Joel Bloom approached Kyle Warren, his mind flashing back to the pain Kyle had once inflicted upon him. The leg injury, the broken ribs—they had almost killed him.
With a sickening CRACK, a neck bone snapped. Joel Bloom hadn’t expected the axe to be so sharp. A light slice across Kyle Warren’s neck had completely severed his head.
Warm, fresh blood sprayed across the ground, a glaring sight that made the hearts of the dozen or so people cowering in the corner clench violently.
Kyle Warren was really dead!
Joel Bloom had actually killed Kyle Warren. Seeing this, the will to survive suddenly flared in the eyes of the people who had been cowering by the wall. One by one, they turned to look at Joel Bloom.
"You—you killed soone! You killed Mr. Warren!"
"How could you kill him!"
"Even if he hurt you, you shouldn’t have killed him!"
"You’re terrifying! You actually killed soone... you’re a murderer."
Joel Bloom looked at the people who were speaking, their faces masks of terror and disbelief as they stared at him. He found it laughable.
"Why can’t I kill him? When he was beating half to death, which one of you stood up and said a single word for ?"
Joel Bloom suddenly pointed to two other n in the crowd, a cruel smile spreading across his face.
"You two didn’t think I’d get amnesia just because I was injured, did you? That day, Kyle Warren was the one who broke my leg, but you two were the ones who stomped on my chest and broke my ribs."
Joel Bloom stared at the two n, axe in hand.
"S-so what if we stomped on you? You didn’t die, did you? You don’t even have a scratch!"
"Yeah! Kyle Warren, the main culprit, is dead. What more do you want? If you kill us, you’ll face divine retribution!"
SWISH! Vert’s scythe sliced across one of the n’s foreheads, splitting his entire head in two. The cut continued down his body, cleaving him almost completely in half.
Joel Bloom froze, stunned. He turned his head to look at his sister, Flora Bloom.
At that mont, everyone was there, including Caleb Bloom and Jade, as well as Maeve Preston, Shelly, Mark Sterling, and several other new acquaintances.
They had all felt a sense of unease when they saw Joel Bloom get his revenge by killing Kyle Warren. After all, killing a person was different from killing a zombie; any normal person would feel so aversion to taking a human life.
But this giant mantis was controlled by Flora Bloom, and for it, killing was a trivial matter. The sight of it cleaving a man in two with a single slash, such a brutal slaughter, made their blood run cold.
This was especially true for the newcors. They had been deceived by Flora Bloom’s slender and beautiful appearance. No one would have thought that such a pretty girl could be a killer.
Flora Bloom now looked at Joel Bloom, and her gaze also swept over the people in her group standing behind her.
"To be rciful to your enemies is to be cruel to yourself and those closest to you! Joel, rember that!"
After hearing his sister’s words, Joel Bloom seed to understand sothing. He turned and fixed his gaze on the other man.
"Don’t, don’t, don’t kill ! I-I didn’t an to!"
Before he could finish, another head hit the floor. It rolled to the base of the opposite wall, the crowd scrambling to make way for it.
At last, their emotions completely broke down. So what if there was a giant mantis? It was death either way. No matter what, they had to fight for their lives one last ti.
The dozen or so people scattered, all of them running for the main entrance. But Joel Bloom remained silent as he watched them flee.
Flora Bloom walked over and patted his shoulder. "You’ve already done well! But those people... are you sure you want to let them go?"
"Sis, what do you an?" Joel Bloom asked, looking at Flora Bloom with confusion and alarm. "The rest of them... they didn’t actually harm ."
Flora Bloom sighed and shook her head. "Can you guarantee that none of them will harbor a grudge in the future? What if they awaken powerful superpowers and try to get revenge soday? Maybe they won’t be able to kill or Dad, since we have superpowers, but what about you and Mom? How will you protect yourselves? If you let them go today out of rcy, have you ever considered that one day they might get the people close to you killed?"
Joel Bloom was stunned. He couldn’t imagine such a thing happening! "Sis, don’t you think you might be overthinking this?"
"AHH!"
Just then, even more terrified screams erupted from the entrance. Then, the dozen or so people who had just fled ca running back, huddled together.
"Monster! There’s a monster!"
Flora Bloom ignored them, instead staring into Joel Bloom’s eyes. "Today, I’m giving you the power of life and death over these people. If anything happens because of this soday, I expect you to take responsibility!"
Joel Bloom stared into his sister’s eyes for a long ti before finally nodding. "Let them go."
"Alright."
The people who had fled had their hearts leap into their throats when they saw the Juggernaut blocking the main entrance, and they had scrambled back inside. They paid no mind to Flora Bloom and Joel Bloom behind them; after all, people’s attention tends to fixate on the most imdiate threat to their lives.
"Juggernaut, let them pass."
Flora Bloom’s voice reached everyone’s ears. The people inside couldn’t see what was happening, but the dozen who had fled saw it clearly. The enormous crocodile at the entrance—which looked as if it could swallow them all in a single gulp—actually obeyed Flora Bloom’s command and obediently cleared a path. It lay on the ground, motionless, only its pair of bilious yellow eyes blinking at them from ti to ti.
From where he stood, Joel Bloom could only see the Juggernaut’s hind legs and tail. But even those features were enough for him to guess what kind of creature his sister called Juggernaut was.
’Besides this giant mantis indoors, there’s an even bigger crocodile outside.’
’Are these all under my sister’s control?’ His sister seed to have truly changed, completely different from the person she was before. He vaguely rembered the phone call she’d made to him on the day the apocalypse began, telling him to prepare food and supplies. At the ti, he hadn’t listened to a word. Thinking back on it now, it felt as though many things had started to change that day.
"You should go," Joel Bloom said to the panicked crowd.
"B-but can you guarantee that monster won’t eat us?" one of them asked, turning to Joel Bloom.
Joel Bloom couldn’t give them a guarantee. He looked to his sister, Flora Bloom, only to hear her say, "If you don’t even have that much courage, I see no reason for you to stay alive."
Flora Bloom deliberately brandished the axe in her hand. The next second, as if they had made so firm resolution, the dozen or so people rushed past the Juggernaut and out the door.
Caleb Bloom and his wife had not interfered in the siblings’ affairs. But now, Caleb walked over to Flora Bloom, his face heavy with worry.
"Flora, you let them all go. Will soone really co looking for revenge in the future?"
Flora Bloom smiled and shook her head. "Dad, don’t worry. Even if soone does want revenge, as long as we’re strong enough, what’s there to be afraid of?"
What Flora Bloom didn’t say was that, now that these people were gone, they would surely spread the word about her ability to control giant creatures. That would indeed cause so trouble later on. So trump cards were only effective when used as a surprise.
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