Choose Your Apocalypse (A LitRPG Apocalypse, Progression, System Fantasy) [CYA]

<Lenka, Real - Prepare, High School Gym Loading Bay>

"No! We are not going to close the door, Alex is still out there."

The woman—who had just arrived—grabbed the door anyway. "Either he gets here in time, or he's already lost. We don't need to die because he's still out there."

Behind the woman, Lenka saw Alex get swarmed by five of the faster zombie things. Come on, Alex.

The woman did have a point. They had to get the doors closed before the truly chilling number of slower undead reached them.

"Let go!" The woman pulled on the door again, but she clearly hadn't put any points into Physical Power.

"No. Look. He's already almost here."

Indeed, Alex had already dealt with the creatures and was nearly back to the gym. He was a bit terrifying sometimes.

She could see bite marks on him, but as she looked closer, they seemed to be pulling closed, though that was hard to see through the blood that had already flowed out of them.

The gunman pointed his gun at Alex, and Lenka felt her own eyes go wide.

They had been talking before, so she hadn't noticed what he said. Still, she heard his final words, "I'll make it quick."

She wasn't fast enough to do anything before the gun cracked, filling the little room with the sound.

<Alex, Real - Prepare, Street Beside the High School Gym>

Alex stared down the barrel of the stranger's gun from barely ten feet away.

The man spoke casually, "I'll make it quick."

Then, Alex's Basic Mana Sense allowed him to feel the man pull power from all throughout his own body, directing it into the gun even as he squeezed the trigger.

Alex had no time to think; he just acted.

He lunged forward, left hand coming between himself and the gun, even as his bloody dadao came into his right hand.

That's odd. Shouldn't all the blood have dusted? Then he remembered that his dadao had briefly been within a corpse on the ground. That was irritating, but he could clean it in a moment.

He shoved aside the thoughts as oddly disjointed to have in the fraction of a second before the gun went off.

Life's Active Defense triggered, and the enhanced shot landed squarely in Alex's left palm.

It was a surprisingly hard hit, clearly augmented by skills or spells of some kind.

Alex took a 11 HP and 11 SP hit to his resources, meaning that the base damage of the shot was 110.

That didn't sound like much, but if the bullet had landed against a vital area, Alex expected the multipliers would have rendered the shot… lethal.

The gunman's eyes began to widen in shock, but Alex was fast.

Alex hadn't had time to adjust. So, Alex's own mind didn't truly understand how much faster than human standard he was.

In that moment, however, he wasn't thinking.

He was acting.

The gun barked three more times in quick succession, but the shots were weaker and trailing just behind his movements, showing that he was faster than this gunman thought he should be, too.

Still, Alex needed to remove the gun from the equation. Life's Active Defense had a five second cooldown, and he couldn't count on surviving a critical shot from the weapon.

His dadao whipped forward.

His aim was superhumanly good, and his dadao connected with the gunman's extended arm, cutting off his hand just above the wrist.

Just like with the higher level ravagers a few moments before, the weapon cleaved straight through bone.

Alex had covered the distance between them faster than should have been possible. For a pre-System Human, Alex; you are no longer that. He wasn't too harsh with himself for his continued failure to adjust to all the changes, however. It had only been hours. Weirdest hours of my life.

In the moment of safety—now that the gun was out of play—Alex's mind went through a sequence of noticing things and connecting dots.

First, the gunman's stump already had black tendrils stretching up the limb. As he focused, Alex could somehow see the man's spark beginning to flicker oddly… almost starting to twist.

What? The answer was immediately obvious. The blood on his dadao.

But that had come from a corpse, one of dozens that were scattered about…

One of dozens that were closer than he remembered them being even a couple of seconds earlier.

One of dozens that were less than ten feet away, slowly almost flowing across the ground with their unnatural, almost boneless movements.

Zombie Corpse Crawler
Level 3

They weren't strong, but they were numerous, and more traditional zombies were still sprinting or shuffling their way.

Thus, once again, Alex acted without thinking.

He gave a powerful backward thrust kick into the gunman's chest, throwing him into the group behind, knocking all of them fully inside the gym.

As he did that, Alex tapped the falling hand, still clutching its gun, storing both within his Inventory. He also dropped the bullet he'd caught into his Inventory, beside the gun.

I might need to frame that, somehow. It's not everyday that you catch a bullet.

That done, he tucked down, rolled backward, and lunged through the doors himself, even as he shouted to be heard over the gunman's belated screams. "CLOSE IT!"

