Lecherous Leech CH46

He could smell the sizzling fat dripping off the bat; it smelled like bad bacon. The flaming bat flailed, knocking over the lone tree that remained after the shelling before it suddenly froze. It lunged down on the nearest zombie and devoured the thing whole. Silas watched the thing travel down the zombie bat's gullet, only to be broken down and merged with the rest of the body. The worms moved fast enough to see the corpse practically dissolve.

Silas shot forward and sliced at the bat’s open belly with a thin coned flamethrower. In the precious seconds needed to activate the spell, one of the bat’s wings swiped him. He shot off, skidding against the ground and crashing into a small group of undead.

Thoughts that he might be hallucinating came to mind as he watched one zombie hug another before something erupted between their chests. Smaller versions of the worms inside the bat zombie moved between the corpses binding them together. He raised his hand and blasted them with silver flames; it was the only way to be sure they would die.

Suddenly the bat froze and turned to him. It turned its head in confusion before the many faces covering the corpse tried to speak. As they tired, the worms moved from victim to victim, devouring the brains remaining in their hosts, leaving the faces stitched to the bat frozen mid-sentence.

The flames on the bat were starting to die after the infusion of fresh dead flesh. More motes of ash flowed into him, and he fought through the pain. Silas crawled his way back to his feet and tested his legs. They were still more than strong enough for what he needed to do.

From the start of the fight, he fought the monster like a normal human with a flamethrower or a lightsaber. That was his mistake; he was far stronger and faster than a normal human; if he acted like one, he would die.

He activated charm and felt it fail against the mindless undead watching him. That was ok; his secondary instance hit the monster, and he moved. He flashed over to the monster in a burst of speed, cut through three of its front claws, and moved before the monster could swipe. When the monster lunged, he jumped with all his might leaping over the beast and landing on its back.

Black silk shot out of the monster’s back as Silas jumped and used a wide cone flamethrower to bathe the monster in silver flame. He focused and made a tiny platform with telekinesis just large enough to put his toes on. Above the bat, Silas unleashed a long, satisfying wave of a wide-coned cursed flamethrower. He counted 20 seconds as the monster thrashed before he released it and fell down behind the creature.

When he stood on his toes, he was quiet, and that was how he ran up behind the thrashing creature and used a small cone of cursed flamethrower to cut one of its feet off before bathing the stump in renewed flames.

The creature turned swiftly, lost its balance, and fell. Silas repeated his action and sustained 20 seconds of concentrated hell flames on the monster.

He felt warm for the first time that night as the giant pile of human fats turned into a silver inferno. Motes of ash flowed into him continuously, covering his skin, and Silas howled in pain. Yet, even as he felt warm, he suffered to strengthen his skill. The motes fell on him in a steady stream until they finally subsided.

His skill had stopped at 98%, leaving him right on the edge of ranking up. Silas used the light from the burning bat to find a gas can and a rubber hose. It wasn’t easy, but there were plenty of supplies, including standard-issue machine guns and grenades. He piled a few boxes of the grenades he found in the back and grabbed some machine guns.

After gagging on a mouthful of gasoline, he managed to fill the Humvee and tried to crank it. Nothing happened; he tried the lights, and they were dead. He made his way over and checked the jeep, but they had different batteries. He might have taken the jeep if it wasn’t open to the elements. In the distance, under the light of hellfire, he saw a tank but didn’t know how to operate it. Finally, he found another Humvee with a hole in the side of it and checked its lights. They flashed on, and he quickly pulled the battery and changed them out with some tools he found nearby. Nearly 2 hours had already passed since Elizabeth and Zacharia left them.

He turned the key to the ignition again, and the Humvee started up. Silas climbed into the vehicle and couldn’t see over the dash or reach the peddles. It seemed there were more problems with his plan than anticipated. Yan was a cute girl and was quite the dark horse surviving, but he didn’t want to let her drive. But, then again, he didn’t have many options.

Silas nearly jumped out of his skin when he heard the radio. “Noble Six Actual, this is Alpha Niner. Is there anyone out there? Over”

He picked up the radio, pressed the button on the side, and held it to his face. “Alpha Niner, this is Leech Man; there are no survivors near me, and it looks like everything has gone to hell; where are you over,” Silas said, hoping he got the call right. This sounded like a dungeon quest if he ever heard one.

“Leech Man, are you a civi? How did you survive, and how are you outside over?”

“Alpha Niner, I could ask you the same thing; give me your location, and I’ll pick you up.”

He gave his location, and Silas left to gather his girls. It was a snug fit on their way toward the hospital. Silas stood on the hood of the Humvee and used his fire bolt spell to lay waste to any undead on the road. Only there weren’t many, and that was concerning. He saw what the undead did when they had enough in a group. Soon enough, the small undead wouldn’t be a problem. They would be up to their eyeballs in kaiju. Who knew what the second floor would be like?

They found a super-sized horse trailer near the vet clinic on campus and hooked it up to the Humvee. It was more than large enough for the remaining imps. His devoted imp, Lily, stood on the Humvee hood behind him.

“We’re at the end of our usefulness. But Mary is lvl24. When she hits 25, she’ll be able to get a class. Make sure she gets demon summoner and calls for me. When you do, use my true name. Its…” Lily said.

“Why didn’t you just introduce yourself with your true name? I like it?”

“It's not for introductions; my true name is like my telephone number; a girl doesn’t give that out to just anyone,” Lily said.

Silas felt the flapping of wings and the heat of the worms. They were much smaller and managed to stay out of sight. He felt them swoop down out of the light to snatch up undead, only to drop them later with parts missing. The hellfire wanderer felt his heart race as a new opponent presented itself.