Once he was sure that the flames had consumed everything in the room, Ashton pushed aside the rocks he used to fill in the doorway. A rancid charcoal smell poured out from inside, and flowed out into the narrow hallway.

  Ashton sighed, relieved that he couldn't find any surviving trace of the zombie virus. At least this time, this strain, had been eliminated. It was likely that it popped up in other places in this world, but since monsters tended to refuse leaving the region they were in, the virus was generally contained locally. It wouldn't turn into a world-wide pandemic. The last one of those was annoying enough.

  With the heat in here, the virus would have been killed completely, so Ashton just scooped up any pile of ash or soot that he could find, putting it into a bag. Ash from magical fire was a great ingredient for fire-based potions and, especially, ink. He needed to stock back up on some fire ink to keep summoning the salamander, so this was weirdly good timing.

  After confirming that everything was fine, Ashton stepped out and walked down the hallway. The constellations were quiet, for the most part. Whether they were deliberating amongst each other about everything that just happened, or they just didn't have anything to say anymore, Ashton didn't care.

  He didn't do anything wrong. He was the victim of some constellations whose ego was so big that they tried to skew the rules that were set by the council. Though, then again, shouldn't that make them good guys in Ashton's book? A 'The enemy of your enemy is your friend' type of thing. Not that this was ever true for Ashton. In his experience, the enemies of his enemies were just more enemies.

  But beside whatever those guys did, they might be talking about what Ashton did a few minutes ago. He didn't even know what would happen when he interfered with that thread, the message just disappeared. Clearly, the constellations were confused, so it wasn't something that was commonly known could happen. It took a few moments, but the Eight-Legged Queen came back without problem, just annoyed that they were cut off like that.

  Whatever that was, Ashton was happy he knew about it. It seemed to have something to do with the veil, but the implication of that was interesting to say the least. It meant that these messages were projected to people through the veil. Constellations existed somewhere else entirely, in another dimension, and somehow they viewed and contacted earth using the veil as a conduit.

  It seemed to be the same principle as summoning magic, somehow. From Ashton's understanding, that first 'call' to magical beings was sent out through the veil, too. For some of them, they lived in various parts of the veil too, and in other situations, the call was just sent using the veil as a bridge.

  In that case, it made sense that Ashton was able to interrupt that message. If not him, who else would be able to intervene with that sort of call? It was exactly that ability that protected him from beings like the Summoner now.

  But first and foremost, even more so than the ability to interrupt the constellations when they were annoying the shit out of him, he was happier that they were leaving him alone right now in the first place. Especially right now. He had to collect his thoughts and change some of his plans, both short- and long-term.

  For the time being, he would have to make do with a finger less. In day-to-day matters, that was fine, but it would definitely weaken his combat ability to some degree. That was why he would like to replace his finger somehow, but it was actually harder to replace that sort of thing than you would think.

  Since he had the Spawn of Akrazoth with him now, transplanting something as small as a finger was literally child's play. But even then, there was the issue of rejection.

  For a perfect transplantation, you needed a perfect match. Blood type wasn't the biggest issue. Ashton had AB-negative, which, while rare, should be able to get transplants from o-negative, which was common enough overall. The bigger issue at this point was mana compatibility. The mana pattern had to have at least the same base form, otherwise any use of magic in the body would lead to a rejection of the limb. Of course, the new limb's mana pattern would gradually change to become like that of the rest of the body, but that process took a while.

  Ashton couldn't risk rejecting his new finger every time he used any amount of mana. In that case, he would need to probably take full control over the pattern in his hand and stabilise it before using magic, which was doable, but annoying. Getting a finger from someone with very little mana would definitely make that easier, too. Though supply was a big hurdle anyway.

  He couldn't take a finger off some random corpse. When someone died, their flesh and mana started to decay, and if it didn't happen within a few minutes after death, that wouldn't stop even if a limb was perfectly transplanted.

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  That meant he either had to find someone that freshly died, get a donation, or take a finger off someone he killed. Nobody in their right mind was stupid enough to donate something like a finger in this world they now lived in, nor would Ashton accept it if someone tried. It was hard enough to survive as is, and Ashton would be fine even with one or two less fingers overall, while for others, losing a finger suddenly could be a death sentence.

  That meant, if he managed to find a Marked that was compatible enough, maybe Ashton would consider it.

  That was the only real option right now, anyway. Getting a 'flesh seed' wasn't viable at the moment. It was far too expensive and complex to create with the abilities and tools that Ashton had at the moment. Plus, using a flesh seed on a finger felt like a waste in the first place...

