“Get ready?” replied Tasha, strangled. “Get ready for what?” She raised the cleaver, pointing it with a trembling hand. “Ah, man. I should have stayed in the store.”

“What…?” said the older man.

The undead minion sniffed the air like a dog. If Logan hadn’t increased his perception attribute, he was sure it would have moved too fast for him to see. The minion contorted its body, getting on four limbs—sandal-clad feet its back limbs, hands its front. It crawled towards them like an insect, mouth gaping wide.

“Don’t let it touch you!”

It was too late. The minion jumped on top of the older woman, golden flower petals ejecting out of its mouth in a stream. The petals clung to the woman’s skin and then seeped in like wiggling worms, burrowing and creating a weave.

She gasped, her tongue turning blue, before her eyes rolled up in her head and she collapsed to the ground like the others.

Logan used [Idiot’s Inspect] on her.

[Level 1 Gestating Undead Minion]

Ah, fuck. The minion was seeding these people, transforming them into other gestating minions. Is that what happened to Martin?

“Mom?” asked the younger man, eyes wide in disbelief.

At the same time, another group of tourists exited the hotel just as the undead gestating minions stopped… gestating. They sat up with gasps, mouths gaping wide to display tongues in the shape of blooming flowers. Then, scrambling to their feet, they turned towards the tourists with their arms held out in front of them, fingernails transforming into wiggling fungi strands. From afar, they could still pass as people. But up close, even their clothes had a stench of rot.

They rushed towards the tourists as if they were professional sprinters. The people didn’t even have a chance to run back inside. The minions were on them in seconds.

“Don’t let them touch you!” said Logan.

But it was just as hopeless as the last time. Each minion latched onto a tourist, wiggling fungus fingernails burrowing deep into their skin. They injected the fungi into the people like a syringe, the fungi quickly spreading until the tourists grew pale and collapsed into the same hibernating minions.

Three tourists had escaped but only because there weren’t enough minions to go around. Panicking, they ran towards Logan and Tasha, faces ashen with fear.

“You need a weapon!” Tasha held out her fork, handle-side out.

Two of the tourists ran past her, screaming, but a man in his 40s with bulging biceps and a muscular neck stopped. He looked as if he spent seven hours a day in the gym. “That isn’t a weapon! I need something else.” He ran frantic eyes over his surroundings before narrowing in on Logan’s baseball bat. “Give me that!”

“It’s mine,” said Logan, his voice tense.

The man flexed the muscles in his chest. “Are you shitting me? I can do more damage than you. Be smart. You take the fork and I’ll—"

“We don’t have time to argue. You’re not taking my weapon.” Logan felt a flush of heat filling his face, the fights he’d won to get to this point running through his mind. If this unleveled asshole thought he’d steal his baseball bat, he didn’t know who he was fucking with. Logan tightened his grip on the handle, his feet spread wide apart, the heat in his face spreading to his neck, then his shoulders.

Hell, he’d take on the jock, the minions, and the world.

“Whooooa,” said Tasha, sidling away.

The man paled and took a step back. “Hey man,” he said, swallowing. “Didn’t mean anything by it. I’m good with the fork. I’ll stick ‘m good.”

Logan blinked and loosened his grip on his bat. What the hell? He knew he was higher leveled, but the guy hadn’t known that. Why back down so quickly?

Logan inclined his head to Tasha and lowered his voice. “What just happened?”

“What just happened?” she said incredulously. “You became serial-killer scary, is what happened. You didn’t do it on purpose?”

“Do what?”

“The thing! Like you had this nasty presence that made me feel like you wanted to kill me.”

An aura? That made no sense. Logan could admit he’d gotten worked up; he’d thought of the fights he’d won, the repeated level ups… huh. Did the System let you project your strength to others as an intimidation factor? There was no other plausible explanation. If that were true, he could see that being massively convenient. Instead of having to resort to a fight, just intimidate them into backing down by projecting your strength. That is, as long as they were lowered leveled.

Tasha shifted from foot to foot. “Glad you got that out of your system, but you know… minions…?”

Logan snapped to attention. The level ten undead minion had finished ejecting petals and had turned to face them. “I need to take out the minion in the sundress. It’s the highest level.”

“What about the others?”

“They’re level one. You can both handle them.” Logan included the man in his glance, trying to give them both encouraging grins, but he suspected it came out as a grimace. In truth, he had no idea if he was signing their death sentences. But he couldn’t fight the undead minion on top of all the others, and they needed to be stopped. If Logan retreated, they’d be handing the tourists to these things on a silver platter.

