Clearford City...
General Cross and the others were in the middle of discussing the incoming massive zombie horde when the satellite phone on General Cross’s hip suddenly started ringing.
He glanced at the caller ID and imdiately picked up.
Within seconds, his expression turned... weird. Not panic, not anger—just the kind of look you get when reality stops cooperating.
Director Vaughn and the others watched him, faces full of questions.
After a while, General Cross finally ended the call. Everyone jumped in at once.
"General Cross—did sothing happen?"
"Yeah," he said, voice heavy. "Sothing big."
He paused, like he couldn’t decide whether saying it out loud would make it more real.
"Leonard Hale... is dead."
"What?!" Everyone in the room jolted.
"He was fine in Goldcrest City—how does he just suddenly die?" They were all baffled, and then the sa thought hit them at once. Eyes widened.
"Don’t tell ...?"
General Cross gave a helpless nod. "Yep. Ethan and them killed him."
"...."
Soone dragged a hand down their face. "That Ethan... he went to pick up two people. How did he end up killing another compound’s top commander?"
"Did Leonard refuse to hand over the crystal core?"
"Probably not," another person said quickly. "A Tier 8 crystal core is like a coin to them. They wouldn’t care. I’d bet Leonard pissed them off."
"Agreed." General Cross’s tone sharpened. "From what I know about those two, this was most likely Leonard’s fault. That guy’s ambitious. He probably tried sothing shady, and Ethan’s the type who never eats a loss. It escalated until it turned into a fight."
"Is Leonard an idiot? He’ll offend anybody?"
"Aren’t Hale family people all like that?" soone muttered. "Self-important, every last one. He probably didn’t expect Ethan to be that strong."
Director Vaughn leaned forward. "General Cross—was that call from the Hale family?"
"Mm." General Cross nodded once. "Alexander Hale himself. He told us to hand over the killers."
"Ah—then what do we do?"
"We don’t get involved." General Cross answered imdiately. "If they’ve got the ability, they can go find them themselves."
"But if we do that, aren’t we basically offending the Hale family? Later, if they—"
"Then we offend them," General Cross cut in. "Between the Hale family and the Fallen Star Squad, I’m more afraid of offending the Fallen Star Squad."
"...Fair." Heads nodded around the room.
Out of everyone, they were the ones who understood the Fallen Star Squad best. They knew exactly how terrifying they were.
"But General Cross," soone said, still uneasy, "if the Hale family can’t touch the Fallen Star Squad... won’t they take it out on us?"
"It’ll be fine." General Cross waved it off. "With our compound’s current strength, the Hale family alone can’t do much to us."
"And besides..." His eyes narrowed. "Atlas City isn’t sothing the Hale family can decide by themselves. If they want to move against us, the other families won’t agree."
"Good..." The room finally exhaled.
By evening, three massive birds flew straight into the Clearford City compound.
The guards on duty spotted the giant birds—and the people on their backs—and hurriedly lowered the anti-air guns, terrified of an accidental shot causing a misunderstanding.
After the Titan Ape siege, Clearford City’s soldiers treated the Fallen Star Squad with genuine respect.
Soldiers worship strength. And the Fallen Star Squad had practically saved the entire compound, so they’d earned that respect the hard way.
At this point, Ethan and the others moved around Clearford City like it was their own backyard.
Soon, the three giant birds landed behind a mansion inside the compound. Ethan and Skinny Pete jumped down with Skinny Pete’s parents, and Ethan imdiately pulled away and collected the Ironback Rat shell plates.
This was good material—practically bulletproof.
Maybe it didn’t an much for Ethan himself, but if he took it back and had it made into armor for Fallen Star City’s Enhanced, it would absolutely be a lifesaver.
Chris and the others ca running the second they heard the noise.
"Ethan, you’re back. Looks like it went pretty smoothly."
"Uh... not really." Ethan smiled like it was no big deal. "Co on. Let’s go inside first, and I’ll tell you."
"Okay."
"Oh, right." Ethan pointed at the peregrine falcon still wrapped in ragged strips of cloth. "Henry, patch Flint up."
Everyone’s eyes lit up the mont they got a clear look at it.
"What the—another flying mount?!"
"Yeah." Ethan nodded. "Get one more and from now on we can just fly wherever we want."
"Haha, that’s aweso!"
With Henry’s treatnt, Flint’s injuries healed fast—so fast it was hard to believe he’d been in that bad of shape earlier.
The mont the ugly, torn cloth strips ca off, Flint got so excited he started flapping and darting around like he owned the sky.
Then he swooped into the backyard, spotted a few white-furred apes sprawled on the grass asleep...
...and instantly behaved.
They headed into the living room. Skinny Pete took his parents upstairs to a bedroom on the second floor.
Ethan dropped onto the couch and told everyone what had happened in Goldcrest City, start to finish. By the ti he finished, the room was buzzing.
"There’s actually a secret art like that? That’s horrifying."
"Yeah—and the Hale family was experinting on living people. That’s beyond ssed up!"
Ethan shrugged. "Nothing ’beyond’ about it. In the apocalypse, there are plenty of people who’ll do anything to get what they want. And that kind of thod—no matter who gets their hands on it—they’re going to try it."
"...Fair."
Soone leaned forward, eyes bright. "Then that Void Realm in Atlas City might be like the one we ran into the first ti—full of good stuff. Should we go check it out?"
"That Void Realm’s been discovered for days," another person said. "Atlas City has tons of Enhanced. They’ve definitely already looted it. Even if there was anything good, it wouldn’t be our turn."
"Not necessarily." Another voice cut in. "Don’t forget the captain’s True Sight. Even if they strip it bare, the captain can probably still dig sothing out."
"Yeah, good point." A couple people turned toward Ethan. "Captain, are we going?"
"After we deal with the Zombie King here," Ethan said, "we’ll head back to Fallen Star City for a trip... and then we go to Atlas City."
"Done!"
Right then, the doorbell rang.
Ethan chuckled. "That’s probably General Cross and the others."
"No need to guess," soone said. "After what you pulled in Goldcrest City, if they can still sit still, that would be weird."
Sean hurried to open the door.
Sure enough, General Cross and Colonel Mitchell were standing outside. When Sean opened up, they both put on polite smiles.
"Good evening. We’re not interrupting, are we?"
"No, no—co in." Sean waved them in quickly. "General Cross, Colonel Mitchell, please, have a seat."
They stepped inside and walked over toward Ethan with friendly expressions.
"Ethan, sorry to bother you again."
"General Cross—no bother at all. Sit, please."
They sat down on the couch. General Cross let out a long breath, half amazent, half disbelief.
"Ethan, you guys are way too fast. This place to Goldcrest City and back is over two thousand miles. I thought you’d need at least two or three days. I didn’t expect you to finish it in one."
"It wasn’t too bad." Ethan smiled. "Flying mounts. It’s like taking a flight back before the world ended—doesn’t take long."
General Cross shook his head. "Not even close. After the apocalypse, planes are basically useless. Us—and other compounds too—we tried using aircraft after everything fell apart. Most of the ti it ended the sa way: the plane goes down and nobody walks away."
"Those flying mutant beasts see a plane like it’s dinner. They swarm it. You can’t outrun them, can’t shake them."
He looked at Ethan, aningfully. "At this point, I’d bet the only people still daring to fly are you guys."
General Cross clearly wanted to ask how Ethan made flying mutant beasts obey him—but he could tell that crossed into private territory, so he forced himself to swallow the question.
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