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...I only had two more magazines with me though, and it was clear I was going to need to be much more careful with my remaining rounds.

A quick survey of the area showed that some of the barricaded buildings had been breached, and the people within were quickly succumbing to their own respective hordes. It was clear that we were going to need to finish up quickly before more of the dead turned their attention on us. To my dismay, however, I noticed several dozen feet away, that one of the corpses of someone who had been pummeled to death began to shift, and after a few moments, began to rise from the ground, a soft blue glow emanating from his eyes. What was scarier was the fact that this particular zombie seemed much more dangerous.

Instead of facing off against the undead who largely had no flesh left remaining on them, I was instead met with a very fresh corpse, and as I focused on the zombie, it became clear what the difference was as another screen appeared in front of me.

Skill [Appraisal] - Level 1 has been gained!

25 experience points have been received

[Appraisal] grants the skill user the most basic information available concerning any given monster.

Name: Reanimated Corpse

Level: 1

Health: 45/45

Instead of facing off against a [Reanimated Decomposing Corpse], it appeared I was up against a simple [Reanimated Corpse]. It became clear that having decomposing in your name was not considered a good thing, as this one was much stronger. Why did the dead man reanimate though? Was it because he was infected? Or is it just that if you die that's what happens? It made sense actually. Since I doubt the entire cemetery had been reanimated over a simple infection. The one thing that was in common however between the two occurrences was the fact that the man in front of me, as well as the other undead, had all likely been dead before they found themselves reanimated.

I hope that's the case, I thought as I quickly glanced over towards the large African-American man. I'd hate to go up against a zombie of that size.

My musings however provided ample distraction for the new threat to come charging at me. I was prepared, however, as I aimed my gun right between the eyes of the monster. With two shots that embedded themselves into the head of the monster, I was rewarded with another blue screen, slightly different than the numerous others that I had been consistently dismissing as soon as they appeared after I killed one of the undead.

Notice: You have used a weapon outside the purview of the system.

[Calculating...]

You have received a ~99% debuff to your experience gain.

[Calculating...]

You have dealt ▗▚▚▙ points of ▟▚▚▞ damage to [Reanimated Decomposing Corpse]

1 experience point received

I still had no idea what an 'experience point' was. However the more of these blue screen I began to see, the more I was beginning to believe that I had somehow been introduced to some sort of RPG system, like from one of those games I had played back when I was younger, and before I had given up on games in preference for my family. The theory certainly made a lot more sense than others I could think of. However, I had no clue how all of this had happened. My instincts, on the other hand, seemed to believe that Thomas held some of the answers.

To my utter exasperation, it was at that point that I began noticing the corpses of others who had been mauled to death by the zombies beginning to stir.

"Dad!" I cried out. "We need to get out of here right now!"

The worry in my voice was evident and has some measure of effect on my father, who, to my utter surprise had begun to swing even harder and faster than before. Each strike nearly decapitating every undead he struck. What the hell? I thought. Even I couldn't hit that hard.

His efforts were effective though, as he had made his way to the survivors, and after some curt words, the group of nine began to follow him as he began to lead the way down the street to where the house was.

It was at that point, to my dismay, that I realized just how damn close the house was to the cemetery. The house was a block away from it, though, I was surprised when I found myself hoping that the screams coming from the nearby buildings being assailed by hundreds of zombies would draw most of the undead to them. I swear, if I'm becoming a psychopath, that's going to piss me off. Granted, I couldn't help myself but thinking that being slightly psychopathic might not be nearly as bad in what I was sure would become our new reality. Being able to cope with this massive increase in violence would be an undeniably useful trait.

Making sure that Kaitlyn was still directly behind me, I smiled. She had done well to stick by my side despite all the mayhem. My father had already managed to lead the group about thirty feet in front of us.

I caught up to him as Kaitlyn and I made a quick sprint ahead, and we caught up to the group just as the new dead joined ranked with the hordes assailing the buildings. I sighed in relief, as they appeared to be more interested in the screaming feasts.

Well, to a degree it serves them right for abandoning so many people outside and locking themselves in. I shook my head once again. At least I have the self-awareness to realize when my thoughts are... Insensitive. Though, it appeared my father had at the very least the forethought that we would need to be satisfied with the scale of our current rescue effort.

Glancing at the obviously exhausted group that we had rescued, my first thought was whether my Dad actually planned to have them join us. My second thought, dispelled the first, as I realized that I actually hoped they would join us. The large African-American man was likely ex-military with the way he fought, or at the very least had some level of experience fighting, and two of the other men in the group looked fairly capable themselves. As long as they were agreeable, I would be amenable to them joining the family for a few days.

My Dad appeared to have similar thoughts, as it was clear that he had taken a personal responsibility in taking them in. That's just the type of man he is though, I sighed. I wasn't nearly as worried about it as I thought I'd be. I knew we had plenty of food storage to likely keep even a group of our size going for a few weeks, and once Thomas arrived, that was likely when we'd be making more long-term plans. As of right now though, I knew we were going to need to hunker down and wait out the storm.

It only took a few more minutes to reach my home, and my father managed to take out the few straggling undead in our way. He was clearly much stronger than before our skirmish, and I would have to make an effort to ask him what exactly happened.

Making our way into the house, it was eerily quiet. No sign of my mother or Ariel. Just as I began to fear the worse, I heard my mother's voice from the basement. "Alex?" I heard. "Is that you?"

I was flooded with relief, and I also noticed my Father and Kaitlyn visibly relaxing as well, especially as both my mom, with Ariel in two made their appearance. She was surprised by the large group with us, but one quick look from my dad and she kept quiet. I knew they'd be talking quite a bit later.

