Mathew grabbed at the shadow of the merchant for the third time.
Now that he had access to the greatest supply of everything in the universe, Mathew decided to use it to its limits.
The dark shadows of the merchant's realm surrounded him, separating him from the rest of the world.
'I wonder how does this really work,' Mat thought, looking around the place. But it was exactly the lack of the answer for this that forced the young man to hurry it up.
"I wish to purchase a second expansion of the system information," Mathew announced.
He had no way of knowing whether others could hear his words. But right now, he had no time to think about potentially revealing too much.
"Five cores." The same voice from before filled the shadowy realm.
'That's cheap,' Mat thought; the meager price of what he asked for stunning the young man.
"Fine," Mathew threw five more cores up in the air.
'I think I gathered a hundred and seventy-three cores,' Mathew calculated, looking down at the remaining cores in his hand. 'Between the cure, the information, food, and explosives, I used a hundred and fifty-nine,' he calculated.
Then, he brought his eyes down and counted the cores still in his possession.
'That leaves me with fourteen,' Mat thought, raising his eyes at the floating robe of the merchant. "How much for the next level of information?"
For but a moment, Mathew could swear that he saw the merchant smirk.
But there was no merchant in this strange, shadowy realm. Nor was there any face on which lips could form a smile.
"Ten cores," announced the cold, metallic voice of the system.
"Deal," Mat threw ten more cores at the shadows, only to watch them disappear in the burst of their inner light.
His body didn't twitch. Mathew didn't feel any strange sensation of something changing whatsoever.
"What about..." Mat smiled a little, ready to ask for the next level.
"Twenty cores," the metallic voice of the realm replied before Mathew could finish his sentence.
"I see," Mat replied, releasing a small sigh as he shook his head. "Then, what kind of weapons can I get for the fourteen cores?"
Mathew's question was given.
The horde was coming. It would be a wave that they wouldn't be able to stop. But, if the push came to shove, Mat's system would be the greatest weapon the survivors had.
That's why he didn't bother asking about weapons before spending all the cores he could on his system first. And now that Mat had reached the limit of the information about his system that he could buy, he simply moved on to the next best investment.
"Weapon of first grade cost five cores," the metallic voice filled Mathew's ears.
"What about the second grade?" Mat asked, despite not knowing what those grades of the weapons could be.
Sure, it appeared to be pretty self-evident... but using the old common sense in this new, changing world was something that Mat was pretty worried about doing.
"..." The merchant didn't respond.
'Huh?' Mathew twitched when a strange sensation appeared in his mind.
It wasn't something that he could experience with any of his senses. But he still somehow felt as if the smirk returned to the faceless merchant's lips.
'What was that?' Mathew thought, stumped by the strange experience.
The young man then shook his head.
'No.' he clasped his hands against his cheeks. 'I have no time for this.'
Mathew raised his at the floating, empty robes of the merchant.
"I want to buy two grade one weapons, two packs of supplies, and two packs of explosives," Mathew listed out the items before throwing the rest of his cores into the air.
A light flashed brightly as the stones turned into small stars, only to subside a moment later.
"What the fuck..." Mathew muttered, only for the shadowy realm around him to disperse.
Yet, right when only a fleeting sense of the merchant's presence remained, Mathew could feel its aura smirking.
'It's not like I can see the smirk, but more like...' Mathew thought, trying to put what he just went through into words.
But before he could do so, the real vanished completely, banishing Mathew out into the real world.
Now that he had no more cores left, his presence was of no worth for the merchant.
And the second Mathew returned to reality; the entire school shook with another scream from a monster approaching from below.
"ROAR!" the cry filled every nook and cranny of the building, instilling a sense of a deep, primal fear into any and all that heard it.
"What the hell is this?!" the officer moaned, sounding as if he no longer had any energy to deal with Mathew's bullshit.
The thing is... Mathew was just as stunned by how the merchant did him in.
'I made a mistake,' Mathew thought, allowing himself a short moment of respite for a small smile. 'I didn't specify what exactly I wanted,' he thought, lowering his head in the admittance to his shameful display.
And right by the merchant's figure, on top of two crates of military supplies and two bags filled with grenades... there was a simple, robust sword....
And a trebuchet-like pendulum mounted right on edge formerly occupied by the staircase.
It was made from a mix of wood and some glistering metal, holding a wheel roughly two meters in diameter right above the floor. The big wheel was then attached to a tiny one, on which a huge, swinging hammer was mounted.
