Lowly Ascent

Cain was leaning on a tree next to a fire. He and Anders were camping in the wilderness before moving to Yoen in the morning.

They could have made it in a day but when they left the burning city, it was close to night. Instead, they set up camp a little ways outside the city.

Surprisingly, they saw many others also taking the road to Yoen. Yoen was the closest town in the vicinity and a popular trading hub, It made sense for a lot of survivors to go there.

Cain couldn't sleep, not because he didn't have peace of mind but because Anders didn't. As of this moment, Cain watched Anders toss and turn on the ground as sweat streamed down his head, he was repeatedly calling out to what seemed to be his mother and sister.

'It seems he will forever have these nightmares.'

Cain ponders if he would also be in a similar situation, though he doesn't know. He erased his memories, it was impossible to know if he would be like Anders.

Thinking about his missing memories, Cain's mood was affected negatively. He hated how it loomed over him and how it made him feel, he wished he could just forget these feelings as he could memories.

It was not as if Cain didn't want to not have feelings but he knew if he did, it would make his plans even harder for him. 

Conditioning an already conditioned mind was hard.

He was always okay with killing people but not genocide and the like. He had a conscious, but he had to begin doing such actions, it was the straightest path toward his goal.

A requirement for power was always to lose oneself in it. Those with power walk a thin line between sanity and insanity on their journey, many falling into the depths below.

Cain didn't want this, he still wanted to unlock his memories at the end of the day and remember who he was, he yearned to know his story. Even he feared losing his emotions completely, as although he would say otherwise, he was human and will continue to be.

A long path filled with nails was before Cain, and he would have to step on every inch of the way to move forward. 

Anders finally calmed down, it appeared he finally entered a deep sleep.

Cain closed his eyes and rested, he spread some of his pathogens around the camp for safety and dozed off. 

Before he went to sleep, Cain repeatedly went through his memories of the events since he took over the body he is now in, he scrutinized every detail over and over.

He went through days of memories and knowledge at least 7 times!

Eventually, Cain found some things out, conjectures. One of these conjectures was that he shouldn't use Animum anymore. He had the feeling that it was for the best and it also gave him more time to train his other skills.

...

Cain was sitting inside the carriage as they entered Yoen.

It had been so long since he left, or at least it felt like that. Cain felt he could now see the world more clearly, before, he viewed the world almost optimistically even though he knew deep down that it was a false reality, maybe due to his trauma or maybe his subconscious mind was at work.

Nevertheless, his worldview and how he saw the world was previously foggy, he didn't see or perceive lots of things like before. It was like mosaic glass, where he only focused on what was important to him and forgone everything else. Cain only saw what mattered to him and forgot everything else, like a dream escaping reality.

But now, Cain saw many things, especially the bad.

Strolling through the city for only a few minutes he saw so many things, a woman being harassed by two youths, a man being discarded in an alley to feed the rats, and a corrupt officer shutting down a merchant, the competitor nearby laughing with an empty wallet.

Cain was sure that in the past he wouldn't notice these things and instead be thinking about his next experiment. He was ignorant of the world.

This experience pulled the wool off his eyes, things like this happened all the time even in his school, and he could just never see it for what it was. He thought Luna was the only victim, but there was far more than just her.

'Truly disgusting, it's like a putrid stench that doesn't leave your nose.'

Cain had even more reasons to hate Yoen now.

Before it was just because of the near-death attack that caused him mental trauma, but now it was the fact that the city was filled with criminals and evil people who hurt and manipulated the weak, the type of people he hated most.

Strange, how he became someone with the mindset of a hero, only his mind was far more twisted than the others. He was conditioned for it, after all. 

...

Cain was in an inn in the South-East part of town, it wasn't lavish but it had all the necessities required.

The inn bordered the edge of the south side and close to the north side, this was because Cain needed a quick escape and because he and Anders were headed to the capital of the Puffrid Kingdom.

It was already late and Anders was having nightmares again, Cain quickly got dressed in some nice clothes, opting for a greyish-green turtle neck and a dark green frock coat over that, doubling down on the green.

He put on a murky green top hat and headed outside to walk the streets. Everywhere he went was illuminated by oil lamps.

If he still had his emerald eyes, he would've looked mesmerizing, yet his red eyes made him look unnerving, it gave a sense of wrongness mixed with the green.

