Chapter 17: Apartment Complex: Part 2

It was at this moment that Gray realized now was a better time than never, so he went down the stairs. As he poked his head around the corner to the right where it had just passed, when he did, his pupils dilated.

There it was, right in front of him, they were face to face with one another. In that moment, it's mouth began to slowly open, displaying an abundance of broken teeth within it.

Remembering what had happened last time one of these different acting zombies opened there mouth. Gray new what was coming.

A scream.

"AH-"

Just as it was about to let out an ear piercing howl, it was interrupted by Gray who suddenly pierced it's throat with the thrust of his rod. As it was about to let another blood-curdling scream from the pain, Gray swiped two of it's bottom legs in one motion

[Pause]

Before it could fall over, it's entire body had frozen in the air. It was paused. From then on, Gray would only have five seconds so he needed to do as much damage to it as possible.

At moment, he pulled out a long kitchen knife out of the holster hanging around his waist, before swinging it down at it's neck.

0.5 seconds

But in that instant, Gray felt a presence appear behind his back, and then he remembered. He had poked his head around to the right, to the right as that was where the monster had went. And upon doing so, he could see an empty hallway with only the monster being there.

But what about the left? What about the side where the monster had come from? The side where the monster had come from? Gray had never thought to check. When he realized this, his heart sunk.

0.8 seconds

[Unpause]

Gray reacted as fast as he could, unpausing the monster ahead of him, and quickly turning to what was behind him, he did so expecting to have to deal with one or two zombies while the one he had just hurt recovered.

1.2 seconds

But upon turning, he realized just how truly stupid he had been. Rather than having focused on the abnormal looking thing in the first place, he should've worried more about what was on the other side.

A group, no, horde of zombies could be seen rushing at him, at him. There were simply so many that they had filled up the halls and were scraping against the walls and doors as they moved. Two in fact were already right in front of his hands, ready to bite down on them.

His eyes opened wide as he thought of leaping down the stairs beside him as it was the only option he had to escape. But if he did, they could split up, some going up the stairs in the process.

With no other options, his body moved on instinct, instantly pausing the air, inches away from his body, Gray had the image of a thin rectangle which was two meters long and wide to clog up the zombies in the other side. Creating a thin wall which would last for a few seconds while he thought of how to deal with them.

1.7 seconds

But contrary to his expectations, It had failed. Rather than creating a rectangle which could be used as a wall. It had created a thin horizontal line in the shape of a rectangle just centimeters ahead of Gray's hand, which was just about to be bitten, going from one side of side of the wall to the other.

'SHIT!' Gray panicked in the motion of leaping back.

However, he had waited too long, his leap wasn't going to make it in time. The zombies mouth was already closing down on his hand.

1.9 seconds had passed.

'Ah… I'm dead.'

[You have slain a zombie]

Snapping Gray out of his thoughts, a notification played on the inside of his head. In that instant, a pool of blood spurted out, landing all over him. It was as if a giant blood-filled human sized mosquito had been swatted

[You have gained 2 XP]

Following that, time seemed to stand still as he saw the head of the zombie which was just about to bite him, fly past his face.

That was just the beginning.

[You have slain a zombie]

[You have gained 2 XP]

[You have slain a zombie]

[You have slain a zombie]

[You have slain- You have slain- You have-]

A bloodbath. One by one as pieces of the zombies corpses began to go past Gray, painting both him and the walls as they passed through the thin line he had created.

The zombies, with their low intelligence, continued rushing right into the line, showing no signs of stopping as they were further pushed into it.

The notifications resounded in Gray's head over and over and more and more screens began popping up. His head felt as if would burst with information as he could feel nothing but surprise.

The unintentional accident he had made, resulted in him creating a functioning trap. Some of the zombies had made it through the trap, with just their torso, still showing signs of being alive as they dragged themselves towards Gray.

But they had still been immobilized. Seeing this, Gray decided to finish off the one he had original went for so that he wouldn't have to worry about it attack his back as he finished off the immobilized ones.

Ignoring the notification, Gray turned around watching as the abnormal zombie lunged at him with the rod still stuck on it's throat.

Gray avoided the leap, swaying his body to the left, before swinging the knife on his right hand diagonally down on the zombies neck as it passed by him.

It's neck was hard and thick, making it harder to cut through, but thanks to the momentum and the sharpened blade-

*Swoosh*

[You have slain an abnormal zombie]

[You have received 5 XP]

As it's head flopped on the floor, Gray turned back around. His guard up, ready to slash down on the remaining zombies as the timer for the paused trap was about to end.

But before he had even realized it, it had already been over. A pile of corpses could be seen, blood everywhere.

Panting heavily, he dropped to his knees.

Was he going to have to go through this for the rest of the floors?