Chapter 146 A-Grades Of Today
"Yeah… a couple of unexpected things, actually."
Hearing those words, I raised my eyes at her, and she continued speaking.
"Actually, there were a couple more B-Grades who got attracted here. In total, about 5 of them, though I killed them all."
She then showed the B-Grade Cores to me and I nodded at her. It wasn't too unexpected for something like that to happen. Zombies do get attracted to humans in some ways. It would have been more odd if they hadn't arrived here at all.
"Other than that, I think we attracted a couple of humans as well. I sensed some people getting closer to us before stopping at a distance and then moving back. Since they were too far, I didn't bother to check up on them. Though I believe sooner or later, they will end up coming here. All the more after the sun rises up."
"Is that so? Well, that's not much of a problem. I do wish to meet people. Socializing is a good thing," I spoke with a smile.
"The wide, devilish grin on your face says otherwise," Irene smirked at me, making me chuckle a little before she took something out of her bag and presented it in front of me. It was a sort of canned food.
"Here. Take it, I still have enough to go on for another couple of days," she spoke with a bright smile as I took the can and began opening the container.
Though it was a bit bitter, it was still good enough to be considered edible. Both her and I ate our share before I recalled that I was almost going to buy something that would create whatever food I wanted. It was on discount before…
'Maybe I should look at it. Wonder if I can buy it?' I thought as I pondered what the price of that thing was.
After having eaten with Irene, I stood up and looked at the sky.
'How long till the sun shines?' I questioned
[1 Jour : 4 Minutes]
"Well, looks like there is still an hour before the dawn arrives. Why don't you tell me more about those organizations? Their powers and stuff. Who is the strongest among them and other stuff related to them," I asked as I looked at her and she started recalling bits of information as she described the hierarchy.
"On the top, Mallorn sits as the strongest A-Grade, though I doubt it's true after the power you have presented me with. Though, other than him, there are a few who are powerful but haven't shown their full capability.
Among them, 3 are directly under Mallorn. One is a Pyromancer, with the ability to control power using his energy. Another one is an Arcanist, whom even Mallorn doesn't really know much about. He is just there… It is said that he is waiting for someone to come back from the dead.
Though it's more of a rumor… I mean who could appear out of nowh… ere… " as she spoke, her eyes fell on me for a few moments as she spoke,
"Wait a second!... It can't be…"
I don't know what she was thinking about. She just looked at me with a baffled face as she spoke,
"Do you know anyone with the name of Walter Ignis?"
I thought about it for a few moments before shaking my head,"I don't know… maybe.. Maybe not? Doesn't really ring a bell, though."
At my words, she starts pondering deeply about it. Before she sighed,
"Maybe I am overthinking it? Well… okay. Moving to the next person, this guy is an Enhancer. He can imbue his energy into a weapon or an object and increase its firepower. One of the most trusted dogs of Mallorn."
I nodded at her as I discussed a bit more in detail about them, and she answered a couple of my questions.
"Other than them, there are a few more A-Grade Humans. One of them is the Blood Manipulator, a lone wolf, who wanders around the deserted area, killing zombies and stuff. Even his powers aren't fully explored yet. So People don't know how strong he really is.
Another one is Queen, someone who is trying to create an organization of her own. Finding strong people, Gifted ones, and creating her own empire of sorts. As for her powers, nobody knows about it."
Then she kept on describing about 5 more A-Grades about whom she knows. Though, according to her, there are more A-Grades hiding among them, doing their own stuff.
"Well. That is more or less about the A-Grades. As for B-Grades, that's more or less common now. About half the people alive are B-Grade now, at least the people who dared to venture into this area. Others who haven't reached B-Grade stay within the walls and sometimes venture together with a party comprised of B-Grades to get strong," she spoke and I kept my eyes closed for a few moments as a few things confused me.
"Before I get to the main question, what about D-Grade Humans?" I asked, keeping my eyes closed, and she spoke with a bit of confusion,
"Nobody is D-Grade anymore… Everyone is either C-Grade or Dead."
For a few moments, I kept quiet as I wondered how things reached this level in a mere span of 6 months… or maybe things were really this fast to begin with and I just failed to notice? Who knows…
"Hmmm… how do you grade people, though?" I asked, as this point particularly made me curious. As for me, I can easily use the System to check one's power and stuff, but how come they, someone without the System, are organizing them? That too accurately.
Once again a bit confused, she looked at me and took out a certain stone. It looked like a Zombie Core, except there was something odd about it.
[Inspect!]
[Mutated Zombie Core (Grade-C)!]
[Can reflect the amount of Energy one holds. The brighter it shines, the better it shows the amount of energy being processed. Can hold 100,000 Energy at max.]
"Anyone who lights this completely is easily a C-Grade. People have better quality cores that could tell B-Grade and even A-Grades. There is also a core that tells about S-Grade, but people can't light even 10% of it, with Mallorn lighting it up with a little of a spark into it," Irene spoke as she explained how the core functions while lighting it up as she fills her energy into it.
"Is that so? Can I see it?" I asked for the core before trying to fill some of the Time Energy into it, however sadly the core wasn't accepting any energy from me.
'Guess it only works for Zombified beings?' I thought before passing it back to her.
"Hmmm… looks like the sun is up," Irene spoke as she saw the NightCrawlers at a distance walking back slowly, crawling back into hiding. The sky was turning blue slowly and slowly as I yawned a little before I observed the map and questioned,
"Are we going South to find that A-Grade Core?"
And surprised, Irene looked at me and nodded as she asked,"Yeah. How did you know?"
'Well, there are too many zombies in the south of here,' I thought as I looked at the map around the dungeon. I could see about 2 dozen B-Grade and even 2 A-Grade Zombies.
"Nope. Let's go… Though let me kill a few zombies first," I spoke as I began walking after putting the UV lamp and that artifact inside my [Time Storage].
After all…
[Level: 15 (2,474,531/2,500,000 Exp)]
There wasn't much left before I could level up again.