Skirmish

Sheila Arada is currently 20-years-old. She enjoys listening to music, baking, and watching television. She is kind and graceful, but can also be very foolish and a bit dull. People of old and young tend to like her on their first meeting.

Physically, Sheila is in pretty good shape. She had average height with light skin, black hair, and brown eyes.

She grew up in a working-class neighborhood. She was raised by her father when her mother left when she was young. Her father owns the clinic and is one of the reasons why she chose to become a nurse. She always felt that her father tries his best to keep on smiling so that she can forget the past and grow up happily.

Hearing Jun's explanation, and seeing Carlos's body riddled with missing flesh, she had no choice but to accept the fact that the world had changed.

Instead of feeling scared, she became anxious. Her father should have arrived five minutes ago, and knowing the situation didn't make her feel good.

When she was staring blankly ahead, looking soulless, Jun asked her the same question.

[A user sent you an organization invite. Would you like to accept? You gain 10% EXP gain and 10% overall stat increase. Declining the offer will stop you from receiving invitations for the next 12 hours.]

"I have a request," Shiela said, her eyes filled with hope. "I want you to help me find my father. I will follow you willingly and do everything that you ask me to. But you must help me search for him. Even if it's just his body." Tears started flowing down her cheeks, and her voice filled with despair.

Jun looked at her indifferently, contemplating her request. "I can't promise you that. You don't even know where he is. We can check your house, and that's the best concession I can give you. I don't have enough time, so I need your answer now."

Sheila felt troubled. Her request didn't go according to her plan. She thought that Jun badly needed her and would try his best to gain some 'gentleman points.'

Sheila thoroughly misunderstood Jun. The only reason Jun was having this long-winded conversation with her is for his father.

After leaving the bank, he planned to go back home and secure the house. He's an unfilial scum of a son, but the thought of his father getting feasted by a group of infected still made him feel bad.

Jun is not someone evil. He chose to do wrong just to annoy his father, to make him see what his son had become. Jun's hatred was so deep that he's trying to recruit a nurse, so that someone with proper training and knowledge, can take care of his father.

"Okay, I'll follow you. Please keep your promise."

As soon as Sheila agreed, the idle notification on her side updated itself.

[Congratulations! You have joined a faction. You can join and leave a faction anytime you want. Leaving a faction gives you the 'Hunted' debuff. When fighting someone from your old faction, receive 10% reduced overall stats.]

[Hunted]

[Description] You are hunted. When someone from your old faction is near, they would be able to feel your presence.

[Faction Member: Rank - Recruit]

[Effect] Gain +10% EXP Gain & +10% overall stat increase.

Jun placed his hand on Carlos' body with the intent of absorbing some free stats.

To his surprise, he received the 'looting' notification instead of 'legacy' notification. He was confused about why this happened. When he placed his hand on Jake's body, he absorbed some of his stats, but when he did the same thing to Carlos' body, the results changed!

Thinking about it now, the only difference between the two was one got bitten, and the other was not. Was that the reason?

Jun decided to ignore the matter for now. He glanced at Adrian, leaning on the wall. "Are you done? We're leaving.", he said, then took the military knife from Adrian's hand. He gave him his baseball bat, and the knife to Sheila.

Jun looked around and found a coat rack beside the door.

The coat rack was made from cast iron and had a simplistic design. It's height almost reaching up to two meters. There were four hooks on its top, spreading in four different directions.

He took the coat rack and was instantly surprised. He was holding a two-meter iron coat rack, but the feeling it gave him was as if he was holding onto a tree branch.

As if using a spear, he practiced swinging left and right, testing the range of his new weapon. He made a diagonal slash, brought it up, and finished with a simple thrust.

'It's really light!'

When he was finally satisfied with how he handled the coat rack, he opened the door. "Let's go."

***

There were four infected hitting the gate.

Above the gate, the durability bar shows that it had only 40% durability left. Jun strode forward with no hesitation, using the coat rack as a spear, he stabbed the infected's knee joints through the gaps on the metal fence.

He used the same technique on each of the infected, making them unable to stand due to their knee's inability to hold their weight.

Every stab he made was precise and powerful.

When all of the infected fell and could only growl at them, he opened the gates and went outside. He hurriedly stabbed the joints in their shoulders then whispered authoritatively. "Kill them, be sure to go for the head. Both of you get two each. Hurry up! We don't know how fast they can recover!" Jun said anxiously. He noticed that the horde of infected who was 50 meters away when he first entered the clinic had come closer and was approximately 30-40 meters away. He then chose to guard the perimeter outside the gate, so the two behind him can focus on the task.

Adrian and Sheila followed his orders without questions.

Adrian swiftly stabbed the military knife on the forehead of an infected that was nearest to him. When it stopped moving, he then looted its body.

He had been observing Jun's action starting from when they first met at the bank. He needs to place his hand on top of the dead body to loot it.

He chose to loot the body first while being cautious of the other infected next to him.

Jun can see that Adrian has already begun to adapt, and his plan to make them reach level one seemed achievable. That hope vanished when he turned to the side and saw Sheila standing idly near an infected.

She was trembling while hugging the bat close to her body. She raised it forward and smashed down on the infected's head. Due to her force not being strong enough, it only caused the head to cave-in slightly, but the infected didn't die.

The infected who got bashed in the head started snarling, causing the group of infected to notice them.