"Holding anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die." - Alan Brandt

Use the anger. Kill them. Take revenge.

I woke with a distinct pain in my neck. And in my eyes. And most everywhere else.

"Ughhhhhh..."

I groaned as I leant my head forwards, being awarded a series of loud clicks that provided ridiculous relief.

Unfortunately, the same couldn't be said for my eyes, which were in direct sunlight. I looked through the window in front of me, seeing only a bright white.

I guess it isn't direct sun then. Direct cloudight?

I shook my head, and leant forwards, easing myself out of the chair. My body clicked in several places as I straightened out, making it better in some places, but worse in others. I winced as I pushed against a bruise on my back. I didn't remember being hit there, but it was probably due to the chair.

I walked over to the windows and lowered the blinds. The room was instantly at a more tolerable light level, so I assessed the situation properly.

I looked over at Klaudia and was somehow not surprised at what I saw. At some point in the night, she had removed some of her clothes in an effort to get more comfortable and had thrown her bra, skirt and shoes and socks across the floor. I saw a foot peeking out from under the coat that was cover in my legs, and was half tempted to tickle it. I dismissed it as I realised she would react badly and nail me with whatever power she had used to survive up to this point.

Instead of antagonizing her, I focused on an immediate issue. Sustinance.

I had only energy drinks in my bag, along with a bag of caffeine tablets and vampire blood. None of the items seemed to be suitable, so I realised I would have to venture out to get anything.

I was planning on doing that anyway. No sweat.

I unlocked the door, but stopped and thought for a second about what to do with the key. If I locked it and took the key with me, she would be stuck in here for half an hour at most. But if I died, she would have to break her way out, probably attracting all kinds of monsters.

If I left in unlocked, anything could come in here while she slept. I resolved to leave the ankh on the desk so she could at least defend herself or break the door if I didn't come back, and locked the door behind me.

I was fine being relatively weaponless as I wondered the silent but brightly lit halls. I still had the knife in my pocket in emergencies, and the glass dagger was in the deep pocket of my blazer... which was still over Klaudia...

Damnnit.

I still had my soul tearing power, so I could easily kill anything that tried to stop me. But something felt off. Not threatening, but strange.

I found a vending machine without any issue. It had already been smashed, and half of the food taken from it. This could have meant many things. Maybe this was from someone taking advantage of the initial chaos to loot. Maybe it was another group of survivors.

Whoever it was, they were being irresponsible with their diet and had only taken the sugary drinks and sweet or high calorific snacks. They had left behind almost all of the water, and the cereal bars.

I filled my bag with half a dozen bottles of water, and handfuls of various healthy snacks. I enjoyed sweets as much as the next person, but I had always balanced it out by eating healthy otherwise. So I had no problem eating the fruits and nuts glued together by honey.

As I walked back to the dean's office, I realised what was so off about the halls. The fact that there was nothing wrong with them. I was used to the halls being empty, but after the previous day of them being blood stained and scattered with bodies, it was odd again to see them clean.

I guess the dead bodies have despawn rates... shame. Missed out on a lot of souls.

But that wasn't the right way to think. It was nice that I didn't have to wade through day-old blood. I was vaguely concerned about the growing souls of the rabid abominations. I didn't know if they were formed yet, or if they were particularly strong if they had.

That was an issue for later. For now, I had to formulate a plan. Of course, I had to not die, but I felt that at this point, that was fairly easy. Most of the deaths would have been during the first day, and soon enough, the average populous would become strong enough to survive a monster attack.

As I approached the dean's office, I shuffled through the fabric remains of the students that had died the previous day. I was curious to see if any of them dropped loot like the monsters, but I couldn't see anything out of the ordinary. Mostly stationary and old sterling currency. I was certain it was obsolete now, so didn't bother picking it up. The world would probably work off the metal coins that had been introduced.

I unlocked the office door, pushed it open and immediately ducked to avoid being hit by a shard of glass in the face.

I popped back up and grabbed the slender wrist that was gripping the glass. It let go, and I half turned to see a part angry and part embarrassed Klaudia.

