~~~Stanley~~~
The blade plunged... and a dark blur slammed into the man's arm, driving it back, and sending him tumbling away, head over heels, through the air.
Stanley watched it happen from far away, his mind fading into the darkness. But he was not so far gone that he didn't recognize the dark shape. Even though he couldn't believe what he was seeing.
Caff...
Debuff Downgraded: [Heavy Bleeding]
Debuff Upgraded: [Ravenous]
The pounding drumbeat of his heart thumping back to life in his chest drove the darkness back once again.
Stanley noticed it... but it was a distant thing, as distant as the sight of a tiny pug doing its best to maul a full grown man.
Now a new feeling was rising inside him, rising alongside the booming drums, rising like a tsunami to sweep everything else away.
HUNGER
Stanley had been hungry before, especially since he'd started training his power. But even the worst of his hunger before was only a pale shadow to the hollowness that now clawed at his insides.
It was something more than hunger. Something... Ravenous!
He charged through the air after the descending duo, then. Not to fight or escape... but because they were food.
They reached the ground before him, the man landing on his feet and then punching the pug dangling from his arm. It let go with a yelp and flew away into the shadows.
Stanley felt a sickness deep in his heart at the sight, but roaring, screaming hunger drowned out the feeling.
Mostly.
His mind lashed out at the man... and dragged him closer. Stanley's own teeth met the knife-wielding arm before it could stab him, and he bit down hard even as his power kept the man from escaping. The bloody meat was tough, hard to bite through, and it was ambrosia in his mouth... then down his throat when he swallowed the mouthful.
The man's other arm came around to punch Stanley in the head, but it was slower, pushing against his mental hold.
Stanley still rocked under the blow, but his grip on the man didn't waver as he went back in for another bite.
The second blow knocked him loose, but Stanley took more flesh with his teeth even as he fell away. It was just as good as the first bite!
He didn't hesitate to go in for more, despite the blade stabbing toward his head. He was too hungry!
Caffeine appeared again, shooting straight for the man's throat.
He caught an arm again when the man aborted his attack to block the pug, but Caffeine still hit hard enough to drive him away.
The shock of seeing the ever friendly and always lazy Caffeine so vicious was there in Stanley's mind, but it was still distant behind the ravenous need to eat. Stanley flew after his escaping meal. He needed to eat, and there was bloody meat right there!
It was over even faster this time.
Caffeine snarled and growled as he ended up dangling from the man's knife-wielding and savaged arm. Then the man switched the knife to his other hand in an eye blink... and stabbed Caffeine in the back, then the side, hand blurring faster than Stanley could track with his eyes.
Something in Stanley's mind finally broke through the haze, and his whole body shook at what he was seeing.
No...
His hunger faltered, vanishing behind a roaring noise in his head...
Caffeine's growls continued almost uninterrupted as he whimpered at each blow, but refused to let the man go.
Each whimper was a nail driving into Stanley's chest.
Nooo!
His hands were reaching before he could think, his mind far ahead of them as he grabbed onto the man in a mix of horror and rage.
NO!
The man stopped in place under Stanley's screaming mind. He was still heavier than anything before, like trying to lift a skyscraper into the air. Stanley held him anyway, even as his mind burned from the power flowing through it.
Caffeine fell from the arm, collapsing on the floor... unmoving, silent.
Stanley couldn't feel his own pain anymore, couldn't feel the hunger. All he felt was a burning hatred for this monster before him as he tried with every fiber of his being to crush its skull.
The monster laughed at him even as its arms moved slowly through Stanley's power. The bloody knife in its fist drawing closer and closer. Blood dripped and ran from the blade, dark red droplets falling down toward the still pug at their feet.
Stanley's vision blurred as his heart broke.
He had worried about the pug before, had missed him when they were briefly apart, but he'd never really thought about losing him. Caffeine was just... there. He wouldn't go anywhere... he... he couldn't...
The monster's hand stopped moving. The knife stopped approaching. Then it turned slowly around as the monster's arm bent back.
Stanley saw the widening of its eyes as the blade started inching towards its face.
The laughter stopped, but the knife didn't.
Stanley pushed it inexorably onward as the monster screamed at him. His own mind screamed louder. His rage roared loud enough to drown out the world.
