Gamer of the Dead

Book 2, Chapter 17:

**** Somewhere else in Manila, Six days ago... ****

A day after his group arrived in his house, the young man watched Dominador Norba walked towards the front gate of his mansion and then greeted him like an old friend. He and his people raised a wooden platform just behind the barred gate of his mansion compound and is now observing the old man waving outside.

"Should I shoot him?" His bodyguard growled next to him. A large bow already nocked but pointing downward.

The young man did not say anything. Instead, he dropped down from the platform and walked over to the gate to open it. Reluctantly, the huge bodyguard followed outside.

"Domeng," He greeted him calmly, as he stopped a few meters in front of the old man.

"Senyorito," His former gardener greeted him back toothily. "I'm glad that the ravages of this new era did not affect your health that much."

The young man smiled coldly. "On the contrary, this new era affected my body to the extreme. You see, it made my body so much stronger and faster than before."

"I understand how you feel," Domeng said, nodding cagily. "I used to be asthmatic, don't you know that? The very smell of cigarette alone is enough to get me coughing nonstop. If I don't have my inhaler, I'd probably die, but now look at me, I'm as fit as a horse." The 60-year-old, weather-beaten old man absently scratched an itch behind him. He may be old, but his body looks remarkably fit, despite the beer belly.

"I didn't know you have asthma," The young man said conversationally.

Domeng laughed. "Of course not!" He said, smiling as if he is the only one that can understand the secret joke. "I hid it well. If you or your bastard father or harpy mother knew about it, then I most likely, I would have lost my job earlier! Hahahahah!"

He watched the old man as he laughed. When he was a boy, this man's bald head and leathery-like dark skin, and toothy-grin have always been a subject of his ridicule. As he grew up though, that feeling change to disgust. Mostly because the old man hunched shoulder and defeated look made him feel that way. But as the old man stared back at him for the first time, he felt a completely different feeling for him.

Hate.

Abruptly, Domeng stopped laughing and just stared at him with those glaring eyes of his. Then he sneered. "Did you like my present?"

Sweat poured at the back of the young man's neck, for a moment only the thought of this old man's chattering teeth smashing the ground gave him any pleasure. But his own sense of responsibilities reigned him in. "So, you admit that you are the one who lynched my parents?" He said coldly.

His bodyguard growled at the sudden realization, and he advanced toward the old man, but his master's hand stop him from moving further.

Domeng blinked. "What? No!" Domeng said, then he shrugged. "Well, yes. I was the one who strung up Senyor and Senyora, but they are already zombies, and that wasn't my farewell gift to you." The delighted sneer return back to the old man's face. "I'm talking about your girlfriend on your sofa! That's my handiwork."