Comrades

The Kill Count points from slaying the imp allowed me to boost my stats to 24 each. There weren't enough left over to add to my Ability, but I didn't complain. Perhaps I would run into more zombies along the way and could farm them to add to it later.

But I was exhausted. Even with my increased Endurance, I was still a human. An evolver, yeah, but still a mortal. I was far from being a god.

"How do they even measure these stats?" I wondered out loud. I had originally wondered if a value of 4 meant that I had just quadrupled my base stats, but when I fought against the grotesque, it didn't feel like that sort of simple multiplication. Perhaps my math was off – like I said, math wasn't my strong suit. I was an arts student.

But there was no doubt that I was faster and stronger than before. I probably would never have been able to react quickly enough to shoot the imp before it evaded my attacks before I boosted my stats. Not to mention my increased resistance to illusions.

I should ask my brother about the algorithms or whatever that decided these values when I get home. He was more familiar with the math of it than I was. Of course, that meant that I actually had to reach home first…

Hopping over the rubble, I continued to make my way across the wasteland. Whatever dim illumination was provided by the stars and full moon overhead was captured and magnified by my glasses, allowing me to see in the dark. Theoretically, the night and complete lack of sun should mean that the zombies were more active, but I had yet to see even one of them.

Then I saw why. Dawn was approaching. I could see the sun just peeking over the horizon and the black sky slowly dissolving into a deep blue. No wonder it was brighter than I thought. I must have spent more time unconscious or engaging the grotesque and zombies in combat underground than I had first believed.

Good. That was to my advantage. I scrambled over the debris faster, though when I climbed over an outreach, I found myself overlooking a small clearing. It was once a road, with totaled cars smashed into each other and then abandoned by their drivers. Twisted lampposts lay strewn, looking as if something massive and heavy and collided against them and bent the metal. Worn buildings towered on either side of the road, their surface dotted by moss, mold and ferns. Nature had tried to reclaim the environment from manmade settlements, with plants growing rampantly over the concrete, forcing their way out of cracks in the roads and walls, and spreading their creepers and roots all over ledges and windows.

Finally I saw about six or seven zombies. Gunning them down, I hopped onto the junction, panning the area with both my guns. There was no other sign of enemies. The zombies had been more active, reacting quickly when I shot the first two, but as fast as they were at night, there were too few of them. I easily gunned them down from a distance before they even reached within a hundred meters of me.

"Strange…even if it's almost dawn, there's still too few of them."

I couldn't believe I was saying this, but the lack of zombies concerned me. There was something amiss with the situation, but I couldn't put my finger on what exactly was wrong.

Shrugging off those useless thoughts, I proceeded onward. Hopefully I wouldn't run into another imp, though I wasn't worried about those cunning mutants. They were just a pain to deal with. Inputting the points into my stats and increasing them to 25 each, I then hurried forward. My Ability now stood at 26, and I wondered briefly if I should have saved most of the points for it. That would have left me with about 5 for each stat, but that would make it difficult for me to survive the grotesque earlier. Not only that, I might have fallen for the imp's predations if my Spirit had been that low.

No point dwelling on it and regretting. The only way was forward. I should look toward the future. I believed that I made the right choice, even if armchair generals and keyboard warriors insulted me in the comment section for being stupid or retarded. They could go screw themselves. They weren't the ones risking their lives here in a post-apocalyptic wasteland.

I left the junction behind, squeezing into a narrow road. Holding my pistols up in front of me, I proceeded cautiously, just in case I was walking into an ambush. Zombies might not be known for their intelligence – their rotting brains made it difficult for them to think or strategize – but the mutants were another story.

And the mutants were a lot more dangerous.

I hadn't gotten very far when I heard thunderous noises in the distance. Was that gunfire? And those yells – those were definitely human voices.

Abandoning my caution, I sprinted toward the source of the sounds and caught sight of a group of students fighting off a pack of zombies and a single warrior-class mutant. Even though they were wearing the same uniform as me, which meant they were also from the same Fourth Evolver Academy, I didn't recognize most of them. I only recognized one of them because of how popular she was, and that only cemented my suspicion that they were from another class.

The zombies were shambling toward the students, only to be mowed down by glowing swords, whirring axes, bristling spears and precise volleys from guns. They weren't the main threat, though, despite their numbers.

That honor belonged to the warrior-category mutant leading them. An aberration, it had a human torso sewn onto a bloated, arachnid-like abdomen, with four spike-like legs scuttling on the ground. Instead of hands, the human torso sported pincer-like claws that resembled a scorpion's, but swollen and oversized when compared to its body. Towering over the evolver students at about five meters, the aberrant smacked close combatants aside with massive sweeps of its pincer-claws, while its carapace armor absorbed the desperate barrage of bolts or elemental projectiles from ranged evolvers. Whether it was gun blasts, fireballs, icicles, lightning, wind blades or earth spikes, they harmlessly dissipated against its hard shell.

With a growl, it slammed his arachnid legs against the ground, stabbing deeply into the broken concrete. A few of the students were flung away, screaming or rendered unconscious. A fireball exploded against its face, causing it to stagger, but it whirled around to snarl at the assailant, who retreated when it charged at him.

Now I understood the reason for the lack of zombies. They didn't just disappear – most of the zombies in the area had been drawn toward this group of living humans, either having sensed their evolver energy or sniffed out warm, living flesh. They had no reason to specifically target me, not when there was a greater source of food nearby.

