Chapter 81: Chapter 70: Clearing the Residential Building

Flora heard Cynthia Grant muttering Lex Cross’s name and asked, "Yeah, he’s the one who gave me this car. His name is Lex Cross. Have you heard of him?"

Cynthia Grant shook her head, searched her memory for the name again, and continued, "Someone with the surname Cross? No, I’ve never heard of him." Cynthia Grant hesitated, holding back the rest of her thoughts.

’The City of Argent’s special forces does have a young major general, but he’s said to be very mysterious. He’s the eldest son of the Adler family, the nephew of Vice-General Milton Adler. His name is Lex Adler. That couldn’t be the person Flora is talking about, right?’

The group drove to a closed-off suburb bordering Azuregard City. There were several small villages and residential areas nearby. Before they even got close, they could see a number of zombies wandering about near the residential districts.

’Flora considered their upcoming journey from Azuregard City to Morhaven by sea. There was no telling what might happen. In their group, besides herself, Cynthia Grant, Neal Wallace, and her father were only First Level superpower users. Her mother and Caleb had no superpowers at all. If they ran into an emergency, their current strength wouldn’t be enough.’

Since the villages and residential areas were in the suburbs, the population wasn’t very dense, even if it was large. Judging by the zombies currently on the road, the group was more than capable of handling them.

’This is a good place to upgrade our superpowers. It would be safer to set off after Neal Wallace and my father raise their Superpower Levels to Second Level. Besides, it’s getting dark. Driving at night is too dangerous in this apocalypse.’

"Dad, stop the car. We’ll find a place to rest in the residential area nearby tonight and head to the military base tomorrow."

No one objected to Flora’s words. After everyone got out, Flora stored the car back in her space.

Caleb Bloom’s superpower had fully recovered during the drive, and he had already reinforced and upgraded everyone’s weapons.

The moment Flora and the others stepped onto the ground, the scattered zombies spotted them. The rich scent of human flesh stimulated their sense of smell, making them feel even more ravenous.

Seeing a dozen zombies surround them first, Cynthia Grant’s Wood Element Ability was already raring to go. Two vines grew rapidly from her hands, whipping through the air.

"Cynthia, everyone, try to use your superpowers as little as possible. Use your weapons to kill the zombies. A First Level superpower is easily exhausted. Just think of this as a workout."

Flora reminded everyone. The zombies in the early days of the apocalypse weren’t really that strong. As long as you had a fit body and a sharp weapon, they were actually quite easy to deal with.

In fact, if they used their superpowers and overexerted themselves, it would leave them in a weakened state, which was even more dangerous.

"Okay, we’ll do as you say." Cynthia Grant retracted her superpower and raised the axe Flora had given her, ready for battle.

’Ever since she had left Evan’s group and turned back to find Flora, Cynthia Grant had seen how different Flora was. This girl was about her age, yet she possessed a wisdom and strength that Cynthia couldn’t match.’

Vert and the Golden Cicada followed them from above, keeping watch from the sky without descending. Flora had tossed the little white tiger back into her space first thing. She really couldn’t bear to see its snow-white fur get contaminated with zombie brains again, especially the sight of it swallowing the brain matter while grooming itself. That was just too much for her to handle.

Flora charged to the very front, with Neal Wallace at her side. They worked in tandem, cleanly lopping off the zombies’ claws. Then, they let the de-clawed zombies flow past them to their rear, where Caleb Bloom and Jade would finish them off.

Cynthia Grant was on the flank, preventing zombies from attacking their sides. She had originally thought it would take quite a few swings to kill a single zombie. To her surprise, with one swing of her axe, she actually chopped off a zombie’s entire shoulder, which startled her.

She gave the axe in her hand a strange look, her courage swelling. As more zombies advanced, she cut them down one by one. Except for a few where she missed the head and needed a second swing to split their skulls, the rest were all one-shot kills, falling dead from a single blow.

Ethan Monroe had a fever and felt weak, so he didn’t join the zombie-slaying brigade. He just held a fruit knife in the middle of the formation, protecting Caleb.

Although Caleb was young, he was also holding a small knife that had been reinforced by Caleb Bloom. His face was stern as he watched their surroundings, not slacking off in the slightest just because he was the one being protected.

"Old Monroe, you and Caleb dig out the Zombie Crystal Cores. We’re moving toward the residential area. We’ll clear out one of the housing units so we can get a good night’s rest."

