Little Bing looked at Little Har and Little Raf for a while, before leaping onto the emptied body of the huge mouse. She pulled on its intestine and ran towards both of us, as though she was asking for a compliment.

“Retch.” Harry and I turned towards each other to throw up! Little Bing held the long intestine in her mouth as she looked at us blankly, innocently crooking her head sideways. It seemed like she was wondering why we didn’t like it.

I extended my hand to hold Harry’s shoulder subconsciously as I calmed myself down. When we looked up, we realized that we were standing close to each other. The fringe of his hair brushed against mine and there was a flash of panic across his amber eyes. We quickly stepped back from each other.

My heart suddenly started racing, but quickly resumed its calm. I had never had such a feeling. It was like.. my heart was acting up.

“You.. Do you feel strange recently?” I held my chest and asked without looking at Harry.

“Mm..” He replied without looking at me.

“Bang!” The ground quaked suddenly. “Pak!” Harry held my hand, and my heart skipped a beat. He was clasping my hand firmly and every single finger of mine was turning pale due to his firm grip. He was highly alert and staring at the cave’s entrance with his guards up.

Little Har, Little Raf and Little Bing stiffened. They slowly moved away from the huge mouse, retreated softly. Little Carl ran to them, just like a hen that was protecting her chicks.

“Bang!” There was another loud bang. Harry suddenly started running without hesitation, “Hurry up and run!”

He pulled me and ran past the huge mouse’s corpse. Little Bing flew with the intestine in her mouth and the intestine nearly hit both of us.

Little Raf and Little Har picked up a bigger chunk of flesh in their mouths. Following that, Little Carl suddenly overtook us and ran in front of us. He was faster since he was running on wheels.

Harry ran extremely fast. I followed closely behind him as I turned to look at him. Suddenly, a huge head popped out of the cave. Its skin was rotten and it looked like an even larger mouse. It squeezed out from the cave and looked at the killed and torn mouse. It lifted its head and squeaked in agony.

Oh no. That must be the mouse’s mother.

“Hurry up and leave!” Harry told Little Carl and the birds.

They ran even faster!

“Squeak.” The huge mother mouse locked onto us as its target. It chased after us, and its huge body was just like a mountain that had grown a pair of long legs. How could a mutant at the end of the world be so huge?!

It caught up with us really quickly. Harry pulled me to a white building and took a quick turn. We stopped and panted as we pressed against the wall of this building.

“Huff and puff..”

Once my dad had offered to throw me a coming-of-age ceremony on my birthday. I knew that he was referring to a real battle by that. The uncles and brothers wouldn’t have given me leeway, but they would have conducted a strict examination!

It would have been my special coming-of-age ceremony.

Harry held my hand tightly and took a deep breath. We looked at each other as I gripped his hand.

“Are you ready?” He raised his gun. I nodded while I raised my gun too.

“Bang!”

“Bang!”

“Bang!”

Harry and I walked out from the side of the building with our guns raised up to aim at the huge object in front of us. We pulled the triggers without hesitation!

Lights pierced the big mother mouse, piercing her head. One hole after another filled her face. In the end, she collapsed in front of us, blood pooling all around her.

Harry and I put down our guns and looked at the huge mother mouse blankly, and then we looked at each other; his amber eyes were shimmering like the sun. We kept staring in one another’s eyes; we were such a well-coordinated team.

Suddenly, we realized that we were still holding hands, and I accidently shot in the distance with the gun in my left hand.

“I’m sorry,” he quickly let go of my hand. At that very moment, the warmth of his hands left mine, and my hand was instantly greeted by the cool air. He turned away from me and I clasped on my hand that was burning from his grip. Harry’s hand was so warm.

Suddenly, there were rustling noises in the warehouse by the side. Harry whispered to me, “Hurry up and leave.” He raised his gun and became very vigilant. Both of our backs were against each other’s, so that we could guard our backs, as we slowly moved away from the huge mother mouse.

Before we got far enough, I saw many small monsters swarming out of the huge white buildings. They leaped onto the dead mother mouse and started fighting over her body, tearing her into pieces.

They looked strange—they walked on four legs but had no hair on their bodies. Their rear limbs were longer than their front limbs, and they looked like monkeys.

“Here,” Harry had brought us to another white warehouse. There was an opening that only a human could fit in, and it led inside the warehouse. He stood by the side of the opening and looked around us cautiously, then he beckoned me to get in quickly.

I got in without questioning him. Although the monsters had come out of a similar building like this one, I trusted Harry’s judgement and knew he wouldn’t do anything to put me in harm’s way.

When I was inside the white building, I realized that it was like the upper floor of a bigger building. With the light shining through the opening at the top of the building, I could see capsule cabins standing in different corners of this floor. There were buttons next to the capsule cabins, and these were none other than elevators to go downstairs.

“It was a military base camp,” Harry stood behind me and spoke softly.

“Military base camp?” I blurted out. Harry covered my mouth hastily and pointed above us. I looked up and saw that there were huge birds resting on the building’s metal beams above us.

They were sleeping like bats.

Harry walked to a wall and looked outside through the gap.

I followed behind him and looked at the monsters fighting over the flesh of the mother mouse.

“Those are Day Monsters. They are humans,” Harry said softly.

I looked at him in surprise while he creased his eyebrows, “They mutated from zombies.” Then, he turned to look at the capsule cabins and then at me, “Do you want to see the world underneath?”

I looked at him in shock, but he smirked and carefully moved closer to the capsule cabin that was closest to us, while keeping an eye at the huge birds above us.

I followed closely behind Harry and moved closer to the capsule cabin. I soon realized that there was no flooring in the capsule cabin, instead there were only ropes that went up and down. Harry jumped and grabbed the rope on the left. Then, he looked at me. I put my gun away and jumped to grab another rope. It was pitch dark underneath us.

Harry took off the apple badge on his chest and threw it down; right away, it started hovering and shone light in the tunnel below.

I became excited. I reckoned that my coming-of-age ceremony was going to be unforgettable.