In the southeast corner of Knoxville Industrial Park, there was an abandoned sewage treatment station half-buried underground.
This was the unspoken "neutral zone" between the Scavengers and the Throat-Slasher Gang.
Whenever the two sides needed to talk, they chose this place to meet.
The last time they had gathered here was when the Red Scarf Gang suddenly increased its patrols, forcing both sides to briefly work together to avoid them.
Late that night, Cole and Eddie met here once again.
Each of them brought only one trusted man.
Cole brought Tony. Eddie brought Rex, who, like him, had once been a member of the Red Scarf Gang.
The atmosphere was awkward from the start.
The two groups had constant friction inside the park. Just last week, they had nearly come to blows over a batch of tools.
But tonight, a greater threat made them temporarily set aside those petty grudges.
"You made contact on your side too?" Eddie leaned against a rusted pipe as he spoke, pulling half a crumpled cigarette from his coat.
Rex lit it for him with a lighter.
Cole nodded, spread out a ragged blanket, and sat down with Tony.
"It happened close to noon. A woman named Gwendolyn led the group. Jason was with her too."
"Jason, that traitor." Rex spat.
Cole glanced at him but did not respond to the word traitor.
After all, the Red Scarf Gang had never been anything good. Whether someone had betrayed them or not had nothing to do with him. "What matters is this Rock Fortress he joined. What exactly are they?"
Eddie took a deep drag from the cigarette and sucked at his teeth. "They came to me in the afternoon. There was a one-armed madman, and another guy who was damn good with throwing knives."
The two men exchanged a look, both seeing the same seriousness in each other's eyes.
"How many of them are there?" Tony could not help asking.
"Sixteen showed themselves today," Eddie said. "All fully armed. Not patchwork junk like what we use.
"Matching combat uniforms, proper military rifles, suppressors, tactical vests. Fuck, even back in the Red Scarf Gang, I never saw equipment that clean and organized."
Cole frowned as he recalled the details. "I noticed their boots.
"They were muddy, but you could still tell they were the same model of military boots, with about the same amount of wear. That means they were issued as standard gear, and not long ago either. Their logistics are frighteningly strong."
"It's not just the equipment," Rex cut in. "Did you notice their positioning?
"No matter how they moved, someone was always watching the flanks, and someone always had the high ground covered. That's regular army behavior. People like us can't fake that."
Tony thought back to the scene from the afternoon. "The way they looked at us didn't feel like they were looking at people. More like objects. Useful, or not useful."
The room fell silent for a moment.
"That woman," Eddie suddenly said. "Gwendolyn. Her clothes were clean. Ironed, even. Her hair was combed perfectly. Her face was a little thin, but not hollow like someone who's starving."
Cole understood what he meant. "That means she lives somewhere with enough food, clean water, and even the spare time to care about appearances."
"And her hands," Eddie said, remembering. "Her nails were trimmed. No dirt under them. Those aren't the hands of someone digging through trash in ruins."
All those details piled up, gradually forming the outline of an unsettling force.
Rock Fortress was not just a powerful fighting group. It was a community with complete logistics, stable supplies, and even traces of civilized living.
"They said they were the ones who wiped out the Red Scarf Gang," Rex said, his voice lowering. "I didn't believe it at first. Back then, what came was clearly a massive walker horde, but now…"
"I believe it." Eddie took one last hard drag from the cigarette and ground the butt out under his foot. "Who was Lorenzo?
"A lunatic, but a ruthless one. The Red Scarf Gang had fifty or sixty people and plenty of guns. To bring in a walker horde that huge…
"Rock Fortress may be far more terrifying than what they showed us today."
At that moment, Cole took out a small piece of compressed biscuit Gwendolyn had given him. He carefully broke off a tiny bit, put it in his mouth, and slowly chewed.
"This is military-grade compressed biscuit. If they can casually use something like this as a bargaining sample, it means they don't have a small stockpile."
"They gave me this too." Eddie took out the small cloth bag and shook it.
Even in the dim light, the antibiotics inside were still obvious.
Tony's eyes widened. "Antibiotics? They just handed those over?"
"Because to them, it isn't much," Cole said with a bitter smile. "It's like us finding half a bottle of clean water in a trash pile and treating it like treasure. But to people with water purification equipment, that's something they can take out without thinking."
That realization left all four of them silent.
The sense of being completely outclassed was not just about weapons and numbers. It was a gap in their level of survival itself.
While they were still worrying about their next meal, the other side was already thinking about expansion and order.
"Are they really going into the park the day after tomorrow?" Tony asked.
"Before dawn," Eddie said. "Their target is Block B. They told us not to get in the way."
He did not mention that they had also been told to keep an eye on the Scavengers.
If his guess was right, Rock Fortress had probably said the same thing to the Scavengers.
"What about the Scavengers?" Rex asked, looking at Cole.
"They want us to keep our distance, and if possible, help watch for anyone trying to interfere."
Cole paused. "They also mentioned… 'afterward.'"
"Afterward?"
"After the park is cleared, they'll build outposts and need people familiar with the area to manage them." Cole repeated Gwendolyn's words. "Sounds like absorption."
Eddie gave a scoff. "That generous? Give us territory and let us manage it?"
"Only if we obey," Cole said, still clear-headed. "And I'm guessing this so-called management means following their rules, using their people, and doing what they arrange. But at least… it's better than what we have now."
Another silence followed.
"What are you planning to do?" Eddie finally asked.
Cole did not answer right away.
Only after a long while did he speak. "I have more than fifty people under me. Eight children, five old people.
"Last week, George was bitten by a walker. All we could do was watch him… turn. There's a little girl with an infected leg wound. If we can't get antibiotics, she won't last more than a few days."
Cole's voice was calm, but every word carried weight. "Every day, we risk our lives. We search for supplies, search for food, then risk our lives again. I can't see an end to it.
"When the Red Scarf Gang was around, we lived like rats. Now that they're gone, we still live like rats. Maybe… maybe it's time to try living like people."
Eddie's expression was complicated.
His men were all young and strong, with no elderly or weak dragging them down. But because of that, they relied even more on looting and threats of force.
Yet just as Gwendolyn had pointed out, the park's resources were shrinking, the targets they could rob were growing fewer, and now a force far stronger than them had arrived.
"The man with the throwing knives said that if we got in their way, they'd show us how Lorenzo died."
Eddie's voice dropped. "I've seen how Lorenzo dealt with his enemies. If these people can drive walkers to kill Lorenzo…"
He did not finish, but his meaning was clear.
"So what's your decision?" Cole asked him.