Chapter 5: Chapter 5: To the Death

"Ugh~~ Fine. let's get going I guess. We can't waste any more time. We already threw away enough."

"I... Understand Adam, I want to save them as well. But... We need to clarify our goals. How are we going to save as many people as possible? What are we going to do once we save them? What is going to happen to this enormous border that separates us from whatever is outside of our box? It is only 40 or 50 something square kilometers large, there is only so much here but it still is large. Are you planning on going over every centimeter and kill every single gurgling you see? What if they are spawning from somewhere and we need to kill that in order to save the most people?" 

"I get it. Okay. I get it. Let's just make a base. Go to the town hall. Set up there and begin spreading the word. Find as many people as we can and rescue them. Those that want to can help us and those that don't can just stay in the safe zone we will create. Does that sound good?"

"It sounds good enough."

"Then that's that, I'll leave all the details to you, I just have to beat those fuckers to a pulp don't I?" Adam opened the door of the house and began walking out, looking around. 

Adel smiled wryly and shrugged as she followed Adam outside. "You're really like dad, you know that?" 

"And because you are like Mom I can give you my unbending trust."

**********

"I... I don't wanna die! Mommy! Mommy!" A child cried. It cried as loudly as it could for its mother. But she didn't respond and neither did anyone else. No one could hear the child's cries. At least over the tumultuous wasteland of a battlefield that they barely managed to stand on. 

The child though could not understand the death and danger all the others were experiencing. All it could do was hold its mother's hand that was quickly losing temperature. The child tried to hug her and shake her but she wouldn't budge. How could she? The bottom half of her body was missing. Gorged on by a newly dead abomination. Elderly and other people unable to defend themselves stack to the walls of the crumbling building they had taken refuge in. Men and women alike fought off the disgusting creatures with everything they had but it was not enough. 

They didn't have a lot in the first place. They are simply a group of people that happened to be together when all of this started. They had no armor, no real weapons, no fighting experience. They are and always have been simple farmers or workers living their simple lives in their simple city. 

They had been lucky enough to live in a city that was not only large and full of office job opportunities but also close enough to good farmland that it was always an option. Yet now they were blocked off from any and all help as they fought for survival, engaged in a desperate struggle with every man for himself. 

The child cried and its voice was not heard, it was drowned out from the screams of men and screeching of monsters, from the tearing of flesh and the breaking of bones. 

"I agree with the fucking kid! I don't want to die!" A man yelled. He was in the thick of it, having taken a lion's share of the burden, having fought the hardest and killed the most. He heard the child's cries and yelled, he rallied. He wanted to live just like everyone else here. He truly did.

"But ya know! I can't just let those depending on me die! I Can't let them down! I made their protection my duty and as a man of my word I must carry that out no matter the costs!" He continued. He knew that most fighters had lost their morale. They were either ready to let themselves die or run away and save their selves. But would a life like that even matter?

Would a life full of guilt, built upon broken morals and crumpled foundations even be worth living? 

Many may think that it did, and if he was asked before the end of the world he may have answered that he was unsure of what his answer would be. But now, seeing all the death and despair the abominations and that conglomerate brought to the world he knew what he would do. He would die. Bradley knew that he would die. Bradley knows that these were the last moments of his life. 

And if by the end he managed to protect the helpless and trembling, the defectors and the weak. Even for one moment longer, even for a few minutes of peace before their eventual demise at the ending, mindless abominations, then he would. 

Bradley swung his metal pipe down and crushed one more gurgling. He then side-stepped and dodged the gurgling flying through the air and into the hall behind him. He made sure to step on the limbs he could reach without turning back and letting it get killed by the backline. He charged forward and swung widely with the pipe in his hand. 

But the disaster worsened when the dented and beaten pipe finally dented past its limit. A hollow sound was released from it when Bradley hit a collection of limbs from many gurglings. It became bent and twisted. Flimsy and cracked. A huge maw bit down and pulled the pipe apart and straight out of Bradley's hands. 

Bradley's face fell. He had made a wrong judgment and jumped forward without knowing that his weapon was about to break. The gurglings immediately took the chance and lunged at the undefended Bradley. Men from the sides tried to stop the gurglings but it had all happened too fast for their untrained bodies and minds to be able to react fast enough. 

You are reading story End of Times at novel35.com

Right as a swarm of bony hooks was about to pierce and slash and tear at Bradley black and shiny staff crashed into the ground while being swung vertically. A deathly silence followed the resounding cracking and breaking of tens of bones as the staff rushed through all the incoming attacks. The blonde man with short hair that was holding onto the staff took a stance and pierced forward. 

In only a matter of seconds, the savior had executed his thrusts enough times to put a hole through all 6 gurglings in his reach. They all dropped down one after another. But what was even more impressive wasn't the speed with which the man moved and neither the technique but rather the current of wind and power that exploded outward from his every attack. It wasn't superhuman, nor could it be paralleled to a gunshot but it could be seen in the gurglings that had died from his attacks that they held real deadly potential because on the opposite side from where the staff had entered their bodies all of their innards had exploded from inside their skin and skeleton and into the other gurglings further back.

