When heading to the security room, there was more than one objective in Zain’s mind.

He wanted to see if there were more mutated zombies he needed to deal with, either in the parking lot or around the supermarket.

As for the normal ones, they wouldn’t react to Zain, and not to mention that if he takes them out, he will end up losing exp instead of gaining more. This was why he was only concerned about the mutated ones so he could level up and increase his stats.

‘If I just say I want to do my part and look at the security room for my shift, he will agree, right?’ Zain thought.

Although if he didn’t find any zombies, there was still one place where he was sure to come across something, and that’s the freezer where Kelly and others had moved all the bodies. Although the doors were tightly shut and made the freezer soundproof, he heard something move inside when he pressed his ear against the metal door.

Just then, while walking through the aisles, a figure dropped down directly in front of him. It had startled Zain a bit and caused him to step back, but noticing the hood, he realised that it was the teenager from earlier.

‘Where did this guy come from? Did he climb over the aisles? Without making any noise?’ Zain thought.

“I followed that suit guy as you asked.” The teenager broke the silence, “For a while, he was just walking up and down the aisles, but then, I saw him head down the cutlery section and grab a few knives.

“After that, he stayed behind an aisle, as if waiting for something. Then, while hiding, he would peek in and out, acting as if he was in a spy movie or something.”

‘Hiding himself?’ Zain thought._.

“Thanks for the help. If you could continue to keep an eye on him and make sure he doesn’t do anything, that would be good. When you saw him hiding, where was he? Do you know what he was looking at?” Zain asked.

“Yeah, he was staring at the Butcher’s Section.”

Zain’s pupils constricted upon hearing this. There was no reason for someone to act like that if they didn’t want to be seen, perhaps following someone, and he knew quite well who had been to the butchers recently.

‘Was he following me? If that’s the case, he would have seen Barbara and me enter…Damn it! I will have to go and check on her and see if she’s alright. Maybe I should tell her to move to another location? I didn’t think someone would be following me.’

Turning around, Zain exited the aisle and headed back to the butcher room, but just as he did, a large figure in a red sports outfit was standing behind him. It was none other than Mr. Clark, clutching a tennis racket.

“Excuse me, I just need to check something,” Zain said, walking past him. But as soon as he walked past the former, he suddenly heard something whip through the air, and before he knew it, he heard a resounding snap.

[Your leg is now broken]

[Would you like to use your energy to heal?]

Zain collapsed onto the floor, falling on his knee. One of his legs had completely given up on him, and when turning around, he found the tennis racket in Clark’s hand was now bent, and the latter was already beginning to tie Zain’s hands with the help of some rope.

‘He broke my leg with a tennis racket…damn, this guy has some serious strength..but why? What happened? Did I mess up somewhere?’ Zain racked his brain as he realised that the games were far more effortless than real life because people were unpredictable.

“Come on, kid! Help me tie him up!” Clark instructed the teenager while handing one end of the rope to him. The latter looked a bit confused, but in the end, he did as Clark told him, and they had tied both of Zain’s legs and arms in no time.

——

A short while later, they put Zain on a garden chair. Not only were his limbs restrained with a high-duty rope that one would use for rock climbing and such, but he was also bound with the chair, with his leg still broken. On top of that, Mr. Clark had shut his mouth with duct tape, so he couldn’t even say anything.

Looking around, Zain found himself near the closed shutters of the front entrance. Mr. Clark had pulled the chair here, had taken away all his stuff, and piled them on the other side of the hallway.

After double-checking the knots, Clark called everyone to the entrance to tell them what was happening.

“Where the hell is that damned old woman and that office guy!” Clark shouted, but the others shrugged their shoulders. They hadn’t seen the other two either.

“What happened? Why have you tied up Zain?” Kelly asked as soon as she noticed him, “And his leg…what did you do?”

Straight away, Kelly had an assumption as to who had done this. There was no one else that could have possibly done something like this.

“Before you start shouting at me for saving your life, I think you should see something because I am sure you’ll be thanking me,” Clark interrupted her, walking into the security room, which was not too far off.

The others stared at Zain in confusion for a few seconds before following Clark.

‘They’re heading to the control room… Wait! No! It can’t be…’

Once everyone entered the room, Clark rewound the video, and soon, Zain appeared on the screen. They mainly saw him looking into the vehicles in the area, trying to find something, and he continued to inspect each car.

Zooming in on the video, Clark showed them all a clip of a certain individual in a car. His body was blocking what he was doing, so it was hard to see, but then an arm came into view flopping out from the driver’s seat onto the ground, and they saw him picking it up and moving it towards their mouth.

“This damned kid is a cannibal!” Clark said, pausing the video. “He might be human, or he might even be one of them!”

Walking back to where Zain was after seeing the clip, there were different looks toward him. He could see the look in all those eyes. It was a look that Zain had seen a few times before and started to stir some feelings inside him.

‘These guys!!! What are they looking at! I’m trying to help you…I’m the one that stopped you from rotting in here!’ Zain thought as he scooted forward in his chair with his strength and the others took a step back.

“Oh…you want to explain yourself, huh? Explain to us what you were doing in those cars? Very well, but I doubt you can say anything that will change our minds.” Clark said as he pulled the tape off of Zain’s mouth

——

Over at one of the houses in the neighbourhood, one could hear the sound of loud snoring, and it had eventually woken up Skittle.

“Damn it, this guy’s snoring will attract Zombies from the whole street!” Skittle said, lifting his head. Although he said this out of frustration, it was also partially true. Getting his glasses that were on the side table, Skittle started to look around the room.

He was displaced for a second, not noticing where he was, but then all the events from the day flashed in his mind.

“That’s right…so it was all real.” Skittle murmured, and then looking to his right, he found something strange.

“Hm? Zain? Wait, where’s Zain?”

Suddenly finding his friend missing, Skittle panicked and turned to his other friend, “Buke! Buke!”

But Buke was in a deep sleep. Skittle threw away the rug he had on himself and ran up to his friend.

“Get up, Buke! Zain, he’s gone. He’s not here! wake up!” He shouted while trying to wake up his friend.

Buke’s eyes shot open, and he stood up. “What happened?”

“Zain!”

“Zain what?”

“Yeah, he’s not here!”

Buke frowned, “Did you check the other rooms?”

“…no.”

Buke shook his head, “Go and check. No wait, let’s look for him together.”

The two of them walked out of the room and searched the house but couldn’t find anything.

There was no Zain, so now they needed to decide what to do themselves.

*******

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