He croaked in pain before finally opening his mouth to speak.
"...I won't tell you anything..."
Ugh, looks like I have to think of some torture techniques.
However, before I could think about methods of maximising pain in a human being, Chloe decided to speak up first.
"Hey buddy~" She pressed the point of her blade into his neck, "that's not an option I'm afraid."
A gentle stream of blood dribbled out from his neck. Slowly, the sword was pushed further and further into the skin on his neck, a centimetre at a time.
"...w-wait, no, stop..."
She didn't take any notice of these words, continuing the slow descent of her blade.
More and more blood began flowing out of his neck.
"...Wait! Okay-okay, I'll tell you anything, just don't kill me!"
Well that was easy.
She left her sword pointed at his neck and I walked closer to him. The pitiful, dirty man was laying on the ground, covered in vegetation.
"Why were you trying to kill us?"
"I-it was an order."
It didn't seem like he was lying.
"Who was the order by?"
"A man..."
"I'm going to need more specifics."
"I-I can't give anymore... they'll p-punish me..."
What a pain.
"How about this, I promise to protect you with all of my resources, under the condition that you'll tell me everything. They're our enemy, not you."
"R-really?"
Not really.
But what needs to be done needs to be done.
"I promise."
I gestured for Chloe to withdraw her sword and take her foot off of his chest. Slowly, he coughed a few times before getting into a seated position.
"Okay, as long as you can stop them from hurting me."
"I have plenty of manpower to do that."
He took a deep breath, the unworthy me had finally gained his trust.
It was a pretty high-stress situation so his decisions-making wasn't exactly top-notch. Even with his trust, I would have to take his words with a grain of salt.
"So... they have someone who's really strong, t-they offered to defend us from zombies in return for making us a part of their army."
"Do you have any description of this 'really strong person'?"
"U-um, I think he was in the top-5 ranked people in the world at one point, h-he can shoot light and stuff."
Shoot light?
"I'm going to need more details."
"U-uh... he's a high-school student and um he makes these balls of light which shoot rays and burns the zombies... I don't know much more."
Looked like that was the extend of the description I was going to receive. Judging by the fact that this person might have been in the top 5 at one point, they were likely quite strong. Although, if they aren't there anymore, they may have either lost their position to another, or they may have been judged incorrectly like I was.
At the moment, I didn't have a great deal of information to work with.
"Now, where are these people located?" I asked.
"U-um, they take over settlements, so they have a lot of different bases."
This sounded problematic, if they had lots of different settlements to work with, it would be quite hard to take them down at once.
"Where did you come from?" I asked.
"I came from my old settlement which was taken over by them."
"By the way, what's your name?"
"It's Jonas..."
Well I didn't seem to recognise it.
"So where is your old settlement?"
"It's about a few hundred metres that way."
He pointed deep into the forest.
As soon as he signalled, I sent Bishop to scout in that direction. I gave it the command to return if it locates a camp. I didn't fully trust this man's words either so I wanted to send a scout to check before I pushed in.
Anyways, I was running out of uses for this person.
"S-so um, are you guys going to protect me now?" He asked hesitantly.
Hm.
"Sure."
I still had information to claw out of him, although I would like to discard him soon. Just judging by his personality, I didn't really want to have him around. Granted, Chloe's personality wasn't exactly 'normal' but it was reassuring in its own way. This man would be nothing but a liability.
Chloe walked up to me as I thought about what I was going to do.
It was probably good to go back to camp for now and gather resources and prepare for the next day. If Bishop comes back with news that there is in fact a settlement, we will probably raid it the next day.
Chloe, my Minions and I began making our way back the way we came. Through the dense shrubbery and thick, dark-brown trees. The loose dirt crackled as we walked through, there were scarce patches of grass although they were more rare than you'd expect.
Like a stray dog, the man followed behind us. It was annoying but I wanted to wait until Bishop came back before I got rid of him. Just in case he was incorrect or lying. I guess I'd have to deal with this for now.
I was still holding onto his long, solid staff and I wondered what I was going to do with it. I looked in my shop to see if I could maybe sell it.
-
{1x} Renewed Magic Staff = 15 Tokens
-
Wait I actually could sell it, for quite an extravagant amount as well. That was quite nice, without hesitation, I agreed to the digital offer and the staff vanished from my hands. As the man watched the staff disappear, he spoke to me from behind.
"U-um, could I have my staff back?"
"Sorry but I didn't put it into my inventory, I sold it."
He faced suddenly looked at me with shock.
"W-what do you mean..."
"We're going to protect you aren't we? What do you need the staff for?"
"I guess so..."
We continued on our way back to my settlement. The sun was pretty much in the centre of the sky so I assumed that it was near midday, I still had plenty of time before night so I should probably make some impovements to camp. I unlocked some new crafting recipes so I might be able to make some nice upgrades.
After several minutes of walking, we finally reached the large open area. My huts, my campfire and my various other pieces of architecture all sat there waiting for us.
Now lets see what I can craft.