Although the chances of humans slowly turning to a zombie or ability user were fifty-fifty, Sera's case was special. Those humans could still eat normal food, but Sera couldn't.
Zombies ate flesh and crystal nucleus. They wouldn't be able to swallow human food, which was akin to dirt to them. In this case, Sera's transformation was only one step away from becoming a zombie.
"What am I, Thalira?" Sera grabbed Thalira's shoulder, muttering in distress. Then, she abruptly let go of her with widened eyes, stuttering, "I-I didn't mean to… I am sorry, it might be infectious."
Thalira bit her lips and made a decision. She needed to tell Sera the truth. Even though her friend would become a zombie in the future, she weirdly felt like she could trust her.
Because of this weird feeling of trust, she had even once wondered whether Sera was another soul from her divine beast realm. Her powerful eldest brother told her that souls have threads of karma in them. Hers might have been entwined with Sera at some point in her past lives for her to have such a feeling.
"It's alright." In order to appease her, she grabbed Sera's hands to prove it. "It should be alright for me."
Sera's eyelashes trembled, and she cautiously asked, "Do you know something…?"
Thalira sighed. She began her explanation. "You see, the increasing number of people losing control lately, right? They have gone completely crazy, like they are almost not human anymore."
Sera's eyes widened in shock. With her face that looked like she was suffering from facial paralysis, she whispered, "I am going to turn to something else that is not human…?"
Panic painted her face, and she seemed to think of something. "Like a zombie or a vampire?"
Looking at her friend, she saw in Sera's eyes that she looked like she was about to suffer from a mental breakdown. Well, anyone would too upon receiving such information. Who wanted to be such a mindless creature? It was even worse than death.
Thalira nodded. "Aren't the symptoms more similar to zombies?"
"You are right," Sera muttered. A fear flashed in her eyes as she looked at her own hands. Thalira had washed the blood from Sera's hands earlier. She was very quick to catch on to what was happening. "Then it's the end of the world?"
"You can say so, considering what is currently happening all around." Thalira felt a bit uncomfortable when she had to deliver such bad news. Even if she wanted to help anyone, she couldn't guarantee her own survival yet.
Sera fell silent.
Thalira didn't disturb her, letting the girl absorb the information she had just received. It must have been too much of a shock for her.
"It will only get worse, right?" In a numb voice, Sera looked at the window, where some sort of mist was faintly visible. It was a rhetorical question. "People think that storms are coming because the weather has gotten colder."
"Some have also begun stocking supplies because of it." Her eyes flashed as she mumbled almost incoherently, "I can't… but my aunt and her family…"
She was reminded that Thalira had bought her supermarket. There was also news that she had put a lot of things there. However, even until now, the doors of the supermarket remained tightly closed. As if she hadn't planned to open it at all.
Giving her friend a complicated gaze, she seemed to have grasped a vague hint of something.
"Thalira, do you think how long I will remain conscious as a human?" She asked Thalira. The hope in her eyes made her chest feel like it was being tightly clenched.
"A few days…" Thalira muttered.
"That should be enough time." Sera nodded. There was a determination in her eyes. "I am going to stock supplies for my aunt, just in case."
Then, she looked at Thalira hesitantly. She decided to bite the bullet. "If I didn't do it in time, can you please help me, Thalira? Get rid of me if you can."
Thalira's pupils widened in shock. She grasped Sera's hands, shaking her head frantically. "What are you going to do? Get that kind of thought out of your mind, Sera!"
Sera felt her eyes stung. If her aunt knew what she had become, she would probably chase her away, but Thalira still cared about her… why?
Her aunt was the only relative she had left. Although she sometimes was a bit materialistic, it was the only warmth left for her in this world. She just wanted to pay for all the kindness her aunt had shown her. The absolute bottom line of her aunt was her own life and son's, so most likely she wouldn't risk it to keep her around once she found out her niece was no longer human.
She had paid the expenses for her niece's hospitalization and borrowed money from the loan shark, partly because she knew Sera had the supermarket. They could sell it to cover the cost.
"I have no choice, Thalira. If I will truly turn into a zombie, it will be dangerous with me around. Judging by those people who have been hurt by those who have gone crazy, it's clearly infectious too," Sera numbly muttered. The moment she turned into a zombie, even if she had some human consciousness left, she would be alone in this world. Her aunt wouldn't want her.
Thalira swallowed, and then she sighed. "Are you going to make a plan for your aunt first?"
With a solemn look in her eyes, she nodded.
Looking at the determination in Sera's gaze, Thalira pulled her and whispered in her ear, making the girl widen her eyes. In her dim eyes, there was a hint of hope.
***
Tomorrow was the time that the planet would completely be enveloped by a dense fog.
Thalira inspected her preparation. She had just retrieved the last batch of ammunition from the Brown family's private warehouse. After finding that she has everything prepared already, she went inside her inner world.
She had a feeling that her fire ability was going to upgrade to the second level. Thus, she had to find a safe place to upgrade.
The moment she stood in the sunny grassy land, she already sensed it. Her hand reached out, and a fire burned in her palm. It grew brighter and denser, blanketing her entire slender frame.
It was like an inexhaustible energy, and Thalira struggled to control it. Like a layer canvas that was stabbed by pencil, slowly, she began to get rid of that thin canvas, bit by bit.
Some kind of energy poured in, filling the location in her lower abdomen, where her beast core originally was. Unnoticeably, a few strands of her black hair had small dots of silver in them.
An area in her inner world flickered, and the invisible barriers showed a sign of collapse.
While Thalira was in her inner world, unknowingly, a day passed outside. A layer of dense, gray fog emerged from a few positions on planet Tenebris, spreading at a fast rate toward both lands and the seas.
Some people who still dared to do their activity outside began panicking. "What is happening?!"
"Get off me! Why are you biting me?!"
In another place, there was a sound of flesh being gnawed on. The most horrifying thing was that the owner of the flesh was still alive. He could only watch in despair as a figure filled with rotten flesh, munching directly on his torn stomach.