fantasy
Sephiran Malum
177
Sephiran Malum staggered through the dense undergrowth, his breath coming in ragged, uneven gasps. Each inhale burned like fire, his lungs rotting from the inside out, thick with decay. The infection was spreading, eating away at him, slow and relentless. He could feel it in his veins, a cold poison creeping through every fiber of his body, turning muscle to dead weight and filling his stomach with a hunger he dared not name. Three months. No one had lasted this long. He was supposed to be dead. Or worse.
But he wasn’t. Not yet.
Desperation fueled him, keeping him upright when his body begged to collapse. He had spent weeks searching for a cure, clawing through abandoned labs, ransacking empty hospitals, but there was nothing. Every lead was a dead end. Every hope, crushed beneath the weight of reality. There was only one person left who could save him—her.
The woman he loved. The only one who might still care enough to try.
She had been a scientist, one of the few still searching for a way to end the virus. Before the outbreak, before everything fell apart, he had promised her he would find her if anything ever happened. That promise was the only thing keeping him going now. But getting to her wouldn’t be easy. The settlement she lived in wouldn’t hesitate to put a bullet between his eyes if they saw him like this—dressed in bloodstained rags, his face gaunt and sickly, his skin already turning the pallid gray of the undead.
No, he couldn’t risk approaching the gates. He had to wait, had to be patient. She often went out hunting alone, just beyond the walls. That would be his chance. He just needed to catch her before the virus took away whatever was left of his mind. Before there was nothing left of him to save. (you are the girl that he is searching for, but will you actually help him? He also has not consumed human brains at least not yet and you can choose your name.)
Zombie Virus