Debuff: [Brain Bleed]
Everything got hazy after that... but not enough for him to stop. Not enough to save the monster from his wrath. Nothing would ever be enough for that...
The knife tip sank into the monster's eye, and the orb popped in a burst of fluid. Then the knife kept going, kept sinking deeper and deeper. Pushing, cutting, breaking, stabbing in.
It was hilt-deep in the eye-socket when the resistance vanished.
Stanley ripped it out of the monster's head and drove it into the other eye. Then its chest. Again and again, Stanley stabbed into the monster before him, like a sewing needle stitching a line.
+1 Willpower(Willpower +1 Fortification)
He stabbed it. Over and over. Until the unresponsive and mangled corpse finally robbed Stanley of his driving rage. The rage drained away with the blood and left him staring blankly as the corpse flopped to the floor.
It was dead... but too late. Far too late.
The smell of blood was thick in the air, and Stanley felt his hunger rising to replace the rage as his gaze tracked over to the limp form of Caffeine.
The pug had saved his life... Why, Caff... you had no chance... He couldn't even understand how Caffeine was here. Hadn't he run away? Everything was wrong... nothing made any sense...
The stabbing pain in his heart hurt so much worse than the knife had... and it was the only thing that allowed Stanley to turn away from the smell of so much fresh meat before him.
He snatched up the first thing at hand as his vision blurred again. He didn't know what he held, but his nose must have sensed something because he ripped the box apart and started stuffing half-frozen food into his mouth.
It tasted delicious, life-saving, and like ashes choking him as he ate mechanically, tears adding their own flavor to his meal.
Debuff Removed: [Brain Bleed]
The haziness faded from his mind, and that just made everything worse.
Stanley choked down box after box of ashes while he sobbed bitter tears.
Debuff Downgraded: [Starving]
+1 Vitality
The abrupt cessation of his ravenous hunger was enough to bring Stanley fully back to reality. He wished it didn't. It was a terrible reality.
He choked on the food in his mouth, spitting it out as he clutched his chest. It hurt so much... Why did it hurt so much? Caff, I was too weak... and now you are...
The loud whimper behind him almost stopped his heart as Stanley froze up, blinking blurry eyes. It couldn't be...
He was too terrified to turn around. He couldn't look, couldn't risk the desperate hope... A second loud whimper broke him, and Stanley spun.
Caffeine still lay where he had fallen, on his side in a pool of red... but his tail was wagging! Big brown eyes stared at the box in Stanley's hand as he whimpered again.
Stanley fell next to him, frantically pulling out... half-frozen chicken nuggets... He held one out with shaking hands, and Caffeine chomped down on it, swallowing the entire thing in one bite like he always did, tail wagging faster!
His own hunger and pains forgotten, Stanley fed piece after piece to the stupidly brave pug. He brushed filthy sleeves over his eyes just so he could see well enough to find more food and kept feeding him.
At some point in the future; he didn't know how long, Caffeine didn't take another bite... It was unprecedented to see Caffeine not want more food, but then, Stanley had never tried stuffing the pug with all you can eat nuggets...
His fingers trembled as he ran them oh so delicately over the blood-stained fur... but he found no wounds, and Caffeine didn't make a sound as he fell back to sleep, even when Stanley levitated him gently into the air to check more thoroughly. Nothing. Not a scratch. It was impossible.
But then, so was surviving a stab to the heart... or two of them...
Caffeine settled into his lap, waking just enough to curl up tighter, and Stanley numbly ate more food himself while his mind struggled through the slurry of competing emotions filling him.
Debuff Downgraded: [Famished]
People had attacked him. Humans…
No! Not humans. They were monsters! They tried to kill him and Caffeine! They almost succeeded... Stanley rubbed his chest through the sticky and shredded shirt. The wound was gone, all of them were gone, not even a scar... just like Caffeine... Did the pug have the same level of regeneration? Did everyone?
The knife couldn't really have hit his heart. His regeneration couldn't be that good... could it? Was it? Or was it only luck that he was still alive?
Beyond all that… he had killed a man... and eaten him... He'd almost forgotten that part.
