Survival Bunker System Developer

Survival Bunker System Level 2

The night hunting to test if the system accepted animal ghouls as valid kills worked like a charm. Caleb went to the East River and was immediately attacked by birds. Thankfully, the system developer arrived in a car even though his black Benz was a little more scratched up by the end of his trip. The pole easily slipped through the small gap he opened in his window and Caleb was able to stab more than thirty aggressive birds.

All the birds that attacked him were counted as valid ghouls even though they were still one step away from eating each other. Apparently, anything that was infected with PXE22 even in the early stages counted as ghouls to the system.

Caleb arrived at an empty parking lot at ten at night. There was nobody in sight. The locals knew about the rising cases of aggressive animals attacking people so nobody hung out and even the homeless moved.

Caleb circled the area a few times in his car to look for any CCTVs and selected a spot that didn’t have any security cameras in operation. It would be easier to do what he needed to do without anyone reporting him. His black Benz settled in the middle of the empty parking lot and Caleb waited. There were many birds in sight and none of them seemed to notice his arrival. Caleb wanted to test how ghouls recognised their targets. In his previous life, ghouls targeted people and would prefer to go after people who ran. He thought that they recognised movement but after driving around the parking lot with the birds walking around aimlessly, Caleb knew that wasn’t the case.

Ghouls didn’t attack moving objects that weren’t alive. Hence, Caleb revised his strategy and boldly cracked down his window just enough for him to stick a finger out but not big enough to put his whole hand through.

Sure enough, the moment he wound the window down, the birds started to become more agitated. They started making low noises and circled Caleb's car. Caleb didn’t move a muscle and observed the birds from the safety of his vehicle. Once the birds got into a radius of five meters, they started attacking the sedan and Caleb was very thankful that his windscreen and windows were made from polycarbonate glass at his request. Although Caleb lived in a safe neighbourhood, he wasn’t too sure about America as a whole with random people shooting each other on the streets so it was better to be safe than sorry.

The birds scratched the surface of his bulletproof windows with fury and Caleb took this opportunity to stab them with his homemade weapon. Naturally, he didn’t succeed at stabbing the birds with good accuracy to kill them all but he did wound a lot of them to the point they would fall off from the side of his window. Caleb then used his car to run them over a few times to increase the ghoul kill count. After repeating the process of stabbing and running them over, Caleb checked his kill count.

He couldn’t help but laugh when he saw that his hard work paid off. Now that he knew hostile creatures infected with PXE22 counted as ghouls, Caleb knew what he wanted to do next. He also confirmed that an indirect kill such as running ghouls over with his car counted as a kill count, Caleb used his phone to order hundreds of rat traps designed to kill. Those hamsters were finally going to be put to good use. Also, he would need a few bottles of oil for the trap to work effectively.

Placing his orders on sss and driving to the nearest car wash station, Caleb cleaned his Ghoul Stabber. Now that the second requirement was fulfilled, Caleb could take it easy until the arrival of his goods. It was only a shame that Caleb was unable to get out of his car to sacrifice all the kills to the system. Although the system didn’t accept ghouls as resources, it helped him dispose of the bodies. Caleb just didn’t sacrifice all the bodies to the system tonight because it was too messy and bloody. He also was in a rush to get out of the car park and get to an unattended car wash station to clean the bloody mess before he returned home. The resource gathering can happen after he gets some sleep.

>>Xxx Destiny Aitsuji xxX<<

Caleb woke up to the sound of someone ringing his doorbell. He groaned and tumbled out of bed, nearly stepping on Jeremy’s tail in the process and got to the door.

“A delivery for Mr Houston!” the delivery personnel shouted and Caleb opened the door. He was slightly surprised that even after his apartment was turned into a bunker, he could still hear the things that went on outside perfectly fine.

“Good morning,” Caleb greeted and signed on the phone app that he received his deliveries. sss worked fast and Caleb was impressed by how many things were blocking the corridor. If the building manager saw that, the man would freak out at the potential fire hazard.

Caleb waited for the delivery person to leave with his team before looking at the huge cartons. He went back in for a pen knife to cut open the boxes and check the contents. Apart from the rat traps and oil, everything else was going to be added to the system for completing his first task.

