END Initiated...

Everyone stood quietly, still engulfed in the horrors as a thin long arm drew a short but sharp arc in the air, grabbing the hair of the totally dazed and stiffly standing Aida Reyes, before proceeding to drag her towards the horde at the back.

"Kyaaaak!!"

Aida, who was standing at the back due to exhaustion from her previous earth spell, became one of the easiest targets this time.

The sudden pull on her head almost made her lose control of all of her body. And like a cricket ball on it's way out of the pavilions, she got rapidly s.u.c.k.e.d into the gaping black hole which seems to be keen on taking her down.

She was not the only one, as everyone witnessed through their stupid gazes, even more, rotting bodies one after another lengthening their arms to catch their preys, dragging them back to he self-created hell. Some kids even fell down on their bum witnessing the helpless victims of such assaults.

"Heeeeelp!!"

The numerous cries sobered up everyone right away, and the crowd rushed in to grab hold of the ones whoever they could from being dragged away by the lifeless bodies.

As the numerous odd pairs of hands tugged and pulled and yanked, shoes flew away, and then, even loose socks came flying. 

Amongst the hectic chaos, somehow some of the kids managed to grab Aida's flailing legs too. However, she did not seem to be as helpless as others and seemed to be highly trained. 

Even in that kind of situation,  where she could not even cast any proper spells due to the exhaustion from before and her limbs bound, she still managed to cover herself in a thin layer of rock to protect herself from the strong forces acting on her from both sides. 

Kiel was surprised to see such quick combat adaptation from a child of her age. 'Maybe she has an IQ of over 200?'. Usually, some of the trained soldiers from his previous world didn't have such quick adaptations.

However, there was no time to think about this kind of stuff. The whole place had already descended into chaos. Cries and shouts were roared out; no one dared to hold back as they struggled hard to fight the things back. But still growls of the lifeless and cries and limbs of the life-full we're everywhere.

In the midst of all the unfolding, Yebon Yialga and Neel Howell were also among the ones to fall victim to the lifeless things.

However, Kiel noticed that the green kid named Neel who was surrounded by the zombies being unfazed conjured a few flexible wood branches from the ground and punctured the zombies just as easily as a piece of tofu.

However, Yebon didn't seem to be that fortunate and although she too was fighting, after being surrounded by three zombies, she was easily caught up in their counterattack, dragged by the long arms unable to even ask for help, due to the powerful strength of the zombie's arms. She didn't seem to even have an edge on spells from the looks of Kiel.

Leone was helping his own teammates and punching the shit out of the zombies with little to no effort. However, as he had to lead his team, there were too many zombies near him, so even though he seemed to be leading the others to help Aida, he failed to notice Yebon being caught. 

And Astrid was just fighting on his own with a smile on his face without a care of anything else. His fighting style being quite unique- boxing and he seemed to be quite proficient at it. However, what was strange was that none of the zombies near could even touch him literally. It was only him mowing the other zombies.

But among all the chaos, only one kid was standing still doing nothing. Yes, it was Kiel, who was only watching at the fights, seemingly lost in thoughts. He was standing near the entrance. So he was yet not caught up with all the mess. 

As the number of zombies kept on increasing from the broken walls, and without any help to back out, the kids could only fight their way out from the sides. The rock layer was too thick to break with the strength of one or two kids, and the kids didn't have the leisure to focus on it now. And the zombies seemed to be endless speaking out from the breach, so each had to hold on his or her own fight. How could they focus on something else when their own life was at risk? 

Colourful fires, water and air spells were being cast without any limits. It would now seem that everyone was a genius of their own. Otherwise, how could they come up here? However, life is just a series of decisions. And it did seem that they made their first decision wrong.

"Hold on!! Don't let go!"

Four plus kids were still trying their best to pull out Aida under the command of Leone, who was handling one side on his own. The kids were also being roughly rocked from side to side due to the sheer force pulling her from the other side, causing many to almost lose their grips and crash to the floor from time to time.

"Hahaha ah!"

"Hey! Don't let go!"

"I know"

SCCCREEEAAACH!

The scream was from a girl who was also pulled away by the zombies, yet the horrifying wailing tone made it seemingly impossible for a human to issue such a sound.

Splash!

Just as they looked at the one making the sound, they found the girl being torn apart in two from her belly horizontally. Red liquid exploded outwards from both ends. It was like seeing a blender stuffed full of tomatoes switching on but with its lid not closed, and then, crushed bits of flesh and juice were flying off everywhere.

The crimson blood rained down like a small fountain. but that was not all. There were even more similar situations happening.

"Noooo…"

Everyone was looking pale as the things continued. They didn't expect the things to turn out like this. And as a rusty iron smell pervaded the atmosphere, everyone felt like their stomachs churning up. Scary and irritation were definitely the dominating emotions felt by everyone now. Fighting in such a narrow place was definitely putting them at a disadvantage. Even if everyone wanted to help, most of the options were blocked.

"Hel….p"

Even Aida who was covered with a thin armour of rock while being pulled from both sides was at her limit as she asked for help. There were constant cracks forming on her armour as she tried to mend them all. 

