The Dark King

by Steffen Schmidt

  In response, they quickly jumped out of the window next to them and fell on the other side of the street. They rolled up to minimize the impact from jump and stood up to ran away.

  Reid was late to jump so along with the collapse of the building few stones hit him. One of the stones hit his nose and the next moment he touched his nose there was a bit of blood on his hand.

  Brainpeckers locked onto him the moment blood oozed out of his nose and rushed over.

  "No -" Reid panicked. He used his dagger to protect himself but the next moment of the brainpeckers was already on him biting his upper body. While the next moment another brainpecker was eating up his viscera. Blood was spewing out at a fast rate.

  The other brainpeckers who saw Linda roared and rushed after her instead of focusing on Reid.

  Linda's face was pale as she clearly knew that even if fifteen silver level hunters were surrounded by the brainpeckers, none would survive!

  She discarded everything as she ran, including the backpack which had the precious monster materials from the previous hunt.

  Roar! Roar!

  Brainpecker herd roared as they tried to catch up with her.

  After they left, a small figure appeared from the small building. It was Dudian. He looked at the collapsed small building. There was nothing left of Reid but traces of blood on ground. He was feeling nauseous as it was the first time he witnessed monsters eating a human.

  He retracted his eyes and looked at the arrow which he had shot before. The small bag of blood which he had tied onto it had blown up because of the pressure.

  He looked at the discarded backpack. All of kind of smell belonging to different monsters was exuded from it. It should contain all the valuable materials collected by the Linda.

  Dudian picked up her backpack and found few pieces of remaining dry food. He began to chew them immediately as for the last three days he hadn't had any food as he was searching for the monsters.

  While he was eating Dudian suddenly smelled the bleeding odor from Linda. He didn't think that she would be injured so soon. It seems he had done a good job by finding these beasts.

  "Direct kill." Dudian whispered.

  However, he suddenly smelled that Linda's smell was mixed with other scents. The scents that were almost covering her smell were rancid and our. He couldn't help but a think of the place where she had gone to.

  The sewage network!

  Dudian's eyes narrowed as he smelled that monsters stayed outside in the street and didn't go as their bodies was too large and was difficult for them to enter.

  He didn't expect that so many beasts that he had lead to here would fail to kill Linda. Intermediate hunter's survival ability was really unusual.

  He didn't rush to catch up because from the smell he understood that Linda slowed down her speed in the sever. It seems she was aware the monsters didn't chase her so Linda had taken the opportunity to restore her strength.

  "She is ready now, so using arrows to ambush her would be very difficult and inefficient! The previous diversion plan won't work too. It has been used once so she should not fall into it the second time" Dudian frowned as he knew the variables has changed again.

  He had singled her out but taking the approach to attack would not work. "Is this really the end?", Dudian murmured.

  "If my archery skills were better than this I could have killed her with an ambush. Right now my range is 100 meters which means that if I fail or she blocks the shot I'm going to be beheaded the next few seconds." Dudian clenched his fist," Even if I want to improve my skills its not something that could be done in an instant. Spiralling arrows are useless too as they are not fast enough."

  "If there were firearms...."

  "However, its been three hundred years so the guns in the police station would not be in good condition. I would deep-fry myself..."

  "Oh!?"

  Dudian was startled, "Guns can not be used but I can use the bullets. Ah! I can use the gunpowder from them and create a bom!"

  He was excited as he thought of possibility. The police had a special storage room for firearms. Most probably guns and bullets are maintained in that room. If its inddors then even after three hundred years he should be able to find useful ones!

  Dudian immediately took action as he went along the streets looking for police station.

  Chapter 121: fortress

  Sewers were last repaired at least three hundred years ago. It was dark and the air was rancid. From time to time iron cans would touch concrete echoed out low sounds.

  Linda suppressed her breathing, inhaling and exhaling slowly. She tried to reduce motions too. Her eyes looked around in alert as the years of hunting experience had taught her that not only 'bone rats' but other monsters preferred to hide in sewers.

  Because of darkness, her vision was limited. She could see the outline of things only within five meters of distance. If Dudian would be here he would be surprised to find that the vision in the darkness was not shared by all hunters. It was one of the unique abilities that had come with his magic marks.

  Linda's ears were erect as to detect the slightest and subtle movement around because of potential danger lurking in her surroundings.

  Creak!

  A 'bone rats' screaming echoed out from twenty meters away. It was an extremely painful sound but soon was stopped. At the same time water burst and sprayed into a wave.

  Linda was not sure if it was a fight between rats for food or something else had attacked the rat. However, she didn't leave as she knew that rats wouldn't be a threat to her and if it was something else then the monster wasn't something dangerous as it fed on rats. As long as she was careful, nothing would go wrong.

  She leaned against the side of the wall and gentle walked in a slow pace. She was vigilant and alert at all times as to avoid any beast that could leap out and drag her into the stream.

  She had explored around a hundred meters or so when she found an opening in the corner. The light dimly shone and the rancid smell was dispersed.

