Trash in the Apocalypse

Chapter 129: Mega Centre

The hot rays of the sun shone unto everyone below the heavens.

On the open road, numerous carriers were fighting with a large group of skilled individuals. They killed their enemies every time they swung their swords. The carriers blood would then drip from the tip of the sword as the masked men looked for their next target.

At that moment, a loud roar resounded followed by the earth quaking.

Behind the masked men was an individual wielding a large hammer that has two skulls with burning eyes. It glowed red and would emit sizzling sounds every time it hit its target.

"Good job everyone! Just keep them away and I'll be able to deal with this one." Jun shouted as he stepped to the side, safely dodging a humungous muscular hand that wanted to punch him.

Jun was currently fighting a D2 all by himself.

The D2's hand only hit thin air and overextended since it uses overwhelming strength on its every strike. This is also one of the reasons why Jun can fight it solo. Since the D2 had an oddly long arm, Jun took advantage of its recoil period when it was pulling back.

He struck the D2's kneecaps once again and after keeping at it for several times, the joint on the knee finally gave up and dislocated itself.

The D2 staggered before falling sideways. It used its hands to stabilize itself, then ferociously roared at Jun. A second later, using its long hands, it limped towards a nearby dead carrier on the ground. It hurriedly devoured the carrier starting from the leg. Eerie bone crunching noise came out of the D2's mouth as dark blood flowed out from it.

The onlookers were already used to the sight of slaughter but still felt terrified at the cannibalism that's happening in front of them.

Jun noticed that the D2's wounds were slowly regenerating, so he quickly ran towards it. Since the D2 had its back on him, Jun channeled as much energy to do an Empowered Strike.

The bonehammer glowed crimson and Jun smashed the D2's head with an over-head strike , finally dealing the final blow.

The D2's head splattered in the area and the headless corpse fell forward. The body it was holding got squashed when the D2's bulky body fell on it.

He looked around to make sure that everyone is safe, before looting the evolved carriers body.

He made some simple rules earlier and the group was now implementing it. When a carriers body is damaged and unlootable, it would be harvested for its resources. Currently, the bone is used to make weapons for fighting the undead while the meat still had no purpose aside from bait and as an escape tool. You could also make traps were you place meat out in the open and wait for an unsuspecting carrier to take it.

The carriers can eat their fellow friends as lng as they were stronger than them and Jun has witnessed alot of it. The evolved ones would always grab a nearby carrier, dead or alive, and use them as health potions.

For regular carriers, meat gives them additional energy which could help them survive for the day or if they're lucky enough, evolve to something new at night. This is why the meat trap was effective for catching lone or small groups of carriers.

Ever since the bone weaponries were sold to the public, the survivors finally got stronger. And since the survivors were getting stronger, the carriers were being killed with ease, resulting in abundance of crafting resources; the bones.

The price of the regular carriers bones were halved and yet it was still on the decline while the evolved carriers bone stayed on its regular price. Why did it not rise since it was rare? Its because some civilian groups were finally able to deal with lone Ranked 1 Evolved carriers.

The survivors were now slowly getting accustomed to the new world and has started its advance in exploring it.

The skirmish by the street finally finished. The rice paddies on both sides of the road were a nice change of scenery for everyone.

Jun was currently on an EXP Buff and wants to use its effect as best as he could. They went out before the sun could even rise. He already planned for this but he forgot to remind everyone about it. So, when he arrived outside of the Black Haven compound, there was noone waiting for him on the street. The problem was easily solved when Jun used the contract to wake everyone up and ordered for them to come. Several minutes later, dozens of masked men jogged towards him.

The group followed Jun as he journeyed to the east. They used a jeepney to transport everyone since it could accomodate 25 people in it, including the driver. They left the jeepney at the local gas station, since there's no reason for bringing it further when the goal was to fight the undead. Also, going back was not a problem since they can just portal back to the statue.

Past the gasoline station, after the intersection came to sight. Stranded abandoned cars were in the middle of the road. There were some cars that crashed into different buildings. Numerous carriers loitered around the area. There are men and women wandering aimelessly while some children could be seen along the sides.

Jun happily slaughtered them and the carriers didn't back out. The regular carriers would growl, shriek and snarl causing a disturbance in the area. If it were one or two carriers making noise it would have been finem but since there's dozens of them, the local bully finally decided to show itself and charged right into the crowd.

Jun noticed the early signs of the earth quaking and was able to prepare himself in advance. He did nothing extraordinary. He just repositioned himself and clashed with the D2 repeatedly. He ordered for everyone to stay back since he wanted the solo experience.

And he won the fight.

"We continue east?"

A shade covered Jun's head and so he looked up. Nik was standing beside him and was waiting for his orders.

The intersection leads to three places. A barangay, a diversion road towards the town plaza, where the public market and the dock could be found, and the national road that continues eastward.

"Yeah, stick to the highway."

Jun chose the national road for a single reason. The road is the place where you could regularly encounter people. He could choose to go to the barangay and get lots of experience, but after clearing the barangay, he would have to double back and that would waste too much time. Besides, it was the police force who took charge of clearing the nearby areas. 

As the group advanced, it became common knowledge that carriers were now always in groups. Since they started their leveling journey, the group always encounter atleast ten carriers per group while the highest was around thirty, which was still doable unless they met some evolved ones. When that happens, Jun had to work extra hard, so no one dies for no reason.

He already killed several evolved carriers along the way, and the solo kills were giving him huge amounts of experience. With the previous accumulated experience and these days experience, Jun managed to level up two time, which brought him to level 7. He then invested all of his points in strength which raised it to 34.

The group passed 2 barangay's and chose not to enter it, staying only by the roadside and clearing any horde that came rushing to them.

Fighting the carriers everyday was becoming easy for everyone. The repeated duels with the carriers made everyone's body automatically remember how to fight them. Their hands and feet automatically move when a carrier dash towards them. They would easily dodge the lunge by side stepping, then stabbing the back of the head. The group's muscle memory was being trained every minute and every second. It also helped train their awareness since they have to keep an eye on everything that's happening around them while looking out for threats.

Noon came and the group finally decided to take a break.

Jun looked around.

There's an event center futher ahead the road, but he wasn't sure if it was empty. On the other hand, there's a construction supply store nearby to their left. Both were probably infested but after thinking logically, he decided to head first to the construction supply store.

He led the group and entered the parking lot. A big sign was on the side by the decorative plants, it has the store's name, Mega Centre.

He then strode towards the door and knocked loudly. He then leaned by the door and waited for a few seconds to make sure that there was nothing inside.

Several seconds later, he entered and searched the lobby first before looking for a place to sit down. Normally, he wouldn't really allow breaks since walking could be considered resting, but this time it was different.

He cleared the counter top of everything, then brought out a chair. Jun then shook his head as he stared at the chair which barely reached halfway the counter top. He then took it back and chose to stand. He then swiped his hand over the counter top and numerous items appeared.

He agreed to have a break since Marianne prepared something for him.

On the table were a pink lunchbox, a water bottle and a red apple.