Chapter 4: Synthesized Serum
1197 Words
Luke decided there was a need to get more test subjects.
However, going out isn't an option for the moment as he is powerless against the zombies that he had created himself.
It was imperative to have a weapon of his own.
Naturally, Luke has guns and ammunition in his base. But such weapons are limited and would run out eventually if he heads out for a long period of time.
Luke was never one to act without a plan so he continued to stay in his base for a year after he started the apocalypse.
He wasn't only studying the mutated zombies and Lucy, but also studying the various advantages that he can extract from them.
The Zombie Core is one such advantage.
He had placed it under a microscope and continued performing experiments on it using various chemicals and mixtures.
Eventually, he was able to synthesize a complete extract of power from the core which is harmless in nature but provides great power.
Luke was confident of his intellect and solution. Coupled by the fact that he didn't have anyone else to test on, he was left with no other choice but to test it on himself.
"Sir Luke! Please calm down! It's dangerous to inject yourself with an unknown substance such as-"
"It's not unknown. It's something I made. Now shut up."
Luke ignored Athena's objections and stuck a needle through his chest and directly injected the fluid inside to his heart.
"Gh-!"
Luke gritted his teeth as he felt his whole body burning. However, it isn't to the point of being unbearable. It was as if he was soaking in a hot spring bath.
It was a refreshing kind of hot.
It was only painful at first but after a while, he started to relax and feel a lot better.
He gripped his hands a few times and noticed the muscles in his arms had contracted and became even stronger.
There was a black substance oozing from his pores which is equivalent to his excess fat and impurities in his body.
"Hm, it sounds a bit like one of those Chinese martial arts novels, don't you think?"
Luke stretched his body for a bit as he asked Athena.
"...Sir, I may be an Artificial Intelligence, but even I felt stressed from worrying for you."
"...Do you have a virus?"
"..."
"That isn't a pun for the zombie virus by the way, I am seriously asking if you are bugged or have malware-"
"I don't."
Athena said curtly from his phone and no longer said anything. One can almost picture a child pouting from her tone.
Luke shook his head and no longer minded this AI of his.
He continued to run more tests and found that his physical attributes had increased by two-fold with that one serum.
Luke nodded in satisfaction.
"Pretty good outcome. Let's do it one more time."
As he had two Zombie Cores, he can still use one more to synthesize and turn into a serum for increasing his physique.
"Sir Luke, please advise caution. We don't know yet if there are any side effects for repeated use of this-"
"Injecting Serum_02."
"..."
Luke ignored Athena and injected the second serum onto his body.
Once again, Luke felt that hotness at first and the relaxing feeling soon after.
More impurities left his body but there were no other visible side effects.
"See, nothing to worry about."
"Everything you do is worrying."
"You're an AI. Stop worrying. It's not like I can eat you."
"But you can eat my servers and I will die."
"..."
Luke didn't know what else to say.
Anyway, he performed another round of tests and experiments on himself.
After injecting himself with two Zombie Serums made from synthesizing the Zombie Cores, Luke now had around four times the strength he had prior to his previous body without being injected.
He then began to train himself for a few more months before finally leaving.
About a year and three months had already passed since the start of the Apocalypse.
Now, the person who started it is finally leaving his underground shelter and walk the world he had made.
Luke wore tactical gear and armed himself with various weapons.
He had a sniper rifle slung to his back, two handguns strapped to his chest, two more handguns on his waist, and one more handgun on his back waist.
He also had two knives on his thigh and two more knives on his arm.
One might say that he is overly armed, but to Luke, it was better than having a few and needing it at the last minute because of some situation.
Right now, around 20% of the population are only left and they had all hidden, only occasionally leaving their bases to get food and other necessities.
So when Luke left his underground shelter, all he could see were shadows of a once lively city.
The buildings have started to crumble.
Cars littered the road, unmoving.
Wild weeds started to grow everywhere. It seems the zombie virus had also affected the plant life a bit as there was no way they could've grown this big in just a bit over a year.
Zombies could be seen walking idly on the road.
They continued to groan and walk about, not knowing where they are going.
Looking at all these zombies, Luke searched for the one nearest to him.
Then, he walked up to it calmly and patted its shoulder as if he was just greeting a friend.
"Grr?"
The zombie turned its head as if confused. But then after it saw a living person, it began to growl and charge at him.
Luke didn't say anything else.
He used his hand which was on the zombie's shoulder to grab its head.
Then, he used his other hand holding a knife to slice its neck cleanly.
With the force of his swing, it was quite easy to behead someone.
Soon after he did that, he picked up its body and head and returned back to his underground shelter.
And so the journey of the man who started the apocalypse is over...
Inside the underground shelter, Luke dissected the zombie head and body and extracted its Organ and Core.
He gave the Organ to Lucy while he injected himself with another serum made from the Core.
"...Hmm...it doesn't seem as effective anymore..."
Before, Luke felt his power had doubled for every serum injected.
But now, the increase isn't as much anymore.
It seems there is a limit to it and he couldn't keep powering himself up through such a method.
On the other hand, Lucy appeared a bit more intelligent.
"Luuuuk..."
Right, it is now capable of speech.
However, her speech is equivalent to that of a child as she can't speak properly. She's struggling with her words but she can already understand certain things such as Luke's name as well as hers.
It seems that taking in more Zombie Organs is indeed the right way.
"Sir, your face looks like the face of a bad guy now."
"What do you mean? I've always been the bad guy."
"...That's true..."
- Writer
