Chapter 135: The Journey
Kevin Keane hurried to jump down after them. He grabbed Luna Dawson and then Rollo. The three of them tumbled to the bottom of the slope in a tangled heap. Seeing that they were still sliding and about to crash into a nearby tree, Kevin quickly pulled Luna into his arms, using his own body as a human cushion. However, he completely forgot about the dog, and the two of them almost squashed Rollo into a canine pancake.
Rollo whimpered nonstop; the sudden slip had made him completely forget that he could fly.
Thinking everyone was playing a game, Tina excitedly dashed down after them. Nancy Sullivan and Shane Shaw couldn’t stop her at all. Great. Two people and two dogs were squished together all over again.
After a good while, the tangled mess of humans and dogs managed to scramble up, looking thoroughly disheveled. Fortunately, they were wearing thick layers of clothing, so no one was hurt.
Luna directly stored the two little ones into her space, sparing them from any further suffering. Upon being sent into the space, Tina was momentarily stunned by the unfamiliar yet comfortable environment. Once she realized what was happening, she excitedly ran around with Rollo, playing wildly and leading him to herd the flock of cattle and sheep that Luna kept.
Right after Luna stored the two little ones, Kevin specifically shot the dumbfounded siblings a warning look. "Keep it a secret," he said in a deep voice.
A chill ran down Shane’s spine. He and his sister nodded vigorously like bobbleheads. Jokes and teasing aside, some things needed to be made perfectly clear.
The closer they got to the commercial district, the more zombies they encountered. Everyone drew their respective cold weapons to dispatch the approaching first-tier and Second-tier Zombies.
Along the way, Luna’s spiritual power threads remained fanned out, steadily covering a radius of thirteen hundred meters around them. The vegetation in this area was simply too lush. Thick vines coiled around the exterior walls of the buildings, climbing upward. The dense foliage even blocked more than half of the stairwell entrances. Many zombies were trapped inside the dimly lit stairwells or the storefronts along the street, occasionally letting out muffled roars, unable to break free due to the barrier of plants.
Slashing their way through the sparsely wandering zombies, the squad steadily advanced toward the target shopping mall.
Luna was the first to stop. Her spiritual power instantly blanketed the large parking lot in front of the mall. The scattered abandoned vehicles, broken billboards, and piles of construction debris were all precisely manipulated and moved aside by her. In the blink of an eye, a wide, open area was cleared.
Immediately after, she shifted her focus, moving the abandoned cars and various debris they had scavenged along the way to the various entrances leading into the mall. She stacked them tightly, layer upon layer, until the entire mall was firmly surrounded by a barricade of scrap vehicles, completely cutting off any possibility of the surrounding zombies approaching.
After setting up the defenses, the group quickly worked together to clear away the vines at the mall’s entrance. At that moment, Luna’s spiritual power threads detected several powerful energy fluctuations nearby. Her brow furrowed slightly as she warned in a low voice, "There are quite a few tough ones around here. Be careful."
As soon as she spoke, she pulled three Eagle Claw Hooks from her backpack, aimed at the load-bearing structures on the roof of the mall’s sixth floor, and fired with precision.
WHOOSH! WHOOSH! WHOOSH! With three soft sounds, the Eagle Claw Hooks firmly latched onto the edge of the roof, and the ropes instantly went taut. Working in perfect sync, Kevin, Lynn Shelby, and the others immediately grabbed the ropes. Using both hands and feet, they rapidly climbed upward and soon reached the roof of the sixth floor.
Finally, only Rhonda Dawson, Nancy Sullivan, and Luna were left on the ground.
"Rollo, it’s your time to shine." With a thought, Luna summoned Rollo and rubbed his furry head. Rollo grunted, and his body rapidly expanded in size.
Luna jumped onto Rollo’s back first, then held out her hand to Rhonda and Nancy. "Hop on."
Grasping Luna’s hand, the two of them carefully climbed onto Rollo’s back, gripping his thick mane tightly, afraid to let go.
Seeing their bodies go stiff with tension, Luna couldn’t help but smile. "Still so nervous?" she comforted them softly. "You’ve flown several times already, haven’t you?"
