I was taking a stroll down the corridor, calmly descending the stairs, and without even tensing up, swinging my bat, bursting the heads of the dead without any problem.
The rest of the people followed behind me, and specifically, right to my left and right, were Takashi and Hisashi, killing those who approached from the sides or simply those who hadn't come at me and therefore hadn't died instantly.
Right in the center were Saya, Shizuka-sensei, and my K-imoto, whom we were protecting. At the very back and center was Kohta, who was picking off the smaller number of dead who approached from behind. Directly to his right was Saeko, wielding her bokken with deadly skill, and also Rei, standing to Kohta's left, landing precise strikes to the dead's heads with her spear-mop.
Honestly, there weren't any particular difficulties; the zombies were moving in an uneven formation and in rather small numbers.
The hardest part will be in the parking lot. If everything goes well, I won't have to use metal, but if everything goes badly... then I'm not going to sacrifice someone's life to hide my powers.
One dead girl ran at me, having heard her kinsman fall. Maybe she was once a pretty sexy girl, looking at the size of her chest and waist, but now? It was just a piece of god-knows-how functioning meat, the same meat that instantly flew off from a single blow.
We started to descend from the second floor to the first when we heard the sounds of a struggle, and at my nod, everyone quickened their pace.
When we ran closer, we saw a small flock of students, three guys and two girls. Only one of them was trying to do something while the other two just stood in indecision, and their situation was bad because they were slowly being surrounded, standing right in the middle of the staircase.
"AAAAH!"
"Back! Damned zombies!" The guy with a towel around his neck was swinging his bat while the two girls behind him screamed, only he was swinging from a distance from the zombies' heads, not hitting them.
"Ugh, what idiots, it's like they have no brains at all." Sighing, I nodded to my team and, quickening my pace, dropped down to them. A zombie was just beginning to turn towards me, having sensed me, when its head was literally torn from its neck by the force of my blow.
To the right on the stairs down, there were a few more zombies, whom I sent back down with one sweeping kick.
To the left of the group stood two more zombies, which I hit with the bat, crushing their skulls again, just like their kinsmen before them.
[Save 5 students at once]
[Two silver tickets]
"This is how you do it, kid. What the hell can you do swinging your bat from a distance from their heads?" More tickets than usual? But two? Two for 5 students, so only 2.5 of them are equal to one Hisashi, or Rei, or Sae? What's the difference?
"Huh?" He stopped and tried to catch his breath, as did the rest of his group. One of the girls shouted. "Th-thank...!"
"Don't you shout, you idiot!" My angry whisper was back in action. "Zombies may be blind, but they have very good hearing. I'm damn surprised a horde of zombies hasn't surrounded you yet."
The rest of my group caught up behind me. Saeko, Rei, and Kohta covered the rear until they realized there were no more zombies and came over too. We remained standing on the landing between the second and first floors.
"They seem to be fine." K-imoto looked them over and came up to me, standing behind my back.
"Y-yes, we're not wounded…" The girl who had screamed earlier looked at me with some fear, as if I were the one who had been shouting and calling more dead.
"Alright, quick, name and class."
"Takuzo Shiyuki, from 2-C, Sempai." This kid looked at me with respect, surprising me. He has some brains. After him, the girl behind him introduced herself.
"N-Naomi Toyu, also from class 2-C, S-Sempai…" After her, the girl next to her.
"Kawamoto Karakasu, from class 2-B." She looked at me with admiration, also not a standard reaction, although who am I to talk about standards when I have a damn gacha of all possible things.
"Kokuto Miyura, from class 2-B." Now this guy had a healthy reaction. His hands were trembling and he couldn't even raise his eyes to look at me, though thanks for not stuttering like that chick pressed up even closer to Takuzo.
"Kirigaya Miyura, also from class 2-B…" These two guys had similar features, but this one was even fatter than Kohta.
"Okay, listen up, kohais. We're planning to get out of this hellish abyss. Are you with us?" I looked at all of them. If not, then no. My job is to offer; I'm not going to save anyone by force. But looking at their faces, I knew they would, of course, agree.
"Y-yes, Sempai, please help us get out of here." The leader of their team seemed to be Takuzo… And judging by the way they all looked at Takuzo, he really was their captain, like I was for mine.
"Then listen up. You will not talk until I say so, you will not do anything I don't tell you to do, and you will categorically not argue with what I say, understand?" I asked, looking at them. The fat one wanted to say something. "And yeah, I'm saying this in advance: I'm not doing this to stroke my ego. I'm doing this because otherwise, you'll die like pigs, capiche?"
