Buying My Way Through the Multiverse

Gray walked outside and made the mobile kitchen vanish into his inventory. He sat down on a concrete bench in the yard, looking out through the fences. He just stared into the quiet forest for a long time.

He didn’t want to sleep inside one of the dirty cells. Instead, he opened the shop and bought a luxury RV, a Bruder ADX-21 to be exact. It cost him 19,000 gold. He pulled it out of his inventory and placed it right on the basketball court. ”I always wanted one of these in my past life,” Gray said excitedly.

Going inside, he noticed it came with fully charged batteries and a full tank of fresh water. At the entrance was a queen-sized bed, and at the back a small, clean wetroom. Gray caught his own scent and winced. He decided to take a shower first. He was pleasantly surprised when hot water started coming out of the showerhead.

Once he was done, he looked at himself in the bathroom mirror. He was surprised by his own reflection. His shoulders were broader, his stomach had perfectly defined abs, and his muscles looked dense and powerful. He didn’t want the group asking questions, so he reopened the shop and bought some baggy clothes, including loose jeans and an oversized jacket, to hide his new build.

He locked the RV from the inside, turned on all the ceiling fans, and lay down on the comfortable bed. He pulled out his laptop to continue watching ”The Walking Dead.” The last time he watched, he had stopped right at season three, episode six. Because of his new stamina, he didn’t feel sleepy or tired at all. He spent the entire night binge-watching the series.

Once the sun rose, Gray got up and changed into his new baggy clothes. He finally stepped out of the RV. He didn’t want to attract any attention from the group, so he turned around and put the massive vehicle right back into his inventory.

Gray stood in the quiet courtyard, thinking about the new episodes he had watched last night. He had completely finished season three. The threat of the Governor sat heavily in his mind. If that psychopath found out they had cleared the prison and moved in, it would be war. Woodbury was a heavily armed community, and the prison group was completely exposed out in the open yard.

He started walking along the outer chain-link fence. The fence was flimsy and easily knocked over by a big enough crowd of walkers or a single vehicle. He needed a way to reinforce it.

Gray opened the system shop and began searching for construction materials. He scrolled past standard concrete barriers and basic anti-riot walls, looking for something unbreakable. Eventually, his eyes landed on an entry that made him stop.

{High External Stone Wall (Rust)} (15,000 Gold)

He pictured the massive, towering stone barricades topped with barbed wire from the video game. Putting those up would turn the prison into an actual medieval fortress. At 15,000 gold a piece, he could easily afford to wall off the entire perimeter using a fraction of his daily income.

He thought about just buying them right now, but he immediately shook his head. If the group found a fifteen-foot stone wall where the chain-link fence used to be, they would lose their minds. He couldn’t hide a fortress. Once the time came to tell everyone about his powers, expanding the prison perimeter would be effortless. Until then, he had to play it smart.

”We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” Gray muttered to himself, closing the system overlay.

Not even thirty minutes later, the low rumble of engines broke the morning silence. Gray looked down the road and saw two pickup trucks kicking up dust as they got closer to the prison. It was the crew coming back from the farm.

Gray walked over to the gates, grabbed the chain, and pulled them open to let the trucks inside.

Rick stepped out of his truck first. Shane, Daryl, and a loud Merle Dixon followed closely behind him.

T-Dog, Jim, Andrea, and Morales piled out of the second truck. They carried heavy duffel bags packed with clothes and ammunition.

Gray adjusted the collar of his oversized, baggy brown jacket. The thick fabric draped loosely over his frame. It completely hid his new Batman physique. His muscles were now hyper-dense and in peak athletic shape, but nobody could tell.

”Place looks quiet,” Shane grunted. He rested his shotgun against his shoulder as they walked into the main cell block. ”You pass out, or did you actually keep watch, kid?”

”Kept watch. Nothing happened,” Gray replied smoothly. He walked down the metal stairs with them.

The group started dropping their heavy duffel bags onto the concrete floor. Suddenly, T-Dog stopped in his tracks. He stared at a neatly stacked mountain of pristine cleaning supplies resting near the staircase, which stood out like a neon sign in the dark, bloody prison.

”Where the hell did you get all this?” Shane asked. His eyes narrowed as he stepped up to a jug of bleach. ”We cleared this entire block yesterday. It was nothing but blood and rot.”

”Found a locked janitor supply closet in the deep corridors last night,” Gray lied effortlessly. ”It must have been locked tight since the start of the apocalypse. Figured we could use it to make this place liveable.”

Shane locked eyes with him, looking deeply skeptical. ”A locked closet? Right...”

”Luck of the draw, Shane,” Gray shrugged. He kept his hands inside his baggy pockets. ”Unless you prefer the smell of decomposing flesh.”

Rick held up a hand, cutting off the brewing argument. He didn’t entirely buy the story either, but he wasn’t going to turn down a clean house. ”Doesn’t matter where it came from. We need it. Let’s focus on moving the rest of the bodies out of the courtyard.”

Before they could turn back toward the exit, a deep voice echoed from the rows of cells at the far end of the block.

”Yo. Boss,” Oscar called out, stepping up to the bars of his cell. ”We wanna help. Me, Tiny, and Axel. We can help you haul the bodies out to the yard.”

Rick immediately stiffened. Shane scoffed, stepping forward aggressively. ”Are you out of your mind? We just locked you, criminals, down yesterday, and you think we’re letting you out to ’help’ us?”

”They’re fine, Shane,” Gray intervened. He walked right past the hot-tempered deputy. ”Oscar helped clear the bodies yesterday without a single complaint. They want to earn their keep. I say we let them.”

