What do we do with them?

The slayers made their way through the ruins of Vegas; the deeper they ventured beyond the borders of the compound, the more they witnessed the bloody scenes of humanity's struggle for survival. Though at this point, Alex had started to become accustomed to the mountains of corpses. He no longer had the urge to vomit upon contact with the endless gore that surrounded him. Though he still felt slightly nauseous at some of the more mutilated corpses.

The team came across a pack of monsters with which Alex had not seen before along the journey. They were a race of reptilian creatures smaller than the lizardfolk mongrels but slightly larger than goblins. Apparently, the slayers had encountered them before as they approached with caution.

"Keep your wits about you; these fuckers are cowardly and cunning. If they start running away, don't follow, they will probably lead you to a trap."

Cassie seemed to notice Alex's perplexed expression upon seeing the reptilians and decided to give him some ample advice. Alex nodded and stood by, ready for combat. The creatures were apparently unaware of the slayers' presence, and as such, were playing around with what appeared to be a human leg.

Alex was enraged upon witnessing the carnage and rushed out of his position. As he did so, he activated his skill [Charge] and ended up before the three reptilians in a second. Before the creatures could react, a flurry of punches and kicks landed heavily onto them, cracking their skulls and sending their lifeforce to the void. A series of somewhat familiar messages appeared in Alex's peripheral vision.

[You have slain a kobold and gain 30 xp]

The message appeared thrice, and Alex instantly became aware of what these bastards were. Cassie's warning was starting to make sense. After all, in most RPGs, kobolds behaved exactly as he had mentioned. As Alex was reveling in victory, his teammates were stunned, all of them except for Cassie; she had already witnessed his strength prior.

Before they could even react, Alex had charged the group of kobolds and slain them in an instant. Brandon began to have second thoughts about getting back at Alex for the incident in the grocery store.

At the moment, unless he caught Alex off-guard, he would have no chance to harm him. He gripped his rifle tightly and felt envious, there was only a level of difference between the two, but his stats were obviously quite higher than his own.

After the incident with the kobolds, Alex began to lead the way. For numerous reasons, he was chosen to lead the way; chief among them was that he had the capability of silently taking out the enemies they came across without alerting nearby monsters. After all, the deafening blast of a gunshot would quickly alert nearby hostiles to their position.

For some unknown reason, the different types of monsters seemed to be friendly towards each other, or at the very least non-hostile. Some monster species stuck to their own territories, while others would aid other monsters in contact with humans. The more information Alex gained about this apocalyptic world, the more it confused him. He tried not to think about it and put his attention on the task in front of him.

After a bloody struggle, the team of slayers finally reached their destination, a local hardware store. They figured not too many people would be ransacking a hardware store during the initial chaos, so there must be some supplies they can use to fortify their compound further.

Luckily the slayers had yet to suffer any injuries; they mostly came across low-level mobs, which were easy to defeat with Alex taking the lead. Though Alex had not gained much XP, he would need to encounter groups similar in strength to the lesser lizardfolk he had beaten to death days prior if he wanted to level up quickly.

As the group neared the entrance of the hardware store, they noticed signs of combat, fresh corpses of monsters were littered near the entrance. Gunnar closely examined the bodies before motioning with his hands for the team to be prepared for combat.

"The bodies are fresh; someone is already inside."

Alex nodded and took a fighting stance; in his experience, humans could be more difficult to deal with than monsters. If they had to fight their way out, it would not be easy. The team took the necessary precautions to engage in combat before entering the abandoned hardware store.

The squad of slayers cautiously trotted down the aisles of the hardware store, following the path of monster corpses left behind. Until they finally came across a group of humans who were standing before a pile of human corpses.

At the front of the group of survivors was a young man in his 20s, with long hair and a sleeve of tattoos on his right arm. Beneath his feet was a fresh corpse of an adult human male with an arrow protruding from its forehead. The man pulled out the arrow and placed it back in his quiver.

The survivors were not yet aware of the slayer's presence and laughed freely among themselves about their recent kills.

"Did you see that faggot beg like a bitch?"

"I can't believe he actually thought we'd let him go; what an idiot!"

Evidently, this group of survivors was hostiles. The slayers took notice of this and began to move into flanking positions. However, as Brandon approached with his rifle raised, a bolt fell from the rack next to him and echoed in the empty warehouse alerting the survivors to their presence.

The lead survivor quickly drew an arrow and pointed it in Brandon's direction while the other survivors attempted to flank him. Unbeknownst to the survivor, Alex had already gotten behind him; before the man could react, Alex had placed him in a rear-naked choke. The man tried to struggle out of the choke when Alex whispered in his ear.

"Tell your men to stand down, or I'll break your neck."

A flash of terror appeared in the man's eyes as he knew there was no way he could escape the chokehold. Resigning himself to his fate, he told his men to stand down. After noticing their leader's position, they were quickly surrounded by the slayers and disarmed and huddled together closely. Cassie and Gunnar kept an eye on them while Alex and Brandon ransacked the equipment they needed.

The tattooed man held his hands behind his head and cursed loudly, to the point where his voice echoed across the warehouse. "You fuckers have any idea who you're messing with? You and your friends are dead when our gang finds out who you are!"

Gunnar grew frustrated with the threats thrown at him and struck the man in the nose with the stock of his rifle. The man cursed to himself and held his nose which was now bleeding profusely.

the slayers still needed some time to scavenge their supplies, with only two of them working, it took longer than normal. Eventually, Alex and Brandon returned with sacks full of supplies. Alex looked at the tattooed man who now had a broken nose and was cursing furiously at the others and asked the question everyone was thinking.

"What do we do with them?"

For a while, there was only silence as the slayers looked at each other with different expressions. They hadn't thought about it. The only ones among them who had taken a human life were Gunnar and Alex, and even then, Alex's was a mercy kill. He had no experience in outright murder.

Meanwhile, the man noticed Alex was the one who had put him in this situation and began to curse him out.

"You better fucking kill me because if I get my hands on you, I'll skin you alive!"

Alex didn't feel the least bit intimidated by this guy; he knew his own strength and felt there was no way this thug would be able to fulfill his claim. Alex approached the man and kneed him in the stomach. The man winced in pain as he fell over and grabbed his gut.

"Shut the fuck up; you're in no position to be making threats."

Alex looked around at his fellow slayers, he had no desire to get his hands dirty with these thugs, but he was still a realist. He knew if they were released, they would come back for trouble. A wicked grin spread across Alex's face as he suddenly had a bright idea. He approached the man with a chain in and began to tie him up.

"the Captain said to bring back survivors we deem as valuable; I believe if properly interrogated, these punks could provide us some valuable intel."

A similar expression appeared across the slayer's faces. They quickly tied up the survivors. If these thugs could provide some valid intel they'd probably be given an extra ration as a reward. Though there was some resistance, it was quickly squashed by Alex who's iron fists were like a living nightmare to the survivors who attempted to escape.

"Alright let's head back"

Cassie said with a cruel smile on her face. Though the slayers had not explored the entire area on their list, they believed these prisoners were valuable enough to warrant a quick exfiltration back to the compound. If they stayed any longer they risked encountering more of these thugs.

Little did they know that their trek home would become a bloody death march.