The hammer consisted of two parts. The longer one bore a simple, sharpened tube on its end. And from how it hung down in its resting position, it was clear that its handle could bend pretty smoothly.
On the other end of the wheel was the counterweight. But right between those two-sized gears, there was a rope that connected the entire thing to a simple rotating wheel.
'This feels both futuristic and ancient at the same time,' Mathew thought, baffled by what he could see before his eyes.
The mechanism of the weapon was pretty simple and easy to understand.
By spinning the power wheel of the construction, one would put the main, big gear in motion. The big wheel would then turn the tiny one, which would then swing the hammer.
'Is that an alternating mechanism?' Mathew thought, falling down to his knees when he spotted the detail.
He couldn't exactly tell its details from just a single, short look, but the use of this complicated box of gears and switches could only have a single purpose.
'I guess we will test how good it is pretty soon,' Mathew thought, noticing the sounds of the approaching horde getting louder and louder.
"Why aren't the other stairs blown up yet?!" Mathew barked, ignoring the officer's question.
There wasn't any time for idle discussion now.
"What the hell is going on?!" the officer shouted in response, clearly aware of how the air continued to tense with each passing second.
"We are about to get swarmed," Mathew informed before approaching the bag with the grenades and throwing its opening towards the ground, causing the explosives to trickle across it.
"I need three men. One more to throw with me, two more to keep passing up more of them," Mathew informed as he approached the edge of the former staircase with an explosive in each of his hands. He then turned his head to the back.
"I also need enough guys to spin that wheel, but I trust you can organize that," Mathew added, throwing another order towards the officer before moving his head back in the direction the noise was coming from.
For the next few moments, people rushed about the place. Some followed the orders; others were too frozen in fear to move.
By the time everyone finally took their positions, the noise made by the approaching horde was already pretty loud.
"Mat?" Mathew heard a tiny voice. It barely reached his ears, proving just how weak it was.
But the young man recognized it in an instant. Sadly, he could no longer afford Nadia any attention.
"They are here," he informed calmly, pulling the pins of both of his nades and releasing the handles.
'Five,' Math thought, sensing how everyone on the floor froze.
"When I give a signal, you need to all rush towards the rooftop," Mathew announced. 'Four,' he thought, holding the live grenades like hot potatoes in his hands.
"Mat?" This time, Nadia's voice was clearer, stronger, followed by the sound of hurried footsteps.
"Stay back!" Mathew shouted, not daring to turn his face away. 'Three,' the explosives in the young man's hands seemingly got hotter.
But it was all an illusion. A projection of his mind that grew increasingly aware of the threat.
'Two,' Math thought, swinging his hands to the back.
The noises stopped. And then, the sidewall of the corridor exploded under the pressure of an entire horde of zombies smashing through it.
The undead calamity rushed around, all drawn towards Mathew's position.
'One,' Mat thought, swinging his hands forward and dropping his grenades right in the path of the approaching horde.
Powered by seven athletic men and policemen alike, the pendulum started to swing.
Regarding the number of stones - Once I have some time to do so, I will look into it and make sure to fix any and all inconsistencies.
The two grenades exploded almost at the same time, right when the horde rushed past them.
The explosion shook the entire building.
Mat reached out and cleaned his forehead from sweat.
Even though he was likely the only one who knew what to expect, that didn't make it any less stressful to face thousands of zombies all crammed into the school's corridor below them.
"Free the pendulum!" Mathew shouted when the wave of the zombies pushed those still shocked by the explosion out of the way.
With the stairs demolished, a huge chunk of the floor collapsed, creating something akin to a fall trap.
Under the force of the zombies pushing from behind, the zombies at the front would run towards the former staircase... and either fall down the stairs or directly drop over the edge to the lower floor.
Sure, it would only take to turn around and climb the stairs back to get where they started... But an action like this would require the zombies to be capable of thinking.
'It's gonna take them a while, but they will find a way,' Mathew thought, watching how the group of seven men rotated the power-wheel and swung the pendulum into the crowd of the zombies.
This stationary weapon was made so that the hammer would first gain momentum and then strike right at the height where the head of the zombies would be. What's more, the zombies lucky enough to avoid getting hit in the head would still end up pushed down the hole and forced to move up the floor.
"Pull it back!" Mathew shouted, reaching out with his hand to the back, only for one of fellow students of his to pass him a grenade.
"Throw the nades whenever they are raising the pendulum!" Mathew shouted, moving towards the second phase of his plan.
For now, this was the most effective way to keep thinning out the number of zombies. With the grenades preventing the zombies from stacking in a single place, the pendulum continued to crush several zombies with each swing it took.