Rick and Shane exchanged a tense look. They were deeply skeptical, but they remembered Oscar’s hard work the day before. The man hadn’t complained once while hauling rotting corpses in the heat.

”It’s still a risk, Gray,” Rick warned, his brow furrowed in concern. He hesitated for a second, looking back at Oscar’s calm expression. ”But we need the extra hands if we want to finish this today.”

”They won’t be a problem,” Gray said with a reassuring nod. ”Go ahead and pop the locks.”

Shane grumbled but didn’t argue further. Reluctantly, Rick pulled the heavy ring of prison keys from his belt and stepped toward the cells.

Rick slid the key into the lock. The heavy mechanism clicked, and the door swung open. Instantly, both lawmen froze, two cells were dead silent.

Tomas was curled up on his bed. His face was pale, and his breathing was shallow. In the next cell, Andrew sat on the concrete floor. His nose was completely shattered. Dried black blood covered his mouth and chin as he stared at the floor in pure, traumatized terror.

Rick looked from the battered prisoners back to Gray. ”What the hell happened here?”

”They wanted to use the bathroom last night,” Gray explained casually. ”The moment I let them out, they tried to jump me. Thought they could take over the prison.”

Shane looked at the heavy damage on Tomas and Andrew, then looked down at Gray. Gray stood at a modest 5’7. He was completely buried inside a baggy jacket that made him look small and unassuming. There wasn’t a single scratch on his face. His knuckles weren’t even red.

”You did this?” Shane asked. His voice lost its aggressive edge, replaced by pure bewilderment. ”Both of them? At the same time?”

”They aren’t very good fighters,” Gray replied with a small smirk.

Daryl let out a low, rare chuckle from the back of the group. ”Looks like they bit off a hell of a lot more than they could chew.”

Suddenly, Merle burst out laughing. ”Damn boy!” he barked, throwing a heavy arm right around Gray’s shoulder. ”Didn’t know you had it in ya!”

Gray casually stepped out from under Merle’s arm, keeping his expression neutral. Rick finished unlocking the other cells. Oscar, Big Tiny, and Axel stepped out into the corridor and walked straight toward the exit. The group headed out to the courtyard to start moving the bodies.

Once outside, the heat hit them immediately. Gray grabbed a massive, bloated walker by its leg. Without a hint of strain, he casually began dragging the heavy dead weight across the grass toward the burn pile.

An hour later, Rick and Shane stood shoulder-to-shoulder, watching him closely.

Shane adjusted his grip on a corpse, his voice dropping to a low, intense whisper. ”You seeing this, Rick? Look at him. He’s moving bodies around with a lot less struggle than yesterday. He ain’t even sweating. It’s weird, man. The kid is acting completely suspicious.”

Rick kept his eyes forward, watching Gray toss another body onto the pile effortlessly. ”I noticed it too.”

”No, I don’t think you do,” Shane pressed, his eyes narrowing. ”A locked janitor closet? Suddenly turning two grown men into burger meat with his bare hands? And now he’s tossing two-hundred-pound corpses like they’re pillows? It ain’t natural.”

Rick sighed, turning his head to look at his partner. He was deeply uneasy, but he kept his voice steady. ”He will tell us what’s going on when he’s ready.” He continued, ”He’s been helping this group from the start, Shane. He saved Jim, he saved Amy, and he kept Jenner alive. He hasn’t done anything to be treated any differently.”

Shane wasn’t convinced just yet. He spat into the dirt, staring holes into Gray’s back. ”Keep telling yourself that, Rick. But something is seriously wrong with that kid.”

By noon, the entire group had completely dragged every single corpse out of the courtyard and from inside the cell blocks. With the bodies gone, the real work began. They unpacked the pristine cleaning supplies and started scrubbing the inside of the prison.

They split into two teams again. One group stayed inside to mop up the blood and sweep out the trash. The second group was put in charge of getting fresh water from a creek outside the main fence. Five people made up the water crew, Merle, Oscar, Axel, Big Tiny, and Gray.

They walked back and forth, carrying heavy buckets through the main gate. On one of the trips back, Gray was walking toward the fence with empty buckets in his hands. Suddenly, he heard shouting. Axel and Big Tiny came sprinting back from the outer gate, their eyes wide with panic.

”Help! The dead are coming!” Axel yelled, dropping his buckets.

Gray stopped and looked past them, outside the fence. Seven walkers had stumbled out of the woods and were shuffling quickly toward the open gate.

Instead of running, Gray calmly dropped his empty buckets onto the gravel. He took his M4 from his shoulder and brought the rifle to his eye in one fluid, lightning-fast motion. BANG!x7

The rifle barked in a terrifying, perfectly rhythmic cadence. Seven shots left the barrel in less than two seconds.

Across the open field, more than 150 yards away, all seven walkers dropped hard into the dirt. Every single round had pierced precisely between their eyes.

Gray casually lowered the smoking carbine and slung it back over his shoulder. He picked up his empty buckets as if nothing had happened.

Merle, being closest to the gate, started yelling back, ”When am I getting my lessons!”

Beside him, Axel and Big Tiny froze, clutching their chest as they panted from running. Oscar slowly wiped the sweat from his forehead, staring at Gray in absolute disbelief. The inmates had spent the morning whispering about Gray’s freakish physical strength. But seeing him with a gun was a whole different level of terrifying. They realized he wasn’t just a brawler. He was an absolute, cold-blooded executioner.

”Jesus, kid,” Axel muttered under his breath, his voice shaking. ”Note to self... never, ever get on his bad side.”

Gray didn’t acknowledge the staring. He just looked over at the stunned inmates and gave them a calm nod. ”Gate is clear. Let’s get back to work.”