While rek lay sprawled on the rooftop, the world around him seed to slow. Inside his mind, profound changes were unfolding. The space of his will, once confined and rigid, stretched outward like a rubber band being drawn wider and wider.
With each subtle expansion, his thoughts sharpened, his perception grew clearer, as though the fog that clouded the edges of his awareness was burning away under an inner sun.
For a fleeting mont, rek was weightless in that rare clarity, as if he could see and grasp the threads of the world itself. But the world wasn’t about to let him linger in that serenity.
A sudden shadow fell over him, blotting out the sun. rek’s eyes snapped up, his sharpened senses catching the torn, bloodied tissues beneath the feet of a hopper irregular, its legs mangled from the sheer force of its monstrous leaps.
Snarling, its hands outstretched like claws, it plunged down toward him, intent to crush, to devour.
But then, with a sharp clink and rattle, chains shot through the air. They wrapped tight around the creature’s legs mid-descent, jerking it sideways. The irregular hit the rooftop hard, dragged past rek in a blur of flailing limbs.
With brutal finality, the waiting Vulture undead plunged its massive sword through the zombie’s head.
There was a flash of essence, a shudder through the body, and then the lifeless corpse was flung aside like garbage.
The other Vulture dropped to one knee beside rek, its armored hands, like skeletal gauntlets forged of darkened steel, opening before him. Resting within its palm was the prize: the core of the slain Type One.
The other core, rek knew, was lost, buried in the mangled head crushed earlier, likely lost in the endless tide of the horde. But this one... this one was his.
Without hesitation, rek took the core. He wiped away the gore and raised it to his lips, swallowing it down.
A flood of warmth spread through him, not the searing heat of battle, but a steady, strengthening fire that bolstered his weary mind, anchoring his thoughts, steeling his resolve.
He rose, steady now, and climbed onto the back of the Vulture undead. With a wordless signal, the pair of dark knights bolted from the rooftop. Their plus whipped in the wind, their armored forms slicing through the streets like wraiths of war.
Behind them, one Vulture stayed just long enough to carve through the pursuing dead, severing limbs and heads, leaving ruin in its wake. But soon, even the fastest of the zombies were nothing but fading shapes in the distance.
Following the deep, ragged gouges Yuki’s sword had left in stone and steel, they tracked the buses and at last, they found them, battered but moving, clinging to hope.
rek exhaled as his boots touched down on the roof of the last bus, the wind tousling his hair as the battered convoy roared through the streets.
The air was thick with the stench of decay, but fewer zombies erged now, their numbers thinned, no longer worth the effort. His chest rose and fell slowly as he lifted his gaze.
Across the convoy, rek spotted Felicity standing atop the second bus. Her expression was unreadable, her twin blades slick with dark blood, her hair matted to her face by sweat. Without a word, her sharp eyes shifted, lifting beyond him, and rek instinctively turned, following her line of sight.
From the street they’d just thundered past, the nightmare returned. Dozens of zombies spilled from shadowed alleys and hollow buildings, their twisted forms shuffling and snarling. Among them ca several Irregulars, crawlers that skittered like spiders, hoppers that bounded forward with unnatural strength and a towering Type One, its grotesque bulk making the asphalt quake beneath its feet.
Before rek could even act, Felicity vanished in a blur of azure light. She reappeared among the monsters, blades flashing, and in the space of a heartbeat, four fell in pieces at her feet. She spared him a glance as she moved, her eyes bright as gemstones, fierce and untad. Her lips moved and he read the words.
"I’ll hold them."
rek scoffed softly, leaning back against the roof of the bus, letting the rush of wind wash over him.
He knew her hunger for growth. She wanted essence cores, essence orbs, whatever fragnts of strength these creatures might leave behind.
He closed his eyes. The cool wind brushing his face and hair was almost soothing. His mind, still evolving, drifted deeper into subconscious focus, letting the transformation of his will accelerate.
For a fleeting mont, sleep threatened to take him, until the screech of brakes shattered the fragile peace.
All three buses ground to a halt, tires shrieking against the cracked, grass-choked asphalt. rek snapped upright, his eyes narrowing as he took in the scene.
The city around them had changed. Buildings lood like forgotten monunts, their walls strangled by thick roots. Grasses pushed through the fissured road, wild and overgrown as if a century had passed in the blink of an eye.
The place felt abandoned, reclaid by nature, but that wasn’t why the drivers had stopped.
Before the convoy, amid the rubble of collapsed structures, stood two silver-backed gorillas, each easily ten feet tall. Their muscled forms glistened with sweat and blood, chests heaving from their battle.
The scars of their clash lay all around, storey buildings toppled, the street reduced to ruin.
But it was their presence, the sheer, oppressive weight of it that froze rek. These were no ordinary beasts. The aura they radiated, like a hill pressing down on the soul, left no doubt.
Both were Stage-1 beasts!
And behind them, nature’s cruelty completed its trap. The grass rose taller, rging into a dense, prival forest that seed to breathe. At its heart stood a great tree, its trunk broad and gnarled, its leaves white as cloud, glowing faintly. For a mont, the sight felt like salvation, a haven untouched by horror.
But the haven was guarded by death.
The silver-backs bared their fangs, their bloodied lips curling back in savage snarls. They stood on the edge of deciding: continue their own brutal duel, or turn on these fragile, trapped prey.
The convoy tried to reverse, engines roaring but unnoticed, vines had crept from the overgrowth, wrapping the wheels in their crushing embrace. The buses shuddered as the vines tightened, steel groaning as it bent beneath their strength.
The Vulture undead swung their swords, great arcs ant to cleave flesh and bone, but the blades sparked harmlessly off the vine’s skin. Even Yuki, found her strikes deflected.
All the while, rek remained still, his gaze locked with the beasts’. The gorillas’ dark eyes burned with primal hunger and battle lust, weighing the worth of the feast before them. Most of these humans were weak, essence-less. But so... so would be worth the effort.
The decision was coming.
By the ti it did, rek had stepped forward, standing at the front of the lead bus. The wind tugged at his coat, but he stood unmoving, his spine straight, his expression carved in iron. Gone was the man who had struggled to his feet minutes before.
Below, Tevin clutched his ragged mantle tighter, his sharp eyes scanning for any hope of escape. Nero’s gauntlet glowed red-hot, as if it had just erged from a blacksmith’s fire, his stance poised for combat.
Professor David’s voice rang out, hoarse but unyielding, urging the students and teachers to flee down any street not yet claid by the vines. His words carried desperation.
Above them all, rek held the gaze of monsters. Two titans on the edge of slaughter.
And the forest beyond, with its pale, beckoning tree, waited in silence.
Reviews
All reviews (0)