Alex left the base after that and set off on the road.

  He snatched a car from some random place and searched his phone for the most popular sports store.

  The Internet in the instance was so advanced that not even an apocalypse could stop it.

  Connecting his phone to his car, he set it beside him and focused on the screen beside the steering wheel.

  On it was a map of the area with directions clearly indicated.

  Alex found it nice that the map could update in real time, providing a route through the carnage of damaged cars and corpses.

  So all he needed to do was follow the map.

  Alex suddenly felt the silence of a quiet drive to be depressing.

  All was deathly silent, and the wreckage in sight certainly didn't help to lift his mood.

  Alex shook his head and muttered that he must be crazy to wonder what that idiot was doing.

  The said idiot, Paul, was sighing in the bed, feeling that it became boring without his grumpy friend.

  Plus, he couldn't do much because he was injured.

  Paul rubbed his stomach where Alex kicked, feeling aggrieved.

  I know I was harsh and all, but did he really have to hit that hard??

  "Young man, what are you doing here?" an elderly lady in her late 40s came in, walking with a limp.

  Paul recognized her as one of the people he helped while escaping in his previous base.

  "I made my friend angry and well… hehe," Paul chuckled, embarrassed.

  "And you're such a good kid, don't worry, I'll take care of you, take it as repayment" the lady patted his shoulder.

  "My friend has gone through a lot and refused to talk about it, so I wanted to help him a little," Paul smiled.

  "It seems you helped him a bit too much," the lady chuckled.

  "What did you come here for though?" Paul changed the topic to escape the teasing.

  "My leg was acting up again, so I came for painkillers," the lady patted the leg that was stiff.

  Paul met her while escaping from his previous base, she was injured by other people who wanted to escape, causing her to have a limp in one of her legs.

  The situation was dire and Paul wasn't a doctor, so he couldn't treat her injury when he found her bleeding on the ground.

  He could only carry her on his back and offer prayers that she wouldn't die.

  That they both wouldn't die.

  They made it out under the Lord's protection, but her leg couldn't be saved by that time.

  Nevertheless, she was always grateful to Paul.

  After all, it was only her that understood the despair she felt at that time—

  like the whole world had abandoned her.

  "Ah—" was all Paul could say.

  "I'm really okay, I'm happy to be alive," she smiled at him kindly.

  Paul could only hum, still feeling sad about it.

  "You mustn't have eaten yet, why don't I get us some breakfast?" the lady clapped her hands and limped away.

  She arrived a few minutes later holding two packs of small stale bread.

  "Sorry, this was all I could get," she offered Paul one apologetically.

  The food was distributed based on work points, which itself was fair.

  This was the end times, so law and order was gone.

  The only thing left was a person's value.

  The lady had a limp and worked in the kitchen, so her value was replaceable.

  Replaceable meant that her food would be the least in value.

  "It's better than the food I ate when I was a child," Paul ate the bread happily.

  He ate the dry bread with so much joy that the lady almost thought she was holding a full-course meal.

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  So with curiosity, she tore off the package and took a bread.

  The usual dry taste with a slightly stale texture was felt by her taste buds.

  She looked at the dark-skinned man laying on the bed, eating with a smile that made even his eyes curve…

  And suddenly felt like there must be something wrong with him.

  Come to think of it, what normal person goes back to a building he painstakingly got out of, just to save a stranger that looked half-dead?

  Hmm, I was on the brink of death at the time so I didn't think about it.

  Like that, her thoughts began to wander farther and farther.

  The look in her eyes when she gazed at Paul was becoming more and more troubled.

  "It's not good to waste," Paul's voice interrupted her thinking.

  He used his eyes to indicate the bread still in her hand with a bite taken out of it.

  The lady subconsciously held the bread closer to herself and looked at Paul warily.

  "I'll eat it," she said cautiously.

  "Huh? Why do you look so conflicted then? I thought you didn't like it but didn't want to throw it away, so I would have offered to help," Paul chuckled.

