Mutagen

"Prepare to raise the bridge, kill all then infected on the bridge and close the gates."

Major Lopez told one of his assistants to deliver his orders through the radio. As the soldier was about to radio in the order, a hand had blocked the soldier\'s arm that stopped him from speaking. The soldier was about to question the owner of the hand when he saw that it was Mark who was staring at the major.

"Major, don\'t raise the bridge and leave the gates open."

Mark spoke.

"Are you planning to do something?"

Major Lopez sternly looked at Mark. Leaving the gates open was a risky thing to do.

"Don\'t worry. We\'ll handle this."

Mark smiled confidently.

The Major stared at Mark\'s eyes. Then, he sighed and turned to the soldier he had just told his orders.

"Forget about my previous orders. Tell the guards at the gates below to leave the bridge down and the gates open. Then cooperate with "Team Fairy" on what they are about to do."

"But Major."

The soldier spoke in worry.

"No buts. I\'ll take responsibility for whatever is going to happen. Understood?"

The soldier was still worried. Seeing the serious old face of the Major, however...

"Yes, Sir!"

The soldier saluted.

Mark turned back to the horde that started to traverse the bridge which the soldiers atop walls started to shoot.

"Jaeya, you can hear me?"

"Yes! Clearly!"

"Okay, I\'ll relay my instructions to you. You tell everyone what they need to do."

"Huh? WHAT!"

Jaeya was obviously confused by her tone. But then...

"AHHH!"

Everyone connected to her mental link heard her scream filled with shock and pain.

***

"Auntie? Are you okay?"

Abbygale asked watching her Aunt kneeling on the floor of the vehicle. Everyone was surprised by her scream, more so because the scream echoed inside their heads directly instead of entering their ears.

Jaeya slowly returned to her seat. She looked quite pale but she did not seem to be in pain anymore. The woman then turned to her niece.

"The Papa you chose really is something."

She smiled bitterly.

***

"You received it clearly?"

Mark asked.

"I did. I didn\'t know that it can be done like this but next time, please warn me."

Jaeya complained.

"Stop complaining, time is essence right now."

"Alright! Alright!"

Jaeya replied before going silent.

***

The gates were open and the bridge was left lowered. This caused a commotion from the survivors below that could see it. They did not even realize that the soldiers below were preparing for something.

Then, the black Sci-Fi vehicle moved. The wagon it was pulling was detached and it quickly drove before stopping in front of the gates over the lowered bridge. It then maneuvered making its left side face the incoming horde from the other side of the bridge.

From the right side facing the back, several people came out. Several clicking sounds accompanied their exit as the weapons on the left side of the vehicle were opened.

As Mark instructed, everyone went into positions.

Karlene who was the best shooter in the group manned the sniper dome. She put two assault rifles on the gun mounts and faced the incoming horde.

Edzel and Spera readied the weapons on the left side of the vehicle. The two were nervous but in the least, they were inside the vehicle.

Jaeya also stayed inside waiting for Mark\'s next instructions.

On the other hand, the rest went out of the vehicle. It included the [Blood Children].

Odelina immediately transformed with her body covered with her bone armor.

Iola climbed up to the roof of the vehicle with Aephelia and Amihan and raised a [Corrosion Barrier] around the vehicle.

Aphelia then readied both Gifre and Logan to skirmish while Amihan was ready to support with her controlled wind.

Both Abbygale and Miracle stood on standby behind the vehicle. Their duty was to deal with the infected that would manage come close and push them off the bridge with Amihan\'s help.

Lastly, the [Blood Children]. Hopping and bouncing, they went to the wagon carrying the blood bags. If needed, they were there to replenish the stock of ammunition that the weapons in the vehicle used.

Following their lead, the soldiers also drove two armored vehicles upfront lining with the [Exceed: Personnel Carrier]. They also started to position themselves to fight behind the cover of the vehicles.

Atop the walls, the soldiers also moved to assist the bridge.

As the infected came closer and closer, the first shots were finally fired in unison.

***

Mark watched as his instructions were followed by what he imagined. Jaeya\'s sudden scream in his mind was quite unpleasant though. It seemed that she had no idea that it was possible after all. Well, she was really not that used to using her ability as she had no opportunity to use it before.

What was possible? The method he used to give his instructions. Instead of words, he transmitted the idea through pure images. A method that was, sure enough, not everyone could do. It was true even for most Telepaths.

Telepathy was not just being able to transmit words and messages through thoughts. The actual process was actually transmitting brainwaves that contained the information the sender wanted to tell the receiver. Nevertheless, that information was not limited to words but also images, memories, and even transmit what the sender was currently seeing to the receiver.

It was as possible to do as long as the sender was capable enough.

In Mark\'s case, he was used to doing this.

Mark also had a mental link to others himself. Those were Chaflar who became a Mutator Dragon branded by his blood and the [Blood Children] that took the same properties of his blood after absorbing it in their bodies which included Miracle.

