was the level of intelligence the current zombie held. The problem was, it was hard to tell if Jelly had always been like this or was it after turning into a zombie.

Now inside the place, with Skittle in as well, Jelly shut the door behind them and put back all the locks. Meanwhile, Zain took a moment to look around the club.

The place was larger than he had expected from the outside. It had several tables and seats with a stage at the other end. Then there was also a bar area on either side. The only thing was, the place was quite empty.

Another thing he noticed was that there were no dead bodies on the ground or zombies anyway, apart from a few blood spills here and there. That's when Zain and the others heard voices coming from the back of the stage.

"Come on, let's go meet the rest. I'm sure they will be excited to see you." Kun said.

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n0𝑣𝐞𝑙𝑢𝐒𝓫.𝒸0𝑀

It was rare for Zain to feel anything, but at the moment, his hands were a bit shaky, and he could only imagine it was due to nerves. If it were people or zombies he was up against, he wouldn't mind, but there was something about meeting others similar to him that created a strange feeling within him.

Kun walked forward while Zain and Skittle followed with Jelly at the very back. Although his size was large, his footsteps weren't heavy like the Titan they had gone up against.

Then, three people walked around the corner and looked up to see Kun. Although three 'people' wouldn't be the right term to describe them because they were, without a doubt, Zombies.

Just like Kun, all of them had wounds somewhere on their bodies. It now made sense why Kun was so surprised when he saw Zain and why he also remarked that the latter was one of the lucky ones.

The second they saw the newcomers, though, they had frozen in place. Until a female with bright pink hair and a dirty pink shirt and skirt pressed both of her hands together and stood on her tiptoes. Upon carefully observing, Zain noticed bite marks all over her legs leading up to her thigh.

"Kun, you really found another Reborn. Oh wait, you found two!" the female zombie exclaimed.

"Yeah," Kun seemed nervous as he scratched the back of his head. "Because of it, I was only able to bring back flesh, I thought this was more important and sorry to burst your bubble, but it's only one. The other one is just a regular zombie, and it's his friend. He follows the Reborn around."

"You mean like a pet?" The female replied instantly, and immediately Kun could feel the change in mood behind him.

"A friend, he's a friend," Kun replied.

Listening to the conversation, Zain had taken note of the word Reborn. He could only assume that was referring to themselves, the zombies that had come back to life.

"Alright, so since I brought a guest here for the first time in a very long time, why don't I introduce you all," Kun then looked at the others and said.

"You've already met Jelly, and he is the type of guard to this place. He doesn't go out on missions and always looks after everything. I know a lot of this is a bit confusing, but it will all make sense to you later." Kun explained to Zain.

"The beautiful young lady here is Pink. Since it's a new life for everyone, everyone also decided to dub new names for themselves that suit them, which is why we call Pink, Pink. She recently graduated and moved to the city to follow her dream of becoming an actress."

"Next, we have Fingers!"

The zombie Fingers waved to Zain when Kun called out his name. He looked the most friendly out of the lot but had a few bite marks on his arms. Zain also noticed that he had extremely long fingers, which now made sense why they had given him such a name. Other than that, he had a nice soft smile, and the short hair on his head added to his amicable vibe.

"Fingers was an accountant, if you would believe it or not. So he is in charge of our stock, who contributed what and the distribution between us, basically, the brain of the Group. Then finally, we have Shark."

After hearing his name, Shark was the only one that put his hand out for a shake, which Zain willingly accepted.

The man was well built, similar to Zain. He also wore what looked like a swat uniform. A bulletproof vest, boots, and gloves, among other things. Although his white hair made him stand out, he didn't look too old, at most around his late thirties, which made Zain think it had to be dyed

As for his nickname Shark, that bit was obvious as well. They were two large marks on either side of his mouth. They looked like giant holes, and through them, one could see his teeth that looked unusually sharp.

"Shark here says he worked in a normal office, but none of us believes him. We think he has to be a special agent of some sort. Anyway, he is the leader of the Group, and because of him, we have been able to survive for so long."

Just from looking, Zain knew that Shark was the leader of the Group. He had this air of confidence around him. What he was interested to know was what exactly Shark had told the others or done in order for them to survive till now.