"Huh?" They looked at me questioningly. Fuck, fucking isolationist culture of Japan.
"Do you understand?" Sighing, I asked the question.
"Y-yes!" They answered in unison, for some fucking reason, shouting again.
"Then shut up and come with me. Girls, in the center of the circle, and guys on the sides of the center. And yes, hit the heads of all zombies that come within 1-1.5 meters with all your strength and don't pity them. They are no longer human." They nodded and did as I said. All this time, my team was looking at me with growing respect, although I wasn't doing anything particularly difficult.
Like the point of a spear, I walked ahead and killed all the zombies, when I received another ticket and we found ourselves at the school entrance, completely cleared of zombies, with the shoe lockers.
[Kill 50 zombies]
[Silver ticket]
Hm, good, very good.
Walking up to my locker, I opened it and took out my sneakers, JoJo style sneakers. The eyes of all the guys lit up when they saw them.
"Wow, Sempai, where did you get those?" Takuzo looked at them with surprise and admiration.
"Yeah, ordered them from one guy. He made pretty comfortable shoes. It would be good if he hadn't died."
"Ah… have you read JoJo, Isao-san?" Hirano asked a funny question. I didn't read it, buddy, I drew it. K-imoto almost burst out laughing at that, which Rei and Saya, standing next to her, noticed.
"Yep, from cover to cover. The author is simply a genius," I said with irony in my voice.
"Yes! And which part did you like the mos…" Kirigaya wanted to ask a question, but we didn't have that much time to discuss which of my creations I loved more.
"Alright, guys, we don't have all the time in the world, so let's shut our traps. And yeah, I'm reminding you again: you scream? You die. Do not scream under any circumstances. You're under protection, damn it. And it's clear you're pretty capable guys, so let's not screw up." I reminded everyone not to scream and encouraged the new guys, in whose eyes the fear of me also disappeared and, to my surprise, respect began to appear.
"Look, we're going to quietly go out through this door. Again, for the third time, I'll remind everyone not to scream and not to run. We'll just walk calmly to the school bus, get in, and drive closer to a store or somewhere else we can get a bite to eat, and there I'll explain the rest of the plan. So let's go, and don't forget anything." My voice was completely focused, as if trying to put them in a trance, but still loud enough not to do that. "And now, let's go." As a whole crowd, we began to quietly exit the school. Some zombies, sensing us, started walking towards us again, but not all of those that were in front of the school, so it was fine.
With quiet and strong swings, I destroyed the dead, walking silently towards the parking lot and the bus. Everything was quiet and peaceful, and we even reached it and started getting on the bus. I stood at the end to protect all these sheep, just in case, when…
"Wait! Wait for us!" I heard that disgusting voice, the one that made me want to puke. Shido Koichi!
Looking towards where the voice came from, I saw him, just as the others on the bus did. Rei started screaming something, but I couldn't hear a damn thing.
Behind Shido was a whole crowd of students, probably 10 at least, and also one teacher, Kyoko Hayashi. They were all barely running, trying to catch up, leading a whole damn horde behind them, but Shido was the very first one running.
Some students fell, as did the teacher Kyoko, but Shido didn't even look at them. Even though he and the others could have helped, they could have done it, but they left their friends, classmates, and students, as if they were worth nothing.
And I hated it. I hated it because in all this filth, I saw my past self: a too-dependent addict who didn't give a fuck about anything, who easily abandoned loved ones and those who loved him.
I hated Shido because he was like my past self, the same scumbag as me.
And I'll fucking kill him.
Everything seemed to slow down. The fight-or-flight reaction was instantaneous, and my furious mind chose Fight. Fight with Iron.
Instantly, I formed iron circles and made them fly out at high speed towards those lying on the ground, forming a sphere around them to protect them from the zombies.
The same moment I did that, I created more iron circles, but this time I made them incredibly sharp and, spinning them like saws and twisting my hands, I began to guide them straight horizontally through the horde, cutting them to pieces.
[Kill 100 Zombies]
[Silver ticket]
[Kill 150 Zombies]
[Silver ticket]
[Kill 200 Zombies]
[Gold ticket]
The gacha screen flickered before my eyes. Those who were running towards the bus stared at me in shock, frozen in place, just like those who were on the bus.