All of them, however, could not understand all words that were in human language. Despite being intelligent species, Chaflar was still a lizard and the [Blood Children] were still children at an infant age.

To communicate with them, Mark did not transmit words but thoughts.

It was a more efficient way to talk through minds than saying it word by word.

***

"So, this is why you made your group intercept the infected on the bridge."

Major Lopez\'s amazed voice sounded beside Mark.

Not only the major but also some other soldiers atop the south walls noticed it.

The number of infected being thrown over the walls lessened greatly.

"Those [Catapults] are only throwing the infected over the walls for one reason." Mark spoke. "They wanted to enter the settlement but can\'t find a way to do it."

SWWWOOOOSH!

A small but strong tornado suddenly appeared at the center of the bridge. It caused the already unstably walking and running infected to get pushed away and fall off the bridge.

"Since they found a way to enter, they will swarm that way and stop throwing. If we deliberately opened a path for them, we can manipulate the state of things and have more ways to deal with it."

Mark smirked and then said something that the Major and many soldiers could not understand.

"In video games, learning how the AI of the enemies work can help in dealing with them."

\'But this is not a video game!\'

They all exclaimed the only thing they understood in their minds.

Nevertheless, there was no doubt that his method was effective. Every one of them was only thinking of not letting the infected into the settlement and did not think of something like this.

Now that the number of infected being thrown inside the walls was lessened, they would have more hands to block the infected on the bridge and make them fall unto their demise.

***

"Gege, what are we going to do?"

"Mei\'er." Mark caressed her head. "Follow me but remain flying in the air. We\'re going to deal with the ring leader."

Hearing that, Mei nodded.

Opening their wings, the two flew off after telling their plans to Major Lopez. He also told them the weakness of the [Catapults] to lessen the load on the soldiers at the other walls of the settlement.

Seeing the two leave, Major Lopez had a stern face. They also had a hunch that the infected in the horde was being manipulated. However, as the settlement was already surrounded, there was no way for them to find the culprit that was obviously not within the horde. Now, they could only rely on Mark and Mei to do the job that they could not do.

***

Day 59 - 3:21 PM - Bayview International Towers, Roxas Blvd., Baclaran, Parañaque City, Metro Manila

Flying over the horde, Mark and Mei reached a tall building just three hundred meters away from the gates.

It was a condominium complex occupied by people before the apocalypse.

On the rooftop, however, a figure was watching them as the two flew near.

Mark and Mei also did not have a hard time finding the figure. Its body could be seen from afar because of the visible black aura around the figure\'s body.

"There you are."

Mark said as he landed in front of the figure. Mei, on the other hand, stayed in the air while wielding two sub-machine guns on both her hands.

While looking at the figure, Mark tried to see if it was an intelligent infected by talking to it first. Unexpectedly, he was not let down by the male infected clad in black aura.

The figure stared at Mark with a menacing expression.

"You... Smell... Queen... Have... Queen... Where..."

Although the sentence construction was rough and there were a lot of pauses, there was no doubt. Those were human words.

Just by those words, Mark roughly figured what this attack was about.

This infected was looking for something, probably a queen or someone named queen. The former was rather more possible. Because of how this infected was able to amass such a number of infected and had such level of intelligence to roughly converse, it was likely to be a King.

No, it was more appropriate to say, a [King Type] infected.

Another important thing Mark noticed as he landed.

The black aura around this guy...

It was actually miasma.

There was no doubt about it. This infected was created because of him.

Mark saw quite a number of infected with demonic flames around their bodies among the horde. Strange enough, he never saw a single one affected by miasma. It would be good if there was actually none.

Nevertheless, it seemed that there was infected that absorbed miasma inside their bodies. And Mark immediately knew why there was only one.

The nature of miasma was to absorb. This [King Type], for sure, absorbed the others.

Seeing that Mark was not answering and was just staring, the [King Type] was infuriated.

"QUEEN! WHERE!"

It shouted.

BAM!

The muscles on its feet bulged and it kicked the ground causing the floor to crack. It charged towards Mark.

\'Fast!\'

Mark exclaimed in his mind as he hurriedly dodged.

The infected was fast as a certain blue hedgehog without even rolling into a ball.

In an instant, it was already in front of trying to grab him.

RATATATATA!

As Mark jumped back, Mei unleashed a barrage of bullets towards the [King Type]. Feeling her killing intent and the danger of the bullets coming towards him, the [King Type] stopped charging forward and kicked the floor to jump back.

The infected glared at Mei who was still flying in the air.

GGRRAAAAAAAHHHH!!!

And it let out an ear-piercing roar.

"Holy sh*t."

Mark cursed as a group of black shadows flew into the open from the surrounding buildings. He immediately opened his wings and flew up beside Mei.

"Gege, just how many were there?"

"Can\'t count. Probably around five hundred or more. Also that thing."

Who would have thought that the [King Type] would have reserved troops hiding?

The worst part of that...

There was a four-meter tall infected that was capable of flight among the infected\'s reserved forces.