God's Champion (Multi-crossover Anime)

Spoiler: Chapter 1

It was a tranquil night, the sky filled with stars and moon, it was a good time to just lay and stare, enjoying the sound of crickets.

In the middle of the forest, there was a big clearing, at this moment, the smell that should not be appeared in this natural place spread throughout the area.

A man stood, short hair but a tall body, his eyes were sharp like an eagle, but there was endless sorrow in those lights, staring at three bodies that laid on the pool of blood before him.

"Brothers, we don't have to do this..."

The man said, although it sounded like a pleading, there was a hint of danger in his tone, making it more like a threat.

There were another 4 figures between him and the dead bodies, none of them were breaking eye-contact with the man.

"The order is clear," one of them said, he looked younger than a man, but just about 2 or 3 years, there was no fluctuation of emotion in his face.

The man no longer insisted, he nodded and waved his hand, clearly provoked the 4 figures before him to come and try.

Then 4 shadows lunged forward, taking out their dagger and attempted to stab the man, his eyes flicked with cruelty, taking out his own dagger, he ducked to avoid the first attack, then launched his foot to kick the hand of the second attack, blocking the last two daggers with his own dagger.

Four coordinated attack, these people were proficient and tactful, every strike aimed toward the man's vital spot, but he managed to handle all of them, the way he moved was like a demon, flickering from one side to side, skillfully handled the group attack.

*Splash*

The man slit one of his attackers' throat, reducing their number into three, then he followed up with another deadly strike, stabbing the back of one of his attackers.

The younger man gritted his teeth, his spiky hair drenched with sweat, he knew how skillful the person in front of him, but he didn't know he could take on four people at the same time.

But of course, regardless how terrifying it was, he was just a man, after killing the last person, the spiky-haired man could see he was about to out of breath, so he charged ahead, taking the account of the situation, he flashed the dagger in hand and aimed it toward the man's spinal cord.

*Puchi!*

It was a successful attack, his dagger jabbed on the man's flesh, but at the same time, the man swung his hand backward, he grabbed the spiky-haired man's arm and threw him onto the ground, a fierce dagger descended toward his chest.

In the nick of time, the spiky-haired man brought up his arm to protect his chest, as the blade of the dagger sank into his limb, the last person finally made his move, he leaped forward and stabbed the man's back, his red blood splattered.

The man gritted his teeth, he complicatedly looked at the person below him who defended his heart with his arm, he could remember the time they spent together, laughing and risking their lives, practicing and growing together.

He felt the dagger on his back went deeper, this new kid really didn't know how to be gentle, with a flash of craziness in his eyes, he turned his face around and stared angrily at him, he grabbed the kid's neck with his trembling arm, using the sharp nails, he tore off his neck, brutality this last person could have not ever expected.

The spiky-haired person rolled out from the man's side, dagger still jabbed on his arm, he looked at how this man killed that kid, it was a lie if he wasn't scared.

"What the hell have you turned into, Dani?"

"I don't know..." the man called Dani stood up, blood dripping from his back and hand, the stab on his spine should have enough to kill the man, or at least paralyze him.

"Then, the rumor about you is true? You are collaborating with those satanic worshippers?"

"I don't know..."

"Then why you have not died yet?!"

The spiky-haired man shouted, venting his frustration and disappointment toward Dani, it's only the reasonable explanation of why he could survive the attack this long.

Dani grabbed the dagger from behind him, and he took it out, looking at a spiky-haired man with deadish eyes.

"Rama... I don't know..."

---

"Buddy, you will soon enter the stage, wake up."

There was a kind tone resounded in his head, I opened my eyes and looked around, it's dark... where was this?

"I am sorry that I have to inform you were dead, right now you are in the bridge between the world, soon you will arrive."

I was dead? Right... Dani, we fought teeth by teeth, that guy just refused to go down, in the end, he managed to get me too, huh?

Hmm, but where was this? Underworld? Was I going to Heaven or Hell?

"Neither, it may be sound selfish, but it is the time for the selection of the New God, so every Gods in Heaven must decide for their champion to participate in the selection, and I pick you..."

There was a selection for a New God? I didn't know heaven was so... republicans...

What should I do, and what exactly in it for me?

"It's simple, you just have to survive 100 worlds, and in the end, you will have to fight against other competitors, if you manage to win, I will become a new God and you will become my envoy, you can live as you want."

What sort of danger I will have to face? I mean... 100 worlds, that's just too much.

"Every world has different object and mission you need to complete, and as long as you do, you can proceed into the new world, until you reach the last one."

"Also, if all the 100 competitors are dying and it is only left one standing, the competition will be put to stop and that person along with his or her Gods automatically win."

I see... I don't mind really to become your champion, my whole life, I spent it under people's order, it's not something new for me... but I do hope you will give me some kind of help, right? I mean as your champion, I have the right to be given a benefit.

"Of course, to survive and win the competition, any champions will be given a choice of a weapon of selection; Sword, Spear, or Dagger. These weapons will grow as long as you keep killing, it will eventually become a weapon that can kill God."

That strong? How could you give people a weapon that could threaten your people?

"Believe me, it's not easy to feed these weapons, not a lot can do it."

"Okay, you will soon arrive, you can only talk to me during this phase, oh, what weapon you choose to use?

Dagger... that's the only weapon I ever wanted to use...

Soon, a grey colored Dagger appeared in my hand, it was crude and simple, I sort of like it.

There was also new information that entered my head.

[Highschool of the Dead Objective: Kill 1,000 zombies, duration: 1 month]

[1st Tier: Grey Dagger, Level: 1]

"Good luck, Rama, and I am sorry for making you do this."

Afterward, the voice disappeared, and by the next time blink of the eyes, I found myself on a rooftop and wearing some kind of uniform. It seemed like my identity in this world has been decided, I was a Japanese student of Fujimi Highschool, 2nd year, I was brand a punk here, therefore I was in the rooftop despite it was supposedly the morning class session at the moment.

This was interesting, I had never been into school before... and when I did, it was all the way to Japan.

I walked toward the edge of the rooftop, saw many Sakura Tress, and the courtyard of the school was really vast, Fujimi Highschool was the number one school in this city apparently, not just covered a large land but also very beautiful, the wind carried the sakura petals and danced in the air.

At this moment, I saw a group of teachers gathered at the front gate, confronting a man beyond it, I could hear a vague complaining voice, then one of the teachers went forward, approaching the man, he stopped before the school's gate and extended his hand to grab the man's shirt, but what happened afterward, that teacher suddenly fell backward, seemingly grasping his hand.

He was screaming in pain, even I could hear it from this distance, then I saw the teacher no longer moved, he was dead? No... the teacher twitched, he rose up again but then, he attacked a female teacher.

I was stunned a bit, although I knew and remembered very well my mission here, it was still a sight to see, a zombie... one might only found them in a fictional story, but here I was, seeing them beforehand.

"So, all I have to do... is to kill 1,000 zombies in a month... otherwise, I fail? Sounds about right..."

I kept looking at the zombie teacher below on the ground level, I confirmed the way it moved was the same as the many sources from the movies I had watched before. They were slow, lack coordination, and seemingly didn't know other actions besides eating, grasping, and walking.

"To all school students, the school at the moment is under attack, please remain calm and do not-"

Before the announcement finished, it was suddenly cut off before followed with an agonized scream, the zombies seemed to have entered the school, perhaps from the different exit, or some of the staff or students had been infected before.

...

Good, the more people turned into zombies, the more they would benefit me.

Spoiler: Chapter 2

While watching the chaos on the school's playground, I heard a sound of the door slammed open, I turned my head in a snap and prepared the fighting stance, only to see three students waltz in; two boys with black hair and ash hair, and the other was a girl with brown hair.
They also seemed to be startled, the black hair student walked a few steps forward, said, "You are..."
"Rama, second year."
"Oh... you are the same with us, I am Takashi, this is Rei and Hisashi," Takashi pointed his finger at the girl and the other boys, they nodded their head to me, I noticed the wound on this Hisashi guy's shoulder, was he bitten?
I nodded in response and glanced toward the ground level again, Takashi also came to the edge and saw the chaos, his face became depressed.
"What the hell is happening? How should we escape the school?" he grabbed the rail guard and clenched it.
"I don't know..." I had no intention to escape anyway.
Hisashi said, "The campus has been infested with those... things, probably the result of the virus, transmitted through their saliva."
"Eh? Is that mean... Hisashi, you shouldn't be..." the girl named Rei turned pale, she put her hand in front of her lips, trembling.
"Yeah..." Hisashi bitterly laughed, knew his life was basically over.
"NO, NO, this cannot be! You don't know that! This is not some kind of movies, don't believe those things, it just a bite, you are going to be fine!" Rei said, broke in tears.
Hisashi sighed, then he nodded toward her, although we knew it was just a simple lie.
*Whuush*
At this time, several black helicopters had been flying from rooftop.
"Blackhawk helicopters? US forces?" Takashi said a surprised tone.
"No, it's SDF, but I don't think there is a nearby military base..." Hisashi said.
"Heeey, save us...!" Rei lifted her hands and waved toward the helicopters.
But those helicopters just continued flying, we knew they noticed our presence in the rooftop, it's just they didn't have the power to help, in a situation like this, they must have been ordered for some mission, probably also transporting important people in the city.
"No way..." Rei said in disappointment.
"Anyway, we should block up the door, and I believed there should be some water in observatory club, Takashi if you don't mind," Hisashi said, his body swayed slightly as if soon he would fall.
"Then, you guys keep safe, I must leave..."
I walked away from the rail guard and headed toward the door.
"Ah, where are you going? It's too dangerous out there!" Rei exclaimed.
"To you, but to me, this is nothing but a drill," I shrugged, continued to walk toward the stairs, said, "good luck."
It wasn't long until I encountered a group of zombies, already on the way toward the rooftop, I took out my dagger and turned it in a reverse grip, the length of the blade was about 12 inches and the handle was 8 inches, it didn't have a handguard, kind of reminded of Rondel Dagger.
One zombie finally entered the range of attack, I stepped into its side and swung my dagger into the side of its head then pulled it out less than a second later, I swayed my dagger slightly, and then quickly stabbed the following zombies in the same way, one by one started to fall, there was only about 7 zombies so far, I didn't know whether it was good or bad luck.
The reason most people were unable to kill them, it's because they were full of fear, even the strongest soldier could be overwhelmed by his opponent if he was afraid. Also, for the fact they had been surrounded, therefore, it was best not to run into a dead-end, one bite was all it took.
As I stepped into the hall, I saw many corpses, these poor students just didn't have the chance to escape, directly became their dinner.
I waited for a while, waiting for them to raise up and become the zombies, it could be said the entire school's situation only gave me an advantage.
"Rama!"
I heard a male voice from behind, it turned Takasi, Rei, and Hisashi, I wondered why they decided to come down.
"We want to help, it's impossible to just let you do this alone..." Rei said.
I looked around the dead corpse on the ground and wrinkled my eyes toward her, simply stated 'Do I look need your help?'.
"Err... it's best to stick together, that way, the odd to survive is much bigger," Takashi awkwardly said, he was supporting Hisashi.
"Whatever, but you should take care of him first," I pointed my dagger toward Hisashi.
"I told them to leave me behind, but..." before Hisashi could response, Rei suddenly snapped.
"NO, he's fine, he just needs medical attention, let's head to the infirmary first, maybe Nurse Marikawa still there."
"Stupid girl, start using your brain for once and look around, aren't those the same students like us before? Look how they turned!"
I usually not cared about this kind of thing but since they wanted to tag along, then it's best not to drag me down, Hisashi right now was no doubt a liability, even if he only had injured legs, I would have left him behind.
"You... how dare you call me stupid?!" Rei suddenly shouted in anger, the hands that tight around the handle of broom shivered.
"Rei..." Hisashi tried to calm her, but he seemed also lost for words.
"You want to come with me? Fine, but don't expect me to save you," afterward I turned around and started walking, completely ignored them.
Hisashi and Takashi exchanged glances, Rei bit her lips, hesitated for a while before the three of them eventually caught up to me.
We killed a few zombies along the way, then we stumbled into a quite tall zombie, at least a whole 10 centimeters taller.
"Ah, isn't he the star of Basket Ball team?" Rei said while she's holding the weakened Hisashi now.
Takashi couldn't help but swallowed his throat, he thought this tall dude could have easily trashed them around.
I felt a little annoyed, perhaps due to being matched with my current background, my age and body had been arranged, although my strength didn't seem to change much.
"Rama... what's the plan here?" Takashi nervously said.
I didn't answer him, walked toward the tall guy with a calm pace, as soon as we closed with one another, the zombie tried to grab me, I ducked and slipped under its arm then thrust my dagger into the side of its left thigh, then dragged the blade all the way to the back, the moment I pulled it out, it also the same time the zombie knelt on the ground, reducing its height to become shorter than me, then I grabbed its hair, pulled it back, and I stabbed the zombie on its forehead.
My movement turned the three students speechless, in fact, most of the kill had been done by me, it's understandable if they were feeling like dead weight instead.
"Hisashi!"
We heard Rei's scream and saw Hisashi had grasped his chest, his face was absolutely in pain.
"Hisashi! Hisashi!" Rei hugged his body and howled sadly.
"I can't... I can't take it anymore... pain..." Hisashi said with closed eyes and heavy gasping, his body was trembling all over.
Finally, in a roar, Hisashi spurted blood from his mouth, his expression was pale, his eyes looked dead, everyone knew he was at the end of his life.
Rei couldn't bear it, directly wept while Takashi could only cast his eyes to the side.
I meanwhile, twirled the dagger in my hand until I grasped only the tip and swung it toward Hisashi's forehead.
*Puchi!*
Everything happened so fast, without Rei and Takashi knew, Hisashi had been killed such easily in front of their eyes, his deadish eyes widened slightly before stopped completely, then his body lost power, pulling Rei also onto the ground.
"Hisashi...?"
Rei shook his body, of course, the man wouldn't respond. I leisurely walked toward them and took my dagger back, turned around, and left.
"Close his eyes, find a white sheet to cover his body, you can do at least that much for him," I said simply.
"You... what have you done..." Rei said with the trembling tone, it's like she would breakdown at any moment.
"Ending his suffering."