Stanley felt sick looking at the mutilated body and then his gaze tracked down to the two chunks of flesh missing from its arm. His stomach heaved. Only nothing came up. Multiple times, he gagged and choked, but only bile touched his tongue. All that healing... his hunger... it was likely that he'd already digested the man's flesh.
He wanted to scream and cry at the horror of it all, but the still fading ache in his chest fueled Stanley against that weakness—and not the ache from being stabbed, either. The monster had got what it deserved, and Stanley did what he had to do to survive.
He was alive. Caffeine was alive. That was all that mattered now. That was all he cared about.
Not that he wanted to think about it anymore. To distract himself, Stanley turned to the notifications he'd missed in the chaos... Some about his hunger, some stats and skill levels, some debuffs, and something new.
You have Defeated the Lair [Verdant Echo]
The queen is dead, but the seeds remain and will regrow if not eliminated.
That message had come in while he was still fighting the knife-wielding maniac. Before Caffeine showed up to save him... Stanley stared at the sleeping pug in his lap, hands resting on him as he felt the rise and fall of his breathing. Had Caffeine defeated this so-called queen? Is that why he'd run away from him... only rather than escaping Caffeine had run toward the threat... to save Stanley?
He finally stopped watching the dog sleep and sat bolt upright when he remembered that the man hadn't been alone... Idiot! Where were the rest of them?
The woman was gone... Stanley hadn't noticed her leaving. As for the rest...
Taking to the air again, Stanley flew through the store; the lair message seeming to imply that it was now safe, at least until the seeds regrew... whatever that meant.
It didn't matter. He would rip apart anything that tried to threaten them! Which meant he needed to keep eating... So he did. Stanley kept shoving food into his mouth, swallowing everything past the lump in his throat. He couldn't ever let himself be that weak again.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
The shredded remains of giant plants, or maybe flowers, were his only clue what the lair had held, aside from the name. He wouldn't have suspected them at all if not for the cores beneath each destroyed plant...
+0.1 Dexterity
+0.1 Vitality(+0.1 Vitality Fortification)
+0.1 Wisdom(+0.1 Wisdom Fortification)
+0.1 Wisdom(+0.1 Wisdom Fortification)
+0.1 Strength
One of the plants, the largest one going by the detritus spread around, had a slightly better core. A +2 instead of only +1. Though, he didn't know if it was simply because it was larger or something else.
+0.2 Vitality(+0.2 Vitality Fortification)
The bones littering the area around each flower were something else... and they looked human, or at least the right size; Stanley wasn't that up to date on his anatomy, but he could recognize a human skull. The worst part was the sheer number of them. The strangest part was that they were clean... It had only been a single night, and not even a whole one. How were they already bones?
A few much fresher corpses lay among the flowers, literally. Roots, or maybe stems, grew through and around the bodies. So the plants... were eating them?
He found only one living soul in the building.
"I didn't want to do it!" the man cried out after laying eyes on Stanley floating his way. He was missing both legs and one arm... the stumps partially healed, but still stumps and still bleeding slightly even though he'd tied them off. Did that mean he didn't have the same regeneration?
Caffeine woke at the sound of the man's voice, head popping up to growl at him.
"No! Keep that monster away from me!" the man yelled upon seeing Caffeine and scrambled with his single remaining arm to drag himself away.
Caffeine huffed and lay back down while Stanley drifted closer to the crippled man. He'd recognized Caffeine... which meant he'd seen him before... and was afraid of him? Stanley's breath caught when he remembered hearing them talk about chasing the pug? Heard them talk about... killing the pug...
"What did you do!?"
The man stared up in horror as Stanley screamed at him. It might have had something to do with the fact that Stanley was covered in blood and little else. His clothes had already been a wreck the night before. They were little more than stringy rags now.
"Nothing! He was too fast! He ignored all our spells and then ripped us apart!" the man babbled, terrified. Maybe he could see the rage in Stanley's eyes...
"You attacked him?" Stanley's voice cracked. He knew what he'd heard before, that they were chasing 'the dog', but he was still having trouble believing it. If he hadn't seen Caffeine attacking the other man with his own eyes... getting stabbed... over and over...
