"Let's hope they make it in time."
Kara's feminine words hung heavily, swallowed by the moans of the horde. The night pressed closer, smoke curling like fingers around the vehicles. The fires sputter, casting jagged shadows across the rubble.
The Zombies surge forward again.
The Rank ones stumble over charred corpses, their jaws snapping air. A Rank-two darts through, eyes glinting, claws raking concrete with a screech.
Ethan braces, shield raised. A Rank-two lunges, and he slams it back with a clang, the axe cleaving its skull. Gore sprays, black and slick, catching the firelight.
"Damn it," he growls with frustration, evident in his voice.
Philip weaves left, blade flashing. A Rank-one's head rolls and another's chest splits.
From the truck's roof, Jace continues to nock arrow after arrow. His fingers tremble, quivering, nearly empty. He aims and releases.
A Rank-two's throat bursts, and it collapses mid-stride.
Eryn, beside the transport vehicle, chants low, her white robes stained with ash and sweat. Mana pulses and a gust howl. "Empowerment!" she shouted, while also unleashing another spell, "Mana bullets." A crescent of compressed mana bullets towards three Rank Ones, their torsos shearing apart.
The vice-captain, Kara, grips her red staff, eyes locked on the horde. Fireballs flare, each blast incinerating a cluster of undead—the air reeks of burnt rot.
Still, they came. The hordes were relentless
Kara's jaw tightened. "Give it your all. Reinforcement should be here in a few minutes," she said. However, in all their minds, they kept asking when the reinforcement would arrive, as the five-minute interval was over.
Kara's command cuts through the moans. The smoke thickens, curling around the truck. Fires flicker, casting jagged shadows on cracked concrete.
Her red staff flared. Fireballs erupted, torching a cluster of Rank Ones. Burnt rot chokes the air.
And they noticed that a group had pressed closer to the transport full of civilians without alerting them. With an intelligent Rank-two zombie commanding them, their claws raking the truck's sides.
Metal groans, scratches echoing. Civilians scream inside, fists pounding the walls.
"They're breaking through!" Philip the swordsman yells, blade flashing as he tries to rush over. But couldn't, as the zombies were relentless.
Ethan bashes a Rank-Two zombie, his axe cleaving its shoulder. It snarls, still clawing at him. Rank-One zombie swarm, their hands scraping against the truck's rear hatch as civilians scream, high and desperate.
Kara hurled another fireball. With it consuming a wave Rank-one, but more surged through the flames, singed and snarling. Another Zombie, a Rank-one, slams the truck's door, hinges creaking.
"We have to protect the civilians!" Ethan roared, shield slamming a zombie back.
Philips dived in, blade cutting two Rank Ones down. Their bodies pile, but the horde climbs over, relentlessly. The group of zombies continued to claw and tear at the truck's armor.
"Guys, I don't know what is going on, but the reinforcements aren't responding," the Custodian's voice crackles, strained.
"It's already too late," the vice-captain mutters, staff blazing as they fight to get past the hordes surrounding them to reach the transport.
As the team fights on, exhaustion burns even with the boast; they were all already running on fumes, but now they fought with even more vigor. "We can't let them in," she shouted.
Kara's eyes hardened as she saw the hand of the rank-two zombie, which had managed to claw its way into the truck, red with blood. Blood of one of the civilians.
Immediately, more screams rang out from the truck.
—---.
Far from the team's fight with the hordes, the captain, Felix, battles the Rank-three Rook Zombie. The night chokes with smoke, moonlight barely piercing the haze. Rubble shifts underfoot, fires flickering in the distance.
The Rook stood tall like a giant, its steel-corded muscles flexing. Red eyes blaze like pits of madness, hissing breath fogging with rot and heat. Its fists were shaking the air.
Felix, a young man no older than twenty-five, moves with the eerie grace of an elite. His short, blond hair clung to his sweat-drenched brow; wearing red and blue leather armor, the armour itself, was creaked in different places.
His silver sword gleamed in his hands, frost trailing its edge, crackling faintly.
The Rook's fist slams down. As Felix sidesteps, sword flashing. As blade meets flesh, frost burst from the sword, as ice formed on the zombie's hand and began to spread.
The Rook roars, shattering the frost, its body barely scratched.
It swiped its claws as it grazed Felix's armor—screech. He ducks, heart pounding, hands shaking, and slashes again.