---

While giving them time to mourn, I took a break and looked up at the information.
[1st Tier Weapon: Grey Dagger, Level: 2.]
[Zombie kill: 20, remaining: 980, time left: 30 days.]
I never really played video games before, but I thought this leveling was quite slow, I meant 20 zombies just earn me one level. Although I could understand the reason also, I meant... this zombie wasn't a threat at all, at least for anyone who practiced martial arts before and knew how to kill them, and all of its weakness, they shouldn't have any problem on taking the zombie down.
Hoping them would grant you any good reward was indeed far fetched.
Takashi looked at Rei who stared at Hisashi corpse, said after a brief hesitation, "I..."
"I am fine, you don't have to comfort me..." Rei said.
"I know, I just... I hope you don't blame Rama, he said is right, and we are wrong, we know Hisashi definitely want to die already, the moment he got bit, he knew his life was forfeit at that moment..."
"..." Rei took a deep breath, sighed, "okay, you don't have to say anymore, I don't blame anyone..."
"I want to see my father..." Rei said, sighing sadly, "I don't want the same thing to happen to him."
"Me too, your father is good to me when we were a kid, I definitely don't want bad things to happen to him., we find him Rei, I promise you..." Takashi nodded his head in seriousness.
Rei glanced at him, then smiled slightly, said, "Thank you, Takashi."
We continued walking the hall, killing zombies as much as we could, I was surprised to find Rei had such a good spear skill, Takashi's strength also not bad with his baseball bat. Although they didn't help me with the kill, at least they could reduce the heat for me, I was not a person who didn't recognize effort and skill, as long as people could contribute, I would appreciate them with respect.
"Rama, what about your parents?" Rei suddenly said, it seemed she's no longer brooding.
"I don't have parents, only... an uncle, and he is an international trader, most of the time isn't home," I said casually.
"Oh..." Rei immediately felt awkward, then she looked at Takashi, said, "your parents, do you think they safe?"
"Well, Dad is out of the city now, and Mom should be in her school, well judging from both of their characters, I don't think any monsters can hold them back," Takashi scratched his cheek.
"Hehe..." Rei couldn't help but giggle, I saw their interaction, it seemed these two knew each other quite well, childhood friend maybe?
At this moment, there was suddenly a scream.
"I know this voice!" Takashi exclaimed and quickly ran off toward the source of direction.
"Ah, Takashi, wait!" Rei followed behind, finally leaving me alone in the hall.

Spoiler: Chapter 3

By the time I arrived, five zombies had been killed, only leaving 6 human standing.
Other than Takashi and Rei, there were another 4 people; a pink-haired girl with eyeglasses, a tall and slender purple-haired girl, a bosomy blonde, and a boy with another eyeglass and a bit stodgy body. They were respectively Saya, Saeko, Shizuka, and Kohta.
It became quite bothersome, I didn't mind one or two companions, but the whole six people... it's going to hinder my movement.
"Alright, since you two have met your friends, then this is a goodbye," I turned around and left, Takashi quickly prevented me.
"Rama! Why don't we stick together?"
I didn't stop, didn't even look back at him, said, "You guys are a nuisance."
I had no idea what reaction these people had after I said that, I didn't have particularly any sorry when I said it, it was clear for me from the start that I had no intention in a forming group, my mission was clear; to kill 1,000 zombies, I didn't have the time to relax because there were 100 people like me in this city; if each person had to kill 1,000 zombies, then there should be at least 100,000 population to cover them all. A city with a scale this big no doubt had more than 100,000 population, the question was, how many zombies were there?
Therefore, I couldn't relax; if I don't get 1,000 zombies in a month, I would have failed, and the Gods of mine would have failed to become True God. Although I didn't know what was his purpose, I didn't care, I had an order, the question of the reason was not part of the job, I just have to execute it and got rid of anyone who stood in my way.
I went out of the school and arrived in the side staircase, there were several zombies here and I quickly dispatched them.
From the staircase to the first floor, I had killed about 15 zombies, there were two girls surrounded by three zombies toward the wall, I walked behind them with a steady pace, then I lifted my dagger and stabbed the back of one zombies' head, I pulled the dagger, spun it into the normal grip, I skipped a step and stabbed another zombie's head, made another skip, I kicked a zombie on the back of its leg, made it knelt then finished it off with another stab.
"Wait, let us... let us coming with you!" One of the girls said.
"Go to the second floor, there is a group over there, you should be a lot much safer with them than me," I looked at her over the shoulder and responded.
I walked outside the school and saw so many zombies scattered on the field, some just wandered around, some huddled on the ground, feasting on the victim.
I frowned a bit, this would make things quite difficult, the hall had a good narrow space that would make it easier for me to maneuver my dagger, but which such a vast field, it would be a lot longer to kill them all. I had been standing in front of the school for quite a while and only like three or four zombies that had noticed my presence, although I had the skill to lower my presence, I didn't use any of it at the moment, yet these zombies barely recognized me.
I thought for a while, thinking that I better lured them inside the school, but I had to make sure first all threats inside had been neutralized, I didn't like if there was any surprise from my side.
With that thought, I returned to the school, tried to prepare, and set the path of the onslaught, I found other people inside a classroom, a teacher with several students.
"Oh my, what are you doing walking around alone? It's not safe at the moment," the teacher said, revealed a concern in his face that I knew it was not sincere.
"Stay inside the classroom and don't come out, don't blame me if anything happens to you," I simply said, I went to grab a broom and started banging on the metal around the staircase, I didn't know how far these zombies could hear, but I had confidence the closest ones to the front gate of the building should have heard it.
Not long after, I saw several zombies entered the building, they looked so happy when they caught my appearance, slowly making their way toward the staircase.
I climbed down slightly, with a broom in one hand and dagger in another, I prepared to face the horde of them. One zombie lunged at me with both arms extended as if tried to grab me. I stepped slightly to the left, back kicked the zombie to make it kneel then stabbed the zombie's head, the second zombie came, I smacked its leg first with the broom's stick, then hit its cheek, turning the zombie around in the process as it stabbed it on the back of the head with a normal grip.
With a swinging of broomstick and thrusting of the dagger, I kept moving forward while killing off the zombies, the human's body, or any animal also, was interesting; if you cut a certain part of their nerve, their limbs would have a complication like unable to move or bend. These zombies while didn't know pain and endurance, their bodies just work normally like humans, cut a certain part, they wouldn't be able to operate like usual, you could make them unable to walk by cutting certain muscle on their thighs, you could make them unable to grasp you if you cut the muscle on their upper arms.
Zombie was scary but losing the ability to move their limbs making them no different than the corpse they were once, they couldn't just bite or eat humans only with the twisting of their head.
I repeated this process over and over again, sweats had covered my entire body, and my throat was thirsty, my dagger had many times embedded into the zombies' skull but there was no smell of blood in it, I felt like the dagger absorbed that blood? Maybe that's how it leveled up.
I gasped for breath while sitting on the stairs, there was literally a sea of corpses in front of me, I looked up into my brain to check up my progress.
[Zombies kill: 50, Zombies left to kill: 950, time limit: 30 days]
[Grey Dagger Level: 3]
I sighed quite a while, it's good that I was able to kill that many for this less than an hour; even if I stopped killing zombies today, as long as I stayed in this quota per day, I could finish the job within 20 days, still plenty of time.
But I didn't really like to drag it on, first, I couldn't guarantee the population of the zombies, there were 99 people doing the same things like me, didn't even mention the survivors, the police department, the military, they were also fighting these zombies, so the population of them could be lessened by huge margin each day. Second, I didn't remember the rule that each of us champions could not kill each other, in fact, eliminating competitors this early would be the most effective, for my part, I didn't want my opponent had become very strong before I killed it.
Killing with the dagger certainly my favorite way, but if I have to carry on my order without giving the chance of failure, I had to finish it as soon as possible, which means, I had to find another method to kill the zombies.
Maybe explosion? Or using a car? I remembered there were several cars in the school's parking lot, I could have stolen one of them and ram all of this zombie and flatten them down to the earth.
Although I wasn't sure that all the cars in the parking lot could be hot-wired, there was nothing wrong to check on them first.
I licked my dry lips, thinking of simple cold water would be nice now, before walking out of the building, I decided to go to the toilet first and drank the water from the sink.
But who knew, when I went back to the entrance, I saw a huge group of students, huh, it's them again.
"You... did all of these?" the black-haired guy, Takashi, said in a shocked tone.
I nodded and headed toward the entrance.
"Hey, we have a key for the minibus, why don't we go together?" Takashi seemed wanted to chase after me, but looking at the corpses below the stairs, he was hesitating, perhaps worried that one day might still be alive.
"Minibus?" I stopped and looked at then with surprised eyes, hey it's a big enough vehicle to run these zombies down.
"Deal, but I am driving!"
"You can drive a car?" Takashi wrinkled his eyebrows, highschooler student, in general, didn't drive a car, mostly because of age issues, although in my country, it wasn't that strict, and it was easy to buy a car, Japan had a different rule and culture, also they most like to walk, ride a bicycle, or ride public commodities when going anywhere. Therefore, one could say that Japanese people were a lot less lazy than others.
"I do."
Although I wasn't a super driver, I had been trained to drive before, I meant, what kind of Assassin couldn't drive a car or at least a motorcycle? Should he just let loose his target then if he or she ran away?
"Wait, are we seriously going to trust a student to drive the car for us?" the pink-haired girl, Saya, lifting her eyeglasses and complained.
"Umm..." Takashi was unable to answer, scratching his cheek.
"I need to drive the car, please let me come with you!" this time, the usual indifferent voice in my tone disappeared, replaced with a pleading. I even dropped on to the ground and knelt before them, my forehead touched the ground.
"Ah..." Takagi was obviously felt awkward, her cheek somewhat red as she glanced to the side.
"Well, if he really wanted to drive, then let's just give him the chance, it's not like I can't trade place with him when necessary," the bosomy blonde, Shizuka smiled lightly, then she walked forward, carefully stepped onto the sea of the corpses, bent her body slightly and picked me up from the ground, said, "come on, a man should have dignity, don't lower your head so easily."
I rose from the ground, the indifference returned to my face, I thought what she said, dignity didn't make me accomplish my mission, dignity was worthless for me.
Not long after, we got out of the building, there were fewer monsters now, as soon as I got into the minibus, I slipped into the driver seat and put the key in the ignition, this was my first time driving a minibus, so it took me some times to understand the mechanism first.
"How? Do you have any problem?" Shizuka came from behind me, her big breasts hung from her chest, looked very heavy, I wondered if her back wasn't hurt carrying those things.
"It's fine, I know how to drive it now, sit back to your seat," I put on the gear and prepared to leave.
"Wait!"
There were people running toward us, it's that teacher and the group of students, Takashi saw them and wanted to hold the minibus from driving off, but Rei insisted that he should leave them behind, I could hear the hostility in her tone, it seemed she had some kind of feud with that teacher.
After they had gotten inside, I put in the gear and hit the gas, the minibus roared, quickly left the vicinity and slammed the zombies in front, I didn't know if that was enough to kill them, but I thought the shock from the bus should shatter their bones and muscle, it might be not an instant kill, but it should be slowly killing them.
The problem with the minibus was that it wasn't flexible, and reckless driving could slip the bus and turned over the car, so I couldn't exactly make my way to kill every single zombie.
Eventually, the minibus headed to the gate, there were many zombies in front of it; when people thought I was going to ram it, I stopped the minibus and walked outside, cleared them up first then opened the gate manually, before returning to the minibus and drove away from the school.

