After Surviving the Apocalypse, I Built a City in Another World - Chapter 45

Chapter 45: Night Fight
The crowd gaped in disbelief as Althea and the others disappeared from sight.

“What!!”

“Hey!!”

“Are we running after them?” Sandra’s soft voice gritted in another girl’s ears.

“Pff! Who needs them!” Peacock-woman, with the given name of Ramona, said using that high-pitched voice of hers that she believed to be cute.

She then turned to look at Sandra condescendingly, “If we follow them won’t their heads float up the sky?!”

At this time the suitors of the two only women in the group agreed, so half of the group voted not to follow.

To further make their point, they decidedly chose a slightly different direction just to prove they weren’t following them on purpose.

After several minutes, about a kilometer away, Althea stopped running and they waited for Harold to catch up.

When he finally caught up with the girls, he gasped to take in oxygen.

“Are we… not running anymore?”

“No, it’s fine now. If they catch up, it’s their ability.” Besides, they probably wouldn’t follow for the sake of face.

Now that they realized the pattern that monsters here were weaker and sparser, they should gain more confidence to deal with them by themselves.

Althea didn’t want parasites in her team, anyway.

She handed over some insect-repellant to Harold and Maya so they could go unbothered by these things like Sheila and them.

Then she looked at Harold, looking at him all out of breath from that little sprint. “You should train more. You’re still level one?”

Harold blushed in shame, but nodded anyway. He looked furtively at Sheila. It seemed even the meek (occasionally rabid) woman was already Level 2?

Sheila felt somewhat guilty for inexplicably emasculating someone’s dad. “Don’t worry, I only got to level 2 so quickly because Althea assisted me in kills. I would have died a long time ago.”

Harold paused and looked at Althea with a bit of hope, then felt ashamed again for asking for help from a pregnant woman.

He did not expect, however, that he would open the topic on her own.

“If you teach us culinary arts well, I can help you and little Maya level up.”

“You will help us…?” Harold repeated, unsure if he had heard correctly. “Really?”

Little Maya jumped up, her little head bobbling like those old wobbly heads placed in front of cars. “Me too?! I will also be a cool woman like my sister?!”

Althea giggled. “Yes, Maya, you will also be strong.”

Sheila also found the little girl very cute and told her the story of how she met Althea and how she was trained.

The little girl looked at the two women in admiration, cutely nodding her head from time to time.

The peaceful atmosphere didn’t last long, however.

Before any sound came out, Fufi and Althea suddenly adopted their defensive stances, looking in a single direction full of guard.

She quickly took out her katana, and the others instinctively followed her lead.

‘Grrrrrr’

Althea and the others soon heard rustle of leaves and low growls.

It was as if they wanted to be their whetstone.

The group placed their backs against each other, ready to fight anytime.

Harold and Sheila, though shaking a bit due to nervousness, tried to push down their fears.

Maya, on the other hand, was just excited. After all, in her mind, she was fighting to be as strong as cool sister.

Soon, the growling echoed all around them, glowing eyes appearing like ominous light that lit up one by one.

Both Althea and Sheila put on pinned lighting on their lapels for vision. Because of the two moons, fighting at night with this bit of lighting wasn’t a big problem for Althea, a particularly strong level 4. But a little lighting was still necessary for the others.

With the additional lighting, the image of the enemy became clearer for everyone.

‘Croak–’

‘Croak–’

‘Croak–’

They were blue frog-like creatures as tall as their waists and had weird skin filled with warts that would give people with trypophobia a nightmare.

However, they weren’t actually as scary as they looked. With her ability, Althea detected that the monsters were all on level one.

She relaxed her stance and decided to train the other three instead.

For Maya, she cut a few legs to make it easier for her to kill. The rest were all verbal assistance.

“Harold, you have to commit to an attack. You’re leaving yourself defenseless, even if it is just one moment. It’s enough to kill you.”

“Yes!”

“Be careful of the pus! It’s definitely poisonous…”

“A-ah, understood!” Harold said, shivering at the sight of the pus that landed a few inches from his feet.

