The cold outside City B was merciless, a biting force that seeped through every layer of clothing Zara wore. The barren landscape stretched endlessly in every direction, painted in a monochromatic blend of ash-gray and white. Snow coated the crumbling ruins of buildings, their jagged outlines reaching for a sky thick with iron clouds. The silence was oppressive, broken only by the crunch of her boots on the frozen ground, the faint sniffles from Leo, and the occasional distant groan of the undead.
Zara adjusted the straps of her backpack, her muscles screaming from the weight of the supplies and the three-year-old child strapped snugly against her chest. Every step through the piles up snow felt like dragging an anchor through molasses, her breath fogging the air in labored puffs.