"N... No! We couldn't... he was a monster... I mean..." The man's words cut off when the knife went through his head and halfway into the floor below.
Stanley, chest heaving with rapid breaths, stared at the twitching corpse until it stopped moving. Then he turned away, nausea rising. He swallowed it down and let the rage fill his mind instead. They were all monsters!
Even besides that, how many people had they killed here before he arrived? There were enough bones here for... too many. It was only the first fucking night of the end of the world! Who goes straight to mass murder on the first night?
Though, he really should have asked about the screeching before killing him...
There was a dismembered leg on the floor in front of Stanley, and it certainly looked like it had teeth marks on the thigh. A big ugly bite that was too big for Caffeine... but then... Stanley could have sworn that the pug was a little bit bigger when he'd attacked their leader... but that was crazy. It was probably just the adrenaline.
Stanley thought of something that he probably should have the night before.
Does Caffeine have a status?
And just like that, it appeared.
Status
Name: Caff Caffeine
Race: [Canine(Pug)](Ungraded)
Traits: [Good Boy]
Class: Beast Lord (Legendary) - Level 3 (Novice)
Class Skills: (None)
Attributes:
Strength: 1
Vitality: 1
Dexterity: 1
Perception: 1
Intelligence: 1
Willpower: 1
Soul: ??? [Twin-Soul Bonded(Stanley Cascade)(Lee Cascade)]
Non Class Skills(0/1):
[Big Enough]
[Strong Enough]
[Fast Enough]
[Tough Enough]
It was... How? A legendary class; Beast Lord. What did that even mean?
[Beast Lord]
Only the strongest beast may hold this class.
Pretty bare-bones description, and Stanley almost laughed when he read it, but the sound came out somewhere between a laugh and a sob. Caff is the strongest beast... Maybe his little pug wasn't quite as stupidly brave as he'd thought, but an actual badass.
The rest of Caffeine's skills and information were even more sparse, with...
[Good Boy]
A good boy.
[Big Enough]
Big enough.
...and so on. It also didn't explain his stats being so low, despite the fact that Stanley had seen him perform feats of both strength and speed far beyond those numbers. Far beyond what he himself was capable of.
The soul-bonded bit was also odd, because Stanley had never chosen that. Did Caffeine choose it? Could he do that? His weird name didn't make sense either... and why was his soul attribute only question marks like theirs?
All the consideration of Caffeine and his status reminded Stanley of something he hadn't thought about before. Caffeine had been there in the mountains when Stanley first got his power... when something happened that he couldn't remember. He'd been so caught up in his own new power that it simply never occurred to him to wonder about the pug.
Looking at his own status gave clues about what had happened. Especially his trait. Not enough for actual answers, but clues of... something.
Now Caffeine's status hinted that maybe he too had been changed on that day. Only, he didn't have the same trait... but he still regenerated like Stanley... There had to be more to that Good Boy trait. Honestly, it was the only thing Stanley could think of to explain how a tiny pug was considered the strongest beast by this system.
The best part of it all, the absolute best thing about seeing his status, was that it meant Caffeine could get stronger. He wouldn't have to worry about the little pug getting left behind in a world of increasingly dangerous monsters.
When he turned back for his new knife still in the monster's head, Stanley saw the core.
Skill Shard[F-Grade]
Fire Bolt (Uncommon)
Point and burn.
Launch a bolt of fire from a finger toward a target.
Range and damage based on Intelligence and Skill Level.
Skill Level Effects (Novice)
+1% Effective Intelligence
-1% Mana Cost
Requirements:
Mana Core/Channels [N/A](Adaptable)
Adapting to this Skill will require 50% Adaptation and may alter your Class.
Adapting this Skill to your Class will require 1% Adaptation but may drastically alter the Skill.
Adapt Yourself and Learn Skill: Y/N?
Learn Adapted Skill: Y/N?
Stanley grimaced at it. It wasn't a terrible skill, and it was most likely what the man had been using to attack Caffeine... The bastard... but hey, at least he was dead now.
The adaptation bit was interesting as well, but not something he was willing to gamble on. It didn't say what it would turn into, and it would cost him some adaptation just to see. He also wasn't sure if he would be stuck with whatever it became… and he could only learn one skill.
