Becoming a Monster

"We are…all too weak…if we don't become…stronger…we will…die…"

Paul's words sounded ominous and the vague way he talked made the situation more terrifying. But this answer wasn't enough for Mark.

"That's exactly why I need to get healed Jackass! When I get stronger then there will be nothing out there that could challenge me!" Mark just couldn't accept that answer. Even if Paul didn't mention his name, he felt that he was referring to him being too weak since he got injured.

"Yo-you…"

"…Bailey…just give them the gold, we don't need it right now…Remember, you told me Noah is heading there right? He can definitely help us more than what we can buy here…arguing with them isn't worth it…" suddenly a small yet exhausting voice interrupted the group. Everyone turned to the fourth member of Baileys group. Her clothes were dirty, but now her face and hair was a bit more cleaned up from before.

"Isabelle? Yes…you're right. Even Paul thought so!" Wiping away her tears, she started to regain her confidence again.

"Jas, how much do you need?"

However, Jas and the group didn't answer. How could they pretend that they didn't catch the familiar name being said?

"Noah is with you guys? How is he? How did you get him to join you? Can I come?" Ailetta who has been quiet this whole time couldn't help herself. Ever since learning about Marks attempt of murdering Noah and then how he not only endangered the people fighting with him, but he also didn't seem to care about the deaths of anyone following his lead.

"Ailetta??" The sudden announcement of her wanting to leave made Jasmine feel slightly offended since she's been her only friend for so many years. But when she considers the last outing they had then she could slightly understand her desire to leave.

"Huh? I think you're confused…." Bailey then took the time to explain to them how they met Noah and found out where he was going. Ailetta was disheartened to find out that he had still decided to stay alone. They continued to listen up until Bailey told them about the creature they met near the gate's entrance.

No one was able to get a good grasp of the monster's description. All they could recall was the barrage of tentacles attacking in every direction that was even killing off the police hailing down bullets.

Upon hearing that even guns were unable to stop the monster was a wake up call. Jasmine couldn't picture exactly what they witnessed but if it sounded worse than when they were being attacked by the mantis by a landslide. Her eyes flicked with confliction when she thought about the lone figure that was able to not only take them on but also tame one. She could slightly understand why Isabelle had so much faith in him.

Hearing that there was actually something far scarier than what they have already encountered encouraged the group members to lend whatever little gold that they had. Because of Mark being stubborn, that left them with little since they weren't able to retrieve their loot from their previous battle. They had barely scraped together 700 gold. Luckily for them, Bailey's group had a little over 900 so they could still get what they needed.

"Urgh….are you sure this isn't poison?" Mark complained when he saw the murky green vial that was supposed to be the cure.

"Nobody knows at this point, but it's our only hope…quit complaining already and drink it!"

Uncorking the vial. Mark first took a sniff of the potion before grimacing. But he knew that he couldn't back down after making such a scene when they didn't want to offer the gold in the first place. He closed his eyes while plugging his nose before proceeding to tilt his head back and downing the contents in one swoop.

Moments later Mark was seen kneeled over having a coughing fit, saliva pouring out of his mouth, snot from his nose and his eyes were in tears from the horrible taste. They had noticed while in the shop that there were also syringes being sold too. However the price for that was an extra thousand.

"Sigh! I hope I never have to drink that again…"

"And that's exactly why we still need to find Noah, we don't have the gold to buy a potion everytime someone gets infected. Bailey? Can we rest for a bit so we can go wit-"

Suddenly everyone heard a loud commotion going on in the lobby outside the door. Out of curiosity, the group headed out to see what was going on.

"The gym! At the gym! There's an army of zombies attacking! It's over!"

Amidst the yells, there was one in particular that stood out from the rest. Bailey's ears became sensitive when hearing the word gym and zombies. Her eyes widened like saucers before she took off down the stairs.

"Bailey!" Her friends cried out before they took off running after her, leaving Jasmine and her group behind.

"Mark, what do you think?"

"What do I think? Of course we should just leave them. You told me before that you won't be able to use your skills for a while after what happened. And they have NoAh! So why worry about them?" He pronounced his name with sarcasm, it wasn't hard to notice his dissatisfaction.

If it was any other time, Jasmine would try to convince him, but he was right, there's little that she can do at this time. It would be hypocritical of her to tell everyone else to fight when she wasn't. She didn't notice that someone was clearly dissatisfied with what she heard.

"Ailetta?" Ailetta stopped and turned towards Jas while on the steps." Are you really leaving? why? He already left you before…" When Jasmine looked at her, standing there wasn't the usual oblivious and bubbly girl she was used to. The girl now actually looked at her with anger which would be the second time she has done so since she's known her. The first would be when she bad mouthed Noah, thinking that it would help her get over him.

"It's not just about Noah…can you really stand there with a clear conscience knowing other people you know could die? And if they die then what about us? Can we even survive what Noah couldn't?" Her eyes then turned to Mark, she was angry before, but when her eyes turned to him, her eyes turned into a hostile glare.

"And you! Even if you disagree, you are alive because of Bailey and now when they could possibly die, you throw a tantrum because someone's better than you? I'm sorry Jasmine, but I can't continue to follow you anymore like this…" She wasn't able to hold back the tears, before she cried anymore, she hurriedly ran down the steps without looking back.

Jasmine felt hopeless, she agreed with what Ailetta said and that made her feel hopeless even more. She looked towards her brother who looked at her. He saw his sister on the verge of tears, he was prideful and stubborn, but he wasn't ungrateful to the person who was always there for him.

