Xavier and his parents dealt with the two Mutated Cats and the remaining Infected without any difficulties.

The Mutated Cats had already been injured beforehand, which resulted in their quick death through Xavier’s hands. As for the Inferior Infected, they were eliminated easily. Silvia and Mark had grown more accustomed to the attack pattern of the Infected, and their handling of weapons improved as well.

Xavier felt like he would fall asleep in the middle of the street at any moment due to the exhaustion gnawing at him, but he was still satisfied with his gains. Using Dash against the Mutated Cats had been fruitful no matter how terrible he felt.

Mutated Cat has been slain. +2 Soul Essence

Mutated Cat has been slain. +1 Soul Essence +1 Common Card Shard

Xavier hoped that the Mutated Cats would give him more Soul Essences, but that was just his greed speaking in his head. There was nothing wrong with receiving a total of three Soul Essences from hunting two injured Mutated Cats without any difficulties. If anything the reward was quite generous. It was enough to solve his Stamina issue to a certain extent.

Integrate one Soul Essence into the Star of Vitality. Y/N?

Integrate two Soul Essences to the Star of Energy. Y/N?

Xavier was thankful for the wave of warmth and the cooling energy entering his body. The claw wounds on his left arm barely hurt at this point, and his Stamina improved enough to push him in the direction of his grandmother’s house.

Hopefully, grandma is fine…and I want to sleep…just let me sleep…

It was not that late yet but it was already dark. Fortunately, not even 50 meters separated them from his grandmother’s house.

But before Xavier could rush to his grandmother, he was disrupted by a weird sensation in his pockets.

The Shards! Xavier concluded almost immediately. He accepted the soothing feeling from the increment in his Vitality and Energy while retrieving the Common Card Shards from his pockets.

The Common Card Shards glowed and began to vibrate in his hands as well. The Card Shards were pulled to each other like magnets. At first, the pulling force was faint and barely noticeable, but it intensified as Silvia walked over to Xavier with the 10th Common Card Shard in her hands.

The pulling force grew strong enough to pull all 10 Common Card Shards together where they tried to form a complete Card.

Set of 10 Common Card Shards has been detected. Combine?

“Yes, combine them,” Xavier said subconsciously, his eyes drawn to the glowing mass in his hands. The glow intensified until Xavier couldn’t see the 10 Common Card Shards anymore. However, he felt mythical energies pass through the bright light and faint noises of the Card Shards scratching against each other.

A minute filled with silence passed until the bright light dimmed. The light dispersed in all directions, creating a small firework of lights that revealed the Common Card that had been created.

Heavy Strike

Common - Level 1(0%)

Weapon Enhancement

Active

Requires Stamina and Energy to be used.

Effect – Increases the Sharpness and Endurance of the User’s weapon.

The force of the next attack will be amplified

Enhancement wears off after one attack.

–

Stamina consumption decreases according to Card Level.

Degree of enhancement improves alongside Card Level

Duration extends according to Card Level

Force amplification improves with Card Level

“Not bad!” Xavier blurted out, his eyes glimmering. He showed his parents the Common Card. They read through the information of the Common Card and were also quite surprised.

“This Card seems to be better than our Cards,” Silvia concluded, while Xavier nodded in agreement.

He felt that combining Cards Shards might reward them with better Cards. The quality was still the same but even Dash didn’t seem as powerful as Heavy Strike. Of course, Xavier had no idea how much Stamina and Energy a Heavy Strike would cost.

“Take it,” Xavier said as he pushed Heavy Strike to his father. Mark was just about to respond when Xavier added, “Dash already drains my Stamina more than enough. I cannot handle Heavy Strike’s Stamina consumption on top of that. Besides, you need a powerful Card to protect yourself and mom!”

Mark shut his mouth and pressed his lips together. His son was right. He needed strength to protect his family. Mark accepted Heavy Strike and put it inside his Classless Deck to link the Card to his Deck.

Satisfied with their gains yet extremely exhausted from the changes of the world and the fact that they had to fight life-and-death battles, Xavier and his parents decided to move quickly to their destination.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

Fortunately, no more Infected bothered them in the last few meters.

They finally reached Zora Vador’s house. A small house built on a slightly elevated piece of land. It looked like it was the crown of a small hill. But the first thing Xavier noticed was the stark difference between the surroundings to the house. It was as if the cataclysm had not even touched the house.

It still looked the same to him like two days ago when he had mowed the lawn. The small flight of stairs that led to the entrance did not bear a single crack, nor did the walls look like they would collapse.

“The house looks fine. Good thing grandpa built a real sturdy house!” Xavier praised his late grandfather before he climbed up the stairs to the main entrance. Even though they could have entered the house through the back entrance, Xavier couldn’t wait any longer. He retrieved his key to his grandma’s house and opened it quickly.

The door creaked a little when he opened and Xavier’s hand went to his katana to prepare for an incoming attack. But surprisingly no such attack came his way. In fact, the house looked calm and serene like always. The living room was spotlessly clean and the dim light of the table lamp cast a soft glow in the house. For a moment, Xavier wondered if he was hallucinating.

