Atkinson was immediately knocked out cold and probably in a coma. His whole body fell backwards like that of a cartoon character slipping on a banana peel.
It would've been funny, except it's not funny. His head hit a sharp edge on the hole and bled profusely.
The group was immediately frightened, they saw the shadow of those things. Those things are like cancer cells.
They are basically a clump of zombies mashed together into a large monster zombie.
Surprisingly they were not loud, but rather quiet like a stalker hence their name is the stalker.
Their sizes vary, but the average would be around two meters in height and very large but not fat.
They have large funguses completely covering their head and parts of their torso and legs.
The group faced one when they were stuck in a subway. It crashed when the subway conductor was infected by the spores in the miasma coming from the underground.
Lots of people were clumped together when most of them were infected by the spores.
Luckily, they left with a few other people when the stalker started to charge towards them.
It chased them outside onto the platform before dumbly crashing into a metal pillar. The ceiling crashed onto the stalker and the group escaped successfully.
Back to the highway, Rick started up the truck and drove back where they came from.
No one objected, once the stalker acts up, they were all probably going to be dead rotten meat.
They really left him in the dust. What a cruel world.
Squish Squish
The stalker's hideous face full of fungus stopped an inch before Atkinson's face.
If it was a normal person seeing this, they would've passed out. However, Atkinson already passed out dreaming about zombie sheeps.
A thick cloud of microscopic spores was sprayed onto Atkinson's body shrouding it completely.
Meanwhile, inside his zombie sheep dreams
It was quite pleasant, he was rearing some very fine and obedient sheep. Following his every command with ease.
Some were also quite intelligent and knew how to communicate back to Atkinson, giving him information about how the sheeps were doing.
They were doing just fine, grazing the endless fields of the fleshy earth and multiplying moderately.
Sometimes a sheep would go far away when not commanded and lose its source of food, causing it to lie down and sleep forever.
The corpse would be rotting away while the fungus rested dormant. Waiting for the next meal.
Suddenly after an unknown of time, Atkinson woke up feeling totally refreshed as if he just took a nice hot shower.
Wait.
What is that in front of me!?
Seriously, it hasn't even been a week and there are already boss level zombies?
More importantly.
Why is it just sitting still?
Strange.
Suddenly, a headache washed over his brain. It was painful, but not as painful as hitting his head on a sharp edge.
When he closed his eyes, he could 'see' the zombie in front of him. Not only that, but he could also in a way that would take years to explain, 'see' what the zombie sees.
It felt natural, once again it would literally take years possibly decades to explain how and why this happened.
Lets just say for now, that he was the chosen one.
He tried to 'talk' to the zombie several times. Just then, the stalker moved as Atkinson commanded.
There was a strange feeling inside his heart just then. It was probably excitement and happiness.
For the next hour, he could finally control the stalker with ease like a professional. He ordered it to climb out of the hole with him.
Using his newfound mind-sense, he felt several other normal zombies that were nearby. He tried to communicate and control them.
He succeeded.
Soon he had about 10 normal zombies and a stalker lined up like sheep about to jump over a fence.
Of course, he couldn't control them all at once. He decided to just control the stalker as it was the most useful.
However, when he tried to control more than one zombie at a time, in his mind he could see something that limited his number of control.
To describe it, it wouldn't be possible for a human to even fathom. So using a levelling system as an analogy would be the best way to explain it in detail.
There was an experience bar labeled level 1. And there was an inventory bar below it and a figure of Atkinson with all his belongings.
The inventory bar was grayed out, it was inaccessible for now. Atkinson saw it as an empty void, maybe it's an dimensional pocket mentioned in many novels.
Whatever, I'll figure it out when I become more powerful.
It was a really epic scene, never seen before, a person riding on top of a very large stalker walking off into the sunset.
It was enough to bring someone in tears… of fear of course.
It was really disgusting for Atkinson to ride on some fungus zombie so he wrapped its head with the last towel from his arms.
He didn't think much about his new ability, he already saw others with abilities such as Carl who can discharge high voltage of electricity.
As for Negan, he probably has mind powers only for controlling inanimate objects.
Since they already left, it wasn't necessary to follow them or get revenge on Negan. They will probably meet again.
That's just fate.
Now that he had pretty much an invincible shield, he doesn't feel like he needs to go to some shelter for protection.
Now that the government is probably dead inside, I should make my own shelter and possibly an empire in this new world!
As long as he improves his ability, he will definitely succeed.
Once he reached the city, it looked like a real zombie apocalypse city. There were zombies to be seen every so often.
He didn't know how long time has passed since his coma, but from the condition of the city, it seems to be about a month.
Broken windows, doors, signs, cars, you name it. Nature has also taken roots in the city, there were overgrown weeds and saplings and grass.
There were also some fungus nests in a few buildings.
Truly disgusting.
In reality, it should've taken at least a few years for an empty city to look overgrown by nature. This acceleration was probably because of the strange miasma that can be faintly seen in the air.
Anyways.
Where should I establish my fine base? I think it should be a trading post for now, i can protect myself pretty well so there should be plenty of customers when survivors spread the news.
He walked deeper into the city and chose to settle down in a Bank, named Banknetic. Not the best place in terms of supplies, but great for other reasons.
Besides he can just stay safe inside locked behind strong doors and there are cameras outside and inside the building.
He controlled the stalker zombie to guard the front doors which were metal and secure.
Meanwhile, he took his time to explore the bank thoroughly.