Back at the farm, life slowly began to settle into something almost normal.
For two days, the group worked nonstop. Shane, Rick, and Gray organized shooting practice in the open field Hershel had pointed out while the others helped reinforce fences, repair gates, and haul supplies from the convoy.
The sound of gunfire became common across the property.
Andrea proved to be the quickest learner by far. Her stance improved after only a few sessions, and she started landing shots consistently at medium range. Carol surprised everyone, too. Though hesitant at first, she listened carefully and handled the pistol with steady hands once Shane corrected her grip.
Amy mostly stayed around the farmhouse helping Patricia and Maggie, though every now and then she would wander near the range and watch Gray shoot with obvious curiosity.
Meanwhile, Daryl and Merle spent most of their time roaming the woods around the farm.
Back on the farm, the peace finally broke on the morning of the third day. Beth Greene collapsed during breakfast, and Maggie barely caught her before she hit the floor.
Everything became chaos afterward. Patricia rushed to help while Hershel quickly carried Beth upstairs. Jenner immediately followed behind him with his medical bag while the rest of the family crowded the hallway anxiously.
Gray arrived near the staircase just in time to hear Beth coughing violently from inside the bedroom.
Two hours later, Hershel and Jenner finally came downstairs looking exhausted. "Typhoid fever," Jenner said grimly. "High fever, weakness, stomach pain... she's showing all the symptoms."
Maggie's face went pale. "How the hell-"
Jenner interrupted gently. "Contaminated water."
That immediately changed the mood around the house. Everyone exchanged worried looks.
"The wells," Hershel muttered quietly.
Within the hour, the entire group spread across the property, checking every water source on the farm. The first two wells looked clean, the third did not.
Glenn nearly gagged when he leaned over the edge. "Uh... guys?"
Everyone crowded around behind him. Far below, partially submerged in the darkness, a bloated walker stared back upward with cloudy white eyes.
"Damn..." Shane muttered. "The thing must've fallen in days ago."
Gray immediately stepped back from the well. "Nobody drinks another drop from these wells."
Otis nodded quickly. "We can pull it out."
Using ropes and hooks, they lowered Glenn down carefully while everyone else held the line steady.
The walker thrashed weakly as Glenn looped a rope around its chest. "Got it! Pull!"
The group strained together, dragging the soaked corpse slowly upward. This time, unlike the disaster Gray remembered from the original timeline, the walker didn't break in half and remained intact.
The walker slammed onto the dirt beside the well with a wet thud, before it could even move, Rick buried a hatchet into its skull.
Nobody looked at the well the same afterward. By noon, the farm officially stopped using all the well water.
That was when Daryl remembered something. "The highway," he suddenly said.
Rick looked over. "What about it?"
"I remember seeing a water delivery truck near a pileup, it could be full."
That immediately got everyone's attention. Within minutes, Gray, Shane, Glenn, and Morales loaded into two pickup trucks and headed back toward the highway after Daryl showed them on the map where it was.
When they arrived, the abandoned delivery truck was still there exactly where Daryl said it would be, inside were dozens of sealed five-gallon water jugs.
"Jackpot," Glenn laughed.
They worked quickly, transferring as many containers as possible into both trucks.
Halfway through loading, Morales suddenly froze. "...You guys hear that?"
A low, distant groaning drifted across the highway. Gray climbed onto one of the abandoned cars and looked down the road. His expression hardened immediately. "Horde."
Hundreds of walkers shuffled slowly between the stalled vehicles further down the highway.
Shane cursed under his breath. "We don't have enough ammo for this."
Gray jumped down immediately. "Then we don't fight."
The group abandoned the remaining water jugs and hid silently between the wrecked cars while the massive herd slowly passed by, only yards away.
The endless sound of dragging feet and groaning filled the air for nearly ten minutes before the horde finally wandered off into the woods beyond the road.
Only then did everyone breathe again.
"Let's never do this again," Glenn whispered.
They emptied the remaining water from the delivery truck into their pickups and immediately returned to the farm.
