System Of The Undead

Chapter 173: Evolved Zombies Can Do What!?

Kenny was conscious enough to answer questions and with his relaxed state, he was more than willing as he noticed that Franklin was willing to kill him.

The only way he would remain useful was if he told them everything he knew because, in the end, he planned to return to the community under Franklin.

He told them about the zombie and how it wiped them all out but that was about it.

Debra was in danger, she chose to draw out the zombie so he could escape but this only seemed to irritate Franklin even though if the roles were different between him and Kenny, he would have done it if Debra was a normal person to him.

"The zombie..." Franklin muttered, drawing Kenny’s attention towards him.

"Which direction did it go?" Franklin asked and Andre just glanced at him because there was no way he would want to go chase it.

Not after what they had heard but Andre didn’t express his thoughts verbally.

Kenny looked hesitant to answer but he gave in, pointing to the east.

Franklin’s head jerked in that direction and contemplated what his choices were.

Would he be ruled by emotions or would he make the right choice relying strictly on logic?

Franklin strapped a gun over his shoulder and took some ammunition with him.

These people were already running out of ammunition so it was a tad bit inconsiderate of Franklin to think he was more deserving of them.

Andre grabbed him by the arm, halting Franklin in his tracks.

"Where do you think you’re going with that?" Andre asked and Franklin yakked his arm free from his grasp.

"I don’t expect you to join me or understand but if we don’t kill that zombie, what stops it from attacking? At least this way we have the element of surprise," Franklin proposed.

This made sense but it wasn’t enough to convince Andre. They had a golden opportunity to do what they needed to do without a right and yet Franklin wanted to go and track down this zombie?

Andre was also curious why he didn’t show this side to either Jason or Clementine.

He seemed unbothered by the prospect that they could be dead.

Was it because he believed in them or did their deaths make no difference to him?

"Fine..." Brayden blurted out as he could see Andre was having difficulties handling this situation.

The answer he gives would tell his men how he thought about them and what Andre would possibly do if they ever found themselves in this situation.

Brayden picked up on this and stepped in to diffuse the ticking metaphoric bomb.

"I will go with you," Brayden completed his sentence, snatching the ammo from him before tossing it to Andre, who caught it.

"And if we find the corpse of this girl along the way, we’re turning back," Brayden said.

Franklin had no objection seeing as that was the reason he was even going in the first place.

He didn’t know what was going to happen and understood what Brayden meant.

"Thank you..." Franklin showed Brayden his gratitude.

"Don’t thank me yet, thank me after we return in one piece," Brayden said.

Andre didn’t like that Brayden was putting himself in danger for a stranger but he understood what this was meant to represent.

Brayden was useful in the sense that he could perceive social cues that Andre missed and this was one of them.

Andre nodded, giving Brayden his approval but he divided the ammo that was returned to him.

He didn’t care what happened to Franklin but Brayden was a different case entirely.

"You better come back alive," Andre said, his eyes focused on Brayden.

"Even if the planet were to blow up today, I will find a way to survive in space," Brayden responded.

This didn’t make sense considering the flames would consume him first before he even thought about entering space but this was typical with Brayden.

Andre shook his head with a smile creasing his face as he watched Brayden and Franklin head in that direction.

He instructed his men to raid the store and see what it was that was left there.

-

The creature that came into view was not only heinous but it was huge.

Jason didn’t understand what was going on but for some reason, this zombie triggered the flight response in his body.

The zombie didn’t look normal, it looked deformed so to speak and Clementine knew it shouldn’t be able to perceive them since they were covered in the flesh of the undead.

She took a couple of steps backwards and urged for Jason to do the same but Jason didn’t bulge.

Jason knew if he moved with her, then the zombie would still move towards their position.

He knew that things could go from bad to worse.

He at least had Nexus, which gave him a fighting chance but Clementine was just a normal girl.

The zombie sniffed the air rather loudly before its face settled in Jason’s direction.

Jason gulped as he braced himself, slowly equipping his gun so he could open fire if he needed to.

Jason knew from its size that it couldn’t move swiftly but something bothered him.

[[Fragment not detected]]

Jason wondered why a zombie with no fragment could instil such fear and knew that this wasn’t a normal zombie for even the system had alerted him of the danger it posed.

The zombie walked right up to Jason and stopped.

Jason’s gun was positioned to face it, aligned towards its head as he remained motionless.

Jason knew that picking a fight they didn’t have to was the last thing that they needed but he wouldn’t hesitate if this zombie was going to make a move.

Clementine, however, was one step ahead.

She picked up a stone and threw it as far as she could, it tore through the trees, creating a rustling sound.

The zombie’s head tilted in that direction.

Jason used this opportunity to take a couple of steps away from the zombie but he didn’t head in Clementine’s direction, but the opposite direction.

Clementine knew what Jason was doing, he was drawing the zombie away from her and towards himself.

Jason wanted to figure out what kind of zombie this one was and thankfully, it didn’t have a fragment so that meant that he could analyze it.

[[New Zombie Detected!]]

[[Zombie Type: Forcefully Evolved]]

[[Description: This person was turned by an evolved zombie and retained some of the characteristics of the evolved zombie!]]

The moment Jason heard this, he knew that this wasn’t good news.

He never for once thought that such a thing was even remotely possible.

Now he was heading that evolved zombies could make even more dangerous zombies?

Jason couldn’t believe this and only if Clementine knew the threat that these zombies possessed.

She would take to her heels but his thinking process was soon interrupted as a crunching sound originated under his feet.

The zombie immediately jerked its head in Jason’s direction and without running, charged at him.

"Shit!" Jason muttered, the zombie had reached for his head.

Normal zombies always tried to bite first but this one was trying to restrain him, it missed by a hair’s length.

Jason could only dodge this because he was about to fall and it was that fall that acted as an evasive action.

Clementine didn’t need to be told, she opened fire without hesitation, and the bullet pierced the zombie’s lower back.

She couldn’t aim for the head due to its crouched-down position but she knew that they had to find a way to immobilize it.

Clementine didn’t care about the amount of ammunition she had left but for some reason, the bullets were getting stuck in the clump of fat that consisted of this zombie’s body.

It wasn’t dealing much damage, Jason managed to put some distance between them but he saw something that made him realize that this zombie might be a lot more dangerous than he had anticipated.

"Isn’t that..." Jason thought to himself as he noticed a piece of clothing stuck between the zombie’s teeth.

It was no doubt the badge of the raiders.

If they couldn’t take it out, then there was no way that this zombie was an easy one.

"Clementine! You need to leave!" Jason said, opening fire on the zombie.

The bullet landed right on its head but it couldn’t penetrate the skull as the fat had not only slowed down the trajectory of the bullet but it was a subset of an evolved zombie and this meant it possessed certain traits as its creator.

"Fucking hell! What the fuck are you!?" Jason asked.

The zombie picked up one of the corpses and crushed it within its hand before launching the chuck of flesh right in Jason’s direction.

Jason had to take cover behind a tree as the bones acted as spikes, impaling anything within their grasp.

Clementine knew it was after Jason as it had ignored her gunshots and focused on Jason.

Jason took a deep breath, he knew that there might be only one way out of this and that was activating Nexus but that would render his usefulness for the rest of the day naught.

He would instead become a liability and that was something that he couldn’t risk.

Jason was done with all this and he took a step out.

Nexus was a skill but Chronos also told him he was no longer human.

"... Jason?" Clementine muttered.

"Active Berserker Mode," Jason muttered with a smirk and he blacked out of the moment he uttered these words.