Chapter 126: Chapter 126: It’s My Time to Shine
Under Sue Lawrence’s expert guidance, the hunting squads from Silas Hawthorne’s base stuck to the safest routes, deftly avoiding the massive zombie hordes lurking around street corners and in abandoned buildings. They focused only on picking off lone, wandering zombies or those in small, scattered groups of two or three.
There were no intense brawls, no unnecessary losses. Every strike was clean and decisive. The team members worked in perfect concert; the kill and the core extraction were performed in one smooth motion. What seemed like a slow and steady clearing pace was, in fact, astonishingly efficient.
In just half a day, the storage pouches on the team members’ waists and the backpacks on their backs were all stuffed to the brim. When the Crystal Cores they brought back to the base were poured out onto the empty plaza, they truly formed a small mountain shimmering with a faint glow. The light blue and pale green Crystal Cores overlapped, emitting an incredibly alluring luster under the dim light of the apocalyptic sky.
Jason Sterling stood at the edge of the plaza, his gaze glued to the mountain of Crystal Cores, his eyes surging with an almost crazed greed. His Adam’s apple bobbed uncontrollably, and his hands were clenched so tightly that his knuckles turned white. He didn’t even notice his nails digging deep into his palms.
He knew the value of these Crystal Cores all too well. ’In my past life, I used my foreknowledge of the apocalypse to seize the power of distributing Crystal Cores. With a constant supply of Crystal Cores, my Superpower advanced by leaps and bounds. I went from being a mere Low Level Superpower User to climbing the ranks of the base’s high command, basking in the admiration of the masses and wielding supreme power.’
’Looking at this mountain of Crystal Cores now,’ he thought, frantically calculating, ’if I could make all of these my own, my Superpower could instantly break through its current bottleneck and advance a whole level. I could return to the peak state of my past life, or maybe even become stronger.’
But this burning greed was instantly doused by a flood of icy despair. The two extreme emotions crashed violently in his chest, threatening to tear him apart.
He stared intently at the Crystal Cores being put away by the team members for their own personal use. His heart felt like it was being viciously squeezed by an invisible hand. Bitterness, unwillingness, regret, and resentment intertwined, suffocating him.
That’s right. These Crystal Cores no longer belonged to him. Now, whoever killed the zombie got the core, and that person could do whatever they wanted with it.
After all, the current rules were set by Silas Hawthorne. In Silas Hawthorne’s base, one naturally had to follow Silas Hawthorne’s rules.
The rule was simple: whoever personally slayed a zombie owned its Crystal Core. It was fair and just, and no one was allowed to privately seize or distribute them.
So, he could only stand aside, watching helplessly as others took their Crystal Cores, either consuming them on the spot to increase their strength or carefully stowing them away for later. He was filled with greed, but he didn’t even have the right to reach out and touch them, let alone control the distribution of all Crystal Cores like in his past life, giving them to whomever he pleased and keeping as many as he wanted for himself.
Images from his past life flooded his mind. Back then, all the supplies and Crystal Cores brought back from hunts were under his sole control. He was the core figure in everyone’s eyes, the one in power who controlled the resources for survival. Everyone had to act according to his mood and treat him with the utmost respect.
But in this life, everything had changed.
He had gone from being the high and mighty distributor to a powerless bystander with no say in anything.
This fall from the clouds into the mud was an agonizing torment. The intense feeling of loss gnawed at his soul, causing his face to pale. He stood there, his body slightly rigid.
Sue Lawrence took in Jason Sterling’s strange expression but paid it no mind. She had no intention of staying long at Silas Hawthorne’s base anyway. This was ultimately Silas’s territory; she was determined to build her own safe harbor.
After confirming that the hunting squads at Silas Hawthorne’s base had mastered the skills of hunting zombies and extracting their cores, and that order in the base was running smoothly, Sue Lawrence, without the slightest hesitation, informed Silas Hawthorne of her departure.
Silas Hawthorne knew well Sue Lawrence’s independent nature and that she had her own plans. After a few fruitless attempts to convince her to stay, he let her keep her Points and all the privileges she had earned, told her she was welcome back anytime, and then watched her leave.
Once she was somewhere private, Sue Lawrence finally retrieved the Paramount Raider from her space.
Now that the cataclysmic phase of the apocalypse was over, the vehicle finally had its use.
Thanks to its immense weight and incredible power, they didn’t even have to dodge zombies. They could just charge forward and run them over. And so, plowing through zombies all the way, they returned to their own base.
An abandoned mine—an excellent shelter in the apocalypse.
After Sue Lawrence left, other people began to leave Silas Hawthorne’s base in trickles.
For one, you couldn’t stay in the base if you wanted to get more Crystal Cores. For another, people like Jason Sterling, who had their own people and organizations, also chose to leave to develop their own factions.
Silas Hawthorne didn’t stop them. In an apocalypse like this, as long as people were willing to organize, it would contribute to future reconstruction efforts. This was especially true now that many foreign countries were doing the same thing.
Therefore, developing smaller groups was necessary.
Thus, Wyatt Sterling also planned to take his people and leave Silas Hawthorne’s base, returning to the abandoned mine they had long since prepared.
After everything was packed, Jason Sterling turned to look at his father, Wyatt Sterling. The older man was standing at the edge of the camp, giving orders to his dozens of men in a deep voice.
Wyatt Sterling was the true foundation of the Sterling Family, a veteran leader who had accumulated a considerable network even before the apocalypse. The decisive expression on his face made it clear he had already made up his mind.
"Dad," Jason Sterling walked over, his voice low but filled with undeniable resolve. "It’s stable here with Silas Hawthorne, but we don’t have a say. It’s time we strike out on our own."
’We came here to help the Sterling Family grow stronger and more prosperous in the first place,’ he thought. ’Now, it’s our time to shine.’
Wyatt Sterling patted his son’s shoulder, his gaze profound. "Now is the time to rewrite everything. Go make your mark, son."
Money was useless now; capital had been converted into all sorts of supplies. Following Silas Hawthorne wouldn’t lead to much growth, but Silas had offered to provide a certain degree of security assistance, and that was enough.
"Don’t worry, Dad." A blazing fire ignited in Jason Sterling’s eyes, a feverish heat mixed with ambition, resentment, and unwillingness. "I know what to do."
’If I can just become powerful enough, maybe Sue Lawrence will stop and give me a second glance. Maybe she’ll even come back to me?’
’It’s still possible,’ he thought. ’After all, this is the apocalypse.’
And so, while many other countries had yet to react, Veridia’s reconstruction was already on the agenda.
This was especially true around Silas Hawthorne’s sphere of influence, where new groups were sprouting up everywhere, and people heading out to develop their own factions or gather Crystal Cores were a common sight.
The Points ranking of Silas Hawthorne’s base remained firmly in first place.
