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2024-10-29 19:42:56Amy was back to driving her second-hand car, leaving Seth slumped on his passenger seat, looking out the window where green trees passed by.
After hours of driving, they finally arrived at Cold Spring. They just have to find someplace to stay. It would be better if they found an empty building for themselves.
“What was that?”
He knew what the blonde meant, but nothing came to mind, so he merely shrugged his shoulders in answer.
“She called you Jet Lynx,” she said again, repeating in case he needed clearance.
“I know. I heard her.” Seth exhaled noisily, tapping the window glass with the back of his forefinger. “It just doesn’t make sense.”
“Why don’t you ask your dear System?”
Huffing again, Seth picked up his phone. It was uncharacteristically silent. However, given their remote location from the big cities, he figured this piece was only because there was no infectore in sight. Well, except for the one locked inside the trunk.
Upon touching the white donut icon of the User Interface, the System displayed the familiar futuristic blue theme. It felt a little silly when he said, “Who the fuck is Izuka?”
It took a moment, but his phone screen popped up with an answer.
[Show 4.863 records for ‘Izuka.’]
Many names appeared, but there were too many. Besides, what was her full name again?
“It’s a waste of time,” he said instead, pocketing his phone again. He didn’t need a constant update on how the world was being destroyed currently. He had seen a very small show of how an infectore munched on someone; he didn’t need a reminder for it.
“But you said it yourself, it’s strange. Her entire self is strange, now that I think about it.”
Amy was right. Aside from her generosity, the whiteboard where she plotted, and her urgency to fly for a holiday, the fact that how she offered her store for them was fishy. As if she was stocking up the store for them in this kind of situation.
“She knows something.”
“Look for Himeyaka Izuka.”
Seth did as told, not even grumbling as he would usually do. Amy should have told him her full name in the first place. This time, however, the System displayed fewer results.
[Show 301 records for Himeyaka Izuka.]
Seth was about to get down to it, but Marnie woke up with a start. Her bleary eyes teared up all around, accompanied by her wobbling lips. “Please don’t cry, I can’t handle another scream right in my ears.”
Marnie stared at him, and she started to sob. This was not good.
“Can you not make her cry? Gosh!” Amy turned to face Marnie and smiled at her. “Are you scared? Did you have a nightmare?”
The six-year-old in the back seat shook her head but looked a little fearfully in Seth’s direction.
“Oh, don’t mind him. He’s not the best brother in the world, but I’m sure he’ll adore you in no time. Just give him a chance, okay?”
Marnie nodded, despite Seth’s scowl. She smiled at him, showing some missing teeth. She looked cute, but he wouldn’t tell her that. The kid would be glued to him, which was the worst thing that could happen.
Thankfully, after that, Amy went back to look at the road. It wouldn’t be funny if they avoided infectores attack, only to be found dead from crashing the car against a tree.
“Seth?” came the kid’s voice.
“What?”
“I want my mommy.”
Seth silently grumbled in irritation, but he tried to placate her nonetheless. “Don’t worry, I won’t steal her from you.”
“I want mommy now.”
“She’s not here. She has things to do, remember?”
“You said she’s dead?”
He sighed in exasperation. “Then why are you asking about her?”
Amy glared dagger at him, “Can you not talk to her like that? Geez!”
It was a wonder that Marnie didn’t wail again. Instead, she was chewing on her bottom lip, sulking with a massive scowl on her face. On a second look, she definitely mirrored what Seth was currently doing.
However, that moment didn’t last long because a hand suddenly shot through the backseat, reaching for Marnie’s own hand.
A high-pitched shriek was heard, Amy stepped on the brake and sent both her and Seth to bumping the dashboard. Seth recovered first, getting out, and then wrenched the back door open. He tried to release the ashen hand from Marnie without success.
“Seth! Seth!” the six-year-old cried out, clutching her half-brother’s hand in return. She didn’t let go, too afraid that the hand would pull her back to the trunk.
It seemed that Wade the infectore had lost his patience.
“Oh my God! What should I do? Oh God, oh God!” Amy harshly pulled at her hair, looking back and forth at Wade’s hand and the road ahead. She already stopped the car, Seth didn’t see why she even looked at the front. Her cousin freaking tried to eat his half-sibling, for God’s sake.
Wade the infectore’s grip on Marnie was too tight. He couldn’t even move a finger off. Just when he thought he was pretty strong after an upgrade through the System and easily killed an infectore with his kick, he couldn’t even release a newly-turned one’s grip.
“Get my knife!”
“You’re not chopping Marnie’s arm off!” Amy stared in horror, frantically shaking her head no.
“Of course, I’m not! Are you crazy?!”
