Still at SC12 University, the group of college students, led by Travis and Maggie, made a great effort to clean the cafeteria building where they were, eliminating all the zombies from the area. After all, they had convinced the students that the place was well protected and had a good supply of food and water.
Of course, this cleanup wasn't without casualties, and after the death of so many infected, especially a strange infected with red eyes. Some medical and veterinary students asked to perform an autopsy on some corpses, in an attempt to find out some additional information about the strange disease.
Now, the most experienced student of this group, who had already started his residency at a hospital, came to meet Travis and Maggie with worried eyes. Noticing their hesitation to speak, Travis was direct.
"Just tell me what you found out, no matter how bad it is…"
"Well, without technological equipment it's impossible to do more detailed analyses… Besides, there aren't even basic instruments and alchemical materials needed in this building. With that, the autopsy was very simple and rudimentary, just like our initial diagnosis…
…There was nothing different about the corpses of all the monsters, other than their black saliva. So we confirmed what you said, we deduced that biting is the main means of transmission and the initial version of this virus must be airborne, since there were many corpses without signs of biting, which makes us immune to this airborne variant… As for the infected one with red eyes, we noticed much more resistant muscles in his body, almost inhuman, and near his heart, there was this."
After the young man handed Travis an asymmetrical red crystal the size of a fingernail, he excused himself and left.
Maggie, who was looking at the crystal in Travis's hands, frowned as she realized that he was in some kind of trance as he stared at the crystal... But in a matter of seconds, he threw it into his mouth and swallowed it without hesitation.
"ARE YOU CRAZY?" She screamed, moving away from him.
He just stood there in silence for a while, then looked at both of his hands and clenched his fists tightly a few times, as if he felt something different in his strength. His eyes turned to Maggie, and a small smile appeared on his face.
"What are you talking about?"
"You swallowed that thing! Why did you do that?"
"Hm... Some kind of instinct?"
"Damn! It seems like this crisis has made you lose your mind…" She said, as she paced around the room nervously with the thumb and index finger of her right hand rubbing her temples…
"I'm fine, I've never been better than before. Something tells me we should collect more of these crystals. The difference is small, but I think my strength has increased by at least 20-30%."
Maggie was still in doubt and afraid of Travis, so she kept her distance from him and said:
"I'll ask the students who stood out the most in today's combat to do this. But until we get more of this stuff, keep your room door closed, and let me know immediately if you start to feel feverish or unwell, okay?"
Travis nodded and stood up, going to the window of the room where he was. From here, he had a good open view of the University Campus and his eyes swept over the second place he should loot with his group of survivors, one that had many blunt weapons and also protective clothing; the sports gym…
***
Far from SC12 and far from many human cities. In the middle of a large forest reserve, there was a giant surveillance room. Inside this room, a middle-aged man who appeared to be an ordinary citizen of Jyera watched several live images of several important cities, taking several notes. Something unusual, since none of the cameras in this world worked anymore. But suddenly, an alarm sounded, taking his attention away from the screens.
The man recognized the sound of the alarm and got up from the chair where he was moving to one of the few doors that the surveillance room had. When he left, he looked at the red sky of Jyera that made the sun impossible to see. It was also possible to notice that the man had opened the door and came out from inside a huge mountain where no one would think there was anything there.
Silver lights shone in the surrounding forest before the spatial dilation removed all the trees in that place, creating a luminous mini warp gate 3 meters high and 2 meters wide. From inside the warp gate came out a tall, white man with blue eyes and blond hair. His clothes were elegant and luxurious, reminiscent of Jyera's current fashion style. He exuded an aura of natural leadership and had an armband with a strange symbol on his right arm. He was followed by four other men also dressed in Jyera's style, but they wore more humble clothes. As if they didn't want to overshadow the person who led them.
The man who came out of the surveillance room recognized something on the blond man's armband and knelt in front of the five newcomers, showing great respect:
"Greetings, Vice Admiral, I am the Observer of this planet. Was there a communication problem? I did not make any request for help or report any emergency."
The Vice Admiral just looked at the red sky, and then said a short sentence that shocked the Observer by the complexity and absurdity of that simple sentence.
"There was a temporal anomaly on this planet..."