The ballistic glass of Block 3's lobby revealed no movement—clear. Lucas slipped inside, the reinforced door thunking shut behind him. His tactical gloves creaked against the hatchet's grip.
Five floors. No elevator. Old-school killbox.
The foyer split into twin luxury condos. One door bore rust-colored handprints, long dried into abstract art. The other stood ajar, smeared blood trailing into darkness like a macabre welcome mat.
OPTIONS:
Seal the compromised unit (safety)Clear and loot (high risk/reward)
Lucas kicked the door wide, immediately slamming it shut behind him. CLICK—the magnetic lock engaged. Two infected emerged in stereo—one from the master suite, another from the sanitation pod. Their milky eyes locked onto him with predatory focus.
"Over here, maggots!" Lucas barked.
The creatures hissed, their decayed muscles propelling them forward at terrifying speed. BAM! Both collided with his riot shield. A quick pivot used their momentum to pin them against the security door.
THWACK-THWACK!
The hatchet found purchase twice. Two headless corpses slumped to the marble flooring.
LOOT ALERTS:
[Acquired: Energy Core x1][Acquired: Sterile Fabric x5][Bio-Comp x5 added to inventory]
The open-concept kitchen revealed horror and hope. Lucas yanked open pantry doors to find what should have been staple goods mutated into nightmare fuel—sacks of grain now putrid green masses, sprouting mushrooms with blood-red polka dots that pulsed visibly.
[SYSTEM WARNING: CONSUMPTION HAZARD]
"One bite: psychedelic hallucinations. Two bites: permanent dirt nap."
Not that he needed the alert. The fungal growths' veined caps secreted oily droplets that sizzled on the shelves.
The fridge's humming compressor was a miracle. Inside:
2x "Long Haul" Survival Liquor (80% ABV, 20-year stability)3.5kg cryo-sealed protein brick (lab-grown meat substitute)
SYSTEM ANALYSIS:
[Calendar data suggests viral outbreak occurred Q4 2012]
[Current dust accumulation: ~8 months post-collapse]
The liquor's nuclear-grade expiration date made Lucas whistle. "Twenty years? What the hell did they ferment this with?"
His fingers came away gray from the dining table—eight months of decay at most. The math chilled him more than the freezer's contents. Less than a year to reduce civilization to this... and the System warned the worst mutations were still suppressed.
The freezer's final gift: a kilogram of frost-rimed meat, still vacuum-sealed.
Score. Meat, booze, and four days' breathing room. Outside, the stranded woman's screams echoed.
Not my problem.