The realization set in. “You’re not cutting Wade’s arm off either!”
“He’s not letting her go!”
Marnie’s terrified screech didn’t make it better. Between Wade the infectore’s guttural sound and the sales girl’s rant, Seth wanted to free his half-sister and set his head on fire.
“Just get me my fucking knife!”
Finally, Amy moved to help. She rummaged around the back they filled with the freebies from Izuka and pulled out the Hot Spray.
Seth almost jaw-dropped at her stupidity. “Do you really think spraying his hand will work?!”
“You don’t know before you try it!”
“You–“
“Fine! I’ll do it myself!” Amy directed the spray to Wade, the infectore’s hand, after telling Marnie to shut her eyes.
And true to her belief. Wade, the infectore, groaned loudly before he released Marnie. The ashen hand relaxed, laying like a listless robot cut free from its power source.
“See?”
He was annoyed at her proud face and the confidence overflowing from her, but he had to give her applause. Even if it was in his head.
However, unlike earlier, Wade the infectore didn’t fall asleep like Amy guessed. That side effect probably only affected him when the Hot Spray hit him in the face. In turn, Wade the infectore’s hand struggled like crazy, treating the backseat apart as he emitted more guttural sounds.
Seth quickly got his half-sister out of the car, hugging her like it was the end of time. That analogy probably fits more with this current state of the world. Probably, he had to repeat.
The blonde salesgirl followed suit, running away from the car before she caught the infection. Thankfully, she had turned off the engine, so the car would be fine later. Except for the big hole her infectore cousin caused anyway.
“What do we do now?” Amy asked in a ragged breath, her bangs disarrayed in front of her face.
“Let’s run first.”
However, even if Seth said so, he didn’t run along the asphalt road. Once he deemed it far enough but still within sight of the abandoned car, he led Amy to hide behind some trees and bushes on the roadside.
The blonde sales girl asked, raising an eyebrow at the way he planted his ass on the dirty ground. “What are we doing here?”
“Waiting,” he said without giving any emotion.
So they waited.
Amy checked on Marnie, making sure there was no scratch or visible wound. Thankfully, there were none, but it didn’t excuse her from being traumatized. Well, she was already traumatized, to begin with, but she wasn’t the only one.
From a distance, they couldn’t see how Wade the infectore fared. But if he succeeded in getting himself out of the trunk, they would immediately see him out of the car.
They continued to wait, and Amy almost decked Seth in the face for how bored she was. “Shit. The infectore number keeps on growing.”
“As expected.”
“And we’re doing nothing here.”
“Doing nothing is better than getting infected and eat brains for breakfast,” Seth commented, then felt a small hand tug at his shirt. He only realized now that he was still holding Marnie to his chest. Awkwardly, he put her down on the ground. “What?”
“I’m hungry, Seth.”
“Is that news?”
Amy really decked the back of his head now. “That’s not how you respond to a hungry kid.”
Seth scoffed, “Like you can do any better? All foods in the car. You get it, you become that infectore’s food.”
“’That infectore’ is my cousin, Wade.”
“Same difference. The case still stands.”
Amy huffed, but only after she promised the six years old that they would get the food soon. “Although, what are we waiting here for, anyway?”
They heard heavy metal music traveling in the air as if on cue. Not long after, they saw a modified van coming from the other side of the road at a slow pace.
“That,” Seth grinned, eyes lit up like Christmas light, “Is what we are waiting for.”
The modified van passed them. Then it stopped just a few feet after it passed Amy’s second-hand car. Soon, six people got out of the van, mostly dressed in leather or black and bright pink. They surrounded the car, peering down through the window and opening doors.
Nothing prepared them for what had to come from the torn backseat.
It’s feeding time.