'It's far more effective than I expected it to be,' Mathew thought, throwing yet another grenade down the gap and leaning back.
"Mathew!" Nadia shouted, trying to force her voice through the constant noise of the ongoing fight. "What the hell is going on?!" she cried out, clearly in distress.
But who could blame this poor girl for being stressed out if she first succumbed to some strange and insanely rapid disease, only to wake up in the middle of a zombie apocalypse!
"Nadia, I'm sorry, but I can't right now," Mathew said, turning his head to look at the girl.
'As much as I want to just cuddle her and keep her in my arms to calm her down,' Mat thought, moving his eyes towards the girl...
And then, he saw the depth of terror in her eyes.
It wasn't an expression one would make when faced with a horde of zombies. What's more, from her current point of view, Nadia wasn't likely to even have an angle to see the zombies in the first place!
'Is this about her race?' Mathew thought when he noticed the information flashing in the half-transparent windows floating slightly above the girl's head.
According to the only window that had any content, Nadia was no longer a human but a half-zombie.
"What's wrong?" Mathew asked, forgetting about the ongoing battle and focusing all of his attention on the girl. He then brought his hand forward and grabbed Nadia's fingers only to cup them together and then cover Nadia's hands with his own.
"Everything... I can see everyone's hearts pumping, the sounds..." Nadia moaned before falling to her knees. "The entire world is red all around!" Nadia cried out while wrestling her hands free. She then his her face in her palms.
'Is she turning?' Mathew thought, glancing over at the girl's status in panic. And the former "recovering" changed to something else.
[Status: In a shock]
This one line was enough for the young man to somehow calm down. But the noises from right behind his back quickly brought Mat's thoughts back into reality.
"Nadia, I'm here," Mathew whispered into the girl's ear, hoping to reach her in this way. "I need to take care of a few things for now, so can you just sit down and wait for me to come in a moment?"
Instead of sharing Nadia's panic, Mathew decided to put on a perfectly calm but busy front.
"O-okay," Nadia muttered, unsure how to react.
Throughout their entire relationship, she was usually the one to protect and cheer Mathew up. And from how easily Mat managed to subdue her fear, turning her into an obedient little girl, the change was still quite surprising for her.
"Good girl," Mathew purred, rustling Nadia's curly hair.
Mathew stood up and took a deep breath. He then turned his head to the other side, inspecting the progress of the battle.
"So far, so good," Mathew muttered under his nose.
The results were far from satisfactory, but they were better than Mathew's grave predictions.
Even the combination of the explosions and the swinging pendulum had its limits.
Soldiers could throw the grenades only once per swing of the weapon; otherwise, they would risk damaging it.
Because of this short time window, the zombies eventually started to form into waves, quickly building up a disgusting pile of rotting flesh.
Both the explosions and the pendulum would often miss the vitals, turning the zombie into a mesh yet not fully killing them. And as time went on, those broken parts of zombies continued to build up.
'Thank God the hole is quite big,' Mathew thought.
When the explosions went off earlier, the resulting demolition deleted not only the stairs but also quite a bit of floor from the level below. The falling rubble simply blasted past the aged floor, only stopped on the next level.
That's why the zombies not only had to move up but also move forward.
Unable to breach the gap on their own, they could only rely on this build-up of corpses that would eventually bridge it. Yet, it had to grow considerably higher just to account for the changed angle.
After all, for a pile to grow up, it had to rest on some kind of foundation.
But the zombies kept on coming. And there was no telling when this swarm would end.
'The monsters have yet to show up,' Mathew thought, scanning the area as he grabbed one of the grenades before timing it out and throwing it right at the zombies.
A dull sound of the explosion shook several of the bloodied bodies, throwing them around like some rag dolls.
One of the zombies, already only contained within its head and half of its shoulder area nearly managed to land on the upper floor.
'Tsk,' Mathew clicked his tongue when the still active corpse flew right past his feet.
Even if it would take way more than a single scratch for someone to turn, it surely would cause a massive commotion.
And then, something that Mathew initially didn't dare to believe.
Mat's lips formed a smile, only for the young man to shake his head and focus.
The influx of the zombies finally slowed down. One could see that down the corridor; their horde was starting to thin out.
'Right, the school is fenced off,' Mathew thought, relieved by the change. 'And there are only so many students to turn in here,' the young man added, blinking his eyes to refresh his eyes.
It would still take them a long while before the fighting would come to a complete end. But at least they could now see some kind of future ahead!
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