Spoiler: Chapter 4

I had to say, the road didn't have many zombies, it's like one or two for every five minutes, but still a kill. I looked at my record of killing, it was about 70 now.
"How can you kill them so calm like that?" Rei said, she sat on the co-pilot seat, I didn't know the way after all. Moreover, this weird lanky teacher at the behind, Shido if I remembered correctly, kept preaching about salvation and new world order, Rei was getting sick of it, initially, she wanted to get out, but I didn't bother to care about her request, but I did feel she was uncomfortable in his presence, so I just made her sat in the copilot under the guise of leading me the way.
"Experience."
"Experience? You killed these things before?" she looked at me with surprised eyes.
"No, not when they are a dead man walking."
"You... kill people?" from the periphery of my eyes, I could see Rei's face had a hint of horror, then again, which people wouldn't? No one would just remain nonchalant about a person who had killed, let alone seemingly not just one head, but many.
"It's what I do, I did it under the order..."
"Are you an agent or something? But... you are so young."
Well, not really, I am 22 years you know, this world just fucked up my age, how irritating, my permission to drive was even brought up to be questioned. I wondered if she would believe if I told her about the truth.
"I am actually dead but instead of going to the underworld, I was moved here because I was picked to become a God's champion for this selection of True God's seat, in my original world, I was 22 years old, and I was working of assassin organization."
After I said that for a while, Rei stared at me then blinked several times, then she laughed, said, "Oh, good one." Right, of course, you wouldn't believe it, not her fault though.
The minibus continued driving down the road, we could see some blood and ruined building from left and right, we also saw several survivors but it was always too late to stop and save them, the dead always got them first.
"This horror... I can't believe this is all happening..." Rei clenched her fist, trembling slightly.
"The future is unpredictable, today is zombies outbreak, tomorrow maybe alien invasion."
"Well, I hope not so, as if zombies are not enough already," Rei gave a bitter laugh.
"What? You don't like some tentacle-like monsters invade Earth?"
"Ew, that just sounds so gross!" Rei finally laughed for real, perhaps it was the first time she could feel like this ever since everything fell apart. I chuckled, looked at Shido through the rear-view mirror. He kind of reminded me of some annoying politician who talked too much and done too less. Promises were all they offered, but the realization never happened. Rei was no doubt hated that guy, although it's normal for a student to have some dislike toward their teachers, even me, who never been to school, I hated some of my mentors. But Rei hated for Shido seemed quite deep.
"What's your problem with that guy?"
Rei went silent for a while, said, "He made me repeat a grade."
"That's it?" I wrinkled my eyebrows.
"My grade has been good, I am literally straight-A students, you can ask anyone," Rei shook her head, then continued, "the reason why he did it was that my father was investigating the corruption case of Shido's father, it was a lesson and a threat to him."
Ah, politician... could not have your nose clean, weren't you?
"You feel guilty for your father?"
"Un," Rei nodded, she stared at the vision in front of the window, said, "I feel like I was a burden..."
"Every child in this world is a burden for their parents, a burden they happily to bear, when a mother bear you inside her belly, you make her look fat and feel uncomfortable for 9 months; when you are about to come out, you gave her a tearing feeling that she feels like she is going to die, she bleeds for you, but what happened when she hear your first cry afterward? She smiles, tears of joy come from her eyes, your father will come inside, hug you for the first time and give you the name, he knew that there would be another mouth that he had to feed, so he must work harder to earn more, sometimes very tired and exhausted, but when he came home, and it's the smile of his wife and child is the first time he saw, that exhaustion and weariness disappeared, turn into what you called happiness."
"A child should feel that they are their burden, so they will know how to respect every effort they had made to give their child welfare, the parents wanted you to score well in class, you did it to make them happy, the parents wanted you to behave good, you did it to make them happy..."
"So, it's good if you feel that way, make sure you work harder in the future..."
Rei closed her eyes as if hearing a lullaby from my words, it's not the first time I had to say like this, back when I worked for the organization, I had subordinates that sometimes would feel dejected and nervous before carrying on the task, so I had to encourage them with some words, dispirited personnel was useless to me.
"I remembered you said that you don't have parents, what happened to them?" Rei turned her eyes and looked at me.
"I have no idea, besides, you don't believe me working for Assassin Organization, so there is no point in telling you."
"Well, let's say I do believe you, will you tell me?"
I took a deep breath, said, "All I know is that I was sold as a baby."
"Ah? How could they?!" Rei brought up her hands to cover her lips, eyes widened as large as possible.
"Life is not easy, people need money to survive, paying for food, paying for a place to rest, paying for debt, paying for medicine, in short, they sold me because they need money, and I don't blame them," I said, although my voice seemed calm, in fact, it just for the sake of my own self-comfort when I was a child, I kept telling myself they needed money for an urgent reason, so they had to sell me.
"No, it's not right, sacrificing a child like that, it's..." Rei's voice rather became excited, I glanced at her, for the first time I gave her a small chuckle.
"Well, why do you believe me? I also said I am working for the Assassin Organization."
"No, it's just... was it not true?" Rei suddenly became embarrassed, perhaps because she was too emotional before, thus she thought my words were true, although it honestly was.
"Relax, my father is dead because he got hit by a blimp, and my mother died due to laughing too much, sounds happy?"
"Now, you make fun of me!"
After driving for a while, we passed by a convenience store, the people behind suddenly clamored that they were thirsty and hungry, I didn't deny them because I did feel the same, so we decided to split task, Shizuka took the wheel while I, Takeshi, Kohta, and the rest of the men came down to gather the supply, the rest of the girls stayed in the minibus with Rei and Saeko to protect them.
I walked down from the bus, looked at Kohta, and his nail gun, it looked like a sub-machine gun, I said, "A handmade?"
"Ah, yes, Takagi made me built it from leftover stuff..." Kohta rubbed the back of his head.
"Nice, your parents into guns?"
"No, my father is a jewelry merchant and my mother is a fashion designer."
"So, I guess guns are your thing then? I see how you shoot, it's quite good, where do you learn?" I remembered at the way toward the minibus, I saw this Kohta could shoot on the forehead of the zombies quite flawlessly, such talent was rare, let alone still in highschool.
"Well, I always like guns, and I went on a month-long trip to America to be trained by the US military contractor Blackwater USA, I also went into a shooting practice several times in the past."
"Good, people like you are needed in the time like this, survive well," I patted his shoulder then continued on watch, at this moment I suddenly heard a roar from inside the convenience store, I saw Takashi and a blonde dude was in conflict.
"Shit, why should I listen to you?!" the blonde dude said.
"Look, all I am saying is that, we don't need any beer, we have to remain focused, otherwise, if the danger arise..." Takeshi hadn't finished saying, the blonde dude suddenly grasped his shirt and pulled him.
"If I want to drink, I will drink as I like, you are not my mother!"
"Calm down, there is no need for violence..."
"Shut up!" the blonde dude lifted his fist and was about to punch Takeshi, there was suddenly a hand seize his hand, it turned out to be Shido, he squinted his eyes behind the eyeglasses.
"Student Komuro has a point, alcohol will not bring us any good at this time, please be patient."
"But teacher Shido..."
"I know you are scared, terrified, but alcohol is not the answer, we need you clear-headed because I believe you will be needed when the time comes."
The blonde dude gritted his teeth, then released Takeshi from his grasp, walking away with some frustrations.
"Are you alright, Komuro?" Shido patted Takeshi's shoulder.
"Un, thanks, teacher..."
"What are you saying, you are my student, of course, I will take care of you..." Shido gave seemingly a gentle smile.
Meanwhile, I and Kohta was looking at the event from the store's gate, since the trouble had been settled, there was no need for us to step in. I looked at Kohta, there was a slight shift of anger in his expression, but only for a brief before it returned to normal again, I wondered what was that about? Did he also have a feud with this guy Shido?
At this moment, there were two students on the back shelves, one had a short hair and the other had a cheek-long hair, the short hair said, "Dude, I need to take a leak, come with me."
"What the hell? Do you need me to hold your dick?" the cheek-long hair said with a frown.
"I am scared if there are those monsters on the back!"
"Relax, we have made quite some noise here, I believe they would have come if there is one here."
"Fine..."
The short hair guy carefully walked into the back of the room, it wasn't long until he found a toilet and sighed in relief after checking there is no zombies around, but as soon as he opened the door of the toilet, in his surprised eyes, there was a man inside, with a small grin in his face, he moved his right hand and thrust what appeared to be a sword straight into the short hair guy's chest, then he pulled it out, blood spurted as the guy was still in a daze, then his body fell onto the ground, his body twitched several times, in his last vision, he saw the man hovered the sword above his body, then he descended the blade and stabbed him again.

