Chapter 55
"Those four groups around here were tricked like that. They spent all their team's supplies to get in, and once inside they had no food, so they started looking for suckers to borrow grain from."
After Lloyd finished speaking, Caesar asked, "So none of them come from camps outside?"
Caesar didn't actually care about these people's backgrounds. He just worried this group had connections with some outside camp, which would cause unnecessary trouble.
Of course, by trouble he didn't mean eliminating them—he meant Caesar would have to leave Black Pine Valley to eliminate the roots.
Caesar had read countless apocalypse stories. He'd comprehended only one principle from them.
That was ruthless brutality.
Seize the opportunity and kill the enemy dead. Don't give anyone any chance to catch their breath.
You have to understand—this is the apocalypse. A single person could cause an entire camp's destruction.
Caesar only wanted to be the executioner, never the victim.
Lloyd said, "As far as I know, no."
"If they had camps outside, no one would be willing to leave their camp for long periods."
That made sense. Even marauders would have a fixed camp for rest.
After understanding the situation clearly, Caesar had only one order.
Fuck them up!
"Should we make a battle plan?" Lloyd asked.
Caesar stood behind the wooden desk, hands braced on the table, eyes gleaming fiercely. "Plan?"
"There's only one plan—crush them to death."
"A bunch of petty thugs actually want to bully us? That's asking for death."
This was the first thing Caesar encountered after bringing people back. If Caesar handled it lightly, how would the ranch people view him?
How would those wolves and tigers outside view him? They'd only look down on Caesar, treat him like a ball to squeeze at will, coming to bully him whenever they felt like it.
Caesar had to choose—strike with a heavy fist.
After the attack order was issued, among the squad leaders, Daryl and Merle's squads plus Caesar's squad would handle the assault.
Guillermo's squad would remain behind, focusing defense around Jenner's laboratory truck.
Merle swaggered up to Amy and said, "Caesar sent me to get weapons."
Amy nodded. Caesar had already told her.
Amy led Merle into Caesar's stone house, walking down a corridor. At the corridor's end hung a painting.
The painting depicted a heavily armored knight on horseback, standing on a hill covered with corpses. The bodies on the ground were painted with vivid realism.
Amy walked up close and gently lifted the painting. Sensing the movement, the painting shifted forward slightly.
This revealed a small window with both password and fingerprint verification. After Amy operated it for a moment...
The entire wall began opening inward, revealing a staircase leading downward.
"Please!" Amy extended her palm, moving aside.
Merle raised his eyebrows, saying with surprise, "The boss really made this secret room nice!"
Merle descended. The walls were thick concrete, the steps beneath his feet embedded stone—unfinished, revealing roughness and primitive quality throughout.
The stairs descended some distance. Merle's vision began turning black.
At this point, a light appeared in the darkness.
Below the light was a thick iron door with familiar password and fingerprint locks.
Merle walked forward, about to step aside to let Amy behind him open the door, when he heard Amy speak.
"Squad Leader Merle, this door has your fingerprint registered. You should know the password too."
Hearing Amy's clear voice echo in the space, Merle froze for a moment, then revealed a smile.
"Tsk, the boss really knows how to win people's hearts!"
Though Merle knew Caesar valued him, he hadn't expected even this important armory to have his fingerprint registered.
Thinking of this, Merle laughed again, his face full of complex emotions.
Merle extended his hand to press on the fingerprint lock, then tentatively entered the date of the first day he'd met Caesar.
RUMBLE—
Behind the door came the sound of gears turning and mechanical parts moving. Then the door opened inward.
Merle walked inside. The dark room instantly lit up with lamps one by one. Merle also saw the armory's full appearance.
"Welcome to the armory, Squad Leader Merle."
VI's cold voice entered his ears.
Amy walked gracefully into the armory, explaining, "This is the artificial intelligence, VI. You should have seen it at the CDC. The boss asked Dr. Jenner to install VI here as well."
Merle didn't understand what use this artificial intelligence had. He only cared about power. The firearms arranged on rack after rack before his eyes—that was power.
The armory was spacious. Gun cabinets lined both walls, reaching the ceiling. Each column of cabinets could hold three firearms—upper, middle, and lower. At the very bottom of each cabinet was ammunition for the corresponding models.
In the center, waist-high display stands were arranged. On these stands sat various heavy firepower—light machine guns, machine guns, rocket launchers, grenade launchers, and so on.
There were also high-powered weapons like sniper rifles.
Each stand was spaced one meter apart, enough for people to pass through. Looking ahead, you couldn't see the end.
Merle's eyes widened, extremely surprised by this scene. With so many guns, Caesar probably wouldn't even need to be afraid of attacking Atlanta.
Amy explained, "This armory is very large, but many of the shelves inside are still empty. The firearms on these shelves all came from the CDC."
"After distributing them to combat members, this much still remained. The heavy firepower also isn't necessary to use right now."
Merle's eyes stared fixedly at the machine gun on the stand. He couldn't help reaching out to touch it. "Tonight, can we have some fun with these?"
Amy bluntly dashed Merle's hopes. "No."
"The boss still needs those four camps' houses. Using a machine gun would shatter the houses directly. It's unnecessary and not cost-effective."
Merle sighed with regret, stroking the machine gun, his eyes carrying a tenderness Amy couldn't understand.
Then Amy somehow produced a shopping cart from somewhere, having Merle select firearms and place them in the cart—direct zero-dollar shopping.
After Merle walked through the entire armory, he discovered the armory only had that small initial section filled with firearms. A large portion afterward was completely empty.
Merle wasn't too greedy. He just selected a few firearms—that was enough.
Merle and Daryl's squad members weren't numerous. At most they had ten people. Taking too many guns wouldn't be useful anyway.
When leaving the armory, Merle ran into Caesar.
Merle opened his mouth and discovered he was originally so poor at expressing emotions—even genuine loyalty was difficult to voice.
Caesar wasn't surprised. He just smiled and patted Merle's shoulder. "Do good work. You'll definitely be one of the ranch's great generals in the future."
"You and your brother Daryl are both my right and left arms. I trust you very much!"
Merle nodded heavily and left the stone house carrying his gun bag.
Watching Merle's retreating back, Caesar's expression remained normal.
For more chapters, leave a review or powerstones(100)
or
go check out my patreon that has 50+advance chapters(50% OFF-$6) patreon.com/Twilightsky588