Her legs that were kicking and twisting until now, were going limp by the seconds. All of her toes were curled up simultaneously; her t.h.i.g.hs trembling and her knees straightening up. A certain sickening sensation of her flesh tearing up more than possible was being transmitted to her brain as well as the other kids holding her up.

Kiel was still watching all this from the sidelines along with a few other scared kids. He was neither helping anyone like Leone, not was he fighting anyone like Astrid. It was not because he found this situation very fascinating… maybe he actually did. However, at the moment he was worried about something else. 

There was a faint chill continuously rising from the back of his spine. It was the same type of chill that would occur when he was about to come face to face to something ominous. However, it was much more clearer. And he was sure it was not due to the zombies in front of him. The worst thing was his spine seemed to get ever chillier by the minutes, giving him real goosebumps.

'System scan the zombies for any infections?'

Although these zombies were very slow and didn't bite anyone, and their only way of attacking was by lengthening their arms, it still remained a possibility. After all, Kiel had his share of apocalypse movies. So he didn't want to rush into the situation. As nothing was clear. He could not let himself be infected now where the cure is not even a remote possibility.

[Beep… scanning…. scan completed! Host scans show that the zombies contain no biological infection carrying transmitters. But they do seem to be able to transfer their zombified state to others by some means. However, the process is still unidentified and not easily possible. 

Host… Azrael would like to add that there is something oddly different about these zombies… different from my database]

'Huh? I can see that. They are not hungry to eat humans. Can definitely see it. But if it is not the infection then… something feels totally wrong...'

[...]

It was then!

KYAAAAAA! 

A loud sound transferred to everyone's minds. A shout that made it look like their heads could even burst for a moment. The voice seemed to drill into their very minds and was more like a banshee wailing inside their very minds. Some of the kids even fell back hard on their rear ends due to the sudden shock.

The shout stunned not only the kids, it even seemed to stun the zombies, friends and foes alike. 

[Beep… a sudden spike in the psychic element detected interpreting with Host's brain waves. The host is warned to stay alert!]

Looking at the direction of the shout, a familiar blue short skirt soaked in blood was hanging from a rotten arm. Beyond that…. Kiel couldn't see any other connecting body parts. All he could see was some remains of crushed intestines and bits of mangled flesh. And to the side lay a mangled human head. 

"Yebon!!!!" 

The shout was almost like a race startup. As if waiting for such a moment, Leone gushed forward, taking advantage of the fact that even the zombies were stunned to rescue Aida who was in her last legs. He drove straight into the mess and punched one of the two zombies holding Aida straight in the face. It seems that Kiel was not the only one to notice that the zombie had very fragile defences. And as expected the zombie's grip loosened and it fell down.

However, the force woke up the nearby zombies who were stunned. Seeing the human in the midst of them invoked the necessary reactions in them- lengthening their arms to grip and crush their prey.

GROWL!!

The other zombie who was also holding her was next in line in Leone's list. However, just as he turned to take down his next target, what entered into his sight were three more arms lengthening towards him at high speeds. 

Such high speeds would even be a problem for an average a.d.u.l.t man from Kiel's previous world. And even most kids here would lose their cool in such an attack. However, even metals have exceptions to them.

Leone was obviously trained in combat. In that very moment, Kiel could see red marks appear all over his body, just as fast disappearing indicating his bloodline powers activation, as his speed increased suddenly skillfully dodging the attacks in front of him. However, nothing missed Kiel's eyes who was highly vigilant now.

Leone was skilled no doubt. However, he made a grave mistake this time. In the surge of the moment, he forgot that this attack landed him with his back against the zombies. And the zombies didn't care about frontal attacks.

But he was fast too and was dodging almost all the arms lunging at him. But there were too many arms attacking him where he was, and before Leon could figure out his next course of action, his back was hit with a very heavy force.

Leon felt like a solid stony block of stone crashed on his back. It was definitely unsettling. And what came after that was not the pain, but a jolt which seemed to travel through every inch of his body thrusting him forward with the same momentum.

"Leone!!"

And before he could control his body, he had already blown away some distance. However, he still recovered himself quickly from the jolt. But the pain and dizziness that followed were not to be messed with. His whole body seemed to be crying like it was being broken. 

Just standing up looked like it was taking a toll on his body. But being the boy he was, he refused to give up. Raking his fighting stance again, he stood up. 

Although his vision seemed a bit blurry, he still had his willpower and vision seemed a little blurry, he remembered that event, and his body tensed up automatically.

'This is nothing. I have faced similar situations before too. I will not back down! I will save my friends. I will never let that happen again!'

And he lunged at the zombies again with a serious face and eyes filled with willpower. But just as he was about to meet the rotten puppets face to face, two small stones passed from his back at tremendous speed and hit the heads of the two zombies at the front. 

CRASH!

He saw it clearly, the stones crushed the heads of the zombies, propelling them back like fallen kites. And the next moment, he saw the stature of a familiar black t-shirt standing in front of him. And as the boy turned his face towards him, Leone saw him clearly.

The same cool and calm face which seemed to be unfazed by everything that was happening around, the same uncaring eyes, the unique silver hair, but a different crimson eye colour in place of the usual blue.

"It is coming!"

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