Chapter 13

  While he rested, sitting on the floor and leaning against the wall, Jake checked his current stats on his PDA. His Perception was thirteen, which allowed his bat skills such as Pistols and Shotguns to increase up to one huhirty. They were currently at thirty-four and twenty-two respectively, so there was no immediate o increase his Perception attribute yet. After giving the matter some thought, Jake put both his skill points into stitution.

  The huge mutant, which Jake assumed was a shambler, had hit him pretty hard, sending him flying across the width of the corridor to crash into the wall. While his body was hurting from the blow and collision with the wall, it didn’t feel like he’d broken anything. As far as he could tell, he was scraped and bruised in numerous pces, but that was the extent of the damage he’d taken. He didn’t bleed—not muyway—and while his ribs were sore, he didn’t think they were broken or cracked. Not so long ago, he’d allocated one skill point to stitution, so that probably was the reason his body was more resilient and damage-resistant than it’d been before. Which was why Jake decided to put both his skill points into that attribute—to further enhance his body’s resistao damage.

  He noticed that aab had been unlocked on his PDA. When he ope, he saw a message dispyed across the s: SUPPLY DROP IS AVAILABLE (x1) [ON]. TIP: TAP AND HOLD ANYWHERE ON THE MAP TO REQUEST A SUPPLY DROP. It was a reward for pleting the sedary objective of his mission, which had been to kill the shambler. He couldn’t help but wonder what a supply drop might tain.

  Jake switched to the map and studied it for a moment. Those areas of the city where he’d already been were cleared out of the gray fog. As for the rest of the map, it was still shrouded in mist. He tapped and held on the spot o the entrao the building he was currently in. A couple of seds ter, a message popped up: WOULD YOU LIKE TO REQUEST A SUPPLY DROP HERE: Y/N (APPROXIMATE TIME OF ARRIVAL: 12 MIN). Jake pressed “No”. Before requesting the supply drop, he wao search this building for loot.

  He stood up and sed the dead body of the mutant with his PDA. DEAD EX-HUMAN MUTAY. Even though no info oant reseo him, by that point, it retty obvious that this mutant was called a shambler. He didn’t know its level yet, though.

  He then pointed his camera at one of the dead walkers. DEAD EX-HUMAN WALKER: EMPTY. The floor of the corridor was littered with dead walkers he’d killed a few minutes before. He was meticulously sing every single one of them, dragging the sed bodies aside to reveal the ones lying at the bottom of the pile. He was taken aback by how quickly he had gotten aced to the sight of gore and dead bodies. Some of the mutants had shotgun shells and pistol mags on them. Jake collected all the ammo, stowing it away in his pockets. He loaded some shells into his shotgun and slung the on over his shoulder.

  After searg through all the bodies, he finally left the corridor auro the hall where a few more dead mutants y scattered. He sed the one. DEAD EX-HUMAN WALKER: STIMPAK (x1). After taking the autoior from the pocket of the dead body, he sidered using it on himself. However, since he wasn’t seriously injured, he decided to save this miracle-like healing medication for ter. He then proceeded to seard loot the rest of the dead mutants.

  He was surprised to find that the fged mutant he’d wounded several times was still alive. It y on the floor, bleeding from numerous bullet holes. The creature watched Jake with its evil eyes, growling faintly, but it was so weak it couldn’t get up from the floor. He sed it. EX-HUMAN LEAPER [Level 3]. He then drew his pistol and fihe mutant off with a headshot. He sed the dead mutant’s body again, but the leaper didn’t have any loot on it.

  He remembered to check the dead survivor one of the mutants had beeing before all hell broke loose. He located the mutited body of the fellow survivor and looked at it for a moment, w who that guy was. He’d clearly been killed not long before Jake arrived. Maybe if he’d e to this building somewhat earlier, he could’ve saved the guy and they might’ve teamed up. Other thatle regret of haviardy, Jake didn’t feel much of anything else. This survivor was just another victim of the Colpse. The world had e to an end, and all those mutants he’d been killing for a while now had once been ordinary human beings. Most of the people living oh had either died or been turned into mutants when the System came, but Jake tried not to think about it so as not to succumb to depression.

  Jake sed the body with his PDA. DEAD SURVIVOR [Level 5]: STIMPAK (x3), BOTTLED WATER (x1), ED FOOD (x2), PISTOL MAGAZINE (x3), BERI PISTOL (x1). The dead survivor had some useful items on him, but looting him felt wrong. In the end, Jake mao quell his sce by reasoning that the dead survivor no longer needed all those items. It would surely not be the st time when Jake stumbled across the dead body of a fellow survivor. It would be stupid not to grab any resources that could enhance his ces of survival in this dangerous world.

  He crouched down and took off his backpack. For the minute, he was taking all the useful items from the dead survivor’s pockets and backpad stashing them into his own rucksack. In one of the dead guy’s coat inner pockets, Jake found a PDA. The device was locked, and when he pressed his thumb to the s, a text message popped up across it: YOU OT USE THIS DEVICE BECAUSE IT BELONGS TO SOMEBODY ELSE. Jake’s gaze fell on the survivor’s severed arm that a walker had been mung on wheepped into the building. Overing his disgust, he picked up the severed arm and pressed its thumb to the PDA’s s. This time, another message popped up. THE DEVICE OT BE UNLOCKED BECAUSE ITS OWNER IS DEAD.

  So the dead survivor’s PDA appeared to be totally useless. Jake dropped the severed arm and the device to the floor and got to his feet, putting on his rucksack. He then looked around one more time. He looted all the dead bodies, but there were a few doorways that led to other rooms. Jake was sure there were no more enemies around, but just in case, he unslung his shotgun a on to explore the other parts of the building.

  For the several minutes, he explored the remaining rooms on the first floor. All the stairs leading to the upper floors y in ruins, making it impossible to get upstairs. Jake didn’t enter any more mutants in the building, but he found some more ammo for his ons. After that, he made his way back to the hall. He retrieved his PDA and requested a supply drop o the entrao the building. He then took up a position at one of the shattered windows that faced the street and waited for his supply drop to arrive.