I work alone. I take on a few zombies, and I finally get a chance to Inspect one.
Zombie Shambler
Level 5
Health 50/50
TP 5/5
The simplest and most common of zombies. The Shambler moves at a walk until it senses a meal. Then they will attack in mass to overwhelm an opponent.
Abilities: Bite, Iron Grip
Weakness: Fire, Attacks to the Head
From the description, these are the classic zombie model. Slow moving but strong and tenacious if they get a hold of you. I fight them one at a time, darting in for a strike to a decaying skull and then darting out before they can attack back. I take out two Shamblers this way, earning me 50 experience points.
The fight just about over, I’m kneeling down and using Absorb on the second zombie I killed, and I notice that one of the kids has gotten separated from the group of survivors. I’m filled with a sense of foreboding, as every single zombie film I’ve ever seen has taught me that such a situation is ripe for tragedy. And sure enough, a zombie someone thought they’d already killed starts to crawl towards the little girl. Either the girl doesn’t have the intelligence to recognize the danger or just hasn’t been around long enough, but either way, the zombie’s only a few feet from making a snack of her. Even if I run, I know that I won’t make it in time and no one else has seemed to notice what’s happening. The zombie’s reaching out for the girl when I do the only thing I can think of and throw the hammer in my hand. I’m not sure how it happened, either because of the many hours I’ve spent practicing the move or just because of stupid luck, but as the hammer leaves my hand, I activate Hammer Time. The ability seems to struggle with the ball peen hammer for a moment, then it kicks in, and I see the object arc through the air and land with bone-crushing force on the skull of the zombie. I see a single red six float away from the zombie, and the last of its health leaves it.
Only after the fight is over does the little girl notice the undead zombie. Then she starts to cry, and one of the huddling survivors runs from the group to pick her up and take her back to the group.
I can only be relieved that I was able to save the little girl. I mean, part of me knows that she’s not real and is only a construct of the dungeon. But another part of me remembers Marie at that age and how she got hurt all the time just being a curious kid, and I can’t help but feel some empathy towards these survivors, real or not.
I wince at how gross rotten brains look and smell as I retrieve my hammer from the zombie’s skull and dismiss the notification about the experience points for the kill.
As I wipe the brains off my hammer on the grass by the road, I hear someone say, “Wow. That was a pretty lucky throw.”
I turn and see Nancy. She has her rifle in her hands. “I saw the zombie moving towards that little girl, but I couldn’t shoot because I might have hit the girl. Then your hammer comes out of nowhere and kills it. That kind of throw is amazing.”
I shrug, not sure if I should tell her about Absorb and how I got the ability to throw like that from a monster in another dungeon. I suspect it’s something I should keep to myself. After all, who knows who Nancy would tell.
“Thanks. It’s just luck that the hammer hit like that.” I shrug and look away from her. “I’m honestly not sure what I was thinking. I threw away my only weapon. If there were any more zombies around, I’d have been in trouble.”
Nancy nods in agreement. “Yeah, you’re right. We should all have backup weapons in case something happens to our primary ones. I’ll make sure Frank and Joe keep an eye out for anything we can use.” She smiles at me and adds, “Though, I’ll tell them that you get first dibs on any hammers.”
We reach the outskirts of Blumkin on the third day. Most of the survivors opt not to travel through the town for fear of zombie attack. Instead, they plan to travel around the town and continue towards Safe Haven. However, Frank and I want to search through some of the buildings to scavenge for food and weapons. Nancy isn’t pleased with the idea but understands that we need supplies. Little Joe wants to go with his older brother, but Nancy refuses to let him go. He walks off sulking.
Frank and I enter Blumkin, passing a sign that tells us the population of the town is 3,000. The two of us creep from building to building, avoiding the groups of Shamblers that wander the town. We enter a hardware store through an open window at the back of a building. We find lots of construction materials as well as all the tools you could ever ask for. Frank goes to the cash register at the front of the store and finds a loaded shotgun under the counter. There are only a handful of shells, but he’s glad to have gotten another weapon and dropped the baseball bat into his inventory.
I realize I’m missing out on a golden opportunity in the hardware store. Last night, I left camp and tested out all the abilities I absorbed from the last dungeon. Roll, Flying Kick, Smash, Stab all work, but Fireball doesn’t since it’s the one ability I have that uses mana and not TP. Still, that means that I have lots of options for weapons now.
I grab everything I think will make useful weapons—Hammers, knives, picks, axes, sledgehammers, and shovels. I also grab everything else I believe that we may need—Duct tape, nails, wire, saw blades, rope, anything else that stacked in my inventory.
Once Frank and I clean out the hardware store, we leave the way we came in and head to the grocery store. It’s a little touch and go, and we have to wait under a metal dumpster while a large group of Shamblers goes by. The extra disturbing thing about the Shamblers, is that they seem to be led by a tall purple zombie with a mutated face. It had no hair and resembles a stretched-out human with limbs out of proportion. I’m able to Inspect the new zombie by poking my head out from under that trash dumpster.
Zombie Howler
Level 8
Health 80/80
TP 15/15
The Howler is an unusual zombie that howls loudly when it spots prey, alerting all nearby zombies. The Howler, though relatively easy to kill, is dangerous because of its ability to gather other zombies into a horde.
Abilities: Bite, Howl
Weakness: Fire, Attacks to the Head
The group only leaves when the tall purple Howler sees a deer run through the streets. The purple zombie let loose a piercing scream that echoes through the streets and takes off at a run after the poor deer. Frank and I don’t look to see what happens to the animal, and instead take the opportunity to sneak into the small grocery store.
The smell of rotten and spoiled food clings to me as I enter the store and find it mostly ransacked. My Quickie Stop Mart training kicks in and I automatically start taking inventory of what’s left in the store. When finished, I not only made progress in increasing my Inventory Management skill but also found six candy bars, ten cans of vegetables, and a box of coveted zombie apocalypse gold—Twinkies.
I’m out of inventory space, but thankfully Frank has some spots left in his inventory. The rest we load into plastic bags and have to carry. The streets are empty as we exit the grocery shop and it’s a clear path out of town. I spot a pickup truck and convince Frank to let me try and hotwire it. If I can get it to work, we’ll have a way to get all these supplies and the survivors to Safe Haven quickly. If I can’t, we’re just out the few minutes it’ll take me to try.
The truck is an old Ford F-150, and I use a coat hanger from a nearby used clothes store to pop the lock on the driver's door. I unlock the passenger side door, and Frank climbs in and puts the grocery bags on the floor by his feet. I take one of the screwdrivers from my inventory and unscrew the plastic panel under the steering wheel and remove a metal plate and find a lot more wires than I was expecting. I glanced up at Frank and saw him watching me intently. I smile confidently while inside I realize that just because I watched a YouTube video once on this doesn’t mean I know what I’m doing. Still, how hard can it be?