Chapter 9: Request (2)

Luke was caught off guard when used Weapon Augmentation level two and felt the urge to throw the sword like that. Still, while it caused some damage, it also served to enrage the monster, not to mention, the cost of the skill doubled.

Luke put the mana potion on his mouth and prepared to drink it, but before doing that, he threw two knives at the remaining eye of the beast. Much to Luke’s surprise, the number of knives doubled… that was the effect of the new level of Weapon Augmentation had on knives. Unfortunately, all the knives hit only the left eyebrow of the creature, and then that thing dashed toward Luke.

“Collect my bones if I fail,” Luke said while holding the ax with both hands and activating Weapon Augmentation.

Luke felt the energy passing through the weapon, and it also made him feel a lot more powerful. The urge to smash something with it also increased inside Luke, but while he wanted to smash the monster’s head, the weapon forced him to smash the ground with it.

When that happened, the store trembled a little, and a shockwave made the nearby shelves fall. Despite its size, the monster also staggered due to it. The momentum still made the monster hit Luke, but the impact hadn’t been nearly enough to knock him out. That being said, Luke felt his lower half being smashed, and after the impact, he rolled on the ground for several meters. Despite that, he still raised his upper body to drink his mana potion and to grab several knives.

“Now you are too close for me to miss, dumbass,” Luke said and then activated Weapon Augmentation five times in a row.

Using all his mana, Luke made ten knives pierce the monster’s left eye. Each attack made flesh and blood spread around the area and increased the size of the wound until the last three knives finally hit the monster’s brain.

You obtained 15 experience points.

You obtained 15 gold coins.

Congratulations! You have leveled up. You have obtained 05 status points.

Luke got lucky that the level up came at such a convenient time because once he relaxed, the pain began to kill him. Still, even though his HP was restored, his bones were hurting more than a little bit.

“You did it, congratulations.” Rina said. “Still, the next time, if possible, don’t get hit like that.”

“Ignore her, Luke,” Shalia said. “You showed that you had guts in facing the monster like that. Not to mention, you killed it so fast.”

It was kind of surprising that those two didn’t get hurt. In any case, even though the pain in his bones was quite something, Luke still got up and then went to grab his new skill book.

Congratulations! You have learned the skill Stinger.

By activating the skill while holding any melee weapon, you can dash toward the enemy and cover five meters in a single instant before attacking them.

Cost: 02 SP

“… I was expecting more, but I suppose this skill can be useful under the right circumstances,” Luke said, and then he began to grab his fallen knives.

Although Luke was trying to keep his sense of smell in check, eventually, he was forced to notice that the area was being covered by smoke. That was bad… When he left the supermarket for a short while, he saw many buildings burning. The smoke was coming from the residential area in the North, where his home was supposed to be…

“I didn’t see many people around here, but it seemed that there were a lot of people running around in that direction,” Luke said and furrowed his eyebrows.

The fact that he wasn’t in a residential area and the fact that the big monster had been running around would explain why the number of zombies was so low. In any case, Luke also could see some weird creatures flying and firing things from their mouths.

“Do you guys know what that is?” Luke asked.

“Probably a species of your world that has been contaminated by the virus,” Rina replied. “Species of flying monsters won’t show up for a few days.”

“How are those creatures appearing Anyway?” Luke asked.

“I know only a few examples,” Rina replied. “The zombies appear where there are inhabitants of the world in question, as for the other species, sometimes they just randomly appear and sometimes a group of them appear in a specific region and begin to reproduce.”

To prevent future problems, finding those special locations seemed the best option. However, the real question in Luke’s mind was: should he go to the residential area straight away or slowly hunt zombies around and then go afterward? While he has been a college student only for a month, he knew how deserted that part of the city was during Sundays. While it was Miami, even that city had boring places, and it seemed they had United all of them around the college.

While considering his options, Luke returned to the supermarket and checked the areas that hadn’t been destroyed yet. He also smelled some boxes of candies and cooks to check if they smelled like zombies. Once he assumed it was safe, Luke began to eat them. He couldn’t exactly fill his belly since he had to fight, but he needed to ingest some calories. Not to mention, it was almost noon, and he didn’t eat anything yet.

“I guess I will go to the residential area…” Luke said. “There are many shops around there that are easy to invade to gather tools and weapons… I need to check those as well.”

Weapon Assimilation was quite a weird skill since it destroyed the weapons used alongside it. However, it had endless potential, and Luke had to test that potential with all kinds of weapons. It would be better if he could find a melee weapon suited for him. However, since he was still so clumsy with any weapon, he should adapt according to the possibilities the skill could give him.