The stairs creaked as John went down the wooden steps of the stairwell. This would've caused most people's heart rates to skyrocket in their chests, but it only excited him further… That was until he heard the distinct gurgling of a Boomer.
Of fucking course the first special infected I encounter is a Boomer. Why would it be anything else?
Dread immediately started to set in when his thoughts went to the Boomer's disgusting bile and the deadly effects it brought when it met air, such as its ability to draw in all nearby infected and cause hordes of undead to descend upon a given area.
This isn't a game anymore so when one of those fat bastards blows I'm sure every zed in the surrounding area will descend upon this place… Maybe I'd be better off racking some kills from the rooftops before I attempt to clear the lower floors of the apartment building. I mean, I have only one high-cap magazine at the moment, so if I were to set off a horde response, there would be little I could do to handle that kind of threat. And if multiple special infected take interest, I might as well off myself before they can do the job themselves.
Although John wished to clear the building this very minute, confronting the Boomer right here and now wasn't worth the risk. Hence, he backtracked up the stairs quietly and considered what to do about the wide-open stairwell.
Leaving this open is not an option since the infected will more likely than not hear the noise coming from my shots. It probably won't be that easy for them to locate me initially, but as I keep firing and taking out their fellow infected, I'm sure they'll eventually lock down my location. Meaning, it'd be best to block this way up as best I can to give myself as much time to farm before the inevitable confrontation happens.
Confident about what needed to be done to ensure he had time to grow, he lifted and returned the cushioned chair back to the living room before moving a wooden bookcase from the living room and setting it down in front of the threshold. That only covered half of the opening, so he moved another bookcase from down the hall and set it down right next to the other one, completely covering the stairwell entrance.
That's not gonna hold if a whole bunch of them are beating and clawing away at it, so let's add a little more.
John was a bit paranoid about what could happen when he started his killing spree from the roof, so he dragged just about every piece of furniture the apartment had and used it for barricading… Including the appliances.
Good luck getting through that.
He thought smugly after dragging the fridge from the kitchen and jamming it in between the dryer and the wall of the building. There was so much crap piled in front of the stairway that he couldn't even access the whole other side of the apartment. Our protagonist admired his work for a couple of seconds longer before heading for the rooftop that still had an ongoing shower.
I was hoping it'd stop raining, but I suppose this will go on for at least a couple of hours... If not all night.
The conditions weren't the greatest nor the most comfortable, but he wasn't going to let a little rain stop him now, nor was he going to complain when it was actively removing the blood and brain matter he accumulated throughout his fights. Thus, he put his big-boy pants on and stepped out from cover with his Glock 20 drawn and approached the half wall that ran around the roof. Once he reached the side, he looked down and saw plenty of zombies mindlessly wandering the messy streets, many of which were surrounding an abandoned police car that still had its lights flashing.
I'll take out those closest first and expand from there... Time to start blasting.
As soon as he made up his mind, he took aim at a male infected in a jumpsuit wandering the soaked street, lined up the red dot on his head, and exhaled before pulling the trigger. The instant he performed that action, the slide of the Glock 20 shot back explosively and picked up a new cartridge simultaneously as a bullet left the suppressor, and before he could even register it, the 10mm FMJ round pierced the male infected head and ricocheted off the pavement.
There was no doubt about its effectiveness, but it wasn't completely silent because when the solid metal projectile exceeded the speed of sound it released a crack. Thankfully, because he was using a handgun, it was a low one, so it was going to take a few of those before the infected could discern his whereabouts and lock down his location. That said, John couldn't drag things out and abuse that aspect; hence, he moved his focus to the next infected and lined up a shot once more.
*Crack… Crack… Crac-*
Determined to get that money, he transitioned from one head to another and continued letting off rounds in rapid succession. This would've been all well in good if not for the fact that the zombies on the street all started looking in the direction of the three-story apartment building and if that wasn't bad enough, he heard a bunch of faint stomping coming up from the blockaded stairs below.
Alright, I gotta ramp this up.