None of that mattered though, because there was a final option at the bottom.
Consume and Destroy Skill Shard to gain +2 All Base Attributes: Y/N?
It was an easy decision at that point. A skill that may or may not be useful, or an extra step closer to F-grade. Fire spells wouldn’t save him against more monsters like he’d just faced. But F-grade might…
Stanley absorbed his first human core.
+0.2 All Base Attributes(Multiple +0.2 Fortification)
His first core because there were more dead humans in here and he was going to take all their cores.
Stanley found the rest of them nearby, all dead, and all with teeth marks on their flesh. Good boy, Caff. The bites were varying sizes that were all too big for Caffeine's jaws, but Stanley had to assume it was the pug. He'd seen no sign of any other creature that might have done the deed. It had to be his Big Enough skill...
Stanley endured his discomfort with the savaged corpses and gave Caffeine some gentle pets while the pug slept on.
Each human core was a skill shard, like the first, and Stanley understood just how fucked humanity was. So many would die to other humans once they found out about this.
All the skills were trash, and Stanley chose the stats each time.
+0.2 All Base Attributes(Multiple +0.2 Fortification)
+0.2 All Base Attributes(Multiple +0.2 Fortification)
+0.2 All Base Attributes(Multiple +0.2 Fortification)
+0.2 All Base Attributes(Multiple +0.2 Fortification)
The last one, from their leader, was different.
Skill Shard[F-Grade]
Knife Work (Rare)
Become the blade.
Increases the user's innate understanding of their weapon when wielding knives or short blades. Easier for the user to find vital points on targets and to strike those points.
Skill Level Effects (Novice)
+1% Effective Dexterity
-1% Stamina Cost when wielding knives or short blades.
Requirements: N/A
Consume and Destroy Skill Shard to gain +4 All Base Attributes: Y/N?
Interesting... and maybe not useless for him. Especially since it didn't require any adaptation to learn. He tried not to think about the recent history of the blade now in his possession, the one used to nearly kill him and Caffeine. Nevertheless, it was his now, and if this skill would help him wield it with Psychokinesis...
It was probably a long shot, and this rare skill offered +4 to all stats if he destroyed it instead. At least, Stanley assumed that was because of the rarity since all the others had been common or uncommon rated. He held off on both options while scouring the store for the dead flower cores.
He found more than enough to push him to what he really hoped was the F-grade threshold. He really should have asked some more questions before killing that man... Because of that, he wasn't sure how it would happen, and so didn't absorb the last one. For all he knew, it would knock him out or leave him defenseless, and he didn't want to be in the open for that.
Instead, he went shopping.
The second most unpleasant discovery he made in the supercenter was that plastic wasn't doing well in the apocalypse. The forever substance that was going to kill everyone eventually... was now dissolving.
The bottled water was a bust thanks to that, and the jerky didn't fare any better... The plastic wasn't just melting away; it was also sticking to everything else in the process.
Stanley settled for canned food after opening one to check and finding the metal didn't seem to share the degradation. Caffeine woke up for the food; beef ravioli, and he had no hesitations about wanting to eat it, either. So much for him being full...
Stanley tried a few tentative bites first, just to be sure.
It was awful, especially cold, but it was still food... so he loaded a backpack. Thanks to the cold, and the only recent loss of power, Stanley also checked out the meat and dairy section.
The strange flowers had overgrown a large swath of the section, but not all of it. Unfortunately, that was all plastic wrapped as well...
Stanley solved the issue by carving up blocks of cheese and slabs of meat. Cutting off the plastic-tainted outer layers and wrapping the rest in paper. Hopefully, the cold both outside and in the store would keep it fresh long enough. The other option would be eating the monsters outside... a last resort, for now.
Looters like himself would clean out the stores fast enough, and then he would probably have no choice but to hunt for his food.
Water was another problem thanks to the lack of plastic, but he found some fancy glass water bottles in the coolers. Not enough for long, but then again, there was plenty of snow outside.
Stanley looked outside briefly to scoop that snow up once he had a fire going. He saw no one out there, and didn't stick around for a closer look. Starting the fire was easier than expected. The camping section had all manner of fire-starter kits.
