Several minutes earlier.
A shotgun-wielding bandit cautiously walked through a door and arrived inside the railway depot where trains are serviced, maintained, and stored.
Two survivors wielding a metal tube and a crowbar are hiding behind one of the old trains that was left there inside to rot.
“Calm down, he’s almost near.” The dark skinned middle aged man whispered to the young woman beside him.
The young woman just slightly nodded her head, her eyes betraying her real emotions.
Babababang!
The sound of gunshots continued to echo in the distance, making both the survivors and the bandit nervous since they have no idea what side is currently winning.
“If you don’t want to die, come out! I know you’re in here!” the bandit threatened as he slowly moved along the train tracks.
The dark skinned middle aged man gestured for the young lady to crouch down.
“He’s coming from my side. I’ll try to tackle him down while you quickly disarm him by swatting his weapon away with the metal pipe, got it?” the middle aged man whispered.
“I’ll try.”
“Don’t try, do it.”
The young woman gripped her weapon tightly and nodded her head with determination.
“Fuck, I'm supposed to be having fun and straddling that bitch right now.” The bandit cursed in frustration and he couldn't even hide the bulging tent on his crotch as he suddenly started thinking about naughty things he was supposed to do!
‘Bastard!’
The young woman who heard his mutterings got annoyed because that woman he should be having fun with was supposed to be her.
The bandit is slowly reaching the end of the old train and had this sudden feeling that there are people hiding at the end. He swallowed hard as a grin painted his face, his finger itching by the trigger and ready to fire.
When he was about to reach the end of the old train, the bandit suddenly dashed forward and turned his body to the side while pointing his shotgun forward.
“Gotcha! You b–”
The bandit was at first surprised that his expectations were off, but his realization came a bit too late when he finally noticed that there were actually two survivors who were just crouched down, with their bodies almost touching the ground.
“Ahhh!”
Bang!
The bandit tried to adjust his aim down, but the dark-skinned man didn't waste this window of opportunity. He smacked the shotgun upwards with his weapon and pounced forward like a predator as he tackled the man down onto the ground while the bandit, already out of balance, could only shoot the ceiling on his way down.
Clang!
The young woman quickly stood up and immediately smacked the shotgun away with her metal tube when the bandit tried to shoot her.
“This is for our friends you killed! This is for taking advantage of our kindness! And THIS IS FOR MY DAUGHTER YOU PEOPLE KILLED!”
The middle aged man, now on top of the bandit started raining him down with punches.
“Stop! Stop..s..top.”
The bandit yelled while covering his head with his arms, but everytime he did that. The middle aged man would switch his target to the man's body, rendering his efforts useless.
The young woman didn’t bother stopping him as she too had lost people from these people they treated with kindness and only got taken advantage of in return.
When the man finally ran out of fumes, only then did he realize what he had done. The bandit under him had become an unrecognized piece of flesh.
“Ahh…ahhh!”
The middle aged man looked at his bloodied and wounded hands while shaking from either the adrenaline or the horror he had inflicted upon. The man let out a terrified yell as he quickly moved away from the bandit, whose situation now remained unknown.
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The middle aged man looked at the young woman with horror in his eyes. “I..I killed him. I killed him. I killed a person!”
The young woman ignored his hysterics and quickly checked the state of the bandit and was relieved to know that he’s still breathing. “Snap out of it! He’s still alive, you didn’t kill a man.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”
The young woman really wanted to kill the bandit, but she just can’t pick herself up to do it.
‘No, no, no. I don’t want to be like them.’
If Michael saw this, he would only have one word for them, naive.
On the other hand, the survivors were also able to take down the bandits hunting them down, though with some losses from mistakes due to hesitations out of fear.
Present.
x57 [You terminated a Zombie! Gained +57 EXP and +57 Coin.]
After cleaning all the walkers that surrounded the train station after they were lured over because of the gunfire, Michael returned and met the remaining survivors of the survivor community, Terminus.
Mary looked at the man sporting a long black trench coat, black leather pants, and a pair of sturdy boots, while also wearing a pair of fingerless gloves and a black shirt underneath his coat and completing it with a large belt buckle featuring a roaring bear.
“Thank you..for saving us.”
Michael smiled at them while holding a bloodied kampilan. “No problem. I just hope today’s events didn’t dampen your spirits to continue helping people. Though I hope more cautiously from now on.”