  Linda crawled out from the sewers along the rocky hole. She took a deep breath as the fresh air was blowing to her face. She looked around and saw that brainpeckers hadn't chased her. She was relieved as she quickly went to nearby building.

  As she closed to the building Linda saw few undeads roar and rush towards her. With a sudden twist, her body turned like a whirlwind and the heads of undeads were cut off from their bodies as if autumn leaves fall of a tree.

  She found a stable place to sit. Her stomach gurgled and she thought of her luggage which she had discarded previously. Her face was gloomy as she thought about Dudian. Her heart burned in anger: " The kid should have sense my smell and knows that I'm not dead. He will come after me... That's when he will face death!"

  She thought of dead Nick, Rona and Reid. She couldn't help but clench her palm into fist: "I will help you to avenge your death! Afterwards, I'll get your ashes to be buried in hunter cemetery..."

  She gradually restrained her hatred to think up calmly, : "This little devil is bound to appear again. However he will be back with new insidious ways. If he uses the monsters then I'll hide in sewer or I can move to adjacent area no 9." But he won't be able to use brainpackers as they don't eat undeads and he has smeared undead powder. Moreover, he was successful in leading them the first time but it doesn't mean that he will be able to do so the second time."

  "If he doesn't use monsters but traps alone... He isn't capable of making traps that could kill me. Previously, he killed Gale because of surprise attack and it was a pure luck."

  "Additionally, I can see that his effective range is merely 100 meters!"

  She had noticed that Dudian's range of attack with the bow was limited. Even if he wanted to improve his range, it couldn't be done in three or five days of training. Especially, Linda thought that his arrows should be limited so even if he trained the efficiency would be low.

  "Hundred meters... If it's within hundred meters and he tried to atta
ck me again, I'll need three to five second to catch up with him and beheaded for good! He should know that I was seriously injured because of the brainpecker herd so he will attack for sure!

  There was a trace of remorse in her mind, but she changed her mind, " He can't do anything. Unless he is foolish enough to believe that he can shoot me with an arrow. So I will wait for him to attack and when he comes out the initiative will be in my hands. He had used Gale's sense of smell and blurred Gale's judgement... But tactics such as that won't work on me..."

  Thinking of everything a plan surfaced in her mind.

  ...

  ...

  Whoosh!

  Dudian rapidly ran through the street looking for police station. Occasionally he would sense the smell of monsters and make a detour to avoid the beasts.

  "I've been to a dozen or more streets. Isn't there any police station in this area?" Dudian frowned. However, he soon found a place that had high barrier of three or four meters high covering it. It was hundreds of meters long and the middle part had collapsed. He didn't know whether it was work of corrosion from rain and radiation or was the baptism of war.

  "Fortress?" Dudian was surprised.

  Even though the wall was covered in vines but he still was impressed by the structure.

  Three hundred years ago, after the outbreak of the disaster globally refuge cities were built as a defensive fortress to protect people. These fortresses were located in various parts of the city and were used as a second line of defense from undeads.

  Dudian was silent for a moment but thought of a matter and quickly ran towards the fortress.

  Near the fortress there were traces of detonated bombs and dense pile of bones. There was a skeleton which had a machine gun while his green military clothing had long faded its color.

  Machine gun has become rusty and erosed because of rain. Although the machine gun itself is made from rust-proof steel but the nuclear radiation had affected the rain too. The other components of steel had long been damaged or deformed.

  Dudian was surprised as he saw the machine gun. This defensive fortress should have lots of firearms!

  He picked up the machine gun and gently broke it off. He was after the bullets. He quickly unscrewed the cap of the bullet. There was dark gunpowder inside but it didn't come out as moisture had intrused and hardened it.

  There was regret in his heart as he dropped this string of bullets and moved forward and went inside the fortress.

  Along the way, he saw accumulation of bones all around. There were small monsters which seemed had mutated from snakes that moved through the bones. Once in a while their tails from be exposed from the rib part of bones.

  "Tank?" Dudian was impressed to see a tank. It was covered in moss and vines but it's long barrel was still visible. It was rolled over so it wasn't difficult to imagine the intense fight that had broken by it.

  Chapter 122: Free city

  Dudian came close to the tank, lookup and down. The surface paint has been scratched off and machine gun on top of it was covered with moss and thick dust. It seemed like a stone sculpture.

  "Have the parts inside of it decayed?" Dudian was curious as he climbed up the tank. He cleaned the dust covering the entrance shaft and jumped in.

  Roar!

  As he was falling in a hoarse roar echoed from behind.

  However, Dudian had already sensed the smell and his dagger was in his hands ready for the situation. It reflexively pierced across the throat of the young undead wearing a torn green army uniform. The undead's hair was brown while his eyes were green. From the appearance alone it could be seen that he was a foreigner.

  "Giggle --" Sound of hoarse breathing echoed as the undead died.

  Dudian noticed the faded national emblem on top of the uniform. It belonged to an American country. Some doubts emerged in his mind but soon he thought a place - independent city-states.

