Read Novel Full Chapter 396: Kidnap Ivy
Chapter 396: Chapter 396: Kidnap Ivy
Hannah stared at the man sitting opposite her, his figure relaxed at the far end of the long table, and she could not stop the faint trace of ridicule from seeping into her gaze.
The air between them smelled faintly of stale alcohol and rusted metal, a suffocating mix that clung to her senses.
"So it’s easy for you to talk," she said, her lips curving into a thin smile that did not reach her eyes.
"That’s because you don’t know the reality I’m facing."
Her fingers brushed against the cold tabletop, and a chill crept up her spine as she continued, her voice low and edged with restraint.
"If I get caught, there’s a very real chance I won’t even live long enough to see that beautiful future you’re so confidently painting."
The man across from her looked to be in his mid-twenties.
His face was undeniably charming, not breathtaking but handsome enough to draw attention without effort.
Even Hannah, wary as she was, felt the pull of his appearance.
Yet it wasn’t just his looks that unsettled her. It was the way he carried himself, the quiet confidence in his posture, the calm certainty in his eyes. He looked capable. Dangerous.
And he was.
He was the base leader of the very place she was currently staying in.
Moon Base.
A name that sounded poetic, yet in reality, it was nothing more than a downtrodden settlement barely holding itself together.
The facilities were laughable, the defenses crude, and most people treated it as nothing more than a temporary shelter before moving on.
Hannah herself had looked down on it when she first arrived.
That was until the base leader personally came to meet her.
At that moment, her thoughts had shifted.
’He can be charmed,’ she had concluded almost instantly. ’And if he’s useful... then this might just be my opening.’
She had assumed he was intoxicated by her presence, that his interest was shallow and predictable.
From there, she planned to maneuver him, to execute her plan quietly and cleanly.
What she had not expected, what made her blood run cold even now, was that this man would casually reveal his future plans to her.
Plans that made her instincts scream.
After listening in silence, suspicion coiling tighter around her heart, she finally learned his name.
Joel.
And Joel was far from ordinary.
He was, in fact, one of the most powerful figures in the entire city.
Long before the zombie apocalypse erupted, he had already received word of it.
He had prepared meticulously, anticipating every possible disaster.
Moon Base, as crude as it appeared on the surface, was nothing more than a disguise.
Hidden beneath its simplicity was an underground auction house.
A place where human lives were weighed and traded as lightly as dust.
Here, people bid using "lights." One lives. Two lives. Three lives."
In exchange, they received food, sometimes no more than a single loaf of bread. Humans were sold as commodities, handed over without hesitation, as though they were nothing at all.
This auction house was Joel’s creation.
He had always harbored grand ambitions, but lacking the right connections, his obsession with researching humans had remained stagnant.
The apocalypse, however, had changed everything. When the world collapsed, he was thrilled.
’If I hoard enough food,’ he had thought back then, ’I’ll not only survive... I’ll thrive.’
And beyond survival, he dreamed of something far more twisted.
Hybrids.
He had always been fascinated by the idea of human evolution.
Of what it would look like if humans possessed wings. Before, it had been impossible. But with the emergence of mutated beasts, his hope reignited.
So he opened the auction house.
At first, he offered small items, bread, water, scraps of preserved food, in exchange for human lives.
To his delight, people lined up willingly. Some even offered two lights for a single loaf of bread.
That insanity thrilled him.
After all, he had stockpiled enough food to last for years. It became his startup capital, his leverage.
Without hesitation, he began collecting humans. They were dragged into hidden facilities, strapped down, injected, dissected.
Used.
Experiment after experiment failed.
Time passed, and even his massive food reserves began to dwindle. Doubt crept in just as despair threatened to take root.
Then he learned about SiIvy.
The moment he heard of them, excitement surged through him like electricity.
This base, SiIvy base, was living proof that someone, somewhere, possessed incredible backing. They could keep zombies at bay with uncanny effectiveness.
Joel theorized endlessly.
’Perhaps the base leader himself is abnormal,’ he mused. ’Maybe he carries hybrid blood... animal blood.’
This theory wasn’t baseless. He had recently discovered that mutated beasts naturally repelled zombies. Wherever they appeared, the undead kept their distance.
That meant only one thing.
If mutated beast blood could be injected into a compatible human, that human might gain immunity.
Not only immunity, but power. The ability to drive zombies away effortlessly.
The moment Joel learned about SiIvy base, he began investigating relentlessly.
And what he found fascinated him.
Since the founding of the beast faction, only one representative had ever appeared.
Ivy.
Some believed she was the beast leader herself.
Others speculated that the true leader was a genius with an advanced technological mind, someone capable of building a base impenetrable to zombies.
Joel thought otherwise.
He suspected that the power did not lie in technology... but in a person.
And that person was Ivy.
This suspicion wasn’t unfounded. Those who dug deep enough would notice a disturbing pattern.
Whenever Ivy left the base, zombie activity around it surged. Attacks became frequent, relentless. Only through sheer military effort did the base manage to hold.
But once Ivy returned...
The zombies scattered.
Slowly. Reluctantly. As if repelled by an invisible force.
To Joel, that was proof enough.
Something was deeply amiss.
Others might have noticed too, but in the chaos of the apocalypse, few paid attention to such details. Everyone was too busy surviving.
Joel was not.
He made his decision swiftly.
’Kidnap her,’ he resolved. ’Bring her to my base.’
Once Ivy was in his hands, experimentation would be easy.