The silver blade bites, frost flaring, but the ice crumbles against the Rook's raw power. Barely leaving a mark.
The ground trembled with each clash, the floor grinding. Felix's eyes narrowed, jaw clenched– another swing—sword meets fist, frost aura snapping uselessly. The Rook snarls, driving him back.
Felix's boots skid on rubble, his breath ragged. 'I need to finish this fight as fast as possible.' The thought burned, sharp as the frost on his blade.
The Rook's red eyes locked on him –his arm aches with every swing, the silver sword heavier with each swing and block. The frost, his edge, did nothing—shattered like glass against the zombie's body.
Felix grits his teeth, deflecting the Rook's clawed fist with his silver sword.
The frost flares, crackling, but shatters uselessly against the beast's hide. 'My friends… the civilians.' The word echod in his mind, distant but sharp.
The Rook charges, its steel-corded muscles rippling again with even more hunger.
Felix dodges left, boots skidding on rubble. His sword slashes, his ice aura surrounding his silver sword, sparking, but the raw power of the zombie—a rank three, a being rank above his own, with a rook's sub-rank—barely flinches. Black blood drips, pooling on cracked stone.
If it were a normal Rank-three, Flex knew he would not be having this many issues, even if it was a rank above him.
But this zombie was different; its red eyes blazing with hunger. It was a sub-rank and a high one at that.
Felix blocks a fist—clang—his arm shuddering. The ground splits beneath the impact, dust choking the air.
He counterattacks, sword slicing the Rook's flank. Frost coats the wound, then cracks. No good. His heart pounds, thoughts racing to the transport, to his team.
Even though he trusted their capabilities, nothing was assured in this cursed world.
The ground trembles as rubble tumbles while the Rook slams forward. Felix weaves to the right, sweat stinging his eyes. His red and blue leather armor creaks even more, gashed from claws. Another slash—his blade bites shallowly, ice crumbling. It's too strong.
'Finish this fast.' The urge burned in his mind, but the Rook's speed and power overwhelmed him. As he blocks another attack, his hands are shaking. A pillar shatters nearby, stone spraying as the shockwave from the zombie's fist grazes it
His mind snags on the civilian and his team's fading strength.
"I can't fail them. I need to finish this." He lunges forward with desperation, his sword flashing as he aims for the Rook's neck—the only vulnerable part his blade could penetrate.
However, the challenge was the zombies' immense size—twice that of an average man—and their height, which made reaching them difficult. In his haste, he falters, misstepping on loose rubble, causing his balance to slip.
The Rook seized the moment without hesitation. Its fist struck Felix with a blur of raw force and speed, sending him flying back and crashing through debris, wood, and stone, splintering around him.
Felix lies sprawled in rubble, wood, and stone jagged against his back. Pain sears his chest, and he coughs out—blood splatters, flecked with bits of organ: his vision blurs, the night's smoke stinging his eyes.
The Rook looms a few paces away, its red eyes blazing. It stalks forward, each step trembling the ground as cracked stone crunches beneath its bulk. Felix's heart hammers, and his breath is shallow.
A faint red glow had immediately pulsed from his red-blue leather armor at the point of impact — a mana shield. It flickered as his opponent's fist struck, saving him from death. Now, a green aura seeped from the same armor, which was barely holding up, wrapping him in a hazy glow.
His coughs began to ease, and his wounds started to knit together, but the pain still lingered. 'This healing won't last. I need a medic.'
Felix's friends' faces flash in his mind—his team and the civilians. He clenches his jaw, thinking, 'I know they are strong. Why did I rush? I should have just trusted them.
His haste clouded his judgment, and that mistake almost cost him dearly. As the green glow began to fade, he could feel the pressure of the zombie, a few feet away.
The Rook moved closer, its body glinting ominously. Its hissing breath carries a foul stench, and the ground shakes with every step it takes.
Felix grips his silver sword and forces himself to stand, his legs trembling and blood dripping from his lips.
Even with that, he took a stance, as a transformation began to take form, his blond hair shifted.
One half of his body flared, shimmering blue. Ice shimmered along his shoulder and down his blade. The air around him frosted.
The other half—red. Flames licked up his side, flickering in his hair. Heat shimmered around him, sweat instantly evaporating.
His silver sword—now glowing with both fire and frost—vibrated in his grip, humming like a storm about to break.
He stood tall.
"Come," he rasped, "let's finish this."