Lenka reacted remarkably well, slamming the gym doors with the help of the fire-woman, who had already been trying to close them. Lenka then dropped the locking mechanism into place.

Her voice cracked out just afterward, ordering the survivors to go where they were needed, "Everyone to the gym! I've got defenses to activate in here."

All the more regular folks did as Lenka commanded, leaving their erstwhile protectors behind.

The magic wielding woman was kneeling beside the gunman by that point, tears in her eyes.

The gunman was pulling out another pistol and moving it slowly but inevitably toward his own head.

Using his Basic Mana Sense, Alex felt the man's spark was flickering, starting to twist toward undeath, even as it seemed to be fighting just to let him move at all.

Alex dropped down on the other side of the man, easily taking this new weapon from the man's off-hand, and only then did he hear what the woman was saying.

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"We're all dead. We're all dead. Infected within the walls. Oh, hun, why? Why did we pick zombies?"

The gunman swallowed, locking gazes with Alex. "You should kill me, before you kill yourself."

Alex frowned. "You want to die?"

The man glared. "Not everyone is a selfish tortilla farmer."

Alex fought back a laugh at that randomly generated censoring, but then he really took in the situation.

The gunman was obviously distraught but willing to die to keep others safe.

The mage had already given up, clearly caring deeply for the gunman.

Alex sighed, grabbing the gunman's stump and pulling the hand from his inventory.

He pressed the two together and channeled Basic Life Transfusion. It took a surprisingly little amount of his HP to reconnect the hand.

The gunman's eyes went wide before the fingers flexed.

There were still black tendrils on his arm, but they were considerably lessened.

He swallowed before carefully speaking, "The plague isn't gone, the timer just reset. The movement restriction is gone, too." Even as the gunman delivered the bad news, there was still some hope in his eyes. "Can… can you do more of whatever that magic was?"

Only a movement restriction? Not a full paralysis. That's interesting, but not really important right now.

The woman had pulled back in astonishment, covering her mouth with one hand to stifle a gasp.

Well, I'm really glad that that worked. I would not have enjoyed trying to help him regrow a hand… if that's even possible.

Alex nodded, pulling out one of his Potions of Cure Magical Disease. "This will cure you, but we have very few, and I'd like to try a couple of other things if you are willing."

The man's eyes widened as he saw the potion, but even so, he nodded. "To help save such a precious resource, I'm willing, yes. If I can, I will."

Lenka called over even as she kept working. "Natasha and the others are back from the other locker room. That door is secured as well, and they're checking the newcomers for bites. They had to use one of the potions on Grant. Brood-guard got in a good chomp right at the end."

Alex nodded in understanding toward Lenka, before turning back and meeting the gunman's eyes. "I'm immune."

The man frowned, then his eyes widened. "Oh! Oh… oh, no…"

Alex shook his head. "I know you meant well, and no harm was done. I tell you because it is my blood that makes me immune. I'd like to try feeding you some."

The man pulled back a bit, looking quite disgusted.

Alex grimaced. "Yeah, it's disgusting. I know, but this is likely the most controlled environment we'll get in the near future. We need to know if this works."

The man swallowed, grimacing in turn.

"I'm Alex, by the way."

"John."

"Good to meet you, John."

"Pilar," the woman added.

<Pilar, Real - Prepare, High School Gym>

Pilar tried to control herself as the ragged man introduced himself, "Good to meet you as well, Pilar. Now, John, we don't have long. Are you willing to help me test this? For the sake of others who might be infected?"

Alex was oriented on her husband more than her, and the message couldn't have been clearer. She wasn't a threat. He caught John's bullet.

She couldn't even conceive of that level of speed and power. They would be nothing to him.

She twitched as loud noises came from the sealed doors, the pounding and scraping continuing to rise in ferocity, almost as if to emphasize Alex's point.

We need to be prepared.

John looked to her, and she had a moment of panic. Me? I have to choose?

She swallowed. Be strong, Pilar. You two can get through this, together.

Pilar did her best to put on a confident air even as she shrugged, chuckling nervously despite herself. "Well… whether it works or not, it can't be worse than zombieism."

She saw his love for her in his eyes, even as he turned away, growling to work himself up for the hard choice. "Fine. Do it."

That's the man I married. She found herself grinning, even while she kept her new magic near the surface, ready to burn away anything that actually got through the door behind them.

