Chapter 49: That is Why
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’He’s awakened.’
The moment Dion had held Adam’s hand and felt the flow of mana within him, he had been forced to bring himself to notice deeper for Anastasia, he knew. Their hands shook in a tight, solid shake, and he brought it back to his side.
"I need your help."
Dion’s brows raised upon hearing that, though only a little. Looking at the wheelchair, he understood why he would need help, though he didn’t immediately want to talk about it.
"Let’s talk inside. More of them will be coming soon."
Dion turned on his heel as he said so, and he began walking back towards the apartment he had come to occupy. While she wasn’t awake, he couldn’t leave there.
He hadn’t heard the wheelchair move for a moment before Adam followed, and in saying so, he had mentioned, "It would be better in my apartment, no? You kind of destroyed the door."
Dion gave a faintly wry laugh at that. "Nah, don’t worry."
The both of them crossed the threshold into his apartment, and the blood that had settled on his wrists moved once more. Although just that alone wouldn’t have been enough so he pulled more from the wound in his wrist he hadn’t let heal. Adam turned his head, watching as the blood hardened to form a makeshift door.
"See?"
"...It’s definitely a handy ability."
Dion watched as Adam’s expression gained some more confidence, perhaps in asking him for help, and he walked over towards the chairs of the living room table.
At the same time, Adam had been looking around a little, his eyes especially lingering over the ice that remained towards the couch, frosting over what should have been a working TV.
Then he looked to where the pooling of blood was.
"You got rid of the Jameson’s corpses?"
"Keeping zombie corpses around isn’t exactly conducive to good rest. How long ago had you cleared the two floors?"
"During the day." Adam mentioned, driving his wheelchair somewhat closer, "The original plan had been to work my way down till I got to a floor, but after this, all that work’s gone out the window."
Dion’s internal expression went wry at that. He already knew that he had been the larger reason why the zombies should have come here.
Adam began reloading his weapons, the clatter of the sound resounding in the silence that lingered between them.
"You are with someone else in here? Or, is it that you have another ability?"
Dion’s brows slightly raised at that. He knew the man would have been curious, but to the extent that he might actually ask directly, without the slightest hesitation, was a bit of a surprise. Although perhaps that was his own hesitations speaking.
"Immediately asking for help, and even asking about another ability; you’re very direct. What if I wasn’t a good enough person as to like having my secrets pried into when the world has become what it is now?"
Adam faintly shrugged. "I trust my gut, and it isn’t telling me to be wary of you."
"Even though you know I’m something like a vampire because of what the world has become?"
Adam briefly paused, raising his eyes from reloading his pistol. "Are you telling me you’d like middle-aged war veteran blood? I was pretty sure vampires only like the blood of delicate virgins. I’m neither of those, and I probably taste like gunpowder."
Dion laughed slightly, then shook his head. He didn’t clarify the misconception, silently reminiscing that there had been a part of him that, some time ago, wondered whether he would have been subjected to the same.
"Can you tell me about what Eve Taylor’s broadcast said? I missed the whole thing, and clearly it’s been important enough that I’ve been mistaken for a zombie."
Adam’s brows faintly furrowed. "You didn’t hear about it from the others you had met?"
"..." Dion paused briefly, and he faintly shook his head, "They died before I could ask."
"Did you kill them?"
Adam’s eyes remained still over him, though Dion faintly heard the sound of his heart rate climbing a little.
"No. It was a gnoll that did."
Adam’s brows furrowed deeper at that. "A gnoll? What is that?"
At that, Dion had been brought to remember the circumstances Adam was in, ’Of course he wouldn’t know. He hasn’t yet left the building.’
"Fantasy monster made real, looks almost like a werewolf to an extent, and they’re much more dangerous than zombies. They’re smart, sadistic, and they have abilities like us."
Dion heard Adam’s grip on his pistol tighten, and his heart rate shot up. "Compared to you, how strong are they?"
"I wouldn’t advise making a comparison with my strength," Dion said, faintly shaking his head. Then as his head settled, his expression darkened and chilled, "But there were two other awakened I had seen fighting them. Two of them had been a part of the group I had met earlier, and they didn’t even hurt the thing."
Adam’s lips pursed tightly, and he holstered his gun.
Then, Dion gestured at the one that he had holstered, as well as the others. And Adam’s eyes widened a little, taken by surprise and wonder at how he had known.
"You are awakened, aren’t you? Does using guns still allow you to harvest essence like normal?"
’For him to be that good with a gun even in his state, he wouldn’t have been a normal soldier.’
That thought had come to him as he remembered that one shot Adam had taken.
It had whirred right past his head, and it hadn’t been as if he had fully sensed the thing, and he wasn’t fast enough to have dodged it.
Dion only knew about it when it had come rather close, and in that time there had been nothing else but for him to commit to his attack.
To his surprise, the bullet hadn’t hit him at all, instead killing the zombie that he would have next focused on with his blood manipulation.
"...It doesn’t. I had to kill them with an axe to get that message." Adam confessed, and briefly, he had paused as his lips pursed, "And that is why I need your help."