“Fuck this,” said the man and dropped the fork.

Tasha tried to grab his arm, but he shrugged her off. “No! We need your help….”

But the man hadn’t left. He’d gone for a patio umbrella. Unscrewing the base, he threw the umbrella to the side and hefted the pole. It was half his height and had a pointed, narrow end, used to either drill into the ground or screw into a stand. It had to be sharp as hell.

“That’s what I’m talking about!” Tasha said, bouncing on her feet. “We can do this, we can do this,” she mumbled.

“What’s your name?” Logan asked as the man rejoined them, holding the pole like a javelin.

“Brad.”

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“Well, Brad, when you kill one of those minions, the System will ask you if you want to level up. Accept it. Accept every message. And when you get the chance to boost your attributes, you need protection. These things don’t seem that strong, but they’re infecting people. So, constitution. Constitution, all in, you get me?”

Tasha nodded, but Brad twisted his mouth. “If what you’re saying is true, then not really, man. Strength seems more appealing. I eat healthy already, don’t think I need a boost there.”

“That’s not how it works.”

“No time,” Tasha hissed. The six minions had finished with the remaining tourists and their creepy flower eyes were focused on them.

“Constitution, Tasha,” Logan insisted. If Brad didn’t take his advice, that was on him, but Tasha could survive if she managed to avoid those fungus tentacles. He didn’t know how the weave infection worked, but she would have no chance if she kept her default base constitution attribute.

Tasha held the cleaver with a trembling hand. “Constitution, got it. I can’t believe I’m about to slash a zombie with a cleaver,” she muttered.

That was the best he could do. With a shout, Logan ran towards the level ten minion, swinging his baseball bat at the gestating, motionless minions on the ground as he passed them. They were still gestating, but they wouldn’t be for long. It was like hitting bowling pins, but at the same time, they’d been people not five minutes ago. Nausea threatened to overwhelm him as the nails on his bat sank into their skin, splitting skulls, brain matter and blood flying everywhere.

Ding!

[You have defeated a Level 1 Gestating Undead Minion!]

He slashed through the skull of the kid who’d accused him of being crazy, shattering the sunglasses that were still on the top of his head.

Ding!

[You have defeated a Level 1 Gestating Undead Minion!]

The kid’s father had fallen awkwardly, face first in the ground, blue fungi still spreading, crawling tendrils moving through the skin on the back of his neck. Due to its head being directly on the ground, Logan only had access to its back, so he bashed its shoulders and spine, going to town. The bat took chunks out of the side of its neck, opening up a huge chunk of flesh. He was about to rush past—he’d torn out half of its windpipe; it had to be dead—when he paused, skidding to a stop as he received the latest System notification.

[You have subdued a Level 1 Gestating Undead Minion! XP reduced.]

What the hell? Subdued? A trickling of dread made the hairs on the back of his arms stand on end. Logan was a big fan of The Walking Dead, both Lara and him caught every episode back when it was popular. When she’d gone through her divorce, he’d spent many nights with a six pack of beer, Lara with a glass of wine, while they binged whole seasons. Zombie movies were something of an obsession for them.

In the films, zombies always came back, never dying unless you gave them a head kill. Could it be possible that fiction had turned into reality?

“Tasha!” he shouted, “what message did you receive when you stabbed Martin?”

“What?! Why are you asking me that now? I don’t know!”

There was only one way to find out.

Logan skidded back to the fallen gestating undead minion, kicking it, and pushing it over so that its head was at an accessible angle. This time, he made sure to whack the hell out of its skull, blood and gore flying.

Ding!

[You have defeated a Level 1 Gestating Undead Minion!]

Holy shit, he was right. “Head shots!” he screamed. “You need to hit their skulls to kill them!” He wasn’t sure if it was the same for the undead minions. Could you ‘subdue’ them and they’d stay down as they rushed past? Either way, better to be safe than sorry.

Logan’s stomach lurched, but he kept going, whacking one last minion underneath the chin and carving deep into its brain. It felt like a violation, going against everything he believed in to be randomly killing things that resembled sleeping people. But he couldn’t think of these things as people anymore. If he did, it would be the rabid squirrel scenario all over again. There was no room for mercy in world in which mercy could mean your death.

Going by the System rules, these people identified as a different species now. They were no longer human and if he didn’t take advantage of eliminating a threat when he had the upper hand, he really would be earning that [Idiot] name.

