Bonus Chapter!
First Thing First I just fixed everything it turns out problem was with chapter 20 itself and I fix so you should re read it from the scene change sorry about that! So read it again.
So what power should his X-Gene, Quirk Factor, or Compound V give? They should be related to strength but just shouldn't be basic shit like super strength, it could be something like Colossus' metal skin or Sebastian Shaw's kinetic energy absorption. What are your ideas?
Author's note: Come on guys write some reviews.
If you want me to continue this work, I would appreciate encouragement. Let this novel become famous! I would like you to bring power stones. If you have any advice for me, please comment so I can improve.
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"Get off!" Rain kicked it in the face, shattering its nose. She pulled herself up just as three more swarmed the spot where she had been standing.
But the danger wasn't over.
As they crawled along the suspended pipes, zombies began to climb the walls, reaching out with desperate, grasping hands.
"Keep moving!" Alice ordered.
They crawled on hands and knees, balancing precariously twenty feet above the gathering horde.
Rain gasped. A hand shot out from a side vent, grabbing her injured arm. She screamed, not in fear, but in pure fury, and smashed the zombie's hand with the butt of her gun until it let go.
"I'm bitten!" she yelled, checking her neck where another one had grazed her. "Just scratches! Keep going!"
They reached a junction. The pipes led to a small maintenance hatch—the exit.
Alice, Matt, Spence, and Rain made it across the gap.
It was Kaplan's turn.
He was sweating, his glasses fogged up. He crawled along the pipe, the metal groaning under the collective weight.
CREAAAAK.
"Kaplan, hurry!" Alice shouted, reaching her hand out.
"I'm coming!" Kaplan lunged forward.
SNAP.
The bracket holding the pipe to the ceiling rusted through. The bolt sheared off with a sound like a gunshot.
The pipe swung violently downward.
"Whoa!" Kaplan screamed, losing his grip.
He slid backward, his fingernails scraping uselessly against the metal.
"Chad! No!" Alice yelled—confusion making her mix up names in the heat of the moment, but the horror was real. "Kaplan!"
Kaplan fell.
He hit the ground hard, landing in a foot of murky water. His glasses flew off.
He groaned, sitting up, blinking blindly in the dark.
"Kaplan!" Alice leaned over the edge of the catwalk. "Grab my hand! Jump!"
Kaplan looked up. The pipe had swung too far away. The wall was too high.
And around him, the shadows were moving.
Dozens of zombies, drawn by the noise, splashed toward him. They emerged from the steam, surrounding him in a tightening circle of teeth and hunger.
Kaplan found his glasses, jammed them onto his face, and saw his death approaching.
"I can't reach!" Kaplan yelled, pulling his sidearm.
"Try!" Matt shouted. "Climb the rack!"
"There's too many!" Kaplan backed up against the wall. He looked up at them—at Alice, Rain, and Matt. He saw the hesitation. They were going to come down for him. They were going to die for him.
He couldn't let that happen.
"Go!" Kaplan screamed, his voice cracking. "Leave me!"
"No!" Alice shouted.
"I said leave!" Kaplan fired a shot into the nearest zombie. "Get out of here! Save yourselves!"
He turned his gun on the horde, firing wildly.
Rain grabbed Alice's shoulder. "We have to go. We can't save him."
Alice looked at Kaplan one last time. He was disappearing under a wave of grey bodies.
"I'm sorry," she whispered.
The group turned and scrambled through the maintenance hatch, slamming it shut behind them.
[Below]
Kaplan screamed as a hand grabbed his ankle. He kicked it away, firing point-blank into the zombie's face.
Bang! Bang! Click.
His gun slide locked back. Empty.
"No... no..."
He scrambled backward, crawling through the muck, looking for an escape. He saw a small service crawlspace—too small for the zombies, but maybe big enough for him.
He dove into it, shimmying backwards, kicking at the hands clawing at his boots.
"Back! Get back!"
He squeezed deeper into the hole. The zombies jammed their arms in, but they couldn't fit. They snarled and snapped, blocked by the narrow opening.
Kaplan sat there in the dark, breathing like a dying engine. He fumbled for a fresh magazine, only to realize he had dropped his ammo pouch in the fall.
He checked his gun. One bullet in the chamber. That was it.
"Shit... I can't... huuuuh..."
He pointed the gun at his own temple. The sounds of the gnashing teeth were inches from his feet. He closed his eyes, his finger tightening on the trigger.
"I can't do it."
He lowered the gun. He looked down the dark, narrow tunnel behind him. It led deeper into the unknown.
"I'm not dying here today."
Kaplan turned around and began to crawl into the darkness, leaving the horde behind.
---
Ten minutes later.
The utility tunnel was quiet again, save for the splashing of the undead wandering aimlessly.
From the maintenance hatch leading back to the Red Queen's chamber, a massive shadow emerged.