Spoiler: Chapter 5

"Rama, where do you learn how to use dagger?" Kohta said, there was no dagger-style martial arts club in the school after all, and unlike sword or spear, dagger took more times to practice as the limited range was not favorable but at the same time, anyone hardly could disarm a person who used dagger and knife as a weapon.
One might argue that anyone could have used a dagger and knife, I also could the same with sword and spear, but to get good at them, dagger technically required more time to learn.
If one with no skill in dagger met someone with no skill in sword and lance, it was more than likely the one with a dagger would have lost the fight. if one with skill in dagger met someone with no skill in sword and lance, then the one with a dagger would have won easily, and if both were skilled persons, the fight would come down to who was more skilled or waited until one parties made mistake.
"Well, my mentor trained me," I said simply, couldn't help but reminiscent, my mentor, his name was Jaka, a strict and disciplined person, he would not hesitate to punish me if I slightly slacked in the training, sometimes I was denied of food for the whole day as the punishment.
"How long you have been practicing?"
"Let's see... since the first time you guys grab the pencil and learn to write."
"Haha, no way, but that's kinda badass!"
I merely curled the corner of my lips and didn't continue, I had no intention to convince anyone, I said the truth and that was it, believed me or not, that's their own problem.
There were several zombies sometimes would approach us, I took care of all of them in pretense to make Kohta conserve his ammo, he didn't complain of course, unlike me, he didn't have the obligation to kill zombies.
"But I think guns are more good in the situation like this; if we have to fight a crowd, I feared a dagger will not be enough," Kohta said.
"True, anyone with basic to none skill in using knife or dagger will not survive a crowd of zombies, no, in fact, fighting two unarmed people already a disadvantage," I didn't deny the truth inside his words, my mentor told me that in the situation when I had to fight more than one person; if there was anything to force me to fight them, then it's best to make a run for it, naturally, it only applied when I was still beginner, as my skill grew, I naturally could fight more than one opponents, but if only they were not as skilled as me.
I still remembered Dani, he was the most skilled among of us, a prodigy in a fight one could say, but even he was unable to fend off the attack of four experts at the same time, yes, he could take down one or two, but I and my teammate was able to injure him, and if not for the strangeness in his body, he would have died already.
"When facing against arrow or bolt, any melee practitioner has 50% chance to win as long they can dodge the first attack and get closer to the enemy, but when facing against gun, especially automatic rifle, our best bet to win is to use sneak attack, we might be able to run to our left and right, maybe make a way toward the gunner in a zig-zag manner, but the success to be able to land attack on them, let alone kill is fairly lower than 30%," I said, back in the past, there were many times I had to suffer gun wounds, even almost died several times in open confrontation, that's how helpless we were in the face of guns.
"But guns do have a problem on their own," Kohta grabbed the lens of his eyeglass, "like run out of ammo or it might get jammed, a beginner might even forget to release the safety button."
"Anyone can shoot a standing still target, but it took practice to shoot a moving one, and if the target is fast enough, they can get away or commence counterattack to the shooter; if the shooter is less flexible, like me... I may have died right away," Kohta helplessly said.
"You right, but it's impossible for not to get shoot unless you aim for a certain spot like the person's head or leg, then yeah, a beginner will have a difficult time, even an expert like you will less likely to get a hit, but if you want to shoot the enemy anywhere, the enemy will not be able to avoid the shoot, no matter how fast they were running from it."
For the time being, we talked about gun and dagger from a different perspective, I had to admit, although Kohta seemed to favor guns more, he didn't dismay the dangers of using a dagger or knife, I was certain with this attitude of his, he would have survived a quite lot of situation.
While we were chatting, the other boys had been transporting food, water, and other necessity, even such as a portable potty, we certainly didn't want to stop midway and looked for a restroom, even peeing on the side of the road might have dangerous.
At this moment, there was suddenly a scream from inside the convenience store, I and Kohta was surprised and dashed inside quickly.
From the very far back row of the shelves, I saw a man holding a student with a sword on the student's neck, I was surprised a bit while quickly moved my right hand behind my leg.
"Now, now... don't be panic..."
This man was very tall, slightly handsome, he had black hair and teal eyes, the eyebrows were curved at the end, but his body was rather skinny. He wore a cloak with a hood, his outfit was a black suit with tie. The sword in his hand also in grey color, proved he was probably the same as me, a champion!
"Ah... help me..." the cheek-length haired student in his arms looked pale and ghastly, it's like he just saw a horror, not just from being taken as hostage.
"Sssh... I am not going to kill you, I just want one of your friends to hand me a pack of cigarettes from the cashier, you hear me? Hand the pack for me, and I will let him go..."
Everyone had a doubt all of a sudden, that's all? It was rather strange to hold someone's hostage over a pack of cigarettes when you could have just asked.
"Oi, are all you deaf?! Get me what I want!"
"Okay, I'll do it..." Takashi suddenly said, he walked toward the cashier.
I went silent for a while, then said, somewhat loudly, "Kohta, how good your marksmanship?"
"Eh... err... depend on the weapon, I can hit a headshot in 1 mile..." Kohta bewilderedly said, didn't understand my action.
"How confidence you are within this range with your nail gun?" I smirked slightly.
"Very..." Kohta somewhat gave serious eyes, the nail gun in the hand was steadied.
"What are you talking about? Don't you see I am holding your friend now? Get me what I want, other I'll kill him!"
"You are going to kill him nonetheless," I said in a deadpanned tone, "you just look for an excuse to kill another person."
"Huh, what are you talking about? Why do I need to do something like that? Come on, we are all civilized people here, not some savage..." the man grinned, looked harmless but he couldn't deceive my eyes.
If he didn't have that sword, then I would have perhaps trusted his ridiculous reason slightly, but I knew the mechanism of our weapon, as long as we killed, the weapon would grow, but never mentioned it happened if we only killed a zombie, although I hadn't proven it myself, I believed even killing a human would raise the level of our weapon, perhaps much greater than killing zombie.
It took 50 zombies to raise my dagger to level 3, I believed killing Hisashi might have also included somewhere in there, I believed killing 50 humans perhaps would raise my dagger's level far quicker.
Right now, I had a minibus full of harmless people, other than Rei, Saeko, and Hirano, most of them will not even put up a fight if I killed them, the thing was... I didn't do it. They had no relation with my mission, my mission was to kill zombies and not to level up my dagger, one could I say I was naive, too stodgy; if my weapon's level was higher, it was naturally easier for me to kill people.
But that's how I took comfort in not killing innocent lives, it's because I was not ordered to do it, my mentor told me to aim my dagger to the people I told to kill and those who stood in our way, we were an assassin, but we had a code to follow, something that had been ingrained in my mind since I was a child.
Then why I decided to kill this man? It's because he stood between me and the mission, and if he was about to roam freely, more zombies would be killed by him and it left me in unfavorable situations.
Therefore, he must die...
"Kohta, shoot that man's left ear!" I said loudly.
"Roger!" Kohta didn't hesitate, he lifted his nailgun and aimed it toward the man, then he pulled the trigger.
"Oi, you crazy-" the man in instinct dodged to the right, carrying the cheek-length haired student with him, but at the same time, there was something flew toward his forehead, so fast that no one could have anticipated it.
*Puchi!*
A 20 inches dagger jabbed on the man's forehead, he widened his eyes as blood dripped from it, his body stumbled backward and hit the floor hard, staring at the ceiling with unbelievable eyes.
There was silence... everybody looked at me who just had swung my dagger, I hid it first behind my leg so the man wouldn't know I had a weapon, I didn't have to worry if he found out my identity, but alerting the enemy of my weapon was the last thing I wanted to do.
An Assassin didn't walk around with dagger in their hand, they only pulled it out when killing was certain or caught in the battle.
Then I asked Kohta loudly if he was the confidence with his aim, this would alert the enemy for his skill, and told him to shoot the left ear, it's a very difficult spot to shoot, but it also gave the proof of Kohta's skill in marksmanship, making the enemy believed it and feared for it.
And finally, when Kohta shot the nail, his instinct was to dodge to the right, naturally, there was a chance he would have used his sword to block the nail, but either way, it's enough for me to deliver the assassination; when he dodged, his body wouldn't have enough response to avoid my dagger, and when he blocked the nail with his sword, he wouldn't have enough reaction to my incoming dagger.
Either way, it's 100% kill for me, and that's how assassin work, either 100% or not all.
Eventually, the time had to move, the people were broke out from their shock, then looked at me with terror in their eyes.
"Murderer... murderer!"
"AAahhhh!"
Other than Kohta, Takashi, and Shido, everyone started screaming, pointing their fingers toward me, judging my action.
I didn't deny it, regardless of what they thought, or for what reason, killing was killing, I didn't do it to protect any of them, I didn't do it for their approval, they could curse me out loud, I could treat them like mosquito buzz.
I approached the dead man, I realized his sword was suddenly missing, was this the result of his death? I bent down and pulled out my dagger from his forehead, I saw at the blade and it was really didn't have a single stain of blood, this was such a perfect killing weapon.
I extended my left hand and shut the man's eyes and gaping mouth, afterward I stood up and left for the front gate again, at this moment, Shido suddenly approached me, said, "Student Rama, your action is very disturbing."
"I know."
"How can a student easily commit murder like that? We are people living with the law, your action can be brought to justice!"
"Sure, call the police for me, I surrender."
"Hey, your teacher is-"
Without waiting for Shido to finish his words, I already walked out from the convenience store, I regarded this teacher as a clown, and he had overestimated his performance to me.
We continued driving toward the highway, I let Shizuka drove the minibus, I was honestly tired a little bit, I gave a knife and a tape duct to Rei, this way her dull broomstick could be more useful, and I also gave a knife to Saya and Saeko, the latter could tape it to her bokken.
Rei still sat on the front row and I sat beside Takeshi, he looked complicated, said, "That person... is he really going to kill me if I deliver the cigarette?"
"He has a reason," I said, my chin was resting on my knuckle, looking toward the scene outside the window.
"Then I owe you gratitude."
"But do you have to kill him?" Takeshi said. It seemed like he was still having trouble with it.
"Killing is like a luxury, not everyone can have it, but it does exist, and I have it in me."
"What is that mean?"
"It means it's fine to think killing is bad, but don't assume everybody thinks the same as you."
Then I closed my eyes, taking a nap to restore my strength.