Logan had no more chance to dwell on the morality of his actions. He’d reached the level ten undead minion.

If flowers hadn’t replaced its eyes, he’d say it appeared amused as he reached it, but there was an alienness to it, making it difficult to gauge whether that slight smirk represented amusement. After all, it was a different species. If cultures had different quirks, who knew about the undead?

Once he was five feet away, it made a clicking sound like an insect and it jumped back to four legs, twisting its body and running at him at full speed. But unlike the older woman, when it lunged at him, his baseball bat met it—face first. He was expecting a spray of blood like with the gestating minions, but it was as if he’d hit the flesh of a noxious mushroom. Bits of skin flew off, but… that wasn’t skin. The minion was fungus, literally fungus.

And when he tore off strips of its skin, the gold fungi spread, filling up the gaps and weaving golden thread until it was as if he’d never hit it in the first place.

Was this what it meant to be an undead fully evolved minion? Instead of hibernating after a stab, it would just endlessly regenerate?

The minion cackled, and this time, Logan could recognize true amusement. It had no weapon, but it didn’t seem to want to cause damage. After all, a damaged host wouldn’t make a good minion. Opening its mouth, shooting out a stream of golden petals, it tried to cover him with the things.

Logan jumped back, but a handful had fallen onto his arms. The petals turned into wiggling worms, burrowing, burrowing, trying to get through his skin.

His constitution attribute was working for him. None of them got through, and they eventually fell off like petals that had dried in the sun.

Now the minion’s cackle was full of rage rather than amusement. Even as Logan whacked it again with his bat, tearing off a chunk of white fungus flesh, it opened its mouth even wider, flower petals spewing in a continuous stream.

Logan didn’t notice at first, still intent on taking out chunks, but some of the petals had landed on his hand, crawling down his finger like marching ants. They made a beeline for his bandage, swarming around it. The first hint of trouble was a foreign feeling, something off, then a horrible itch, like the most intense rash he’d ever had.

Logan jumped out of range and tore off his bandage. His stomach dropped to the floor. That couldn’t be good. Worms had burrowed into the wound, and a golden weave covered the pad of his finger. Unlike the older lady, though, something was fighting back. His constitution must be high enough to slow the advancement of the parasite, but that word was the kicker—slowing it. The fungi were winning the battle against his constitution.

“You moldy fucker!” Logan said, incensed. He needed to kill this thing, and quickly. What he was doing wasn’t working. By rushing past and hitting it, then jumping out of the way, he wasn’t slamming away at the same spot. Each time he jumped past, the minion had enough time to heal itself. Eventually, it would wear him down.

Eventually, Logan would turn into a mindless fungi minion.

Hell no.

Logan braced himself, holding his bat in a swinging position as he sprinted forward, whacking the minion on the head, nails digging deep into squishy flesh while darting past, out of reach of its petals. The minion tried to follow, all four legs scrambling like an insect, but Logan’s agility was higher. He turned on a dime, his feet swivelling, not a second lost while he resumed his hits. Whack after whack, he hit it repeatedly on the same spot.

He may as well be hitting a punching bag. Sweat beaded on his forehead, his lungs on fire.

“I’ve leveled up!” shouted Tasha behind him, exuberant.

“Me too!” said Brad.

Logan had no attention to spare. He could feel the worms spreading, travelling up his finger, his constitution losing the battle. With new urgency, he resumed his hits, skidding out of reach, swivelling back, the muscles in his arms burning.

Ding!

[You have defeated a Level 10 Undead Minion! Extra experience granted for defeating an enemy above your level.]

[You have leveled up!]

He didn’t have a second for relief. This wasn’t over, and something told him that allocating the extra points into his constitution stat wouldn’t help. The worms were too far along.

“Tasha, I need the cleaver!”

She looked up from finishing off an undead minion, her face covered in a mix of blood and goo. Brad pulled his pole out of the chest of the last minion, leaving a mess of bodies at their feet.

“Cleaver! Please!” Logan’s voice had taken on a hint of desperation as he felt the fungi moving up his finger, past the second knuckle.

“But we got them all.” Tasha gave him a confused look but still flipped the cleaver on its end, grasping the blunt edge with her thumb and index finger and handing him the handle.

Cleaver in hand, Logan dropped his bat and rushed to a discarded patio umbrella, frantically cutting away a strip of fabric. He took a steadying breath and then stared down at his finger.

This was going to hurt.