Chapter 12: Experiment
Edward tried to sneak out and go down to the lower floor alone to have some privacy but that thought was crushed by Fablo who insisted on following him as it was dangerous to move alone even in this building. Edward could helplessly let the man tag along, as he had used the excuse of using the restroom on the bottom floor.
Fablo took the lead and led Edward toward the direction of the restrooms. The place was also in ruins just like any other place Edward had seen. Broken glasses, splinters of wood littered all over the floor, pieces of clothes and dried stains of blood all over the walls; Edward could only imagine the amount of chaos that had transpired in this building three years ago and later on.
"There, pick any one of the doors and I'll be waiting outside" Fablo stopped and pointed at a long column of doors for Edward to choose from while he stood guard. Edward nodded before deliberately picking a door that was on the far end of the section.
"This kid," Fablo did not think too much about it and just shook his head. Barely all of the doors were intact and some were simply resting on the wall to provide a sense of privacy for those who used them so it was not strange that Edward would look for one that was still intact.
"Not like it's any of my business though," Fablo shrugged and went to find a place to sit.
Meanwhile, Edward closed the door behind him after entering the room. The lid on the toilet seat was down and the place was strangely clean, he would not say neat as there were still signs that spoke of the aftermath resulting from the panic of a person or the struggle of being eaten or not. Well, that was not why he had come. Edward sat on top of the cover and looked around himself, easily finding a small glass fragment on the floor, and picked it up.
Edward had already confirmed that he had become different ever since waking up after his first death. First, was the sudden increase in his strength which he still did not know the extent since he had not been chanced to measure it, Second was the sudden change in his taste. Remembering how he had somehow ended up eating those zombie eyes, Edward almost bent over to let out the contents of his stomach. He was genuinely spooked by the thought of such things being pleasant to him.
Another change was the fact that he could still see clearly at night, darkness could no longer hinder his vision. And then, there were the last two changes which Edward found more scary and incomprehensible.
First, was why zombies avoided him and the second, was how he always woke up unscathed after clearly taking a front seat row in a bus to hell.
The first was not actually a problem since Edward was more than happy to live in peace with the zombies, as long as they did not make an attempt on him one day, everything was fine. But that led him to being careless and less vigilant which had resulted in that harrowing experience at the store. That hideous zombie had suddenly attacked him out of the blue when he had his back to it. Still, he had woken up with every sign of injuries completely gone and the zombie was lying motionless a bit further away from him.
This had caused Edward to be very confused and formed another question in his mind, 'what killed the zombie'? Was it…perhaps him? Nah, that was not possible. Edward knew himself better than anyone else and he knew for a fact that he would flee at the slightest chance even if the chance of escaping was lower than one.
But where he could find answers to all these questions, he had no idea. This made Edward sigh in frustration. So many weird and strange things were happening to him but he was clueless as to which direction to go and felt lost and helpless.
"Oh well, guess I will have to test what I can for now" Edward sighed, gathering his resolve as he stared at the small glass piece in his hand. He wanted to see if there were any other changes in his body since he could not give a reason as to why zombies avoided…some zombies…avoided him or why he had survived two zombie attacks when he had clearly died.
But looking at the small glass, all Edward could see was…pain. Pain, wouldn't it hurt if he struck himself with this small object? Of course, it would, and Edward was scared of pain just as he was scared of dying. That was why he had never had the guts to fight a zombie in all three years of surviving in the apocalypse, it was truly a miracle that he had survived this long, truly.
Elsa had once called him a coward because of his fear of pain and had even beaten him up. He did not deny it inwardly but still tried to refute her in the open but even Helen, Lily, and Mark had not objected to Elsa's fury and only watched him get hit for a while before eventually stopping her. Edward knew, he knew deep down that this was who he truly was, but what about now? Since he knew that he would somehow wake up even if he died, wasn't it only appropriate that he abandoned his cowardly nature?… No, that's not right. He was misguiding himself here, how was he sure that he would surely wake up every time he died? Unacceptable, it was better to stay safe than die foolishly.
Edward made a mental note before suddenly stabbing at his arm with the broken glass.
He shut his eyes close in wait for the pain. And indeed, the pain assaulted him the moment the glass made contact with his skin but it wasn't as intense as he had expected. It felt like someone had poked him strongly with a finger.
Crack!!
A cracking sound entered his ears and Edward opened his eyes only to see that the glass had broken into smaller bits, as for his arm, there was only a small mark on the surface of his skin. The glass did not manage to penetrate it.
"My skin is that tough now?" Edward wondered in amazement but the next second, the mark left behind by his earlier experiment suddenly disappeared… more like faded slowly and his skin was soon back to normal. Edward could only stare at the place that the mark had been without a word or thought in his head but one thing was clear.
He had indeed become one of those abnormalities in fantasy novels and he had gotten self-healing or whatever it was, too.
But while this was a good thing, it could also act in the opposite as well so Edward had to be more mindful from now on to avoid hurting himself as much as possible as it would be a pain if he got injured but his injuries suddenly disappeared the next moment.
It would be a mess if he tried to explain things to others without them suspecting him and that was if they did not chase him away or kill him instantly.
(A/N: you go explain tire [complete it with your comment] hahaha)
Edward suddenly threw his head back and started laughing like a maniac, one of his hands covering his face.
It really was laughable because never in his life would he have thought that he would one day bother or worry about keeping injuries. People usually hoped for a quick recovery from injuries but here he was panicking that his injuries would disappear too quickly, it was just hilarious.
But that was what the current situation had placed him in unless he was willing to live like a fugitive from both humans and zombies.
Edward stopped laughing and his expression became unsightly, what a mess he had found himself in. Even he could not fully understand his situation, how did he plan to make others understand then? Simple, just don't let them find out.
Nodding to his thoughts and wisdom, Alex continued his experiment to test his current body limits. He found a steel pipe and tried to bend it but it seemed he had overestimated himself as he only hurt himself instead. Edward did some other tests till he tried to crush a piece of concrete with his hands, he did crush the concrete into bits at the end but he also ended up wounding himself in the process. He was both amazed by his strength and stunned by his healing ability as the tear on his palm healed in a matter of seconds but his eyes widened as he realized something. He had bled out during the seconds that his palm was healing and the blood was still all over his hand, but that wasn't what shocked him. What made Edward's heart shake was the color of his blood…
"Green?" He stuttered, his voice filled with disbelief.
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