novelraw Chapter 50 50: This fucking… world…
Chapter 50 50: This fucking… world…
After nearly an hour, Leon and Natalia finally reached the gymnasium. With his injuries, they had no choice but to move at an infuriatingly slow pace, step by step, with frequent stops where Leon clenched his teeth and simply kept going, refusing to comment on the pain, as if he'd decided there was no point in even naming it anymore.
When the metal doors shut behind them with a dull, heavy thud, the atmosphere inside hit him almost physically.
It was bleak.
Not because of the lighting, the lamps were still on, but in the worse, human way. The air was saturated with fear, muffled sobs, and low whispers that repeated everywhere: broken conversations about what happened, who didn't come back, who saw something awful, who still believed it would somehow work out.
Some of the men wandered between groups, trying to comfort people, especially women, murmuring that everything would be fine, that they'd protect them, that they wouldn't let anything happen. They swore it with a seriousness that bordered on comedy when set against the fact that most of them didn't even have the courage to pick up a weapon, let alone step outside the building's "safe" walls.
The women clung to their arms, desperately, tightly, like those men were their only lifeline. In a world that had turned into a nightmare overnight, they had no one else they felt they could trust. Leon could see it clearly: that need for safety was crushing common sense.
How was someone who couldn't lift a knife or face even the weakest zombie supposed to protect anyone?
But in a situation like this, even false hope was welcomed with open arms. It offered an illusion of control over a reality that had slipped beyond logic a long time ago.
Natalia watched it all with her pale blue eyes and felt something close to contempt. And it wasn't aimed at the men.
It was aimed at the women.
In her eyes, they were truly hopeless if they believed someone else would take responsibility for their safety, rather than fighting, learning, adapting, and surviving on their own terms.
A moment later, Leon's attention caught on a familiar figure.
Marek.
As one of the few who actually fought, one of the few with real strength to protect others, he'd become a natural focal point. People clustered around him instinctively, drawn to someone who looked stable, capable, decisive.
Marek, who by nature liked attention and had a crude streak a mile wide, sat surrounded by a handful of young female students. He spoke in a low voice, smiling, gesturing casually, like this was just a slightly more stressful camping trip, not the beginning of the end of the world.
And even though nothing about his appearance stood out beyond a shaved head and a massive build, for those women, still haunted by images of friends being torn apart by beasts, one thing had become the only thing that mattered.
Not character.
Not morality.
Not promises.
Strength.
Because in this world, just beginning to show its true face, strength decided who saw the next day, and who became another whispered memory in some dark corner of the gym.
Adam glanced at Marek, brows knitting slightly. He snorted under his breath, more to himself than anyone else, remembering Marek's earlier words, his patronizing talk about how Leon couldn't be helped, how he was a lost cause. For a moment, a cold irony flickered in Adam's eyes before his gaze shifted.
To two figures slipping into the gym almost silently, opening the metal doors only enough to pass through.
At first, hardly anyone noticed. Then one person turned their head. Then another. Then more, until a whisper rolled through the room like a wave, and more and more eyes locked onto Leon and Natalia. For a brief moment, relief appeared on many faces.
Then it cracked.
Because once they saw them clearly, once it sank in that Natalia was supporting Leon, that he was walking unsteadily, barely placing his feet, leaning his full weight onto her shoulder, disbelief spread across their faces, followed by something much worse.
Especially on Elena face. A strange-looking little black cat was curled up asleep on her legs, completely out of place in the atmosphere. She remembered Leon's terrifying speed, his strength, the way he fought powerful beasts while shielding them with his own body, moving faster than any of them could even comprehend.
And now that same man couldn't walk on his own.
"He… he's injured…?" someone whispered.
"What kind of creature…" someone else breathed, almost soundlessly. "What kind of creature could do that to him…?"
The whispers began to stack, feed into each other, spiral. Fear took root on more and more faces as they started to understand: if something existed that could reduce Leon, one of the strongest people in their base, to a state where he couldn't even move by himself…
Then what chance did they have?
Any chance at all.
The conversations warped into nervous speculation, dread-filled guessing. Even Marek, who'd been smiling and talking with the women just moments ago, suddenly stiffened. His entire expression changed the instant he saw Leon.
He shoved one of the girls aside almost on instinct and hurried toward them. When he reached them, he took Leon from Natalia without a word, slipping an arm under his shoulder like he was afraid Leon would collapse if he moved too slowly.
Leon leaned onto Marek. Marek stared at him in disbelief, worry plain in his eyes.
"You… you okay?" he asked quietly, honestly.
Leon gave a faint smile, almost unconsciously, seeing that worry. This blunt, simple guy was genuinely concerned.
"It's nothing," Leon said with the same small smile. "Minor burns. Fought some oversized boar."
Marek stared at him like he'd lost his mind. Adam did too, both of them clearly thinking that what they were looking at was anything but "minor burns."
A beat later, Adam looked at Natalia, and only then noticed there wasn't a scratch on her. No wounds. No bruises. No signs of a fight. He let out a breath of relief almost without realizing.