Spoiler: Chapter 6

We got stuck in the traffic Jam when the minibus reached the highway, it's not strange for all of these people also on the run, probably sought for the government's quarantine zone. Looking at the line up of the cars from the top of the minibus worried me greatly, while I sat on my thumb, the other champions probably had massacred many zombies, getting as many as they could for today.
Therefore, I must leave the minibus to carry on my mission, I could have returned but I thought it was not very time-efficient, I might as well just found a random place to rest and carried on afterward.
I climbed down from the minibus and told them I was leaving, who knew Saya, Saeko, Rei, Takashi, Kohta, and Shizuka wanted to come along.
I had to say, after knowing them a little bit, it would be good to have them on my side, Saeko was a great kendoist, I saw her performance with her bokken, and I admired it, it's truly beautiful the way she moved, it's like an elegant dancing. Rei was a great spearman, the way her handling that broomstick was excellent to some extent, I would not underestimate her in under any circumstance. Kohta had good marksmanship and his knowledge in firearms certainly would bring a lot of advantage, I didn't have long contact with Saya and Shizuka, but I knew the former had this bearing of aristocratic, I felt like she was a noblewoman of a sort, and Shizuka was a nurse, which vital in case something undesirable happened to me, as for Takashi... well, I had no reason to say no to him.
But just going anywhere in a big group like this without a plan would bring a disaster later, the first question was where to rest for the night, the sun had already on the west, the sky grew red, it would be soon evening, and when the darkness descended, it would be horrible for our vision, reducing our awareness of the environment.
Although I had no problem seeing in the dark, these people certainly quite contrary, though the city's lights should still be on, it's in the early outbreak, after all, the city shouldn't lose its function right away.
"Hmm... we can go to my friend's house, and if we move now, we can arrive there by nightfall," Shizuka placed her finger on her lips,
There were not much of a choice here, so we agreed to take a rest at the night in Shizuka friend's house, next, where would be our destination?
"I would like to visit my house, take a look for my Mom..." Rei said, then she started to explain that her mother was a housewife, during the rise of the outbreak, she most likely still in the house.
"Then might as well my house too, our house is still in the same neighbor, although I am sure my parents supposedly not at home, there is nothing wrong to check up," Takashi said, they were indeed a childhood friend.
"My house is the closest to the bridge, and my father is a leader of Tokonosu prefecture's ultra-nationalist organization, in this situation, I believe he must have set up a big protection site, with the help from all of his members to guard it, so it's the best bet for us to go tomorrow, and if my guess is correct, we will have a powerful stronghold and a safe place," Saya said, I knew I wasn't misjudge her, her arrogancy and the stubborn attitude most likely due to her family circumstance.
"The Busujima residence is the furthest from the bridge, but my father is on the self-defense conference abroad, so I don't have a reason to check up on my house," Saeko said, I looked at this purple-haired girls, compared to other, she was the calmest next to me, I wondered was it because of her training or her family's teaching, or perhaps both. Also, she used the Busujima residence, did this mean she also came from a big lineage family? What about her mother? Did she was not worried about her?
Then again, it was not my business to ask, so I just remained silent.
"Both of my parents also abroad," Kohta said.
"Alright, then it is all settled, first we go to Shizuka's house to rest for the night, then we go to Saya's house tomorrow, followed up with Rei and Takashi's house, also remember not to wander on your own accord, stay in the group and protect each other's back, considering Saya and Shizuka are not a fighter, you two stay in the circle of the group, Kohta and Takashi stay on the back, Rei and Saeko defense from the front, and I will lead the way."
"Yes..." the six people nodded at the same time.
At this moment, Shido noticed our small group, he turned slightly, and with a harmless smile, he said, "What's wrong people? We're supposed to be working together?"
"Excuse us Teacher Shido, but we do have a plan of our own, and this is not a school trip, we have no obligation to listen to you," Saya expressed a toothy grin, speaking with confidence in her tone.
"Hmm... I see that you have already decided, well, I won't forbid you from going, Japan is a free country after all," while the other students seemingly dislike her attitude, Shido merely smirked, he joined his fingers in front of his face, it's like a posture of thinking.
"However, we cannot allow you to go, Nurse Marikawa, what if your students here get hurt? What should we do when they need medical attention?" Shido licked the corner of his lips, his appearance looked like a weasel.
"Ah... I..." Shizuka couldn't say for a while, it's true that if she left, that means she abandoned other people for the sake of others, which definitely against the vow of her job.
"Do we really want to play like this, Shido?" I said, taking out my dagger and slashed the backrest of the chair, tearing the cover and exposed the material inside.
"..." Shido immediately went silent, anyone could see he was gritting his teeth, he saw beforehand how I killed a man without mercy after all.
"Humph, fine, get out, get killed if that is your wish, also Nurse Marikawa, you do not qualify as a Nurse," Shido said, pressing his eyeglasses with his middle finger, did he just give us the finger?
"It's fine, the world is going to break anyway, you don't need other approval," Saya said, comforting the Nurse.
"Oh, um..." the nurse nodded.
We got off from the minibus and walked along the highway, we could have taken a shortcut, but Shizuka feared she wouldn't remember the path, surrounded by a bunch of building could indeed confuse you sometimes.
Along the way, I saw Shizuka still looked down, it seemed like Shido's words affected her that much.
Although she looked ditsy, she definitely took her vow seriously when she graduated from school, being insulted like that and remained careless was unseemingly.
"Shizu... err, teacher," I said, I never really called out anyone with the words 'teacher', my mentor Jaka just told me to call him by that name, he said there was no official title for assassin's trainer, so there was no need to call him 'Master' or 'Mentor'.
"Yes, Rama?" she glanced at me with a slight smile.
"My mentor once told me, the profession is not something that the people call you, but something you have dedicated to practice and learn, so if there are people who told you that you are not a doctor or nurse, it doesn't mean you will stop being one."
"But I have abandoned people..." Shizuka gloomily said.
"Yet you will save others, don't you think it's a good exchange?" I smiled, "nobody told you what to do, but since you have decided to come with us, then you surely knew the consequence of this choice, right? And I am sincerely offered my gratitude here, teacher."
I stopped and bowed down my head, Shizuka was greatly surprised by my action, and soon the others; Takashi, Saya, Saeko, Rei, and Kohta also do the same, bowing their head.
"Ah, you kids..." Shizuka gave a long sigh, then she said with a serious tone, "then you better listen to me, okay? Don't overdo it!"
"Roger!"
We continued walking, at this time the heat from the sunset and panorama view was quite good, it's weird to feel this kind of way when there was perhaps a walking corpse ate a person in a building around us.
But enjoying small little things was not bad, it reminded us that we were still alive.
"Can I ask you a question?" At this moment, Saeko came to my side, smiling slightly.
"Sure."
"When you killed them, what are you feeling?"
I thought for a while, said, "I don't have any particular feeling, to me, killing them is no different than killing others, perhaps you can say that my heart has gone cold, but that's how it applied to all of the assassins; if we are to bring our emotion, then we are not fully assassin yet, we do not kill based on our emotion, we kill because we carried the order."
"Then what do you feel with your first kill?" Saeko mumbled, there was an inexplicable uneasiness in her eyes.
"My first kill... I was 12 at that time, and it was the requirement for my graduation from trainee rank, I had to kill this small drug dealer, I was alone and outnumbered, so I had to plan quite a lot to fulfill the task. In short, when I finally able to sink my dagger into that small drug dealer's heart, I... I would not lie... I was a little happy, perhaps it's because I succeed the mission, or maybe I had my first kill, but I was happy at that time, especially knowing my plan work, it's just... sort of that way."
"You already kill when you are 12?" Saeko said in a shock, but then she nodded her head, didn't seem to suspect my story at all, unlike Rei who questioned my status as an assassin.
"What about you? I can see you have no scruple in killing them, I know it's perhaps because you want to survive, but it's naturally will not be easy, right?"
"It's..." Saeko hesitated, she bit her lips, I could see her hand shook a little.
"It's okay if you don't want to tell me..." I thought for a while, then said, "but if you have any of suppressed feeling, it's better to let it out, it's not good to hide it away, it can make you depressed."
Saeko looked at me, then there was firmness in her eyes, she nodded, "Then I will tell you later when we are in the safe place."

