There was nothing I could see but darkness, stretching towards the unknown. An Oblivion? The void? Or maybe the abyss? There was no way on telling where I'm in and the only thing I could hear are the sounds of crashing waves.
A never-ending splash of water, getting stronger and stronger by the second until a sudden burst of uproar resonated, piercing my eardrum so hard, it brought my consciousness back to reality. But the reality was still the same as I had passed out. I was still in the world I thought was just a hellish dream of swarming undead, and nothing has changed.
It was still plagued and chaotic.
Light-headedness was still attacking my mind when the phone in my jacket vibrated in my pocket before shutting off and to my surprise, it has already been ten minutes since my sister last called, a few moments before this mess started. But in the duration of my sleep, I found out something that gave me a huge relief.
I wasn't getting zombified.
Unlike the one I saw in the movies, they don't seem to be capable of infecting nor spreading plague towards the population through a bite. Although, leaving the untreated wound seemed to still have an effect on me. Aside from feeling like I could have a fever, the wound was very itchy and I felt a bit of sting within like a hundred needles piercing it.
But I can't bother myself getting treated by someone now as no doctor would be in-house in this tragedy.
The scattered bottled water did little help from the pain after rinsing the wound but scarfs lying among the wrecked stalls patched the wound just fine, keeping it from bleeding further. It was the only thing I could do at the moment.
Well, of course, I'd pay the stall owners back… If ever this whole mess even end.
But that said, I don't think that'll be any time soon. The mess those creatures had brought into our place was no ordinary litter.
And more was still coming.
The plaza became less crowded, and every people hiding from the dead had started fleeing. Some were hiding atop of the great tree, while the others still cower beneath unturned corpses. Yet anywhere in the vicinity, there wasn't a sight of her, nor her date. Those two might have gotten elsewhere but knowing the current situation of this madness, I doubt there would still be called a safe haven.
In every direction, black smoke ascends into the sky, people's voice echoes in every corner as they cry, while the sirens resonate only to keep adding noise in this maddening time.
It could longer keep anyone sane but somehow, I was able to keep pushing through just to know she's safe. But I couldn't picture her smile now as this scenario crashed into this place.
I had to find her.
But first, getting out of that place was my first objective. Taking a wooden stick, and a piece of plywood as a shield from the wreckage of the stall near me, I broke a small chuckle as it made me look like I'm cosplaying a beginner player in a video game with cheap equipment.
I was ready for escape when another problem occurred, halting my plan.
The decayed man appeared at the center of the plaza, then the wound I had started wringing. The creature began murmuring words that called out a giant obelisk from the ground and breaking the hard concrete floor, and the pain I felt became more excruciating.
It was like something was eating me from the inside while my heart seemingly stopped beating.
The pain disappeared as the obelisk had fully ascended four meters from the ground. It was an eerie object that made all my hair in my body stand while a phenomenon emerged after, taking the small positivity I gained.
As the solar annular eclipse faded, the sky succumbed to these massive dark clouds, seeping all the light and making the day look like the night. The sky turned dark gray that light barely passes through and only adding light to the path was the fire burning all throughout the city. Electricity had also disappeared as an explosion occurred somewhere in the city.
To put things worse, the undead started gathering, surrounding the plaza, and trapping me along with the other hiding citizens.
Until bullet rained as dispatched soldiers and police officers arrived in their vehicles, and fought valiantly on handling the situation but were only dragged into the mess and added into the infected beings.
At first, I thought they would be able to control this madness as they were able to get rid of a large amount of those dead but soon as those demonic creatures formed within the obelisk that turned the tides upside down.
They were helpless. I could imagine they were like ants getting trampled upon so easily. But their sacrifices aided my escape.
I knew there was no evacuation plan made for the people could no longer keep their sanity as the controlling forces were already down. Even if one was still sane enough to try, the population had already been eaten by fear to even listen to anyone and be united.
Escaping the plaza was indeed became like a rogue-like game. Although, I wasn't the calm player behind some screen but rather, the character of the game itself who feels the tension of one wrong move would lead to an instant game over, death. There was no way of just leisurely walking on the streets without getting detected. And if my phone was still alive, the never-ending notification would have caused me trouble like what it brought the others.
There were full of questions inside my head but one thing for sure was, the thing going on right now, wasn't just happening in our place but rather, the whole world is suffering in such fate.
["I repeat, this is not a prank. The world's gonna end! Argh!" A reporter behind the flat screen on the television store screamed before getting attacked by the dead. Other news showing on different monitors were about it as chaos as well. The pyramid getting destroyed by a giant serpent, the arctic region getting invaded by skeletons with rusty blades, while the other places were just as messed up as the other.]
"Just what the heck is happening?" I cursed before running after getting noticed by those creatures again.
Running, hiding, and sneaking, all led me into the place I thought I'd never see again. But even there was catastrophic for the whole campus has been turned into a base of the living dead. The entrance was filled with those things and not a single normal living being could be seen there.
Well, of course, I'm talking about the campus ground but on the roof, it's a different story. Somehow, a couple of people manage to make their way through the roof, cautiously avoiding the threat beneath their feet, then descended through the fire exit after reaching the next building through great effort.
It was them, I thought and I was right.
But as soon as I've gotten close to their party, I saw horrific and disturbing faces. Everyone was badly injured, and the girl with the most beautiful smile now had been rewritten by chaos as she drew the expression of a dreaded and terrified face.
She dropped onto her knees, her left hand supports her fall as the other grasps her heart as she tries to endure the pain while her lungs kept functioning abnormally. She was out of breath while her face turns pale white. The person she was with was no longer on her side and her clothes were splattered with blood, then a thousand pictures and scenarios formed my head of what might happen.
The more I watch her, the more the fear I once felt turns into hatred towards this unforgiving event. My blood boils to the extreme point and my eyes darken as madness develops through my veins. But against this catastrophe, we're just moths going against a massive fire. Which further pissed me off.
"We can't keep going like this!" our class president, Shane panicked.
"We don't have a choice! It's either we tire ourselves to death from running or be eaten alive." Rodrick claimed.
"I know that! But not everyone is in the right state for another run!" Shane protested.
The others were still in the process of regaining their lost breath when the large gate collapse from the heavy stress and freed the trapped undead. The impact may have knocked a few into the ground, building a barricade of rotting meat for the undead but it won't be long until the dead comes crawling back again.
"Crap, we need to get out of here!" Rodrick cursed.
"Over here!" From across the street, inside a dark alley, one of our classmates gestured as he flashes the lights from his phone at us.
The path was a tight space, capable of hindering a large number of pursuers to a bare minimum at a time. But even in there was still dangerous and silence was needed to stay alive as for what was revealed at the end were large river serpents occupying the water, devouring anything that makes a loud sound.
It ain't as large as what I'm seen on the monitor, but it was large enough to haul you for a snack, and not even the dead escaped the mouth of the serpent.
The railings that should be there to protect us from falling to the river were mostly destroyed, giving us only half a meter of clearance as a path.
Every single rustle, every ripple, and every slight sound we hear makes our gaze shift in its direction. All of us were wary of the fact that our choices could determine our fate whether we could live another tomorrow or not. We either fall, get eaten or get out of this place alive.