Mary just smiled at his words while her sons and the others just stood there and curiously studied Michael.
“Damn, he looks like he came out of a movie in that outfit.”
“Is that a mace hanging on his waist?”
“Did he really take them all down by himself?”
“I wonder if he was in the special forces.”
Gareth suddenly stepped forward and stood in between Michael and his people cautiously looked at him. “We are thankful and grateful that you saved us, but who are you?”
Michael wasn’t bothered by his blunt approach as he can understand his actions since they just survived a terrifying ordeal. He calmly smiled while whipping his sword to get rid of the blood and sheathed it. “Right, I never introduced myself. I’m Michael. One of the leaders of my group, but I’m currently alone right now since I’m looking for survivors to join our coalition.”
The moment Michael mentioned the word group, the people behind them suddenly went awfully quiet and the tension in the air since again started running high.
“Don’t worry, we’re not like them. I can’t say that we’re good people, but I can promise that we do not take the initiative to attack other survivor communities unless provoked. Right now, our group has a lot of supplies, mostly medicines. Right now, I’m looking for communities that are open for trades and possibly establish ties with each other. What I'm trying to do here is, we would like to establish a mini version of City-States like during Ancient Greece. To trade and aid each other in times of crisis.” Michael calmly explained it to them. Though right now, it’s obvious that he had just created his own operation or business since everything he had said until now clearly wasn't discussed with his group before his departure.
‘Though most of these medicines are with me.’
“Right now, as you’ve seen, my people are currently not fit to have this talk. We don’t even know what we can offer right now due to recent events. So we would like to rest and pick ourselves up first, and then discuss your offer among ourselves before we get back to you.” Mary proposed with a weary expression on her face. It wasn’t just her, the others look tired too and probably just want to have a long rest right now.
Michael smiled in understanding and nodded, “Gladly, you people deserve a good rest after what happened. When you finally have a decision for my proposal, then you can find me in that house up that hill.”
Mary smiled. “We will, and thank you again, Michael.”
Michael just responded to her with a nod before he started walking away from them.
The people remained standing there for a good while as they watched Michael slowly ascending the hill.
Mary turned around to face her people and addressed them. “Come on, let’s head back inside. Everyone should take a rest first, then we’ll start cleaning this place up back to the way it was before.”
The remaining survivors wearily dragged their bodies back inside the safety of the buildings, while Alex and Gareth remained behind before turning their attention to their mother.
“You’re considering that man’s proposal, aren’t you mom?” Alex finally had the chance to open his mouth and eagerly inquired about what Michael proposed to them.
“Not right now. We’ll have these kinds of discussions with everyone from now on.” Mary finally realized that she can’t take on this burden alone. This time, she wants everyone to decide on how they will survive from now on and not just rely on her family’s leadership most of the time.
Alex was quick to disagree. “What? This will cause a division if we do that mom, and some people might start getting the wrong idea and won’t start listening to us anymore.”
Mary snapped her head towards her son. “And that’s what got us here, because we took on this burden all by ourselves. I know this might not be the best idea right now since it would slow down the group’s efficiency in the long run, but it’s what the group needs right now. To have an opinion, especially right now when a couple of people have started showing signs of discontent towards us after what happened.”
“Fine.”
Michael went up the hill and made his way towards the small building near the slope and looked for an entryway.
Knock! Knock!
Inside, Michael carried out the first rule when searching inside a new place; Knock first and Find Out!
“Graah!”
And once again, it proved useful as Michael heard the sound of a walker on the floor above.
Michael armed himself with a mace he recently looted and a handgun on his left as he started ascending the stairs.
“Graah!”
Arriving on the second floor, Michael realized that the sound was coming from inside of what looked like a built-in wardrobe or storage space.
Michael returned his handgun back to its holsters and quickly pulled the door open as a female walker stumbled out and tried to grab him.
Michael immediately dodged her hands back, before he brought his mace up and smashed it towards the walker’s head!
[You terminated a Zombie! Gained +1 EXP and +1 Coin.]
“Woo! Man, that was always satisfying.” Michael let out a satisfied laugh after experiencing the little excitement from smashing someone’s head.
Michael studied his blooded mace and thought. ‘A blunt weapon is indeed the way of a real man.’
‘It’s actually surprising that few ever thought of looting a museum for medieval weaponry. People are kind of dumb these days.’ Michael smiled when he thought of how the people back at the camp will be so excited once he brings those medieval weapons back home.