Spoiler: Chapter 7

It was already night when we arrived at the home of Shizuka's friend, there were quite a lot of zombies that I had killed along the way, at least majority of them I killed by myself, it was about 90 zombies now, and my dagger was level 4.
I didn't know what was the occupation of Shizuka's friend, but she actually got a fucking humvee on the parking lot, Kohta said that humvee was a military type, so it's more likely she worked as a soldier, and if it was true, she ought to have guns in her closet in which Kohta was very excited for.
Nonetheless, a change from minibus to military humvee, I couldn't help but marvel at our luck, the body of this vehicle should be more durable than a minibus, and more flexible when running fast. While the others wanted to rest due to the long journey, I borrowed the car key for the humvee and with a reason to take it out for a spin, I drove it away from the house and used its reinforced body to ram any zombies I found.
Of course, I was taking account the car's fuel, therefore I only took about a couple of laps before returned to the house, when I got there, the women seemed to take a bath and the men tried to pry open a closet, Kohta said the guns should be in there because he found some ammo and other stuff.
"Here we go, 1... 2... 3!" with a joined power of two boys, Kohta and Takashi managed to break open the closet with a crowbar.
The moment it opened, I widened my eyes, those were not just a gun, that's an armory!
"Fufufu..." I looked at Kohta and saw the inner demon inside of him raised, the chubby innnocent-like dude disappeared and replaced by the gun mania.
The first weapon he held was a Spring-Field MI41 Super Match, but only Semi-Automatic, the second weapon was a Knight's SR equipped with a scope, something you couldn't get in Japan, so it was a modified AR-10. Then, he looked toward the closet and found a crossbow, a Barnet Wildcat CS, a Hunting-Crossbow made of England, and the last one held by Takashi, an Ithaca M35 Riot Shotgun, also had a scope.
We sat on the ground and started filling the bullets, also talking about the identity of Shizuka's friend, most of these weapons were illegal after all.
"They are not just illegal, each part of these weapons must be ordered specially, and even then, it would be still illegal to own them," Kohta said.
"So I guess she's not police officer, then?" Takashi frowned.
"Probably not even an average citizen, just looked at this house..." Kohta mumbled, putting a sharp bullet inside the magazine, "this is not a house a police officer can afford unless her family is super-rich or her boyfriend does."
As we continued preparing for the guns, we heard the joyous laughter and a rather weird screaming of the girls from inside the bathroom, while it didn't affect me, it still disturbed these two boys, especially Kohta, his face started to become dreamy.
"Will it be fine for them to laugh like that?" Kohta couldn't help but feel worried, but also didn't want them to stop.
"Compared to the sound from the elsewhere, this is alright," I looked for the remote and turned on the tv in the room, it showed the emergency news of the situation in the bridge.
"Yeah... it is chaotic there," Takashi picked a binocular and walked toward the balcony, monitoring the bridge, even in the night, it was very lit at the moment.
At this moment I saw a beautiful reporter started to talk about the current situation.
"The Tokonosu Police's West Branch's Blockade is still in effect, the Killer Disease has spread all over Japan and the entire world, because of that, people around the globe are in protest over how the situation is being handled. Furthermore, according to the reports we've received, many are fleeing to the ocean until this issue is resolved..."
"... Right now I am in front of a group of protesters, as they claimed the origin of the Killer Disease as the fault of the cooperation between the government and America for creating some sort of new weapon. But we are still unclear whether this is merely an accusation or they have the fact to support their claim..."
"That is crazy!" Takashi clenched his fists, continued with an outburst, "the dead man walking, the corpse raise from the dead, cannibalism, this is not something science can explain!"
"Well, a classic movie will use the theme of the end of the world phenomenon to explain the rise of the dead, but modern movie tended to use the virus as an explanation, creating some sort of biological weapon, so their claim is not really far-fetched," I said.
"But I think, they're just trying to cause hysteria, or maybe is the result of the disease? Are they left-wing radical?" Kohta kept observing the bridge with the binocular.
"Yeah, I have no doubt they are left-wing radical, taking advantage of this disaster to blame the government," Takashi twitched his mouth, "tch, they are no different than right-wing fascist, this is such a horrible disease."
"You seem to know quite a lot, Komuro," Kohta revealed a grin, which made Takashi let out a small huff.
"Well, my mother's coworker must have done the same thing, it's funny how they speak about war but do nothing against a bully in the school," Takashi looked at the other part of the city through the balcony, said in a worried tone, "I wonder how my mother fare against this, she just an elementary school's teacher, I can't imagine how she should keep calm all of those children..."
"Yes, unlike us, they may not have the ability to escape from the school at all, perhaps still trap in the classroom, waiting for rescue..." Kohta sighed.
At this moment, my eyes fixed on the television, it's not because of how the police fought against the zombies, but because... a single person walked from the line of the police.
He was slender, probably 20-ish, his hair was soft-looking flax-blonde, slightly wavy hair, and fair colored skin. And he actually wore the police's uniform, in his hand though, there is a sword...
A champion!
"Right now, we are seeing one of the officers stepped into the wave of the attackers, is he going to fight them all?"
In the split of a moment, the blonde dashed ahead, swung his sword toward a zombie's neck, and behead it, then he spun with his feet before launching another beheading toward the zombie on his left. The group of zombies, at least 15-20 them, all focused on the blonde, yet he was like a wind, his footwork was amazing, everywhere he visited, a zombie at least got beheaded or a stab in the forehead. His flexibility, his focus, it was inspiring, heroic, even the group of protesters went silent, it's like the camera also froze on the blonde.
20 zombies... got defeated by a single man, let alone when he was surrounded like that.
The blonde stopped, then he walked toward the protester, the leader of the group was startled, everyone could see the horror in his face, but in the camera, I could see it clearly, this blonde face... he was not scary at all, there was no threat, he was smiling in fact, his eyes were gentle, revealing the warmth that was missing from other people.
"Right now it's not the time to have a conflict with one another, please go home and lock your door, until there is a further notice from us, do not walk a step outside, we will also deliver provision when it is necessary," the blonde said, then he turned around, walked toward the reporter lady, she couldn't help but blush at the blonde's smile.
"Miss, you have done a great job, people need support from the media to know the real situation and motivation to survive, so don't stop, alright?"
Then he walked toward the other side of the city, our side, there was no fear or hesitation in his steps.
"Ah..." the reporter lady just recovered, she slapped her own face and shouted, "excuse me, but officer, who are you?"
The blonde stopped, he turned his face over the shoulder, said gently, "My name is Evans, I am your protector."
Then he continued walking ahead.
I was blinking several times, couldn't even stop staring, with a swallow in my throat, I could say, this guy... Evans... he would be a tough enemy to face.
At this moment, I saw a pair of my arms stretched into Takashi, with a great response, I was about to kick him away, thinking it was a zombie, but who knew, it turned out just Shizuka, clad only in her bathrobe!
"Waaah!"
Poor Takashi, he was clung by a heavy-weight that was Shizuka, I was not talking about her body, but those pair of milk jugs, seriously, how she could walk around carrying them was beyond me. I saw her face was red, probably drinking some alcohol...
"Kohta-chaaan~" after Takashi put her down, she looked at Kohta and mewled toward him, then she kissed him on the cheek.
It's an effective attack! Kohta spurted blood from his nose and deemed unable to continue to fight.
"Hehe, Rama... you such a good boy..." I dodged to the right and made her fell on the bed.
"Ah, don't evade me~" she started throwing tantrum, who's the children here again?
"Teacher, you may don't want to talk so loud, you could have attracted them," Takashi came in front of her and shushed the nurse.
"But it's so quiet here... the outside is also the same, it's scary..." Shizuka mumbled, her expression was not depressed at all.
"What a headache, Takashi, take care of her..." I walked out of the room but immediately stumbled on the so-revealing-dress Rei Miyamoto, she surprised to see me and blushed. But it only lasted for a while before she suddenly fell on the ground, her cheek was red a little, was she drunk too?
"You alright, Rei?"
"Yeah, Rama, it just... so many things happen today..." she said with a somber look.
"Don't sit there, otherwise, you get cold," I extended my hand to help her stand.
"I don't know what happens anymore... Hisashi died... I can't communicate with my father... my friends turn into a monster... all of this chaos..." for some reason, she started sobbing. When someone dipped into alcohol, sometimes their inner feeling would release, the girl held back her depression because she knew there was no time to feel sad, now she unleashed it all.
At this moment, Takashi came out from the room with Shizuka on his back, he saw Rei was crying and looked at me questioning eyes, I merely shrugged in response, said it was not my fault.
But since Takashi was Rei's childhood friend, perhaps it was better for her to confide into him, so I took over Shizuka this... all meaty women, and placed her in the living room, besides the sexy-attire looking Saya who slept on the couch.
Looking at all of these women, I would be lying if I said they were not tempting, but I got some better control of my body, so I could face all of these with a peaceful mind.

