My Reality Became a Zombie Game World, but Only I Can Use the Game System - Chapter 9: The Hell of the Gymnasium Building

Chapter 9: The Hell of the Gymnasium Building

Inoue Yume, who had evacuated to the gymnasium building, was more concerned about Karamine Ritsu than her own life.

Yume had fled from her own classroom to escape the zombies, and first, she had run to Ritsu’s classroom. However, Ritsu wasn’t there.

She had dropped her smartphone in the confusion, so now she had no way to contact Ritsu. She prayed from the bottom of her heart that Ritsu was at home.

Despite the fact that all the students had been evacuated, there were only a few dozen students inside the gymnasium. The other students had probably been killed by the zombies.

“Hey, Yume, we’re going to be okay, right? We’re going to be saved, right?”

“We’re gonna be alright, Natsumi.”

Yume hugged her crying classmate and stroked her head.

Uchida Natsumi was usually a mood maker who brightened the atmosphere of the class. But now, she was mentally exhausted and distraught, and her tears were flowing continuously.

Every time she heard the sound of someone banging on the gymnasium door, Natsumi’s body trembled.

It’s okay, zombies don’t have the strength to destroy an iron door. If we wait here for the police, we’ll be rescued for sure.

Suddenly, Yume wondered what was happening outside the school.

The first zombies that attacked were not students at the school. Where did they come from? If it was the residential area around the school, maybe there were zombies outside the school as well…

Yume shook her head, stopping herself from having bad thoughts. At any rate, she had to wait for rescue now. And then, she had to think of a way to save Ritsu.

“My phone won’t connect! My dad isn’t answering! Yume, why won’t it connect?”

Yume tried to comfort Natsumi again, who was holding her phone that wouldn’t connect.

That’s when it happened.

“Get out of the way! Kaori is right there!”

Someone was shouting. At a glance, a few people were fighting in front of the gymnasium door.

It seemed that a male student was trying to go outside to save his girlfriend.

“I heard it again! Don’t you hear it too? She’s saying she wants to meet me! Ah, Kaori, I’ll save you right away!”

Yume’s consciousness, which had been in a daze, after fleeing from the zombies, was suddenly awakened by the approaching danger.

The male student had pushed past a few people and opened the gymnasium door wide.

“Ahh, Kaori, Kaori! It’s okay, Kaori!”

The male student embraced the female student zombie who had stumbled in through the opened door.

The male student was bitten by the zombie, but he continued to hug the girl, crying.

Zombies poured in through the door. Screams rose from all around.

A panicked person tried to escape through another door, opening it, and zombies from outside rushed in. Someone else tried to close the door, but failed, and was bitten by the zombies.

In an instant, the gymnasium turned into a hellish scene.

“Ahh, what should we do! Hey, Yume, what should we do!”

Natsumi clung to Yume, crying with her face twisted.

Yume calmly looked for a place to escape and said to Natsumi,

“It’s okay, come on, let’s run towards that equipment storage room.”

The equipment storage room was inside the gymnasium. The door was open, but zombies hadn’t entered yet.

If they could escape there and close the door, they might survive.

Running with Natsumi, holding her hand, Yume heard screams that would probably stay with her for life.

Zombies attacked, but Yume kicked them away forcefully. But soon, other zombies jumped on them.

Unless she bought them some time, they wouldn’t be able to reach the equipment storage room.

“Natsumi, go ahead. I’ll catch up with you right away.”

“Okay! You have to come right away! Come to me right away, Yume!”

Yume had some knowledge of martial arts. If she was alone, she could deal with zombies to some extent. Natsumi must have realized that too, because she started running towards the equipment storage room again.

Kicking away the horde of zombies, pushing them with the palm of her hand, and tripping them up. Yume ran towards the equipment storage room, taking advantage of the brief respite.

“Wait! Please! Yume isn’t here yet! Don’t close the door!”

Yume witnessed Natsumi’s screams, and then the students closing the door of the equipment storage room.

