The everlasting twilight flashed through the gaps of the improvised wooden planks that blocked the shattered window. Jamila leaned against the wall, sighing as she became lost in her own thoughts.
It had been only two days since the terrifying spider attack, and since then, things had only spiraled downward. After she had managed to kill the creature, she had thrown its heavy, twitching carcass out the window, watching it hit the pavement ten stories below with a sickening splash just to be certain it was dead.
Since then, she had spent her time scavenging the neighboring apartments for food. To her dismay, she found little of use—only a few dented cans of soup, amidst rooms filled with the stench of rot and the silent presence of those who hadn't survived the first week.
Resources were thinning by the hour, yet she had refrained from venturing down to the lower floors. She felt like a character trapped inside a low-budget horror movie, constantly wondering why this was happening. But her apartment was no longer the fortress she thought it was.
She soon realized that many monsters had the ability to get here.
Just yesterday, she had faced the most harrowing moment of her life. A massive ape, its muscles bulging with unnatural strength, had swung from a nearby tree and crashed through her bathroom window while she was inside! The fight had been brutal and desperate. The beast's punches shattered the tiled walls like they were made of glass. She had barely escaped death multiple times before finally managing to leverage her Qi and hurl the gorilla out into the abyss.
[I have to leave!] Jamila decided as she looked over the destruction left by her last fight against the gorilla. [If I stay here, I'm just waiting to be cornered.]
She spent a few minutes gathering her meager belongings: two cans of food, a half-empty bottle of water, a change of clothes, a pistol that he had found in one of the neighbors and a metal pipe that he would use as a weapon.
She had no idea of how to use a gun, but decided to leave it in the holster, exposed.She knew the psychological power of a weapon; sometimes, just seeing a gun was enough to keep a predator at bay.
Finally, she tucked her most cherished possession—the cultivation book—securely against her chest.
*********
The first step is always the hardest.
It took an enormous amount of courage for Jamila to step into the stairwell and take the first flight down. The metallic scent of blood filled her nose before she even reached the nineteenth floor. Her legs trembled as she rounded the corner and saw the carnage in the hallway.
[Why? Why does it always have to be spiders?]
[Nope, I'm not going there!]
In the center of the corridor, three massive spiders were busy gnashing their mandibles into what remained of several human bodies. Fortunately, they were too engrossed in their feast to notice her. It seemed they had claimed the floor as their nest; thick, sticky webs hung from the ceiling like macabre decorations.
Quietly, holding her breath, Jamila continued her descent. Floor after floor, she encountered the same grisly scenes. On one level, she found an improvised spear—a kitchen knife lashed firmly to a long metal rod. She took it gladly, feeling slightly more confident with the extra reach.
Finally, she reached the entrance hall.
"Give me all your food and that technique book, or your carcass will become a snack for the mutts outside!" A strong and demanding voice echoed out in the hall.
[Shit!] Jamila thought, her heart sinking. [My luck just ran out.]
********
The hall was spacious, even more so after all its furniture had been smashed and nothing was left but shards of glass, pieces of wood and dried blood.
Massive spider webs were draped across the ceiling like dusty curtains, and the creature that had spun them lay dead in a corner, its legs torn off and its many eyes pierced, leaking a thick green ichor.
On the far side of the hall, directly on the opposite side where Jamila was, eight men were locked in a tense standoff.
They were split into two distinct groups. The first group had five members who reminded Jamila of a paramilitary squad—only much scruffier. They wore khaki pants and had shaved heads. The man in the center held a pistol, its barrel leveled at the other group. The rest carried makeshift clubs and rusted machetes.
The other group of three young men were in even worse shape. It was as if they had just come out of an intense fight, their hair was disheveled, sweat dripped from their body and mixed with blood from their wounds. Apparently nothing too serious.
Yet, the man in the center—a youth with long black hair and a strong jaw—stood defiant. He gripped a medieval-style sword and a crude wooden shield, facing the gun without flinching.
Jamila watched from the shadows of the stairwell. It was the first time she had seen another living human being in a week. She didn't know whether to run to them or hide.
"We bled for this manual," the man with the shield said, his voice steady. "We aren't handing it over to a pack of scavengers like you."
"What did you say!" shouted one of the opposite party. "Just kill him, captain!"
"The Captain, the man with the gun, simply smiled. It was a cold, predatory look. "You're too young to understand how the world works now, lad. You don't belong to a pack. No one will miss you, no one will cry for you, and no one is coming to save you. In this new world, the weak don't get to walk alone. You're lambs, and we are the wolves. Now, give me the book, and I might let you crawl away."
[Ugh, how cliché.] Jamila thought, feeling a wave of nausea. The man sounded like a villain from a bad B-movie. [Wait... what is that?]
As she focused her eyes, she realized her vision had changed. She could see faint, misty traces of light surrounding the men. Qi.
It didn't take long for her to realize that this was related to their cultivation. The five smugglers, she now fully believed they were just that, had only thin, flickering traces of it. They hadn't even achieved the First Stage of Body Tempering yet. But the trio with the sword? Their Qi was much more dense.
"Sakeem, maybe we should just give it to them?" one of the younger men whispered to the leader. "As long as we're alive, we can find another way..."
"I'll answer you with two simple words," Sakeem ignored his friend, staring directly into the Captain's eyes. "FUCK YOU!"
*BANG!*
A sharp, explosive sound rang out, echoing through the hall. Jamila squeezed her eyes shut, her body flinching. [Oh God, he just killed him!]
She was terrified to open her eyes, but the shouts that followed weren't cries of victory—they were screams of pure, unadulterated terror. She forced her eyes open and gasped.
And she became even more terrified.
Sakeem wasn't dead. The sound hadn't been a gunshot; it had been the sound of something heavy crashing through the skylight.
A beast—looking like an oversized, prehistoric cat—was currently tearing through the smugglers. It was over five feet long, its fur a chaotic mess of colors that didn't match any tiger or leopard Jamila knew. It moved like a blur, leaping with a nimbleness that defied gravity.
The five smugglers were already down, a pile of blood and khaki. The "cat" had opened their throats with a single swipe. Now, it was focused on the trio. It lashed out at Sakeem, its claws ripping jagged chunks of wood out of his shield with every strike.
The three survivors tried to surround it, but they were exhausted. Their Qi was flickering, their movements slowing down. They wouldn't last another minute.
The remaining group tried to surround the beast, but they were too tired to succeed. Their Qi was ending and they wouldn't be able to hold on for much longer.
[What do I do? What do I do?] Jamila gripped her spear, her knuckles white. The beast was too fast. It was a killing machine. But even as her mind screamed at her to stay hidden, her legs began to move. Her body, conditioned by a week of cultivation and survival, acted on its own. She was sprinting across the lobby before she even realized it.
[Oh God, what the hell am I doing!?]
"DIE, YOU STUPID CAT!" Jamila screamed at the top of her lungs, the sound echoing off the marble walls.
She threw herself forward, channeling every ounce of Qi she had into her arms and the tip of her spear. The beast, caught in mid-air as it lunged for Sakeem's throat, couldn't adjust in time. It twisted its body, but the spear was already there.
"What!" the group screamed in bewilderment.
*SPLASH!*
The improvised blade sank deep into the beast's soft underbelly. The momentum carried the spear all the way through, the tip bursting out of the cat's spine in a spray of dark blood. The creature let out one final, choked hiss before crashing to the floor, dead before it even landed.
Silence returned to the hall, save for the heavy breathing of the four survivors.