"And finally, it's time for our new companion and new Reborn member," Kun introduced him to everyone, "This is Zain. We haven't been together long, but I still know a few things. Zain was a university student, and guess what, he's a kickass fighter as well!

"On our way here, there was an Evolved Zombie chasing after us, one of the large ones with the black armour, and Zain here took him out all on his own!"

The expression on all of their faces had changed then.

"No way!" Pink was first to show her scepticism, "Are you sure it just wasn't a large Zombie that looked like an evolved one?"

"Does that mean you brought the crystal back?" Fingers inquired, although he didn't outright show his disbelief.

Hearing this, an awkward expression formed over Kun as he scratched the back of his head and explained the situation,

"Well, we were in such a rush, and I couldn't find it in time, so we had to leave it behind."

From the looks on their faces, it looked like Fingers and Pink thought it was an excuse.

"I believe you." Just then, Shark opened his mouth. He had been silent all along, and his voice came out a bit gruff.

"I don't think Kun would make that sort of mistake, and besides, we shouldn't discredit what anyone has been through. Why don't I show you around, Zain? And we can talk more about how things work around here. I will also tell you the rules of what we do, and you can decide if you want to stay with us or not."

"That sounds good." Zain nodded.

Soon Kun and the others went off to do their own thing. Both Fingers and Pink seemed interested to know more about Zain, but Shark said they could do that later. Just as they were heading behind the stage from where they had come out before, Zain spotted something strange.

There was a notice board out, and drawings and red pen marks were everywhere on it. Some were descriptions of the various Evolved Zombies he had come across, like the Spitter and Titan, but then he saw something else that caught his eye.

[Don't go out at night. Otherwise, the Demons will get you.]

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The others were huddled around Kun, and from the sounds of it, he was telling them all about the encounters and troubles the two of them had gone through, starting with seeing the military taking on a horde of zombies and then the fight against the Titan.

Zain knew he would go on to give out other details as well.

'I thought as much, Kun seems to be the blabbermouth of the group, so it was a good thing I didn't tell him too much. Otherwise, it could have turned into a problem.'

Either way, Zain would not be there to listen to the rest of the former's story as he enjoyed a tour from Shark. Behind the stage, towards the right, there was a door, and going through, Zain and Shark walked into the kitchen area.

"This whole thing is relatively new to us. Remember, it's only been five days, but we have been doing our best to adjust to the situation, and our first priority is survival." Shark explained as he went over to a large double-door fridge.

Zain liked the sound of the leader's importance to survival. He knew there had to be at least one capable person in the group to set up such things. And when opening the door, Zain was quite surprised at what appeared in front of him.

From top to bottom, parts of human flesh had been wrapped up in cling film. It was set up in a way that they didn't even look like human flesh, but from the familiar smell, Zain knew it was the same.

n0𝑣𝐞𝑙𝑢𝐒𝓫.𝒸0𝑀

"If you have survived this long, then I'm sure I don't need to tell you. We need to eat to survive. It's been hard on us, Zain. Pink was actually a vegan, so she refused to eat until her body wouldn't let her anymore. It only took two days for the hunger to set in for her." Shark sighed.

Looking at the fridge, there was plenty of flesh for them to survive for around two whole weeks. It was packed.

"How did you get all of this?" Zain asked.

"The club," Shark replied immediately as if he had expected this question. "Kun told you, right? We all met up through a series of events that I won't bore you with, but I suggested we needed to make a place our permanent shelter, and he thought of this place. When we got inside, there were a few zombies. We just pushed them out of place since there was no need to kill them, and then with the rest of the bodies…well, I decided to skin the meat from them."

Zain couldn't imagine doing such a thing himself. How much work had to have been done in this kitchen to get all those bodies a certain way? It was hard to guess.

'Are they like me? Their emotions for certain things have just been dulled now that we are dead.' Zain thought. After all, something like this definitely wouldn't be possible for a normal human without any repercussions.

As the two walked forward, Zain noticed there was a smaller fridge next to the large one, and when opening this up, Zain could instantly tell what it was. He had only tasted it once, but the feeling was so refreshing on his body that he honestly wanted to try it again.

