After parting with Bob, Lux turned around and led HK416, MDR, and Candice in the opposite direction of where they had come from.
"Why? We need that truck more, don't we?"
Candice suddenly asked. She couldn't understand what Lux was thinking.
Although she didn't know exactly how far they were from the city, it was clearly tens of kilometers at least. Under these circumstances, they obviously needed that heavy truck more.
But along the way, Lux hadn't made a single wrong decision, which only made her feel even more confused.
"Candice, did you forget that I can do magic?"
Lux smiled. In the next instant, a seven-seater MPV appeared on the road—it was the same car he had used when he and MDR, and HK416 escaped from home.
"Get in, get in."
Lux unlocked the car with a smile and walked toward the driver's seat.
"???? That—there's no way this is magic! I'm not stupid—this is way beyond a magic trick!"
Candice stared at the seven-seater in shock.
"Get in. I'll explain it to you slowly."
Lux put his hiking backpack into the trunk, then sat in the driver's seat and started the car.
HK416 took the front passenger seat. Candice, still completely bewildered, got into the back seat together with MDR.
"Yeah. The magic thing—I lied to you. This is my ability. A spatial ability. I can store things inside it."
He had no intention of revealing the system. At most, he was just a spatial ability user—a walking warehouse. Even if that got out, no one would really target him over it.
After all, in this apocalypse, no one would trust him enough to hand over their supplies for storage. If he ran away, those survivors would lose everything.
But if any faction learned that he possessed a system capable of converting materials into supplies, then he would definitely be targeted by all major forces.
Someone like that was essentially a resource conversion machine.
Under torture, he wouldn't be able to hold out. He would be forced to compromise and become nothing more than a production tool.
"So that's it. No wonder you dared to leave without bringing anything."
Candice said in realization.
"But keep this to yourself. If we meet other survivors later, don't tell anyone."
Lux reminded her.
"Okay. I'll listen to you."
Candice nodded.
"Lux, where are we going now?"
HK416 asked from the passenger seat.
"A grain depot on the outskirts of X City."
As he spoke, Lux turned on the car's GPS and followed the voice navigation.
"Won't we run into those soldiers from earlier?"
HK416 asked.
"No. That one military truck can't haul much grain anyway. Loading food also requires manpower, and right now, no one's interested in ordinary grain."
Lux smiled, speaking confidently.
Aside from someone like him with an absurdly large system space, almost no one would set their sights on a grain depot.
Even if they could get there, they wouldn't be able to take much. One trip would be guaranteed profit.
"You three can sleep for a bit. If you get hungry, just say so."
He couldn't afford to feed a large group, but with just the four of them, the boxes of self-heating rice they had looted from the outdoor supply store would last a while.
With his current abilities, raiding small convenience stores was easy enough—there was no way HK416 and the others would go hungry.
"Then can I play on my phone?"
MDR asked cheerfully.
"Do whatever you want."
MDR hummed to herself while playing on her phone. HK416 leaned against the window and closed her eyes to rest.
'System, how many resource points do I have right now?'
Lux asked mentally while driving.
[Four hundred fourteen thousand seven hundred points]
'If I choose to summon Tactical Dolls, how do they appear? Do they just pop up in front of me?'
Lux continued asking.
No. Tactical Dolls will appear before the Commander in a reasonable manner. Therefore, after summoning, there may be a delay of anywhere from one hour to one day before they report in]
The system answered immediately.
Lux let out a sigh of relief. If people were just appearing out of thin air, there'd be no way to explain it to Catherine. Appearing in a 'reasonable' way sounded much safer and wouldn't expose the system.
After being strengthened by the gene modification serum, he had given up on the idea of exchanging for riot armor. His physical attributes had increased drastically—ordinary zombies would have a hard time injuring him.
As for mutated zombies like the Splithead, even wearing riot armor wouldn't help much. That thing could chew through his blade—extra armor weight would only slow him down.
Weapon prices were also strange.
Most ordinary firearms cost under three thousand resource points, but silent ranged weapons like crossbows and compound bows were nearly twice as expensive.
Probably because firearms could attract hordes in the apocalypse, the system had adjusted the prices.
But after testing the compound bow in the trunk, Lux realized that without professional training, he simply couldn't use such weapons effectively.
To kill zombies, you had to destroy the head. He wasn't some legendary marksman.
Simple weapons like katanas and hatchets suited him far better.
So he gave up on exchanging for a crossbow as well.
On the other hand, when facing mutated zombies, relying on just HK416 and MDR's rifles was still insufficient.
Killing one mutated zombie rewarded one hundred thousand resource points—that was no small sum. He had only gotten three hundred forty thousand points after clearing out an entire museum's antiques.
A city might only have one area like that. In comparison, hunting mutated zombies was clearly the proper way to earn resources.
To kill such targets, he needed sniper units with extremely high single-target lethality. That was why Lux planned to summon Tactical Dolls.
'Can I choose the weapon type when summoning?'
[Yes. Specifying a particular weapon type costs five hundred thousand resource points per summon. Specifying a particular Tactical Doll costs one million resource points per summon. This is a shortcut specially prepared by the system for unlucky Commanders}
The system's malicious voice echoed in Lux's mind.
'I get it. You're trying to scam my money.'
Lux had the urge to curse out loud. Paying five times the price just to get the type he wanted—if his luck was bad, he might have to save for an entire month.
Looks like at most he could gamble four times and hope to pull a sniper-type Tactical Doll.
[How could that be? This is simply the system's thoughtful care for unlucky Commanders. And these are resource points—in simple terms, the Commander is freeloading]