  At the time of the disaster, the first to be destructed were capitalist Western empires. Moreover, a large number of Western refugees were transported to Asia. To be correct to northern territories of Russia. At least tens of millions of westerners were sent to Russia because of mutual assistance and the law that made it possible to accept the refugees. Russia had the largest territory in Asia. Moreover, its population was very low in comparison to its territory size. That's why it was able to accommodate so many refugees.

  Second reason was that Russia had large number of air defense tunnels built formerly by Soviet Union, which was also an excellent choice for shelter.

  "Did my father brought the frozen storage to a free city after I slept?" Dudian thought more and more about potential possibilities that led to the creation of the giant wall. "Was it the independent city states that created the giant wall? But how could they built something like that with limited resources? These places were barren land... "

  "Even if they could make the giant wall, it should be made in areas with abundant materials. The refugees were located in areas with poor raw materials and transportation would be time-consuming..."

  Dudian thought about the height of the giant wall. It was pretty much impossible to see its top. Another idea emerged out in his mind. "This giant wall ... ... was it really built by humans?"

  More he thought about it more he felt that he knew very little or nothing at all. A growl echoed from his belly. He immediately kicked the undead's body away and looked insides of the tank.

  Dudian was disappointed to find that the tank has long been abandoned. At a glance he could see what kind of damage had it suffered in the last three hundred years.

  Dudian continued to sneak into the fortress as he left the tank.

  Using his sense of smell he tried to avoid the undeads who were sleeping, in case he couldn't bypass them then he directly beheaded them.

  "Did not expect that these undeads would sleep." Dudian was perplexed.

  Soon he came into the fortress. Inside was dimly lit but it didn't effect his line of sight.

  Roar!

  An undead flapped out of the corner.

  He used the dagger to accurately pierce its face and nail it to the wall.

  After the absorption of hundreds of cold crystals, he felt his physique has been in no way inferior to other primary hunters. He found himself be able to firmly keep up with speed of the dark skinned girl and the other two hunters.

  However, if it was face-to-face combat then Dudian was not sure as he lacked the actual life-and-death experience that the rest of the hunters had.

  However after going through few battles he knew that fighting was not simply the competition between speed, strength or other hard data of the sides. After all, no one will be stupid enough to face you barehanded while you wielded a knife.

  Terrain, weather, mood and so many other factors affected the battle. Moreover, even could cause the reversal of the role during the combat!

  Dudian continued to go along the corridor and look for storage facility where the arms were kept.

  He opened a new room. There were three undeads who were sleeping inside. They slightly raised their heads and gradually woke up.

  Dudian didn't give them the opportunity to respone as she quickly approached and by using the dagger stabbed onto its skull. The second one was about to open its mouth to roar when the dagger cut it off too.

  However, the third was already completely awake as it roared and used its claws to attack.

  Dudian quickly bent over to escape its claws while at the same time quickly stabbed the dagger.

  Puff! Undead's body trembled and fell down.

  Dudian took a slow breath. He felt the cold sweat in his palm while there was an excitement in his heart.

  After killed the undeads Dudian looked around the room. He found that it was the command operations room. The undeads that he had killed had golden stars on their shoulders. They should be major general level army officers.

  His eyes were attracted by the map on the desktop. Although it had dust on it and m
ice had crawled and chew it, still Dudian could get the approximate outline and location. IT was the old era map of the Asia.

  "So, we are in territories of Russia. To be exact somewhere in Asia." Dudian suddenly thought that the areas that had been scavenged before should had such fortresses too. Most probably scavengers have brought maps back with them. So there should be those who knew the true face of this world and how vast it was.

  " 'Temple of Elements' is responsible to price the things brought in by the scavengers. Holy Church and them are linked inextricably. Holy Church seems to be the ruler of the giant wall. Then what kind of relationship the military of the giant wall has..." Dudian pondered a bit," 'Temple of Elements' should have a lot of things. They should have mastered a lot of things by now. But most of the news aren't released. What is the reason? Is it because these things desecrate the faith?"

  He frowned as he couldn't understand what was going on. In the old times religion and state co-existed together so there shouldn't be a problem with faith.

  He shook his head as he didn't want to ponder on the issue but instead turned away to continue to look for other places in the fortress.

  Half an hour later, he finally found the room where arsenal was kept.

  "So much ... ..." Dudian looked at neatly stacked weapons, mines, grenades and other arms. This fortress was simply a big treasure!

  Chapter 123: Action

  Dudian checked the rows of weapons.

  All of them were piled into rows according to classification. For example, gun-like weapons were put on a metal frame near the walls while the majority of rifles and submachine guns were placed afterwards. However, landmines were put onto the floor. The were double layered wood pads for isolation to prevent the moisture to affect the mines but after three hundred years of time lapse the wood had long been rotten.

  Dudian wandered around the room and found that despite the indoor storage the corrosion was terrible because of the time. Survivors died but these arms had persevered. However, they were nothing put a pile of rotten iron as all of it had rusted and were not longer usable. The mines were covered in heavy dust. The elastic spring used in mines to detonate them had decayed and were damaged. The explosives that were inside them couldn't be detonated.