Hershel met them near the porch, looking far more worried than before. "The antibiotics are almost gone," he admitted quietly. "What we have won't be enough."
Otis stepped forward after a moment of silence. "The high school."
Everyone looked at him.
"Before things got bad, FEMA set up a medical station there. They had supplies... antibiotics too."
Shane crossed his arms. "And what's the catch?"
Otis grimaced. "Last time I checked, it was overrun."
Silence followed that answer, Gray finally broke it. "Then we go right now."
Rick nodded immediately. "The fewer walkers wandering around during daylight, the better."
Otis volunteered to guide them since he used to volunteer as an EMT and knew what meds they needed, while Shane and Rick began gathering weapons and gear.
Gray quietly stepped away from the group for a moment and opened his system.
For the past 2 days, he hasn't bought anything other than the next upgrade and the next two multipliers. Finally, he opened the [Status Info] Tab.
[Status Info]
Name: Gray Ashwood
Age: 23 years old
Race: Human
Gold: 3,623,593
Gold per hour: 147,694 (98,463)
Gold Multiplier: 1.50x
"This will set me back a day, but better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it," Gray said to himself as he scrolled through the shop, finally finding it.
[New Skill]
{Deadshot's Marksmanship} (3M Gold)✔
After the uncomfortable feeling went away, he also searched for some noise makers from the game 'Surroundead.'
{Noise Maker} (20 Gold)
Without hesitation, he bought three of them, small metal cans packed tightly with firecrackers. Simple, cheap, and effective.
He stuffed them into his backpack before heading toward the Humvee. On the way, he grabbed one of the M4 carbines they had recovered outside the CDC and slung two extra magazines across his vest.
Shane noticed immediately. "Going heavy today?"
Gray checked the rifle once before nodding. "Something tells me we're gonna need it."
Otis sat in the passenger seat, guiding them through the countryside while Rick and Shane checked their weapons in silence.
By the time the school finally appeared in the distance, every single one of them had gone quiet.
The parking lot was flooded with dozens, no, hundreds of walkers.
The entire school grounds crawled with the dead beneath the sunlight.
Even Shane stared for a moment without speaking.
Gray slowly looked over the massive crowd surrounding the FEMA tents and abandoned military vehicles. "...Well," he muttered quietly while gripping the rifle tighter. "This is gonna suck."
Gray kept staring at the school grounds for a few seconds before finally speaking. "Alright, new plan."
Rick glanced toward him. "You got one?"
Gray unzipped his backpack and pulled out one of the strange metal cans.
Shane frowned immediately. "What the hell is that?"
Gray shook the can lightly, making the firecrackers inside rattle. "A noise maker."
Otis looked confused. "A what?"
"It'll draw every walker around toward the sound." Gray slid another can into his vest pocket. "You three head for the FEMA trailer while I keep the dead busy."
Rick immediately frowned. "Absolutely not. That's suicide."
Gray pointed toward the massive crowd around the school. "You got a better idea?"
Nobody answered.
Shane crossed his arms tightly. "Even if that thing works, there's too many of them."
Gray smirked slightly. "Good thing I'm fast."
Rick still looked unconvinced. "You don't gotta do this alone."
"Yes, I do," Gray replied seriously. "If too many of us move around out there, we'll split the horde and make this messy."
He tossed one of the cans into his hand again before continuing. "You guys just focus on the medicine. Grab antibiotics, painkillers, IV bags, whatever you can carry."
Rick looked down at the strange device again. "And those things work?"
Gray immediately cut him off. "Guess we'll find out."
That answer clearly annoyed Rick, but before he could argue further, Gray opened the Humvee door.
As he stepped out, he paused for a second before speaking without turning around. "Don't wait for me if something goes wrong."
Shane stared at him for a moment before nodding once. "We'll go get you once we are done."
Otis swallowed nervously. Rick didn't look happy about it, but eventually agreed too.
Gray closed the door behind him and immediately started moving around the edge of the parking lot.