It moved on all fours, crawling along the ceiling upside down. It had no skin, only raw, exposed muscle. Its brain was visible, pulsing beneath a thin membrane. It had no eyes, but its long, whip-like tongue tasted the air.
Subject-001: The Licker.
It hissed, tasting the scent trails.
Sweat. Fear. Blood.
It ignored the zombies. It wanted fresh meat. It locked onto the scent of Alice and the others.
The Licker dropped from the ceiling and sprinted into the tunnel, moving with terrifying speed.
[But it was not alone.]
Licker believed itself to be the apex predator here.
It was wrong.
Minutes after the Licker vanished deeper into the Hive, another presence emerged from the darkness.
Boots touched the ground without a sound.
Atlas stood at the edge of the corridor, head slightly tilted as he studied the environment. The smell hit him instantly—rot, rust, old blood, and something sharp beneath it.
High above the murky water and rusted grating of the utility tunnels, concealed within the shadows of the ventilation infrastructure, a pair of grey eyes tracked the movement below.
Atlas crouched on a suspended conduit, his body perfectly still, blending into the darkness like a gargoyle of modern industry. He watched the massive, skinless form of the Licker—Subject 001—scuttle along the ceiling, its whip-like tongue tasting the air for the scent of Alice and the others.
The Licker was fast. Terrifyingly so. To a normal human, it was a blur of death.
But to Atlas? It was a walking treasure chest.
'Go on, doggy,' Atlas thought, a predatory smirk stretching his pale lips. 'Lead the way. Take me to the main event. You're just the courier delivering my Experience Points.'
He waited a few seconds after the Licker disappeared around the bend, ensuring the "Boss" wouldn't interfere with his warmup. He looked down. The tunnel below was crawling with the leftovers—the straggler zombies that had failed to catch the humans but were still hungry for flesh.
Atlas stood up on the narrow beam, balancing effortlessly.
'Time to grind.'
He dropped.
THUD.
Atlas landed in the center of the walkway, the water splashing around his boots. He didn't stumble. He didn't roll. He landed with the heavy, solid impact of a creature far denser than a human.
Immediately, many pairs of milky, clouded eyes turned toward him.
The zombies—a mix of maintenance workers in greasy jumpsuits and technicians in tattered lab coats—groaned. The fresh scent of his "living" biology hit them like a drug.
"Graaaagh..."
They lunged.
Atlas didn't flinch. He didn't back away. He smiled, his sharp canines glinting in the flickering strobe of a dying halogen bulb.
SNIKT!
The sound was music. Six silver-white bone claws, razor-sharp, slid from his knuckles in a synchronized flash.
"Come here, my little EXP bags," he whispered.
A scientist zombie reached him first, arms flailing wildly.
Atlas moved.
He didn't just dodge; he flowed. He dipped his shoulder, letting the zombie's clumsy grab pass inches from his face. Then, with a pivot of his hips, he spun.
SHING.
His right hand swept out in a brutal horizontal arc. The claws caught the scientist in the neck. There was no resistance—just the wet sound of tearing meat. The head separated from the shoulders, spinning in the air before splashing into the murky water.
'Too slow,' Atlas critiqued. 'You move like molasses.'
Three more surged forward, trying to overwhelm him with weight.
Atlas clamped his mouth shut tight—he had no desire to taste the rot-infested black blood that was about to spray everywhere.
He leaped.
With Agility and Strength 18, gravity was merely a suggestion. Atlas jumped straight up, grabbing an overhead steam pipe with his left hand. He swung his body like a pendulum, his legs snapping out.
CRACK! CRACK!
His boots connected with the skulls of two zombies. The force was catastrophic. Their heads snapped back, necks breaking instantly, and they were launched backward into the tunnel walls.
Atlas released the pipe, flipping mid-air to land behind the third zombie.
Before the creature could even turn around, Atlas drove his claws into its back, piercing the spine and severing the neural connection. He ripped the claws out sideways, shredding the torso, and kicked the corpse into the path of the others.
He was dancing.
It wasn't a desperate fight for survival; it was a performance. A waltz of gore.
Next was a scientist, lab coat hanging in tatters, jaw partially torn away. It turned, groaning, arms stretching forward.
Atlas didn't slow.
Three silver claws extended from his knuckles in a blur of motion. He twisted his body mid-stride, using rotational momentum—
—and decapitated the zombie in a single spinning slash.
The head hit the wall first.
The body followed a second later.
Atlas landed lightly, already moving.
He utilized the environment perfectly. He grabbed a maintenance worker by the collar of his jumpsuit and slammed him face-first into a protruding valve wheel.
Crunch.
He spun a female technician around, using her as a meat shield to block another zombie, then skewered them both with a single thrust of his long claws.
*****
I hope now you know the world is more than you or Atlas thought.
So what power should his X-Gene, Quirk Factor, or Compound V give? They should be related to strength but just shouldn't be basic shit like super strength, it could be something like Colossus' metal skin or Sebastian Shaw's kinetic energy absorption. What are your ideas?