  The lady: I look conflicted because I'm starting to think that you're crazy!

  Is what she thought, but she only smiled stiffly and ate her bread quickly.

  Paul, seeing she was eating, didn’t bother anymore and hummed a tune while looking at the ceiling.

  He subconsciously remembered his life in the slums, and how such dry bread was a luxury among the kids.

  Heck, even eating a meal was a luxury.

  A child wouldn't know whether they would be able to find food that day…

  Or go hungry.

  Stealing was a risk that had to be done with accurate preparation.

  Failure most likely meant being beaten to death.

  The worst outcome would be being sold into slavery or becoming a slave to the adult you wanted to steal from.

  And the adults in the slums were always a part of one criminal group.

  Becoming their slave meant that you would be repeatedly thrown into danger just for their own profit.

  After surviving that, you would be beaten up for a slight mistake and handed barely any food.

  Thinking about it made Paul even more amazed that he was alive right now.

  After all, the corpses of children who lived in the slums were the easiest thing to find.

  Paul spent the rest of the day on the bed with the lady accompanying him at random times.

  It was during one of those visits that Paul noticed her looking troubled.

  A week had gone by since Alex left, and Paul could sit up at least.

  It was quite good considering his bones and the slight damage to some organs.

  Added with the fact that the drugs had been cleared out and only basic painkillers and willpower were the healing factors Paul experienced.

  Now he sat up on the bed, trying to urge his body to allow him stand without that ache in his stomach.

  So far, he could stand for half an hour.

  "Is something wrong?" Paul asked, wiping the sweat on his forehead as he settled back down on the bed.

  "I almost forgot to warn you," the lady slapped her forehead, mentally berating herself for not revealing such an important news sooner.

  "No worries, it must be something particularly distressing," Paul comforted her.

  "Well, something did happen, but I don't know if it is good or bad," she said, still conflicted.

  "Explain it to me first," Paul hoped that talking about it to another person might help her make sense of it.

  "As you know, the doctor told us about the horde that would attack the base."

  After saying that, she paused and seemed to get sucked into bad memories.

  Paul hummed, also remembering the scenes of people dying and all the people he couldn’t save.

  "Well, the doctor had spoken of looking for a solution previously, and now he revealed that he had found a direction," she grimaced at the last word.

  "I guess the direction must not be too safe huh… but we can't blame the doctor for that, can we?" Paul tried to comfort her.

  She took a deep breath to gather her words and continued explaining.

  "The doctor claims to be researching a way to make ordinary people gain abilities that could help them fight the zombies."

  "Isn't that a good thing? Now people can fight the zombies and ensure their survival and fewer people would die," Paul blinked, his expression a confused one.

  "The doctor hasn't made any progress yet, but he claims to have begun the preliminary process," the lady said, meaning it's all just theory for now.

  "That's good, I guess," Paul still didn't grasp the problem.

  "The issue now is that the nobles who had calmed down have begun to spring up again," the lady frowned.

  Nobles… just that word made Paul instantly understand the problem.

  Nobles are selfish.

  It's like a disease that they acquire once they are born.

  Something that gets practically coded into their gene sequence.

  The apocalypse might have thrown them off balance for a little while…

  But alas, that wouldn't last.

  They used their connection and even more ruthless methods to always make sure that they remained arrogant.

  It doesn’t matter whether they met someone stronger than them.

  Speaking to a noble was like talking to a recorder—

  all it could do was repeat the set of words in its tape over and over again.

  Communication was meaningless.

  Therefore persuasion was meaningless.

  They only seek to dominate.

  The lady explained the ins and outs of the matter.

  Now they had surfaced again, that terrible disease in them called prideful arrogance and malicious selfishness.

  They tried to leverage the fact that they were nobles to force the doctor to give them premium rights.

  They were to be given the solution created first.

  Some nobles even indicated that they should be given all of it and the commoners should beg them like a dog if they wanted it.

  The doctor was a reasonable man and refused of course.