Beginning to feel the pressure, John did just that and kept pressing the trigger whilst the zombies sprinted for the apartment building's front entrance and began slamming on the door attempting to break it down. They weren't able to move around a whole lot when they were all bunched up like that, hence he took advantage of the presented opportunity and leaned over the edge and began popping heads one after the next, which had the side effect of adding obstacles to their break in. Unfortunately, as all this was going on, a loud breaking sound came from down below.
Shit, I ran the mag dry, and now I need to get down there and go deal with those damned infected attacking my barricade.
Things were really starting to ramp up and go to shit fast, so he backed away from the half wall that ran along the entire rooftop and sprinted downstairs. And just as he was running up on the blocked stairwell that had a few zombie hands poking through, he heard the distinct sound of a Boomer climbing the stairs that was already swarming with zeds.
Oh, great, as if things aren't bad enough, now I gotta deal with a Boomer and the shitstorm that'll come afterward.
Not looking forward to what was to come, John quickly racked his brain and considered his next move whilst the zeds kept banging away and scratching his makeshift defenses. He wasn't completely screwed just yet because he still had quite a number of rounds sitting in his backpack; however; they weren't going to do him any good when they weren't even loaded. And seeing how he had a small hoard of zeds banging away on his cobbled-together barricade, he didn't have the luxury of time either, so packing mags was currently off the table as well.
Damn, things are looking bad, but it's not completely f'ed just yet.
With his routes to survival severely limited, he did the only smart thing he could do in this situation and opened up the store to buy a new weapon that would come fully loaded when purchased.
[ Store ]
Gold Coins: 56
( Search Bar: _______________ )
( Weapons )
Glock 20 - 10 Gold Coins
AK-47 - 47 Gold Coins
M249 SAW - 150 Gold Coins
RPG-7 - 350 Gold Coins
Mystery Box - 1,000 Gold Coins
…
Why did I get fewer gold coins this time…
Stumped by the much-reduced income, he ran the numbers real quick in his head and soon discovered the reason for the lack of cash.
Ohh, so for every headshot kill with a melee weapon I get 3 gold coins and every headshot kill with a ranged weapon only nets me 2 gold coins… Mmm, that's a bummer but I suppose that makes sense since it is easier and far safer to dispatch a zombie from afar than up close and personal.
Bummed out a wee bit by the lesser funds, he didn't dwell on it and quickly purchased an AK-47 from the shop.
I would've rather saved up for something better like a 6P68 KORD, which is basically a better AK with a high rate of fire of 900 rounds per minute and a balanced automatic recoil system, so I can dump drum mags of 7.62 with minimal recoil, but this will have to do for now.
Things were dire, so even though he didn't want to spend his money, he swapped the mag on his pistol just in case, stowed it away in its holster, and bought the AK-47. The second he purchased the old Soviet Union assault rifle, it appeared from thin air and dropped into his awaiting hands.
With his new problem solver within his grasp, he pulled the charging handle back and let the bolt fly forward and catch a full metal jacketed 7.62x39mm round. When that cartridge entered the barrel, John moved close to the barricade and started firing one shot after another through the mostly wood defenses at head height. And as he expected, the sound of zombies falling down the stairs commenced, and the size of his wallet grew by over a dozen gold coins.
"Now we're cooking with gas."
The Boomer was still groaning about in the stairwell, so John set the assault rifle to full auto, braced the rifle as tight as he could against his shoulder and held the trigger down till the remaining half of the steel mag ran empty. Luckily or unluckily the last few shots managed to strike the Boomer and the instant it did, the groaning fat bastard went boom and blew many of the infected that were trying to climb the stairs back to the previous level along with a whole host of injuries.
Fuck, that stinks.
Disgusted by the putrid smell of the Boomer's stomach bile, he swiftly retreated to the kitchen and purchased a box of 100 7.62 FMJ rounds since there was a literal pile of bodies blocking a good portion of the stairwell. The zombies of Left 4 Dead were a tenacious bunch, so he had to use this brief respite wisely and prepare for the coming horde. Incredibly aware that time was of the essence, he purchased a tool that would help make use of that limited window, a 7.62x39mm speed loader, alongside a couple of mags so he wasn't wholly reliant upon a single magazine.