<Alex, Real - Prepare, High School Gym>

Alex nodded at John's decision, glad to have this chance to test his theory. Without further delay, he pulled a small utility knife from his Inventory after putting the valuable potion back within it. The knife was one that he'd picked up from his apartment, a simple, basic utility blade.

He cut a slit from the tip of his thumb to the base of the pad before shoving the digit into John's mouth along with two fingers so that he could work the cut to get his thumb to bleed more.

It was Alex's turn to grimace, partly at the pain he'd inflicted on himself, and partly on how odd it felt, purposely bleeding into someone's mouth.

I am the red cow. Milk, milk the red cow. His eye twitched at the oddity his own mind had just cooked up. Yeah… I'm never speaking that out loud.

Still, he could sense his life energy rampaging through the man, this time healing rather than harming.

It didn't have the same outer shell of what was probably mana that existed when Alex used the Basic Life Transfusion, but if anything, it seemed even more effective, working with the man's own body and life energy rather than trying to destroy it.

It also felt… different?

John spoke around the fingers. "This is weird, man."

"Is it working?" Alex could sense his life energy moving through the man even as his HP ticked down slowly, but he didn't know if it would be enough.

John's eyes unfocuses slightly, reading something that no one else could see. He then spoke again, his voice still garbled around the obstructions. Alex understood him well enough as he conveyed what he saw, "The timer is ticking back up. I'm being healed too, quite a bit."

"Tell me if the timer goes past where it started. What was that time for you?"

"Three minutes."

"What is it now?"

"Two fifty five, fifty six, fifty seven."

John swallowed, then his whole body relaxed.

"The timer is gone."

Alex pulled back his hand, and John laughed.

"The condition is gone. I'm not infected. I'm fully healed too."

Alex used Analyze on him regardless.

John Morrison
Human, Level 3

He needed more.

So, Alex focused more closely, feeling a resonance with his own life-energy still faintly present within John. He remembered what he'd been able to see with the wight after getting so close and staring it down.

Even though he couldn't see the man's exact health, Alex could tell that his maximum was likely a bit more than half of Alex's, and that he'd lost about a fourth of it before Alex had started to heal him. Additionally, another line appeared on the Analyze notification, and he was able to focus enough to see the man's spark of life, healthy and fully non-twisty.

If that's even a thing.

John Morrison
Human, Level 3

Conditions:
None

Alex sighed in relief at that. "I think you're good."

John smiled, joy evident across his features.

"Out of curiosity, how much did you heal?" It was mainly a passing curiosity. Alex, himself, had lost about one HP per second, even after his regeneration, so after those roughly ten seconds, he'd spent twenty, while losing ten.

"I'm topped off. I was hurting beforehand, too."

Pilar gave a teasing smile. "He fell down a flight of stairs after taking a zombie's rush head-on."

John chuckled goodnaturedly. "Regardless, I was around a hundred and sixty in the hole before the plague started causing harm. If I had to guess, you healed me in the neighborhood of two hundred HP. That's just about half my total."

Alex's eyes widened. Two hundred? Then… I was way off in my estimates… Why? Why did I think he had twice the health he claims to have?

More importantly, Alex had healed him for ten times what he had spent. Was giving his blood that much more efficient than Basic Life Transfusion?

I really need to get to those skills… If he could forcibly fill his target with his own blood, and it had this much of a multiplier… But this is only a test of using it to help. I don't know that I could use it to harm at all.

Still, it was something to consider. There was also the fact that his power within his blood had felt… different than it usually did with Basic Life Transfusion.

"And I think," Lenka interjected, "that I need you all out of this room. Hurry up."

They all glanced to the woman before scrambling to their feet and preceding her out.

Alex, however, paused. He checked his status and the quest timer.

Alex Johnson
HP: 291/780
SP: 359/460

Wounds:
Deep Bites, clean x 1
[7 HP x 1 required to heal]

Group Quest [Prepare]:
Create a base of operations from which you can survive the end of the world.

The outbreak has begun.
Survive:
03:05 hrs

I can do a bit more.

"Lenka, can you let me out to kill a few of those things?"

She gave him a look. It was like one his wife used to give him when he was doing something she didn't approve of. At least, she had given him those looks before they learned to actually talk through such things.

He shook off the memory. "We're going to have to clear the school, and I need as much experience as possible. If I can get another level, or even get close…?"

The woman sighed. "I can give you three minutes."

"I'll take it."