Chapter 70: Deep Inside of the Tunnel (Not that Tunnel)

“There have been more of those hideous creatures hunting the scavengers on the surface recently. It had become harder for the people in this station to secure additional supply for the upcoming winter. The old man caught a certain wind from somewhere it seems and advised the men to not go out for the time being. But with rations running low, it was impossible to keep the survivors from venturing onto the surface for food.

There were already discussions going on to abandon the station and migrate towards Central station, the chancellor of the Central station had announced that he would welcome us. They even promised to provide the stockpile for us to last until the end of winter. Some of the awakened humans however, were against the idea as the rules at the Central are quite different; they would lose the privilege they have now in Saw. But I believe the old man had already made his decision.”historical

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“While the men were still arguing, the monsters finally came knocking on our door. The survivors must have given away the position of our station during one of their escapes from those abominations. We were able to hold them off yesterday for a night, but our ammunition is running dangerously low.

The second night was approaching, everyone could feel another attack was going to come soon. Those creatures get extremely active at night as the scavengers had learned that the hard way. All the survivors were expecting the inevitable, and they were not disappointed. Before we were ready, gun shots could be heard from the entrance again.

Fortunately, our evacuation had already been decided and some level of preparations were done; but the line was broken through in an instant before the assembly was complete and everything went into hell. Some survivors made a run to the surface, while the rest of us pressed on into the dark passage and left the rest to fend for themselves.

The escape within the subway tunnels could be described as a trail of tears. The old and wounded ones were left behind to buy time for the rest of the group to advance. Fortunately, those monsters didn’t chase us deep into the tunnel; it almost seemed like they were scared of something and suddenly turned back. Perhaps taking the risk to go on this route was a good choice after all.

The path we chose was the quickest route to the central, but it was a route that the survivors traveling between the two stations seldomly used. The travelers claimed that this place was cursed. There were many travelers who made it out of this passage alive, but all of them attested that they had seen great horrors in their journey. Some had become insane and incapable of living amongst others. Most would agree to never venture out to this place again. Yet, here we are.

If there was really no choice, there was one warning from our predecessors that traveled this path. Never approach the abandoned station in between Saw and the Central. It was the place where only a few, countable by the fingers, had made it out alive. Those that witness the horror within the place could not and refuse to speak of it.

By the end of the night, only about two hundred of us made it to the Central. We lost about a quarter of the refugees in that accursed place, almost matching the death count under those monster’s fangs.”

— Oct 1st 2042.

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Within the silent tunnel way, ominous cold winds blew sharply against their faces. From a distance, the darkness was entrenched deep into the void and seemed to consume all that dared to tread within. Yet, the group was casually following the trail of blood and gore, only Timmy was left startled at every tick of sound that was heard.

Behind their ears, faint whispers could be heard from afar. Yet, when they heightened their senses, there were no whispers but sounds of eerie footsteps from the group and the hustling wind howling in the dark. No one was able to make out any meaningful words from the whispering sounds and quickly forgot that they even heard it.

The stone with markings was humming more violently as the group ventured deeper into the passage. Reina examined the stone again and had a bad feeling. The girl’s intuition wanted to throw away the stone or tell the group of the strange phenomenon; but somehow, she couldn’t let go of her hands and still kept silent to herself.

Leo noticed that the corpses they started to see were without any wounds. Some of the dead bodies even seemed to remain fresh when the rest was starting to rot. However, the smell from these corpses was horrendous nonetheless.

Soon, the group arrived at a forked passage. The train rail branched out into another tunnel where the ominous cold wind was blowing from. Leo was unsure of which way to go. When he looked at his friend, he noticed that Timmy started to act strange. The boy looked like a drunkard that saw a top tier beauty waving in front of him, slowly tumbling his way to a female corpse.

“Timmy? Timmy! Where are you going?” Leo shouted, but was met with no response from his friend.

There is the corpse of a young lady with a line of dried blood from her mouth, sitting on the ledge of a stair towards a maintenance room. The face was covered, but her body still retained the beautiful curves when she was still alive; those two bounties matched the prowess of Leo’s sister before the apocalypse. The tipsy Timmy walked towards the corpse with the smirk of a dirty old man. Whatever the kid has been smoking, Leo wants some of that.

“Heh, Heh, Heh.” The boy hopelessly sounded like a degenerate and buried his face into the deep valley of the female corpse.

The corpse remained motionless, but a small grin on the female’s face could be seen if one watched carefully. Before Leo noticed something was wrong and tried to pull his friend out of his hope and dream, Timmy started to scream in horror while struggling to get out himself. Yet, some invisible force seemed to bound him into that valley of mountains and was suffocating him to death. His voice was muffled by the two fat clamming on his head.

In the end, Leo easily pulled his friend out and felt no resistance. Timmy continued to panic in terror and blindly ran towards the branched tunnel. The big girl was in position to give the terrified Timmy a hand chop and raggedly held the boy by his cuff.

Leo looked at his unconscious friend worriedly, but quickly realized something.

“Where is Reina?” Leo asked.

The maids looked at each other and then shook their heads.

With his sixth sense tingling, Leo then slowly turned his head towards the branched tunnel and gazed into the dark.

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Leo arrived alone at an abandoned station from the branched tunnel, leaving his maids behind to watch the back and guard his helpless friend. The place had no signs of being inhabited since the black mist and some charred corpses were seen littered on the ground. The walls of the tunnel were painted with burnt marks, dust and ashes were spread on the ground; the story of this place was obvious.

Breaking into a sealed room, Leo found a group of rotten corpses without any burnt marks. The mass heap of corpses piled up into a daunting sight. The room was also completely insulated from fire; however, the people taking refuge in this room probably died of carbon dioxide poisoning. After finding nothing interesting in this place, Leo went back out to the corridor.

Through a blasted open wall, the boy noticed a faint humming melody propagating in the air. Following the sound, he arrived at an empty darkened hallway, where he found a certain stone with markings on the ground. The stone stopped resonating the moment Leo picked up. Seeing the strange marking, the boy intuitively used his vision to examine the stone.

Black streams of energies were flowing along the carved markings, but slowly dissipated upon contact with Leo’s skin.

“Interesting..,” Leo muttered.

The hallway leads to the boarding area on the other side of the station; walking down the stairs, Leo finally found Reina humming a cheerful and childish melody while surrounded by even more corpses. The girl had her back facing Leo. In front of her, was an object that looked like a stone tablet lying on the ground.

Leo did not approach the girl and was on guard. Without uttering a sound, the boy waited for Reina to finish her melody. While using his vision, Leo was perplexed that he could not spot any abnormality from the girl.

Reina slowly turned around and brightened her eyes the moment she saw him.

“You are finally here. I knew you would come for Reina,” The girl had an adorable innocent smile.

“Now that we are finally alone..,” Reina took small steps towards Leo then leaned her face on his chest. Meanwhile, her small delicate hand slid down to the bulge inside of Leo’s pants. “Could you feed Reina milk, Papa?