"Sigh….Don't give me that look Jas, I'll go…It's the price I must pay since I'm the hero." He said with such certainty that it almost caused Jasmine to break character. But because of it, she was able to smile. 'At least he's not as lost as I thought he was…'

—————-

"Everyone! We have to fight together! We can win if we come together."

"Don't tell us what to do! You're the one who brought those things here!"

Everywhere you turned, there were students either fighting against zombies or running away.

However most were forced to fight. Noah didn't know how many humans and creatures the Zombie King in his army had killed along the way, but he knew it had to be a large number when he saw how many zombies were runners.

And that wasn't even the worst of it. In the center of the court, where the more intense action was taking place. There were four, almost completely identical zombies that resembled the king. The only difference was that they didn't have the apparel nor the bone sword like the original counterpart. They did however have the same height and battle instincts like their king and used those instincts to commandeer weapons for themselves from the dead bodies.

The average student wasn't able to contest a single blow against the king's new subordinates until different battle hardened groups joined the fray. There were four to five people in each group battling it out with one subordinate while the less advanced students tried to hold, if not kill the regular zombies.

At the edge of it all was Noah himself, along with Arachne and surprisingly Lucas in his werewolf form. The battle against the king became more difficult than before after the King was now aware of the danger of Noah's webs, so when he attempted it before, it would block it with its sword since it was too big to dodge the webs completely.

Noah was too concerned for Grims safety, he thought it would be best if Grim helped take care of the regular zombies in the area. That's where Lucas came in, but he didn't bring much help to the fight.

Whoosh!

Noah was seen ducking another swing from the kings sword, before sidestepping it's leg that it used to attempt to kick him. It growled in annoyance, for the past few minutes Noah was constantly weaving through the zombies attacks while Arachne would attempt to go for its legs like before. Anything higher than that would be asking for death when it came to the King's battle senses. Noah almost lost Grim, he wouldn't risk losing Arachne.

But after dodging the latest barrage of attacks, he glanced over to the side. When he noticed that Lucas wasn't there to follow up AGAIN, he began to grow frustrated.

"DO SOMETHING ALREADY OR JUST LEAVE! Is this what I was supposed to regret? You watching me like an abandoned puppy??"

Whoosh!*

Even while distracted, Noah was able to pick up on the subtle differences in the air to dodge backwards just in time from another blow.

Lucas wasn't able to give a retort to Noah's criticism since he was in his transformation, but he felt attacked! He was angry, angry towards Noah, angry towards the zombie king and especially angry towards himself. Whenever he lunged forward to follow up on an opening, he felt an instinctual fear of death approaching him before he entered the King's proximity.

'Fuck fuck fuck!!!!' Lucas roared internally. There was no way for him to attack and come out unscathed and if he did as Noah suggested and leaves, wouldn't that just mean acknowledging that he was useless?

'No! I'm clearly faster than him, if he's able to dodge his attacks so easily then there's no way I should get hit. I can do this!'

During the time he was thinking, he saw Noah dodging a strike from above by evading towards the King and gluing its leading foot to the floor with his webs.

At the same time, he saw Arachne preparing to strike again. Ever since the first few times Arachne was able to inject her venom into the King's legs, the King barely moved from its positioning, but it didn't need to move when its sword skills were more than enough.

At this time, Lucas went down on all fours and dug his back paws into the floor, propping himself for launch. His muscles constantly spasmed as his muscles flexed past its limits.

"Awwwhhooo!" Lucas couldn't resist howling before he dashed like never before onto the Zombie King. Over the time he spent fighting in a group, he had realized that you gain experience based on the amount of contributions achieved during the fight. So far he knew he amounted to very little of it, but he couldn't allow Noah to continue to pull ahead of him in terms of power. He needed to do something big.

Its legs were almost useless which would make it the most suitable target. If he could tear off one of the legs of the King then surely he did more than what Noah and his creatures did over this entire amount of time right?

But he messed up…The best way to make a surprise attack is for it to be a surprise. When he howled, he only made himself aware to the King who was in the middle of forcing Arachne back once again.

Just as he approached the King's reach, his eyes filled with expectations and glory. Soon his eyes reflected the shape of a sword bearing down upon him. Lucas left himself with no possible way of escape. The best he could try to do was to dig his claws as deep into the court as he could to stop his momentum.

Just when it appeared that he was about to be cut cleanly in half. The choice of digging in his claws prevented the gory scene, but at what cost?

"ARRRR ARRR ARRR!"

Lucas fell back whimpering in pain, the stress and pain in his voice was unbearable for some to hear. The distraction almost proved fatal to his best friend LeRoy who knew who those whimpers belonged to. Instead of LeRoy being put in harm's way due to the distraction. Tristan happened to meet his end when he stepped in to save him.

The zombie subordinate they were pinned against used a flail with spikes covering the metal ball. When it whipped the spiked ball towards LeRoy's head. Tristan misjudged the direction of the swing and when he dove to push LeRoy out of the way, the flail impaled directly into his face while he was falling and his head was cleanly ripped off his shoulders while still being embedded into the spikes.

Quickly, everything was turning from bad to worse. Lucas could be seen trying to crawl himself away. A cut from his thigh to his shoulders left a trail of blood as he made his way away from the fight. However when looking closely at the cut that should be trying to heal with the regeneration prowlers of a werewolf. The cut was festering and beginning to emit a greenish toxin that began to burn at his insides.

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A/N: work will pick up this week, the post might be on random days still but I will still strive for 5 chapters.