"This is where the brains go if we find any, but as you can see, we only have one here." Shark explained. "They are hard to come by. Approaching living people is dangerous for us due to how we look.

"You might not know this because it's only been five days, but our Reborn bodies require a brain at least once a week to function. This single brain can be split up between five of us fine, but now that you and your friend are here, we're going to need more. It's time to show you the more important bits." Shark explained, already walking off.

There were a few questions in Zain's mind. First, from what Shark had said, the body wouldn't deteriorate until a full week. So there was no need to eat a brain for a long time. Yet, Zain's body functionality had gone down in two days.

'Was it because of all my injuries and energy I used up? That could be the case, but I'm more interested in how Shark even has this information. Without the system, I would have never known about flesh and brains restoring anything.

'He could have just figured it out, but his information is so specific. Seven days have yet to pass, and he knows that a brain is needed every seven days. Something doesn't add up.'

Stepping out of the kitchen behind the stage, there was a door heading inside, and it looked like it was an office room with a chair and a desk. On the desk was a large radio transmitter, a specialised one that you wouldn't normally find in a place like this in this day and age.

"What do you use that for?" Zain asked.

"To see if anyone is out there, anyone like us, or to find out information about what is currently happening in the world," Shark replied and quickly went to show another detail. On the wall, there were countless draws, and when he opened one of them up, there were crystals inside.

"We have come up with a plan. Once in a while, we head out. Either on our own, in pairs or maybe even as an entire group. If we collect any crystals, we put them in here.

"I'll be honest, there is no use for the crystals for now, but I believe they have to do with this whole damn zombie thing, So I'm keeping them for now in case anyone needs to do research in the future. On top of that, it proves that we are cleaning the streets of dangerous zombies one at a time."

If Zain had to guess, the crystals had something to do with the zombies' evolution and maybe that was why Stage 2 and Mutated Zombies were the only ones with crystals. Making a note of this room, Zain thought maybe he could test something later on.

"You heard me talk about missions, which is relatively a new thing that Fingers has set up. If you follow me again, please." Shark stated that when leaving the room, they had entered the main hall, and here a large whiteboard form before could be seen.

There was everyone's name in the group, when they had last gone out, how much food they had collected and more. Even the amount of brain circulation amongst them, which showed its importance.

"Ah, you have the stage 2 Zombies on here," Zain said out loud, looking at the drawings.

"Stage 2… that's an interesting name." Shark smiled. "Here, we call them Evolved. So far, we have only encountered three types. Are there any that you have seen?"

Zain pointed to the pictures.

,m "The Spitter and the Titan, but I've never seen this one before." Zain pointed at the new type of stage 2 he had never seen before."

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Hearing the names that Zain had given to the evolved zombies, Shark felt like they fit well, so he took the black marker that was in its holder along the bottom and scribbled the names Spitter and Titan under the two illustrations on the whiteboard.

"It seems like you have gone through quite a lot yourself." Shark said while putting back the marker, "I have only seen the Spitter once, but as soon as I saw one, I decided it was my cue to get out of there."

Once again, Shark's words and what was written underneath the Spitter didn't make sense. Mainly because there were notes as to what the Spitter could do and how it was able to spit a type of liquid that could attract the zombies in the area, and about the Boil Zombies it could create as well.

"The Titan seems to be the most common 'Stage 2' Zombie, and thankfully due to their slow movement, it's easier to avoid them. As for the third type of Evolved... I would say it's the most dangerous of the three."

The drawings weren't great, so it was hard for Zain to imagine what it looked like. But it had a normal human figure, or a normal Zombie figure, apart from these strange long parts that were sticking out from the arms, back of the legs and other places.

"Their bones." Shark explained. "Extremely sharp bones. The Zombie is able to sprout them out of its body and use them to slice and cut everything while at the same time, they're solid as well. The most worrying thing about it is its speed.

"Going one on one against this is impossible, and it would be best to deal with it from a long-range and in some cases, retreating would be the best option."

This certainly did sound like a hard stage 2 Zombie. Going through his head, Zain was thinking of how he would defeat it, and he could only think of using his guns as well. There was another way, but right now, that was impossible.

