Chapter 164 - A Story of EAT KILL ALL
The boy proceeded through the live house, readying the submachine gun. Since the live house was originally a renovated warehouse, its structure wasn't particularly complex. Furthermore, when he was brought here, he had memorized the route from the entrance to the stage to some extent. He just had to trace it in reverse.
The door leading outside remained open, and he could see that the members had rushed out of the live house in a panic. Just as the boy was about to go outside himself, he heard footsteps from outside and hurriedly hid in the shadow of a nearby pillar.
Those who returned to the live house from outside were the comrades of the earlier guards. A pair carrying rifles and shotguns in their hands dove into the live house through the door that remained open. Perhaps they were in such a hurry that the two didn't even notice the boy hiding nearby.
"There's no contact; what are those guys doing?"
As one of the guards passed by the boy, he heard him mutter that. By "those guys," did he mean the other guards who were trying to restrain the boy? If so, there was no way contact would come. Those two would have long ago become prey for the infected and had their bodies devoured, or had become infected themselves.
The boy, once the guards had passed by and turned a corner out of sight, secretly went outside through the entrance they had just come in from. He braced himself in case there were Brotherhood people outside as well, but there was no one around the live house.
Red flames were rising in various parts of the base, and black smoke was billowing toward the night sky. Was the person who planted the bombs also going around setting fires at the same time? However, the fires that were occurring all seemed small-scale, and it would be possible to extinguish them if there were fire extinguishers or the like.
As for priority, first was securing weapons and ammunition, followed by grasping the structure of the base and securing an escape route, and then rescuing Aki and the others.
He had obtained a gun, but it was useless without bullets. Only five rounds remained in the gun, and in a gunfight, he would shoot through them in an instant. He intended to avoid combat as much as possible, but he had to be prepared for it.
No human figures could be seen around the live house where the boy was. Normally, no one used this place; it probably wasn't a very important facility. By now, the Brotherhood members should be on guard at the perimeter of the base in preparation for an attack by infected, or be mobilized for firefighting and pursuing the attackers inside the base.
First was securing weapons and ammunition. That said, the boy didn't know where the armory was, and even if he could go to the armory, he knew that security would be heavy and infiltration would be impossible. Fortunately or unfortunately, every single member of the Brotherhood was armed with firearms. If he defeated them one by one, weapons would be obtained.
At that moment, another large explosion thundered. The air vibrated, and several warehouse window panes broke. At the same time, the streetlights went out all at once, and the surroundings were enveloped in darkness.
Apparently, the power generation facility had been destroyed with a bomb. At the Brotherhood's base, a system had been established that could supply power even at night by combining solar and wind power generators with electric vehicles and the like. By storing power in the batteries of electric vehicles with solar generators during the day and supplying power from there at night, electricity could be used within the Brotherhood's base even at night. Lighting up the entire base was difficult due to power supply issues and discoverability, but lights were lit for roads and passages so that there would be no hindrance to traffic.
All those lights had gone out. The boy considered this a good opportunity and started running all at once. The rising flames dyed the sky orange. Seeing these flames, the infected might also gather at this place one after another.
The boy knew almost nothing about the structure inside the Brotherhood's base. Since being caught and brought here, only the solitary cell and the Colosseum had been the boy's places, and he couldn't freely know the state of the outside.
At the very least, he knew that this base was along the sea. Therefore, if he went west, he should eventually be able to escape from the base. The boy looked up at the night sky and confirmed the position of the North Star. Thanks to no lights being lit in the city at all, the stars in the night sky were clearly visible.
Immediately after finishing confirming the approximate direction, the lights attached to the exterior walls of the warehouses and the like suddenly lit up again. Apparently, they had started power supply again using an emergency generator. However, the amount of power generated seemed inferior to the amount of power supplied from the batteries of dozens of electric vehicles, and not all the lights were lit back to normal.
Orange streetlights, which seemed to have been retrofitted to the exterior walls of buildings for emergency use, lit up in places. They weren't very powerful lights, but to eyes accustomed to darkness, they were bright enough to feel dazzling.
And once he got used to that light, the boy was finally able to recognize the scenery around him clearly. The place where the boy was now seemed to be a materials storage yard; resin pallets were piled up like mountains, and square timbers and steel frames were lined up on the ground in bundled states. A forklift rusted brown by the sea breeze reminded the boy that this place used to be an industrial zone.
The piled-up pallets were like walls. Then, at that moment, a single human figure jumped out from a gap in the pallet wall several meters ahead of the boy. A black bandana was wrapped around his forehead, and he carried a hunting shotgun in his hand. The moment he understood it was a Brotherhood member, the boy readied his submachine gun and raised his voice.
