Chapter 52: Race against time (3)

Even before they could cross St Lorenzo Avenue, Luke already could already see tons of black smoke coming from the direction where the airport was supposed to be. The aqueducts of fuel probably had been damaged and exploded. That would explain so much smoke. In the end, using the airport was really out of the question.

Amanda didn't think that Luke would work with them again after what happened. Still, he surprised her since he was being reasonable for a change, but she knew that it was just something temporary due to the situation. Maybe Luke could escape the city by himself, but he couldn't do it in less than five hours.

Since they couldn't use the airport, then Luke assumed they had to head west, which was the direction the chopper came from when that pilot attacked him. The shortest route out of the city was 8th street, so Luke gave the order for Amanda's father to head toward there.

"Ignore most of the zombies, if you find too many mutants ahead, warn me of them," Luke said while he was checking the crossbows he obtained. 

Unfortunately, one of the crossbows was identical to the one he got earlier. Still, the other two had the same bonuses in status. Still, they had different effects, a burning effect and a poisonous effect that caused damage over time. Poison against zombies was probably a waste of time, and while the burning one seemed useful, Luke picked both that could fire faster bolts. When he saw enemies ahead, he began to use his weapons. Hitting them while the pickup was moving was hard, but by using two crossbows, his accuracy doubled. Besides, he got the Archery skill earlier, and that increased the power and accuracy of bows and crossbows by three percent per level, so Luke had more reasons to use them.

LV 24 - 25%

HP: 186/186

MP: 76/86

SP: 162/162

STR: 43 + 8 + 2

SPE: 59

INT: 18

END: 11 + 04 + 08 + 02 + 05

RES: 09 + 02

FOC: 40

Free points: 00

Gold Coins: 4955

Active Skills: Weapon Augmentation Lv 03, Stinger Lv 04, Dash Lv 01,

Spells: Appraisal Lv 03, Spark Ball Lv 03

Passive: Fire Resistance Lv 02, Wind Resistance Lv 01, Archery Lv 01, Viral Resistance Lv 01,

During the fight against Andre's group, Appraisal leveled up once, and Luke leveled up three times, so he gained twenty status points. He allocated ten of them in focus and ten on speed since it was evident that he would need to fight for quite a while, and those attributes would help him the most in that situation.

"I am sorry for before…" Amanda said. "Because of my naive thinking, that puts your group in a difficult situation that will last for a while."

"Instead of wasting your time, you should make yourself useful and kill zombies," Luke said. "Your levels are low and I doubt that you would be able to be of any use when we find a horde blocking our path."

Amanda twitched her eyebrow since Luke was being ruder than usual. Still, he had a point. Amanda also obtained Appraisal in the last twenty-four hours, and she confirmed that their difference in levels had spiked again. Before, they were at level seven and Luke at thirteen. Still, while they supposedly could level up faster, Luke increased the distance even more.

"There's a large group ahead," Stanley said while he was slowing down.

Luke looked toward that direction, and he found a large hospital a few hundred meters ahead. It was Kendall medical center, and between them and the hospital, a large horde of mutant zombies. Around one hundred fat zombies and fifty fire zombies… it sure was a troublesome combination.

"Keep your eyes open on the surroundings and use the crossbows if you feel the need," Luke said. "Against a large group like this, it will be better if you keep your distance."

Luke jumped from the pickup and then ran toward the enemies. While everyone, except Amanda, her mother, and Celia, could fight up close. Their current speed level would make them unable to fight against so many mutants. Luke imagined that they had the strength now to win a one-on-one fight against the mutants. Still, it was hard to imagine that actually happening when there were so many enemies and so few targets for the zombies.

"Shalia, target the fire zombies," Luke said. "Rina, boost my strength to the limit."

Luke equipped a sword in each hand and prepared to fight. When he felt his body being filled with power, he used Stinger with one sword being pointed toward the enemies and the other being pointed to his left side. Thanks to that, when he charged instantly, his left sword beheaded five fat zombies while the frozen claymore only impaled the heads of three.

You obtained 08 experience points.

You obtained 08 gold coins.

You obtained 08 experience points.

You obtained 08 gold coins.

…

Once again, the amount of experience and gold earned had increased. While that was useful, it was also a sign that the monsters wouldn't go down that easily. Luke and the others will lose a lot of time and energy dealing with enemies of that level…

Before Luke could attack again, Shalia froze the heads of some fire zombies with her magic and then destroyed them by firing ice bullets. At the same time, Luke could hear the sound of zombies falling around him. Amanda, Celia, and the others finally decided to do something. Nevertheless, Luke used the same tactic again and again until he reached the other side of the horde. Once that was done, he used Spark Ball to damage and paralyze some of the zombies, and in that short of time, he began to behead the zombies like a killing machine. The putrid blood of the creatures began to rain over him, but Luke ignored that. He didn't have time to worry about that… even more furiously than before, he resumed his fight, the enemies got even more violent when he approached, though.