Trash In The Apocalypse

The lobby has dried up blood everywhere. Chairs in the waiting area are toppled down. The elevator"s door was ajar blockaded by a slanted wheelchair.

Before Jun could continue forward, two adult women came down from the staircase. One was the blue capped woman he"d been searching for and the other was someone who seemed to be a hospital employee.

The blue capped woman stared daggers at Jun, and said, "What do you want?"

Jun stared at the fair skinned woman in front of him, matching up to expectations of its name, Dream Fairy. Jun could feel that the woman"s face was covered with a layer of fog but at the same time, he could clearly see her glistening face.

The Dream Fairy was probably the local star when the apocalypse haven"t happened.

When she felt Jun staring at her face, she doubted whether the illussion she casted to cloud her face was even working. It was the reason why no one has ever seen her face.

Jun replied to her question, "To be honest, I just wanted to ask you what skill you used on me. I was just curious whether I could also learn it or not. Then, I saw you create weird illussions that were quite intriguing. You can just think that I"m here because I"m a curious man."

After the woman wearing the hospital gown realized that the two were acquainted, she interrupted their conversation and asked Jun worriedly, "Were you followed? Did you kill them all?" 

Without waiting for an answer, the woman decided to ran towards the front door. ran past Jun and looked outside the street. She then saw the dead bodies all over the parking lot. The woman quickly turned around and rebuked Jun. "You didn"t loot them?"

"It"s fine. I severed their heads." Jun replied nonchalantly.

A bit irritated with Jun"s casual att.i.tude, the woman went outside and stretched her right arm in front of her. A few seconds later, a breeze flew out from her hand together with white dust that sprayed around the area. She sprayed the dead bodies first, then the air, before going back inside.

"Is he your friend? You should teach him how to clean his own mess."

The woman started climbing the stairs after saying her piece.

The capped woman frowned at her friend. "He"s not my friend! He"s the perverted maniac that I told you about!"

"When did I become such kind of man?"

Jun tried defending himself, only to gain the other parties unfriendly glare.

"To clear things up, my name is Jun, and I came from Binangonan, This is my first day here, and I don"t know anybody. If you"re thinking that I"m someone sent by Marcus, then you"re wrong. I just want to learn some skills and if possible exchange informations."

With much reluctance, the woman finally decided to introduce herself.

"I"m Lolita Alvaro. You keep on saying about learning skills but I don"t even know if that"s possible."

"Then, the skill that made me drowsy, was that your generated skill when you first leveled up?" said Jun.

"That"s right."

"Then, I guess it couldn"t be helped. Let"s just exchanged information. By the way, are we really going to talk here? Anyone or anything that pa.s.ses the street could see us."

"That"s true... you should leave. We"re not interested with exchanging informations." she replied forcefully.

Jun saw her firm stance on the subject and couldn"t help but reveal his only plan. He said, "I"m planning on killing Marcus, that Marcus. I heard that you"re group was planning on doing the same thing, so I thought you might be interested with additional help. What do you think?"

"How did you know about that? Be careful about thinking too much. They will sense it. i don"t know how it works but one of Marcus" subordinate can sense intense thoughts towards him."

Jun was surprised but still nodded his head. He cleansed his mind and started thinking of puppies, very blessed puppies with soft and tender...

"You"re really a pervert!"

"What, no!

As they were about to quarrel, the two-way radio on Lolita"s side came to life.

"There"s a horde pa.s.sing by! Get up here now!"

Lolita took the radio and replied, "I"ll be there in a second."

Jun stared at her innocently. "Are you going to send me out now? I"m here to exchange information. I won"t stay after that. We could also team up to kill Marcus if you want."

Lolita stared at Jun with complex feelings.

—

"Keep those arms raised. I don"t want to see them fall below shoulder level!" said a boyish woman as she stood behind Jun. She seemed to be around twenty-two years old.

Jun was currently seated in a swivel chair with his arms raised above his head. They were inside the meeting room at the top floor of the hospital.

Excluding Jun, there were four other people in the room, and all of them were women. The hospital staff that he saw earlier was called Mellissa Mariquina. She sat on a nearby chair reading a book about techniques on how to fight bacteria.

A mature woman was sitting near the window with a binocular and a radio in hand. She would peak from the blinds from time to time to check the situation outside. She was Lourdes. Jun learned of her name when Lolita thanked her earlier after they arrived.

