The yellow wall that Stanley had seen turned out to be a hot shield that burned anything that it came in contact with.

It wasn’t just one shield either, but a dozen different shields working in random intervals such that at any time, there would be at least half the number of shields active.

And unlike regular shields, which stopped around the object if something was caught in it, this one seemed to attack it with lasers.

’I can’t go past this,’ Stanley thought with a frown. He had tried with his dead left hand and knew that if he tried to go past that barrier, he would be shredded by the laser before he made it halfway through.

"How is this barrier even active?" he wondered. "From outside... or..." It had to have a powerful plasmium core somewhere running everything.

"And a powerful computer too to know what to shoot and what not to." There were trees around the barrier that moved but were completely fine.

In the end, Stanley didn’t know what he could do with that information. He barely knew what a shield was less than half a year ago. He still hadn’t seen plasmium on its own.

He turned around and made his way toward the top of the mountain, with the large piece of log that he walked around with to get it to dry. It was fortunate that the wood didn’t instead rod when he aged it. That would’ve brought all sorts of problems.

He had stashed his other items at a place only he could find.

It took Stanley 3 hours to make it to the top of the cliff he had seen. From there, he wanted to see the entire area. However, when he reached the place, he was surprised to find a small group of people already there.

There were 2 women and 2 men, all of whom stared back at him. They seemed to have realized he was coming from a long ago.

Stanley stared at them, trying to figure out what was happening there. His attention was on one of the women who seemed too old to be here and was definitely not part of the group.

Her hair was fully white, with her skin pale as well. There were scratch marks all over her face that hadn’t been healed just yet.

"Stay right there," the other girl, with short jet black hair shouted at Stanley. She held something to her back, ready to pull out if need be.

Of the two men, one was shorter than the other and had a bulbous body. The other one looked as handsome as they came with a well-built physique and a handsome face.

"He is alone," the short man said. He held a spear in his hand, surprising Stanley.

The tall man nodded. The only weapon he held was a long, thick stiff which could work for a staff. He seemed ready to fight as well.

Stanley frowned a little and tried to piece together what was going on here. "I’m... not here to fight," he said. "I’m just trying to get a lay of the land." His eyes glided over each and every one of them, waiting to get more information.

The tall man spoke first. "If you’re not here to kill, then step back. You can come here once we leave," the man said. He seemed rather nervous, so Stanley didn’t find it hard to believe that there would be no fights today.

But then again, killers were quite crafty, so it was better if Stanley was alert the entire time. He said nothing more to them after that. This was the best place to look down at the land and get an idea of where exactly he was, but he wasn’t going to do that while they were there.

"I’ll leave," he said and turned around. However, even as he did, he couldn’t help but feel that something wrong was going on here, especially with the old woman who looked like she needed help.

He sighed and turned around, making the people frown once more.

Before they could speak, however, he started.

"Miss!" he shouted out loud toward the old white-haired woman. "Do you need some help?"

The woman looked up, surprised. "I..." she started speaking, but her voice was hoarse.

"Just say if you need help, I’ll help," he said. He only prayed he was making a good decision here.

"Hey, that makes us look like we’re doing something bad here," the young girl cried out. "We’re trying to help this lady too. She just doesn’t want our help."

Stanley ignored the girl and looked at the woman, waiting for her to speak.

"Look lady, if you don’t need his help, say so," the tall man said. "And if you don’t need our help, say so too. There will be many coming to kill you in the coming days, so I’m just trying to live for as long as I can."

The woman finally cracked. "Get away from me! I don’t know what is going on here. Why did that man suddenly try to kill me earlier? Why should I believe that you won’t try to kill me too?"

"Come on, woman," the girl said in frustration. "If we wanted you dead, wouldn’t you be dead already? We don’t even gain anything from keeping you alive. Just tell us what your powers are and if they’re not helpful, we’ll leave."

"And what if I say I don’t have any powers?" the woman asked them.

"This is pointless," the short man said. "If you think you can survive on your own, then stay. We’ll leave."

The other two sighed as well and turned to leave.

"I can create small amounts of food!" the woman quickly answered. "Enough to feed 2 people for the night."

"Oh! Food?" the girl’s eyes widened. "Any food?"

"Any I know about," the woman said.

The young girl turned around toward the group. "That’s a handy power. We can create snacks if nothing," she said.

"Yes, but... she’ll be a burden, won’t she?" the short man asked.

The tall man fell into a thought, considering what choices he had. Then, he remembered Stanley and turned to first learn more from him.