6 Library

"There is a zombie on our path." Brian checked their route with the Life Pulse and noticed a zombie wandering alone on their way. Leaving the dormitory, they avoided zombies walking too close to each other and headed to the library.

Their university campus, which was bustling with students when Dave returned back in time, was completely desolated...Well, except for zombies that were students before. Zombies were wandering freely on their campus, swaying slightly as they moved forward.

Dave wanted to test his rusty sword on the flesh of a zombie. It was a dull sword, so it may be not effective on other monsters, but zombies were less robust than others. Their bones were fragile and their skin was less elastic than that of humans.

Stealthily approaching a zombie, Dave slashed the neck of the monster beheading it in a swift movement. Dave felt that killing them by slicing their heads off was much easier than smashing their head.

[You have reached level 2.]

[You have earned 2 free points.]

He needed to kill 5 zombies to increase his level to level 2, while it required only one zombie to reach level 1. Later, as his level would go higher, the monsters he needed to kill to level up would only go higher. After the 100th level, some Enhancers might even need several weeks to raise their levels by one.

'1 point to the strength and 1 point to the agility.' Now, Dave had enough strength to kill zombies with a swing of his sword, but when he was attacked by two of them, he wasn't able to dodge the second one. Well, he could only blame his low agility, which was lower than that of a normal person. Even the least athletic person might have higher agility than him. Most people had 10 points in agility from the beginning, with a few exceptions that were a point short from it, yet he had only 7 points in agility.

If strength increases the power of your muscles, agility stat strengthens your nerve cells, speeding up the impulse in them. Even with 1 point increase in agility, Dave witnessed how the world started moving slightly slower than before. It was a weird feeling for the first time, yet Dave had already gone through such changes countless times, so he had already learned how to adapt to such minute changes in reaction speed.

Along the way to the library, Dave and Brian had killed zombies that were wandering alone. On their way, they were close to using up all of Brian's Life Pulses, so they quickly needed to increase his level. Dave wanted to quickly level him up since his Life Pulse was too important for their survival.

Dave had killed two zombies, while Brian killed three of them. After killing the third zombie, Brian finally reached level 2. With another point in spirit stat, Brian had another 10 mana points to use. Having 11 mana points, 1 left from before and 10 points from the stat increase, Brian was able to use Life Pulse another 11 times. Since levelling up won't restore mana and "health bar" of the user to the maximum as in games, it couldn't be used as a way to pump you up to your optimal state.

After several minutes, they had finally reached a library. Like every library in their university, it was a rectangular-shaped building and had tall wooden doors that gave the library a more majestic feeling. The shapes of different animals were engraved on the door, and the pictures of scholars were drawn on the walls of the library.

Approaching the 3 meters tall doors, Dave grew more excited to meet his friend again. It may be only one day for Adam but it was 5 years for him...5 tiresome and exhausting years.

"Adam! Are you there? Open the doors!" Silently knocking on the wooden doors of the library, Dave whispered to call out Adam. With every second his heartbeat was speeding up, clearly indicating how nervous he was.

'Am I already late? Has it already visited the library? But the door is still intact, so Adam should be fine, right?' Dave thought inwardly. However, his heart calmed a bit when he heard a familiar voice from the other side of the door.

"Dave! Are you okay? Wait a bit, I'll open the door." It seemed that Adam was also happy to meet Dave when the apocalypse had descended upon the world.

"Adam, don't open the door! It is dangerous outside and you know it. What will we do if they are infected?" Commanding voice rebutted Adam. Hearing it, Dave was irritated by the owner of that voice as he recalled unpleasant memories from his past.

"Lucas, Dave is my friend. I am opening the door and if you are so frightened, you can hide somewhere inside until I close the door." Adam said in a steady voice.

"Tsk" Lucas responded to Adam, clearly dissatisfied that Adam wasn't listening to him.

Lucas Wade, son of a rich businessman and a person who was partly responsible for Adam's death in the past. Dave didn't like him at all since he was a spoiled brat with an inflated ego. Yet at the first sign of danger, he was the first one to run away. If it hadn't been for him, Adam wouldn't have died in the past.

Actually, when the world had ended in his past life, Dave was stuck with Adam in the library. He had probably visited Adam after finishing a group assignment in the cafeteria. At first, both of them were confused by a sudden voice in their minds, however, it quickly turned into fear.

The senior student was the first one to leave the library. It was already a deep night, so he must have hurried to his dorm room...But, after several minutes, he returned scared to hell and with the wound on his arm. The chunk of flesh was torn from his left arm.

10 minutes later, he turned to it...

Turning into a zombie, it had eaten several students before getting killed by Adam. He was the first one to kill a zombie among them and was the first one to increase his level. Adam was the one who shared his discovery about Beginner's Survival Pack.

