Turn Two

I slapped my hand over my mouth in fright. I didn't mean to scream then. They just scared me since they came out of nowhere. I could hear Mr Saizo and Ryuu yell to check on me but couldn't answer. I was so scared to make any more noise.

I waited till my breathing was calmer before I shuffled to look around the pile of rubble I hid behind. I winced a little bit, looked down, and saw that my knees grazed. Probably when I jumped to cover. The tears that started to well up in my eyes caused everything to go blurry, and when I finished rubbing my eyes, I continued to look for the bad guys that were nearby.

"I see a small group of zombies nearby, I'll go and get rid of them," Mr Saizo reported.

Zombies. That's what they're called according to Mr Saizo and Ryuu. I guess that's what they're called.

I slowly straightened up and peeked over the top of the rubble I was hiding behind and nearly screamed again when I saw that the…zombies had gotten closer. Before I knew it, I realised that instead of screaming, I had jumped up and straightened fully, and the zombies had noticed where I was.

I sprinted away.

The System wasn't joking when it said that it would give "Watchtowers" extra agility. The speed that I ran at was so quick, it was almost freeing. The wind that flew past my face as I ran was cooling and nice to feel.

A Window popped up in front of me and I stopped running. It said that I had just received 30EXP. That must have been from Mr Saizo.

Mr Saizo and Ryuu seem to handle the zombies really easily. It must be great to be able to fight back. I imagine being able to get EXP all by yourself must be very rewarding.

I looked around to make sure that there were no enemies — no zombies or anything — near me, and I brought up the map and saw that Ryuu had made good progress towards the POI location that I showed to him.

I pushed the map Window to the side and took a deep breath in as I closed my eyes.

I willed the "Detect" skill to activate and when I opened them again, my vision widened. I wouldn't be able to describe the sensation to anyone, it was so weird to experience the first time I used the skill. My field of vision had increased so much that without turning my head, I could almost see what was directly beside me, and everything that I could see looked a bit warped — a bit curved.

Everything was also in black and white and looked almost like I could see what was through the walls. I don't know if that was what I was actually doing, but whatever the skill actually does, it makes my head spin a little bit once I stop using the skill.

Once I made sure that there was nothing important near me, within 50 metres or so, I pushed further out. As I extended my vision further and further, I noticed the bright glowing points that represented Mr Saizo and Mr Mobito. I was about north-east of them, about 700 metres away.

Using their location as my guide, I turned to my left slightly and continued to scan further and further away with my "Detect" skill.

800 metres.

900 metres.

1000 metres.

I stopped searching when I saw the glowing point that I knew was Ryuu. He was still making his way. At that point, he was around 1018 metres away from where I was. It seemed like he was making good progress. I scanned past Ryuu and before long, I found what I was looking for. This glowing point in the far distance was slightly different than the others, that I saw so far, and that's how I knew that it was the POI that we should be looking for.

As far as I could tell, since the POI was moving, it meant that it was probably one of the enemies' own "Soldiers" or something, and not whatever Ryuu found the first time around since that one didn't move at all. At least, this POI hadn't moved very far in the time between the first time I scanned it, and now.

I looked at the distance indicator. 1672 metres, and decreasing ever so slowly. Placing the marker in the map from the "Detect" skill was strange.

I raised my right arm and could see it in my vision, slightly obscured by the black-and-white effect of the "Detect" skill. I made a grabbing motion at the glowing point with my hand and slid it across to where I thought the map Window I had put to the side was. There was a soft chime that told me that it had worked and I closed my eyes once more and deactivated the skill.

I waited for a second before opening my eyes again to give myself time to adjust, but even then I was still a little bit dizzy as my vision went back to normal. Normal as in, in drab, dark colours and at my normal field of vision.

When my feet were steady again, I looked around once more and realised that a few zombies had spawned near me and started to approach me. I thought about heading back over to Mr Saizo. I'm sure he could help, but then I remembered about how Mr Mobito was doing. Mr Saizo's job was to make sure that nothing happened to Mr Mobito, and what if my being there with them caused more enemies to come towards us and Mr Saizo gets overwhelmed? That wouldn't be good. As I was about to sprint away, I paused. I didn't want to run away again. All this time, I had been running. When I wasn't running, I was captured by the —

I shook my head. I had to focus. I looked back at the zombies that were trudging along towards me and noted that I still had time.

I squinted through the slight darkness that simulated nighttime in this task area and saw that there was a building that was still mostly standing in the wrecked streets. I started to make my way there, quick enough to keep my distance away from the zombies, but I didn't want the zombies to lose track of me.

As I got closer to the building, and I saw more and more details in it, my heart started to race. Not out of fear, but more out of excitement as I started to think up a plan as to how to deal with the zombies that were following me.

