Mutagen

<strong>Day 21 – 2:11 PM – Mount Daraitan, General Nakar, Quezon</strong>

Exhausted, hungry, injured. These words were just three of the things that could describe a group of people hiking in the mountains with improper hiking equipment. Rather than hiking though, it was more likely that they were escaping. They were trying to survive with all they could.

There were eleven people in the group. Seven were males and four were females. Among the group, three were obviously injured and two of the injured were males. On the other hand, two of the men were somewhat in good condition compared to the others.

Within the number of females, there was Nicole Alberts who was currently helping her best friend, Hallie who injured her leg walk. On the other side of Hallie was another female who was called Trisha also helping. It was not like the males did not want to help but the two males who was injured was also being helped by the others while those who were free was the ones to protect them if danger came.

Leading the group up the mountain was Jefferson Alba who was someone that got bitten by the zombies. At that time he was bit, he left but only to return the next day and actually gained superpowers. The other male beside Jefferson was Sherwyn Ferer who somehow gained higher agility after escaping a horde and succumbing to fever.

Except for two people among the group, the rest of them here were employees from the same animation company. When the outbreak struck, they were in a hotel resort in Antipolo, Rizal. It was because of a three-day companywide team building camp. They checked out early even before daybreak and wait for their ride back to the city. Unfortunately, what greeted them that morning were not the rented vehicles that should bring them home but a plane crash at a nearby barangay.

Sirens of fire trucks, police cars and ambulances echoed all over in that cold morning and it made their whole group of more than a hundred employees rather restless as they waited in the hotel lobby. The hotel staffs were also troubled with a lot of people in the lobby but as there were no guests coming at that time, the employees with higher positions managed to convince the staff to let them stay as they waited for their ride. For some reason, their phone calls were not connecting.

Three hours past the scheduled time however, their ride still did not arrive. What arrived was sudden chaos with people outside the hotel running away and screaming.

It was the start of the zombie outbreak and all of them were caught unprepared.

Among the over a hundred employees in the team-building camp, only fifty-one managed to get the safety of the upper floors of the hotel. They had access to the food supply of the hotel through the employee and service hallways but along with the hotel staff and the hotel guests with them, the supply did not last long and the capable ones started to gather up and do supply runs in the following days.

Unfortunately, in almost every run, one or two of the members that went out would not be able to return.

About two weeks after, a helicopter flew throwing leaflets. They tried to signal the helicopter but it did not respond. The helicopter was attacked by flying insects at that time but the people aboard the helicopter were capable and equipped enough to thwart the danger.

On the leaflet, they were enthusing survivors to gather at their base in Ungos, Real Quezon.

Considering their current condition in the hotel and their dwindling supplies compared to the hope of finding a safer place to stay, two factions came about. The first faction was adamant of staying at the hotel while the other was the ones who wanted to find a safer place.

There were thirty people on the second faction and they all left the hotel the next day after arguing with the other faction on splitting the supply even resulting to a murder of two people. That was how bad their condition in the hotel was.

The hardest obstacle they encountered when they left was that even the roads going through the mountains were filled with zombies. The scary part was that there were a lot of animals and mutated among the zombies. Because of the zombies along the road, they lost a lot of people due to their group being too large especially when they had no way of finding good transportation in the area.

They were forced to stray away from the roads going into the mountains. They thought that there would be fewer zombies here due to the terrain.

What they did not expect was that it was even worse. They just entered another hell. The only difference was that the ones attacking them were not zombies but absurdly large animals and insects. At times, there were even plants. Their numbers started to dwindle.

They had been wandering through the forest and mountains since then.

When only fifteen of them were left, they found a good place to stay near a large river. The area was wide and the vantage point was good with the forest being quite a distance away. There was also unused camping equipment left in the place that they managed to use. Unfortunately, they were attacked by another monster.

For sure, it was a tiger. The only difference was its fangs were protruding out of its mouth and its claws were as sharp as swords. When they flee, they saw how the tiger cleanly slashed the bodies of their team-members that tried to stall the tiger. They had two guns with them but they only have a few bullets left and looking at how the tiger attacked, there was no other choice but to run away.

That brought them to their current predicament. Without rest, sleep and food, they were forced to scale the mountains after even soaking themselves across the river just to escape.

Nicole felt her body was starting to feel hot and her face flushed red due to illness but she could not stop until they get to safety. The only thing she could do was to bite her lips and endure while she dragged her best friend along with them.

