The atmosphere around the group of five was tense.
While Oliver stared at the stone weapons as if they were made out of gold, Sarah, the young woman, kept staring at his backpack.
Dilan noticed this quite early, and soon enough Jack started asking him questions.
"I won't beat around the bush. I don't really care if you killed that girl before she turned into a zombie or after, but why did you cut open the heads of all zombies?"
It was obvious that Jack had not seen the Essence crystals, but he was not stupid either.
As such, he asked the most important question.
'So he allowed me to come inside this hospital because he wanted information? Looks like I was a bit hasty by entering the hospital...'
Dilan understood the tricky situation he was in quite easily as well.
Jack was still pointing the gun at him from some distance, preventing him from doing anything as well.
Thus, he could only play along for the time being.
"If you cut open the heads of the zombies all around here, you should be able to find something called an 'Essence crystal'. Try it out, if you don't believe me."
Dilan had no plan of acting like a pushover irrespective of whether the gun was pointed at him.
He stared straight in Jack's eyes and didn't avoid them when he shared a few pieces of information, leaving it up to the others whether they wanted to believe him or not.
He didn't really care about their opinion in that regard.
Jack looked at Dilan for a few seconds before raising his free hand when they passed by a bunch of zombie corpses.
"Open up one of the zombies' heads, Oliver!"
Carrying the weapon that once belonged to Dilan, Oliver was the only one who had the necessary tool to open up the zombies' heads right now.
Jack had made it pretty clear that he did not want to dirty his finger right now.
However, Oliver was too disgusted and frightened to even touch the zombie corpses.
Shaking his head vehemently, he refused to do what Jack asked as he couldn't overcome his fear.
When Jack saw this, he grunted in anger before snatching the Reinforced Stone dagger out of Oliver's hands.
Throwing a glance back at Dilan, he moved the handgun around while saying,
"If you make even one suspicious move, I will shoot you!"
Dilan thought that Jack was being too wary of him, but he just nodded his head while mumbling,
"Then do it, you piece of trash!"
At that moment, he noticed the unarmed woman appear behind him and began rummaging through his backpack.
This was something that Dilan didn't want to happen which was why he instinctively moved.
"Don't move!" Jack barked a warning at him again.
'Fuck you!' Dilan cursed in his head and went still as he saw Sarah take his Essence crystals away as well.
'I will remember what you did there, woman!...'
"He has these crystals! But what am I supposed to do with them now?" She blurted out, visibly confused.
While pondering about their use for a few seconds, she even considered eating them.
But it was just at this moment that the first Essence crystal crumbled in her hand, and a notification popped up right in front of her.
[Essence of a Tierless Level 0 Zombie has been absorbed→ +0.1 Strength]
Several Essence crystals crumbled one after another and an enlightened expression appeared on Sarah's face.
'I shouldn't have saved up the Essence crystals for later to level up in one go…' Dilan thought in vain before he heard Sarah's voice.
"I gained 0.1 points in Strength!" She exclaimed after devouring the first Essence crystal but quieted down afterward.
Sarah realized she should not have said it out aloud but now it was too late.
Upon hearing her, everyone turned towards her, astonishment visible in their eyes.
Meanwhile, Jack got impatient as he searched for an Essence crystal impatiently, and found his first after a few seconds had passed.
Like Sarah, he too absorbed it, and the crystal crumbled in his hand a second later.
"I only got its essence, no increment in Strength!" He said, before looking at the Essence crystals in Sarah's hands.
She didn't devour all of them, and seeing greed glimmering in Jack's eyes, she quickly handed them over to him without another word, afraid that he would hurt her if she didn't comply.
A moment later, the remaining 12 Essence crystals crumbled at once, causing Dilan to want to stab Jack with his stone spear.
"0.2 points in strength, and I leveled up with the last crystal!!" Jack exclaimed with a bright smile and a glint in his eyes.
When Dilan heard this, he was a little bit astonished.
'Even if it looked like the Level 0 Zombies had less essence than the Level 1 Goblins, it shouldn't have required 12 Essence crystals to level up for the first time…and he got only 0.2 status points in total…'
At first, Dilan was confused, but then a quite simple yet somewhat plausible answer flashed through his mind.
'Is it because I killed the zombies, and not them?'
This was quite likely, and when he saw that Oliver overcame his fear to use the Reinforced Stone Spear to start pulling out Essence crystals out of the few zombie corpses that laid in the hallway, he figured out something else as well.
'Monsters killed with guns won't provide any status points and only little to no essence?'
Dilan arrived at this conclusion, when Oliver absorbed the essence of more than 12 zombies without leveling up, or receiving a single status point.
The others comprehended this as well, which was why they kept glancing at the two Stone weapons.
But what they misunderstood was an important fact.
The Essence crystals that belonged to him did not provide more Essence and status points because he used a weapon that belonged to the system, but because he fought with his own strength.
However, this was not something the small group had realized yet.
Thus, the focus of the group of four shifted from Dilan to the Reinforced Stone Spear and Stone Dagger, and they lost interest in him.
Only Bianne, the woman who had shot him in the arm, didn't lower her guard around him.
Yet, even then, she didn't notice that Dilan had already used his Origin ability [Regeneration] to heal the wounds all over his body a little bit faster.
Additionally, his high Health stat helped him recuperate even faster.
As such, by the time they reached the area in front of the cafeteria, he had nearly stopped bleeding.
'I just wanted to get a few things in the supermarket…and now I'm here, in the cafeteria of the hospital…after being shot by some lunatic!'
This was the only thought that flashed through his mind after getting shot and robbed as well.
He was angry and wanted to beat up the entire group for acting as if they could order him around.
But instead of doing something stupid, Dilan chose to wait.
Knocking on the doors of the cafeteria, Jack seemed to become quite impatient as he looked back a few times.
He had heard a few zombies before and hoped that some zombies from other rooms or the second floor would not come and hunt them down.
"It's us. Let us in, quick!"
What followed after his silent demand, was the sound of furniture being dragged away before the cafeteria doors opened.
A moment later, Dilan saw more than a dozen survivors right in front of him, looking at the group of five, with a mixture of fear and apprehension in their eyes.
But curiosity trumped over all their emotions, as they all observed the newcomer. Dilan furrowed his eyebrows and he couldn't help but ask,
"You guys were quite fast, not bad…are there more survivors?"
'...If not...I will beat your asses soon enough!'