Chapter 222: Chapter 210: Terror in the Mall
Before anyone could see what happened, Flora Bloom’s axe had already cleaved the head from the Second-level Wind Ability user who had spoken.
Perhaps they never imagined a woman could possess such strength, nor did they expect Flora Bloom to strike so suddenly. She had killed a Second-level Superpower User in a single blow, sending his head rolling across the ground.
A giant praying mantis suddenly appeared overhead. Before the men could even react, let alone activate their superpowers, its two sharp scythes had already reaped most of their lives.
"Vert, leave one. We still need a guide."
Flora Bloom approached the last survivor with her axe and laid it on his neck.
"Want to die, or do you want to lead the way?"
The last survivor was a First-level Gold Ability User. He watched as the giant mantis monster in the sky cut down his companions with its scythes, and he collapsed to the ground in terror.
"You can’t even stay calm when things go wrong. And you’re out here hunting zombies?"
"Don’t—don’t kill me! Your father... he might not be dead! I-I can take you to him!"
"My father won’t die, of course. But do you really think you’re in a position to negotiate with me?" Flora Bloom glanced at Chester Sawyer. "Chester Sawyer, didn’t you say you were changing allegiances? I’m not seeing a whole lot of sincerity."
Hearing Flora Bloom, the last First-level Gold Ability User turned to Chester Sawyer in disbelief. "So! You betrayed our leader long ago! You damn traitor!"
The corner of Chester Sawyer’s mouth twitched. He kicked the man and put on a sanctimonious air. "Traitor? I’m just being pragmatic. Don’t you understand?"
"Hmph!"
"Still ’hmph’-ing? Are you going to walk on your own, or should I have my little pet ’help’ you move?"
In a shopping mall in Area 09, Caleb Bloom was hiding in the fitting room of a clothing store.
The mall’s power was out. Once night fell outside, the interior was plunged into darkness as well.
He knew he couldn’t move. He carefully controlled his breathing, not daring to exhale too frequently.
Zombies were countless times more active at night than during the day. Moreover, their senses of smell and hearing were unnaturally sharp, especially their sensitivity to human breath and the scent of blood.
Fortunately, from hunting zombies during the day, he was covered in the stench of their brains and viscera, masking his own scent from any nearby undead.
Perhaps it was because Morhaven was transitioning into winter; the days were still sweltering hot, but the nights grew cool. The combination of his own sweat and the fluids covering him—zombie brains and the like—made him shiver slightly.
The fitting room door only had a simple slide bolt, with a large gap at the bottom letting in a draft. To avoid being seen, Caleb Bloom had to sit on the changing bench, bracing his hands and feet against the walls to keep his body hidden from view.
The horde of zombies outside was larger than any he had ever seen since the apocalypse began. The mall’s main entrance had been utterly destroyed, its reinforced, tempered glass doors shattered and strewn across the ground.
Several bodies lay near the entrance—the corpses of Morgan Sterling’s men, who had come with him.
’This can’t go on! There are just too many zombies outside. If all of them get into the mall, I’ll have no chance of escaping!’
’But what can I do? The moment I step out, the zombies will spot me! A horde this massive has to be commanded by a high-level zombie.’
Suddenly, the scattered, shuffling footsteps outside the fitting room stopped cold. The world went utterly silent. But this brief quiet filled Caleb Bloom with a deep sense of foreboding.
"WOOF!"
The sound of a dog’s bark echoing through the mall made his heart seize.
’A dog?’
"WOOF WOOF WOOF!"
Another volley of barks!
Immediately after, the footsteps of the zombies scattered around him all turned and charged toward the source of the barking.
As the commotion outside the fitting room finally receded, Caleb Bloom slowly lowered his limbs and peeked out through the crack in the door.
"Stop peeking! Get out here and let’s move! I had my dog lure the zombies away, but it won’t hold them for long!"
A rough, gravelly male voice called out from outside the fitting room. "Yeah, you! In the fitting room! Let’s go! There’s something big behind this horde! If we don’t leave now, we won’t be leaving at all!"
Caleb Bloom, finally certain the person outside was talking to him, quickly opened the door and stepped out.
The man who had appeared was a bearded, middle-aged man in a tattered short-sleeved shirt, clutching a Wolf Fang Club of unknown origin. When he saw Caleb emerge, he immediately motioned for him to follow.
"How did you end up in here alone?" the man asked, walking briskly. He led Caleb Bloom to a stairwell door, knocked three times, and then meowed once. Only then did the door open from the inside.
"If you knew where I was, you must have known my teammates are all dead."
The two of them slipped inside. A woman in revealing clothes was waiting. After they were through, she locked the door and effortlessly lifted a long wooden table to barricade it.
"Your dog... is it alright that it’s not coming back?"
The man shot him an angry glare. "Of course it matters! If the boss hadn’t ordered me to save you, I never would’ve sent my dog to lure away that horde! He’s been with me for five years, and now, because of you, he’s probably being torn limb from limb by those things!"
Caleb Bloom was speechless. "I’m sorry," he said, his face full of apology.
"Are you two finished? Get moving upstairs! If we linger, that thing might show up again!"
The woman’s voice was cold. She led the way up the stairs. The mall had eight floors. After climbing two flights, the trio entered the new level and quickly ducked into a corner room. They opened a door, went inside, and locked it behind them.
"This is the building’s main electrical room," the woman explained. "Farther in is the security monitoring center. It’s not on the main floor plan. Other than the service elevator, this is the only door in."
The three of them walked a little farther inside, and the woman knocked on another door.
"KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK."
The door opened from within. As it swung open, Caleb Bloom could finally see clearly. He realized the corridor he had just passed through was filled with nothing but electrical cabinets and bundles of wiring.
"Go on in. Our boss wants to see you."
Caleb Bloom stepped inside. After an injury forced his early retirement from the army, he’d been given a desk job where all he did was print and transfer files. This room reminded him a little of the conference room from his pre-apocalypse office.
There was a long, rectangular conference table in the room, with two rows of computers set up back-to-back on top of it. A main computer sat on a separate desk at the very front.
Only one or two of the computers in the rows were powered on. The screen of the main computer at the front desk was also lit up, displaying footage of the zombie horde on the first floor swarming after the dog.
Just as a pack of zombies on the screen was about to pounce on the dog, the middle-aged man who had brought Caleb Bloom lunged toward the monitor.
"Lucky!"
As he watched the dog get swarmed, bitten, and torn apart, the middle-aged man turned to glare at Caleb Bloom, then plopped down into a chair in a huff.
Caleb Bloom also felt sick watching the brutal, bloody scene. After all, the dog had been torn to pieces by the horde just to save him.
A man was sitting at the desk at the front of the room. He stood, turned around, and walked toward Caleb Bloom.
"It’s been a while, Caleb."
Caleb Bloom’s eyes widened. "Quinn? I heard you were dead."
