Caspian’s white-hot eyes dimmed back to a shimmering gold, his head tilting in pure, baffled silence. The Boar Alpha, still pressed into the dirt, let out a wet gasp of hope that sounded more like a choke.

"Don’t... kill him?" Caspian repeated the words as if they were a foreign language. He looked at the trembling beast at his feet, then back at Hana. "He called you a hairless bitch, Hana. He tried to take my mountain. He is a traitor. Why should he continue to draw air?"

Hana turned around, the moonlight catching the silver curves of her dress. She looked at the Alpha not as a person, but as a piece of equipment that had just been significantly marked down in price.

"Because dead things don’t scrub floors," Hana said flatly. "And they certainly don’t haul water or move boulders. You wanted to hire ’servants’ to clean your den, Caspian? Well, your brother just delivered the whole tribe of them."

She walked back toward the center of the plateau, her eyes landing on the Alpha.

"You said you’d serve until the sun goes cold. I don’t need that long. I just need you to be useful until your debt is paid."

> [OPTION B SELECTED: ENSLAVEMENT & SANITATION]

> [Current Objective: Deploy the ’Scrub-Squad’]

> [Bonus: +5,000 Points for ’Efficient Resource Management’]

Hm, the things have already been moved, but the floors are still dirty. Hana thought. So that’s why they’re called the scrub squad.

"Hana, you can’t be serious," Raiden interjected, his nine tails still bristling. "He’s a Boar. They’re lazy, they’re messy, and they’ll bite the hand that feeds them the second they think they can get away with it."

"He won’t bite anything," Hana said, her gaze shifting to the Dragon. "Because if he moves a muscle I didn’t tell him to move, Caspian is going to roast his tusks while they’re still in his head. Right, Caspian?"

Caspian’s chest puffed out, a dark, satisfied rumble vibrating in his throat. He liked this. He liked being the one Hana gave tasks to. He liked being the threat that kept Hana’s ’tools’ in line.

"I will turn him into a charcoal statue the moment he stops working," he promised, his golden eyes glowing with a renewed, predatory pride.

Hana looked at the Alpha, who was now nodding his head so hard his forehead was hitting the stone. "I will work! I will scrub! I will move the whole mountain if you ask! Please! Don’t kill me."

And here was the prideful male who said he would never beg a female. In the face of power, in the face of death, even his pride will disappear.

"Good," Hana said, ignoring his pathetic display. She pointed toward the cave entrance. "Caspian, get the Alpha and the warriors inside. I want every rotted hide, every bone, and every piece of ’tribute’ trash moved to the outer rim."

In order to start scrubbing the floors properly, the filth needs to be moved out.

"Raiden, lead the laborers to the stream. I need them to start gathering more Salt-Leaves and Peppercorns. We’re going to need a lot more soap if we’re going to clean this mess."

The two beastmen stared at her. They were used to fighting and hunting. But they were still not used to logistics.

It was up to Hana to beat the logistics into them.

"Now," She snapped, her voice cracking like a whip that landed right on their senses.

"Moving the Boars now!" Raiden chirped, his tails instantly shifting from a barricade into a guiding fence. "Move it, you stinking tuskers! To the stream! Jump!"

Caspian reached down, grabbed the Boar Alpha by the back of his neck, and hauled him up like a sack of grain. The Alpha cried out as his broken knee dragged, but Caspian didn’t care.

"You heard my mate," Caspian growled into the Alpha’s ear, his golden eyes burning bright. "If the floor isn’t shining by sunrise, I’m having bacon for breakfast."

As the mob began to move under the direction of the two predators, Hana let out a long, exhausted sigh. Her back ached, the thought of her pregnancy was making her stomach turn, and she was still starving.

She sat down on a smooth rock, watching the chaos of her new ’civilization’ project.

> [CURRENT BALANCE: -1,204,480]

"Better," she whispered to herself. "But still not enough."

She looked at the Boar Alpha being dragged into the cave. He was a traitor, yes. And traitors needed to be disposed of.

But in the apocalypse, the traitors who aren’t disposed of make for good use. They were just workers you didn’t have to feel bad about overworking.

Hana stared at the blue window flickering in front of her.

> [CIVILIZATION PROGRESS: 1%]

She stared at that tiny number for a long time. One percent? She had just defeated a Boar Alpha, taken over his tribe, and started a chemical revolution with her soap, yet she was barely at the starting line.

What did he have to do to increase the progress of civilization? Surely, they didn’t expect her to create light bulbs of electronics like Nikola Tesla, right?

No, that’s not it... right?

This system could be really cruel so there was no telling what exactly it wanted.

Then, the window flickered again with a personal message from the system.

> [YOU’RE JUST OVERTHINKING IT]

Ah, if it’s like that then it was fine. She could do anything if she put her mind to it, but not create electricity from scratch.

But then again, the task was not going to be easy either. If concurring one tribe and getting them to work gave her only one percent worth of progress then...

Hana looked out at the dark, endless Emerald Forest. She might have to fix this entire vast land and every tribe in it to hit a hundred percent.

If so, she was going to be very busy—and very annoyed.

Just as she was wondering how many more beastmen she’d have to bully to make that number move, Raiden suddenly appeared at her side.

He didn’t have a speck of dust on him or his pretty pink tails fluttering behind him. In fact, he looked very proud of himself as he held out a plump, freshly caught squirrel.

"For you, Great Female," Raiden said, his tails swishing against the ground. "I figured the Dragon was too busy playing ’Boss’ to actually feed you. This is tender. Much better than that tough boar meat."

Hana took the squirrel by its tail. "Thanks, Raiden."

She didn’t see Caspian walking up behind them until the air suddenly got hot enough to burn her hair. 𝒻𝑟𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝑛𝘰𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝘤𝘰𝘮

"What is that?" Caspian demanded. His golden eyes were fixed on the small animal in Hana’s hand. "That is a snack for a kit!" He snarled. "I was going to bring her a feast! A real meal!"

"A ’feast’ she’d have to wait three hours for because you’re too busy moving rocks?" Raiden shot back. He ducked behind Hana’s shoulder, using her as a shield. "She’s hungry now, Lizard. I actually look after her needs while you’re just looking after your ego."

Ah... They were going at it again.