I finally reached the perimeter of the building, and walked through an archway that seemed to be where a door would have gone, back when these buildings weren't wrecked and damaged. I found myself in a pretty large open area.

To my right, a massive hole that almost reached the archway I went through went around the corner of the wall and nearly reached the back right corner. Rubble from the hole piled up in a heap next to me. I could have stepped over the leftover wall to my side, but by entering through the archway, it seemed like the zombies were following my footsteps directly. I wanted that to happen because near the back right corner of this front room that I was in, right near the other edge of the massive hole in the building, laid a set of stairs that led up to a second floor.

I stood up on top of a small pile of bricks and looked directly up above me near the front archway. There seemed to be an almost circular hole that carved its way through the multiple floors of the building and gave me a straight and clear view of the dark sky.

Almost directly above me, the second-floor landing ended up at a drop point with no barricades. Whatever went through the building from the sky, destroyed the end section of the second-floor landing. This looked to me like a perfect lookout right at the entrance archway, and it gave me the perfect place to throw rubble down at the zombies when they entered the building.

I looked behind me and noted how far away the zombies were. They were in a direct line of sight to where I was. I saw three of them, and at the speed they were going, it seemed like it would still take them a long time to get to me and the building, so I went over to the big pile of rubble and started to look for chunks of brick and debris that were not too heavy for me to carry.

I found one that I thought would work for my plan and heaved it up awkwardly. I dropped it again when I realised that it was too heavy for me to transfer up to the second floor. I looked back up and tried to size up how much height the second-floor landing would give me above the zombies and quickly found another chunk of rubble that was slightly less heavy.

I still struggled to carry the block up the stairs and right to near the edge of the landing. I was panting and perspiring when I placed it down. I looked down at the block and then out above the archway where there was no wall and saw how much closer the zombies were, I realised that I didn't have enough time to go and search for another two chunks. One for each zombie. And that's if I don't miss my shots.

I took a closer look and saw that the chunk that I had carried up was made out of several stone blocks that looked like they were all stuck together by a hardened substance in between the stone blocks. I had never seen this kind of building making before. All the buildings in the Religious Community had been made out of wood. That's all I had ever known.

I noticed nearby on the second floor there were a few of the smaller blocks that had separated and broken up from the larger chunks. I picked one of the smaller blocks up and was surprised at how heavy a single one of them was. From what I could tell, there were about five or six of the smaller blocks in the chunk that I brought up, but when I looked down from my vantage point, I believed that if I were to put some force into throwing these smaller blocks down, it would still do some damage to the zombies.

I quickly made my way down the stairs one final time to grab as many of the smaller blocks that I could find that I thought might do the job and waited for the zombies to come to the building.

Not long after, I could hear the monsters when they groaned as they made their way over to the last spot they saw me. I grabbed the chunk that I brought up first and struggled to pick it up off the ground. As the first zombie came through the archway, it snapped its head towards my direction. The grip I had on the chunk slipped and I dropped the chunk down onto the floor. The whole landing shook and I paused. I could see the zombie start to climb over the small hill of debris that I stood on before when I looked straight up and knew that I was running out of time for my chance to drop the chunk on top of the zombie.

I gritted my teeth and picked up the chunk again and quickly made my way closer to the edge before I awkwardly shoved the chunk away from my body and over the edge of the second-floor landing. I managed to time the drop just perfectly so that the chunk actually managed to drop on the top of the zombie's forehead as it looked up at me with one swollen eyeball.

The weight from the chunk and gravity made the zombie's head flick back and shrunk into its own neck on its way down straight onto what looked like the zombie's back. I heard a couple of things cracked and winced away and heard a couple of things drop heavily to the ground as well as several moans and groans interrupted.

[YOU HAVE GAINED 30EXP FOR KILLING A BASIC ZOMBIE]

When I looked back over the edge of the hole in the second-floor landing, I could see the first zombie had crumpled down into a messy heap of bone and flesh and the sudden change of status that the first zombie went through from being a normal zombie to an obstacle of bone and rotten flesh, meant that the two zombies behind it had tumbled over their fallen teammate.

I looked at the notification and realised that I gained as much EXP from killing one zombie myself as when Mr Saizo had killed a group of them. Does that mean that if I managed to kill more monsters myself, I can get stronger faster? That would mean I would stop not be as much of a burden to Mr Saizo and Ryuu.

I knew what I had to do now. I grabbed one of the smaller blocks now and looked over the edge of the landing and saw that the two zombies had gotten back up and one of them was standing still and looking up right at me. I tensed and put more force into my throw this time and chucked the block down at the skeleton. Unfortunately, I was slightly off this time, but the block clipped the zombie's collarbone and I heard it break before it bounced off the body and landed on the ground with a heavy thud.