"How did you survive," Zain asked.

There was a pause from Shark before answering.

"At the time, I was with a group of humans… I ran away, leaving them."

As Kun stated before, everyone had their own story. Zain wanted to know more, but as the new guy in the group, he didn't want to push or step on anyone's toes. There was no rush to leave this place. It was safe for them, and a good system had been set up.

An organized group like this would do well for their survival, and with time, Zain could learn whatever it was that Shark was hiding.n0𝓋𝑒𝗅𝐔𝗌𝓑.𝓬0𝑀

"While you are here, I might as well update you on some information, although you might already know some of this. Actually, I am not sure, but from the sound of it, Kun thinks you're a good fighter, and we need good fighters to survive. So I want you to live, Zain."

When hearing Shark talk for a while now, he talked like an officer of some kind, perhaps a sergeant who had men under him. This made Zain understand why Kun and the others were willing to give him the lead role and why they thought the former might be some sort of a government agent.

"If two Stage 2 Zombies ever come across and you're also at the scene, that is your best chance to get out of there because at Stage 2, the zombies fight amongst each other. We don't know why this is, but it might be a similar situation to us, the Reborn.

"The regular zombies don't go after us, and the Stage 2 Zombies don't go after them either. Yet, the stage 2 zombies do go after each other and us. I have a feeling that it might be linked to those crystals, and maybe inside of us, there is a crystal as well.

"Fortunately, none of us has died yet to confirm if my theory is true, and I hope it stays that way."

It was interesting because somehow, Zain and Shark had come to a similar conclusion, only Zain was basing it all off because he had the system.

"And the last but the most important thing: We will not step out at night." Shark pointed to the words written in capital letters. There was no image, though, just a question mark. "I call them Demons. We don't know much about them, other than the fact that they kill everything, humans, Zombies stage 2, anything they can find. I will leave it at that, but it is one rule that must be obeyed. I will not let a single person get killed in this group by them, so you too must follow this rule."

Zain nodded, showing he understood, but he was a bit disappointed that he didn't find out more information about them. So far, he had survived all the nights, even when out on the streets. So just what was this threat?

"I understand. While I'm here, I will follow your rules. I wanted to ask though, have you seen any military personnel in the city at all, or do you know anything about them? I saw them before meeting Kun." Zain asked.

Tapping his chin, it looked like Shark was trying to think for a second.

"There were a lot of military camps in the city at the start, but because of what we looked like, we would get attacked the second we stepped in front of them. And I don't think our existence is known to others. However, after the second day in the city, everything seemed to calm down, mostly silence but a few things here and there."

"And the meteorites?" Zain asked. "Have you approached one at all or been close to one."

"That's actually on my bucket list." Shark pointed toward the board. "At the moment, we need to focus on enough food for ourselves before trying to figure out this whole situation. Zain, I have to say I'm impressed by you for only being a student and thinking this much. I like you."

After giving the tour, the two walked back to the others, who were all hanging around the bar area and sitting on the stools. They had been captivated by Kun's story of everything he said.

"Hey, is it really true that you can heal your body in seconds?" Pink asked.

Zain was surprised by the sudden question and how close Pink had gotten to his face.

"Yeah, my bones and wounds heal. As long as I eat some flesh after, it will be alright," Zain replied.

"OHHHH, I want to see it, I want to see it so badly!" Pink imitated her wrist breaking and then the bones mending themselves.

"That's quite interesting to know." Shark smiled and sat down. "Come on, Zain, you plan on staying here, right? After giving you the tour, why don't you tell us a bit about yourself? I'm really interested to know how you got that zombie friend of yours to follow you. He doesn't seem like us."

During the whole tour, Skittle had been following them the entire time, and Shark would take glances. At the time, he could hear Skittle make noises, but most of it was gibberish, making it obvious who these were.

"Alright," Zain said. "Well, I do plan on staying." He sat on a stool and looked toward them.

Kun then pulled out glasses and filled them up with alcohol behind the bar handing one to each of them.

"To the new member of our Reborn Group!" Kun cheered.

They all raised their glasses and cheered together, taking a sip. They could hardly taste anything, but it went through their bodies as it normally would.

