Chapter 30 - 26: Helping to Save People (2)

After the four of them had recovered, Flora Bloom looked at Oscar Owen and asked, "Oscar Owen, are you coming with us?"

Oscar Owen hesitated for a moment, his expression suddenly turning downcast. Finally, he shook his head. "You guys go on. I still have some important things to do here."

Flora Bloom didn’t press him further, instead asking Ethan Monroe, "Old Monroe, where are Leigh Atwood and Luna Thorne?"

"We were almost at the horse farm. Then Neal Wallace said he was coming to find you, so we had them hide in a storage room over there."

Flora Bloom nodded and was about to leave with Neal Wallace and Ethan Monroe when Oscar Owen called out to stop them.

"You’re going to the horse farm?"

Seeing the sudden, anxious change in Oscar Owen’s expression, Flora Bloom asked.

"Yeah. I remember your father has an RV. I was planning to borrow it and then head to Sinia City to find my parents, haha."

’After all, the RV belongs to his dad. It would be pretty shameless of me to outright say I was stealing it, wouldn’t it?’

But Oscar Owen said adamantly, "You can’t go there. It’s too dangerous."

Hearing this, Flora Bloom began to understand.

It was a horse farm. If there was danger, it must be because something was wrong with the horses. And for Oscar Owen to react like this, something must have happened there.

"Can you tell us about it?"

Now that it was the apocalypse, Oscar Owen hadn’t planned on hiding anything anyway. He sighed and began to speak.

"My father’s equestrian club was originally for entertaining special VIPs and wealthy people. Naturally, besides horse riding and horse breeding, we would also serve them some special ingredients. Some ingredients were delivered as preserved meats, while others had to be alive right before cooking.

So at the horse farm, aside from the stables, there’s a fenced-off mountain area used for raising some of the rarer ingredients."

As Oscar Owen spoke, he suddenly grew indignant.

"The day the apocalypse began, Seth had booked a lot of special ingredients to entertain an important guest. I was supposed to go pick them out for him, but Timothy called me that day, saying he needed my help with something very important. So I asked my mother to go pick the ingredients in my place."

"I don’t know why, but a lot of people turned into monsters. I found a place to hide. That’s when Seth and his men rushed in. He killed my father and cleared out the nearby monsters.

He told me my mother was trapped at the horse farm. For some reason, the animals there have become aggressive. I tried to go find my mother, but I was nearly killed by a pangolin. ’No, that couldn’t have been a pangolin. It was the size of a baby elephant. How could a pangolin get that big?’

Besides, that monster was incredibly fast; I barely escaped. Seth promised he would help me go in and save my mother. But... well, you all know what happened next."

When Flora Bloom heard this, she wasn’t troubled at all. In fact, she was a little excited.

Ever since discovering her space could sustain living creatures, and after acquiring the giant mantis and the great golden cicada, she had become very interested in these aggressive, evolved creatures.

But this also brought many problems. After all, she had only acquired the mantis and the cicada by taking advantage of their conflict. It seemed now that even a single insect could be that powerful. And besides the incredibly fast pangolin Oscar Owen mentioned, surely that mountain enclosure didn’t contain just one animal, right?

So she asked curiously, "Um, may I ask, what kinds of animals exactly did you raise in that mountain area?"

Oscar Owen thought for a moment and listed them out: "I remember pangolins, cobras, and some brightly colored pheasants. Last month, a few monkeys were released into the woods to roam free. Oh, right, I think... I think there was also a small tiger in a large cage behind the stables. Seth specifically requested it, not to be eaten; I think I heard he had someone smuggle it in to be raised. There were also some other things customers ordered a long time ago, but there were too many for me to remember clearly."

Hearing this gave Flora Bloom a massive headache.

’So many animals... It would be one thing if only one or two mutated. But for all I know, there’s an evolved creature party going on in those mountains right now. Me, go in there? To be their next meal? I probably wouldn’t even be enough to get stuck in their teeth.’

"This is bad!"

Ethan Monroe suddenly yelled.

The three of them turned to him and asked, "What’s bad?"

"Leigh Atwood and Luna Thorne already went into the horse farm!"

Flora Bloom suddenly frowned, her expression turning grim.

’Those two aren’t really my problem, but it’s not like they ever did anything to harm me. We at least have a teacher-student history. I should go check on them.’

Flora Bloom still adhered to her principle of ’save them if I can, run if I can’t,’ and decided to go take a look.

"We’re partly responsible for leaving them there. Flora Bloom, I want to go get them out."

Although Neal Wallace’s expression was serious, for some reason, he was subconsciously asking for Flora Bloom’s permission.

Flora Bloom pursed her lips, which was as good as agreeing with him.

Just then, Oscar Owen seemed to have made up his mind and fell into step with Flora Bloom and the others.

"I’ll go with you. Most of Seth’s men are on the top floor; they won’t be coming down anytime soon. I’ll go with you, and if we run into any of his people, I can help smooth things over. Besides, I was hoping... if it’s possible... I could ask you to help me rescue my mother."

"Me too, me too! Don’t leave me behind!" Mervin Warren suddenly chimed in. He was sticking close behind Flora Bloom, terrified of being left behind.

Flora Bloom, who had already walked some distance, suddenly stopped. Axe in hand, she doubled back and returned to Belle Bloom’s side inside the room. And precisely because she had returned so unexpectedly, she saw an eyelid twitch slightly on Belle Bloom’s face, a face so badly burned there wasn’t a single patch of unblemished flesh.

"Well, well. Burned to a crisp and still not dead. Belle Bloom, I don’t know when I’ll die in this apocalypse, but your life ends today!"

Taking the chance to finish her off while she was weak, Flora Bloom raised her axe and brought it down, striking the back of Belle Bloom’s turned head. The impact of the axe left a bowl-sized hole, and a third of her brain caved in.

Flora Bloom knelt and checked for a breath, sighing in relief. ’Perfect. My new life is only worthwhile without you all.’

But in this apocalypse, is death really just the end?