บท 44: Bullets and Blood
The shotgun went off a couple more times after Elisa left the house, while Brutus used his strength and fangs like never before.
Together, they managed to fight their way through what seemed like a horde of people with no sense of preservation whatsoever who were only rushing at them to end up getting shot.
Luckily, thanks to the accuracy of her bullets and the protection of her dog, taking advantage of a moment when the hooded strangers delayed in pursuing them, they managed to enter the barn.
Closing the barn door and locking it with its wooden latch, Elisa took the remaining ammunition from her small box before throwing it on the ground.
In the process, she didn't stop walking for a second, heading for the last stall of the barn.
Because they hadn't had an animal here in a long time, this barn was used as a storeroom to store various things that they didn't use on a day-to-day basis but were necessary or useful to have.
Among them were rusty or broken tools, food from their barnyard animals, sacks of fertilizer and seeds, to name a few of the things stored.
This was what was in the first few stalls, as the last few were mostly empty, only containing wooden crates, all stacked waiting for the time when they would be used.
Or at least that's what it would look like to anyone who entered the barn and didn't know where to look.
"URGHH!!!"
Pushing with all her might one of the wooden boxes in the last stall of the barn, it was slowly revealed that underneath this box, there was another one that had a circular hole in the middle.
Of course, this was not a coincidence, but it was the way Elisa and her parents had decided to store those things that might be suspicious in other people's eyes.
With a wooden box filled with fertilizer on top and the box underneath being secured to the floor, this guaranteed that even if someone fell on top of this, this secret compartment would not be easily discovered.
As for what it contained, it was not something really scandalous like a human head but something that would draw unnecessary suspicion.
Instead, it was several small boxes of shotgun ammunition, enough so that even if a criminal organization decided to attack the family, they would have enough to defend themselves for a couple of days.
There were times when this compartment was even forgotten by the family because it hadn't been needed in years, even making them think it was unnecessary, but right now, Elisa couldn't be more grateful to her parents.
Bam!
The barn door began to get slammed from outside, letting out creaking sounds from the wood Elisa had used to secure the door.
"Brutus, hold the door for a moment, please!" The young woman shouted as she pulled several boxes of ammunition from the secret compartment.
At the woman's command, the dog placed his large paws on top of the wood, managing to mitigate even some of the force of those trying to break down the door.
Stuffing as many boxes as she could into both pockets of her pants for lack of a better space, the woman reloaded her weapon and again shouted an order to her pet.
"Brutus, behind me!"
Abandoning his position of guarding the door, the dog ran toward his owner, only stopping when he was a safe distance behind her.
Bam!
Without the dog guarding the door, the pounding on the door began to increase, the wooden latch creaking non-stop.
With each of the creaks, Elisa's vision became more adjusted to the darkness, and her grip on her gun became calmer.
Crack!
The wood finally gave way to the force of the invaders, and the figures hiding in the shadows entered the barn, first one by one, then, as the wooden door was shattered, they increased in pairs.
BANG!
This invasion was met with bullets, which despite the darkness, did not miss their target once, causing them to fall to the ground as soon as they entered, spilling blood from freshly made holes.
Although the pace at which the intruders entered was high, with them entering in threes, the young woman had such dexterity in her hands that not only did she not need to see to reload, but she did so with such speed that she was able to keep pace with the intruders.
---
It was unknown how much time had passed, how many bullets were scattered on the ground, or even how many times she had pulled the trigger of her shotgun.
BANG!
"...Ha, what the hell..."
One would think the number of bodies on the ground would be an adequate indicator for this, but that wasn't going to do much good either.
After all, this wasn't the first time Elisa had pulled this off.
Though they were now motionless after she shot them, it was only a matter of time before they were back on their feet, made a bloody mess again, but a mess that pitifully walked.
The young woman did not know how this was happening, and she could not find an explanation.
Her aim had been accurate, and although the damage of her shotgun might have been diminished by the distance and the age of the bullets, it should not have been to the level that a human could be shot without anything happening.
It was clear that something strange was going on here, something that had left her almost out of bullets and based on a tactic of throwing safety overboard, she had been backed into a corner.
Faced with this situation, Elisa lowered her shoulders and her gaze along with her weapon, the situation of facing a horde of seemingly immortal people having affected her.
Between spasms, as if having waited for this moment, one of the bodies on the ground, the one closest to the young woman, began to rise.
Slowly, with irregular steps, he raised his hand as he moved closer and closer to Elisa, now being just a few inches away from her.
BANG!
However, what the walking corpse made contact with was not the woman, but with bullets directly in his face.
"...Can't you people just FUCKING die already?!"
Moving quickly towards the now mangled body of the man, Elisa, with an expression that showed nothing but anger, fired her shotgun again, this time at point blank range at the man.
