Chapter 98: Chapter 86: Milton Adler’s Plot?

When Hugh Warren emerged with Evan and the others, Holly had already been waiting outside for quite some time.

"Captain, how did it go?" Holly still hadn’t recovered from the terror of the zombie dog attack. If she hadn’t hidden behind Sandra, using her as a human shield, she probably wouldn’t even know how she’d died.

Evan’s expression changed the moment he stepped out. He shook his head at Holly, then turned to Hugh Warren.

"Hugh, what’s going on here?"

With a grim expression, Hugh Warren led the five of them across Strategist Plaza and through areas patrolled by soldiers, heading toward the Lighthouse Terminal.

"Evan, I can’t say much else right now. Cynthia got back before you. Milton Adler has sent Flora Bloom, Cynthia, and their team to the flour mill for a supply run."

Hugh Warren gave Evan a meaningful look. "Flora Bloom’s parents and her brother have been settled inside the terminal. Now that you’re back, we need to plan our next steps carefully. Do you... understand what needs to be done?"

The five were brought to the fifth floor of the Lighthouse Terminal and assigned their own rooms. Or rather, they were each given a mattress and a set of bedding.

"Someone will bring you three meals a day. The situation in the base is tense right now, so it’s best if you don’t go out unless it’s necessary."

Hugh Warren turned to leave, but Evan grabbed his arm.

"Where are Flora Bloom’s parents staying? I want to see them."

"The 11th floor." As he spoke, Hugh Warren glanced warily at Sienna Kensington and her two companions. "You should go alone. The situation at the base is unstable. Be careful."

After lunch, Evan washed up, changed into a set of clean casual clothes, said a brief word to Holly, and then went to the eleventh floor by himself to find Caleb Bloom.

He found Caleb Bloom and his wife standing with their child by the outer, floor-to-ceiling glass windows, admiring the view. Each of them held a tomato in their hand as they ate, talked, and laughed.

"Sorry to interrupt." A strange light flashed in Evan’s eyes as he looked at the fruit in their hands.

When Caleb Bloom and his family saw it was Evan, the smiles on their faces instantly froze.

"If it’s not important, please leave. I don’t believe we have anything to discuss."

Their daughter had been surrounded by zombies, and this man before them was the one who had resolutely chosen to lead his team away, abandoning her. Caleb Bloom and his wife wanted nothing to do with him. If their daughter hadn’t been so capable, that abandonment would have been a death sentence.

"I know you’re upset, and I’m sorry. But I’m here about Flora Bloom. You both know that Old Lynch has gone missing, right?"

Caleb Bloom and Jade exchanged a glance and gave a slight nod.

Evan did feel guilty for abandoning Flora Bloom’s rescue and leading his team away. But he had to make them understand what was happening now.

"Our squad was almost completely wiped out on the last mission. Only Holly and I managed to bring Sienna Kensington and her people back to the base. I just heard that your daughter has taken a team to the flour mill for grain. Do you know that the soldiers who went with her are Old Lynch’s former subordinates?"

Jade still didn’t understand what was happening. ’Is this really so important?’ But Caleb Bloom’s face turned pale when he heard that last sentence.

"Are you saying that Milton Adler sent them out together on purpose?" Having been a military instructor, Caleb Bloom knew a thing or two about such machinations.

Evan knew Caleb Bloom was a perceptive man and understood him instantly.

"The flour mill. Milton Adler has sent teams to retrieve resources from there many times before. Not a single mission was successful. The people he sent out never came back alive. They either died or disappeared. For your daughter to be sent on this mission now... the odds are stacked against her."

"You mean, Milton Adler wants to..." The four words "wipe them all out" were on the tip of his tongue, but Caleb Bloom couldn’t bring himself to say them.

Evan nodded, his expression grave as he looked at Caleb Bloom.

Meanwhile, on the fifth floor, Sienna Kensington, Freddy Dnovoan, and Mindy Quincy took one look at the food a soldier delivered, and their faces contorted with disgust. They threw down their bowls and chopsticks.

"How dare you serve us this? This food isn’t fit for pigs!"

A vicious look spread across Sienna Kensington’s youthful face, her voice dripping with malice.

"I want to see your... commanding officer! I’m reporting you... for... mistreatment!"

The soldier’s face turned ashen. He shot a glare at Sienna Kensington, whose face was a mask of revulsion, and made to leave. But Sienna’s two bodyguards blocked his path.

"You dare give us nothing but old vegetables and rice? And you think you can just leave?!"

The bodyguards—a man and a woman—were exceptionally strong. Although they hadn’t awakened any superpowers, the soldier delivering the food couldn’t even withstand a single heavy punch from one of them. He was sent staggering backward before collapsing to the ground.

The soldier’s own fighting spirit was ignited by the Koreans’ aggression. He moved to retaliate, but a red Fireball suddenly flared to life in the little girl Sienna Kensington’s hand and shot toward him.

"AH!"

The Fireball seemed to act with purpose, enveloping only his head. In a searing flash, the soldier’s military cap and hair were incinerated without a trace. Under the intense heat of the flames, his face began to distort. The skin melted away, exposing the muscle and bone beneath in a gruesome, bloody mess.

"I heard there are other guests on the eleventh floor! I’m going to see what *they’re* eating. On what grounds do you get to mistreat us like this?!"

"What’s going on?" Holly had been resting in the next room. Hearing the commotion, she ran over just in time to see a soldier lying on the ground, on the verge of death, his face burned beyond human recognition.

"Stop it! Sienna Kensington, how could you attack one of our men?" Holly’s words only earned her the derisive laughter of the trio.

"I, Sienna Kensington, do whatever... I want! You, on the other hand, are a disgusting hypocrite. I wonder... if Captain Lawson... knows that one of his... team members... used a partner as a human shield, a sacrificial lamb, just to save her own skin?"

"You!" Holly flinched as if struck, her eyes wide with panic and fear. "What do you want? Even if you are the precious daughter of the We Group, you can’t just murder people in our territory!"

"If you want me... to let him live, that’s fine too! You... will take us to the eleventh floor."

The eleventh floor.

Caleb Bloom processed the information in Evan’s words, and a sense of urgency washed over him. If Milton Adler was truly scheming against them, then his daughter’s chances of survival on this mission were slim to none.

"Captain Lawson, take me to Milton Adler now. I’m going to demand an explanation! Jade, take Caleb back to the room and don’t come out. I’ll be back soon."

Hearing that her daughter had been set up, Jade felt her own heart burn with anxiety. "Caleb," she said immediately, "you have to be careful, too. Please, don’t do anything rash."

Evan led Caleb Bloom to the building where they had met Milton Adler previously. After being told that Adler had gone to the command platform, the two of them immediately changed course and rushed in that direction.