"Y-you… are you okay?" he asked, voice trembling slightly.
Natalia looked at him coldly.
"I'm fine," she said flatly, without a trace of emotion.
Leon glanced at Adam from the side and, in his head, labeled him an idiot. Leon was the one barely standing. Leon was the one burned and bloodied. And Adam was asking her if she was okay, like the difference wasn't obvious.
For a moment, Leon honestly wondered who the guy thought was injured.
Marek started to guide him deeper inside, but Leon suddenly stopped, as if something still bothered him. Slowly, he turned his head and looked at Natalia straight in the eye. There was no sharpness in his gaze now. No irony. Only exhaustion, and a deep, sincere pain that didn't come purely from his wounds.
"Today…" he said quietly, struggling to catch his breath, "…you pulled me out of trouble that could've cost me my life."
His jaw tightened, like each word was effort.
"I'll repay you for it someday."
He didn't wait for an answer.
He looked away, as if afraid that if he held her gaze any longer, he'd say something else he shouldn't. Then he pulled his arm off Marek, making it clear he was going to walk the rest of the way himself.
Marek looked startled. He wanted to say something, protest, stop him, but seeing the determination in Leon's posture, hearing it in those few simple sentences, he shut his mouth and watched as Leon, face twisted with pain, started moving toward his shelter, away from everyone, not wanting anyone to see him like this.
Every step was a fight.
The pain under his feet intensified with each movement, pulsing, burning, itching all at once. The weight of his own body suddenly felt unnatural, like gravity had decided to work against him personally. Sweat formed on his forehead in fresh beads, sliding slowly down his temples.
And it didn't matter who was watching him, Natalia, Elena with the strange black cat, Adam, Marek, the rest of the survivors…
Every single one of them understood the same thing.
The pain Leon was enduring right now was beyond words, beyond anything they knew how to compare it to.
"He…" Adam started, like he wanted to add something, say something, maybe stop him.
But then, glancing at Natalia, he simply closed his mouth and stayed silent.
Natalia stood still, watching Leon's back as it disappeared down the corridor, until he vanished completely from view. And even though she still thought he was an idiot, she couldn't deny one fact anymore…
He was brave. He could fight. And he could take his life into his own hands, unlike most of the people gathered here.
Her gaze drifted over the shelter, over the men and women clinging to each other, over the ones searching for protection in someone else's arms instead of their own strength. In her stomach, something unpleasant started to swell, something like rising disgust.
She turned away without a word and walked off.
Adam reacted immediately, hurrying after her like he was afraid to lose sight of her. Marek stood in place a moment longer, staring at the direction Leon had gone… then returned to where he'd been sitting.
It didn't take long.
The women started gathering around him again, one after another. Marek welcomed them with a grin like nothing had happened, striking up conversation.
***
The door shut behind Leon with a dull, heavy sound that echoed through the cramped space, and only then did he finally let his shoulders drop, like crossing the threshold had stolen the last of his strength. His face was soaked with sweat, his hair stuck to his forehead and temples, and every breath left his lungs heavy and uneven, like he had to physically drag it out of himself.
His teeth clenched tighter and tighter until his jaw started to ache. The muscles in his face trembled uncontrollably. Inside him, everything churned at once, irritation, rage, frustration, helplessness, and that disgusting, suffocating sense of weakness that returned like a disease, something he hated even more than pain.
He stood for another second.
Tried for another second.
And then his legs simply gave out.
He hit the floor like a broken rag, hard, uncontrolled, his shoulder and hip slamming into the cold ground. He didn't even try to catch himself. He had no strength left for it, and no reason to pretend. The pain in his feet exploded again, flooding through his body like a wave of fire that refused to die.
He lay there, gasping, hands clenched into fists, feeling the burning itch, the pulsing wounds, the trembling muscles, and that cursed, constant sensation that everything inside him was too heavy, too exhausted, too weak.
They saw.
That thought hit harder than anything else.
They saw him like this.
Wobbling. Supported by someone else. Helpless and weak.
They saw him in the state he hated most, where he wasn't a fighter, wasn't the one who went first, wasn't the one who carried everything…
He was just someone who could barely stand on his own feet.
"Fuck…" he forced out through clenched teeth, voice cracking as hopelessness came with the pain, thick and sticky, clinging to his thoughts.
He slammed his fists into the floor.
Once.
Twice.
The third time he hit with everything he had, not caring that he tore skin off his knuckles, that pain in his hands only added to the rest. The concrete beneath him cracked slightly, leaving shallow dents, tiny fractures that were nothing compared to what he felt inside.
"This fucking… world…" he growled, shoulders shaking as he tried to push himself up even onto his elbows…
And his body immediately rebelled, forcing him back down.
The pain in his feet burned like someone was holding them over open flame. The itching drove him toward madness. And the awareness of his own weakness and they saw him like this was salt poured into an open wound, because no matter how many stats he had, no matter what he'd killed, no matter who he'd beaten…
Right now, he was alone with his pain.
Shut behind four walls.
Not even able to stand.