Chapter 62: You Failed The Test
10 Minutes Later.
Fredrinn was walking down the road with his hands in his pockets.
He was surrounded by a group of men, with Jenny walking next to him.
At the front were 8 humans, holding pipes and any makeshift weapons they could find.
Fear was obvious on their faces, their expressions ashen and hands shaking.
Every once in a while, a zombie’s loud groan could be heard distantly as the 8 men trembled on their feet.
Behind them, Max walked while chatting occasionally with Aadav and the other unawakened human of their group.
Last but not the least, Charlie was alongside Max, but silent and holding a large metallic pipe.
Hearing the groans, even his hands trembled slightly, but he grit his teeth and pushed on through, not scared of the danger that the outside may contain.
Just a couple minutes back, they had left the storage area in search of buses and large vehicles, capable of carrying a group as large as theirs.
There weren’t any zombies in sight, only a couple corpses of some humans left who thought escaping from the room would be wiser than staying inside the room full of zombies.
"It’s a shocker that the Shimada Mart’s parking area doesn’t have any trucks or large vehicles. I would assume that they get a lot of shipments every day." Jenny said as they passed the mart’s area.
Fredrinn shrugged, "It’s not a necessity, and it’s not like we are the only survivors around here. Many other humans must be alive and we might even encounter some."
"So what? Do you think that they would’ve taken the truck or vehicles before us noticing?" Jenny shook her head.
Fredrinn stared at her blankly, "Lady, first of all you came into the mart a day later than the original people. And then, what about the staff or people who used to work in the store? Sure, some might have been killed by zombies, but some should’ve escaped, no? Which vehicles do you think they would take?"
Jenny opened her mouth to retort, before she closed it back up.
His words indeed made sense.
But just then, a masculine, scared voice drifted into their ears.
"Zo– Zombie! There are zombies in front! Shoot them down, brother Max!" He screamed in a low voice, attracting the attention of 2 zombies who began to move towards their group.
Max scoffed lightly after looking at the zombies.
They were the weakest of the bunch, stage 1 according to Fredrinn’s ranking, as they stumbled slowly.
In his eyes, they weren’t even a threat.
Still, Max respected the scared man’s plea, pulling out his uzi as he cocked the barrel of the gun.
But before he could take the aim, Fredrinn calmly said, "Don’t."
Max’s finger paused on the trigger, "What?"
"Don’t waste bullets on those weak zombies, Max. Don’t you know the value of bullets by now? How many magazines do you even have left, hmm? Are they infinite?"
Max hesitated. He only had two more magazines of bullets left, and in an Uzi, that number was certainly not enough.
"I get your point, I guess I am just feeling a little jumpy today." He said flatly, sighing before putting his Uzi back inside the holster.
"B-Brother Max, they are coming closer! Please shoot them!" The man at front spoke in a hurried tone.
And while saying so, he began to move backwards, trying to put the awakeners at the front while he retreated behind their backs.
"We brought you here to help, not be a burden!" Max scolded when he noticed their plan. He quickly pushed the man back to the front of the group, making their legs tremble weakly as they began to panic.
"It’s just two zombies of the weakest kind, and you’re 8 people for fuck’s sake! Stop being a pussy!" Aadav joined Max’s effort, also rounding up those traitors and pushing them towards the zombies.
Jenny had already told them of Fredrinn’s plan to weed out the traitors outside and use them to bait zombies or save their own stamina.
So they knew exactly what to do.
In just a few moments, those men were pushed back to the front and the zombies had slowly but surely arrived a lot closer than they used to.
Their rotten flesh stank in the air, while their murderous, pupil-less eyes were focused on the bunch of humans.
"AAGH!" One guy pissed himself in fright, dropping his pipe as he began to run in another direction without a shred of concern about others.
But, before he could pass even a few steps, a foot suddenly appeared in his way.
The man tripped, falling heads first into the asphalt road.
"You failed the test." Fredrinn smiled, looking down at the young 20-25 year old man, before pulling out his half broken sword from the sheath and throwing it straight into the man’s heart.
"N-No! Y-You traitorous bastard... You never intended to let us go or let us join the group..." The man gurgled, coughing a small amount of blood as he felt his life slipping through his fingers.
With his last bit of energy, he threw some curses at Fredrinn while trying to crawl away, the half sword still sticking out of his chest.
"Ain’t fun being on the receiving end, huh?" Fredrinn merely scoffed coldly and pulled out the sword, drenched in crimson blood as Jenny watched with a hand covering her mouth.
She thought she was on with Fredrinn on the plan to kill the traitors, but thinking and actually doing were two very different things.
Just because it works in theory doesn’t mean that it’s practical.
At front, the other 7 men clearly heard what happened to the deserter, as they gripped their metallic pipes in their hands and summoned every bit of courage in their body.
Then, with their eyes closed and pipes held tight, they swung their weapon with all their might.
A zombie groaned from impact, disgusting blood splashing outwards onto those men as they pummelled the zombies for 1 minute straight, until their brains had turned into mush and bodies stopped moving.
Then...
*Clang*
A man dropped his metal pipe and fell down on his knees, heaving and out of breath.