It was then that they found a village in the middle of the mountains. They were overjoyed at the unexpected findings.

'Maybe, they could stay here. Are there people in the village?'

These thoughts entered her mind as they approached. They noticed the cans and metal scraps dangling on strings around the village.

"Be careful everyone. These cans should be some sort of alarms. There should be people living in the village."

One of the males who was wearing glasses said. He was called Huey Wang, a Filipino-Chinese who was working as a supervisor back in the animation company. He was rather young to be a supervisor but apparently, his father was one of the top executives of the company. There were no negative rumors about him however due to him being rather good at his work and showing intelligence not only in their field but also in other things. When they left the hotel, he was the person leading the group.

After saying that, Huey pulled one of the strings creating as much sound as it could.

"What are you doing?!"

Jefferson hurriedly stopped Huey.

"We're here to find shelter. If we suddenly intrude into the village and there are people there, it won't be surprising if we suddenly get attacked. If we sound the alarm in this distance, even if the villagers are hostile, in the least we can still escape."

"What are you afraid of? There's me and Sherwyn here."

"Don't be too conceited." Huey fixed his glasses. "You two may have gotten superhuman abilities but it doesn't mean that only the two of you received one."

"Alright, alright. It's really hard to argue with smart*sses like you."

Jefferson stopped talking and waited as Huey instructed. A minute passed however, no one came out from the village. They finally went to see if the village was abandoned.

Searching around, they found out that most houses where devoid of things that could be used especially food, spices and water.

"Hey! We found something here!"

Everyone heard Sherwyn's voice and started to gather at the rather sturdy looking house near the center of the village. When they arrived, they saw Jefferson brandishing a reddish-black knife and hitting a body of a rather huge monkey hanged beside the house.

"Look! This knife is amazing! It's even sharper than my claws!"

Jefferson said as he slashed the ribcage of the monkey. The ribcage slanted and the skin opened up but they did not hear any resistance from the bones on the ribs of the monkey.

"Oi! Stop that!"

The last female, Jollene Rodriguez bellowed. The scene was rather disgusting especially when the loose skin of the monkey opened up showing them its flesh and internal organs.

"That's right. Stop doing that. These things aren't ours and that monkey there should be hanged there for about a day or two. It should belong to the person that set up those alarm traps."

Huey added.

"Don't be such a KJ. It's not like I'm destroying anything right?"

Sherwyn then went out of the house nibbling on something.

"Hey everyone! There's meat inside and even fruits!" Sherwyn then handed some slices of smoked meat to them. "I wonder what meat is this. It's too tasty!"

Seeing the satisfied face of Sherwyn, the other men could not help but accept the meat and started to eat. On the side, Huey slapped his forehead. He could not help but wonder where these people did left their brains in despair. Food was too precious to them, not to mention others. Yet, these idiots were nibbling on the food they did not even pay for. He could not help but say…

"We're done for."

"Yeah, you people are done for."

An unfamiliar voice entered their ears making everyone pause.

Since the voice came from somewhere close, they immediately pinpointed where the voice came from. They all turned to the empty house behind them that they were not paying attention to. There was a man sitting at the ledge of the roof looking down on them.

He was wearing a reddish-black light armor with style that could mostly be seen in role-playing games. On his left hand, he was holding a sheathed thin sword. They could not see his face as most part of his face was covered with his neck long hair. The only things they could make out were the pale color of his skin and his eyes.

Due to the fright they experienced, everyone took out their weapons. Even Huey and Sherwyn were not exceptions as the two people who still had their pistols. Jefferson on the other hand clenched his fists and six claw-shaped blades came out protruding from the back of his hands.

To Huey's surprise, he saw the eyes of the man dart alternating at everyone holding weapons. He came to a realization.

'Sh*t! We've been had!'

The man on the roof surely surprised them on purpose so that they would involuntarily take out their weapons! That way, they revealed their cards without them knowing! Now that the man on the roof knew what weapons they wield, there was no way for them to do surprise attacks anymore and he would able to judge which one was a threat and which one was not!

'Damn it! This person is not simple! We shouldn't fight him!'

Those words was about to blurt out from his mouth but he was late.

BANG!

To Huey's horror, Sherwyn did the first shot with his gun.

The man on the roof however did not dodge.

In a fast motion that they could not even follow, the man pulled out the katana out of its sheath slicing the bullet into two in the process.