As he walked the streets, Cain took out a vial and looked at it. It was filled with a pale green liquid and looked like snot that had the same consistency as blood. This was because it was blood.

To store bacteria and especially viruses, many plague-bearers use their blood to keep their pathogens alive.

The blood will usually gain characteristics of those affected by the disease like how this vial contained Zimo so it turned pale green. This not only helped with knowing what the disease was but also allowed the disease to react to the owner's blood.

In most cases, this helped with the study and understanding of the virus as plague bearers were originally doctors, most of the basics go off of treating others and especially one's self.

Unfortunately for Cain, Zimo was a disease that needed contact, so he would have to go around the city infecting people to achieve the desired result.

The desired result being the destruction and elimination of everyone living here.

Cain would first go into alleys and infect rats and cats, he would then head to bars in every segment of the city and infect people.

He didn't have to worry about Anders getting infected, as this strain was different. After he augmented his body, Cain looked into other applications of Zimo disease.

As he researched, he learned that he could attempt to use it as a controller of proxies, supposedly. It required him to use his blood and study the extreme changes in how Zimo connected itself to other cells.

Cain was left with a strain that was a separate Zimo bacteria that not only had the same effects but had benefits, being that it was under his control! 

He was using a loophole in the abilities of a Plague Bearer! Though not by much, he could make the zombies think he was their own and control basic perceptions of specific zombies and even small groups, but that's where his control ended.

This strain was more suited for subterfuge as it took a few hours for the specimen to become a zombie and the undead had less serious side effects, meaning the rotting flesh took a long time to occur and only their eyes revealed their status by turning white.

So the undead now appeared more like drugged or drunk people wandering aimlessly to which no one would notice anything wrong. Yoen was such a town.

As Cain finished his job, it was close to morning. He headed to the market and got some supplies before going back to the Inn and eating breakfast.

Anders was heading down the stairs as Cain finished his pancakes, his eyes had bags and those bags had bags, he looked like he had gone through hell.

"You're going to have to deal with that nightmare problem of yours." Cain was starting to get annoyed by Anders's behavior, it's not like he could understand his pain.

"B-But......I will try sir..." Anders knew it was unfair and disrespectful of Cain to demand that. But survival came first and Anders was his servant, so he had to obey Cain's commands to a tee.

After they ate, Anders prepared and readied the carriage to head out at midday, which was around the time the moons shined ever so brightly with the hue of the black hole behind them.

As they prepared to set off, Anders heard many people throughout the city scream.

He looked to Cain who showed zero emotion on his face. Anders didn't know what type of person Cain was but he sure as hell knew he wasn't of a good deposition.

As they passed the gates, many guards were running through the streets in a panic trying to find the source of screams which began to pop up all over the town.

...

Tyler was sitting in his office positioned in the northeast part of Yoen, he was in distress due to the news of Free City.

To combat this stress, he began to do what he usually did, remember the time when he was a teenager.

It was the best stress reliever for him. He remembered himself and a crew of friends beating a child, but it didn't matter since the child was a contaminant.

Tyler remembered how he bruised the child, how they cried, then unresponsive, covered in blood.

He remembered the sensation of their bones breaking under his assault and how he pulverized almost all their child's bones one by one.

'It was truly regretful I stopped there, it would have been better if I began cutting that thing's flesh and making something out of it to remember by, maybe even use it as a decoration to remember the good old days...Haah."

As he reminisced, a knocking came at the door. Tyler was waiting for it as it was his secretary, the daughter of a restaurant owner who refused Tyler service once. He now had this secretary come into his office every once and a while to blow off steam and get back at her father in a way.

"Come in."

The knocking continued, Tyler sneered and got up to open the door.

The secretary wobbled in the room. Tyler was surprised by such behavior 'Did she get herself drunk because of all the blackmailing? How weakhearted, nevertheless I shall accept!'

He got close to his secretary as he tried to remove her clothes, but as he did, the secretary responded with inhuman speed.

She quickly took a chunk of his throat with her teeth. Tyler looked down as his blood poured down his body.

He then collapsed and died.

Throughout Yoen similar scenes were happening and the whole town was in chaos, it wasn't even midnight by the time every living thing in the city was infected and joined the undead.