199 Their Plans, The First Steps for the Future Base (2/2)

Jollene was thinking something with a rather confused expression.

”No, not with what you said. I'm just thinking why that… Um… Boss, did not just save me directly and made me run away letting the tiger chase me all the way back.”

On that question, the others also did not have an answer. However, Hallie spoke.

”He's probably wanted to prevent a ”Damsel in Distress” trope from happening.”

”What do you mean?”

”You see… If a man saved a woman in danger, it's likely for her to develop feelings for him right?” Hallie fixed her glasses. ”In that case, since he was saving you due to Huey's feelings, then he can't save you directly. Well, I didn't expect Huey to kowtow in front of him though.”

”I-I see.” Jollene was still confused but at least, Hallie's answer lightened her confusion a bit. ”Wait, what do you mean by kowtow?”

”Last nig-”

”Stop! Don't tell her that. And how do you even know that?!”

Huey stopped Hallie from answering with a rare flustered expression. It looked like even though he told Jollene that he begged Mark, he did not say anything about how he kowtowed to beg him.

***

While the Hallie's group was talking outside, Mark had not actually fallen asleep yet. He was thinking about how he should work with building the base.

First was to clear up the area for sure. Removing the trees and wild plants around the spring and with the help of the red blob that was currently jiggling on his lap as he played with it, he would be able to lay the foundations efficiently. As for the consistent source of blood for the materials, he had two options.

First was to get the blood from the other people. After all, humans could replenish the blood they lost with proper nutrition and it was not like they needed to die just for him to get some blood. However, this option had a large downside to this now. After their blood was ”donated” to him, they would surely feel lethargic and that was not good since the manpower he had now to build the base was too small. If he could get to loot a blood bank, it would be good. To normal survivors, a blood bank was nothing but a worthless place to loot but to him, it was a treasure trove to be looted.

Due to those limitations, he could only go for the next option…

After securing the blood source, he needed more people. In that case, he would try to pay a visit at the place written on the leaflet Hallie had. Even though he did not know what kind of survivor camp it was, one thing was for sure, not everyone there had a good state of living. His recruitment requirements would be high but it did not mean that there would be no one to fit the criteria.

Mark wanted to finish building the base as fast as he could. He wanted to see his new family as soon as possible.

***

Day 23 – 6:20 AM – Mountain Village, Mount Malabito, General Nakar, Quezon

The next morning, Mark could smell the aroma of hot coffee. As he slept in the living room, he could see Hallie making coffee in the kitchen. It seemed that Hallie could move better now that her wound was properly dressed and cleaned though she was still having a hard time moving her feet. Now, that he smelled the coffee, he remembered that it had been a long while since he had one.

While having their breakfast, Mark told Hallie what her group had to do while he was away. Well, it was just what Ed needed to do as he was the only one able to move properly and do heavy work. The woman called Trisha who always assisted Hallie on walking was more of a clerk so he did not have much expectation for her to properly help in dismantling the unused houses. According to Hallie, Trisha and Ron did not belong to their company and were strangers when the apocalypse started. They just started to bond together after they left the hotel.

In terms of work, Ed could do the heavy things due to being someone from a dairy farm and his large stature. Trisha could be left with cooking since she was actually an assistant cook at the hotel. As for Ron who was a guest of the hotel at that time, he could be left with other menial jobs after he recovered from his injury. His injury after all was the lightest of them having his ankle sprained when they escaped from the tiger.

As for Huey and Jollene, Mark had plans for them. Hallie told him that everyone decided to stay under his leadership while Huey and Jollene was the most convinced in their decision. In that case, Mark wanted the two to be included in the fighting force of his base once he was assured that the two would be loyal to him. Huey could be a strategist while Jollene who had awakened a very good ability could be the main fighter.

The others were still asleep when Mark left together with Amihan and the red blob inside his bag. It seemed that they stayed up late last night. Hallie who was used to watching anime all night looked fine though.

His goal today was to find the source of these red blobs while following the riverside. If there were other red blobs on the way, he would gladly collect them. He just wished that he could find another one that was alive.

Along the way, he found some red blobs stuck at the rocks on the side of the river but all of them were dead. Following the river upstream, he did not expect…

He came back to the same Barrio and under the huge airplane suspended over the river was a dried up pile of red blobs. Looking at this, there was no doubt.

The red blobs came from this airplane.