"So go on, tell us about your past!" Pink asked.

"My past?" Zain replied. But suddenly, something clicked in his head at that moment, and his vision started to blur. The next second, he felt his whole body swaying to the side as he fell off his chair and onto the ground.

Everything happened so suddenly that others couldn't even react, and Zain himself was confused at what was happening, and soon his vision went black.

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Slowly opening his eyes, Zain's vision started to come back. But he didn't find himself in the club. Instead, everything was pitch black around him, and he couldn't see where he was. However, he could tell what he was currently looking at was the hard floorboards of a room.

That's when he noticed something else as well.

'I'm back here again. It's those damn visions.' Zain cursed while staring at his small hands, which belonged to a ten-year-old, and not just any, but his own self.

After a while, he stood up and looked around as his eyes got used to the darkness and deduced that he was in a bedroom. There was also a window in the room, and when he looked outside, he found the night sky was out, and a half moon shone brightly through it. It didn't take long before Zain began to feel a sense of familiarity within the room.

Walking around, Zain looked at one of the posters on the wall and brushed his hand against it. It was one of the survival games that had come out a long time ago, Train to Huzan, where one would fight a horde of Zombies on a train while also trying to get to the next destination.

'This is my old room.' Zain had realised, 'But why? Why are these visions happening now? Am I dreaming? Is it this damn Zombie head of mine?'

Zain tried to knock the side of his head a few times with the palm of his hand, but nothing seemed to be working. It was also hard for him to tell if he could feel pain or not. Things just didn't quite make sense to him.

In the end, since it didn't look like he would get himself out of the current situation by just standing here, he decided to find the door and leave the room.

'I don't like this place…the quicker I get out of here, the better.'

He soon found the door. He pressed his hand on the doorknob, twisting it to unlock the door. It made quite a loud creak when he pushed the door open. After a few seconds of observation, he concluded he was between the kitchen and living room. On the left was an kitchen island, although the kitchen was small as whole, while on the right was the living room, a sofa facing the TV.

Further through the hallway on the other side, if one was to walk right across, would be his parents' room and the washroom. But, just like the other rooms, this one was dark as well.

Scouting the room, Zain wondered if he would see others here, although it wouldn't be the first time that others had appeared in his vision.

'I thought I might see my mother…or father here.' Zain mused.

Tuning his head, he looked at the light switch and found himself reluctant to switch it on. Maybe because he had been living in the real world, in a high tense situation, he felt like turning on the light would attract whoever it was that might be in there.

'This whole place feels so real. It's not like a dream, I can see everything clearly, move around, and the layout is exactly the same as my apartment, but why bring me back to this age?' Zain frowned while trying to make sense of the situation, 'At least I remember what this place is, and it's not like the last time when I had no clue where I was.'

A little uptight, Zain headed to the kitchen. He saw a knife on the countertop, and after tiptoeing a bit more, he stretched his arm forward and pulled it out from the block. Soon, he was holding it in his hands. This action was reflexive, and he justified it by thinking he needed to protect himself.

But as soon as he held it though, for a second, his hand looked completely covered in blood, and so did the knife. Taken aback, Zain let go of the knife out of shock and dropped it onto the floor.

It made a clanging noise, and quickly, using his feet, he stepped on it to make it stop.

'Sh*t, there's no way someone didn't hear that…but what was that? Why was the knife suddenly covered in blood?'

Bending down, Zain picked up the knife once again, carefully looking at it this time, seeing if it would do the same, but nothing had happened. Neither the knife nor his hands turned red this time.

'I'm having visions in visions. This is great.' Zain sighed.

Just then, he heard a clicking noise, and a slight creak resonated as if someone had opened a door. Zain's heart started to thump and almost jumped to his throat. He immediately crouched down and hid behind the island of the kitchen's countertop.

His heart raced and thumped even louder. Zain wanted it to stop, worried that it might give him away. By now, he was hearing footsteps, one after another, as someone walked toward him. Zain counted them in his head until they had eventually stopped.

'What do I do? Do I make a run for the exit, or to the room and lock it, or do I try attacking them…but this is all fake right? Everything in here is fake.'

