CHAPTER 42: CHAPTER 42: NYRA’S TEST

Even after they reached the room, Zerra was silent. She was extremely disappointed that her first minion had rebelled. In the end, Cassias killed the zombie.

She could feel all sorts of indescribable emotions running through her heart at this moment. Cassias only accompanied her for a few hours before he left. He just briefly telling her he had picked up a fox and was looking for it.

Ha, he would never find that fox.

"Get me one more basin of water." Zerra told Laziel, who was eating his fill at the table. She sniffed herself, then scrunched her nose in distaste. "It still doesn’t smell good."

Laziel glanced at her and scoffed. "Am I your personal water tank?"

After seeing her kicking and alive, and appearing rejuvenated again after a meal, Laziel was back to his old, annoying personality.

Zerra pursed her lips and went inside the bathroom again. Forget it. She would just use her own water. She did that just to annoy Laziel anyway...

Who told him to brag in front of her and call her useless again?!

As soon as she stepped into the bathroom again, someone shoved her to the side. Zerra widened her eyes and scolded, "You scoundrel! What are you doing here?"

Laziel snorted at her. He touched the empty basin in front of him. In half a minute, it was filled with water again. He looked noticeably paler after he did so; obviously it had made him exert a lot of his energy.

He had just awoken his water ability for around a day, after all.

"Here, take a bath again. You stink so much." He made an exaggerated gesture of pinching his nose together.

Just as he was about to walk out, Zerra took out a few bars of chocolate and cookies from her space and handed it to Laziel.

Laziel blinked, a little stunned at the snacks in his hand.

"Your reward," she coughed, shoving the dumbfounded Laziel out of the bathroom.

She knew that he secretly loved sweet things. He never told that to anyone. When he was a child, their parents forbade him from eating too much of them.

They limited his sweets, and in turn, he turned his target to Zerra’s portion, who always got whatever she wanted. Angry that Laziel took her snacks, she complained to their father. As a result, they never allowed Laziel to get any sweets again to discipline him.

After the apocalypse started, such luxury things were even more rare.

Laziel sent a complicated look to the closed door before he heard Zerra’s words. "You go away. I am going to take a bath!"

His mouth twitched. Scoffing, he walked away, clutching the sweets Zerra just gave him tightly.

***

Their group of people who managed to get out of that underground place alive spawned outside the area not far from the hospital.

Only a very few of them managed to come out alive from other exits. The malicious soldiers and ability users who had lured them to the mutated plant never came out.

Nyra was with Darren, checking the result of the weird incident. They found out that all possible paths toward the underground place had been blocked.

There was a few meters wide sinking ground, forming something like a river path. It was obviously the dark, tunnel-like path they had gone through before.

"Did you find the fox?" Laziel asked Cassias when the man came back empty-handed. It was already night.

Cassias’ eyes flashed with an inscrutable flicker. "No."

Laziel pursed his lips. He was about to say something when Cassias threw a small pouch at him. There were some crystal cores inside, sparkling blue like an ocean.

"You can use those crystals to improve your power."

Cassias walked inside after saying that.

Meanwhile, Nyra also just returned to their room. She looked surprised as soon as she stepped inside the room. "Zerra?"

Zerra raised her eyebrows at her. "Eldest sister, you have come back."

Thankfully, she hasn’t shifted to her fox form yet. Otherwise, she would be in trouble if Nyra discovered her fox form inside their room.

Nyra’s face didn’t change. "It has been three days?"

She was referring to the time of her observation period.

Zerra nodded. "Yes, I didn’t turn into a zombie after all. I also... miraculously survived."

After a while, Nyra cracked a smile. The invisible tension in the air dissipated in an instant. She nodded in approval. "That’s good. Be careful next time."

The next morning, Nyra divided the crystal cores she had gotten to others. Space ability was rare, and they hadn’t found one so far. So, Zerra only got a few and none suited her attribute.

Well, she should just join missions on her own...

As for Nyra, she was so hardworking. She helped the Brown family to clean the remaining zombies and mutated animals in the northern part of the hospital, simply because she loved it.

Nyra loved money, which translated to crystal cores in the apocalypse.

Soon, after more people found out the function of the crystal cores, it would be the universal currency.

"There seems to be something wrong with the previous accident that befell on us." Nyra glanced at Cassias. A faint scrutiny flashed in her eyes, like she was waiting for his reaction.

Zerra’s gaze also flitted toward Cassias, curious.

"What did you see in that place, Cassias?" Seeing him so slow in reacting, Nyra seemed to grow impatient.

"That mutated plant was heading toward us with countless tendrils, two times the number." He explained, his face unchanged. "If we didn’t hurry, we would have been dead."

Nyra fell silent. "I will tell Darren about it. This can be considered as an anomaly... too many people died."

Well, not much of an anomaly now that things were basically unpredictable in the last days. She just based that incident on her previous life’s knowledge. Such a creature shouldn’t have existed at the beginning...

"Is it safe now, or will something like that happen again?" The silent Laziel opened his mouth. The fear still lingered in his mind.

"It could happen again..." she glanced at Laziel.

Zerra secretly analyzed their interaction. A bystander saw things more clearly than the people involved. She could see that Nyra was testing Cassias.

Repeatedly.

Which girl would be so calm in the apocalypse like Nyra? Moreover, she wasn’t a vase that needed to be protected by others. She was a skilled and fierce fighter of her own.

Besides working outside during those years, Nyra also secretly took combat classes.

When the apocalypse started, the rain had blocked their mobility. All shops were closed. Where had Nyra acquired those foods she had taken out during their time at the underground place?

It was the same for Cassias.

Those two were suspecting each other, but none spoke about it openly. They still didn’t trust each other. It was still early in the story, so that was only natural.

Zerra sighed and clicked her tongue inwardly. What a drama, she grumbled. Just kiss and get married already, then forget about her...

Alas, things weren’t going to go easily in the direction as she wished.

"Are you guys not interested in going to another place...?" Laziel trailed off. "For example, The Capital. I heard it’s safer there."

He glanced at Zerra, then Nyra, seemingly wanting to say something, but didn’t dare to be too blunt about it.

Their home was located in the city nearest to the Capital. Their parents most likely had also stayed there and their survival was unknown.