“Sheila, skills consume mana, try to hit two-in-one.” She said, “You have to be able to get your timing correctly.

“That cannot be rushed, just practice often.”

“Maya, strength comes from the diaphragm, not the arms—you’ll tire yourself out like that.”

“Focus more on agility than strength. Sharpen your observation skills and determine weaknesses.” She said, directed to everyone.

“We have limited life and spirit; Be more efficient.”

“Fufi, that’s disgusting. Don’t eat that.”

In any case, the trio went on with their killing sprees, getting the occassional life-saving assistance from Althea and from Fufi.

[Killed Juju Toad (Lv1): +30 copper, +30 experience]

[Killed Juju Toad (Lv1): +30 copper, +30 experience]

[Killed Juju Toad (Lv1): +30 copper, +30 experience]

By the time the score of toads were killed, Maya was in the middle of level one and Harold had reached level 2.

Fufi expressed it won’t be long until he was also halfway to level 3 though it would still take a while, since pets had twice the experience requirement to level up..

Harold would not have thought he’d level up so quickly and safely and he looked at Althea with deep gratitude.

Teaching him to fight and letting him be stronger in its own right was akin to saving his life hundreds of times.

He didn’t have any ability other than household chores, so he swore to do this very well to pay off their debts.

As the three rested, Althea looked down at her compass. It seemed they got a bit off course due to the fight.

Because of this, they had no choice but to look for a decent place to camp.

They eventually found a small clearing about a few hundred meters from where they were.

They lit up the fire and Harold handled the cooking set-up.

Harold also showed his value and was very detailed in teaching the three girls some know-how and basic knowledge about cooking.

After eating, they put away the tools to relax. Althea put out a rattan basket they made a few hours prior and laid out a few fruits in their own containers.

The trio looked curiously and one even wanted to try eating, hand was promptly slapped by Althea.

“These are all edible plants I found.” She brought over a dozen varieties.

In fact, she noticed that after the initial discovery stage, she noticed the biodiversity wasn’t actually large.

It was even a little worse than Terran, whose majority of species had already died out.

She reckoned it had to do with the monsters and whatever environment this place had.

This was bad news, actually, because this meant that the environment wasn’t very friendly.

However, she didn’t dwell on it for now, simply because she was powerless to do so.

Instead, she focused on things she could control. For example, her lifestyle.

“I want to explore the formulation of condiments from local plants.” She said, “These condiments we have won’t last a few months.”

“Most plants that are genetically similar to the ones on Terran are mostly trees. Most of the fruits, herbs, and others were new species to me.”

She put out multicolored plants and flowers, putting it out for the adults to taste. “Taste this.” She said, “Tell me if you can think of a way to process them.”

As they took something each, she added to reassure them, “I’ve already tested all these. They are fine, even when eaten together.”

Harold tentatively ate the most attractive yellow fruit and froze. Maya was curious and also placed one in her mouth. The little girl’s face crumpled, almost fainted. “So sour!”

Althea chuckled and just looked at Harold.

“If we add something sweet with this, ferment it… we can create vinegar and other derivatives.”

Althea smiled. “You really know a lot.”

Harold scratched his cheek embarrassedly. “I used to be a chef. I was hired by the master because he loved my food. Then time passed and I eventually got promoted.”

Althea then proceeded on telling them, especially Harold, of what she knew as well as which Terran plant had similar properties.

Harold then told them some of the basic common processes of condiments, sauces, and spices.

From this, they brainstormed and determined some foods to be made and experimented on.

For example, some beans could be used to make an alternative to soy. There were also berries similar to what they knew, and there were dozens of ways to handle those.

In half a day, they also determined some possible uses of some herbs.

They wouldn’t be the same, of course, and they had a lot of trial and error to go through, but preliminary plans had been made.

Of course, Althea could look at her tablet for this, but learning by example and practical experience was still the best.

Through this, she could already have a preliminary plan regarding the production of these essential products.

Of course, much of this would be for later.

At the moment, they still had a home to build, before they could really think about filling up their non-existent kitchen.

In any case, she thought smilingly, her husband would be so surprised to see her cooking.