May Peace Grace Us

Chapter 80: Cannibals

The destination Aila and her team were heading to was the capital itself. From their base’s location it is quite far and is estimated to need a few weeks on the road before they could reach it. So their departure was in fact quite early to arrive at the date and time agreed upon.

“It has been so long since I was out without Stephen on my neck,” Judith said as their team made camp for the night.

The RV could house them all, but due to privacy reasons, the team preferred to set up some tents out in the open. The barrier that Jerome and his department have created has solved most of their safety problems, therefore they are not so wary of doing such arrogant practice.

“Uncle loves you so much, auntie,” Jerome said cheekily to his side. “You are the pearl in his hands. If he could help it, he would want you to stay still in his palms forever.”

“But also because he loves you so much that he is willing to let you do what you want,” Aila commented, defending her father's mindset, as she too shares the same sentiment as well. “Thus, you get to be here despite how unwilling he was.”

“You talk as if I am his daughter instead of a wife.” Judith smiled warmly as she said this. “I know how precious I am that I get out here to strengthen myself. If the world was still peaceful, I would probably be happy to be a homely housewife for him in our later years. But with how dangerous things are now, I cannot bear to be a weakness to that proud man of mine.”

Aila and Jerome wisely did not comment on her words and silently did their tasks at hand. Judith, seeing no response, continually took out what the camp needed from the tents down to a generator and wires for them to charge the RV as they rested. The rest of the team returned at this time after they gathered enough firewood for a campfire and some animals they could feast on. Although they had some food that they could easily take out and consume, they rather save it for real emergencies. The issue of them expiring is not much of a problem, as time does not move in the space of a spatial supernaturalist.

“There are quite a few level three zombies here.” Diane said as she set fire to the firewood that was piled up by her teammates. On her hand were some crystals of different colors, newly harvested from the look of their grime.

“Considering that our base rarely goes out and there are no deterrent forces to clean the zombies here regularly, it is no surprise that there are some strong zombies here.” Aila said as she made Jerome produce some water to clean the crystals. These crystals will be processed by her later in a simple manner; no hard candy process, only a crude liquid state for a quick drink.

“Although it is no problem for us to take care of them on our own, fighting them is a hassle.” Billy said to the side as he started to process the game they hunted. “But who would have thought that before we used to panic when we saw a stronger variety of zombies now we are making annoyed faces because disposing of them is a trouble.”

The team chuckled at Billy’s remark as they thought back to that time as well. If they are near the base, they will call Bella to rescue them. If they are on their own, they rack their brains and drain their energies to survive the ordeal. Now, as long as they are not the unusual kind of zombie, and they do not exceed the level of four, each of them could guarantee their lives to some extent.

“Talking and relaxing in this manner was definitely impossible back then, but thanks to Jerome, here we can relax and rest well as long as there is nothing abnormal happening nearby.” Brian, a supernaturalist whose ability lies mentally, said with a cheeky smile.

“Say more praises. I hardly hear those.” Jerome good-heartedly.

“Say no more. That guy’s head will fly if you feed this ego more.” Aila said as she pinched Jerome not so subtly.

Everyone laughed at the scene.

The current team have a leisurely life as they advance towards the capital. Aila never thought that there would be a time that humanity would be like this again after the world ushered in the era her pen had once written. She wished that everything would be fine, at least until the end of her life, but she knew it was an impossible wish.

Just as they were a week away from the capital, they encountered an existence much more terrible than zombies could ever be.

Cannibals.

Aila briefly wrote about them in her story and did not go into detail. First was that the topic itself was a stuff of horrors and her readers were not exactly too mature to read about it. She just mentioned a few details about how Alfred encountered them and how he dealt with them after he found out about their practices.

Aila knew that she should have thought about them when she first heard of them going to the capital. Her story takes place in the capital and the areas surrounding it, so most of her canon plotlines as well as the unofficial ones are occurring there ever since the whole apocalypse started. So being trapped to be these cannibals’ dinner should have been part of her expectations for their journey.

“I get that the world is hard and people want to live. But I never thought I would be the fish on another's chopping board.” Diane said as she watched their kidnappers celebrate their successful capture with them. They are currently in an abandoned house with their limbs tied tightly by ropes.

