Chapter 555: 555
I almost forgot what I was doing but I was so mad that I didn’t think of that. However, I just shook my head in amus.e.m.e.nt and noted to myself that I would shake the hand of the person that did that. There was only a small percentage of people that could be clinically insane but able to function normally like me, so I treat them very dearly.
Moving on, discovering that the slurpers had a new trait of their own, finding a proper name should be essential in identifying them. Aside from taking control of their victims by jabbing their heads with their tongues and eating what was left, they could now make ‘armor’ or additional modification to themselves just by ‘stitching’ it with themselves.
In any case, most of their abilities’ primary source was still their tongues.
‘Although, it’s safe to assume that not all of them would be like that. We still have varying sprinters compared to the ferals we would only encounter when we’re deep enough…’
It took a while to take into account everything that we assumed was one of them, but to make most of the daylight that we have left, we called a clearing group then we changed locations. It was easy enough to park in one of the malls surrounding Monumento but we picked one that was closest to the road they would be taking.
–
*bzzt*
“Old man, are you done over there? Can you send them and at least clear one side of the road.”
*bzzt*
–
*bzzt*
[Kid? Ah, yeah~ we’re taking a bit of time you see. We could maybe get there a few hours before sunset. In the meantime, why don’t you permanently close off the snaking walkways you did last time so they couldn’t reach us from the left side?]
*bzzt*
–
*bzzt*
“Yeah, we parked atop a mall so the timing may just be right. We’ll try to clear the inside and try possibly get to their parking area in the bas.e.m.e.nt. A few delivery vans are probably present there so we’ll be able to take home what we need through several trips. It could be done in a week at most but the problem with the dead is still the priority.”
*bzzt*
–
*bzzt*
[Alright, kid. We’ll table that in the meeting but we’ll see what we could do on our si- WHAT KINDA F.U.C.K.I.N.G 3 MILLION POINT TURN IS THAT?! Ah, sorry- someone needed to have driving lessons… WHAT TH- I TOLD YOU TO- Anyway, I’ll call you in a few hours.]
*bzzt*
–
*bzzt*
“Sure…”
*bzzt*
–
After ending the call, I tasked Kaley with guarding Lois, Chris, and Cynthia atop the roof while the rest of us will be heading down. They will be in charge of closing off the paths we made while we would clear the mall of anything that stayed a little too long for shopping.
‘I’ll trust her with this at least…’
The mall was shaped like an isosceles tr.a.p.ezoid curving from the inside. It had three floors in total excluding the bas.e.m.e.nt where the parking area and a few facilities were located. The walls were made of glass aside from a few made for advertis.e.m.e.nts. Three entrances/exits in total were on the 1st floor but an elevator could access each floor freely, even the bas.e.m.e.nt and the roof.
However, there was no more electricity powering this mall and a few things should be considered.
Before we head down, we secured several climbing ropes and threw them on one side of the mall. It would be serving as another exit plan in case of emergencies and it would be ready once we break the glass windows against it on the lower floors. I gave my group a run-through of a simple plan and we gathered by the roof access.
“Okay, sunlight will be our friend here so we stick to the glass windows as much as possible. We could try to get to the bas.e.m.e.nt to try their generators too but we need to properly close off the 1st floor. With that in mind, that floor had some leakage due to the glass doors being broken so we’ll see once we get there. We’ll worry about the 3rd and the 2nd floor first and we’ll do the same thing of heading straight to block the passages to the lower floor.”
Tatiana chambered a round in her pistol, “Yeah, same old, same old.”
I nodded, “Doing that would ensure nothing would come up while we clear the current floor, but we’ll remove it after and place it on the lower floor’s passage to the floor beneath it until we get to our destination. Don’t worry about the loot because we had no one to contest for it besides ourselves. Try to be quiet as much as possible but don’t worry about letting loose if the situation calls for it. We’ll be splitting into teams of three and but we’ll be fanning almost in the same direction.”
Stefan raised a question, “How many are the passages we’d be trying to block? Also, wouldn’t it be a problem if we start to remove them and head down? Will a group stay behind to guard it?”
“There’s a total of three escalators, two stairs, and a single elevator. We wouldn’t worry about the elevator so we’ll have five passages to block. Don’t worry about removing them. We’ll be only removing one, right? We’ll do that in the escalator in the middle so we’d have an easier time going to it. Besides, we’ll place it back, and unless we encounter a feral or two, we’ll make the blockage to be vaultable only by us with our fine motor skills.”
Stefan nodded a few times as he said, “Who are the teams?”
“Hmm~ Let’s go with-”
Tatiana cut me off, “I’ll decide. Marina, we’ll-”
Stefan immediately side-eyed Tatiana as he turned his head, “Who made you the team leader?”
Tatiana scoffed, “Just by order of who got here first. Artem and Nikolas aren’t here so I’m kinda next in line. In our group right now, Kaley’s gone so I’m also next in line. Also, just by weapon type brought, it’d be unanimous the three of you guys get together, correct?”
“But I- Ack!”
Before Stefan started to argue, Mikhail just picked him up by his neck as he threw him down the stairs. Luckily, there was another door below to get to the 3rd floor and by some chance, Stefan landed on his feet despite carrying a few pounds of gear. It was almost cat-like in a sense but it wasn’t graceful to look at.
‘Hmm, there’s another tidbit… kinda good with balance, eh?’
It didn’t take long before we bust the door open while Tatiana and I pounced on the ones in the immediate vicinity. The light was coming from the left side of the mall, barely illuminating the stalls from the opposite side. Like everything else enclosed, the smell was horrible and we headed straight for where the climbing ropes were located before splitting up.
Tatiana and Stefan fired five shots each with buckshot shells loaded into their guns before kicking off what was left of the glass windows. We tested it by pulling hard for a short moment then we turned around and picked a far side to fan out. I was with Tatiana and Marina on the wider, right side while the other three were on the narrower, left side.
–
*bzzt*
“You know the drill.”
*bzzt*
–
*bzzt*
[Roger.]
*bzzt*
–
Even Mikhail’s side was shorter, visibility wasn’t as good on their side of the mall. Despite that, they were making quick work of the ones in front of them as I could hear blunt objects slamming on frail bodies and sharpened blades cutting through flesh. On our side, Tatiana and I were leading the charge while Marina was providing support at the back. She was right in the middle of us because Tatiana would fan to my left as I continued to move forward.
Marina was providing additional light while pointing out a few stragglers in our blindspot, but she would immediately fire when the numbers were a little too much.
I started cutting down deadhead after deadhead wearing the same uniform, only changing when a manager came by. I was holding my katana with my right hand and my pistol in the other, using the flashlight to shine on what was in front of my path. How I could’ve wished we have shot down each glass window because the deeper we went, the more horrible it smelled.
Not to mention the inner stalls that sold food and whatnot because the vegetables and fruits in the produce section have already turned to some sort of f.u.c.k.i.e.d up mushroomy, molded, gelatin.
A rotting scalp with bits of skull landing on top of it didn’t help as much but we continued cutting them down. The group of three was starting to form into groups of two because Petrov did the same thing of fanning out to the side, almost meeting Tatiana in the middle.
‘So far, so- what the f-‘
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