Later, the students, eaten by a senior student, raised from the dead and started attacking them. Luckily, they were quick to respond to it, so they were able to deal with them.

However, it was enough to scare the hell out of them. Trembling and shaking, they stayed in the library for half a day, unable to leave it since they were able to hear growls from the outside. Admittedly, it was quite foolish of them to hope that everything would turn right after waiting a bit.

...

Suddenly, they heard stomps from the outside...And yeah, they were stomps, not steps. Like something huge heading towards them. Judging by the nearing sound of stomps, it was clear as a day that it stopped right before the door of the library. Shortly after that, someone or something banged on the doors of the library. Then, the doors crashed open, revealing the monster behind them.

It was a humongous monster 2 and a half meters tall. It had a big stature as thick muscles covered all his body. Getting a clear look at it, everyone froze for a moment...And Dave was no exception.

To save his life, Lucas pushed Dave next to him to the monster's way and ran away through the opening. No one had expected it. Luckily for Lucas, the giant monster was much slower than ordinary zombies, so he easily escaped from the library.

Falling right in front of the monster, despair filled Dave's heart as the monster tried to reach him with its large hands. Fortunately for Dave, Adam attacked it, attracting its attention and buying him enough time to stand up and calm himself.

However, when Dave had thought that he was saved, the giant monster was able to catch Adam who went against it with the club in his hands, which by far, wasn't the best idea. The moment Dave tried to help Adam, the giant had torn Adam in half, sucking his blood and throwing his one half into his mouth. Busily eating his friend, the giant didn't even pay attention to Dave who had frozen in one place and heard the chewing sound the giant was making.

Gulp!

As it finished eating Adam, it turned to Dave. Waking up from his frozen state and having no time to think everything over, Dave just ran. He ran without understanding where he was running. In such a way, he had escaped from the giant, while Adam had died. Moreover, he dropped his Wooden Club when Lucas had pushed him. Only later, he had learned that it was impossible to level up without it.

Luckily for him, he didn't meet any zombies while he was dashing away from the library. Quickly getting out of breath, he stopped in front of the small supermarket. Cautiously entering it, he hid in its storage room. There, he had enough food and water to survive for more than a year. There, he had just hidden from everything before the help had arrived to save him.

That day he should have been the one to die, not Adam. Adam would have all chances to survive if he hadn't tried to distract its attention. However, now Dave had a chance to not let it happen.

'This time I won't let you die.' Dave thought.

Only later did Dave learn that the monster was a special strength type zombie. It was extremely strong, but at the same time, it was extremely slow.

When he finally left the storage room, the university campus was a safer place to live, while the world was harsher and more dangerous than before.

...

The doors opened slowly as Adam could be seen behind them. He was the same as Dave remembered him. He looked extremely handsome with his pale face and black hair outlining his soft facial features. As always, he had a charismatic smile brimming with confidence. Even in such situations, he was able to keep his calm. He looked the same as a male lead in those romance webtoons Dave had read in his spare time.

Seeing his best friend for the first time in 5 years, Dave was extremely happy. He hurried to hug Adam hiding his slightly teary eyes. Freeing Adam from his grip, Dave noticed other 5 students in the library, including Lucas. Except for Lucas, there were 3 male and 1 female student.

"So, Dave, what is going outside?" Adam decided to ask a question that tickled the nerves of every person in the library. Instead of him, Brian started blubbering about the dangers there. "The world outside is hell. Zombies are wandering everywhere attacking and eating people. It looked like the apocalypse descended on the earth."

Because of Brian, people in the library became much paler, even Lucas looked as the blood left his face.

In contrast to them, Adam looked like he was pondering about their situation. As far as Dave remembered, Adam was always like that, calm and wise.

...

Indeed, Dave was extremely happy to meet Adam again, but he never forgot a monster who will crash the doors of the library.

"You there, I will pay you if you protect me and lead me somewhere safe" Dave heard an extremely arrogant voice. It was Lucas. He had blonde hair and smooth skin putting even the moment to shame. He wasn't athletic nor did he have good grades, but for some unknown reason that Dave couldn't understand, he always had that arrogant smile on his face like he was some kinda bigshot.

Dave knew that Lucas was an idiot judging by the fact that he tended to solve all his problems with money, so he decided to ignore him."Adam, we should quickly leave the library and head to the other place. It is too dangerous here."

"Are you ignoring me? I'm talking with you, bastard!" Enraged by Dave, Lucas tried to grab his collar but Dave sidestepped causing Lucas to stumble on the floor.

"Try again and I'll kill you." Dave pointed at the tip of his rusty sword and threatened Lucas. He always wanted to kill Lucas with his own hands, but in his past life, he never saw him again, even after leaving the storage room.

Stomp! Stomp! Stomp!