"Can y'all keep it down out there, I'm trying to work here!" John yelled whilst the zeds were going nuts attacking their boomer bile covered brethren.
The constant screeching, growling, and slamming was annoying and grating on the ears, but it would stop in a moment once the bile's effect wore off and he unloaded on the lot of them. His time was extremely limited, so he speedily loaded 10 rounds into the speed loader, attached it to one of his three empty magazines and pushed the rounds into the mag in one go.
Damn, that's so much faster… I'm gonna have to buy one of these for my Glock 20 when I get a chance.
Impressed by how much time the speedloader saved him, he quickly loaded up another 10 rounds followed by another and then another after that and before long he had 90 rounds sitting in his AK-47 mags +1 in the chamber. Locked and loaded, John took his assault rifle along with his two extra mags and hastily moved over to the makeshift barricades that the infected were slowly but surely destroying.
This pile of furniture and appliances isn't gonna last forever, so I better handle this before they wreck it any further and I have to retreat to the rooftop and attempt to hold out there.
Not wanting those damned undead to break through, he shouldered the 7.62 assault rifle, braced it, and locked it down tightly to prevent it from jumping around as much as possible. He then took aim at the infected heads he could see through the many holes the barricades now possessed and began popping domes like an arcade-style shooter. The second he opened fire, the gunshots boomed and echoed loudly throughout the apartment building as he let off one shot after another.
Because of the noise his weapon was producing, the infected craziness went up another level, and the next thing he knew, they started storming the stairwell with ever-increasing vigor and even more numbers. John was a man on a mission and unwilling to succumb to the difficult situation he'd been placed in, so he kept firing with trigger discipline and using every bit of his limited resources as wisely as he could.
This is going rather well right now. I wonder how many coins I'm gonna have after all this is over.
The fight against the undead horde was going decently enough… At least that was the case until he heard a different-sounding growl coming from the clamor below.
"Ahh, we got a hunter." Was all he thought before a hooded zombie crouching on all fours rounded the corner at the bottom of the stairs.
Special infected were the number one threat to his survival, so John ignored all the other common infected charging up the stairs that were under a layer of bodies and took aim at the newcomer. However, before he could train his weapon's iron sight on the zed's head and take a shot, it released a beastial yowl and leaped with insane speed from the bottom of the body-covered stairs and impacted the barricade.
"Oh, no, the fuck you don't!" John yelled as the Hunter raked its claws wildly across the increasingly whittled defenses.
The stuff he piled in front of the stairwell wasn't going to hold for much longer if he let shit keep going the way it was heading and didn't put that special infected down; hence; he didn't waste another second and took aim once more and held the trigger down. As soon as the trigger depressed just enough, a burst of FMJ bullets flew out the end of the muzzle and shredded the Hunter's head to pieces, putting an end to its miserable existence right then and there.
Well, that was certainly anticlimactic, but it's not really surprising when I'm firing 7.62.
Unfazed by how easily he dispatched that special infected, John resumed his onslaught on the regular zombies and kept piling bodies on the stairs. The gunfire boomed deafeningly throughout the interior of the apartment building as well as the surrounding area as our bloodthirsty protagonist held down the trigger and transitioned from target to target with fully automatic fire. He dropped one zed and after another and kept going till he eventually ran through all three of his fully loaded magazines, and when he did; he had to resort to his other means of attack and hack a few limbs plus a couple of heads before he had finally finished the fight.
Woo, that took more effort than I thought it would've, but I guess I have the survivors to thank for easing the challenge some. If it weren't for them going through the area already, I wouldn't have been surprised to see the zeds opening a new path through the floor. That said, I'm kinda trapped up here now, aren't I.
What lay before John was a devastated stairwell full of fresh, bloody corpses piled high, from step to ceiling.