Apocalypse: I'm Bound to a Mobile Lottery Shop

Chapter 51: Chapter 51: Commissioned to Give You a Beating

He picked up a piece and studied it for a long while before asking, "Boss Hart, what kind of meat is this?"

"Zombie meat," Lily Hart said coolly.

Roman Rowe froze, the meat falling back into his bowl. Then, without a second thought, he shoveled it into his mouth. "Whatever! I’m eating first and asking questions later!"

Stir-fry for lunch and hot pot for dinner. The two kids felt like they’d won the lottery. It was all so delicious!

The five of them devoured everything on the table. Roman Rowe was still craving more, but his stomach was already stuffed to its limit. His brain, however, was still screaming for more!

Lily Hart glanced at the time. It was almost ten. "I plan to move to Bloomfall Base tonight," she announced.

She looked at Frost Shaw. "You have to come with me. You’re the one managing the convenience store. Bring the other kids, too."

’There’s just no way I can handle everything myself. It’s not like I can split myself into eight pieces. Dammit, I just have to hire people!’

Frost Shaw nodded. He understood that sticking with Boss Hart was the only way to live the good life.

Easton and Diana Sharp nodded vigorously, quite touched. Lily was heading to another base, but she hadn’t forgotten to bring them along.

Roman Rowe sidled up, his face full of anticipation. "What about me? What about me?"

"You? Get lost!" Lily Hart pushed his face away with extreme disgust. She had no desire to keep a ticking time bomb around.

Letting him have some hot pot was like tossing a scrap to a pitiful stray cat. It was nothing more than a casual act of charity.

"That mission was posted by Winnie Lowell! I already rejected it. The reward was a thousand Crystal Cores..." Roman Rowe explained hurriedly, terrified he’d never get to eat hot pot again.

"I’m only worth a thousand Crystal Cores? And Level 1 ones at that?" Lily Hart’s focus was clearly elsewhere.

Roman Rowe opened his Light Brain and scrolled to the mission page. "It’s twelve hundred Crystal Cores now."

That just made Lily Hart angrier. ’Once I’m famous, my head had better be worth tens of thousands of High-level Crystal Cores!’

"You said Winnie Lowell was the one who posted the mission?"

’Looks like that woman’s hostility toward me is still growing. But whatever. The daughter of a mere Base Commander is nothing.’

She didn’t care, but she wasn’t a pushover either. She called Roman Rowe over.

She casually tossed him a Crystal Core and said with a toothpick dangling from her mouth, "Go beat the hell out of Winnie Lowell. Make it bad enough that she’s bedridden for half a year. There’s your payment."

Roman Rowe looked down. A single Level 1 Crystal Core. ’Damn,’ he thought, ’the insult is real.’

"You got it, I’m on my way!" Roman Rowe agreed readily and, this time, obediently exited through the car door.

With his skills, slipping into the base unnoticed was no problem at all. He infiltrated the core area and found Hunter Lowell’s home.

He then climbed through Winnie Lowell’s window. She was sound asleep. Roman Rowe simply grabbed her, blanket and all, and hauled her back out the window.

He found a random, deserted alley, threw her to the ground with a THUD, and ripped the gag from her mouth.

"You! Roman Rowe! What do you think you’re doing?!" Winnie Lowell’s eyes were filled with terror. Her hands and feet were bound so tightly she couldn’t move.

Roman Rowe took out the Crystal Core and dangled it in front of her eyes, then activated his Light Brain’s recording function.

"Someone paid me to beat you up," Roman Rowe said slowly, his tone completely nonchalant.

"Who was it? How much was the reward? I’ll pay you double!" Winnie Lowell said frantically, a suspicion already forming in her mind.

Roman Rowe refused, saying seriously, "The payment was one Crystal Core. But I’m a killer with principles. I don’t switch employers mid-job."

Winnie Lowell’s eyes widened, the words "one Crystal Core" echoing in her mind. She felt deeply, utterly insulted.