The zombie staggered a bit, its right shoulder had popped out of its socket and its right collarbone was broken, I guess that meant it was less of a threat if I had to get up close and personal, but I wasn't happy.

I grabbed another block and took a couple of deep breaths to calm down and prepare myself. I leant forward again over the edge of the landing and used my other hand to point at the target that I was aiming for like dad had taught me, right at the empty face of the zombie and as I held my arm that held the block high, about to throw the block down at it, the floor underneath my feet crumbled. I was only able to yelp before a series of thuds and crashing as stone met stone completely surrounded me.

When I finally opened my eyes, I realised that I had managed to fall down back to the ground floor. Luckily, I managed to land on top of the rubble instead of being crushed by any. My ears were ringing and felt like they were burning. I got a second Window that informed me that I had killed another zombie so that was good. The segment of landing that I fell down with must have crushed the zombie.

I frowned as I struggled to get up. Where was the third zombie?

My back and shoulders were hurting really bad so I cautiously tried to stretch and as I was doing that I looked up just in time to see the third zombie had stepped over the edge of the second landing and was falling right on top of me.

Thank the One Creator for the extra agility and speed that the "Watchtower" status provided me with because I managed to jump up and away from where I had sat just before the zombie landed on the rubble face first. There was one final loud crack and as the zombie's body went limp, another Window informed me that the zombie was dead and I was gifted the EXP.

I realised that there was another Window that said that I was LEVEL 4 and when I checked my Status Window, I was even almost up to LEVEL 5.

"I ran into a big group of zombies. They're all dealt with but," Ryuu said over the comms, "are you okay Kat? You screamed twice!" There was a lot of panic in Ryuu's voice, I could tell.

I breathed in deeply before responding, "yeah, sorry. A few zombies scared me. But I managed to deal with them."

"Well done!" Mr Saizo's voice rang out. I could hear the relief and pride in his voice.

"Keep safe." Ryuu simply said.

"I'm sorry that I didn't answer straight away, I didn't want to make any noise, I was scared."

"As long as you're safe now." Mr Saizo assured me.

I could tell that Ryuu was still worried about me, but he tried to sound confident and strong, "are you okay to update the POI location for me, I can't seem to find it."

I nodded, then felt silly since I was alone and no one could see what I was doing. I quickly activated the "Detect" skill and updated the location of the POI on the map for him. They were really close to each other now. Nearly 200 metres away.

I was about to say something to the Party when I heard a voice in the distance.

In a low voice, I warned Mr Saizo and Ryuu this time, "I can hear something getting closer to me. I'm going to stay quiet and hide. I'll make sure to update the map for you whenever I can."

Both men wished me luck and I started to approach the voice. I made sure to keep behind cover as I tried to see who was talking all the way out here, I was a little bit further away from Mr Saizo and Mr Mobito than I was before, but if an enemy is this close, then that won't be good for the Party.

I got to a point where the voice was starting to get louder and I realised that it was a woman's voice when I could finally understand what they were saying, I froze in fear.

"Thirty years since I moved and nothing happened. I was forced to just sit in silence, and pretend that everything was good in our Church. Did you know that Mirou? Did you know how much I suffered waiting for the opportunity? The perfect opportunity!" the slightly muffled voice yelled.

I carefully peeked from behind the wall I was hiding behind and looked in the direction that the voice came from.

I could see her. She walked with almost as much grace and purpose as she did, but this time she was hindered by a left foot that seemed to have twisted around into an impossible angle. There were gashes on both her legs that looked incredibly deep and I could see the muscles underneath tense and relax as she limped closer.

"Then one day, the one that seemed to fulfil everything our scripture prophesied came along and ruined everything! Everything! Everything!" the woman's screams grew louder and louder after every repeat.

I could see another massive, open wound that came down from the ridge of her brow, through her left eyelids and missing eye socket, all the way down her cheek and ended at the left corner of her mouth. The skin was pulled back and revealed the destroyed muscles on that side of her face and the bone from her skull.

Even though her speech was impeded slightly by the damage, her voice was exactly the same as the one that haunts me at night. And even though the gash that ruined her face made her look slightly different, she was still recognisable.

"I don't care if I'm wasting my time Mirou, you're not the boss of me! I'm the boss of me! I'm your boss of me!" the woman continued to yell.

A chill quickly ran down my spine as I watched the woman who ordered the murder of all my family and friends.

"I'm going to find that little bitch and that bastard of a Saviour-Vessel and I'm going to kill them both!" Head Pastor Maru screeched maniacally.