The Evolution of Mental Illness?

*BOOM!*

A loud explosion sound could be heard coming from outside the dormitory where Cassian's room was located, causing him to wake up startled.

"What the...?" He muttered in disbelief as he could see something intangible in front of him and even after he wiped his eyes several times the blue message never disappeared from his sight. It followed his eyes and when he tried to touch it, his hands simply went through it.

The message that it displayed was strange in and of itself as it was clearly showing his status in a video game like manner.

**********

[ Status ]

Name: Cassian Lee.

Race: Human [???].

Class: N/A.

Title: N/A.

Level: 0

Experience: 0/10

Status points: 0

Strength: 20

Dexterity: 20

Health: 10

Stamina: 20

Mana: 50

Magic: 50

**********

"What does that even mean?" Cassian didn't understand, he hadn't played much games but was familiar with some of the terms, like strength, agility, health points and endurance, but with terms like mana and magic he was met for the first time.

"Yes, this must be a dream" With thoughts like these, Cassian laid back on the bed and tried to sleep again, he didn't believe it was real, it just couldn't be, he thought it must be because he had been drinking too much alcohol lately.

"What the fuck is that?" He muttered yet again; not a couple of minutes later he heard explosion like sounds again, chilling screams and a strange growl that could be heard not only outside the windows but even outside the door of his room.

"What did I drink last night?" Cassian wrote it all off as a hallucination; he still thought it was because of the alcohol he clearly overused yesterday. Still, he became a little curious as to what was even going on outside to create such a ruckus. Even though he wanted to believe that whatever was going on was a hallucination, he wouldn't leave the room as the sound of growling that came from the outside seemed to originate from very close by.

So he chose the safest way to observe, he squatted down and reached out to try to peek through the window, he wondered what was going on there.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw something that shook his whole existence. It was much scarier than what he had dreamed of before, if in those dreams he had just been killed by people, every day for years, now it was completely different.

The scene was straight out of a horror movie, there was blood and human flesh everywhere, but that was not what scared him the most, scarier were the people, no it couldn't be called human anymore, although they looked like people, but at close range you could see the difference.

Their clothes were tattered, their bodies and faces were covered in blood, instead of their normal eyes you could see an empty white shell like a doll's and more importantly they were eating people, even though they moved slowly, about as fast as a human walking, the way they tore into people's flesh with their yellowed teeth was too disgusting.

"A dream… It's a dream... I don't believe it, it can't be" Seeing people being literally eaten by these creatures made Cassian vomit, it was the first time he had seen a person being eaten alive. He no longer tried to look out the window, and sat down in the fetal position, only one thought came to his mind.

"My mental illness has evolved..."

At that moment his heart was filled with fear, the last nightmare he had been able to overcome only after many years and now that he was back to normal it was happening again, but this time it was much more terrifying than ever before.

"Hahaha, if this keeps up I'm going to go crazy for sure this time!" The frightened cries of men and women could be heard outside, the growling of bloodthirsty creatures bursting from both the windows and the doors of the room, it all made Cassian laugh grimly.

Now his quiet life is over!

There was only one way out, he had to wait until this nightmare or hallucination was over before he could go back to where it seemed his real place was, for people like him. Namely, a psychiatric hospital.

"Help!"

A piercing shriek sounded through the windows, coming from the voice of a young girl. Cassian reflexively turned around and out of the corner of his eye he could see what was going on out there.

He could clearly see the girl and the two young boys, they looked about the same age as Cassian, maybe they were even in the same class, but his eyes trembled a little as he scrutinized the scene outside.

The two men who were guarding the girl were trapped in a deadlock, there was almost no way out until one of them decided on a desperate act, bypassing the girl from behind, he struck her on the head with a bat, then pushed her straight to the bloodthirsty creatures, and he tried to run away while they were busy with the sacrifice.

The second man saw what his friend wanted to do and even wanted to stop him but at some point suddenly stopped, just watching his friend's actions and even when both their plans succeeded and they managed to get out of the impasse, Cassian saw that the man did not look sad or angry at all for his friend's action, on the contrary he was smiling, despite his friend's desperate cries.

Cassian saw both men hide in one of the buildings after successful execution of their plan, and the girl they had thrown as a sacrifice to the bloodthirsty monsters was eaten right before his eyes.

"These creatures look like zombies from horror movies" Muttered Cassian as he was peering at them, as suddenly his eyes glowed slightly violet for a few seconds.

***********

Name: Zombie.

Level: 1

**********

"So zombies also possess a level" He was surprised that zombies like humans could evolve, and it seems their evolution progressed through eating, the more it ate or killed the higher its level would rise. Coming to this conclusion, a chill ran down Cassian's spine, even if it was just a nightmare, it was too horrible for humans.

He was not at all surprised that the men betrayed the girl and left her to her certain death, when Cassian watched horror movies he always thought that the most horrible creatures are not monsters at all but people, if monsters always want to kill you then people may seem good and righteous on the surface while hiding their true nature.

It was all in the order of things, the people you trusted the most were the first to betray you, Cassian knew this well thanks to the nightmare that had been haunting him for years. So on the one hand Cassian seemed friendly and open and on the other he never truly opened his heart, maybe that's why he was rejected like that by Luna and also by himself, who let her go quite easily.

Hiding near his bed, Cassian tried not to pay attention to the screams or the growling of the zombies, he just sat there waiting for his nightmare to end. Several hours had passed but the dream did not stop, it was noon and the nightmare was still not over, when suddenly…

*Boom! Boom! Boom!*

There was a thumping sound that made Cassian momentarily shudder; the zombie, who was very close to his room, suddenly started banging against his door, as if sensing that there was someone to prey on.