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100 Systems Invasion 16. The Witness of A Killing Spree
She saw them.She saw them get killed while she did nothing.She saw the life drained out of his eyes, and her eyes, and their eyes all over the short course of five minutes.She heard the footsteps of the murderer as he stumbled on his uncoordinated feet; only one ragged Converse covered the ashen feet.She felt a tight knot form in her chest, witnessing this mass murder done by her very own dear cousin. Something she knew he could do but never thought of seeing it with her own two eyes.Wade killed six innocent people, and he didn’t even stop to consider that this was wrong. That he was wrong, and they were not. He moved on, cracking their skulls open and eating their brains out.He ate their brains like nothing had happened.But she knew it had happened. Her eyes couldn’t betray her. She wasn’t dreaming, nor was she hallucinating. The rasping of the heavy metal-loving man’s final breath and the crimson blood
100 Systems Invasion 17. Farming Corpse
By ‘farming,’ of course, Seth meant killing the newly-turned infectores.It was not as funny as Seth thought, but Amy would also benefit from his murder in the end. So, she had to shut her mouth unless she wanted to annoy him and make him leave her behind. And for the record, she didn’t have an abandonment issue, no matter what Seth had said.For now, she’d have to suck it and hide behind the abandoned van with Marnie. Seth, on the other hand, was busy with his hands.There were seven infectores there, including her cousin-turned-infectore, Wade. Seth said he had to kill the infectores to get his cells back. Having zero balance in the System was no fun; she knew that much. But, she didn’t think that one time thoroughly out of desperation, so Seth had to forgive her.So, with his leveled-up ‘Strength’ in the System and a knife, or dagger, to be precise, that he got from Izuka’s store, he was confident he could take all of them at the same time. However, for his big talk, Seth didn’t lo
100 Systems Invasion 18. The More Brains He Ate…
Seth was about to get his hand on a signed, limited edition CD album of Queen when he heard loud footsteps from the front.He turned to see Marnie hiding between one of the seats and a questionable furry blanket. “Where’s Amy?”“She’s out,” the six years old said, showing her missing teeth to him. “The strange man is here too.”Fingers wrapped around his metal baseball bat, Seth carefully went to the front, seeing that Amy was far too close to Wade, the infectore. He didn’t know that the blonde salesgirl was this suicidal. Though, he should be picking the signs up from the night they spent together.After all, it wasn’t like she offered a ride and tagged along with him just to win a bet, was it?Oh. She did that, alright.“What are you doing?” Seth stalked behind her, knuckle-white hold around the metal bat.The blonde turned her body to face him, standing between him and her infectore cousin. “It’s not like what you’re thinking.”“What do you think I think?”“I didn’t release him fro
100 Systems Invasion 19. Careless Alliance
As Amy stopped the car and ensured that Marnie was okay, Seth poured all his scrutinies into the lit-up phone in his hand. “Mind sharing with the class what Ally is?”It didn’t take long for the System to reply.[The word is pretty explanatory.]He heard the blonde girl’s snickers from his left. “It’s not funny.”“Sure it is,” she said, not sensing the dire situation.“I got nothing from it, after killing five infectores,” Seth argued.[No kill detected.]He read the words again. “Are you blind?”[Only Systemist and registered Ally can earn from killing infectore.]The System showed the same message.Seth grumbled, “Fine, I’m a Systemist, I get it. But the car I am in just killed a bunch of infectores, doesn’t that count?”[No.][Only Systemist and registered Ally can earn from killing infectore.]“Damn it,” he rubbed his forehead. “Then, what do you mean by Ally?”[Ally is a Systemist’s registered partner.][Invite 3 people to be Ally and get 9.000 cells for free.]“Huh?” Seth rerea
100 Systems Invasion 20. Parallel Log
When they stupidly went to open the modified van’s trunk – while ignoring the disgusting remains of the bulldozed infectores on the road and tires – Wade could only consent with a loud groan and flailing arms.“Right. He’s practically a braindead zombie.” Seth closed the trunk again.“Completely forgot about that.” Amy agreed, pinching her nose. “It’s useless anyway. We still have to kill people.”“Infectores. Not people.”“Oh, so it matters to you now? Didn’t you easily make a man explode into bits and blood?”Seth gritted his teeth, “It’s not me. Victor exploded by himself, I just sat opposite him.”“You know him?”“My professor in uni. But the one who died came from the future.”Amy guffawed, “There you go, let your creativity flow.” However, after his silence and humorless face, she faltered. “Wait, you’re serious?”“We got this nonsensical System and ridiculous invasion where your cousin now drools at human brains. Appearing from the future and then spontaneously self-explode ten
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100 Systems Invasion 22. Systemist 38
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100 Systems Invasion 23. The Hidden Elimination
Invasion Day 2Dillon Nature Center, Hutchinson, KSSystemist 38, the wounded man who, according to the System, was called Chief of Kaiser Hunt, was probably one of the managers at 4Games HQ. He was surely dead, as the System told her, and Beatrice supposed his death was the sole reason why she was still alive today.Beatrice was consciously aware that she had not yet caught up emotionally with how absolutely not alright she was. But she knew that when reality hit, it was going to come down hard on her.After locating the Chief’s car with the key, she drove away from the newly-risen 4Games HQ. She stopped at a small parking lot inside a state forest.A curving concrete path led from the parking lot to a log structure. Above the building’s doorway, a flat piece of rough wood hangs. The words ‘NATURE CENTER’ are written across its surface. A decal that reads First Aid Station stuck to the upper left-hand corner of the door.There were no other cars in the lot. The doors to the Nature Ce
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76. Into Hidden View
After four days of work, Rhea finally got her day off again. Mikhal texted her, 'Meet you at East Station in twenty.' Smiling to herself, Rhea texted back an affirmation. "So…" Liz glanced at her from behind the steering wheel, "If I may ask, where are you going, Miss Rhea?""Out," she merely said."Any specific place in mind?"Rhea locked her phone, "Not really."The bespectacled girl looked uncomfortable for a second before she asked again. "Do you have any companions?""Yes.""Oh. Who is that?"Rhea narrowed her eyes, not liking where the bespectacled girl was going with this. "Is this an interrogation?""No, of course, not." Liz hastily said, topping it with an awkward laugh that she tried to make it sound natural. "I'm sorry if it came out like that, Miss Rhea. I didn't mean to."She sighed, turning to the sturdy houses that came into view as they finally reached the town's area. "It's fine. Lucian ordered you to do that, right?" Liz stayed silent, so she'd take that as a yes.
