The Earth After Rebirth

It was now time to share their exploration stories. Kiro told them first, he recounted everything he saw. Including the corpse and the vampire they saw in the backroom, now everybody understood why they were soaked in blood.

"Vampires?" Hiro whimpered. "Do you think it's Dracula?"

"It's likely."

"Who's Dracula?" Nikolai asked.

"Oh, just some Vampire Lord, Kiro pissed off."

"We probably should've mentioned that we were being hunted by a crazy Vampire Lord." Kiro said and laughed sheepishly.

Everyone looked at the two incredulously. Ishaan especially was visibly frightened. Kel however wore an expression of amusement. The more he knew his master, the more he liked him.

Ishaan and Hiro had nothing to tell that was out of the ordinary, they couldn't even find shelter. When they couldn't find anything they just went into a store that was caved in, and collected the food and water that was undamaged.

"It was uneventful for us too." Nikolai said, looking at Felix. Felix looked at him as if to tell him to say it all. Nikolai rolled his eyes and sighed.

"Well, Felix has a theory. Zombies. We ran into a boarded up movie theatre, inside, there was rumbling and humming, almost like bees really." He shrugged as if he didn't believe in what he was saying.

"Zombies huh, it's possible. This might be the dungeon of the undead or something." Kiro said as the dots connected.

This must've been what the spectres meant when they said undead. Maybe this dungeon harboured every bit of an undead monster.

This made Ishaan uncomfortable, he was fidgeting and almost choked on the meat he was still eating. The conversation made him too aware of his surroundings that, he thought he was seeing moving shadows.

"Why did you even pick a combat mage if you're so scared of everything?" Felix asked with a tinge of annoyance.

"It's just a game, I didn't expect it to be this realistic." He said unconvinced by his own words.

"That's what it is Chubby, a game. Your body is safe in your own room. You're not gonna die."

"Kiro, don't call me that!"

Kiro just ignored him. They continued to chat, coming up with ways to deal with zombies and vampires and everything else that may be lurking.

They had to prepare everything, it was better than not being prepared they figured. Hiro and Kiro told them everything they knew about the vampire they fought, the skills it had, the way it fought.

The night was extremely cold, but the fire made it at least possible for them to camp outside. Though they vowed to find shelter the next morning, because the silence of the night, of the world, was unsettling. It made each of them uncomfortable.

Kiro offered to be the first watch after they finished their food. They all couldn't just sleep while vampires roamed the land. He used Kel as a pillow, he was surprisingly comfortable enough and made sure the fire didn't die out, so he fed it wood once in a while.

He spent the time to enter his mental world, Paraside. Hoping to run into Hubris somehow. But he never did. He instead spent the time using his reality warping abilities to change certain things in his world.

He even figured the frequency he had to vibrate at to be able to jump. Of course it was all theory, it was all happening in his head after all.

The last time he jumped, it had drained all his energy, he knew that he'd have to expand his pool in order to safely make jumps. At the moment that was his priority.

He was jerked out of the state when he heard shuffling. Opening his eyes he saw Felix had woken up, followed briefly by Nikolai.

"You should probably rest too, leader." Nikolai said, yawning.

"I'm okay, I'm not really tired." Kiro said looking into the distance, he could've sworn he saw something in the darkness.

The three boys just sat in silence. The only sound that could be heard was the crackling of the fire. The buildings looked peculiar in the dark, as if they had moving shadows.

"Dad, no, please, dad!!!" Hiro suddenly shouted, which startled the three. Nikolai and Kiro with their weapons at the ready. Ishaan didn't even move, he was absolutely out.

Hiro shot up, breathing heavily. He looked around when he realised where he was, relief could be seen on his face and then embarrassment.

Kiro went up to him.

"Same dream?"

He nodded. While his mind was healthy, he occasionally had bad dreams about what happened to his dad and the trauma from the labyrinth made it more real for him.

He would sometimes dream of that day, his father trying to kill him. It was, terrible.

"You know my papi, I mean grandpa, disappeared too." Kiro said trying to make him feel better, to let him know he wasn't alone.

He continued, "I was probably 7 when he did, but nobody tried looking for him, not even my parents. It's strange how I'd forgotten until that stupid labyrinth reminded me."

Hiro looked up at him nodding because he'd told him about it before, "Where do you reckon they went?"

Nikolai and Felix were as still as water, they didn't want to miss a word of the conversation.

"I have no clue, but I bet it isn't a coincidence. I'm sure, you know, the strings of missing persons in the lower district." He answered, almost absentmindedly, caressing the game version of the necklace his grandfather gave him.

Hiro nodded. After his father's disappearance, his mother didn't let them out of the house much. So he understood what Kiro meant.

There was silence for a long time. Each of them seemed to be thinking about one thing, Kiro's last words lingered in their minds, putting them in a trance-like state.

Nikolai looked to be battling a demon inside of him. He couldn't decide whether to say or not. He knew more than they did, that much was certain, but he was ashamed of what happened to him all the same.

"I may know something about that." He finally said, choking on his own saliva.