Spoiler: Chapter 8

I felt my lips turned dry at the sight of this obscene scene, couldn't help but sigh, I didn't know maybe because I returned into a teenager that my biological response was more unstable than usual. As an assassin, we didn't really distance ourselves from the desire of humanity, when there was no order, we would go out, have a drink and enjoy the touch of a whore, we sometimes even went to the cinema to watch some movies. Naturally, it was not just for the sake of wasting time, we honed our social skill, being an assassin didn't mean we lurked in the dark and appeared grim the entire time, sometimes we disguised, or pretended to be nice, all for the sake of completing our mission.
We also accepted our death whether because we failed of our mission or success but unable to escape, we would commit suicide at that time to prevent the enemy from catching us, thus did not reveal the information of our brotherhood.
I walked into the kitchen, only to find Saeko in an apron with underwear were the clothing left on her body, really these women... did Shizuka's friend lack of dress or what?
"Is that you, Rama? The dinner will be readied soon, please be patient for a little while..." she lifted a spatula for soup while looking at me over her shoulder.
I remembered what she said before we arrived here, there was something she wanted to tell me but she couldn't in the public, how much of a secret it was I had no idea, but it was clearly something very sensitive. I didn't know whether she would say it now, and I didn't really insist her to. After I gave a brief nodded and went to the refrigerator to look for a cool drink, there was a pack of can beers, several of them had missing, probably the drink these women took.
I took one and flicked the can open, my alcohol tolerance was medium, so drink about 1 wouldn't make me drunk, instead, it would make my body warm and up for another mission.
"That smell nice, you are really good at cooking, do you do this very often?" I looked at the pot that let out steam, my stomach was rumbling all of a sudden.
"Well... I am only living with my father, so the chore duties fell on my shoulder," Saeko said, smiling at me.
"Hmm..." I didn't follow up on the question, whatever happened with her mother, it wasn't my right to ask, "you said your father is on martial arts conference abroad? Is he a master?"
"Oh, yes, the Busujima family is a long line of kendoist, we have our own technique and my father also has several disciples," Saeko said.
"Do you bother for sparring next time? It will be great to test my skill against your technique," I said while continued to sip on my beer.
"Challenge accepted, it's been quite a while I fought skilled people," Saeko flashed a confidence smile.
We went silent for a while, I sat on the kitchen table while Saeko continued her cooking, it was really good to have a tranquil moment like this. I looked at her, I was giving her a chance to her to speak her problem, but she kept silent, after several minutes she spoke nothing, I dropped down from the table and walked away.
"Mmmhh..." As I walked up the stairs, I saw Rei and Takashi hugged in each other embrace and joined their lips, the shoulder strap of Rei's clothes slipped off a bit, revealing a small and smooth piece of skin, Takashi also had his forearms nudged against her bulging chest, while she had her both arms around his waist.
It was not because they stuck in their own world that they unable to sense my arrival, but because of how low the sound of my footsteps, even I knew not to disturb the couple at the moment, since both of their closed, I took this chance to slip passed by them unnoticed, then continued to the bedroom.
I saw Kohta was already full of gear, there was a military vest on his body and a sniper of his back, the rifle and shotgun lined up beside him, he looked at the street with binocular.
I didn't know when, but the street in the neighborhood was crawling with the zombies, the corner of my lips couldn't help but curl upward, it's like the god itself delivering me these zombies.
Hmm... it's a good opportunity, why should I waste it? But it's better to have a more narrow space to fight and not have enemies on both sides, I thought for a while and had an idea, I took the rifle with me, and I also had several knives from the convenience store before, with only that I walked out from the house, I told Kohta not to tell anyone, albeit he hesitated out of concern of my safety, he really couldn't stop me, so he promised he would back me up.
I climbed up the wall fence around the house, the height was enough to distance myself from the range of reach of these zombies, only some of them actually noticed me. I kept walking along the line of the wall, hopping from one house to another, after 3 blocks away, I sneaked inside a house, killed a couple of zombies there, then I opened the house's window, all of them, I searched their cupboard for appropriate music, and as soon as I found them, I smirked and turned on their entertainment system.
Immediately, in the once tranquil area filled with the moaning of zombies, there was loud music, very loud coming from the house.
The zombies, from the nearby area to several blocks could hear the sound, they started making their way toward the source, Kohta who watched the army of the dead marched in the same direction couldn't help but swallow his throat and broke a cold sweat, this is insane!
"Takashi, do you hear that?" Rei said in a gasp, her cheek had blushed red and sweating a lot, her plump breast was kneaded in Takashi's hand.
"Music? But from where?" Takashi also woke up from the sea of desire, feeling embarrassed himself for taking advantage of Rei's vulnerability, as much as he wanted her, he shouldn't have done it this way.
He stood up from the stairs and headed toward the bedroom, Rei followed from behind and they finally knew the reason of the music.
"That's crazy, he could have died!" Rei exclaimed upon hearing it, quickly went sober from her drunken state and dashed out, seemingly wanted to help posthaste.
"Wait, Rei, remember Rama is not like us, he has the skill, he has the knowledge, he pretty much knows what he is doing, otherwise, he will not do this," Takashi reached out to grasp Rei's hand, she bit her lips and stopped.
"But why he must do this? As long as we keep silent, the zombies will not notice us..." Rei said.
"He says his mission is to kill zombies, this is a chance he doesn't want to let up, besides, he is fully armed, there is the confidence of his survival..." Kohta seriously said.
"His mission..." Rei mumbled.
Back on the house, after I turned on the entertainment system, I went to the kitchen and turned out the house's stove, letting the gas out, then I opened the front door and sat on the ground, waiting for the zombies to arrive, it wasn't long before the first one to come, I stood up, taking out my dagger and knife, as soon as the zombie was in front of me, I stabbed its chest with the knife and brought it down to its feet, then I stabbed the zombie's temple with my dagger, the next one came, I stabbed its jaw and tilted its head to the side, then I stabbed the back of its head with my dagger.
There were more and more zombies, three came to me at once, I stabbed the stomach of the middle zombie and pulled it to the left, smashing it with its fellow zombie, while I twisted the dagger in my right hand and stabbed the zombie through its eye, then I pulled back the middle zombie to the right one, slamming against its already dead fellow, I stabbed the left zombie with my dagger on its side of the head, then I finished off the middle zombie with a stab on the back head.
For the time being, I have relentlessly killed zombies, I threw my knives and dagger when I saw the chance, and able to retrieve them back. Time to time, I was pushed back, at this time, from the door to the living room, there was a banging, clearly, the zombies had also entered the living room, I climbed the stairs backward, my both hands didn't stop swinging the knife and dagger, the former to subdue the zombie, and the latter to finish them off.
I continued to retreat, all the way to the last bedroom in the house, I stepped into the balcony, I looked down and saw there were countless zombies waiting for me, I stepped on the guard of the balcony and jumped down toward the house's wall fence.
Kohta, Takashi, Rei, and the newly joined Saeko were horrified when they saw Rama cornered into the balcony, especially almost screamed when he jumped down, but they saw he could step on the wall fence safely, they couldn't help but feel relief, rubbing their tensed chest.
"This is far intense than watching horror," Kohta wiped the cold sweat.
"We should do something, what if he slips or something..." Rei said in a concerned tone.
"If he did this without telling us, it means he didn't really need our help, so we better stay put for a while, otherwise, we ruin his plan," Saeko calmly said, but one could notice the uneasiness in her eyes.
"I..." Takashi clenched his fist, clearly, he wanted to do something but also didn't know what he supposed to do.
I climbed down the fence and stepped into the wall, ran across toward the house in the opposite, I sneaked inside, cleaned it from several zombies, then I went to the house's balcony, the direction was directly the house's living room, lifting up the rifle in my hand, although I was not a very good shooter, at least with the assistance of the scope, I could aim better, I shot a couple of times but nothing happened yet, only after the six or seven shots, the air in the living room suddenly lit with fire!
*Kaboom!*
The entire living room blew up, swallowing the zombies in and the surrounding in a flame, the house was burning, smoke high in the air.
I nodded in satisfaction, of course, my mission was not done, I repeated the same process about three times, only after that the population of zombies in the street thoroughly wiped out.
Kohta, Takashi, Rei, and Saeko couldn't help but cheer, although they were rather shocked at the conclusion, the less the zombies, the better it was!
I felt my feet and arms were quite numb, I checked up on the information in my head and felt quite proud.
[Zombie kill: 170, remaining: 830.]
[1st tier weapon: Grey Dagger, Level: 5, Evolve?]
I was surprised at the progress of my dagger, I quickly confirmed to evolve my dagger, soon it covered in a blinding light and the previous grey colored and simple dagger turned into brown with an interesting marking on it.
[2nd tier weapon: Brown Dagger, Level:1, available upgrade: ability and evolve]
[In level 5, you can pick either ability or evolve; if you pick evolve, you will lose the chance to gain the ability, but if you pick ability, you can still evolve your weapon at level 10]
[Ability (you can only pick one among the following three): Reflex (increase the response of your body), Speed (increase the velocity of your action), or Mastery (increase the proficiency of your dagger skill)]

Spoiler: Chapter 9

The entire neighborhood lit up with three houses under fire, I carried the rifle on my left shoulder and walked toward Shizuka's friend's house. At this moment I stumbled into two people; one was a middle-aged man in an office white shirt, the other was a little girl with pink hair, she hid behind the man and looked at me with terrified eyes, probably because I was drenched in blood.
"Are you... are you the one who burn these houses?" the middle-aged man said after a slight hesitation, I nodded in response.
"Do you have a group in a safe place or are you alone?"
"I am with a group."
The middle-aged man gritted his teeth, then his eyes revealed firm expression, pulled the girl to the front, and said, "Please, take my daughter with you!"
I wrinkled my eyebrow while the little girl snapped her head toward her father in surprise, quickly spouted, "No, daddy, Alice doesn't want to leave you!"
"No, Alice... you are safer with them than with daddy, your daddy can't protect your mommy, daddy doesn't want Alice also to get hurt," the middle-aged man said with a gentle voice, I could sense his tone was slightly cracking, of course, he didn't want to separate with his daughter, but her safety was the most important.
"Mister, aren't you rather reckless? What if my group is not good people? You risk your daughter this way..." I said.
"Are you?" the middle-aged man looked at me with a same smile, making me speechless for a while. I didn't know what this man used to judge me, was it because I burned houses that he thought I was a good person? That seemed unrealistic, and what if I told him a lie? That I didn't have a group at all or a safe place? This guy bet on my words only!
"Daddy, why can't you just come with me, we..." the little girl glanced at me with tearful eyes, "mister, please take daddy too."
"Hush, Alice, your daddy can only be a burden to them, but Alice is still a little girl, they will not complain about you," the father said, I couldn't help but frown a little, although I knew the father just wanted to comfort his daughter, the logic behind his words were really fucked up, how could a grown-up be more useless than a child?
"No, no, Alice doesn't want to leave daddy!" Alice grabbed her father's shirt and started weeping, somehow making the father and I felt awkward.
"Well, mister we are planning to go to the other side of the city, one of my friends has a family that possibly set up a big protection site, I can deliver you and your daughter to that place, how about it?" I said after thinking for a while; if there was no humvee in our side, I would have hesitated to take this pair of father and daughter.
"That... that will be a great help, thank you!" the father said with joy in his face, the thought of finding a sanctuary in this place perhaps everyone's dream at the moment.
"Come on, Alice, say 'thank you' to the big brother," he caressed the back head of his daughter, her big eyes stared at me, colorful with tears but no longer a sad one.
"Un, big brother, thank you!" the girl bowed her head, I had to say she's rather cute.
I took them back to the house, along the way, I had asked several questions to determine what kind of person this middle-aged man, his name was Suichi Maresato, he worked as a newspaper reporter before, and when the crisis occurred, he was trying to get his wife and Alice to cross the bridge, but his wife got bitten by the zombies along the way, and with how many these zombies around, he didn't have the confidence to protect his daughter, thus the reason why he was ready to send his daughter to a larger group, although he knew it was more than likely for these people to accept a child, he didn't have much faith that I would take his daughter, but knowing I complied despite just delivering not just her, but also him to the safe zone, at least he decided to trust me for the time being.
As for the daughter, Alice Marisato, she's 7 years old, quite clever for a girl at her age as Suichi said she's also able to speak English quite well.
"Rawr... rawr!" in front of the house, there was a small puppy barked, then it noticed our arrival and quickly came over, wagging its tail and gave me a friendly bark.
"Way, a puppy~," Alice said in glee, crouching on the ground and opened her arms to offer a hug, the puppy surprisingly smart and hopped into Alice's bosom.
"Alice..." Suichi said with bitterness, it's already good these people wanted to take them in even though only a brief, how could they bring a dog in?
I wrinkled my eyebrows, these zombies, although they were reacting to sound, they did not attack animals; if this dog roamed free, it almost could be guaranteed its survival, but if it came along with us, what if the bark drew unintended attention? On the other hand, we would have a great distraction asset on our side, much better than looking for an entertainment unit in any house. I thought for a pro and con for a while, finally decided to take the puppy along, it might have great use in the future.
Naturally, my arrival with three other companions had been known by the group, the women still hadn't yet finished their laundry, therefore, Suichi quickly took by the men to the upstairs room while Alice stayed with them in the living room, I had to bear Saya's protest for taking people into their group before discussing it with them first, but then again, what's the point? I knew they would accept it nonetheless.
"Ah... tired," I sat on the sofa in the room, blowing a mouthful of air, seriously my arms felt quite numb and legs almost couldn't bear it, the urge to sleep was imminent.
"Thank you for the hard work," Saeko came to my side and offered me a hot tea, although I wasn't fond of hot drink, I never reject something nice. After expressing my gratitude, I took a sip of the tea, the herbal scent and taste almost rejuvenated my body immediately.
"That's quite reckless, Rama, what if something bad happens?" Rei sat on my other side, her face was both angry and worry.
"In order to achieve something, one must prepare to face great risk," I said while closing my eyes, leaning back on the backrest.
"That is true... but you don't have to do it alone..." Rei mumbled.
"I am sorry, Rei, I am quite tired, can we talk later?" I opened my eyes slightly and revealed a little smile, Rei seemed to embarrass and she no longer asked me anything. When I closed my eyes, I quickly drifted to my slumber, but it didn't mean I was really deep in sleep, I could still feel the change in the surrounding area, the sound, the temperature, the light between the gap of eyes, a slight touch on my body; if anyone wanted to wake me, they just have to cry out gently, and I would awake.
At this moment, I felt a pair of hands softly kneaded my legs, I opened my eyes slightly and saw Saeko massaging me, I wrinkled my eyebrows, at first I wanted to tell her that this was unnecessary, but I had to admit, her touch was indeed feel good, was it because her mother was long gone that she had spent a long time taking care of her father, thus she good at things like this?
Although I didn't know why she bothered on doing this, I didn't complain, finally shut my eyes, and continued sleeping.