"Don't move, drop the weapon!"
The reason he didn't fire right away was partly because he wondered if he could finish the man with the remaining bullets, but the biggest reason was that he didn't want his location to be noticed by the sound of gunfire. The man in his mid-twenties apparently hadn't noticed the boy's presence for even a moment until the muzzle was pointed at him, and he opened his eyes wide and hurriedly raised both hands.
"O-Okay, okay! So don't shoot!"
The reason he didn't try to counterattack was probably because he still had some reason left. Against the boy who was already pointing a muzzle at him, the man was far too defenseless. Even in a state of panic, he seemed to understand that if he did something strange, he would be shot.
On the other hand, for the boy, the encounter with the man was an unexpected event. Although he had managed to thrust the muzzle at him first, he had no idea what to do next. Even so, since the man hadn't dropped his gun yet, the boy shouted again.
"Hurry up, drop the gun or I'll shoot!"
"Okay, okay!"
The man lowered his left hand, which had been gripping the fore-end of the shotgun, and placed the gun on the ground. But a handgun was still housed in the holster on his hip.
"Drop the handgun too, hurry!"
Just as he swung the muzzle of the submachine gun and shouted at the man again,
"Hey, what's..."
Saying so, another Brotherhood member appeared from between the pallet walls. The other one also seemed surprised that the boy was there. But this time, the member's movement was swift. The comrade with both hands up and the boy pointing a gun at him. As soon as he saw that scene, he readied the submachine gun in his hand and put his finger on the trigger.
But the boy was faster to pull the trigger. The boy aimed at the man and pulled the trigger of the submachine gun, which was set to semi-auto, recklessly. The submachine gun the boy took from the guard was not equipped with a stock for stabilizing aim; it was the type of gun for suppressing enemies by laying down a curtain of fire. To hit, he just had to keep shooting anyway.
Of the five bullets the boy fired, three hit the member who was readying the submachine gun. The member fell, spraying blood from his chest and neck. But the other man, knowing that the boy's submachine gun had run out of ammo, lowered his raised hands and tried to pull out the handgun from the holster on his hip.
"Die, you piece of shit!"
The boy pounced on the man before that muzzle could be pointed here. He grabbed the arm of the man gripping the handgun and twisted that arm up with all his might so that the bullets wouldn't fly this way somehow. The man grimaced in pain but pulled the trigger of the handgun, but because the boy was grabbing that arm, the bullet flew in an absurd direction.
The boy, while grabbing the man's arm, charged toward the pallets piled up like a wall. The mountain of pallets, having taken the weight of two people, collapsed, and both fell over after losing their balance. At that time, the man dropped the handgun, and the boy tried to pick up that handgun as he released his hand from the man's arm.
But before that, the man reached out his hand to the boy's leg, and the boy fell over again. The man, who stood up first, didn't reach for the handgun on the ground but reached for the scabbard hung on his back and pulled out a short sword.
The boy somehow dodged the tip of the short sword that came slashing with a strange cry by rolling on the ground. The Brotherhood-made short sword the man was swinging seemed to be made by processing a leaf spring or something, and had enough sharpness and flexibility to easily slice through a human body. The boy had also experienced that sharpness firsthand when he fought the Brotherhood before.
While rolling on the ground, the boy picked up a fragment of a rotted wooden box and threw it toward the man's face. While the man was blocking it with his arm, the boy stood up and took a square timber that was piled on the ground.
The boy, readying the square timber about 1.3 meters long, measured the distance from the man for the time being. The man also seemed to think he had no time to pick up the handgun and closed the distance with the boy bit by bit while readying the short sword. Because he had made the sound of gunfire thunder, other members searching for the attacker inside the base would surely rush here soon. He needed to finish things as quickly as possible.
The boy was the one who moved first. He swung down the square timber in his hand at the man's head, but the man jumped aside and dodged it. And with that momentum, this time he swung the short sword as if scooping up from diagonally below.
The boy received that slash with the square timber, but the blade of the short sword bit deeply into the center of the square timber, which was as thick as an arm. If this were a human, it would surely be able to cut through limbs easily.
When the boy twisted the square timber with the short sword stuck in it, the man, whose arm was twisted while still gripping the short sword, hurriedly released his hand. The boy, having snatched the short sword from the man, hit the man's head with the square timber it was stuck in. But he lost his balance, and the swung square timber hit the man's shoulder. Furthermore, because the blade had bitten halfway in, the square timber broke in two from that part.
