Chapter 5

Virus samples. How can two simple words immediately catch my attention like that? Well, it's simple really, because my mind immediately started thinking about all the possibilities I could do with those. I may be able to weaponize the samples, creating weapons that are far more dangerous to humans that normal firearms could ever be. For example, smearing the virus samples onto the tips of the blowgun darts that I have. Or creating traps that use the virus samples to infect people who stumble into them. Perhaps I could find a way to create custom firearm ammunition or gas grenades that use the virus?

That doesn't even include the potential for research of the samples to create weapons that instakill or at least do increased damage to the zombies. Maybe even research that allows you to unlock the secret behind being undying without the loss of body function and mental faculties. Perhaps I could find a way to create loyal zombies or even mutate zombies even further than they already have mutated away from being human. 

Of course there is also simply creating a cure so that no one has the chance of turning into a zombie by infection any longer. 

I began the butchering process and watched myself stand in front of the body while hearing the sounds of metal striking bones, flesh being cut and torn, and the squelching of wet things being moved around. I could HEAR the sounds of butchering but there was nothing visible going on which was a little odd to say the least and something I needed to keep in mind if I were around other survivors.

I waited patiently as the timer counted down from thirty seconds, all while serenaded by the sounds of horror and butchery kept me company and when the timer hit zero the body, as well as any fluids or other bits that came from it simply disappeared like they were never there. I also received a simple system message detailing what I had received from the butchering process.

"Ding! Successfully butchered a zombie corpse. Received 23 lbs of rotten meat, 52 bones, 2 lbs of pure fat, 4 jars of potassium nitrate, and 3 zombie virus samples."

Checking my inventory I saw the meat was vacuum sealed into 1 lb bags and stacked together, the bones were oddly modified by the system to all be the same length and shape as well as yellowed and dry with age, the potassium nitrate came in quart sized jars, and the virus sample came in a special syringe that had several safety features that prevented accidentally injections or access to the contents in the syringe.

I looked at the recipes that each of these items can be used as a material for and was surprised at just how widely used these items can be. The rotten meat for example can be used to create fertilizer, bait packs, food recipes, and surprisingly enough it could also be added as a bonus material to many different items to give them additional special properties. If I created a pit trap using the system and added this as a bonus material the trap itself would attract zombies within 50 meters into itself.

The bones could be turned into simple weapons, specialty crafting items like effigies, or even used to create special compounds for other crafts such as glue or blood replenishment packs.

Potassium nitrate could be used to make gunpowder, explosives, fireworks, glass, and high grade fuels used by machines like rockets.

The zombie virus samples could be used for similar things as the others as well.

The one thing I noticed about all of them though is the need for specialized work benches, machines, structures, or personnel in order to be able to make the better items from them, not to mention I would need to unlock the schematics and research abilities through leveling myself up if I didn't know how to make these things in real life.

After looking over my new inventory items I went ahead and did the same to the remaining zombie corpses inside, only receiving additional amounts of the same items I got from the first body. 

Now that the building was clear of rotting bodies that could increase my chances of getting sick or infected I went ahead and sealed the front entrance by closing the doors and then jamming wooden wedges under the bottom lip of the doors. I created the small wedges using the crafting menu and a couple planks of wood easily made me fifty or so wooden wedges that easily help prevent doors from being pushed open with brute force, especially after I kicked or hammered them into place.

After making sure the doors were well wedged shut I then went ahead and covered the doors with the various items that the original survivors had used to barricade it safely. Mostly heavy wooden and metal desks, filing cabinets, and a large pile of sand bags which I quickly moved to not only secure the door from opening but also block the line of sight so that when I was downstairs I would be less likely to attract attention unless I was noisy.

I then went around to the two smaller steel security side doors and wedged them shut as well before using additional, useless, items scattered around the floor to cover them as well. This wouldn't really stop any truly determined human from trying to get in but it would definitely slow them down and they absolutely wouldn't be able to get in without making more than enough noise to let me know… and hopefully attract undead to act as my security force as well.

Now that my temporary home is secure it was time to start trying to figure out where the basement might be. I hadn't seen any doors or hatches that stood out when I was moving around, nor was there an outdoor cellar access when I was outside the building scoping it out so I assumed it must be well hidden somewhere. I began going room to room, lifting carpets, knocking on walls and floors, and just generally doing the things I had seen done in movies while trying to figure out where the access was.

I had almost given up when I noticed something that stood out as different. When I went into the women's locker room and shower area the only mirrors in the room were above the sinks. However in the men's locker room there was a wall of floor to ceiling mirrors just outside the shower stalls. I would imagine mirrors would be more needed in the women's locker room than the men's and why would anyone need floor to ceiling mirrors when getting out of the shower? 

I knew I was in the right spot when I realized the men's shower room also had one less toilet and shower stall, shortening the room a good ten feet in size as compared to the women's side. I knew I was in the right spot but even then I couldn't figure out how to open the mirror door thing to get to what I assumed was a hidden room on the other side for a good half hour. It would have taken longer but I got frustrated and just kicked the mirrors in shattering them and exposing the hidden stairway that led to the basement.