"Well then," I announced, to both my family, but more towards the new group. "Until things blow over we're staying in the basement, it might be a bit cramped, but at the very least I can guarantee it would be a lot safer than just staying up here. We have enough food and water to hold over for at least a couple of weeks." I said.

I could see varying looks among the faces of the newcomers, but the one fact that I saw in common was that all of them had noticeably relaxed. They were afraid we'd tell them to leave, weren't they? I thought. I doubt any of them were excited at the prospect of going back outside for the moment, so the reaction was predictable. Most of them began making their way into the basement, but it was the larger African-American man wh stayed behind, along with the two other men who looked more Hispanic.

It was the larger man that said something first as I looked at them expectantly. "Dante," he said.

I smiled, as I shook his hand, "Alex."

The other two also introduced themselves as Antonio and Alejandro. Antonio looked a bit older, but apparently, they were both brothers. They were construction workers and had been with Maria, who was their younger sister, leaving the library when everyone was knocked out by the shockwave. Maria didn't know English nearly as well as both Antonio and Alejandro, and she had been attending some communal English classes at the library when everything went to hell. It was actually kind of interesting, that despite their similar-looking faces, both Antonio and Alejandro had completely different personalities. Antonio was definitely more serious and looked like he had frequently been the one to take charge out of the two siblings, he had close-cut hair, and was probably about four or so inches shy of six feet. While Alejandro was a bit taller but thinner as well as had hair that went down to his shoulders. The one thing in common however was their gratitude.

"You saved my wife and daughter, and I know Atasha and Daija feel the same way," Dante said matter-of-factly. "If you and your Dad hadn't shown up, I don't think we ever could have made it out of there. So you have my eternal gratefulness. Please, if there is anything you need help with, just let me know." Dante looked into my eyes, I was completely struck by the genuine nature of his response. However, it made me quite happy to know that at the very least the three of them had turned out to be amenable.

I smiled in response to Dante. "Look, you'd really have to thank my father, he was the one that refused to just stand aside when he saw what was going on. However, if you'd like to help... I looked at the windows, You can help me board up the windows. We can tear down the picket fence surrounding the garden just outside my back door, and use those to board them up."

All three understood immediately my intention as I pulled out a tool kit from the kitchen, inside were a few hammers, some of them were older, and hadn't seen use in a while, but they would still work.

When we came into the house earlier, I hadn't seen much in the way of undead in the immediate vicinity of the house, but I knew it wouldn't last. It was time to hunker down, and hope Thomas was able to make it here just fine. With the four of us, we made quick work of the fence just outside, and just as we began to hear strange sounds from the surrounding forest, we hauled the load back into the house. All-in-all we perhaps had about five dozen pieces of wood we could use to board up the windows.

All of us had begun to feel as though we were being watched, and no one complained or made a joke as we went straight back insides and boarded up the back part of the house first. While it was fairly loud, I knew that the walls should at the very least dampen the noise we were causing and hopefully ensure that nothing took the clamor we were causing as an invitation. The fact that Antonio and Alejandro had been construction workers helped smooth out the work considerably. It even surprised me that they knew just how to place the boards and nails to both make the work quick, as well as make sure that if anything attempted to break in, that the positioning of the nails would ensure that the wood didn't just pop off. Within a half-hour, and just as the sun began to dip below the horizon, we finished off the last of the windows. Instead of boarding up the doors as well we simply barricaded them with a few bookshelves and tables. We weren't dumb enough to board up our only potential escape routes should something happen. At the very least the bookshelves can be moved if needed.

With the work taken care of, I nodded gratefully towards Dante, Antonio, and Alejandro. They went down the stairs to join their families. I stayed up on the main floor of the house however and decided to climb the stairs to the second story. From the vantage point that the second story provided I could just barely look over the tops of the surrounding houses and vegetation.

I could also see the cemetery about a block away, and it was filled with hundreds of the dead. Clearly the undead we had seen near the library and main st. was not all that the cemetery had to offer. That'll eventually be an issue if we ever need to leave, I thought. Especially as I noticed that they were slowly shambling into the surrounding neighborhoods. It had been about an hour since we had left the area around the library, and from what I could see, the commotion had largely stopped. Zombies were still prevalent, however, and so the natural deduction was that next to nobody had likely survived the encounter there.

Even further in the distance, the coming darkness of night allowed a better view of the chaos that had befallen the city of Worcester.

The entire city was in flames, and as I looked closely, I could have sworn that my eyes caught the silhouette of the massive monster I had seen descending from the rifts in the first place. Its massive wings billowed out behind it, and a massive tail swept back and forth, toppling scorched buildings. Circling above the beasts I could see a host of black dots, likely more of the monsters.

I simply couldn't believe my eyes, as the city had had once dotted my horizon had vanished into flames within a matter of a few hours. There was no way anybody could have survived that.

It was then that I saw two massive explosions plume around the dragon-looking beast, but, to my utter dismay, despite the fireball, the creature appeared largely unscathed. That wasn't to say that the monsters circling above it weren't, however, as I saw them drop from the sky to the ground below.

At that point, I noticed the F-22's in the distance, just as they were incinerated by a beam of scarlet light erupting from the massive monster.

Ya, the city is screwed. I thought to myself. I could only hope that the flames wouldn't spread over here.

Even though the buildings were rather spaced out, the foliage was pretty dense. It wasn't something I could concern myself with now.

So, I sat there and watched, for what seemed like nearly an hour until the sun descended below the horizon and night finally came. So, into the dark of night, Worcester became no more. I briefly noticed that the silhouette of the beast had begun to move towards the Turnpike as I turned around and went downstairs, joining the others in the basement. All we could do now was wait for Thomas.