"You got it! Hey, brat, you dare to dig in a zombie’s brain? If you don’t, your big bro here will do it for you."

Caleb stared back stubbornly. His small hand, clutching the little knife, was sweating with nervousness, but he still nodded and silently crouched down to start digging into a zombie’s brain on the ground.

If anyone had passed by at that moment, they would have been utterly shocked.

A team of seven people—men and women, old and young. Five of them formed a wide circle, killing the dozen or so zombies that had surrounded them. In the very center were a chubby man and a young boy, using knives to dig into the zombies’ brains, even sticking their hands inside to stir around.

The scene was both bizarre and disgusting.

After her initial attempts, Jade gradually got the hang of it. With the help of Flora and the others, she had developed a certain skill for killing zombies.

They continued to kill zombies as they moved toward a residential building on the side of the street. They didn’t spare any zombie they came across, and it wasn’t long before they had cleared out an open space.

The streetlights no longer turned on automatically when it got dark, and the residential area was completely unlit. The only sounds were the faint shuffling of feet and the soft grinding of bone on bone.

Flora didn’t let her guard down. She enveloped everyone in a water shield as they walked into the residential area, found a building closest to the entrance, and led the group inside to start clearing out the zombies.

The old-style residential building had no elevator, so they had to search door-to-door. They cleared out any zombies they found and rummaged through the zombie-free apartments for useful supplies and food.

After clearing the first floor, the group locked the main entrance and continued clearing their way up. When they had finally finished all five floors, the seven of them found an empty apartment, went inside, shut the door, and collapsed onto the floor in exhaustion.

It wasn’t a long way from the entrance to the residential building, but they had already cleared out more than seventy zombies. Though numerous, the zombies were scattered or in pairs, so aside from sore arms, they posed no real threat.

Naturally, the rewards were also plentiful. From over seventy zombies, they had dug up a total of sixty Crystal Cores. The appearance rate of Crystal Cores was on the rise, which also meant the zombies were gradually evolving. Flora believed it wouldn’t be long before Second Level zombies would also become more common.

Flora washed the Crystal Cores collected by Ethan Monroe and Caleb and stored them in her space. Then, she inspected the apartment’s layout. Although old, the place wasn’t small. It had a three-bedroom, one-living-room, two-bathroom, and one-balcony layout, totaling about 120 square meters.

The apartment was pitch-black. The electrical system here must have been destroyed long ago, leaving no power available.

They had been on the move all day. And while they hadn’t gone hungry, killing zombies, fleeing, and clearing the building had left Flora covered in sweat. She desperately wanted to take a hot bath. After telling the others, she went into the bathroom and started tinkering.

She did have a multi-function generator in her space, but this old-style building had no wiring to connect it to. Fortunately, the generator she’d bought was a multi-function model that allowed her to plug appliances directly into its sockets.

So, Flora took out a portable bathtub and filled it with Space Spirit Water. She then retrieved an immersion heater she’d bought before, plugged it into her multi-function generator, and placed the heater in the water to warm it up.

Before long, the water felt warm. Flora took out her body wash and other things and began to soak in the bath.

Being able to take a hot bath during the apocalypse was an absolutely delightful and supreme luxury. But Flora had long been prepared for this, all to ensure she and her family could live well in these times.

After finishing her bath and changing into a clean set of clothes, Flora went out and told the others to take turns bathing. She also left out clean clothes for everyone to change into.

A long time had passed by the time everyone had finished their turn. This level of inefficiency made Flora resolve that, when conditions allowed in the future, she would definitely have her father install a generator and a solar-powered water heater at their home.

Flora covered the living room table with hot food. There were hamburgers and fried chicken, congee, soup, rice, and noodles, as well as some leftover pheasant that Jade had cooked back at Flora’s house.

Full, refreshed, and clean, everyone was naturally overcome with sleepiness.

Flora took out thick blankets and bedding and distributed them. The apartment only had three bedrooms: Caleb Bloom and Jade took one, Ethan Monroe and Neal Wallace took another, and Cynthia Grant and Caleb took the third. Flora volunteered to sleep on the sofa and keep watch for the night.

At first, her parents wouldn’t agree to their daughter sleeping in the living room to keep watch, but when Flora explained she could catch up on sleep during the drive to the base the next morning, they finally relented.