While Michael is leading the herd of walkers away from Houston.
Roxy and the others had taken this opportunity to drive through the once walker infested road and entered Channelview of Harris County.
As the truck slowed down into a crawl, the group took this chance to witness the devastation around them that the herd had caused to the area.
Overturned cars, large patches of dark blood stains where the eye can see, leftover remains with a murder of crows feasting upon them, and also a couple of small buildings that turned into rubble, probably from the result of an explosion.
"My god, this place is even worse than Meridian." Lucky was horrified at the sight around them that looked like hell on Earth.
"If it's already like this here, then what more in the metropolitan area?" Horrified at the sight around them, Joel suddenly feels less optimistic about going to Fresno.
Driving the truck, Roxy was also looking around. "Don't worry. I think this place is already safe since most of the walkers might've already joined up with the horde. Though there'd probably be still several of them here and there. It's nothing we can't handle."
"Ohh that's right, the sight of that huge horde must have scared me silly." Joel became a little embarrassed that such an obvious hint flew right over his head.
Then he thought of a certain someone and couldn't help but suddenly bring him up. "Though I wonder how Michael is doing now?"
"It's only been two hours. So, he's probably still leading that horde away from here."
Meanwhile, Michael is indeed still busy leading the herd.
He had already travelled past the Baytown Hospital and continued going south. Every survivor along the way that saw and witnessed the procession of the herd all hid away inside their own hiding places and did not dare to come out until the herd had passed through.
Earlier, Michael did not have a place in mind to where he'd leave the walker herd and wanted to just lead it down as far south as possible. That is until he studied the map and came up with the idea of leading them towards the coastal area, all the way down the coast of Beach City. Where the land structure would, in theory, make it hard for the walker herd to migrate anywhere since the two small cities are surrounded by bodies of water from three directions except for the north.
So, unless someone deliberately lures the herd up north, they'd be stuck there for quite a while.
Which of course, is very unfortunate news to all the survivors residing and hiding in the two cities. They'd probably hate Michael for this and would treat him as an enemy if they ever find out who he is.
'I'm never doing this shit again unless I'm riding a bike or a car. This is too tiring even with my current physique.'
He was complaining, but it was his own decision that he's feeling too damn tired and wasn't complaining after he had killed almost a quarter of the walker herd and reaped some benefits from it.
"Graaah!"
A walker popped out from the corner of the street and was about to grab his shoulder, but Michael just casually stepped to the side and pummeled its head with his mace.
Splat!
x1 [You terminated a Zombie! Gained +1 EXP and +1 Coin.]
With the herd closely following behind him, a lot of eyes were also watching him from different directions.
In one building on the western side, there were two women and three men standing on the rooftop of a five-story building and were watching Michael in the streets like a hawk.
"I gotta give it to him. That guy's got a lot of guts." The man with a skinhead spoke with a Russian accent while closely watching Michael dispatched three more walkers with no difficulty.
"And he's strong too. What a guy. Is he CIA or KGB?"
One of the women, who similarly spoke with a Russian accent, scrunched her face and turned towards him. "Shut up. Not everyone is KGB or CIA. He's probably just a strong man. He must be from a family, who still trains like warriors or knights."
"Maybe, maybe not."
"He's quite strong. I think he can even fight a bear."
The other woman, the only American among them, was looking at this group of middle-aged men except the other woman, arguing against each other in low voices with a bewildered look on her face.
"He..he's probably just someone who attends medieval fairs you know."
The Russian people simultaneously stopped talking and turned to look at her.
The woman shrugged her shoulders and repeated the words she said. "He's probably just someone who attends medieval fairs. They would have people dressing up as Knights and would have bouts against each other. Those things are quite popular around here."
They looked at each other, then the Russian woman responded to her words. "You Americans really have many ways of entertaining themselves."
The American woman just looked at her and smiled. 'You drunk bastards. You also hold those same kinds of festivals back in your home.'
Then the topic once again shifted back to the man down the streets leading the herd of undead, like some kind of a General.
"Should we follow him? Maybe there's a large survivor base around here that we don't know and they're cleaning up their surrounding area for an expansion." The American woman proposed the idea while bringing up a feasible scheme behind Michael's actions.
"That's actually a great point, American woman." The Russian man looked at her with an approved look while throwing a thumbs up her way.
The American woman let out a frustrated sigh. "You know I have a name, right? It's Alice. It's Alice for goodness' sake. Why do you people keep forgetting it? Ughh!"
"Okay, American woman."
"Uggh, I hate you."
The group of survivors stayed at the rooftop for quite a while as they waited for the herd to pass through before going down the building and closely followed after the undead when they reached the streets.
There were also other survivors who came out of their hiding hole and came to the streets, but very much unlike the Russian group. Everyone already realized that it's obvious that Baytown City wouldn't be safe anymore with a nearby undead herd looming near them. So, all of them decided to leave in the opposite direction with their resources and risk for a future someplace else.
It took Michael over three hours before he arrived at the hill south of the old railway yard at Beach City, just a mile or two away from the beach.
'I think this is far enough.' Michael thought while gazing at the shimmering sea in the distance.
He slowly turned around and looked behind him, towards a different kind of sea.
A sea of Undead.
"Hey! Over here!"
"Over here!"
Michael kept yelling and yelling and this continued for the next two minutes.
When the undead horde was just a couple of meters from him, he quickly bolted out of there and towards the small neighborhoods along the beach.
'Crap, I hope there are no survivors in the area.'
Michael might act indecisive sometimes, mostly towards women. But that does mean he'd endanger the lives of innocent people just for an objective he wants to accomplish.
He still hasn't lost his humanity for him to be that cold hearted.
"Hey, is there anyone here?! You must leave now! There's a herd of walkers heading this way! Thousands of them! Escape to the East and head North!"
He ran around the multiple neighborhoods in the area and yelled out the following warning.
Fortunately, or unfortunately, Michael did not encounter anyone. Not even a peep from an animal.
"Damn it." He cursed. He had noticed quite a few peeking through their windows before they completely ignored him.
He had the urge to go over and kick their doors down and pull them outside but refrained from doing so since he prefers people having a choice on deciding their lives, whether they live or die following their decisions, he'd leave it to fate. Just like how he never forced the Morales Family to stay with them when they decided to leave the group.
He kept going east at the speed of thirty miles per hour and continued giving the same warning towards the houses along the way.
Unfortunately, it seems his efforts are wasted since no one bothered to heed his warning. Since the houses that still have people in it just continued to hole up inside, probably hoping for a rescue from the national government that had already fragmented into their own government system.
Michael had just run past the last house of the last neighborhood with no luck and was heading northbound. He was approaching a small grocery center along the highway when he noticed something odd inside one of the cars haphazardly parked on the side of the road.
"What the…are those kids inside?"