I was VERY happy that the group here before me hadn't found this basement as it was LOADED with stuff I would definitely make good use of! 

The first thing I noticed was this appeared to be some kind of privately owned survival bunker as there were some funny posters hung on the walls talking about never trusting the government, various conspiracy theories, as well as demotivational posters like one that read "Quality, the race for quality has no finish line, it's more like a death march."

The second thing that stood out to me was the decent sized armory stacked and sorted neatly by the entrance to the basement at the base of the stairs. I saw a rifle rack with a dozen various styles and calibers of rifle that I was, oddly, able to recognize and felt like I could easily pick up and use, along with a small rack on top of the rifles carrying a couple of SMGs as well as a variety of pistols. 

Next to the gun racks there were several large wooden chests that when I peeked inside I found to be filled with boxes of various ammunition types. Above the "ammo chests" I saw a few wall hung melee weapons including some different types of axes, crow bars, hammers, maces, and even a few swords.

On the wall opposite the weapons there were open face lockers holding various types of ballistic body armors, helmets, knee and elbow pads, gloves with built in knuckle dusters, heavy duty boots, and even full on riot gear. 

Stepping through the "armory" room, as I decided to refer to it, I entered a much larger open space that seemed to make up the rest of the basement and stopped in amazement at what I saw. Most of the room was lined with shelves that reached from the floor to the ceiling and were fully loaded with just about anything you can imagine you might need for survival. Even more amazing though was that each of the shelves was clearly labeled as to what they contained.

Most of the shelves contained food of all kinds including canned food, vacuum sealed food, and freeze dried foods. There was pallet after pallet of food in 5 gallon plastic pails, military style MREs (Meals Ready to Eat), and 50 gallon drums of rice and specialty survival feeds. There were shelves of seeds, shelves of water bottles, shelves of hygiene products, pallets of toilet paper, pallets and shelves of just about any damned thing you could think of really.

I wandered among the shelves for a while, not really thinking, just in awe of how much stuff there was down here. Hell, if I were one of the normal Earthlings that had been dropped on this planet without a system I would immediately seal the entire upstairs area as securely as possible and just live down here quietly until the year was up. Finding a stash like this was like a guaranteed "I Win" ticket for a scenario that most of the other 200k people woke to find themselves in.

It took me a while but after I walked the whole room I realized I hadn't seen a generator yet and knew there was at least one more room, so I went looking and eventually found another door behind a pallet of toilet paper in a corner. 

This door however was a steel hatch that looked like it should be on an old submarine movie rather than embedded in a thick concrete wall in a basement, yet it easily opened as it was unlocked and when I stepped through I found the remaining section of the basement to be the actual living and working area of the bunker. Outside was the storage and armory, while in here was where whoever prepped all this most likely expected to weather out the storm safely.

The first room you step into has three military style large generators, easily big enough to power the entire building with a single genny so the other two were likely backups. I looked around and was surprised when I turned back to the door hatch to find a well labeled manual hanging from the wall on a hook. The label was even very obvious as it simply had "Basement Bunker Instructions for Use" in big block letters on the front.

I started reading through the instructions and found detailed instructions on how to disconnect the building from the town grid, turn on and maintain the power, water, sewage, and air supplies as well as a great deal of other useful information. I found the generators were actually the backup to the backup power supply as this building's primary power backup was a series of solar panels scattered around the trailer park and the rooftops of nearby buildings in the city as well as the special underground batteries they used to store power for the building. 

I found the battery indicators and found the batteries to be full so after carefully following the checklist I had power back inside the building in under five minutes and from what the manual said these batteries would last a week without further charging if every light, every piece of machinery, and every power socket in the building was being used at full capacity… so much longer than a week if it's just me here.

I continued reading about the bunker and its features to find the generators run off large buried fuel tanks that are over a kilometer away and have enough fuel for each generator to run nonstop for two years if needed. They also have five gallon tanks on them that can be refilled by hand if needed as well.

The sewage system for the building was never on the grid and is set up to run without interference as long as there is power for the system to run. The water from the tank on the roof, as well as several other large scale water supply tanks scattered around and feeding this building, all run through a commercial water filtration system before the water is then sent to a boiler for a period of time to kill off any microbes and then either used for supplying hot water to the building or refilling special cold water storage tanks in the walls of the basement.

The rest of the small bunker area, which was surprisingly well ventilated, was simply a small efficiency apartment with a small kitchenette, a small bathroom with a standing shower stall, along with a small living room and bedroom area. There was also a computer that apparently had access to satellites in space for trying to connect to various networks including communication systems (phone, radio, internet, TV). The basement also included it's own small server room that had several servers with thousands of TV shows, movies, music, and books for entertainment and education stored on them. There was even content for *cough* men of culture *cough* not that I was looking or anything… you know FOR SCIENCE!

Overall I was quite impressed with my lucky find, and even my day so far so I decided that the next and most critically important task of the day was… a hot shower and a change of clothes. I was still covered in zombie gunk from the roid rage zombie that tackled me this morning and I wanted, no I NEEDED to be clean again before I could focus on anything further. I would still have a few hours of daylight after my shower and could then focus on using my newly found armory to rack up some levels. Daddy needs his level ups after all!