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‘A thousand to establish a fortress… But we need to summon at least three merchants first,’ Mathew thought, trying to fight his confusion by organizing his thoughts.

‘But that’s all a song of the future. For now, we need a merchant,’ he thought, reflecting on his own state of mind.

“How long do we have?” the officer asked, raising his hand to stop the rest of the group from approaching.

The scene of the carnage just a few feet away from us was awful enough from a distance. There was no point in forcing those good men to endure this gruesome sight for no reason.

“Several minutes,” Mathew replied, only to cast a quick glance into the corner of his vision. “Six minutes to be exact,” he then added, making his answer more precise.

“What should we expect?” the man asked, pulling out the mag of his gun and glancing down to check his ammunition.

“And how the heck could I know that?” Mathew asked, opening his eyes wide in a faked shock. “I had my hands full trying to escape those agile ones. I only ended up killing one by accident,” he revealed, only to spread his arms wide. “For all I know, this school might be safe now that the agile ones are gone. But it’s also possible that the first wave of real zombies will begin soon.”

‘That’s right,’ Mathew thought grimly. ‘Even by surviving two weeks into the apocalypse, I still know shit,’ he thought as he bit down on his lip in frustration.

“Mat?” Nadia muttered softly through her sleep. Her eyelids tightened only to relax as a wide, comfortable smile emerged on her lips.

‘I wonder what is she dreaming about,’ Mathew thought, bringing his hand up to Nadia’s cheek and caressing it gently.

“Anyway, what we need, right now is a merchant,” Mathew said as he stood up and looked around. “But we are in a really bad spot to think about it,” he added, raising his hand to his face only to bit down on the nail of his thumb.

A momentary grief took over Mathew’s face, only for him to shake his head and then look up at the police officers.

“There is one thing that we can do,” he stated, only to avert his eyes a moment later. “But I need to ask you first,” he added, his voice faltering.

Because Mathew was aware of what was the true meaning of what he was about to ask.

“Do you want to operate with efficiency or morals in mind?” Mathew asked.

‘Right now, the support of the armed forces is the best guarantee for safety,’ Mathew thought, taking a deep breath. ‘Even if their strength fades away against the evolved monsters, they could offer me a kickstart into the economy of the new world,’ he thought.

In order to make a living, there was only one path worth pursuing.

And it was collecting the life stones of the zombies and monsters alike only to then trade them away with the merchants.

‘I only had the opportunity to visit a merchant once,’ Mathew recalled the short memory from his previous life.

Back then, he only had a few stones on himself, courtesy of defending their fortress from the incoming zombies.

With the favorable terrain and a small help from his former system, he managed to collect a small sum.

‘To think that this would be one of my worst memories,’ Mathew thought, lowering his eyes and taking a five-second period of silence to mourn his idiotic decisions from before.

Back then, he wasted his entire fortune to heal the effects of the last sacrifice. Back then, he gave away all of his potentials to grow just to regain his emotions.

‘Sure, it was torture to live without them, but I could just wait, grow more and regain them later,’ he thought, unable to forgive himself for the past mistakes.

‘But what’s important right now is to not make any mistakes down the line,’ Mathew thought, raising his eyes and looking at the officer with a sense of urgency burning behind his eyes.

“I don’t even want to know what plan you have in store,” the negotiator only shook his head, making his mustache jump around as a result. “But I say we go for efficiency,” he decided only to rest his free arm on his hip.

His right hand, though, continued to tighten around the handle of the man’s gun.

“Alright,” Mathew nodded his head only to then proceed to shake it.

“What are you doing?” the policeman asked, weirded out by Math’s sudden movements.

“Shaking off all the unnecessary thoughts,” Mathew replied, bringing his head back up and then taking a deep breath.

“Let’s do it,” he added after just a short moment.

There was no time for hesitation.

‘It doesn’t matter if my actions will turn me into a devil,’ Mathew thought, the look in his eyes darkening as he picked up the pace and led the group down the corridor.

The school was relatively small. The object of Mathew’s interest was just right ahead.

“I hope you left someone to guard Nadia,” Mathew muttered under his nose as he approached the doors.

“Yeah,” the middle-aged officer nodded his head in response. “There are two gunmen with her; she will be safe,” he explained.

The power balance between those two changed greatly over the course of just the last few minutes.

From the adult and the freaking-out kid to partners who each recognized the other’s value.

Mathew, despite not having any military or disciplinary upbringing, could recognize the discipline and prowess of a trained man. On the other hand, the officer could see the same type of determination that he experienced only on the battlefield before.

It was a weird pairing, but one that worked out surprisingly well.

“What is this place?” the officer asked when Mathew led the forward part of the group inside a small room, cramped with big boxes full of electrical equipment.

“It’s the school’s radio station,” Mathew smiled as he approached the desk and picked up the mic haphazardly thrown in the corner by the previous shift of the radio club.

“How was it…” Mathew muttered as he played around with the switches and controls of the system. He would glance once every few moments towards the clock, watching with desperation as it continued to tick down.

“Okay, I’m all set,” Mathew purred before turning his eyes towards the officer.

“Go and alert the others. We need to occupy the rooftop and the highest floor of the school,” Mathew ordered, only to turn his lips back towards the microphone and press the main switch of the system.

“To all students! Our school will now go through the surprise fire drill!” Mathew announced into the microphone.

In an instant, his voice filled every corner and corridor of the school.

And before he could even make any follow-up, the entire place started to shake when all the students started to move at once.

A fire drill in the exam period was truly a god-sent, a gift that not a single one of them would pass on!

“All students are to calmly assemble in the courtyard of the school and wait for further instructions!” Mathew added only to flick the switch again and throw the microphone away.

“Hey!” the officer shouted, grabbing Mathew’s arm as he turned around with the clear intention of leaving the room. “What was that all about?!” he asked, clearly unhappy with Mathew making big moves without consulting them with the police beforehand.

“Controlling those two places is crucial to our survival,” Mathew explained with a blank, passive voice. There wasn’t even a single emotion in it.

“Why didn’t you pull the students just from those two floors then?!” the officer shouted, clearly enraged by Mathew’s autonomous actions.

Or rather, not the actions themselves, but the insane burden that would fall on all of them as a result.

“If people will turn randomly, then we can’t stop the culling. It will happen, whether everyone is at school or in the courtyard,” Mathew shook his arms, a strange, dark spirit appearing in the back of his eyes.

He survived two weeks into the apocalypse. He saw a countless number of students, hot girls, kind and oppressive guys alike… All of them eaten. All of them turned into gory sights.

“What good does amasing them all on the courtyard do, then?!” the officer still protested, unable to agree with Mathew’s approach.

“For them?” Mathew asked, nodding his head towards the doors where people were starting to rush towards the exit.

Given how excited they were, it would take a long while before anyone would notice the pile of corpses down the corridor.

“It changes nothing,” Mathew revealed without any hesitation.

And most of the students and teachers in this school… simply failed to get a piece of it.

“But it gives us more time to prepare,” Mathew finally revealed the true reason behind his actions. “And well, if we only evacuated the top two floors,” he then added, a wicked smile appearing on his face as he approached the doors.

“Wouldn’t that alert someone, leading to the panic and paralyzing our ability to buy ourselves some time?”