At the same time, several zombies reached out to grab Yume. Yume shouted out of reflex.

“—-Over there!”

*

“Yume-nee!”

I instinctively dashed out from behind the school building, sprinting toward the gymnasium wing.

“Wait, Karamine-kun! There are too many zombies! What are you planning to do!?”

Kenzaki-san shouted from behind.

Even though their numbers had decreased, it wasn’t an amount of zombies that could be overcome head-on with only close-range weapons. I understood that too.

“Please! I’m begging you, don’t act recklessly! Please…”

Kenzaki-san pleaded with tears in her eyes. From the outside, it must have looked like I was a suicide volunteer, rushing into the horde of zombies.

—But this situation, which was hopeless for ordinary people, was just something that made me wonder which option to choose to break through.—

I was glad I had bought the alarm bomb from the store.

As I cut down the zombies with the machete, I materialized the alarm bomb from the inventory, taking a few seconds.

Offensive accessory “Alarm Bomb.”

It was an item designed to deal with multiple common zombies.

When activated, it made a loud noise to attract zombies, and after a few seconds, it exploded, blowing up the zombies. In “DL4,” it was a very useful item, but in the real world, I had to be careful not to involve people in the explosion.

In front of the gymnasium building door, there was a wide space that led directly to the schoolyard.

Making sure there were no humans there, I activated the alarm bomb and threw it.

“Pi, pi, pi, piiiiiiiiiiii!”

The alarm bomb rang out, and the zombies, attracted by the sound, rushed towards it.

Zombies that had been inside the gymnasium building, which I couldn’t see, were also lured out.

I attracted the zombies with the bomb for a few seconds, and then the alarm bomb exploded.

The explosion was so loud it hurt my ears.

The zombies were blown to pieces.

Slime from the zombies’ blood rained down around us. This left me with only one alarm bomb left, which was painful, but this was a good use of it.

“All those zombies… Karamine-kun, who are you?”

Kenzaki-san, who had caught up with me, was looking at me with wide eyes, but I didn’t have time to explain.

As I slashed at the remaining zombies with the machete, I peeked inside the gymnasium building.

“Ugh…”

The smell of blood was overwhelming.

There were almost no zombies inside the building. Only about ten zombies were repeatedly crashing into the equipment storage room.

The number of corpses was far greater than the number of zombies. The reason there were few zombies was that there were no survivors left here.

It was unclear when they had been bitten, but these dead people would eventually turn into zombies. We had to leave before that happened.

I took a quick look around the gymnasium and was relieved that Yume-nee wasn’t there.

It was a pity that she wasn’t here, but it was better than being bitten or dead.

Kenzaki-san, who was walking next to me, stopped.

Her gaze was directed at one of the zombies in front of the equipment storage room.

“Karamine-kun, I found the person I was looking for.”

Kenzaki-san had come here to look for a disciple of the Kenzaki school.

“So… we were too late?”

“No. I saw him walking towards the gymnasium as a zombie. I told you, I wanted to save him. He was a good boy, so I thought he would hate to bite and kill someone.”

Kenzaki-san had come here, risking her life, to mourn the dead.

With unusually kind eyes, Kenzaki-san readied her sword.

“Really, he was such a troublemaker until the end. I’ll take revenge for you, so rest in peace.”

Kenzaki-san cut off the zombie’s head, as if she was performing euthanasia.

She gently picked up the severed head and held it to her chest, and Kenzaki-san shed a silent tear.

I didn’t ask for details. They had their own stories, and I couldn’t be involved in them.

“Sorry, Kenzaki-san, there are too many of them, can you help me?”

“…… Yes, I’m sorry.”

The two of us took care of the zombies in front of the equipment storage room, and then we called out to the people inside.

“We’ve defeated the zombies! I’m sorry, could you open the door for us?”

After calling out a few times to let them know it was safe, someone cautiously opened the door of the equipment storage room.

I prayed that Yume-nee was here, and I checked inside the equipment storage room.