AW? Chapter 06

I worked my way through the uncrowded streets stepping over the body of the businesswoman who went out before us. She really should have thought through what was going to happen as twenty zombies overwhelmed her. I just casually killed them all with my monkey wrench while my group vomited behind me. I began prying off the sources as they watched in curiosity.

The teenage girl asked. “What are you doing?” She was young, probably no older than fourteen. Nose piercing and neon purple hair. Even in the apocalypse, she had her rave makeup on. I didn’t know they still made girls like this. Were emo girls still a thing? I was half a decade out of school so I wasn’t sure. I brought over the sources and handed them to everyone.

“First special source here. Think we should give it to the leader.” I handed her a slightly bigger source of a different color. They looked at me as I explained. “You eat them. Put it in your mouth until it dissolves and it will make you stronger.” I watched the emo girl go first. “Woah, that’s weird. Let me check.” She brought her hand up and clicked like she was clicking a button.

I mimicked her and turned on my menu. That’s good to know you can do that without speaking out loud. I flipped through it before she mentioned it. “Y-yea. I did get .01 in my stats.” They were too busy eating their own sources to notice my shocked look. That’s a tenth the amount I got. It would take them four hundred sources to reach the same level as me… That changes things.

Bigger groups would normally be better in the apocalypse but if you could grow the powers of a few key individuals a small group could overwhelm a much larger one. I think the best strategy would be to join a group and hide my strength while making a few of them stronger than the rest.

Plans kept coming together as I thought about abandoning this group but it wasn’t like The Walking Dead. I couldn’t just one-man army my way through all the problems, the loneliness would kill me before the zombies did. I would also be abandoning them to their most likely deaths if I did break from the group. None seemed… Capable of mass murder like I was.

My plans kept shifting as I realized we needed a larger group to succeed with several of my plans and that would take days and convincing every new group it made more sense for our leader to lead than theirs. A larger group that would realize sooner rather than later that the world we lived in is mostly gone. I kept thinking and knew several steps to guarantee a comfortable living in this world.

First, I needed to keep trying to gain ranks with my helper title. I ask about a half dozen questions before I get on the lead of a possible new line of powers. “So, I get the storage but it isn’t really unique enough right? How about adding in a flavor source to change or add something new to a power? Adding in vehicle storage, maybe cold storage for food, or even shelter storage. It would make each power more unique and if one power is too weak you can add in a flavor to fix it.”

Processing… Processing, accepted. 

Helper II upgraded to Helper III

I kept making suggestions, one out of every fifty or so was accepted. “Maybe add in missions or quests to help guide people and give out resources you didn’t have to fight over.”

Helper III upgraded to Helper IV

“Well, if you haven’t yet. I’d recommend either an electrical power or something that lets people access their phones and computers. If you look at society as it was you can probably steal a lot of technology or quality-of-life things and turn them into powers.

Helper IV upgraded to True helper

True helper- 25% discount on store purchases, access to helper quests, access to true helper quests, access to unique items in store, becomes a passive title that works even when not selected, access to bonus information, and one get-out-of-jail-free card

Awarded three flavor sources for your powers

Awarded three random flavor sources

Awarded small team bundle

Gain access to community bundles as you expand your group size

Holy fucking shit that was a success. I slap the three flavor sources in my mouth.

Liquid storage- Gain a bonus storage for different liquids.

Liquid manipulation- Gain mental control over liquids similar to a water bender.

Spider sense- Gain access to innate danger sense that warns of incoming attacks.

I offered another two hundred and fifty tips but most likely many other people had figured out the suggestion option now and all the easy suggestions were taken. The virus was beyond intelligence but it was missing two things. Innate knowledge of how humans thought and the creative spark humans had. It meant that her options grew more human the more human options she had.

Every suggestion was added or thought about allowing her to develop a pseudo-human personality. Not just one but multiple, she evolved to being able to mimic humans down to even the primal emotions they felt and began to rapidly make changes. She could fully process information and absorb all the knowledge of a book in a picosecond while being able to process several trains of thought several thousands of humans could at the speed of an attosecond.

Thousands of times every second the virus was making micro-adjustments to all the new feedback she was gaining. She had come at the ‘make humans stronger’ with a sledgehammer and had grown enough to regret it, get over the regret, and then regret it again for a different reason a million and a half times. Many of her humans who hadn’t died had already given up on life.

She needed more incentives for people who have given up to continue functioning. There had to be a way to not only grow stronger and live an even more lavish lifestyle than was possible but also redeem those infected for the true elites of the world. A thousand iterations of options as she readjusted the prices before scrapping that idea and making it more rounded and perfect.

A hundred thousand ZKP was beyond expensive but those who worked hard could accomplish it. As it was too expensive there were also found materials scattered throughout the world to lower the price. There was… There was a third option for fixing zombies but she wasn’t sure if she should implement it just yet… Perhaps in the future, or to those who she could rely on.