I gave her a look of pity to taunt her, and then made a show of looking her up and down. She hadn't put any more clothes on since I had left, and was standing in some stylish panties, and a slightly torn shirt that was half see-through. She didn't seem all that concerned with how she was dressed, especially around me, so I paid it little attention usually.

"Why did you lock me in here?"

She spoke sternly, making her Polish accent more pronounced than usual. It was reassuring, but also very unnerving that this was a constant in my life.

"Because you were asleep. Some creep could have come in here and done stuff."

She still looked pissed off, but I knew that was mostly for show. She walked to a corner of the office, picking up her bra and skirt on the way, and got changed while facing the wall.

"You mean a creep like you?"

I didn't answer, only looked away from her. It was the bait that I had learnt not to bite.

"I'm not completely defenceless you know."

She continued, hinting towards some power she held. I was curious, but not keen to let her hold the upper hand.

"I'm sure. Just try not to kill anyone huh?"

I heard her give a small sigh and then speak with an obvious smile in her voice.

"What's to say that I haven't?"

"You would have reacted way worse if you had. Believe me. The last person I saw kill a student took it badly."

She was apparently done changing and managed to sneak up on me, then poke me in the back.

"What happened to him."

"I... I released his soul."

It was technically true, but I didn't really know how to describe what I had actually done. In hindsight, it seemed psychotic that I had calmly ripped his soul apart, then killed the body left behind. I had only seen it as a task that had to be completed.

"You killed him!?"

I spun around holding a bottle of water and a snack bar out to her.

"No. He killed himself. But here, I don't know how long it's been since you've eaten."

She accepted the items with a flirtatious smile. I knew it as her playful smile. She was preparing a joke or prank of some sort to play on me. I would allow it though. She probably needed it.

But no joke came. She merely thanked me for getting her food and water, then returned to the sofa to eat.

I grabbed some from my bag, careful to make sure the vampire blood was hidden at the bottom. I sat in the dean's chair, suddenly more comfortable now that I wasn't trying to sleep in it.

"So how did you survive yesterday? Where even were you?"

Between bites of various snacks, she told me what had happened. The shorthand of it was that she was in a revision class when the shift happened. Like me, she assumed it was a dream and accepted the change. She didn't know that she could alter herself but had put all of her points into agility when prompted. I asked if she recieved any bonus features at all, and she told me that the only one she got was a feature called: Bio-kin.

It was a feature that she had been given for being a vegan throughout the last ten or more years. The fact that she had done that was impressive, but the feature was far more impressive. It granted her an affinity with plants. Essentially, anything made of cells that had a simple nucleus, she could manipulate to an extent.

She had only been given 3% in the affinity, so while I assumed she could absorb some energy from plants, any form of manipulation was minimal so far.

She had survived by using any nearby plants to gain back health, mana and stamina. She was a fast runner before, but with double even my agility, she assured me that she could outrun most things. But she had run into many people in the initial confusion, hence the slightly ripped clothes.

When I was asked a similar question, I had to decide whether to lie or not. I wanted to tell her about my affinity, but not how I got it. She would make an effort to taunt me for that, and I was not prepared to deal with that distraction. So I merely talked about getting the rapid regeneration and inspiring aura skill. I talked about how i met, then caused the death of Kacey. I told her i survived by a mix of luck and strength. She had always laughed at my inability to put on muscle, but with the system, I was far stronger than I looked.

I picked her up with my hands around her waist, straining only a little. It would have been a futile act before, but was relatively easy now.

I couldn't tell if she was impressed, but I got the impression that it interested her. Anything that did cross her mind was hidden and she asked me a question I had been asking myself since I left the exam hall.

"So, what are you going to do now?"

I still hadn't figured it out. I essentially had a few side-quests I could give myself while in the school. I really wanted to pick up some stuff from home but didn't want to meet up with my family at all.

I guessed in the pursuit of power, sticking around would be the best move.

"I'll stay here a bit. There's some stuff I should take care of. How about you?"

"I want to thrive here. Not here in the school, but here in this world. I want to travel. I can do that now I have no responsibility."

"Don't you have any family you want to keep safe?"

"They have as much chance of surviving as I do. If they've lived this far, they can live for as long as they survive."

"I'm not sure I get it, but I admire your aspirations. Where are you thinking of going?"