As expected, the rat traps and oil were still not here. Caleb checked twice to ensure that nobody was nearby before placing his hands on the carton boxes.

“Thank you,” he said and the system sucked everything into its resource panel. Caleb grinned. Who would have thought that such a common word would be perfect for activating the “Add to System” button? He planned to visit Target and steal various hard to find items with this method. Even if he was caught behaving suspiciously on camera, nobody would be able to do anything to him because they wouldn’t be able to find any evidence of him stealing things and Caleb felt very smart for thinking of it.

With both tasks completed, the system finally levelled up from Level 1 to Level 2. The new functions of automation were added and Caleb checked it out excitedly. In his inbox, a brief introduction to the new levelled up system was waiting for him. Caleb read the mail and emptied it quickly after he received his bonus reward for Area Reservations.

At Level 2, Caleb was now able to fully utilise the Research Workshop Bunker abilities. Although there was only one available slot for an automated assistant, Caleb was once again impressed by the magic of this strange system technology. Automated assistants were given a special effect to run on power that belongs to the system. There was no need to design batteries or charging systems for the automated assistants and they were robots with an indefinite lifespan.

“Everything is becoming more and more science-fiction,” Caleb mused but he didn’t mind.

He didn’t know how many automated assistants he could unlock but for the first assistant, Caleb knew exactly what he wanted. Resource gathering during a ghoul apocalypse would be incredibly tricky for humans. Caleb didn’t want to spend too much time collecting resources daily when it happened. He wanted to be able to stay in the safety of his bunker with Jeremy and write survival blogs to help more people as well as work on ghoul hunting.

Like clockwork, the system prompted a new notification. Caleb checked his inbox and already, there was a new task after Caleb received the Area Reservation Reward.

[Congratulations! The system is now Level 2. You can create an automated assistant that runs on indefinite power supply provided by the system. Please check your task tab and complete the following mission.]

Caleb went to his task tab and saw that he was now required to design his first automated assistant. Once the design is finalised, he should sacrifice the prototype to the system so that it can store the design and mass produce. Caleb checked if he was able to improve on the submitted design and was impressed that the system was learning. Now that he was sure about the modification option, Caleb looked at the limitations of the automated assistant. While he was not given a maximum capacity for production, every assistant cost a huge amount of resources depending on the design. In addition, every assistant required a minimum amount of ghouls killed. Caleb knew that he didn’t have enough of either to mass-produce an army right off the bat but he remained hopeful.

Since he was already awake and the weather looked great, Caleb decided to test out his Area Reservation ability. The most important places that he wanted to reserve for now would be the hospital, Target, Helen’s lab, the power plant and a gun shop. He wouldn’t have trouble accessing Target, the gun shop or the hospital but for the rest of the locations, Caleb needed to be trickier.

“Whatever, every journey begins with the first step. Let’s mark out Target and the hospital seeing they are both in Manhattan then stop by the gun shop on the way back. I might need to buy a metal ladder and from Target so that I can visit the power plant and Rockfeller University. Marking an area doesn’t cost me anything so I’ll just mark the entire university and have Helen tell me where her lab is when she calls me. Do you think she will call me tomorrow?” Caleb asked Jeremy who was still sleepy.

Seeing that he wasn’t going to receive any reply, Caleb shrugged and got on with his day. Tomorrow was the 1st of May and Caleb was expecting a reply from Helen who he knew would be keeping an eye out on the news. He made a bloody mess at the car park along East River so Caleb was expecting to hear something on the news about his gruesome experiment.

Caleb got dressed after breakfast and grabbed his car keys. The drive to Target wasn’t bad. In fact, Caleb didn’t see any vicious animals so the city was still in good hands despite last night’s terrible m******e. He didn’t know where all the animal ghouls went during the day but he was seeing less of them. Could there be a correlation between the sun and ghouls? He had to ask Helen about it. The ghouls seemed more irritable during the day for some reason and preferred not to show up on the streets on sunny days in his previous life.

Finding a parking lot at Target was always a fight. So many people in New York City shopped here and Caleb hated the crowd. Thankfully, it was a weekday and not many families were here. Caleb hated children with passion. He hated them because they were noisy and not well-behaved. Not to mention, raising a child was more expensive than caring for a cat. Cats were still Caleb’s best friend. Jeremy grew up with him and was low-maintenance. That silent company was always welcoming and Caleb enjoyed how Jeremy knew exactly when he needed attention or space.