  All in all, Ashton got out of this relatively unscathed. Hell, he might even find that he doesn't miss his index finger at all!

  For now, Ashton did a round through the basement. All those rats had to come in through some route, probably by digging some kind of tunnel, and Ashton wanted to close it down first. It wasn't all too hard to find, either.

  Once Ashton was satisfied, he went upstairs, and then walked through the building, going to all the classrooms where he had found people, and told them that it was safe now. They seemed hesitant, but they came out of the rooms and got ready to congregate back outside and in the gym, where the main base of operations seemed to be. One of the gym's doors opened up directly to the deconstructed playground, anyway.

  Some of the classrooms were being turned into places for people to live, but that still seemed like it would take a while to be really viable. For now, there were just groups of people using blankets or sleeping bags on the ground or mats from the gym.

  The last stop inside was all the way upstairs, where the majority of folk had huddled up. They seemed to be more eager to leave than some of the others. Ashton didn't know why until he reached the noisy end of the hallway.

  "Leave her alone!" one of the kids, Sean, yelled out. He was holding a ruler in his hand like a sword, one of those big ones used to draw on blackboards, and stood in front of the sleeping Millie. Joey was sitting next to Millie, making sure she was okay.

  "We just want to check on her! She was bitten, right?" one of the adults, seemingly a parent, pointed out. "If that's the case, she might still turn into one of those things later!"

  Sean furiously shook his head, so much so that his whole body seemed to shake with him. "No! Ashton said that she was okay! She won't turn!"

  The man in front of Sean was annoyed and grabbed the end of the ruler. "I don't even know who this Ashton person is! He just showed up and thinks he can tell us what to do?"

  "He saved all of us, twice now! So shut up!" Sean pointed out, but the adult clearly didn't care. He just pulled on the ruler, but since Sean was clutching it so tightly, he fell over onto the ground before letting go. But that man didn't seem to care, and just walked over Sean to get to Millie.

  But before he could get close enough, the wisp shot around him and, from a distance, used the 'force' spell. Startled, the man pulled back, trying to hit the wisp with the ruler that he just took from Sean. "Wh-What is this?!"

  The wisp, of course, dodged easily. But by then, Ashton had also reached him, and grabbed onto the man's shoulder. "That's a friend of mine. So I'd be happy if you didn't bother them."

  "F-Friend? Isn't that one of those monsters?"

  "No, they're an elemental. They're not hostile, though they'll defend themselves if attacked. Make sure to remember that, they'll start showing up in a couple weeks. Though they'll be pretty damn rare, anyway," Ashton explained. "Anyway, would you mind explaining what you were about to do?"

  The man meekly pulled back. "Just... we have to stop those zombies from spreading, right? I'm just trying to make sure she's not infected."

  "She's not."

  "How can you be so sure?"

  "Because if she were, she'd already be a zombie by now, dumbass." Ashton sighed. "She's okay, I promise, as I already did when I brought her here. You've got nothing to worry about, I got rid of all the zombies already."

  The man looked back at him, pleasantly surprised. "Huh? Seriously?"

  "Yes. Could've used some help in protecting your children, though."

  "I was just trying to make sure my daughter was safe. She was scared, what's so wrong with staying with her?" This wasn't even attempt to defend himself. It was just an excuse that the man threw out in relief that it was over now.

  Ashton looked the man up and down. He was wearing a button-up shirt, suit trousers... he didn't have many injuries, either.

  "Do you have your class yet?" Ashton asked.

  "Hm? No, not yet, but it can't be that hard, right?"

  Ashton rolled his eyes. Of course there were people like this, too. Ones that didn't take this situation seriously at all. "Just leave the kid alone from now on."

  "Calm down, will you? I was just trying to protect people."

  "From a one-armed child? Yeah, good on you. You're a true hero," Ashton sarcastically replied, not even looking at the man anymore and instead taking out a small bottle that he had the Backpacker give him on the way here.

  The man started getting annoyed at Ashton's tone, though. He opened his mouth and was about to say something, clearly in that self-important way that people like him often did, before stopping as Ashton threw the bottle in the air. It was caught by a figure that was formed from Ashton's very shadow. A massive bear, towering over everyone in this small classroom.

  "Drunken Bear, could I ask you to carry Millie downstairs again? I'd like to make sure Rory keeps an eye on her."

  The man behind Ashton laughed nervously. "What, the janitor? Why'd you bring that kid to the janitor?"

  Ashton turned and glared at the man. "Because I'm leaving him in charge of this place."