---

Somewhere in the city, the situation was getting worst, not only the zombies were on a rampage, even some people helped in creating more disturbance, not only they killed the zombies, but they also hunted down the survivor, their expression was crazy, full of murderous intention, people ran about in the street carrying stolen items from many stores, and from a secluded place in the alley, one could also hear the desperate groan of a woman and maniacal laugh of a man.
Down with their fear of the zombies, turning them into no more than a beast to destroy, in their mind, they could have died any moments, so might as well live their life to the fullest.
It took them this crisis to know that humans were eventually would die, regardless of age, place, wealth, and position.
"Please, mercy, mercy..." a woman, somewhat in her mid-twenty, crouched on the ground, her both hands lifted in the air to defense against the incoming attack of a big man in front of her.
*Whack* *Whack*
He didn't stop, his eyes went wide with ecstasy, a baseball bat in hand kept pummeling the woman below, the bruises and bluish mark on her face it's like watching the greatest show on earth.
"More... beg more... plead for your life..." the man was howling with happiness, mixed with insanity in which unknown how high it had been. The woman shed tears from the corner of her eyes, it's a humiliation and pain she would have never thought to receive.
"Say my lord... say, my master..." he swung the baseball bat again and smacked the woman's arm, a clear crackle tone reverberated in the air, one could her hand slightly bent.
"No, master... master... beg your mercy..."
"Haha, that's great, you're awesome, this master shall deliver you his benevolent!" he said out loud and swung down his baseball bat heavily.
"Oi, mate!"
At this moment, a thunderous voice resounded from behind him, he turned his face in a snap and saw a huge man, brown hair and mustache around his mouth, he was wearing a simple shirt and black leather pants, a furry brown coat over his shoulder. A long and sharp spear rested on the back of his neck.
"Who are you? Mind your own business!" the man snorted and prepared to beat the shit out of the woman in front of him.
"I won't leave unless you let go that poor woman!"
"You..." the man took a deep breath, then turned around, swaying his baseball bat and tapping it on his palm, said, "what did I tell you before?"
"That you are a miserable fool who only knows how to abuse woman?" the huge man smirked.
"So? What is it to you, big guy? You want to stop me?" the man laughed.
"That I do," the huge man nodded and started to walk toward the man.
Looking at him perhaps 10 centimeters taller than him, the man slightly retreated in panic, then he looked at the woman behind him, twitched his lips, and said, "Alright, no more step or I kill this precious woman of you!"
The huge man stopped, seeing his threat worked, the man laughed wildly, said, "Hah, you are the one who fools, there are many women in this world, why to bother to care about this one? She's not even pretty!"
"Mate, let me tell you one thing, you don't look at face, gold, or clothes to save a person," the huge man said.
"Save a person?! Hahaha, there is still a person like that in this world, hah, what a bunch of hypocrites, you save her probably because you want to fuck her!"
"A crazy like you will not understand," the huge man shook his head.
"Call me crazy one more time..." the man clenched his hand on the baseball handle, his face looked furious, it's like one moment away from turning into a beast.
"Crazy."
"Fuck you bastard, die!" the man ran forward, his baseball bat readied to strike.
The huge man didn't move, with seriousness in his face, the moment the man swung his baseball bat, the huge man extended his hand and grasped the bat, a clear thud sound reverberated in the area.
"W... what...?" the man looked quite horrified, he was sure that swing of the bat was powerful, it was enough to cause a huge amount of pain when it hit a person, but this huge man, he only twitched slightly, although he could see his arm was trembling at the impact, he firmly grasped the head of the bat.
"Let... let go, let go my bat, you bastard..." the man tried to pull his bat, but it was to no avail.
The huge man stared at him for a while, then he lifted his foot and kicked the man, he easily thrashed the ground and lost the bat. The huge man cast aside the baseball bat in his hand, then he brandished the spear, walking slowly toward the man.
"Go away, ah... forgive me, forgive me, I regret it," the man crawled backward, one hand extended as if he wanted to stop the huge man from afar, but inches per inches, the huge man was getting closer.
Finally, he was looming before the man, said, "Do you have the last word?"
"What?"
*Puchi!*
In the blink of the eye, the huge man moved his spear and stabbed the man in the chest, the man stared in horror at the blade sank into his flesh, then it was pulled out not long after, spurting his blood in the process.
"That's what most of these people always said..." the huge man complained slightly, then he looked at the woman, she was terrified and trembling in his presence, even though this man had just saved her life.
The huge man didn't bother to tell anything to her, he turned around and walked away, along the way, his spear turned from grey into a brown color, a smirk appeared on his squared jaw.

 

Chapter 10

It was three in the morning when I woke up, my strength had almost recovered, I looked around the living room, most of the girls were sleeping here. The little girl Alice clung onto Shizuka's big chest, looking very comfortable in her sleep. Rei and Saeko were both on the sofa, but I didn't see Saya anywhere.

Maybe she was on the lookout duty? I thought for a while and stood up, walking toward the bedroom upstairs. Sure enough, I saw her wearing some sort of denim upper garment while standing on the balcony, Suichi also with her, they seemed to converse about something. Takashi and Kohta were sleeping on the bed.

"How is it?"

"Kyaaa!"

I was talking in a usual voice, but maybe because it was too quiet, the pink-haired noble girl was startled by it, even Suichi was slightly surprised.

"What? What happened? Enemy Attack?!" Kohta rose up from the bed, his posture was ready but his face was still drowsy, including Takashi also jumped to awake.

"Nothing happens, go back to sleep..." Saya said with redness on her cheek, soon the two boys drifted back to their slumber.

"Rama, can you not sneak up on people like that? You almost gave me a heart attack..." Saya pouted.

I shook my head, I didn't have such intention, I ignored her complain and walked toward the balcony, saw the street outside and there was no zombie, I hoped it's not because the entire city had been cleared up, otherwise, it was really my lost.

"If not for the smell of the burning house, I will have mistaken this for our usual day," Shuichi said.

Then he continued, "I still remember yesterday morning, I sat in front of my computer in the office and drank a hot coffee, now I am here, looking out in case there is a dead man walking... it's strange how much something can change in the matter of one day."

I nodded, but what happened to them was nothing compared to me, one moment I died, and the next moment, I had become one of the Gods' champions; if this didn't happen to myself, I would have not believed it.

"You can still drink a hot coffee, you know..." I said.

Shuichi smiled, "I drank coffee before so I will not get drowsy to fulfill the deadline, now I drink coffee so I will not let anyone die."

Saya frowned a while, biting her thumb and said, "Our response is still too late, I mean where is the military? Where is the big evacuation and quarantine zone? Why there is no information about it at all? We heard the nations all over the world had tightened their border and raised up their security, in time like this, the world's alliance would surely collapse soon, each nation only thinks about their own people."

"Can you blame them? As long as they have no information about this crisis, they can't be bothered to open their country to others at the moment," I sighed.

"Hmm..." Shuichi crossed his arms, then he said, "actually, I have talked about this with Ms. Takagi, one of my coworkers was investigating a case of several missing ships around the island on the off-shore of Tokonosu, he said something about secret research had been conducted to identify the native plants of that island. Although his case led to nothing, and he was forced to drop the subject, he got a word about a plant called 'Netherflower'."

"Netherflower?" I wrinkled my eyebrows, I had quite some knowledge regarding dangerous plants, but I never heard this Netherflower.

"An Urban Legend, it was said that long ago, there was a tribe in that island who worshipped a certain God, with its blessing, the island was prospered and rich of exotic herbs, and this tribe could take advantage of it any time they wanted, with only one flower as an exception, the Netherflower. And then there was a world war, the invader encroached into the island and slaughter the tribe, one of the warriors ran into the deep forest in despair and finally crossed the taboo, he ate the Netherflower."

"After eating it, his flesh turned rotten, his skull came out from his face, his teeth became sharp, nails also turned longer, yet he was granted immortality, sword and bullets no longer mattered, and with that power, this mutated warrior fought the invader and successfully drove them away."

"The legend said, until today, that mutated warrior still alive, somewhere in that island, protecting it in case there is another invasion..."

After Saya finished speaking, I couldn't help but put it into my thought, this could be the origin of this outbreak, the secret research about the Netherflower, and maybe this mutated warrior could possibly the patient zero, they conducted an experiment on it and a mistake happened, the lab was compromised and the virus got spread outside, but if that was the case, if the virus was airborne, then shouldn't be anyone is infected now?

Or maybe the patient zero was transported into the different lab and he got loose? Then he possibly spread this virus from one person to another person.

"But it is just an Urban legend, the island that we are speaking off has been long turned into a resort, hell, it is one of the most sought resorts in the world, although there is indeed a trace of an invasion, the native people of the island still alive, some even work in the resort," Saya raised her shoulder.

We chatted for a while then I sent Saya to take another rest, I also sent Shuici to sleep, it would be dawn soon and we planned to move out in the early morning.

Other than one or two zombies crossed the road, there was really nothing else, climbed down the balcony, and hopped onto the fence wall, killing off these zombies like stomping on a cockroach. I took a look at my dagger, it's clean and flawless like usual, one the most difficult thing about killing was to hide a murder weapon; if you could kill and then erased the trace of your murder, that also means hiding the crime weapon, then the murder could be perfect, no one would have suspected you even though you were brought into questioning and they found your dagger, as long as there was no sign of blood in the blade, you could always get away from the suspect, well, theoretically.

About 2 hours later, the rest of the group had awoken, Saeko prepared breakfast and including packing for lunch, the men transported all the necessary stuff into the humvee and the rest of the girls took another bath for the last time.

After making sure anything readied, I manned the wheel and drove the humvee from the parking lot, because of its reinforced steel, the humvee could fight against the current of the river, which mostly could sweep away a normal car, even the minibus, we arrived at the other side of the city and continued making our way toward Takagi's house, it wasn't long until the roar of the humvee attracted the attention of the deadmen walking, I could only ram a handful of them before I had to step on the break, looking at the scene in front of me.

There was a road blockade made of wire and formed a net, although I had confident the humvee could break through it, yet there was no reason for me to do it since whoever set up this means the other side of the blockade was probably safe.

Let's just hope they quite friendly, I honked the humvee several times, I knew it was a great risk and attracted more zombies, but it was the only way to alarm the people on the other side. Afterward, I let Shuichi took over while I got out of the car, looking at the 40-50 zombies behind us, slowly marching for the fresh meat ahead.

"you are not fighting alone this time..." Saeko came out, stood on my side with her bokken ready, Hirano popped out from the top of the humvee and prepared the support fire, Rei and Takashi, I rather let them guard the humvee, Rei still had a knife-modified broomstick, Takashi also had his baseball bat but also carried on the shotgun.
I was armed with a crossbow, multiple knives, and the dagger, Saeko's bokken also had a knife attached on the pointy end.

This was the battle of defense, I hoped the rescue didn't fail us yet.

 

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