  The nobles tried to throw a tantrum, and the bodyguards around the doctor threw them back.

  The nobles retreated under the force of their fists.

  But they didn't give up.

  They sought out like-minded individuals who were driven by greed and lust.

  She doesn't understand why the nobles who didn't have anything could hire these thugs and violent people.

  She guessed that they were using the nobles as a smoke screen to cause trouble.

  Paul asked if commoners tried to resist.

  She replied that it's hard to change habits, and people subconsciously accepted it.

  "I'm worried that something would happen and the situation would get worse," she ended, folding her arms as a sign of fear.

  Paul too had an even bigger sense of unease.

  The spirit that dwelled in him as a believer was making him agitated.

  Things developed in line with Paul's fears.

  While he was stuck in the clinic healing, a storm was brewing outside of it.

  The bleakness of the situation stretched out its claws even to him.

  Frankly, Paul wanted to go out and help, but he could barely stand.

  He wasn't strong-willed enough to endure the pain and help while also fearing that he would become a burden.

  So he devoted himself to praying about the situation.

  But the answer had always been quite clear to him.

  And it was never a good one.

  As if to force him to accept it, some thugs even randomly came to the clinic.

  They made fun of those who were bedridden due to injuries or illnesses.

  Paul tried to stand up for the others by pleading with the thugs.

  But was only rewarded with a punch to his already aching stomach and more mocking laughter.

  Paul's vision swam and he passed out due to the extent of his injuries.

  He woke up on the bed with the lady with a limp beside him.

  She was in new clothes and her eyes were red; there were bruises on her face and her entire body was haggard.

  "I think people are going to resist. We cannot endure it anymore," she said.

  And in the next few days, the base turned into a confrontation between two sides.

  It would start with the commoners ganging up on some lone thugs.

  Or those who were being beaten would go crazy and fight back using ruthless methods.

  The commoners gradually began to group together and the situation was on the brink of war.

  Paul wanted to advocate for peace, but he was just one person.

  He asked the lady with a limp to seek out people who were neutral and observed the situation—both nobles and commoners.

  A few came but didn't want to join Paul in seeking peace.

  They were cautious and cowardly people.

  While others just didn't feel the need to put themselves in danger for the so-called good of all.

  Paul lay defeated on the bed, muttering prayers.

  "You're a good man," the lady said, handing him a bottle of water.

  "I couldn't do anything to stop this," Paul choked, tears in his eyes.

  He couldn't even get up and felt like such a failure.

  "You're a good man… too bad this world isn't for good people anymore," the lady sighed and smiled kindly at him.

  The doctor came out at this critical moment with words of success.

  The chemical had been produced but he wasn't going to give it to any side.

  Instead, he wanted it to be fair and chose to hide the chemical in a secret place that only he knew.

  He also said that he would reveal the location only as the horde drew close.

  "Didn't anyone try to ask for the location?" Paul was still sullen as he listened to the lady with a limp.

  "The doctor seems to have disappeared after that day and no one can find him," the lady replied.

  "At least they have stopped fighting each other," Paul sighed bitterly.

  Then they both stopped talking.

  They stopped fighting, certainly, but that was because finding the chemical was more important.

  Now everyone was in a state of superficial peace to achieve the major goal.

  But they found nothing, and the day the horde approached drew closer.

  "I'll pray for you especially," Paul conveyed his thanks to the lady with a limp.

  "You're a good person," she patted his hand sadly.

  Both of them understood what she meant—

  he was probably going to die once the horde arrived because he was a good person.

  But Paul still stood by his faith stubbornly.

  He would try to advocate for peace until he's killed.

  He firmly believed the truth—

  it wasn't that God had abandoned him, but that the people in this world had closed their hearts.

  Paul doesn't condemn them because they are just trying to survive in their own way.

  Each individual struggles to live in this world, even though some of them commit sin to do so.

  And dying this way would alleviate the sadness in his heart somewhat, so he can meet his beloved with his head held high.