The walkers hadn't noticed him yet, most of them remained clustered around the school entrance and FEMA tents. Perfect.
Keeping low, Gray circled wide around the opposite side of the campus, putting as much distance as possible between himself and the medical trailers.
Once he reached the football field fence, he finally stopped and pulled out the noise maker.
"...Let's see if this garbage actually works." He lit the fuse and tossed the can deep into the parking lot. A second later-
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
The firecracker explosions echoed across the entire school grounds.
Every single walker froze, then they turned, hundreds of dead heads snapped toward the sound all at once.
"Oh, shit..." Gray muttered.
The horde immediately surged toward the noise.
And because so many were packed together, they started moving faster than usual, stumbling over one another as they pushed forward.
The entire parking lot came alive.
Gray took a slow breath before gripping the M4 tightly. "Alright then..."
The nearest walkers spotted him almost immediately, then the entire front half of the horde followed. Gray turned and ran.
The dead flooded after him, growling, screaming, and hands reaching.
The sound of hundreds of footsteps thundered behind him as he sprinted across the edge of the campus.
Even with his upgraded skills, the sheer number chasing him was horrifying, but instead of panicking, Gray grinned. "...Time to test this out."
He suddenly spun around while still moving and raised the rifle. Everything slowed down, not literally, but his mind processed everything with terrifying clarity: targets, movement, distance, wind, and angles. It all became instinct.
Gray pulled the trigger.
POP!
A walker dropped instantly.
POP! POP! POP!
Three more bodies hit the ground, Gray kept moving while firing calmly into the crowd. Every shot landed directly between the eyes.
No misses, he stopped needing to think, the only thing holding him back was his body. "I feel like I could shoot faster, but my body won't respond to it...I will have to up my workout routine."
Thirty rounds disappeared in seconds, thirty bodies hit the pavement.
Gray stared at the bodies in disbelief for half a second. "...Holy shit."
Excitement exploded through him immediately afterward, and he started laughing.
Meanwhile, near the FEMA trailers, Rick and Shane froze upon hearing the constant gunfire echoing through the school.
"What the hell is he doing?" Otis whispered.
Shane peeked around the corner just in time to see another line of walkers collapsing in the distance. Body after body dropped one after another with impossible accuracy.
Rick stared too. Even from that far away, it looked unreal.
Gray moved through the parking lot like he'd done this his entire life.
No hesitation, no panic, just precise controlled death.
Shane slowly shook his head."...That guy's crazier than the Dixon brothers." But there was something else in his voice, too. Respect.
Even Rick looked stunned, still, the distraction was working perfectly, almost every walker around the school had abandoned the medical tents entirely.
"Move!" Rick snapped suddenly.
The three men rushed into the FEMA station and started grabbing everything they could find. Anything useful got shoved into bags and boxes.
Outside, the gunfire continued nonstop, even after Gray emptied his magazines, the shooting never stopped because every single time he ran low, he simply bought more ammunition through the system.
The horde kept shrinking, and shrinking, and shrinking.
Ten minutes later, Rick finally slammed the trailer doors shut. "We got enough! Let's go!"
The three men sprinted back toward the Humvee, expecting chaos, instead...The school grounds had gone eerily quiet, no growling, no screaming, and no gunfire. Nothing.
Rick immediately slowed down. "Gray?"
No answer, Shane's expression darkened. "Aw hell..."
The three men started moving carefully through the parking lot, bodies covered the ground everywhere.
Walkers lay piled across the asphalt with bullet holes directly through their skulls. Otis looked horrified.
Rick tightened his grip on the revolver. "Gray!"
Still nothing, the silence somehow felt worse than the gunfire had.
Then Shane finally stopped walking."...Over there."
Near the edge of the school courtyard sat a lone bench beneath a tree. Gray was sitting on it, breathing heavily, smiling to himself.
His rifle rested across his lap while his clothes were completely drenched in sweat from head to toe, yet he looked...Satisfied.
Then Gray slowly lifted his head toward them, and the smile on his face widened just a little more.