Lolita Alvaro was seated in front of Jun with a wry smile on her face. She couldn"t stop her friend from acting like a hooligan since she already told everyone about how Jun hara.s.sed and molested her when they met.

Ofcourse it was an exaggerated lie, but she couldn"t take it back now. She never thought that they would meet again, even so, like this.

"Reena... I think its fine, we"ll just talk for a bit, then he"ll leave." Lolita said bashfully.

The boyish woman, Reena, glared at her friend before leaving Jun alone. She took another chair from the meeting table and sat next to Lolita.

"You"re so gullible! We should hit him a few times to get back from molesting you!"

Lolita tried to act calm and ignored her friend. "I- uhmm... so, to start... You should start."

Jun saw her unable to think of what to say and guided the conversation.

"I want to know everything about Marcus. His facial features, his skills, who he hangs out with—everything."

Upon hearing what Jun said, Reena couldn"t help but comment by the side.

"So you want to kill Marcus, why? I"ll give you a heads up, it would be too troublesome."

Jun frowned and turned to Reena. "You"ve fought him before?"

Reena scoffed. "We"re lucky if we can even find him. He has a skill that can change the way he looks. He can copy someones face, so its impossible to search for him. Even if you managed to sneak near him, the Fortune Teller could easily find you."

"Thank you for your concern, let"s continue." Jun said sternly.

For the first time, Lolita saw Jun acting mature. She didn"t see that Jun killed the two teenagers nor slaughtered the group at the apartment building. All this while, she was thinking that Jun was a happy-go-lucky type of survivor.

When you treat other people with seriousness, they would subconsciously act like you, to emphasize that they"re mature people too.

The way Jun expressed his words was also one of the reason for him to change everyone"s view of him inside the room.

Reena coughed twice to release the awkwardness she was feeling. Mellissa and Lourdes glanced at Jun before going back to their own businesses.

Lolita turned serious and said, "Marcus is a business owner. He owns a mining company. He also dabbles in textile trading. Most people know him as a good samaritan while a few knowledgeable ones see his real persona, the swindler. Like what Reena said earlier, one of Marcus" skill allows him to change his face. The other was something like a quick weapon switch, maybe a sleight of hand."

"He can instantly swap whatever he was holding into something else. If you think you have an advantage because he was holding a knife, think again. The next thing you know, there"s a bleeding in your chest and you"ve already been shot."

"Marcus is a middle aged man and he"s fat. A short stature that could easily blend in the crowd and a gentle eyes that could fool innocent people. He has short hair and a crooked nose, and just like everyone else, his skin color is brown."

"Stop for a bit Lolita. This is an exchange, so it should be fair that he share some "knowledge" to us." Reena sarcastically said.

Instead of getting provoked, Jun countered back and said to Lolita, "How do you prove that what you said are the truth?"

Jun couldn"t help but chide Reena in his mind. This girl acted like a hooligan but acts like a petty child! So take this!

"We were watching from afar when the struggle for authority was happening. Even now I don"t understand why they fought over something so useless. We could have just shared it with each other. We could have all become strong and be able to defend the Teleport Portal."

"Things don"t work like that when you have ambitious people around. Your voice can only be heard when you"re strong. Listen carefully, I"ll "pay" now..."

To satisfy, or rather, to fact-slap Reena, Jun explained the basic version of the Black Haven"s research. Although the information was truly basic, both parties agreed that having confirmation would make things clearer.

"Wait, you mean that there"s already an effecient organization from where you came from?" Lolita asked surprised.

"Is that your question?" Jun said.

Lolita clicked her tongue in annoyance and avoided eye contact.

"About his entourage, any details about them?" said Jun.

Lolita faced him with reluctance and replied, "He"s basically surrounded by his security personnel. Then, his trusted aides. Besides that, there"s nothing else. If he doesn"t have monopoly on guns or doesn"t have that Fortune Teller, he would probably died too many times now. The people hates him."

"This is what I find weird about this. Why are you guys not leaving? Why suffer like this. You could just leave the town, right?" said Jun.

"And where would the people go? People have already tried that. And they came back in the end. First, there"s nowhere else safe to go to. The other reason? Marcus set upped a blockade on the national highways. People would be extorted of everything they have if they go out," replied Lolita.

"Oh, those people." Jun said in realization when he remembered the people he killed at the condominium complex.

"They robbed you, right? It"s the same for everyone. No one is exempted."

Lolita tried to give a comforting tone to ease Jun"s feelings.

"Nah, I killed them."