That was the reason she had stood still before, not out of fear or desperation, far from it.
Instead, it was because she was fed up, fed up that she couldn't make those who killed her parents pay despite having filled them with enough holes to see through them.
Right now, these people were no different than filth to her, something disgusting that was hard to get rid of.
But of course, that didn't mean she was going to give up.
BANG!
This time advancing from her firing location, the young woman then began firing at the bodies on the ground, doing so as close as possible, shattering the bodies of the invaders completely.
She had no idea why they were so resilient, but what she was sure of, was that even these freaks would not be able to recover if their heads were missing.
And if they weren't, then she would just have to do it all over again.
"!"
At that moment, just as Elisa was about to finish off another one of the invaders, she felt a chill on the back of her neck, something that made her stop in her tracks.
At the same time, she noticed something at the barn door.
Surrounded by more dark figures, one stood out among them all, positioned in the middle of everyone and with a small red glow at the height of his chest.
"Stand up, for That One's sake!"
Blurting out those words that seemed to be imbued with a strange power, the figure in the middle raised the object that gave off the red glow in the air, the light it produced spreading out towards the entire interior of the barn.
The words had been an order, an order that those who knew what the person was referring to could not refuse even if they wanted to.
Even if life had already left their body, as long as they had not found the truth, eternal rest would not come to them.
Crack
The sound of bones breaking began to be heard in Elisa's surroundings, with the bodies scattered on the ground writhing to the point where it was difficult to distinguish their shapes.
They had been human, but upon hearing the man's command, be that as it may, their bodies found a way to continue functioning.
Even if they lacked organs, even if they had no blood, even if they could not see or feel, breathe or eat, they would move for the sake of That One.
Rising suddenly with their bodies twisted in a way that they resembled a spider, their stomachs facing the sky, their hands and feet were replaced by spikes of bone that broke the flesh.
Protrusions emerged from torsos and backs as they broke to bend, conforming to their new forms.
"...What the..."
Barely able to let out a sound of confusion, Elisa was shocked at what she was seeing now, knowing full well that the beings in front of her, four-legged spiders made of blood, flesh and bones, were no longer human beings.
No, what was in front of her was best described as... monsters.
She wanted to run away, she wanted to fire her gun, she wanted to move, she wanted to do something, anything right now.
But unfortunately for her, it seemed that her body had completely stopped responding to her.
Whether it was the unknown man's words, or the atrocities she was observing, she could do nothing but stand still as she watched her end approach.
"WOOF!"
"!"
However, letting out a bark so loud that it managed to echo throughout the farm, not losing in power against the unknown man's words, Brutus had moved.
CHAK!
Sticking his large fangs into one of the meat spiders near Elisa, the dog had opened the way for her to retreat into the barn.
This action did not go unnoticed by the other spiders, who quickly lunged toward the canine, using their new appendages to cut it down.
"Brutus!"
Thanks to the dog's barking, Elisa had managed to wake up from the trance she was in, managing to see how the spiders pounced on her dog.
Immediately, the woman fired her gun at the spiders, but all she could hear was how her shotgun had no bullets.
She reached into her pockets and rummaged through the floor, but couldn't stop the blood from being spilled on the floor of the barn.
"NOOOO!!!"
Letting out a piercing scream, the woman ran towards her pet, throwing the shotgun towards the meat spiders, who for some reason backed away.
In front of her appeared the image of a dog bleeding and having difficulty breathing.
Without a second's hesitation, she lunged towards the ground, her increasingly wet arms shaking heavily as she examined Brutus' body, not knowing what to do.
Tap tap tap
From the entrance of the barn, the footsteps of one person, only one, were heard coming, it was the leader of the people, and the one who had caused this scene.
For a moment, his gaze scanned the bodies of all his followers on the ground, a scene that would not be wrong to call it a massacre.
"...You, you will serve us well." The man said, raising his necklace towards the young woman, the red light slowly enveloping her.
Elisa paid him no attention at all at first, by this point having torn her own sleeve so she could mend her pet, but as a few seconds passed, her actions slowed.
The sound of teeth clenching could be heard coming from Elisa, who no matter what she was hearing in her head, or what her body wanted to do, still wanted to help her pet.
Wind this, the leader did nothing but start muttering a few words that seemed to increase the red light even more.
BAM!
"Gahk!"
But no sooner had he started, he could hear a clatter outside, of something heavy being thrown to the ground, accompanied by a small cry of pain.
BAM!
The noise was repeated again, with the followers standing at the barn door and even the leader turning toward the cause of the altercation.
Standing at the entrance of the farm, with two people lying at his feet, was a young man in a black sweatshirt and cloth cover-up, holding what appeared to be a long white stick.
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