After Seana finished eating, Lothe carried the heavy sacks of food up to the restricted upper archives, securing them behind the reinforced oak doors.
Once everything was settled, the two of them stepped back out into the open courtyard.
Lothe carried a long black spear, while Seana wielded a slender, dark steel sword she had found in the security office.
The first thing Lothe noticed was the sky.
The purple twilight from earlier was completely gone. In its place, a thick, blood-red sky hung over the city, streaked with sudden flashes of white lightning.
It’s going to rain, Lothe thought, his eyes narrowing.
Seana followed his gaze, her brow furrowing at the unnatural color of the clouds. Without a word, they both tightened their grips on their weapons and quickened their pace.
The path to the medical wing should have been short, but the campus was in ruins.
Collapsed masonry blocked the main walkways, deep fissures split the asphalt, and they had to move in a low, careful crouch to avoid the small groups of white-eyed zombies and mutated dogs roaming the campus.
As they climbed over a jagged slab of concrete, a dull explosion shook the air from somewhere ahead.
Boom!
Neither of them paused.
They pushed through the debris for another kilometer before Lothe suddenly pulled Seana behind a shattered brick pillar.
Just ahead lay the courtyard of the medical department, but a fierce battle was already underway.
Two students were fighting for their lives against a pair of mutated yellow tigers. The beasts were massive, their fangs elongated and their muscles rippling beneath blood-splattered fur.
One of the students stood on a low stone ledge, a composite bow in his hands. He fired a rapid succession of arrows, drawing the attention of one tiger to keep it from flanking his partner.
The tigers roared, their claws tearing deep trenches into the dirt as they grew more enraged.
The second student was a broad-shouldered youth wielding a massive, two-handed broadsword. Every time he swung the heavy blade, faint streaks of white light cut through the air, leaving deep gashes on the tigers’ armored hides.
The pair fought with practiced coordination, covering each other’s blind spots. But the tigers were simply too fast, and the noise of the struggle was already drawing nearby zombies.
The archer looked at the approaching horde, then at the lunging beasts. His face hardened. He shouted something to his partner and leaped backward off the ledge.
The tiger in front of him blinked in confusion as its target vanished, but before it could turn, the broadsword wielder stepped into the gap.
The heavy blade descended like a falling guillotine. Even from his hiding spot, Lothe was surprised by the sheer physical strength required to swing such a massive weapon with that kind of speed.
The swordsman blocked, parried, and slashed, but the sheer weight of the two tigers slowly forced him onto his heels.
Then, his foot slipped on a patch of wet grass.
One tiger lunged, its massive paw sweeping toward his chest.
The swordsman ducked, but the second tiger’s jaws were already open, aiming straight for his throat.
"Oren! You’d better hurry!" he roared.
Without waiting for a reply, he rammed the flat of his broadsword into the tiger’s mouth, twisting it to lock its jaws, and rolled desperately to the side. But before he could scramble up, a massive shadow fell over him.
The swordsman’s face went pale. He closed his eyes, bracing for the teeth.
Thud.
A heavy weight crashed on top of him.
He opened his eyes. Three green-feathered arrows had pierced straight through the tiger’s skull, all clustered within the exact same two-inch wound.
"Sorry for being late, Diego," a voice called out from a second-floor balcony.
Oren stood on the railing, his bow already drawn back to its limit. He released the string. As the single arrow flew through the air, he made a sharp hand gesture, and the projectile split into three mid-flight.
The three arrows streaked forward like green bolts, piercing the second tiger’s skull.
The beast whimpered once and collapsed.
Oren dropped from the balcony, landing lightly in the dirt, and pulled Diego to his feet. The two of them stared silently at the massive carcasses. It was hard to believe the harmless, caged animals used for veterinary research had turned into these monsters.
Lothe watched them for a second, then tapped Seana’s shoulder.
There was no point in getting involved. The noise would bring more monsters soon, and his [Spatial Perception] was already starting to prick at his skin.
Something was wrong.
As Lothe and Seana stepped out from behind the pillar to bypass the courtyard, the quiet sound of their boots drew the attention of the two students. Oren and Diego immediately raised their weapons, their eyes defensive.
They’ve been through a lot, Lothe thought, scanning their torn uniforms.
He didn’t care to talk. The world had already fallen into chaos.
People would naturally become suspicious of one another.
Without saying a word, Lothe simply walked past them, his spear held low, Seana matching his pace.
But they hadn’t gone ten paces when a low, vibrating growl echoed from the surrounding alleys.
"Graaaah!"
The zombies had arrived.
At that exact moment, the blood-red clouds above them churned.
And then, it rained.
It wasn’t water. Thick, dark crimson droplets began to fall, smelling heavily of iron and rot.
For a single second, the entire campus seemed to fall silent under the bloody downpour.
Then, the zombies went mad.
Their sluggish, dragging movements vanished. They let out high-pitched shrieks, their joints popping as their speed doubled.
Before the main horde could reach them, one zombie burst from the pack. Its skull was horribly mutated, elongated backward like a curved blade, and its fingernails had grown into thick, black talons.
It lunged at Lothe’s face.
Lothe sidestepped, the wind of the talons grazing his nose. He thrust his black spear forward, aiming for the throat.
To his surprise, the mutated zombie twisted its body mid-air with abnormal agility, letting the spearhead slide past its neck.
He pulled the spear back, but the rest of the horde was already closing in.
Beside him, Seana’s slender sword cut through the rain. Every arc of her blade released a faint, crimson flash.
She didn’t use flashy movements; she simply stepped, sliced, and let the severed heads of the zombies fall into the mud.
Behind them, Oren and Diego watched in shock.
Lothe focused entirely on the mutated zombie. This rain is acting like a stimulant, he realized. Their muscles are denser, and their Qi is rising.
He channeled a unit of Qi into his hands, transferring the warm energy into the black shaft of his spear.
His physical strength surged.
If he had previously possessed the strength of four average men, that power had now multiplied dramatically.
The mutated zombie lunged again. Lothe didn’t dodge this time. He stepped into the strike and swung his spear like a staff.
Peng!
The reinforced metal shaft slammed into the zombie’s crossed arms. The sheer force of the blow shattered the creature’s arm bones, blasting it five meters back through the mud.
Seana glanced over, her eyes narrowing slightly before she returned to slicing the targets in front of her.
Lothe didn’t give the creature a chance to breathe.
He closed the distance in a single stride, bringing the spear down in a heavy vertical strike.
The zombie rolled, its primal instincts helping it evade, and lunged forward to bite Lothe’s leg.
Lothe remained completely calm.
He twisted the spear, the blade slicing through the creature’s wrists, severing its talons cleanly. The zombie howled, a high, piercing screech that rattled Lothe’s eardrums.
Lothe drove the spearhead straight through its forehead.
The howling stopped.
[You have slain a Level 3, Tier 2 Zombie.]
[You have absorbed his raw Qi.]
[You have gained 30EXP.]
Noisy, Lothe thought, pulling his weapon free.
He looked down at the dead creature, his brow furrowing. The zombie’s final howl hadn’t felt like a death rattle.
It felt like a call.
Lothe turned toward the medical department’s main building, his eyes cold. "We need to move. Now."