"I don't know... France for starters. I want to climb a mountain, run through forests. I want to ride an elephant."

She lost focus in her eyes, and I could tell she was stuck in her daydreams. I would leave her like that for now. I had to make an immediate plan. I wanted to find the source of the lizards if there even was one. I wanted to clear the school of the abomination stacks, and I wanted to see if there was a large group of survivors that I could help.

I didn't care about the people, but the world wouldn't be able to re-develop if everyone died immediately, so I wanted as many people alive from this point forwards to get to work.

The ones that had died before this point were weak, and not worthy of saving. If they are unable to survive the first day, how are they supposed to be able to survive the rest?

Spiritual skill learnt: Reason

I perked up at another one of these weird skills. I was excited because spiritual and spectral essentially meant the same thing to me, but despite me not knowing what exactly it was or what it did, I now had two of them. I wondered what would happen if I got more.

"We should go."

I spoke to the corner of the room, knowing that Klaudia was the only one to hear.

"Where?"

I understood why she was asking but was still irritated that she didn't trust me.

"To end things. The lizards need to die. People need to get out of here. Let's finish it today."

"How do you plan on doing that exactly?"

Ever the sceptical.

"I don't know. I don't like to plan too far ahead."

"Do I have to be there?"

I paused as I tucked the ankh into my back pocket. I still needed to uncover its secrets, but for now, having it close would be enough.

"No. I was only offering a sanctuary here. But as soon as I leave, I'm never coming back. This place, this while building is going to burn. I promise you that."

There was a silence behind me, but I played no attention. If she was caught in a moral dilemma, then that was her problem. I wouldn't help her there. Whatever she did made no real difference to me. I was confident enough in my spectral abilities to be able to tear any basic soul apart. And anything that resisted would die by my bladed hand.

Eventually, after I had reorganised and repacked my bag, she answered.

"I'll come with you... Only to see what you do."

Fair enough.

"Fair enough. Just try not to get hurt."

With that, I suddenly ran out of the hallway, heading for where I knew the nearest stairs were. I wanted to reach the first floor where the cafeteria was. That was my first stop.

My high strength allowed me to take long, bounding steps and stay ahead of Klaudia, even with her high agility.

Skill learnt: Rapid Step ©

I received another skill as I pushed myself, but this one was useful. I immediately could run faster without expending my stamina any further. I was careful that any stamina I burned never reached any further down than 50% of my total. I didn't want to be caught in a scenario where I ran out of breath before my opponent ran out of health.

I saw a patrol of lizards ahead of me and switched steps. Instead of long strides, I began pushing off the walls and lockers as I reached them. I dented the lockers, and cracked the walls, but remained relatively airborne.

As I approached the reptilian patrol, I pulled the glass from my blazer and the ankh from my pocket.

I focused on the ankh to activate, and suddenly a green blade sprung from the loop, providing me with a long, almost rectangular blade, with a high point.

It was a beautiful blade to behold, but I had no time to admire it, and swept it towards a black lizard as I passed over it.

The creature died instantly, and a massive -147hp appeared above it as the two halves squirmed violently.

Monster killed:

Damage dealt: 147

Exp earnt: 199

I landed in front of the patrol, that now consisted only of a long lizard and another of the smaller black ones.

I was reluctant to use up my soul energy so early, so I instead tucked away the glass and held the Egyptian war sword in a two-handed grip.

Klaudia was still standing behind the lizards, but I realised that she was defenceless. If I threw the glass, it would likely shatter, so I threw the closed knife towards her. She quickly caught it and flicked it open while standing in a ready position similar to my own.

We waited as the lizards formulated some plan. We had the upper hand, but they didn't know that and both jumped at Klaudia. I seized the soul of the longer lizard, causing it to freeze in mid air. Klaudia handled the situation well, as she stabbed the black lizard in the eye as it landed just short of her. It hissed at her and scrambled back, so she returned to the ready position, ready to attack or defend.

With the longer lizard still frozen, I released my grip on it, and jumped forwards. I landed on its back, pushing it to the ground, and stabbed it flat through the spine.

-89hp

(Crippled)

Its lower body spasmed for a second then lay still.

