Mall (1)

Zero's eyes shot open, his entire body feeling itchy. Zero stood, before nearly falling over as he had risen to fast. Zero stood in place, not daring to make a single move as he assessed his body. The first thing he noticed was that his body felt cool, the burning from his channels longer there. 'Window, assess my Mana Channels.'

-Notice-

All of the Hosts Mana Channels are completely stable. The Hosts Mana Channels have become 50% stronger.

Zero slowly reached up and unzipped his hoodie before taking it off. The first thing he noticed was that his arms were even more pronounced from last time. Zero looked down and lifted his shirt, finding he now had abs. Zero spent the next two hours simply getting used to his new strength. When he was confident enough, Zero walked out his door and down the hall before making it into the leaders throne room.

Just as he had been expecting, the large table was back, and sitting in his spot with one less arm was Henry. Zero watched as Henry looked at him before quickly adverting his eyes. his hands started to twitch at the blatant sign of fear. "Zero, good to see you." Zero looked at the leader and nodded before she continued talking. "As I was just explaining to the council, we will be going out and hunting for food. We have hit multiple places, however with the addition to three more mouths this morning being added to the group, we will have to go collect more."

Zero simply nodded once before staring at her, expecting her to continue. The leader seemed to pick up on Zero's intent to stay silent because she spoke again. "Are you going to join them?" Zero felt the mood in the room shift, however he still didn't care about any of them. "Yes." The women nodded. "Good. The looting party will be made up of three Ants, and one Ability holder. Zero here will be one of the Host, as for the three Ants, they are already standing at the school entrance. Go join them when you are ready." Zero walked out the door just as she finished speaking, heading for the entrance.

Although Zero had no problem going out into the city, he didn't like having companions. Zero didn't know if he should just kill them and say it was an accident, or ditch them when it became convenient. As Zero made it to the front door, he found three figures all standing around and talking to each other. As Zero came within twenty feet of them, the three stopped talking and turned towards him, their faces all turning white as a ghost. "y-y-your Z-Z-Z-" "Zero, we weren't aware you were going to be the Host working with us today."

Zero staired at the young man that had spoken for the young women. he simply looked the three over, before walking forward and past them. When Zero didn't hear footsteps behind him, he stopped and looked back at the stunned three. "I do not know were we are going. Lead the way." These simple words kicked the three into gear and they quickly grabbed the packs at there feet before racing to catch up with Zero.

"The area we will be heading to is 4 miles in this direction. It was previously a large mall. We have tried to head in and take supplies twice now, however the area seems to be overrun with creatures. We will be trying to sneak into the mall once more. Zero, due to souls being valuable, we have already decided that you wont need to use your ability unless we get into a pickle. That is unless you wish to use it, then we won't stop you."

Zero looked at the confident speaker, finding it was the third group member. He was small, like the other two, however he had a look that said he was smart. Zero simply turned his head back and continued walking. As he knew were the super mall that they were talking about was, Zero didn't need them to guide him anymore. Although Zero hadn't brought his backpack, he figured he could just grab a bag from the mall, as it no doubt had a store selling them.

The group of four ran into the first sign of creatures when they were 1,000 feet away from the mall, in the form of blood, everywhere. The entire street was dyed in different color bloods. The thing that Zero found odd was the most prominent blood wasn't red, but rather green. 'The Goblin's blood was green, but for there to be this much, there would have to be thousands of Goblins completely drained.' "Blood?!" Zero whipped around to find the women staring at the ground. "Shut her up!" Zero hissed out the command, however he was pleased to find that the smart ones hand was already clamped over the women's mouth before he even finished speaking.

the group of four held completely still, as if the slightest movement would instantly attract everything in the area. Just when Zero was about to relax, he suddenly heard a loud roar from behind him. "To the alley!" Zero took off running towards the alley, not waiting to see if the others were behind him. Without pause, Zero continued running through the alley before reaching a larger wall that seemed to connect to the car parking area. Zero jumped up, half surprised when he was able to grab the ledge and pull himself up without an issue.

Zero looked over the thick half wall and back down to find he had made a jump that was nearly twice his Hight. Although the thought crossed his mind to simply leave the three to there own devices, he knew if they made it back he would have to kill everyone there, or be chased. Zero jumped so he was leaning nearly completely over the wall before reaching his hand out. "Grab it!"

The three running didn't jump, but rather stopped at the wall and simply gauged at it. "JUMP!" The shout from Zero caused the smarter one to snap out of his daze, which he then shouted orders to the other two. "Linda, you first! Josh, you next!" Zero's concentration was ripped from the three as he saw something large move at the end of the alley. Zero silently cursed as he staired at a singular, large eye.