Apocalypse: King of Zombies

With the mess finally cleaned up, Sean rushed over and dragged two bloodied bodies out from beneath the pile of corpses—Big Mike and Skinny Pete.

”Ethan, please,” Sean said, voice tight with urgency. ”Can Henry heal them?”

Both men were in bad shape—unconscious, barely breathing. If Sean hadn’t shielded them with his own body, they’d have been zombie chow hours ago.

Ethan crouched beside them, eyes narrowing as he took in their condition. Even he looked a little stunned.

These two were hanging on by threads.

But what really struck him was Sean—how far he’d gone to protect them. That kind of loyalty wasn’t common anymore.

”Henry,” Ethan said, ”do what you can.”

”Got it.” Henry moved quickly, kneeling beside them. He placed a hand on each of their worst wounds, one at a time, and let the healing energy flow.

It took a few minutes, and by the end of it, Henry was pale and sweating. If he hadn’t already reached Tier 3, he’d probably have passed out halfway through.

Still, he managed to stabilize both men. The worst injuries were healed; the rest would mend on their own.

Soon, Big Mike and Skinny Pete stirred, blinking up at the ceiling in confusion.

”You’re awake!” Sean said, relief flooding his face.

”Sean… we’re alive?” Big Mike croaked, voice hoarse with disbelief. ”We thought we were done for.”

”You were close,” Sean said with a shaky laugh. ”But Ethan saved you.”

He gave them the short version of what had happened.

The two men sat up, still groggy but alive, and turned to Ethan with wide eyes.

”Thank you, Ethan,” Skinny Pete said, voice solemn. ”Sean’s decision is our decision. From now on, our lives are yours.”

Ethan waved it off with a grin. ”Come on, none of that. We’re a team now. We watch each other’s backs and get through this hell together.”

The others nodded, firm and grateful.

Ethan stood, brushing off his hands. ”Now that we’ve got more people, we might finally be able to take down some of those Tier 3 zombies we’ve been avoiding.”

Sean looked at him, thoughtful. ”Ethan… can you actually see a zombie’s Tier?”

Ethan nodded. ”Yeah. I’ve got x-ray vision, basically. I can see the size of the crystal core in their heads. That tells me their Tier.”

No point hiding it now. They were in this together.

Sean’s eyes widened in understanding. ”That explains it… I always wondered how you knew to dig that core out of the mutated zombie on day one. No one else would’ve even thought to check.”

It was a game-changing ability.

In the apocalypse, zombies all looked the same. You couldn’t tell their strength until you were already fighting them—and by then, it was often too late. Teams died because they guessed wrong. Others wasted time and blood chasing high-tier cores, only to find nothing worth taking.

But Ethan? He could see it all before the first punch was thrown.

That kind of power was the stuff of dreams.

And now, Sean and his crew were part of a team that had it.

Sean turned to Chris. ”Your ability… it’s invisibility, right?”

Chris gave a small smile. ”Yep. You saw me use it, didn’t you? Not hard to guess.”

”...”

Big Mike stared at the three of them, stunned. ”Wait—you’re all Awakened with abilities?!”

Sean turned back to Ethan, eyes full of hope. ”Is there a way for us to awaken too? Some trick? A method?”

Ethan shook his head. ”Don’t look at me. If there is, I don’t know it. From what I’ve gathered, people with abilities were born the night the world ended. If you didn’t awaken then, you probably never will.”

The three of them deflated a little.

”Don’t worry about it,” Ethan said. ”Abilities are just tools. Power’s power. You can still be strong without one.”

They nodded, a little more grounded now.

Then Ethan turned to Chris. ”Give the spare Tier 3 core to Big Mike. The more of us at Tier 3, the better our odds against what’s coming.”

Chris didn’t hesitate. He reached into his pocket and handed over the crystal core.

”Thanks, man,” Big Mike said, eyes shining. He took the core like it was a sacred relic.

He, Sean, and Skinny Pete had all been stuck at Tier 2 peak for a while now. They just hadn’t had the chance to kill a Tier 3 zombie and get the core they needed.

