"That should last us for a month," a girl said, wiping the sweat off her forehead.
She arched her back, followed by a series of cracking sounds.
She had been crouched for too long, looking for necessary supplies in the broken two-storey mall.
Three zombie corpses lay beside her, their heads caved in from a brutal blow. They were the only ones inside the store, other than a few human corpses that were beyond broken to transform.
The high school girl, Amanda Hayes, looked through her backpack one last time. Just to be sure she got everything. Cans of food, a few energy bars, some instant noodles, two jerry cans filled with water, and some medical supplies.
She looked around the building. There was still space to store more stuff in the bag, but Amanda didn’t want to be greedy. Besides, even though she was a baseball star striker, there was a limit to how much she could carry without slowing her down.
Too bad they didn’t have James’s favorite chocolates. He’ll throw a tantrum again...
With that thought, she zipped the bag shut and slung it over her shoulder. The weight was perfect, not too light, not too heavy.
"Now for the final thing..."
Amanda walked to the sports section of the mall. Her weapon of choice, the wooden baseball bat, didn’t survive the constant encounters with the undead. She was in need of a new weapon.
Thankfully, the store had quite a few items of her preference. At first, she wanted another wooden bat but changed her mind when she noticed a metal one.
The latter would be sturdier, and even if it broke, she could still use it in some way.
"I didn’t think there’d still be this much left in the store," she mumbled. "But then it is to be expected. Not everyone has the guts to leave the safety of their homes."
Who could have blamed them? Until yesterday, Amanda was just like them. When the monsters appeared, she had stayed locked inside, too scared to go outside.
Still, someone had to look for resources and help, and so her parents left her and her brother behind.
They returned after sunset. But they weren’t the same.
Amanda’s eyes turned gloomy as she remembered the scene.
They reached out to her, wobbling. They looked like her parents but weren’t her parents. They had turned into zombies and only came back because they remembered food was waiting for them at home.
Amanda got scared. She had begged. She prayed.
But the god had turned their back on Earth.
Through her tears, she swung the bat, over and over, till her parents stopped moving. Then she hit them some more and set them on fire in the backyard.
She wanted to bury them first, but she was scared they’d rise again. So, she cremated them. Her autistic brother did not know what happened and was still waiting for the parents to return with his favorite chocolates.
As sad as she was back then, killing her parents awakened something in her. She wasn’t afraid of these undead monsters anymore. She was ready to kill anything, or anyone, who got in her way.
In a twisted way, it was her parent’s parting gift to her.
A single tear rolled down her cheek, but Amanda quickly wiped it off. Tears showed weakness, and she couldn’t afford to be weak. Not in the batshit crazy world.
"I should get home before it gets dark."
As always, the streets weren’t safe at night. No matter how strong she was, staying outside in the dark meant certain death as the creatures got stronger and faster under the moonlight.
A random screen had told her that, and so far, everything it had said had been true. And Amanda had no intention of testing its words after sunset.
At some distance, a wobbly figure watched her, getting closer.
Amanda kept walking. Her metal bat was already covered in rotten blood.
"These gutless freaks," she said, taking a deep breath.
Three zombies had attacked her in quick succession. It almost felt like someone was controlling them, wanting to tire her out. Thankfully, she knew a spot to take a breather.
"These damned fuckers!"
Amanda let out a groan, ready to blow the creature’s head off.
"At least they are easy to kill."
One hit to the head and they died. That was the only redeeming feature the zombies had in Amanda’s eyes.
As the zombie got close enough, Amanda swung her bat without hesitation. She waited to feel that sickening thud against her bat, but it never came.
Amanda’s eyes widened as the zombie ducked to evade her strike. It was the first time one of those dumb freaks had done that. She was still processing it when it lunged at her, its fingers stretched toward her face.
Quick on her feet, Amanda jumped back, evading the sudden attack.
"You’re a strange one, aren’t you?" she said, scanning the undead.
The zombie before her was different from the ones she had faced. They weren’t so quick or unpredictable. Still, Amanda couldn’t discern what made the one before him so special.
"Other than that shirt tied around your waist, you look as bit disgusting as the rest of them."
The zombie tilted his head upon hearing her words. It almost felt like it could understand her words... almost.
Did she just call me disgusting? Well, I guess that’s one way to describe myself.
Blaze groaned but didn’t speak a word. He assumed by now she’d be tired, considering she had been fighting with a tonne of weight on her back. But it seemed he miscalculated.
Three zombies weren’t enough.
After seeing how well the girl carried herself, Blaze knew the girl had gotten used to the apocalypse. That’s why he didn’t confront her head-on, instead used the three zombies roaming around to attack her.
That way, not only did he decipher her fighting style, but he also learned a bit about his Necrolink trait.
The necrolink had a duration limit, but not a cooldown. As long as the one he was controlling died before the duration was over, he could switch over to another undead, bypassing the control duration.
Blaze exploited that bug to attack the girl thrice. Yet, it seemed the girl still had some energy left.
And now... I’m screwed.
He had lost the element of surprise. Now the girl knew he wasn’t an ordinary zombie and was alert.
Unfortunately, she didn’t know that the zombie before her knew nothing about being one.