Gripping the knife tightly, Zain looked above him and found a faceless man staring at him. In the next moment, a mouth suddenly appeared on the blank face.

"What did I tell you about coming in here again?!" the man hollered and reached out to grab Zain.

The latter quickly rolled back onto the ground, but the man easily climbed over the kitchen top and walked with heavy-footed steps. He could feel the vibration in the floorboards as the man stomped his feet with full force.n0𝗏𝖾𝐋𝓊𝗌𝑏.𝕔0𝗆

'I can't fight with this weak body!' Panicked, Zain threw the knife toward the faceless man, aiming straight for the head.

Moving his arm, the man flicked it away mid-air as if it was just a simple toy and the next instant, the knife stuck on the wall. Then grabbing Zain by the arms, the man lifted him up off the ground.

Zain kicked his legs and tried to use all his strength to break free, but everything turned out to be useless in his current size and strength. His body had yet to grow, and he wasn't even in his teenage years. It was impossible to break free from an adult.

"You like to think you can survive anything, don't you? Well, let's see you survive this." The man's voice resounded once again, confusing him with those words.

Holding onto the little Zain, the faceless man walked over to the living room and right up to the window. The next second he hurled the young kid and threw him against it. Zain's back crashed into the window, shattering the casing glass as he fell outside into the darkness.

As he fell through the window, Zain noticed the night sky above and staring at him from the other side of the window through where he had just fallen, was the faceless man.

"Bye-bye." The man muttered, waving at him.

'Shit, Shit! Am I going to die? Am I going to fall to my death? I've never died in one of these visions before. Maybe it's one of those things if I die in the vision I do in real life too? Wait, I'm already dead, so I can't possibly die again, right? But no, I can't risk it. Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!' Zain screamed in his head as he continued to fall.

However, before he hit the ground, his vision started to fade. It was beginning to disappear, and soon everything around him turned to pitch black again. Zain couldn't see, hear or feel anything and was left with his thoughts.

'What was all of that? Who the hell is that faceless man…I could hear his voice clearer this time, but it was not the same as before. It's not the same one I heard when I was stuck in that chair. That voice, without a doubt, was him, so who is this man?

'He must have been the same one from the forest that time, but then why is he in my real memories now, or real places unlike the forest from before?'

Suddenly he started to feel a headache. It was dull at the start but was turning into excruciating pain by the second until Zain's eyes opened up. There was light this time as he found himself staring at a crummy old brown ceiling.

There were even a few bugs flying around. And when he slowly lifted his body, he noticed he was on a thin mattress that someone had placed on the floor.

'Am I still in the club? Where are the others?' Zain touched his head and saw something from the corner of his eye.

Skittle was there, staring at Zain, but right next to him was a man tapping his fingers on the former's face.

"So interesting.." The man mumbled.

Jumping up from the ground, Zain instantly leapt to where Skittle was and knocked the man's hand away, trying to defend his friend. And then, grabbing the man by the neck, he pushed him up against the wall.

Without giving any chance to retaliate, Zain held both of the man's hands above and tightened the grip around the latter's neck.

"Why were you touching Skittle?!" Zain shouted. He didn't know what was going on and had done everything instinctively.

Just then, the door was pushed open, and Kun stepped in. Staring at the scene, he was shocked for a moment and then shouted, "Zain, what are you doing to Fingers?! Let go of him!"

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Fingers freed his hands and tried to grab Zain's and attempted to pull them away, but it was clear who was stronger because the latter's grip wouldn't even budge slightly. It was strange because after experiencing death once, Fingers thought he would never have to fear it again.

He couldn't feel pain, but he could tell that at any second, the person in front of him could use the strength in his grip to end it all.

"Zain! Can't you hear me, you idiot?!" Kun shouted, but it didn't look like Zain would even give him the time of day. His head didn't even turn towards the latter.

At that moment, the others had caught up to Kun and could see through the door what was happening. Shark and Pink stepped into the room, seeing that Kun was frozen. As for a reason for this, Kun was worried that he would be on the receiving end of Zain's anger and had seen what he could do.

"Move," Pink said as she pushed him out of the way. Running forward and getting into position, she immediately threw out a kick right towards the back of Zain's head. It was fast, strong, and had perfect form. It was clear she had some type of martial arts experience.