Nancy hugged Rhonda tightly around the waist and mumbled, "I’m still a little scared of heights..."
Rhonda also couldn’t help but mutter softly, "It would be great if there were seatbelts."
As soon as she finished speaking, Rollo stretched his legs and took a few quick running steps on the spot. He then activated his Wind Ability. His massive body became weightless as he suddenly shot into the air with the three of them on his back, flying straight toward the roof of the sixth floor.
"Food! I need food, Boss Dawson." Seeing Luna arrive, Lynn clamored while reeling in his Eagle Claw Hook. Just this three- or four-kilometer trek on foot had taken them at least three hours. Everyone was already starving.
"Alright, alright! We’ll eat right away." Luna was a generous boss. She knew she had to keep her workhorses well-fed so they could do the heavy lifting.
With a wave of her hand, Luna let Tina out and materialized the light-steel villa. The moment little Tina came out, she ran several circles around Luna to express her joy.
Shane stared dumbfounded at the two-hundred-square-meter, two-story villa right in front of him, marveling at how a space could actually store an entire villa. Originally a perfectly gentle and handsome guy, his entire worldview had been repeatedly shattered along the way. His facial expressions were now so exaggerated that he felt he might go back with a few extra wrinkles.
"A villa?!"
"Luna! You have a villa in your space?!"
The Sullivan Family siblings were losing their minds. She was Jingle-Cat Dawson! They wondered just how big her space actually was. She had collected so many things along the way, and she could even store living creatures! She had long surpassed the level of ordinary Space Superpower Users by hundreds of years.
"It’s no big deal. I’ve got everything." Standing on Kevin’s helmet, Little Sweet Potato lifted a small basket of Crystal Cores and tossed it to Luna. Luna hurriedly made up an excuse. "Just lucky! I went out and scavenged a few batches of supplies in the early days of the apocalypse, haha."
Nancy had already fallen to her knees in sheer awe of Luna’s formidable power. "Luna, do you want a wife?"
"I do! I want it all!" Luna blinked playfully. "Chubby Lulu needs one too!"
Aaron Palmer immediately spoke up, "Have some shame! Are you trying to force yourself on Luna?!"
Nancy raised her hand and poked his shoulder. "I want to. What’s it to you?"
Backing away, Aaron shot back, "She wouldn’t want you! There’s nothing attractive about you from head to toe!"
"I’m not attractive?!" These words infuriated Nancy, making her puff out her chest. She indignantly thought about how she could possibly lack standout features when she clearly had killer curves.
As they bickered, the two of them devolved into a noisy, squabbling match off to the side. Everyone flat-out ignored them. They were such a pair of frenemies.
Shane had long since stopped paying attention to his sister and walked right into the villa to look around. From now on, even if Luna pulled out an airplane or a cannon, he wouldn’t be surprised.
Luna’s spiritual power threads spread out like a fine spiderweb, scanning the surroundings. A moment later, she had a clear understanding of the situation inside the supermarket. There were about two to three hundred zombies occupying the interior. Among them, only four were of the Third Rank. This number was within a manageable range. Her tense nerves relaxed slightly, and she felt a bit more at ease.
Glancing at the time on her wrist, she saw it was already 1:00 PM. The continuous travel and fighting had long left everyone starving.
"Let’s eat first. We need to be full to have the strength to clear out the zombies," she murmured softly. Then, with a wave of her hand, she retrieved a large round table and over a dozen matching chairs from her space. She proceeded to bring out about twenty warm boxed meals and arranged them on the table.
The group filed into the house, everyone eager to take off their helmets and masks. The bitter cold outside was bone-chilling. After the long trek, a fine layer of white frost had condensed on everyone’s eyelashes and eyebrows, as if they had been silver-plated. The insides of their masks were already soaked with exhaled heat, and tiny ice crystals had even formed around their mouths and noses. Whenever the cold wind blew, their cheeks and the tips of their noses turned numb from the freezing temperature.
The moment they stepped inside, the indoor warmth instantly dispelled the chill. Everyone couldn’t help but rub their frozen cheeks, letting out puffs of breath to warm up.