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75. Coping Mechanism
The cafeteria was full of cola and burgers. "Free dinner for everyone!" one of the senior staff called out as they entered it. Rhea grinned – almost jumped in excitement – as her favorite food was served in front of her for free. Emi, on the other hand, chimed in a loud voice, "We don't pay to eat here!"She stuffed her face with the burger. She sat surrounded by a white shirt and blue vest-wearing staff, finally having a nice break out of the craziness of the afternoon shift. "I can't believe I was so excited about it before."Emi smiled broadly, munching on her mouthful bite of burger. She looked funny. "Didn't I tell you that it's crazy?""Yes, but you carefully left out the fact that it is precisely like that oddball group all over again, except, it happens continuously. Marching in a group in the lobby, then shoving each other to get in the elevator. Why do we only have four elevators, anyway?""But it only happens in the afternoon. After that, it's pretty slow, isn't it?"Rhea h
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74. Unwritten Law
Lucian had been at the scene of serious diplomacy once, ages ago as he was still ten, where his father was showing him how to negotiate with a foreign mafia boss from another country. Earl would sign an agreement of letting said mafia boss move into Livingard and give him a little territory on the border to set up whatever operation they had planned. Earl would get back his prized butler slash right-hand man safely in one piece in exchange. He was fond of that man, his favorite butler. A middle-aged friendly guy who had a penchant for cutting apples into beautiful figures and dragging Lucian out of bed before dawn for a morning run. So, hearing that his favorite butler would be back after missing – he was captivated by the foreign mafia after accidentally crashing his motorbike to the mafia's daughter on the road – for three days, Lucian was eager when his father wanted him to tag along. It was supposed to be a valuable learning experience for him.One of the foreign mafia subordinat
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73. At Least We Try
'Let him be, don't talk to him, whatever, just ignore him.'She didn't even want to see him. But bottling her overflowing emotions? It was a ridiculous idea.Then a notification chimed in, breaking into her bubble of thought, pulling her from the suffocating underwater feeling. 'How's' your girl's day out with Emi?' Mikhal texted her, oblivious to the chaos she made herself. 'She was great.' She texted back.'Cool. No more outings today?' His reply came seconds later, followed by three dots, signifying he was typing now. 'Imma starts the afternoon shift today. Dunno what to expect.''Expect the worst.''Never know u'r such a pessimist.'She wasn't. Fine, maybe she was. Just at the moment, though. Rhea responded with a laughing emoticon. Followed by a string of crying yellow faces.'What was that?' She bit her bottom lip, 'I want to go out.' Her thumb sent it before she even read the line. She considered deleting it. No use, Mikhal already typed again.'I'm free, if you were asking
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72. The Walk Down
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71. Wolf in the Flesh
It was the first time Rhea saw a wolf in real life.The wolf looked like how a wolf would in a book or movie. Nothing special, unlike the jet-black wild wolf she saw in a show. Or the majestic white wolf in legends. The animal in front of her looked just like the usual wolf. Short, triangular ears. Broad snout. A long tail. Looking slender yet seems powerful in its built. Its back was grey, so was its upper head. While the rest of its fur was light brown, and the underside was white.Rhea could not believe it."Should we continue?" Jo asked, stepping slowly on the gas pedal.As Jo drove the car past the watchful gaze of the wolf, Rhea felt a shudder run through her body. Either it was a creepy coincidence, or Lucian somehow controlled the wolf to appear there and failed Rhea's escape. Which sounded impossible. Both of them.It was some minutes later that Jo stopped the car. They were near the first building in the outskirt of Stradfield's little town. "Are you sure you want to get off
