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Chapter 48: Compensation (9)

Using the helmet would be difficult, but Luke didn’t feel like abandoning such sweet status bonuses. He would have to get used to fighting with it, and he would have to rely on Rina and Shalia more to prevent the problems that the helmet’s bring..

After walking for a couple of minutes, Luke found a shopping mall that had some water on the showers. While some zombies were still there, Shalia defeated them for him since he was too exhausted to even swing his sword. After finding some clothes, Luke immediately threw away his old ones and took a shower.

“Hey… how about having some delicacy?” Rina said when Luke got naked.

“Not bad, Luke,” Shalia said and then smirked. “Not bad at all…”

Luke ignored them… again. He was too tired to care about anything else. After cleaning his body thoroughly, he dried his body with a towel and then put on his new clothes. Which were just a set of sweatpants and a sweatshirt. After that, Luke fell on a pile of clothes in the shop. He found his new ones and immediately fell asleep.

Luke was so exhausted that he didn’t even think about finding an alarm to wake up at noon. He couldn’t waste another day in Miami, after all. He had to escape before sunset. While they weren’t as much as tired as Luke, Shalia and Rina also decided to rest. Still, while they bickered all the time, they decided to take turns in watching the surroundings. Rina took the first watch, and after three hours, Shalia assumed that position. However, two hours later and around noon, Rina woke up and glared at Shalia.

“Why didn’t you inform him of that?” Rina asked.

“Of what? Whatever you are talking about, it is not my problem,” Shalia shrugged and then pointed at Luke. “Besides, look at this.”

“Ufufufu, please, step on me more, Shalia,” Luke said while he was sleeping.

“It seems I have the upper hand here,” Shalia smiled confidently.

“You are so cute when you are pouting, Rina…” Luke said, still sleeping.

“What is the matter?” Rina smirked. “Your smile froze there… Whatever, it isn’t time for that. Luke we have a problem, wake up!”

Luke woke up pretty fast and stared absentmindedly toward Rina and Shalia. He recalled the events of the last few days, but he assumed they just had been a dream.

“Your friends are in trouble,” Rina said. “Luthi just contacted me a few moments ago.”

“Friends, do I have friends?” Luke asked. “I had some in middle school…”

“We already know why, your social skills need a lot of work,” Rina said. “Nevertheless, Celia, Amanda and the others are fighting Andrew’s group!”

“That escalated pretty quickly, I thought Amanda was into guys like him, why are they fighting?” Luke asked. “You say that my social skills suck, but that social butterfly already picked a fight with that guy in less than a day he joined his group.”

“Who cares about that, we have to help them!” Rina said.

“Why?” Luke asked.

“Why? Because they are your friends!” Rina asked.

“Friends? Look at me in the eye and tell me why they didn’t say anything when I told them to join that guy’s group,” Luke said.

“That is…” Rina looked away.

“At least you didn’t try to lie…” Luke said. “Nevertheless, I already told you, I am not a hero. Give me a proper reason to help them.”

“… Because Luthi is a friend and he is in danger,” Rina said.

“Shalia also has two friends there, do I have to deal with them as well because you asked?” Luke asked.

“You don’t have to kill them… just helping Luthi and the others is enough,” Rina said.

“But to do that, I will have to kill humans…” Luke said. “Don’t you agree? Fighting monsters is different, they are trying to devour me, after all, but you are asking me to join a fight that had nothing to do with me and then kill fellow humans, for the sake of people that began to question themselves if they should keep working with me when they found another and larger group. What is that called?”

“Hipocrisy,” Shalia replied.

While she didn’t give Rina much time to reply, Shalia was correct. That is why heroism is troublesome… acting without thinking only causes problems down the road, at least most of the time. Besides, Luke wasn’t someone who had that little self-respect. While he wasn’t that big either, he couldn’t just go and help Amanda and the others like that just because he knew them or because Rina asked after everything that happened.

In the end, Rina wasn’t unreasonable enough to keep asking Luke that, so she gave up. Regardless, it was noon, so Luke decided to get up and keep moving. He can sleep as much as he wants once he finds an airplane that will take him to Italy… probably, for around eleven hours.

After finding some food in the mall to fill his belly, Luke left the place and then noticed that the area was completely free of monsters. That was a bit disappointing, but at least it showed that Luke would have some extra time to head North. However, his plans changed when he heard the sound of a car fast approaching.

In the end, weirdly enough, a vehicle turned right as soon as it appeared on the crossroad on Luke’s right side. That was too weird to be a coincidence, even more so when Luke saw Amanda’s father covered in blood driving the vehicle… it was the same car they took yesterday. After a few seconds, Luke saw a group appear coming from the same direction, and he recognized Andrew and Lucy leading that group of five. Luke was dead set in ignoring all that, so he stepped away from the streets and entered the mall again, but while the pickup completely passed away from him, Andrew and the others stopped in front of the mall. They gave up on the chase since they couldn’t reach the car and chose the easiest target.

“Give me a break,” Luke said.