I looked up from my assured kill and saw Klaudia was still messing with the black lizard. It was half blind and had cuts around its still working eye, but was fighting wilder than ever. As a subtle assist, I held its soul for a moment, causing it to pause. Klaudia took advantage of the moment and stabbed it deep into the other eye.

I didn't see what damage she had caused, but It was high apparently as the lizard attempted to flee.

It ran past me and my still struggling prey. I missed with a backhanded swipe of the glass blade, but I was not deterred.

I made sure the lizard beneath me wasn't going anywhere, then stood and turned, throwing the glass like a knife after it.

-27hp

The blinded lizard took the hit in its back-right leg and slowed down substantially. I quickly finished my prey by twisting the sword.

-45hp

Monster killed:

Damage dealt: 134

Exp earnt: 239

I ran after the running lizard and grabbed it's tail as soon as I could reach it. It pulled a similar trick that I had witnessed the day before and tried to detach its tail, but I merely used it as a weapon to sweep its working legs out from under it.

I ushered Klaudia over, urging her to make the final blow... But she seemed reluctant.

I tried to grab onto the torso of the injured lizard, but it squirmed out of my grip. I threw an accusing look at Klaudia as it might try to convey a message of the two to its hive.

She merely looked helplessly at it as it retreated and I was reminded of her vegan diet. Maybe she was ok with defending herself, but I was essentially offering a free kill to her.

I yawned, and just before the lizard reached the boundary to my range, grabbed it's soul. I ripped it out of the body, causing it to take the final few units of damage left before it died.

-19hp

Monster killed:

Damage dealt: 46

Exp earnt: 95

With the patrol dead, I debated internally about attempting to loot them. But with the powerful Egyptian sword, I had been given, it seemed unnecessary. I did reap their souls though and took 0.6 spectral essence from each of the lizards. The extra affinity that I got from my party would have been useful if I was absorbing human souls, but it didnt seem like much here. I noticed the sword in my hands was way heavier than before, so it must have had some dimensional fuckery going on inside it. I mentally ordered it to deactivate, and with a momentumless slide of the blade, it returned to the harmless stone icon it was before.

I merely indicated that Kaludia followed me, and after a brief breather to recover some stamina, I started running again.

We cleared several more patrols in the same manner before we reached the cafeteria.

I managed to raise my spectral essence to more than 60 in this time and gained a few levels in Rapid Step as I continued to run between encounters.

When I finally reached the doors to the cafeteria, I saw they were swinging as someone had just passed through them. Or something. As I jumped through myself, half expecting a fight, I saw several people finishing a barricade of chairs and tables around the main serving counter in the cafeteria.

Several people looked in my direction When I appeared, but none seemed outwardly surprised. They must have been expecting people to turn up here. A girl with light brown hair and blonde highlights stopped what she was doing and approached me. She didn't even react when Klaudia pushed through the doors a few seconds later.

"I'm Laura. Well done for surviving the first night. You're welcome to stay here where the food is."

I wa stunned and took a moment to collect my thoughts. I hadn't expected so many survivors, so for them to immediately offer me unconditional support was... unnerving.

'Um... no thanks. I'm... only stopping, no, passing through. You guys should leave as soon as you can though. Bad stuff is happening here. You should, everyone should just leave as soon as you can.

Laura looked at me with a small smile like I was speaking nonsense and silently offered me a seat.

"No. I'm not stopping. I'm going to take care of the actually dangerous things in this place. Not... Whatever drama you guys are fulfilling here."

Klaudia stayed silent behind me while I spoke to Laura, looking impassively around. I hadnt meant to be harsh toward her, but I was understandably irritated when they assumed I needed help. It was unnecessary and frankly quite arrogant, but I didn't let it get to me and sweetly smiled back.

"I would, no, we would love to join you here. But I have to go and take care of the reptile problem here... and make sure no abominations take over this place after slaughtering you and everyone else."

I could only take the abundant lack of them as to why they hadn't hatched yet, but I had little idea. Laura looked at me with confused eyes. The gravity behind my sickly sweet tone was starting to sink in.

"What... what do you mean?"