Now, just by joining this team, he was getting a free ride to Tier 3.

It felt like hitting the lottery.

Big Mike swallowed the core without hesitation.

A few moments later, the surge hit. His aura flared, and just like that, he was Tier 3.

Ethan’s team now had six members: one Tier 4, four Tier 3s—and if they added Pumpkin back into the mix, that made five Tier 3s.

They weren’t just strong.

They were a force.

Half an hour later, everyone had more or less recovered. Wounds were patched, energy restored, and the tension from earlier had faded into a quiet, focused calm.

Then, under Ethan’s lead, the group headed out.

Finding a zombie horde with one or two Tier 3s among a hundred or so wasn’t easy. But if you widened the search to groups of three or four hundred? The school grounds had plenty of those.

As they stepped outside, Ethan gave a sharp whistle.

A moment later, Pumpkin leapt down from the rooftop of a nearby building, landing with feline grace beside them.

Sean and the others blinked at the sight of the massive orange cat, but since Ethan had already warned them, no one freaked out. Still, it was hard not to stare.

Under Ethan’s guidance, it didn’t take long to find a target: a horde of over four hundred zombies, one of them clearly Tier 3.

Ethan had scouted this group before, but back then, the terrain offered no advantage, and his team had been too small. He hadn’t dared make a move.

Now? With a full squad and himself at Tier 4?

He didn’t need terrain. He was the advantage.

”Move in. Fast and clean,” Ethan ordered, then charged straight at the horde.

The others followed without hesitation, weapons in hand.

The zombies reacted instantly, letting out guttural howls as they surged toward the group like a tidal wave of rot and teeth.

Ethan swung his barbell bar in a wide arc—crack!—and the first zombie’s head exploded like a rotten pumpkin.

At Tier 4, the barbell bar felt weightless in his hands. He swung it like a baseball bat going for a grand slam, each hit sending bodies flying or skulls shattering.

The others weren’t far behind.

Chris and Henry moved with practiced precision, cutting through the undead like they were born for it.

Sean, Big Mike, and Skinny Pete held their own just as well. All three had switched to fire axes—shorter reach, but brutal in close quarters. Their strikes were fast, clean, and always aimed for the head. One swing, one kill.

The six of them formed a tight circle, backs to each other, weapons flashing as they cut down the zombies charging from every direction.

It was chaos—blood, bone, and rotting flesh flying through the air—but they held the line.

Ten minutes in, the ground was slick with gore. Fifteen minutes, and the last of the horde collapsed with a wet thud.

Over four hundred zombies, including a Tier 3, wiped out.

Only Sean, Big Mike, and Skinny Pete had taken any hits—mostly scratches and shallow cuts. The fire axes were deadly, but their short range meant the zombies sometimes got in one last swipe before going down.

”Chris,” Big Mike said, panting, ”these barbell bars of yours? Straight-up divine weapons.”

”Damn right,” Chris grinned. ”That’s called foresight, my friend.”

”Don’t worry,” Ethan said, chuckling. ”We’ll get you guys some too. Now hurry up—clean the field. We’re heading to the next one.”

”On it.”

And just like that, the slaughter began in earnest.

From noon until nightfall, they moved from one horde to the next, carving a bloody path through the school grounds. By the time they stopped, they’d killed over two thousand zombies.

The haul? Eight Tier 3 crystal cores.

Enough to push Skinny Pete up to Tier 3—and even better, Chris had now reached Tier 3 peak.

That was Ethan’s call.

He’d made it clear: when it came to advancement, whoever could break through first, did. The benefits of a Tier jump far outweighed the gains from slowly grinding to peak.

Once everyone had advanced, then they could focus on pushing each person to their limit.

It was a smart system—maximize the team’s overall strength while keeping no one lagging behind.

And when it came to who got the next core?

That was Ethan’s decision. No one questioned it.

In this team, Ethan didn’t just lead.

He commanded.

...