Caleb didn’t spend very long at Target although he walked through many aisles and touched many things. If one didn’t pay enough attention, they would simply assume that he was window shopping. Caleb was also careful to not move his lips too much to activate the command and sacrifice useful items to the system for analysis. Clothes of all kinds, food of all types and even some electronic items that were missing from the system’s database were added. At the same time, Caleb discreetly took the chance to grab a few pants to the changing room so that he could have some privacy to check the system panels.

Caleb searched for the Area Reservation function and activated it, customising the size of the function to the entire building. The system captured it quickly and immediately, the building’s information was registered into Caleb’s Control Panel. The number of resources Caleb required to convert it to a basic bunker was nothing Caleb didn’t expect. However, when Caleb saw that the additional requirement to unlock a new special bunker space was more ghoul extermination, he cursed.

Just how many ghouls did he need to kill to convert the entire Target into a special bunker? Caleb was at a loss. For now, he conveniently forgot all about it and continued to the next venue after buying a metal ladder.

According to a smart Youtuber who tested the theory out, you could get into just about any place by dressing in covered shoes, jeans and a collared short-sleeved shirt while carrying a long metal ladder. Caleb didn’t believe it at first but the Youtuber proved it on camera with the help of his friend and he remembered his jaw-dropping. If Caleb removed his glasses and didn’t shave for a few days, he could easily pass as a repairman coming for a job. With that disguise, Caleb was looking forward to getting entry to the power plant and the university.

For now, he checked the time. He spent nearly two hours at Target and was feeling up for some lunch. Luckily, he knew of a good café near the hospital. Throwing the metal ladder he purchased into the backseat of his Benz, Caleb drove to the café for a rushed lunch.

Marking out the entire hospital using Area Reservation was extremely easy. Caleb didn’t even have to get out of his car and he was able to save on parking fees because he left the hospital within ten minutes. Now that he had two locations down, it was time to visit the gun shop and head home.

The gun shop was a small office that sold all sorts of ammo and handguns. Caleb bought his very first gun from them too and was rather familiar with the shop owner.

“Hello!” the friendly owner greeted and Caleb smiled.

“I’m here to get a refill on some ammo for my Magnum.”

“Same old?” the shopkeeper asked and went to fetch a box of rounds.

Caleb readied his card for payment and excuse. “Yes. Say, can I borrow your restroom? I don’t think my lunch agrees with me…”

The shop owner showed Caleb the restroom and Caleb thanked the man who laughed it off. Once the door was locked, Caleb quickly accessed the system and added the gun shop to his waiting list of special bunkers. Caleb specially targeted this shop because of two reasons. He knew the owner was a patriotic man who stayed behind in the city during the ghoul infestation in his past life. He was the one who supplied Caleb with his weapons and ammunition but ended up dying on one of his patrols. Caleb simply wanted to repay the kindness while securing a never-ending supply of bullets for the ghoul hunting.

Caleb exited the toilet after five minutes and apologised to the owner who smiled and wrapped up his purchase. Caleb readied his credit card and made his payment. Before he left, he turned around to look at the shop owner with gratitude.

“Paul!”

The gun shop owner looked up from the rifle barrel he was cleaning. “Yes?”

Caleb smiled from the bottom of his heart. “Thank you,” he said before leaving.

Paul was stunned but didn’t have time to ask why Caleb was acting strangely. The system developer had already left. Caleb got into his Benzs and slammed the door shut only to realise something was wrong.

“s**t!”

The round of ammunition he bought was not in his hands and Caleb understood what had happened. The system ate it and it wasn’t even sacrificed to the upgrade panel. He tried to find a way to ‘un-sacrifice the bullets but it wasn’t possible.

Caleb groaned and slammed his head on the steering wheel. That was a perfect waste of six hundred dollars but for some reason, he was still thankful that he discovered this earlier rather than later. Imagine making this mistake with his hand on the Benz instead. Caleb shuddered at the thought. He could easily buy another round of ammunition for his Magnum but his Benz was not as easily replaceable. He spent a lot of time and money customising the boy so he wasn’t willing to part with it in such a ridiculous fashion.