Becoming a Monster

You should live your life too, grow stronger, because if it's really like the stories we read…then this is only the start."

He wasn't one to want to continue to have an emotional conversation so he chose this time to leave. But this time, as he walked past Ailetta, she wasn't crying like he thought she would, considering he just turned her down. This worked for him too since that would've made the situation more awkward.

Reaching the door, he placed his hand on the handle and remained there for a moment. He needed to readjust his mood from the conversation earlier since it could prove to be a distraction later. He thought back to everything that's happened in the period of time everything happened. The near death experiences, the annoying people, the thrills. He didn't realize it, but a smile was able to soon surface on his face.

He opened the door abruptly, prepared to continue his enjoyment of this new life given to him when he heard Ailetta yell from behind.

"This isn't goodbye Noah! I'll become strong! Strong enough to never hold you back!"

He wasn't sure why, but her words touched him. His excited smile that he had before, turned into one of warmth. But both he and Ailetta weren't aware of the look Mark was giving the two during their interaction.

"Urrgh" Noah stretch his body after making it outside. Dealing with everyone made his body tense, he would rather fight a hundred zombies instead of talking with unagreeable people. After finally making it to fresh air, with the mayhem sounding off in the horizons, he felt at ease again.

"Well, it looks like it's just you and me again. Wait! We need a name for you but…are you a male or female?"

The question that Noah assumed to be a simple one, only ended up leaving the spider confused. It doesn't know human language at all and has only been able to communicate with him through intentions. But through their bond, it has also been able to comprehend some of the simple words it's heard so far. But even then, it was still confused about the question.

"Ahem! I mean….are you the fucker or the one that gets fucked?" He looked towards the spider with a serious gaze afterwards. He didn't pay too much mind to his vulgar question, he was just trying to make it as simple for the spider as he thought was possible.

"!"

But it seemed that the spider actually took offense to the question. It suddenly appeared agitated while it started to trample its legs onto the ground. 'Are you trying to call me weak?' It seemed to be implying. It wasn't as if Noah tried to agitate it intentionally, but it seems that he had forgotten the common rule of most insects. And that was the hierarchy between the females and males.

Within most of the species of the insect kingdom, the females were always the dominant party. Even in the spiders situations, the female was normally much larger than the average male.

"So you're a female? Ok my bad, my bad! I should've realized that since only a queen spider can become as powerful as you, am I right?" His wry smile showed that he was just trying to get on the spider's good side and thankfully it worked. It was more than satisfied with what he said, which only made Noah more helpless against his companion. 'Not only is she a glutton, but apparently she's very prideful. Well maybe not too prideful…she at least has been listening to me, but let's see…I still need a name…'

"Oh I know!" The sudden outburst startled the spider because while she was waiting, she was distracting herself by watching their surroundings. She was about to go on another tantrum until she heard what he had to say next.

"I'll call you Arachne! What the name actually means doesn't matter, but supposedly Arachne is a legendary Spider that ruled over all spiders…she was also very prideful and was punished for that. I think this name suits you a lot. Together, you'll become the most powerful spider there is, but you have to make sure you're a good girl or your punishment will be less food."

Arachne was moved upon hearing her name, mainly the part about being the strongest, but the later half returned her back to reality. If she was going to get less food for having a name then she would rather not have one!

"Haha~ don't overthink it, you just have to listen and you can become strong, it's simple right?

But now…let's see, we still have to relocate…I'm tired of being mistaken for a zombie so we need a place where I can shower and returning back to the dorm isn't a good idea."

Looking in the distance towards the dorms, he could see small silhouettes of zombies making their way in this direction. And sadly, he could see more students heading in this direction. But it wasn't as if the cafeteria was the only place the students were attracted to. When Noah first looked out the boys dorm window, he could see students in groups running for the parking lots which was just as far as the cafeteria but were off to the sides of both dorms.

Noah didn't have a car so leaving by car was the last thing on his mind and he believed that any smart person would shut that idea down as well. Fleeing without information and a plan is never a smart move. And even then, if everyone decided to leave in their cars then heavy traffic was sure to occur. Noah would rather be stuck in a building than stuck in a car with no protection.

He was also able to spot students going in another direction, the direction they were headed to was a building almost as big as the cafeteria if not bigger.