I sighed. She didn't know about the imminent danger. Of course, she didn't. I was certainly the only one who had seen what was emerging under the piles of dead students. If anyone else had seen them, they would have drawn a different conclusion.

"Have you seen the piles of bodies in some of the classrooms?"

Laura kept her mouth shut but nodded slowly.

"The reason behind them is more than just morbid cleaning by the lizards. Things are growing in there. Feeding off the souls of the dead people piled there. I can stop it, but I don't know where these classrooms are. It could take hours to search all the rooms, and I have no idea when they hatch. Do you get it?"

Laura's face had turned white with fear. But she nodded again.

"I... I know where some of the classrooms are with them in."

I raised an eyebrow. This was something I hadn't considered. There were students here who had survived the first night. They would have seen rooms that had them in.

"Where? Actually, just write them down. Ask everyone here too. Bring me the list as soon as you can."

Laura backed away and ran through the partially assembled barriers, calling everyone after her.

I took the unsupervised opportunity to admire their handiwork. The tables and benches were laid like bricks in overlapped patterns that practically screamed stability.

I leant over the section of still unobstructed counter and examined the trays of untouched cutlery. The normal knives and stuff were useless, but as this was such a ridiculously overfunded college, they occasionally served steak. I found what I as looking for and pulled a handful of sharp, half-serrated knives with me. I had the ridiculously cool warsword, but Klaudia was my concern. She was only armed with an admittedly dangerous knife, but I wanted her to be better equipped.

She lined up the 7 knives I had given her in the waistline of her skirt. She even tucked her shirt in so she could easier reach them; showing how well she understood how serious she had to be.

While we waited for Laura and her list to come back, I visited the large bathrooms attached to the cafeteria hall. I stood in front of the mirror, regretting not changing myself more. I had always wanted to have a solid hair colour, not the dirty blonde I had maintained for years. And my hair was longer than I liked it. I could have changed so much if I had known. But was never one to regret, so I easily let it go.

I splashed water on my face, washing off as much blood as possible. I had to work by the light of a small window in an outside wall, so the shadow situation was doing me no favours.

I was reluctant to change out of my college clothes, as I had nothing to change into, so I did the best I could. I ripped both the arms off my blazer as they were saturated in half dried blood. I was tempted to do the same with my shirt, as the white was now stained red. But I wasn't confident enough in my biceps to know Klaudia would pick up on it. I compromised by rolling the sleeves up to my elbows. It was a better look to be sure. I looked like i had survived a war film that took place in a Catholic school.

But that's because that was exactly what had happened.

I smiled and walked out of the bathrooms feeling moderately cleaner. I had slept in my sweaty and bloody clothes, but at least my face was clean.

I found Laura was standing, waiting for me with a piece of paper in her hand. Klaudia emerged from the female bathrooms just a few seconds later, following me.

I wordlessly took the paper from her and read through it.

Together, the students had managed to piece together the rough wearabouts of another 10 piles of bodies. One was the room I had already cleared, leaving roughly nine to go. They didn't take long to clear though, so I would probably be able to get it done by the afternoon.

I knew something was going to happen at the 24-hour mark from what Nephthys had spoken about, so if it was dangerous to me in any way, I wanted to be prepared. More souls was the way to do that.

The list on the page was accompanied by a rough map showing the rooms of death were fairly evenly distributed around the hollow hexagon that made up the college building. I was vaguely curious about what had become of the central courtyard and gardens, but that was far down on any list of priorities I had.

"Ok. Let's go."

I suddenly turned on my heel and walked towards the doors. Klaudia immediately caught up and I spoke loudly enough for the seemingly frozen Laura to hear.

"Bye, have fun! By the way, I'm burning this place down soon enough!"

"WHAT?!"

Laura's mind had finally caught up, but I wasn't going to stick around and explain myself.

Klaudia looked back as we walked through the doors, and waved to the small audience that was shattering outside the barriers.

"Bye Laura!"

I smiled at the sickly tone she had put on, sounding superior for no reason other than her own entertainment. And by extension, my own.

I rubbed my hands together, eager to absorb some of the more complete souls, but less than happy at how I would have to do it. Either way, I would reach a whole new level in spectral by four. It would be a good day.