The man hit by the square timber groaned, but his gaze was fixed not on the boy but on something else. The other member the boy had shot and killed earlier. From the holster on that corpse's hip, the handgun had come out, perhaps because the fastening was loose. As soon as the man noticed that handgun, he started running toward the corpse.
The boy, noticing the man's intention, also dropped the broken square timber and chased after him. And just as he was about to pick up the handgun from the corpse, the boy pounced on his back and pinned him to the ground as if clinging to him.
"Let go of me, you bastard!"
The man shouted at the boy, who was pinning him from behind like a child being given a piggyback ride. But the boy couldn't release his hands and feet grabbing his body. If the boy freed the man's body for even an instant, the man would be able to take the handgun from the corpse. The member's corpse was literally within reach of them.
With his whole heart and soul, by mobilizing both hands and feet, he was somehow able to seal the man's movements, but that was all. Instead of the man being unable to move freely, the boy also couldn't move at all. If he reached out for the gun of the corpse instead of the man, the man whose arm became free first would take the gun.
That said, he couldn't keep performing this wrestling match where they were all tangled up forever. He didn't know when the Brotherhood members would rush to this place. Right now, while sealing the man's movements, he had to kill him before he could take the gun.
In a situation where both hands and feet were unusable, there was only one means he could take. In front of the boy pinning the man's body from behind was his defenseless neck. The man's gaze was focused not on the boy behind him but on the handgun of the corpse in front of him.
The boy opened his mouth wide and bit into the man's neck. The canines bit in deeply, and the man opened his eyes wide at the unexpected attack.
"Gyaaaaaah!"
The boy had confidence in his jaw strength, and his teeth were well-aligned. He clenched his teeth hard and put strength into his jaw. The sharp canines tore the skin of the man's neck, and the taste of blood spread throughout the boy's mouth.
"Gaaaaah! Gaaaaah!"
The man, having fallen into a panic, raised nonsensical screams and swung his hands to try to pull the boy off, but the boy clung to the man's body with all his might. The skin and meat of a living human felt harder than anything he had eaten until now, but the boy put so much strength into his jaw that he thought his teeth might break first.
As a wild dog that has caught its prey would do, the boy shook his head left and right with all his might. The wound on the neck widened further, and the overflowing blood filled the boy's mouth completely. He felt sick from the thick metallic taste and the slimy sensation of fat, but the boy didn't stop biting into the man's neck.
With a sensation of something tearing, his head suddenly jerked back. At the same time, blood sprayed from the man's neck like a fountain.
"Uwaaaah."
When the boy pushed the man's body away, the man raised a pathetic voice and pressed his neck. There, the boy finally understood that he had bitten off the meat of the man's neck. The thing in his mouth that had a rubbery sensation was the human meat he had bitten off.
From the piece of meat the boy spat out, something like a blood vessel was sticking out. The man no longer had the thought of defeating the boy and was doing his best just to press his neck and somehow stop the bleeding. But in vain of the man's effort, a pool of blood spread on the ground.
The man was writhing on the ground, but his movement suddenly stopped. Apparently, he had lost consciousness due to hemorrhagic shock.
The man's neck, from which the boy had bitten off the skin along with the meat, had become a wretched sight. Along the teeth marks, the skin of the neck was bitten off, bright red muscle peeked from the wound, and even thick blood vessels were sticking out. It was just like a human attacked by an infected.
The boy pulled out the handgun from the holster of the corpse the man had been reaching for until just now. And toward the head of the man who remained unconscious, he pulled the trigger once. The man's head shook greatly, and this time he stopped moving completely.
Immediately, he gathered weapons and ammunition from the men's corpses. He picked up the shotgun and hung the submachine gun on his back with the sling. Since he didn't have time to take off the holsters or vests, he tucked the handgun and spare magazines into his belt and stuffed the shot shells into his pockets.
The boy, having sensed the presence of the Brotherhood crowd approaching nearby, tried to leave the place quickly. But on the way, seeing his own figure reflected in the mirror of the rusted forklift he was about to pass, he unintentionally stopped his feet for just a moment.
The area around the boy's mouth reflected in the mirror was dyed bright red with the man's blood. Covered in blood and mud all over his body, his appearance was just like the infected the boy had killed until now.
One must fight to survive. But to fight and survive, one must discard reason, morality, and everything else. The Brotherhood Leader had said so. But the boy had criticized the Leader, saying that if humans lived like that, they would be the same as the infected, and he didn't accept that idea.
But he himself, with a reckless way of fighting, was becoming an existence just like the infected who had lost reason and intelligence. What irony, the boy thought.
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