They made a detour on their road for a little while due to an incident on the road. The boys were doing their best to make repairs on their RV and, out of boredom, the girls decided to hunt a few zombies. As this is their normal mood of things, the boys just let them go, not at all worried about them. Trusting their abilities to keep themselves safe.

But they unintentionally went farther than they intended to. And by one careless mistake, they fell into a trap that rendered them unconscious for a while. Thus, leading them to wake up in the room of an abandoned house where their kidnappers placed them in.

“I for once agree with your words,” Gretchen said as she undid her ropes in her corner. “But they sure are foolish to have captured us.”

Aila nodded to her side as Judith, besides her, was absolutely going murderous. For long, they never felt so insulted after they had been part of their base’s combat forces. These people actually belittle them so much as they use common tactics to bid them. Although they heard nothing of those people in the other room saying words that looked down on them for being a woman, the fact they did not put guards on them let them know they didn’t take them in their eyes for being the weaker s*x. After all, most sexist people use this tactic quite often from tales of those teams before them who unfortunately encountered something similar to this incident.

Their base was small and everyone knew better than to have a sexist mindset in their dwelling population. For one, Bella proved herself to be the strongest among them all. And second, women in their base were simply the ones who did most work, as men preferred to be in the combat force as much as they could. It can be said that the number of tasks men and women on their base were almost equal in number and diversity, but with the trend of Bella being the top dog, men respect women with higher respect, as they don’t want to be beaten by doing so and let it be. A stain that will hinder their desire to get a partner.

Last year there were weddings at their base. And for the sake of each and everyone’s lifelong happiness, most men on their base make sure not to offend the women on the base. In return for their respect, women on their base made sure when they were in other territories not to be easily tricked by some vixen who are out to exploit them. Their men are sure to be a catch and the women on their base are not willing for others to hurt them in return for their respect and hard work. It is not an exaggeration that each of them are very protective of their people and that they are doing odd things here and there to protect their own.

As they—the women in their party—were kidn*pped by these people, the men should have been much more murderous than the already fuming Judith. There was no need for Alfred to come over and exterminate these people. Aila and her group were more than offended to make sure they would no longer exist by the end of the night.

“Still, our luck is sure to be so great to bump into hostile people.” Gretchen was simply so baffled that out of all the people who were heading into the capital it was them who became victims. “Cannibals of them all.”

“Who cares?” Diane was simply too uncaring about the details. She was already angry hearing what they planned for them. She felt sick hearing how they wanted to play with them before they would ultimately end up in their stomachs. She had heard weird things before on the internet, but she couldn’t help pondering about these people’s state of mind. Surely the apocalypse was only a trigger for them to act on their darkest desires.

“So what should we do? Wait for the boys or get out here by ourselves?” Judith asked the children before her with a smile that said she was just being democratic by saying so. The girls definitely knew that she was already planning how to kill those people in her mind.

“There is no problem with us taking them on, but the boys will definitely get angry at having no action when they arrive here.” Gretchen says as she nonchalantly stretches her limbs, idly she wonders how long they were out of consciousness. Her limbs felt numb from the awkward position she was in after she woke up. “Besides, those people are too happy to notice we are out of our bindings. Which just assures us that there is no supernaturalist that is stronger than us out there.”

“Don’t use the standards of supernaturalists outside of our own with the standards of our people,” Aila said as she shook her head. “It should have been clear that we are simply not the same as them. Comparing us with them is akin to insulting ourselves to be on their level.”

“My bad.” Gretchen only says.

“So wait or get out here?” Judith asked once again.

“Just wait.” Aila replied as she leaned on the wall, relaxing her nerves. “Wait for our men and wait until the whole group of these people is gathered here. As long as every one of them is here, we can wipe them all in one sweep. It is quite useless and unnecessary to act upon them if we leave some of them alive. Don’t you all think so?”

Judith calmed the rage inside of her as she heard her daughter’s words. She hates these people for capturing them and planning to eat them, so much that she wishes to spill blood on the land. But Aila’s words made sense. If they are going to retaliate, it is better to aim for the whole group. This way they will have worries about others wanting to take revenge on them.