Before she could recover from the insult, a fist fell without mercy. Roman Rowe didn’t bother holding back.

Punch after solid punch landed. "PUH... Ugh." Winnie Lowell spat out a mouthful of fresh blood, feeling as if her internal organs had all been rearranged.

An unprecedented despair filled her heart, her body wracked with a pain she had never known. Tears and snot streamed down her face uncontrollably.

’Am I going to die here?’ For the first time, she had the thought that she should never have provoked Lily Hart.

The one-sided beating lasted for ten minutes. Winnie Lowell’s face was ashen. Beneath her clothes and the blanket, not a single inch of her skin was left unscathed.

Bruises—blue, purple, and red—cruelly overlapped, a sight that would make one’s skin crawl.

Roman Rowe shook his fists. "Nice!" He let out a sharp whistle and walked away without a backward glance.

Winnie Lowell lay alone in the alley, wrapped in the blanket, her entire body aching as if it had been run over by a car hundreds of times.

’Damn that Lily Hart! Damn Roman Rowe and Frost Shaw! Why are people in the top twenty of the rankings helping her?!’

Winnie Lowell couldn’t understand it, nor could she move. The slightest twitch sent pain shooting through every part of her body. She could only wait for daylight and hope someone would pass by and find her.

She felt like she was dying. Her breathing slowed...

...

「Outside the base.」

Roman Rowe ran back in high spirits, ready to report his success to Lily Hart, only to find that the RV and the convenience store had vanished!

His world came crashing down. Where had Boss Hart and Frost Shaw gone? There wasn’t a single trace left on the ground, as if they had never been there at all.

He suddenly remembered—Boss Hart had said she was going to Bloomfall Base, right?

As if waking from a dream, Roman Rowe quickly started up his beloved motorcycle and sped toward Bloomfall Base without a single break.

After an hour of frantic riding, Roman Rowe finally saw the high walls of Bloomfall Base and breathed a sigh of relief.

Sure enough, he spotted the RV and convenience store about a hundred meters from the base gate. Roman Rowe dragged his exhausted body toward them.

The convenience store was closed, completely dark. The RV’s sides were all retracted, making it look like a big metal box from the outside.

The pitiful Roman Rowe could only lean against the RV, sit on the ground, and hug his knees as he waited for dawn.

...

"AHHH—" A scream shattered the morning tranquility of Hope Base.

A flurry of chaos followed. When Winnie Lowell woke up, the first thing she saw was a doctor in a white coat and glasses.

He was shining a flashlight back and forth in front of her eyes. Winnie Lowell found the light glaring, and her vision began to blur.

As she slowly closed her eyes, Winnie Lowell vaguely heard the doctor whisper, "She’s crippled. I’m afraid she’ll never be able to stand again."

Winnie Lowell desperately wanted to get up, but her body wouldn’t respond. Her eyelids grew heavier and heavier, and her limbs felt as if they’d been filled with cement.

She fell unconscious again. Hunter Lowell, standing by the hospital bed, wore a grave expression as he continuously questioned the doctor.

...

「On the second floor of the RV outside Bloomfall Base.」

The spot where the sofa used to be was now occupied by a bunk bed. Diana Sharp slept on the bottom, and Tina Jacobs on the top.

They were some of the kids from Deepfrost Courtyard.

Out of habit, Lily Hart opened her Light Brain and swiped to her personal page. She noticed that the progress bar, which hadn’t moved in a long time, had budged.

Lottery Store Base Conquest Progress (1/1128).

She tapped the progress bar, and a map of Cathaya popped up. A five-pointed star was lit up in the area resembling a chicken’s belly.

She paused, having almost forgotten about this whole thing. It took her a long moment to recall that this was supposed to be her main quest.

It was just that back then, she had felt it was too difficult to complete, so she had minimized it and dragged it into a corner of the screen.

When she left Hope Base yesterday, she had left behind two automatic scratch-off machines. So that’s why the progress bar moved?