Mutagen

"Angeline, you all stay here. Archie! Drive off and leave us if the situation becomes too dangerous."

1st Lieutenant Rafael spoke to Angeline and the driver of their vehicle.

"But Sir!"

"This is an order."

Hearing that, Archie who was in the driver\'s seat could only nod reluctantly.

"Bro, you can\'t leave without me."

Angeline sternly spoke.

"This is a duty for us soldiers. You can\'t participate in it."

"No matter what, I\'m coming with you. Even if by force, I\'ll follow you. Even if we can\'t fight, we can at least retrieve the people in that truck. There are people we knew in there."

Angeline pointed at the overturned truck a distance away.

Rafael knew that his sister would not relent on this. Furthermore, he was aware that his fighting capability was way lower compared to his sister. He knew that it was actually better if he had to send his sister to fight than he participating in it himself but he could not put his sister in danger because of that.

"Alright. I\'ll let you get the survivors on the truck while we fight that thing behind. Once the survivors are retrieved we\'ll all retreat and escape if we can\'t kill that guy."

"Okay!"

As her brother agreed, Angeline was in glee. It was the same for Paula who also wanted to check on the people inside the overturned truck praying that the people there they knew would survive.

With that exchange, with the exception of three Humvees that was left to guard the remaining trucks, all of the other military vehicles went back to assist the rear while several vehicles would check on the overturned truck.

At the rear, the soldiers were in a dilemma. It was because they were being picked off one by one. Not because they were lacking in experience nor they were lacking in fire power but because the creature they were fighting was too fast and cunning. It could even be said that it was toying with them.

The grey humanoid would sometimes move erratically giving the soldiers a hard time to accurately aim and shoot it while just blindly shooting it did not help either as its speed was enough to avoid the bullets and even grenade explosions was evaded. It would retreat and attack without pattern and sometimes would use a comrade of theirs as a shield before killing the caught soldier. Furthermore, there were a lot of times that it could actually kill several soldiers in one go, but for some reason, it was killing them one by one.

The rear soldiers felt elated when they saw the other vehicles going back to aid them. Even if they could not manage to kill this creature, it would give everyone a better chance for escaping.

They were not wrong in that. It was because when the reinforcements joined the fight, the situation became better. The soldiers were still not able to kill the grey humanoid but at least, it could not kill anyone from their ranks anymore. The only thing they needed to do was to delay this creature while the retrieval of the survivors was going on.

At the overturned truck, the retrieval team was stunned at the bloody scene inside. Due to the truck suddenly overturning, most of the living survivors fell unconscious while being placed in a scramble of decapitated bodies, human organs and blood. Everyone was covered in blood making the retrieval even more time consuming.

Angeline and Paula who went out of their vehicle gasped and became teary eyed after they saw the dead bodies of Bernard and Calvin among the dead people. They could not believe that the two people they mingled and fought along with were now dead in a brutal and gruesome way. They then remembered Joseph who they had to see yet.

The two girls were about to search for him when…

They heard a shout.

"Sh*t! Angeline! Paula! Run!"

It was the voice of Angeline\'s brother who should be fighting along with his soldiers.

When the two turned around, they saw a grey figure approaching towards Paula\'s direction with a very fast speed ignoring all the other people around them.

Paula could see the figure coming closer towards her. She could not think of anything as her mind went blank with fear. She saw the figure raise its right arm overhead. It was going to slice her from head to toe.

When she felt that death was coming closer, she saw a face block her sight. It was her precious friend, Angeline. Paula then felt a force push her body away.

Angeline did not shout nor had the time to do anything but push her friend out of the grey figure\'s reach. It was not because she lost her way to think but it was because there was no time to think of anything anymore. The enemy was approaching fast and they were caught off guard. Who would think that it would suddenly attack them who were further away when it was entangled with more than two dozens of soldiers.

SWIIIRKK!

She felt a stinging pain on her back for a little less than a second. It was very short because she immediately fell unconscious due to the sudden extreme pain. Her body fell unto the concrete bleeding from a huge slash wound on her back from her shoulder to her waist. The wound was too deep that her bones could be seen.

Noticing that it was not his target that he managed to slay, the grey humanoid tried to press on attacking Paula. Noticing its intention, one of the soldiers immediately pulled away the frozen Paula while the other soldiers in the retrieval team pressed on counter attacking.

Due to its focus on Paula, the grey humanoid finally received damage. Its left arm and face were drilled with holes from assault rifle bullets.

Feeling the pain from the injuries it received made the grey humanoid retreat back in its fours while howling.

"Ange!"

Paula finally snapped from her daze and shouted. She tried to approach Angeline but she was held back by the soldier who pulled her away because she was obviously the target of the grey humanoid.

***

\'Where is this place…\'

Joseph who unconscious and was buried under the dead bodies inside the truck finally woke up. Unfortunately, what he could all see were red. The dead bodies above his body, the human organs scattered around him and the pool of blood he was lying on. Everything was red.

As if he was just dreaming…

\'This is just a nightmare right?\'

But when he was about to conclude that, the last memories he had before falling unconscious came into place. Tears flowed from his eyes as he remembered the last words of his Dad. He was feeling tired, sluggish, sleepy and feverish. Yet, he moved his body and removed the obstacles around him preventing him from standing up.

Slowly… he stood up. Slowly… he made his way out of the truck.

When he thought that he finally made out of that hell, he saw the scene outside. Several dead soldiers were lying around the truck with incomplete bodies.

