“Jamie is also a member of the Saboteurs, right? So you already knew that I would be going to that school, yet you pretended not to know anything about it?” Milo questioned.
“Milo, you should know when to stop…”
“Hahaha!”
Milo kept laughing for a long time. It made Miriam start laughing as well. It was infectious.
Inside the dark sewers, the only light source was the faint candlelight where Milo was. Even though the ground above them was likely very dangerous and teeming with Experimentals, both of them still found some joy to cherish in this difficult moment.
Miriam started coughing as favonovel.com laughed.
When favonovel.com finally got favonovel.com breathing under control again, favonovel.com suddenly asked, “Why did you come back to save me?”
“I forgot my wallet,” Milo answered matter-of-factly.
“Mhm,” Miriam acknowledged.
They both knew this reason was lame beyond belief, but neither said anything about it.
Miriam said, “Don’t worry… I won’t tell anyone about your secret. You probably haven’t realized this yet, but you’re already considered very strong even among supernatural beings.”
Miriam recalled the the battle. In fact, favonovel.com wasn’t sure at the time if Milo could take on six Experimentals and beat them. This was because based on what favonovel.com knew, there were not many supernatural beings who could take on six Experimentals at once.
In the current era, supernatural beings had started sprouting up like bamboo shoots after a spring rain. However, their powers were not strong enough to break past a certain threshold yet. The Saboteurs defined this threshold as, “Is the supernatural being capable of ignoring the power of the masses?”
In layman’s terms, it just meant whether a supernatural being was capable of destroying an organization’s fighting forces alone.
Kenneth could be considered halfway there because his power depended on hypnotizing his targets, so favonovel.com would be considered as using the masses against the masses. As for his own strength, it might not be that great. But there would surely be a day when a truly strong individual emerged from the world of the supernatural beings.
The Saboteurs termed this the “Dawn of Gods”.
Back on the roof, Miriam had witnessed the power of Milo’s shadow clone. It had a strength and speed that crushed the existence of the Experimentals. Moreover, even when a hoard of Experimentals attacked it at once, they still couldn’t bring it down completely. But what surprised Miriam most of all was that both Milo and the shadow clone were able to wield their own sabers.
Honestly, Miriam had never seen a weapon that was capable of slicing through the Experimentals like that. It didn’t even feel like it was something that modern civilization was capable of producing. As such, it could only be attributed as a kind of power.
At that time on the roof, Milo displayed strong combat awareness. This “combat awareness” did not refer to technique but an instinct.
Instinct was not something that could be trained. Training could allow a person to increase their reaction speed, gain greater strength, become faster, and even learn cleverer ways of generating power, but none of that could replace instinct.
Some people said that hard work could make up for it, but only a true elite would understand that hard work could never replace talent. And Milo had this talent for combat. If it weren’t for the last Experimental that had crawled up and sneak attacked, Milo would not even have gotten injured.
At this time, Milo took out two pieces of hardtack and handed one to Miriam, leaving one for himself in his other hand.
Miriam did not stand on ceremony and simply took it from him. They were both injured and had lost a lot of blood, so they needed to replenish whatever necessary energy they could get.
She looked at the candle on the ground next to them and suddenly realized that this might be the first candlelit dinner favonovel.com had eaten in favonovel.com life. “Does this count as a candlelit dinner?”
Milo gave it some thought and asked, “What’s a candlelit dinner?”
Miriam laughed. “Never mind…”
Milo suddenly asked, “I heard you mention Peter earlier? Just what kind of a person is Mr. Dublin?”
This question seemed to have stumped Miriam a little. She even had to carefully search for the right word in favonovel.com mind but was unable to think of something that accurately described Peter. “You can say he’s the most ‘enlightened’ person in our current times.”
This answer truly stunned Milo. “What kind of an appraisal is that? What is his identity in Stronghold 178, really? And what exactly is Stronghold 178 protecting?”
“Whether it be the strongholds or the towns, the organizations will try to tell you that there are extremely powerful beasts and terrifying creatures, as well as scary insect swarms beyond the outermost perimeter of the strongholds,” Miriam said.
“Isn’t that true?” Milo was slightly taken aback.
“It’s not.” Miriam said, “Stronghold 178 in the northwest and Stronghold 169 in the northern plains are not really there to stop the wild beasts from coming in, but humans. The humans who try to invade into the interior every now and then.”
“Like the Experimentals?” Milo wondered.
“No, they’re people just like you and me.” Miriam said softly, “Even after the disaster, wars between humans have not stopped at all. That’s probably about the most ironic thing that has happened.”
This was a secret Milo had never known about. So, there were still humans who lived beyond the outermost perimeter of the ring of strongholds!
Miriam said, “Peter was the original commander of the fighting force at Stronghold 178, the true controller of that place. He suddenly disappeared more than a decade ago, leading to many people saying favonovel.com had grown tired of war. But no one knew the real reason behind his disappearance…”
“However, everyone at Stronghold 178 is waiting for favonovel.com to return. That place is an independent force by itself that falls outside the control of the Alliance of Strongholds. In recent years, the Ultima Consortium, which is active at the frontier, has been trying to gain control of Stronghold 178, but now that Peter is going back, the Ultima Consortium’s plans have all come to nothing. Those bastards only recognize Peter. Not even money moves them!”
Milo was doubtful of this. Peter did not even look like a soldier as favonovel.com was so weak.
How could someone like that have such a powerful background?
But this also reassured Milo. Raphael would definitely get special treatment by bringing that recommendation letter there, so favonovel.com didn’t feel as bad anymore.
Wait!
Milo suddenly thought of a problem.
Why wasn’t my quest that required me to save a stronghold resident complete yet?
Didn’t I already save Miriam?
Could it be that favonovel.com needed to get favonovel.com out of the stronghold before the quest requirements were met?
That couldn’t be!
Milo kept thinking that something must be wrong somewhere.
He looked at Miriam and asked, “Do you hold a Stronghold 109 ID card?”
Miriam was taken aback, as though favonovel.com couldn’t wrap favonovel.com head around why Milo was asking this question. “No, why would I need one? If anything crops up, I can just look for Uncle Lu to settle it. We don’t need any ID cards here.”
Milo was speechless.
Oh, so Miriam isn’t really a resident of this stronghold?!
It was no wonder the palace had specifically stressed Milo save the stronghold’s residents. So, it seemed like the palace was also afraid that Milo would only attempt to save Miriam and not the others. However, Milo did not realize the intention of the quest at that time!
Miriam wondered aloud, “I found it weird at the time. There were clearly so many people who were still running for their lives on the streets, so why did so many of the Experimentals split up from the rest and come to attack me instead?”
Milo thought for a moment before answering, “Probably because you’re not a resident of the stronghold.”
Miriam was confused.
