Chapter 378: Chapter 378: Trade-off
The only way to pass the time on such bitterly cold days was to hole up at home, eating and drinking. Evelyn Ford took out a tablet and headphones, and the two lay on the bed watching cartoons together.
"Have you cleaned up the space?"
"Not yet," Ronan Kendrick replied, the picture of dejection.
"The rabbits we put inside have had two litters. I took a look earlier—the grass in the livestock area is almost a meter tall. You can just let all the animals graze freely. They can’t get into the other areas anyway."
"Okay." Ronan Kendrick was the one who managed the livestock area, which included cleaning and feeding.
After watching some TV, they entered the space to start their chores. The space had no automatic harvesting function, so the rice and wheat had to be reaped bit by bit. Still, with a harvester and a rice transplanter, it saved them a lot of trouble and effort. No more back-breaking labor.
"Ronan, let’s have crayfish tonight."
Ronan Kendrick gazed at the fish in the pond, silently assigning them their fates. ’Fish with pickled vegetables, steamed fish, braised fish, fish head with chopped chilies, fish balls...’
"I think this one looks a little listless. Maybe we should cook it up?"
Evelyn leaned in for a look. The fish was darting around quickly; she couldn’t see anything listless about it at all.
"It looks unwell. I sense a bloody calamity in its future."
Evelyn listened to his nonsense with a deadpan expression. "Oh, so you can tell fortunes now?"
"I know a thing or two." He had read almost all the books in the space, even finishing "The Book of Changes" several times.
"Then why don’t you predict whether you’ll be sleeping on the floor tonight?"
Ronan Kendrick blinked. "I won’t."
"You know, our bed is suddenly feeling a little crowded. You’ll be sleeping on the floor tonight, Master Kendrick."
Ronan Kendrick cleared his throat. "That’s fine. You can just sleep on top of me."
Evelyn laughed, half in anger, half in amusement. "You’re really going all out just to get some fish, aren’t you?"
"It says it doesn’t want to live anymore. I’m just trying to grant its wish. Seriously, I’m not kidding. I can hear its inner voice. It says its dying wish... is to be eaten by me."
Evelyn was speechless. ’Could he possibly be any more ridiculous?’
"Well then, can you hear *my* thoughts right now?"
Ronan Kendrick fell silent for two seconds before asking with a perfectly straight face, "Do you want to hit me?"
Evelyn raised her hand and gave his cheek a hard pinch. "Get to work. We’re having fish tonight."
Ronan’s eyebrow shot up. "Sweet and sour, and steamed."
Evelyn clenched her fist. "What’s that? Does another fish want to die?"
"Yeah, this one says it just had its heart broken and doesn’t want to live anymore."
Evelyn looked at the fish in the pond, a smirk playing on her lips. "The most terrifying creatures in this world are men. All of you, remember this man’s face. When you come to reap his soul, make sure you don’t get the wrong guy."
Ronan was snickering behind her, and Evelyn caught him red-handed. "Husk that half-ton of rice over there before you come out."
With that, Evelyn left the space, leaving Ronan Kendrick with all the chores.
—
「Fifteen days later.」
The blizzard had stopped. Christina Thorne’s leg injury was healing, and Evelyn, who had checked on her a few times, thought she was recovering well.
Claudia Schultz had brought up the subject of leaving. She hadn’t forgotten her quest for revenge against those people, but she had one condition: that the base take in Christina Thorne. Christina was young, and with her bad leg, there was no way she could leave on her own.
When Wyatt Vaughn heard about this, he came to reason with her.
"Claudia, try to think this through. Maybe those people are already dead. Even if they aren’t, where would you even start looking for them? If you try to walk to another base, you’ll freeze to death in a matter of hours."
"But if I don’t get revenge, what’s the point of living?" Claudia said, her expression placid, her voice devoid of any emotion.
"You’re not just living for yourself. Think of your grandmother. She begged you to live a good life. She wanted you to escape so you could *live*, not so you could get revenge."
Claudia Schultz shook her head. "You don’t understand. After Titus Joyce abducted me, I lived a life worse than death."
Wyatt Vaughn patted her shoulder. "You know, after the oceans flooded the land, we were captured by savages. They were feral—they ate raw flesh and drank blood. They even ate many of our companions. We were beaten daily and had nothing to eat but tree bark. Look," he said, showing her his hand, "a savage chopped off my finger. I thought I was going to die, too. But my brother and Quincy took a beating for me every single day. I couldn’t let myself die. I held on by a single thread until Evelyn and Ronan showed up. They saved us and killed all the savages."
Wyatt Vaughn patted Claudia’s shoulder again. "The more difficult life gets, the more we have to fight to live it well. You say you want revenge, but Claudia... you’re a defenseless woman with no weapon to your name. Even if you managed to find those people, how could you possibly take revenge on them?"
"And what about Christina? You’d just be abandoning her here. Even if the farm agrees to take her in, she doesn’t know anyone. She’s timid and terrified of the men here—she clearly has some deep-seated trauma. If you leave, what do you think will happen to her? You’re asking the farm to keep her, but have you really thought it through? She’s injured and can’t work. The farm would have to cover her medical expenses out of its own pocket. This is the apocalypse. We can all barely fend for ourselves. We’re not in a position to run a charity."
Wyatt Vaughn’s words struck a nerve. Claudia’s eyes welled up with tears and her face flushed, but she couldn’t find any words to say.
"She saved me once," Claudia said, "back when Titus Joyce was beating me."
Claudia took a deep breath. "You’re right. I wasn’t thinking clearly. Even now, all I can think about is revenge. But putting aside the fact that I’m not strong enough to do it... the world is huge. I don’t even know where my enemies are."
"But... will the farm really be willing to take us in? After all this, I’m too ashamed to just be a freeloader."
Wyatt Vaughn sighed. "You should just go talk to Evelyn directly."
Claudia thought for a moment, then took Christina Thorne to find Evelyn. At that moment, Evelyn and Ronan Kendrick were at home playing Gomoku. Just as the two women arrived, Evelyn lost the game.
"Evelyn," she began, "I’m sorry for all the trouble we’ve caused."
Evelyn could see that the dark cloud hanging over Claudia’s features had lifted. It looked like she’d come to a decision.
"You’ve been helping in the kitchen these past few days. Aunt Crane says you’re a hard worker. You’ve even been boiling the water before she gets out of bed."
Claudia looked a little embarrassed. "It’s the least I can do. I don’t know how else I could possibly repay you all."
Evelyn got straight to the point. "So, what are your plans now?"
"Before, I asked you to take in Christina while I went off to find my enemies. That was incredibly selfish, both to the farm and to Christina. Wyatt talked to me for a long time, and I’ve come to my senses. I’m going to put revenge aside for now and focus on living. If an opportunity for vengeance ever comes, I won’t spare the bandits who murdered my parents and everyone in my village. But if that chance never comes, I’ll just consider them dead and let it go. Evelyn, I want to stay at the farm. Please, give me a chance. I’ll clean the latrines, I’ll muck out the sheep pens. I just want a place to call home."
Christina Thorne chimed in anxiously, "I can work too! You can give me all the dirty and strenuous jobs."
"Alright," Evelyn said with a smile. "We lost three people from the farm recently, so we are indeed short-handed. As for your work assignments, just go see Butler Graham."