"Everyone take a moment to catch your breath and help me deal with these fuckers! If we kill them here we can secure the town hall! We can protect ourselves and gather others!" Adam yelled out as he swung his staff widely, covering the entirety of the hall the gurglings were coming from. A wall from the side of the main room of the Town Center had been broken into and the gurglings had easy access. The only reason why the horde had grown into the hundreds was because of how prolonged the fight had been. More and more gurglings heard the cries of their kind and rushed to the sight. 

It is better that way... Now, I won't have to hunt you down. 

Adam pushed another wave of incoming gurglings away with a wide swing of his staff and quickly reached down. He grabbed the hooked limbs and cracked them off. Like taking the legs off of a cooked lobster. Adam had already dug his staff into the ground, crushing and shattering some floor tiles along the way and so after taking the hooks off a dead gurgling's limbs. 

He threw one after aiming and it flew forward, whizzing through the air at speeds faster than 130 kilometers an hour. It pierced into a gurgling and flew through the other side hitting the next one right behind it and crushing its brain, which oozed outwards in a mixture of pink and yellow liquids.

"Aren't you going to help!" Adam yelled as he threw another one, killing only one more gurgling, and then picked up his staff and began wielding it with poised, wide, and slow arcs as he tried to ward off every and all threats. He looked straight at Bradley which he had already categorized in his head as the strongest person there, some sort of leader. 

Bradley looked down at Adam's stare. Now that he had faced death almost grab his neck and choke him his previous recklessness appeared so much more self-destructive, scary. Bradley feared what could have happened if that man had not come at the last second, and now that he was here he felt the burden on his shoulders lift. He felt as if he had given it all and it was time to rest.

It was then that he felt a slap on his back. He was startled to look up and turn around only to see a similarly golden-haired young woman grinning widely, almost slyly at him. If he had seen more cartoons he would be seeing shining golden stars in her pupils.

"Now, now. We can't have you quitting just yet. Who is going to take care of these people after we are gone? What's your name?" The young woman, clearly associated with the golden-haired man asked, without any pretense of manners.

"Mine is Adel, and your savior is my older brother, Adam. Nice to meet you..." She pushed Bradley for an answer as she spoke up again after seeing his confusion and hesitation.

"Bradley... Bradley Cox. Nice to meet you, Adel." He answered, almost coerced to do so, without exactly knowing how. 

"Yeah great. Now. get the fuck up and help me rally these people. The sooner we kill all these Gurglings the sooner we will be able to set up this safe zone and be able to go around the region and rescue all that need it." Adel began saying at a rapid pace, but then she paused and took a deep breath. "AND THUS THE SOONER WE WILL BE ABLE TO RESCUE YOUR FAMILY!!" She yelled loudly enough for everyone in the room to hear. 

No one here could possibly mishear what had just been said, at least in the Townhall. Right now most people here were unrelated to one another. The biggest hope they held was that they would be able to survive this hell and find their partners, children, and parents out there in the city. They had been hiding and fighting in this town hall for the near 2 hours since everything as they knew it had ended and with every passing second their hopes of finding their people safe and sound deteriorated drastically. 

Bradley felt the same, he also had a wife and a daughter to return to. A wife and a daughter that he wanted to protect. A wife and a daughter he wanted to be able to provide a safe space, a safe zone for. 

"Can't really argue with that Adel. Glad we have you here, much better at raising morale than your brother over there." Bradley said as he took the crowbar Adel gave him and stood up and looked over to Adam, that was currently extracting his staff from the skewered bodies of a few freshly dead gurglings. 

"I did less than you might think. If it wasn't for Adam standing bravely in front of tens of those abominations and killing them without letting any of them be a threat to you, I doubt anyone here would be able to spare the brain capacity, or have the willingness, to hear anything I have to say." Adel said as hurriedly as before as she patted Bradley on the shoulder. Her eyes, as she began rushing to her brother's side with a hatchet on hand, clearly conveyed to Bradley what she wanted from him at this moment. I should avoid mentioning the fact that this is the result of my skill hidden for now.

"People! Listen up! What this young one said was absolutely correct! With new, and sufficient reinforcements there is nothing for us to fear. We can destroy those fuckers! Tear them apart and secure this long-standing building as a base! The moment that is done we are free to rush through the city and rescue everyone in need. Grandparents, parents, wives and husbands, children, and even pets! We can communicate and rescue. Reclaim and rebuild all that has been lost in these two hours of hell! Why should we give up?! When have humans given up?! Through all the challenges we have faced, through the thousands of years of human existence... When have humans failed to overcome the obstacles that befall them?! Never?! And this time is no different! We! Will be! The ones! To go. Down. In History!" Bradley cooked up the best he could in this critical moment. It was disorganized, all over the place. It missed the major points and would be considered a failure in any military or even managerial job. but it was enough. It was enough to make the brave people that had been barely fighting between their own mortality and morality this whole time take up sticks and pipes and crowbars and knives and clubs and chairs and everything they could find and charge into the storm. With people that had previously cowered away jumping into the fray following elderly men, that were way past their prime.

With Adam's and Adel's heroic display playing a major part in their sudden rush of adrenaline. This resulted in these simple citizens that had lead simple lives to act more valiantly than they possibly ever had and possibly ever will.

You can find story with these keywords: End of Times, Read End of Times, End of Times novel, End of Times book, End of Times story, End of Times full, End of Times Latest Chapter