RATATATATATAT!

The sounds of gunfire continuously echoed across his ears but it looked like he could not even hear the noise anymore.

He watched the scene were the soldiers fought the enemy to death with both parties enraged.

Joseph looked around and saw the body of his dead father who had already been taken out of the truck. Unfortunately, it was just the upper body. It would be hard to distinguish whose lower body was whose after all of that happened. Further away hiding behind a vehicle, he could see two familiar figures. They were the two brave girls he met at the mall. One of them was unconscious however, while profusely bleeding on her back.

He turned his head back to the body of his father and kneeled.

"Dad, you said that I must become strong and survive. I\'m sorry for being too weak and hard headed. I\'m sure I gave you a lot of hard times since the time Mom died. Thank you for everything. I promise. I will become stronger. I will also live your share. However, I can\'t do that if I don\'t get revenge for you now."

BADUMP! BADUMP! BADUMP!

Joseph could not even realize if he was speaking out loud or said all those in his mind. It was because all that he could hear was his heart beating loudly. He did not realize that his eyes were literally red at the moment. The only thing he could see was his enemy, the creature that killed his only family in this world.

"Kill."

He muttered. There was a strong bloodlust sprouting from his heart and mind. He did not know where it was coming from but he just let it affect everything in him.

He walked several steps and kneeled down beside a dead soldier\'s body. He picked up a military knife and took a grenade from the soldier\'s belt. He did not mind the blood that stained his hands as he took the weapons from the dead soldier\'s decapitated body. There were other weapons on the soldier\'s body but as a normal person, he had no knowledge on using these things. At least, he knew how to use this knife and how to pull the pin on the grenade.

BADUMP! BADUMP!

His heart pounded hard continuously as he walked towards the battlefield in a sluggish manner.

"Hey! Where are you going?!"

A soldier hurriedly grasped his shoulders. However, he just shrugged his shoulders and the hand grasping him was thrown away with force. The soldier tried to stop him once more but was suddenly frozen. It was because the soldier saw Joseph looking at him, exuding a huge amount of bloodlust. Joseph then continued walking leaving the frozen soldier in that spot.

The humanoid figure saw him approaching. It immediately shot towards Joseph making the soldiers even more panicked. In their eyes, Joseph was only a civilian and would be another worthless casualty. However, they had no ability to stop the raging grey figure.

The grey humanoid arrived shortly in front of Joseph swinging its blade downwards if a very fast speed.

\'Slow…\'

Joseph thought as he stared at the blade swinging down towards him. He then stepped his left foot back facing his body sideways. In his eyes right now, the movements of the grey figure were slow.

TING!

A metallic sound echoed after the meter long blade was swung hitting nothing but air and directly landed on the concrete ground. Pulling back the blade that missed, the grey humanoid tried to attack again and swung the blade diagonally upwards.

Then…

Blood splashed…

It was not Joseph\'s but the grey humanoid\'s blood. The grey humanoid succeeded in swinging the blade but it missed once more as Joseph had already jumped back. Taking advantage that the inertia from the missed swing that brought the blade upwards, Joseph jumped forwards lunging towards his enemy boring the knife towards the grey humanoid\'s eyes. He twisted the knife inside the grey humanoid\'s eye socket before pulling the knife and jumping back immediately.

ROAAAAAA!!!

The grey humanoid roared loudly as it unstably stepped back while wildly swinging the blade on its right arm.

Joseph who had already retreated back pulled the pin of the grenade on threw it straight on the defenseless body of the grey humanoid.

BOOM!!!

The grenade did not land on the ground nor hit the body of the grey humanoid. The grey humanoid was wildly swinging its blade and the blade ended up hitting the grenade slicing it and causing it to explode, right in front of its body.

The explosion stopped the roars of the grey humanoid as its body was severely damaged. Its arm connected to the blade was now dangling with just a few muscle strands left to connect it from its body. Its throat and mouth had melted while its torso had a several holes and a huge scorched wound bleeding profusely. Its legs were also damaged making it kneel on the ground.

"RAAAAAAHH!!!"

Seeing that, Joseph did not give it time to recover. He ran forward roaring and and tackled that grey humanoid down to the ground. He then bore the knife in his hands into the grey humanoid\'s remaining eye.

The grey humanoid tried to resist but Joseph pulled out the knife and stabbed it as hard as he could at the center of the grey humanoid\'s forehead stopping its body from moving.

SHIRK! SHIRK! SHIRK! SHIRK! SHIRK!

As it was not enough for him to vent his grievance, he repeatedly pulled and stabbed the knife unto the grey humanoid\'s head splashing blood and brain matter everywhere. However, he still felt that it was not enough. Joseph\'s eyes then landed at the blade on the grey humanoid\'s arm.

Joseph stood up and cut the blade remaining flesh connected to the blade. He then held the end of the blade not minding that his hands got wounded and was now bleeding. He raised the blade up over his head.

SHHIIIRKK!

He decapitated the grey humanoid\'s body horizontally in half. The same way it killed his father.

However, he did not stop there.

He repeatedly swung the blade cutting off even more parts of the grey humanoid\'s body. The grey humanoid\'s internal organs, blood and limbs were scattered on the ground in front of him.

Joseph continued slashing the dead body until he was forcefully stopped by the soldiers who watched the scene with both shock and amazement. The moment Joseph let go of the meter long blade from his hands however, he fell unconscious, burning with an absurdly high fever.