He was about to call out to her when his eyes fell on the rocking chair by the window, her back facing them. His grandma was calmly lying in the chair without making a sound.

The trio exchanged worried glances upon seeing her lying so deathly still. Silvia’s lower lip trembled and the fears chasing her thoughts were easily readable. She gasped and placed a hand on her mouth to stop herself from screaming. Her mind had already assumed the worst. Luckily, Xavier doesn’t let doubts cloud his judgment and observes his grandmother keenly while stepping forward.

“Is she asleep already? The Classless Deck is lying on her stomach…what is going on?” Xavier mumbled mostly to himself. He could see that his grandmother’s rose and fell slowly. This dissolved his worry about her having turned into an Infected.

But how could she sleep soundly while the world turned upside down? Xavier knew that his grandmother loved sleeping more than anything, but wasn’t that a little bit too much?

Silvia rushed up to his mother and knelt down next to her. She inspected her mother’s vitals, which woke up the old woman.

“Silvia? What are you doing here? Isn’t it a little bit late to visit me?” Zora Vador asked her daughter, lightly caressing Silvia’s cheeks. Silvia was on the verge of crying, which naturally awoke the motherly instincts of the old woman.

“Why are you crying, my little girl? Did something bad happen?” She asked, causing Xavier to chuckle lightly.

“Grandma. Do you really not realize what is going on? I doubt Mom likes your teasing,” He said, smiling brightly. He had never been so relieved to see his grandmother. She was usually cheeky, maybe even a little bit annoying. However, she was still his grandmother and he would regret not being able to rescue her. But looking at it right now, Xavier doubted that his grandmother required help, in the first place.

His grandmother was weirdly calm. She looked at Xavier and noticed only now that her precious grandson was wielding a razor-sharp katana and that his left arm was bandaged. The bandages were soaked in blood as well.

“Dear, you don’t look well. Did you have a fight with the neighbor’s cat?” She asked Xavier, still smiling.

Xavier pressed his lips together in a thin line. Technically, he did fight the neighbor’s cat. It was just a little bit different from a ‘normal’ fight as it ended in the cat’s death.

Zora Vador got up from her sleeping chair and walked into the kitchen where she began to brew tea for her daughter, son-in-law, and her grandchild. She didn’t say much, but Xavier noticed that she carried the Classless Deck with her.

“What is that?” Mark asked all of a sudden. He walked to the backside of the house where the terrace was located and couldn’t help but stare wide-eyed at the scene in front of him. There were no couches or tables on the terrace but a handful of corpses.

They were placed in a neat row on the terrace, equally spaced and their feet pointing at the fence in the front. They were burned beyond recognition, and covered in greyish-black ashes. All that remained of their former self was a skeleton with skin and bits of clothes sticking here and there.

“What do you mean? Those ugly things are nothing special. They’re the plaything of the birds,” Zora Vador answered, still as calm as a lake. She pointed to a group of birds, sparrows with red plumage, that circled in the air. Right beneath them was a single Infected that tried to reach the red sparrows and tear them apart.

Xavier stared at the sparrows while scratching his chin. They looked somewhat familiar, yet he could not accurately recall much about them.

“You haven’t forgotten them yet. That’s correct. The sparrows are the ones we fed in the past. They turned out to be quite special,” His grandmother said as she returned to the kitchen to pick up the tea cups for her late guests, “It looks like we did a good job continuing your grandfather’s mission to feed the birds around the house.”

The red sparrows chirped loudly and kept attracting the Infected’s attention. All of a sudden flames ignited around the sparrow’s beak. The flames swirled around and morphed into small fireballs which the sparrows released upon the Infected’s head, burning it down.

Yup. These sparrows are definitely special… Xavier thought, trying not to roll his eyes as he watched the red sparrows poke and taunt the Infected, pecking and clawing at it like it was a worm.

They continued to release small fireballs until the Infected collapsed on the ground and stayed there, without moving an inch.

The red sparrows noticed that their plaything was dead and returned to the small nest they had built on the terrace a few months back.

Zora noticed that the red sparrows had returned to their nest. She picked up her small can of seeds and opened the door to the terrace. In the next moment, she was outside feeding the red sparrows like usual. Silvia and Mark tensed upon seeing what their mother – and mother-in-law – was doing, but Xavier’s eyes gleamed brightly.

His grandmother praised the red sparrows for hunting the Infected and even rewarded them for the kill. She had established a symbiotic relationship with the sparrows by raising them to hunt the Infected in exchange for some snacks.

“That’s amazing…” His grandmother was like a monster tamer from video games!

Despite excitement filling him, Xavier felt his initial worry and tension leaving his body as his eyelids suddenly grew heavier by the moment. Exhaustion began to overwhelm him and he slumped down on the couch.

Knowing that his family was safe and sound, he finally paid heed to his body’s demands for rest and soon fell into a deep slumber.

Not much time passed since the world turned upside down, but Xavier was already dead-exhausted.

How was he going to survive in the future like this?

Was there even a future for him…for humanity?

Xavier didn’t know, but he didn’t care at this moment. All he craved was some sleep.