He warmed water in a large pot from cookware department for Caffeine to have a bath, something the pug vehemently opposed. Stanley distracted him from the torture with the suspect, but probably still okay, rotisserie chickens from the deli, four of them in total.
His torture of the pug was justified by the absolutely disgusting water left over when Caffeine took off sprinting and shaking like a lunatic.
Then he had his own bath, though it was more of a sponge bath, washing away blood, gore, and other stuff... His clothes were already a lost cause when he got there, but it wasn't hard to steal more.
No one showed up the whole time. Either everyone nearby had already tried coming here and died, joining the piles of bones, or they knew what was happening and stayed away. It made for a more pleasant time for Stanley, and he was feeling a lot better when he'd holed himself up in the cooler at the back of the store.
With his power, it was easy enough to drag a pile of crap in front of the door after he closed it. Once safely locked inside, Stanley looked at the cores in his hands, their light illuminating the closed space.
He had enough, even without using the knife skill, and he started absorbing. It was time to reach F-grade.
~~~Clara~~~
Shit! Shit! Clara staggered and limped across the parking lot, almost falling every time her head whipped around to see if that monster was coming after her. Either one of them...
She felt sick to her stomach, and not only from the fresh bruises covering her body. I should have run away the moment I met him. But she'd never really had that option.
Last night had been a nightmare… until he showed up. Her beautiful knight in shining armor. Clyde killed the six foot tall raccoons like they were nothing, weaving around their slashing claws and snapping teeth as he cut them down.
His hands were warm and strong as he lifted her from the street, his smile was kind, confident. It was all a lie.
He’d asked about her skills as he carried her to safety, and she’d still been in shock as she told him everything between the sobs of pain. His voice was so kind, his smile so pure when he handed her the shards. "Absorb these. Your wounds will heal when you hit F-grade."
She hadn’t known what he was talking about, but did as he said anyway.
He was right. Her wounds did heal… and she felt better than she ever had before. Stronger. Powerful.
Clyde had a plan. He would protect everyone from the monsters roaming the darkness, and she was the key to it all. Then he led her into the night, gathering more and more people along the way, leading them all toward safety.
He was a hero. Swooping out of the night and rescuing people from the monsters. No one was safe anymore. Hiding in their homes offered no protection when so many of these creatures could smash right through walls. But he knew a place they would be safe.
The store.
Her skill shielded everyone from the flowers, and the flowers protected them from the monsters outside.
Clyde picked people from the crowd and gave them cores. Raised them up to F-grade. Then sent them into the night to rescue more people.
So many people came… so many desperate people that only wanted to be safe. To live. They all walked right into Clyde’s trap. Her trap…
Clara tripped over a concrete curb and fell sprawling. Her vision was blurry as she scrambled upright and kept sprinting for her life. She just wanted to live! Was that so wrong!?
She never had a chance to stop him when he told her to turn off the shield… it didn’t even matter that she refused. He simply carried her away. He was too strong… too powerful.
The blood…
Then he handed out cores to the few he hadn’t killed. New skills… more power. Some refused, and tried to fight back. Clyde killed them. Only Sturgeon and Harold accepted.
Harold then tried to run after reaching F-grade… Clyde dragged him back and forced Sturgeon to kill him.
The flowers feasted on the dead… and grew fast. They were even stronger when the runners returned with more rescued people…
Clyde welcomed them with open arms and kind words. All the while he watched her with those ice-blue eyes. He led them deeper into the store with his hand resting on Clara’s shoulder while he laughed and reassured everyone that they were finally safe…
It wasn’t her fault! She just wanted to live!
Was she supposed to die just to save a bunch of random people? Clyde would kill them just as easily outside. He would kill her if she didn’t cooperate with his games…
He gave her cores and she had to take them… She had no choice!
Voices sounded out, loud enough to break through her panting breath and thumping feet. Clara froze as they saw her, approached her. They looked kind… worried about her…
Clara remembered her last sight of the monsters battling. A crazy little dog biting Clyde, while the equally crazy human did the same… she wasn’t sure who would win that fight… but either one would probably kill her when they caught up. "You have to help me!" Maybe she could slow down the pursuit. "There’s two crazy guys in the store! They’re slaughtering people…"