"Protect," Zain said one word, and at that moment, Skittle instantly moved in between the two. He lifted his hand and knocked her leg away. Usually, a kick would be stronger than a strike from a fist, but Pink's leg was knocked back so strongly that her other foot on the ground was partly knocked off balance.

'Did he just…give an order to that Zombie of his?' Shark was more surprised by Zain's actions, 'I thought it was just following him around.'

"Zain, you just woke up, right? Fingers was just looking over you, making sure you were okay. Did you have a bad dream or something? We can work this out." Kun pleaded.

It was then that the leader of the Reborn group, Shark, walked forward while cracking knuckles and twisting his neck. Although it hardly did anything in his current state, it was a habit for him, a habit from his past.

"If you don't let him go, then your little friend will get hurt instead!" Shark shouted out as he went to throw out a punch.

Skittle did the same thing. He went to knock it away, but rather than a punch, Shark, had gone and grabbed his arm. Then, lifting him over his shoulder, he threw Skittle to the ground.

However, Skittle was a Zombie and didn't feel any pain. Instead, he got up quickly, and it looked like he was ready to attack until Zain gave another order.

"Stop," He ordered.

When Fingers got out of the grip, he fell to the floor and desperately started to crawl on the floor toward the others.

Shark had again thrown out a punch, but Zain had grabbed him by the wrist, pulling him forward and going for another punch of his own. Shark moved his head, avoiding the hit, and then bumped into Zain with his whole shoulder hitting him back.

n0𝐯𝑒𝓛𝑢𝓈𝓑.𝑐0𝔪

Zain stumbled backwards a little but could see that kicks were coming his way, he blocked one with his right arm, and another blocked with his leg, then lifting his knee, he threw two punches back, but it had hit nothing but air.

"I'm not as easy as those others, am I?!" Shark shouted as he threw a fist and hit Zain right on the shoulder, sliding him a little across the ground. Just then, Shark heard a crack.

'This guy is skilled. Is he really a student? Either way, I could feel that his shoulder should be broken.'

It was then that something strange happened. Zain's arm looked hurt, but the next second, a few popping sounds resonated through the room as his body started to heal, and his arm was back to normal as he took a fighting stance once again.

"It looks like that super healing power you have is real after all. This is going to make things more difficult." Shark smiled.

Meanwhile, Zain was looking at his opponent in front of him, and all he could see was a person with no face.

'I'm still not out of that place… I'm still in that vision, I have to get out of here…I have to survive.'

It was then that Zain pulled out the knives from his belt and held them both in his hands.

"Well, now this has seriously gotten dangerous." Fingers said.

"You, what did you do? Why is he like this?" Kun asked. Although Kun thought Zain had a screw loose here or there, he seemed like a good person. At the same time, there weren't many of them in this world, he just wished they could all get along. Was that too much to ask?

"Me? I mean, I was just checking out the Zombie. He was just standing in the room, staring at Zain, so I was trying to see if I could get a reaction from him, so I was touching him." Fingers replied.

"Well, keep your long dangly fingers to yourself next time!" Kun blurted, "Of course, if he just woke up and saw a creep like you doing that, he would be worried. Apologise!"

Although Fingers didn't think he had done anything wrong, he didn't want the leader to get hurt, so he turned.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry for touching your zombie!"

"Friend, friend, and his name is Skittle!" Kun explained.

Zain was ready to go in again and ran forward with both knives in his hand, but Shark looked ready as well.

"I'm sorry I tried touching your friend Skittle!" Fingers shouted.

The next second and Zain had stopped. He was around a meter away from Shark, and after a moment, he placed his hands to his side and put away the knives.

"What…I can see your face. You're Shark." Zain muttered in confusion. "Wait, I'm back."

Looking around the whole room, Zain could tell from the look on the others' faces he certainly was back.

Although the situation had calmed down, something like this happened for the first time in the Reborn group, and they needed to decide what to do next.

Thank you, everyone, for supporting LUZ so far, and I hope you can continue to support LUZ in the WSA journey by voting for the story! Please continue to use your Stones and Tickets!

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