The spherical circles rose from the ground and flew to me. Right next to me, they opened, revealing the still whole people, who had already accepted their death but were looking around in shock, realizing they were alive. And looking at me, they understood that I had saved them, and something was born in their eyes.
"Ah, wh-what the hell? What are you?!" Shido looked at me in horror.
"You stink, Shido. You stink of garbage. Just looking at you makes me want to puke. My nose can goddamn smell bastards like you ever since I started fighting on the street." My voice was filled with cold rage, both for him and for those standing behind him, but I paid no attention to the students, trying to concentrate on Shido, as they were also just small worms who wanted to live. "I know what you did to some of the female students. That girl behind you, didn't you force her to stay with you too?" The girl behind him was a typical nerd, but if you took off her glasses and brushed her hair, she would look incredibly sexy, which Shido most likely knew.
The girl flinched, hugging herself and trying to shrink, making me hate this bastard even more.
"You disgust me, Shido, and I don't want to live in a world that has you in it, so I'll just kill you." Everything froze around me as I created a new iron circle.
This bastard wanted to hold my little sister back a year, MY LITTLE SISTER!
There wasn't even a sound, nothing, as the circle spun like a buzzsaw.
"Ah, please, spare me, Isao-sama! I beg you! I will serve you as your greatest believer!" He screamed, falling to his knees, having mistaken me for a god after seeing my pathetic abilities.
"I don't need such a rotten believer, Shido."
The circle flew in with a wet squelch, bisecting this snake, killing him as a human, leaving him his dignity as a man, although he didn't deserve it, and only shocked, wide-eyed gazes were my witnesses.
[Kill Shido Koichi]
[Silver ticket]
[Kill your first human]
[Gold ticket]
"On the bus. Now." There was no need for shouting or anything. Everyone quickly got on the bus, obeying me, and soon we left this hellhole.
I told Shizuka to stop near some store if possible, and she, still sitting shocked at the wheel, nodded.
Everyone on the bus was in shock, but Rei looked at me with gratitude. Saeko, however, looked at me with something akin to admiration and adoration, almost orgasming on the spot. And my K-imoto… she looked at me with pity, making my heart ache.
I took her hand and went to the very back of the bus and could only hug her, hug my little sister who almost fell into this scumbag's clutches, if not for the connections of my editor, who worshiped the ground I walked on.
Only thanks to him did Shido stop looking in my little sister's direction at all. And I… I wouldn't have been able to do anything, because I only had money, but not enough… Shido's father was some mafia big shot, and he had more money than the number one mangaka in Japan.
My hands were shaking, pressing my little sister to me. I breathed in her scent, and that desire woke up in me again: the desire to let off steam, the desire for the thrill, the desire for another chance.
And I did it.
Gacha, all silver tickets!
[Familiar Manifestation]
|Uncommon Ability|
Allows you to temporarily call upon the limb or a body part of a familiar you own to use them as an attack, when using Familiar manifestation, the familiar itself does not take damage.
[Hustle]
|Common Ability|
Yomi Hustle - "It may be your only move" allows you to "Hustle" your opponents by performing a gesture, whether it's snapping your fingers and giving a taunting smile or lying down on a lawn chair mid-fight, your hustle must at least last half a second. When you successfully complete a Hustle, you regain some energy and stamina. The longer your hustle goes on, the more you will recover energy. Effectiveness depends on how stylish and aggravating you were. Can only be used in active combat against an enemy who means you genuine harm.
[Pretty Privilege]
|Uncommon Trait|
You aren't physically more attractive of course, but others just find your face and figure more appealing to their tastes. If you were a 5/10 in their eyes before you are now a solid 7/10.
[Despair Aura II]
|Uncommon Ability|
Allows you to emit an aura of despair that makes people feel a sense of unease and fear toward you, weaker willed targets will be overcome with unbearable fear and panic.
[Magpie's Eye]
|Uncommon Trait|
You are very good at spotting treasure and valuables, treasures in sight are highlighted.
After a quick read, I just… ordered it to use the remaining two gold tickets.
[Frozen Lightning]
|Rare Ability|
Allows you to wield and control frozen lightning, unlike regular lightning which is incredibly hot, Frozen Lightning is instead proportionally colder, freezing whatever object it electrocutes or passes through.
[Minimize Me]
|Elite Ability|
Allows you to shrink yourself up to 20x smaller without compromising your power, whether you are 180cm or 18cm tall, your attack will hit with the same intensity. This limit can be increased with training.
My breathing became more stable and, closing my eyes, I hugged my little sister and passed out.