"Ugh…"

"Argh…"

"Please hang on!"

The only student I recognized among this other class was a blond girl by the name of Lisa. I had heard my friends talk about her before – she was one of the two campus flowers, and as beautiful as Lou Qian herself. Lou Qian was known as the black rose, whose cold words and indifferent expression prickled like thorns. Meanwhile, Lisa was often heralded as a warm and gentle sunflower, glowing golden and cheering everyone up with her smile.

In fact, Lisa was probably more popular than Lou Qian, even if the latter was slightly more beautiful than the former. It depended on one's taste, I supposed…some people liked the appeal of thawing the ice queen's heart or some bullshit like that. Not me, though.

Lisa was quick to run toward her downed classmates, her hands glowing with white energies. Like Xin Xia, she was a healer-type evolver, her abilities allowing her to heal the injuries of her comrades. Unlike Xin Xia, she obviously seemed to have more courage and confidence, braving the threat of zombies and the aberrant to tend to the wounded.

That almost cost the campus flower her life.

"Lisa! Watch out!"

"Damn it! Our attacks aren't working!"

After the aberrant struck the guy who hurled a fireball at it, Lisa had moved forward to heal him. Intent on revenge, the aberrant pounced on the both of them, determined to slaughter the guy who had tried to burn it. Lisa was just in the way, but the aberrant clearly had no qualms killing her alongside the fireball guy.

None of their other classmates dared to venture forth to help. They had been batted aside, flung away and almost killed by the raging aberrant. Some of them still lay on the ground, unconscious and broken despite Lisa's administrations. The ranged evolvers performed token efforts to blast the aberrant with elemental attacks, incurring its ire, but it appeared to decide to pursue them after slaying the first fireball guy – especially since he was the closest.

"Help!" The fireball guy shouted…and he actually pushed Lisa toward the aberrant, interrupting her healing. While she stumbled, the fireball guy scrambled away, yelling for help. Poor Lisa hit the ground and rolled, looking up in horror when the aberrant bore down on her.

The mutant didn't even seem to notice her presence. To it, she was merely in its way, a bug to be trampled upon and crushed without a second thought while it pursued its real target. Lisa, on the other hand, froze, aware that she wouldn't be able to get away in time.

"Lisa!"

"You bastard! What are you doing?!"

"Then why don't you go save her then?!" The fireball guy snapped as he retreated to the lines the rest of his classmates had formed. None stepped forward, either knowing they would be too late or that they would die along with her.

Lisa closed her eyes, resigned to her fate.

Before the aberrant could reach her, however, I landed on top of it, both my feet crushing its head and nearly pulverizing its skull. The protective carapace that grew over its body cracked from the impact, and the aberrant was sent sprawling in the dirt. Its pincers lashed out, and somehow they still managed to slash toward a sitting Lisa. She tried to pull back, but she wouldn't make it in time.

Fortunately, I reached her in time.

Propelling myself off the aberrant, I leaped toward Lisa, snatching her up in my arms and ferrying away. Flipping over the flailing claw, I hopped to a safe distance away before putting her down.

"You…you are…?!" Lisa spluttered incoherently, unable to comprehend what had just happened. I ignored her for a moment, drawing my guns. Planting myself between her and the sprawled aberrant, I took aim and hammered its head with salvoes from both guns. The bolts widened the cracks in the carapace at first before finally finding their way inside and pulping the brain matter. The aberrant howled in agony, thrashing about before expiring. Its bulk collapsed, sending up a spray of gravel and dirt into the air.

"Are you all right, Lisa?" I asked. Lisa nodded dumbly. Then her eyes widened and she took a deep breath as she calmed herself down.

"You…you know me? Oh, right you're also from the Fourth Evolver Academy, aren't you?"

"Yeah." I nodded. There was no use denying it. We were wearing the same uniform, after all. Like I said, I recognized Lisa because of her immense popularity among the guys at school. Pang Fei, in particular, would often talk to me about her, expressing his dreams of wanting to date her or something like that. It would be weirder if I didn't know her. If Lou Qian was the campus queen, then Lisa was practically the goddess of our school, with the ability to warm the hearts of men all over.

The rest of Lisa's class was approaching warily, mopping up the remaining zombies. I wanted to join them, but there weren't many left.

As I expected, slaying the aberrant earned me 50 Kill Count points. Seemed like warrior category mutants were considered to be on a different level. I also marveled at the fact that I was able to kill it so easily. So having each of my stats at 25 meant that I was equivalent in strength, speed and power to a warrior class mutant.

That was useful to know.

"Um, I'm sorry…I don't recognize you…" Lisa rose to her feet and bowed her head. "Thank you for saving me, though. Can I have your name?"

"I know him!" One of the other students said spoke up. Oh, I knew the guy. Yong He, who I had played online shooter games with once before. Yeah, I had the vague impression that he was in the same class as Lisa. "You're Feng Zhi Ming from class 4, aren't you?"

"Hey, Yong He." I waved at him. "Good to see you still alive."

"I should say the same to you. How did you end up here? This is class 3's jurisdiction. And where's the rest of your class?"

"Oh, well…it's a long story." I sighed wearily and dropped back to sit on a pile of rubble. After fighting for one whole day without rest, I could feel the exhaustion sinking upon my body like a rock. Looking up, I was glad to see the sun finally rise over the horizon to bequeath upon us a welcoming dawn. "I'll tell you on the way back."