Ch. 4.13

13.

“I’m just saying. It sounds like an excuse,” Alan said with a shrug as he lounged in a chair as he nursed a warm beer. Where he had found one, Santi didn’t know but the older man looked smug as he drank. The rest of his temporary party were sprawled out across the backyard and covered in bandages and looked exhausted. Tank was slumped against the back of the house and snored loudly.

“Sorry, I brought several hundred refugees back into our community along with a level sixty-three elite. I had a very productive day. Plus, we were only two dens behind you and look at the state of the rest of them,” Santi waved a hand at the others. 

He was posted outside of a backyard grill filled with charcoal as he tried his best to not scowl at Alan. Both of the Murtaughs were highly competitive and it sucked to be dragged into their competitions at times. Especially when he lost. Santi flipped the steaks and lamented the loss. He would have enjoyed whatever the System reward was, but he didn’t need it. He was currently in second place and the reward would be good enough. 

“You look like your mom when you scowl like that,” Alan said. 

“Don’t let her hear you say that,” Santi said with a laugh. 

“Gabriella has a fierce scowl. You should have seen the look she skewered me with when your family first moved in. Me and your dad went out for lunch and well…we drank most of our calories,” Alan chuckled warmly as he sipped his beer. 

“Mom was probably just mad you didn’t invite her,” Santi said with a chuckle. 

“Your parents had fun parties. Music and dancing till two in the morning with enough food to keep you on your feet even as you drink enough to kill two lesser men. I miss those days.”

“I don’t miss cleaning it up,” Santi said as he flipped a steak and looked over at his team. They were all done and exhausted, but Chloe and Bianca were stirring as the smell of cooked meat filled the backyard. 

“We helped out,” Alan said, acting offended as he put a hand to his chest as if the audacity of Santi implying he didn’t help clean hurt.

“You guys didn’t get out of bed till nearly noon.”

“Damn fun parties,” Alan said. 

“Alright guys, get up. Steaks are done!” Santi yelled and everyone started to stir from their stupors. The deer-like creature the hunters had brought down the day before had made decent, if thin, steaks. Santi had done the best he could, but it definitely wasn’t proper carne asada. 

He grabbed the potatoes wrapped in tin foil from the second grill with his bare hands and put them on each plate while slapping down the steaks. The plates were embarrassingly thin of food and everyone would have to supplement with more ration bars. Not anyone's idea of a good meal. 

“Really have to fix this food problem. All those people you brought in are going to put a hard strain on the supply lines,” Bianca said as she sat next to him. Cam had grabbed his plate and flopped down across from his dad, the two men talking quietly. 

“Working on it, dude. Just takes time to get it all going. Can’t just wave your hand and have food grow that Acolytes can eat. At least all the Initiates have food right now,” Santi said. In a few years they’d have people who could wave their hands and fill a field with Acolyte grade food. On average for the cultivation classes, [Farmers], [Gardners], [Horticulturist], they could mass produce food for the grade below them. It was growing their own grade of food that was difficult. 

“You’re doing a good job. Mainly by just getting out of the way and letting Marisol handle it. The woman is scary efficient.” Bianca grabbed the thin steak between her fingers and tore at it. 

“Not bad.”

“Dad’s was better.”

“Dad had a grocery store to shop at and a lot more practice. Fuck. I miss ice cream,” Bianca said with a wishful sigh. 

“Cold soda for me.” His brief three days had been a luxury of food and drinks lost to time. 

“Ehh. Ice cream is better.” The two siblings fell silent as they cleaned their plates off and then pried out their ration bars to actually fill themselves. 

“Where’d Naomi go?” Tank asked after everyone finished eating. He said it quietly but there was no way that Alan couldn’t hear them. He didn’t look up from his conversation with Cameron.

“She took that elite we found and settled her down. The woman was out of it, half-insane, but seemed like she wasn’t intentionally harmful. She could be a great deterrent and defensive measure for us. It’d make me feel better about leaving on our trip.”

“How are we going to sell making a bunch of zombie monsters?” Bianca said with a laugh.

“We don’t. We post her up in an area and have Yessi build her a laboratory and we put the inner row of runes to point inward.”

“A prison?” Tank asked with his eyebrow rising slightly. 

“She seemed to be a homebody.” Santi shrugged. She was strong and had a great class for a defensive juggernaut, but if she couldn’t be trusted? Well…then he’d make sure no one had to worry about it. 

“This world sucks,” Tank groused. Santi shrugged. The healer wasn’t wrong. It was brutal and there was no room for error when it came to the powerful. A single mistake could cost them their entire community. 

“If she’s such a threat, why are we keeping her around?” Chloe asked as she walked out of the house. She had cleaned some of the gore and grime off of herself and she accepted her plate from Santi as she sat down next to him, nudging Tank out of the way. 

“Cold, girl,” Bianca said. Chloe shrugged as she tore open her baked potato and stuffed the steak into it. She ate the entire thing with a few savage bites, jaw working hard as she hummed in pleasure.

“Upside. We’re all leaving with only Torin, Yessenia, and a few others staying behind. All our heavy hitters will be gone. With her here she’s a massive force multiplier. Naomi and I destroyed all of her puppets but she can make more. Not like there’s a shortage of bodies around.” 

“Ain’t that the truth,” Chloe said as she finished off her potato and meat sandwich. 

“And if she goes crazy you just drop the hammer on her with the runes you’ll have Yessenia place inside of her workplace?” Bianca said. There was an air of skepticism there. Tank grunted in agreement.

“Yeah. Don’t really have the space or expertise to deal with someone going crazy and having the ability to wipe out our entire community off the face of the planet.” 

“Yessenia will be able to handle her if she does go off the handle?” Bianca asked. There was concern for the youngest Silva sibling in her voice. 

“With my help and a bit of early planning, yeah. We saw what she could do at the battle against the cursed. She’s only gotten stronger and unlocked more rituals. She’ll never be like us who can go out and clear a den easily, but she’s got a great class to contain and defend.”

“Your mom is getting scary too. Never seen someone train that much and have that good of results,” Tank said and Chloe paled a little bit before nodding with him. Everyone was finishing up eating and the conversation petered out as they all waited for the announcement that the monster den bounty quest was done. 

Someone brought out a deck card and soon they were tossing small treasures they had found onto a table while they all failed to play poker. With all of their advanced stats everyone could read each other without fail. There could be no bluffing as with a bit of focus they could hear each other's heartbeats. 

So they all lied with every single hand. They cheated and made up the rules as they went and traded the treasures back and forth with no real care about the wealth that was flowing over the table. In a few months to a year there should be a thriving economy where these goods could be bought with exorbitant amounts of money. 

They all treated them like they were valueless plastic chips. There was plenty of laughing as they played hand after hand until the Systems alert pulled them away from their made up game as the rewards started to pile in.