Chapter 35

  Upon seeing the quickly approag mutant, his first instinctive rea was t up his shotgun and bst its head off. Only he didn’t have any ons on him anymore. His powerful shotgun, reliable assault rifle, and heavy-caliber pistol were gone. He had no ons on him at all now.

  However, despite being unarmed, Jake’s heart didn’t skip a beat. He calmly watched the ex-human walker race toward him. The sight of the bloodthirsty creature charging at him didn’t instill much, if any, fear in him.

  As the mutant sprioward Jake, his heightened intelligend sharpened senses allowed him to meticulously analyze its every move. He could now detect details iant’s behavior and appearance he hadn’t been aware of when he was just a regur survivor.

  He studied the ex-human’s deformed frame, noting its sinewy muscles ripplih mottled skie its wide strides, the mutant’s speed appeared moderate. Each step seemed calcuted as if the creature was serving its energy for a precise strike. When he was a regur survivor, it had always seemed to him that mutants just barreled toward him mindlessly, without giving much thought to their own safety or strategy of taking down their prey. Now, Jake k wasirely true. Ex-human mutants possessed a level of intelligence beyond mere mindless aggression. There was some degree of thought process within their heads. While they weren’t intelligent beings, they wereirely devoid of itive abilities.

  Jake watched the ex-human’s elongated cwed hands swing menagly at its sides before abruptly halting in front of its chest, showg the deadly talons that gleamed in the daylight. He he intricate patterns of blue veih the mutant’s thick skin. With a quick, analytical gaze, he determihe optimal course of a to outsmart and take down the walker.

  As he watched the mutant approach, he pondered ahought in his mind. As a survivor, he had relied on his PDA to gather information about new mutant types. Now, without the PDA, he wondered if he would still be able to access the mutant’s stats or if this feature was lost to him forever.

  As soon as he thought that, a piece of info fshed through his mind.

  Ex-Human Walker – Level 1

  Special abilities: None

  Jake froze. What had just glimpsed in his mihe mutant’s stats, the same ohat would appear on his PDA s if he sed the mutant with the device. So he was actually able to summon a mutant’s stats with just a thought—no PDA was needed anymore. This discovery filled Jake with excitement. In fact, it thrilled him so much he didn’t realize the mutant had gotten too close to him until it was almost too te.

  He remembered about the ex-human only when he saw it right in front of him, shing out with a cwed hand. Jake instinctively jerked back from the attack. Sihe walker was so close to him, Jake didn’t expect to be able to dodge the cws in time. To his great surprise, he mao steer clear of the mutant’s talons as they raked the empty air before him.

  The ex-human seemed taken aback by his agility, grunting in frustration before ung atack. Once again, Jake ducked uhe mutant’s cws as they swiped harmlessly over his head. Uhe mutant lurched at him again, but much to its frustration, Jake once agaily sidestepped, successfully evading the attack.

  For the several mihe ex-human shed out with its cws, but he danced away from every attack. To him, the mutant appeared to move in slow motion. However, he realized it wasn’t the mutant moving slower than usual; rather, he had bee remarkably faster than he ever was as a regur survivor. His increased movement speed altered his perception of time, giving him the sensation that he was moving at his regur pace while everything else slowed down around him.

  Jake also hat the walker was affected by the pull of the Dark Void. Still, they weren’t close enough to the anomaly for it to take full trol over the mutant.

  Despite his speed, Jake cked the skill to expertly dodge the mutant’s attacks. While he had successfully avoided its talons by a slim margin so far, it was more a result of his newfound swiftness and quick reflexes than refined dodging teique. He clearly cked experien such close hand-to-hand bat.

  At some point, the walker mao catch him with its talons, raking his shoulder. Jake felt no pain, though. Despite feeling the cws tear through his bed flesh, it wasn’t the typical sensation of pain he experienced. Instead, he simply received a feeling that indicated his left shoulder had been injured.

  One way or another, it was time to finish this fight.

  He ched his fists, waited for an opening, and wheant lurched at him one more time, he puhe ex-human right in the middle of its face. However, the strike didn’t seem to have much effect, only surprising the mutant without causing any real harm. Despite his heightened agility, Jake’s strength appeared to remain unged. Also, being a non-fighter, he cked bat skills and prhting teiques.

  So, he’d simply thrown the punch, hitting the mutant in the face. He hadn’t even tried to put all his weight into the blow. Still, while Jake wasn’t exceptionally strong and cked fighting experience, his obsidian-bck skin was as hard as rock. The punch he’d just delivered turned out to be powerful enough to leave the ex-human in a daze for a moment.

  Before the walker could recover from the blow to its face, Jake rammed into the mutant, causing them both to tumble to the ground. Pinning his foe’s cwed hands to the ground with his knees, Jake set about hitting the mutant with his tightly ched fists. At first, he was met with hard resistance, but after nding a few more blows, he felt the creature’s skull give way, and the thuds of his fists striking its head were repced with wet, pulpy smacks.

  Its body went limp beh him as the mutant finally kicked the bucket. Immediately after that, a brief piece of information fshed through his mind.

  Enemy killed. +10 XP

  Almost immediately after that, another notification popped up in his head.

  You have gained enough XP to level up. Your level went up from 0 to 1. You have gained 1 SP.

  For a moment, Jake just stared down at the mutant’s dead body, its head a formless mass of pulpy flesh, his arms covered in gore almost up to the elbows. But he wasn’t seeing any of that. He was deep in thought, p the words that had just fshed through his mind. They were not like text messages; rather, they felt like fn thoughts that had been ied in his head.

  As it turned out, he had a system ression of his owe being transformed into a mutant, he realized he could still gain experience points and level up just like a regur survivor. This revetion filled him with excitement as it meant he wouldn’t merely be prey for other survivors to hunt down for XP, as he had initially feared. Instead, he would have the opportunity to level up and grow stronger as well.

  How do I access my stats, though?

  He already knew he didn’t need a PDA anymore. The system notifications were now pced directly in his head. So maybe all he had to do to check his stats was to think about them? He tried, but nothing happened. It was weird. Hopefully, he didn’t need another device to access his stats like regur survivors did.

  Jake crawled away from the dead mutant and sat down on the grassy ground, deep in thought. He tried to call up his stats using a mental and one more time, but to no avail. He was fused. Something didn’t add up. At some point, he closed his eyes out of frustration. After a moment, he made one more attempt to call up his stats—and to his surprise, it worked this time.