"Fuck me…Ok I understand the cafeteria, but why there too?" It took a moment for Noah to register what the other building was, it just so happened to be the second place where he could take a shower to remove all the blood. He thought the gym would be the next perfect place to use as a base, it's still relatively close to the cafeteria so he wouldn't have to go too far away from the mysterious shopkeeper and the gym is fairly large without too many obstacles. If he ever was overrun by zombies or needed to retreat from something he couldn't contend against then he wouldn't have to navigate through too many obstacles to do so.

"Well there shouldn't be too many people there right? Ok, let's go Arachne…shoot, that's kind of a mouthful to say…I may already need a nickname for you…Well whatever, let's head over there and then we can rest for a bit. I'm sure that there aren't just zombies here, that voice earlier referred to all humans so I'm willing to bet that we will be pincered in soon, so we have a lot of work to do."

Thinking about the amount of screaming everyone's been doing and not to mention the students trying to escape by car, he was sure that soon they would attract a lot of attention from outside the campus, bringing in unwanted visitors. Before that happened, he and Arachne hurried to the gym's direction.

Since the zombies were slow, he didn't have to worry about them for quite awhile, or so he thought. When he was making his way to the gym, the group he saw previously who were also on their way there began to scream.

He was sure by the screams that they were being attacked, he didn't care about their situation but he was at least sure that the zombies from the dorms shouldn't be able to reach here yet, at least they shouldn't be able to catch someone who was running away. So his first thought was an animal that mutated, like the vulture for instance.

Now that he had a better understanding of his spider's capabilities, he knew that if they weren't directly confronting their enemy then Arachne would have an overwhelming advantage. It would probably be in his best interest to recuperate first since he has the ability to regain his stamina but his spider does not, but how could he let a juicy situation such as this pass by? He wouldn't always be able to find bait to draw in a big fish unless he was willing to be the bait.

[Player: Arachne

Race: Jumping Spider

Class: Arachnid

Lvl: 5

Exp:75/400

Health:70%

Stamina:53%

Mana: 4]

Just in case, he did a quick look at Arachne's stats to check her stamina, he couldn't use human recovery towards an animal, even more so to a spider that was nothing close to natural. And he was right to do so, the spider already recovered close to 10% of its stamina in that small amount of time which was already unbelievable to him. But he noted something else that was even more unthinkable.

'?? How did her experience increase? We didn't fight! Unless….' He thought back to what she's been doing ever since after the fight.

'Is she really getting experience from just eating? Is that some kind of skill or can we grow from eating too? Maaaann I want to try it so bad now, would my Chimera race make me absorb the traits of everything I eat then? It didn't work on my protein bar so maybe it only works on living creatures that can also level up?

So I should be ok as long as I avoid that for now. But that means I wont get extra experience either…ugh! This is annoying! I need time to think this through…Let's check things out over there first and then I'll make figuring this out my top priority.'

Having finally finished his inner rant. He quickened his pace to reach the group being attacked, the spiders stamina was good enough for now to handle whatever they encounter unless the animals widen the gap in strength since the time he spent in the shop which seemed impossible in his mind. If his spider could get tired then the rest of the animals should feel fatigued as well.

But he also thought about the fact how Arachne was able to recover a portion of her stamina faster than usual. Maybe feeding also helps stamina recovery which would mean animals have another advantage. Unless humans start adapting to this new life then they will soon be out of the race of survival of the fittest.

"Ahhhh! AHHHHH! N-NO HE-HEL-HELP MEEEEEE!"

When Noah finally came upon the group, he noticed that it was a group of around ten, but it appeared that the group should now be minus one since the person who screamed earlier was most likely a goner. Noah first observed the group that stopped and were looking towards the person being attacked as if they were contemplating helping him.

But that didn't last long before two of the females broke away from the group and made a beeline for the gymnasium. Noah already saw this kind of scenario plenty of times so he knew what was going to happen next. After the two ran away, the rest who thought about being a hero also followed in their footsteps, leaving the student alone to die.

This finally left Noah to observe what they were running from, surely it must be something truly horrifying, that a group of ten would be so afraid to help out someone they know. But not only was the perpetrator something he wasn't expecting, Noah was now beyond conflicted about what he was seeing right now.

"Wait….that's a zombie isn't it? And they were just running right? What the fuck is happening?"