Section 31: The Clover Little Girl

I was awakened in a dark room, I remembered vividly that Vladimir took me out in one hit on the neck. I am inside a classroom with a decent bed, this seems like a dream come true for my injured body. My laziness overtook my body, I just wanted to stay in bed for a long time. I see several beds lined up next to me, so it's like a dorm.

"Wake up!" I heard a loud knock on the door.

"I'm going to ignore that" I grumbled to myself as I hid below the dusty blanket.

"I said wake up!!" a boyish voice yelled across the door.

Impatient, the boy opened the door hastily with a sweaty face. It's the boy I saved, Kallen. The boy dragged me out from the bed, forcefully of course.

"Hey, what's the deal with this!" I grumbled. "Let an injured person sleep!".

"No, you can't! You and Ender will be assigned as the team leader for our scavenging team!" Kallen commented.

"Um, what? Excuse me?" I snorted when I heard that.

Did I hear that right? Ender and I as the team leader? Yup, I must have been dreaming. This morning, Vladimir threatened me with a deathmatch, and now he assigned me to be a team leader? Very funny, old man. That's when suddenly, an image of injured Joel flashed my mind.

"Joel! How is he!?" I shook Kallen's shoulder.

"Ah, your glasses friend is on an IT duty, he's going to replace Ender," Kallen explained. In other words, Ender was supposed to be on IT duty, but now he's the scavenger team? I can imagine Ender as the leader though, he would probably pissed and stays mad like a little boy who needs attention.

I followed Kallen from behind, cautiously. He leads me the way to the back courtyard. The sky is already dark, how long did I sleep?

"This is the place where you can get daily nutrition" Kallen explained properly.

"I can see that" I answered short.

After that, he led me toward a special heavily armed room. It was guarded by two muscular grown-up adults. One of them is a female with a muscular build, her golden blonde hair is flashy. She wore a maroon tank top, with red bandanas on her head. Her skimpy military trousers and shoes made me know who she is.

That gold blonde-haired woman is also in the military, seems like she's Vladimir follower. The other guard had a nametag on his neck, he wore a complete military attire with a disheveled collar. Kallen touched the grey-steeled door in front of him.

"This is the weapon room, all weapons are being kept here" Kallen explained proudly as if he's my senior.

Since Kallen explained it that way, then this must be where they kept my military knife, the metal bat, the gun, and Ender's crossbow. They confiscated our weapons from the beginning, so this place might be the first thing I raided if we had the chance to strike them back.

"No funny business, kid" the female spoke harshly as if she could read my mind.

"As if" I raised my brows sarcastically.

Next, Kallen leads me to a distant room in the corner, the room is spacious but it's more like a warehouse. I saw plenty of dead drones inside that room, along with two people inside. There's one female and male inside the room, it seems like they're conducting some research since they're too focused on their laptop to even notice my presence.

The windows of this room are tattered and shattered, and the walls are full of gunshot marks too. Did they conduct an experiment inside this room?

"This is the IT room, you can see that they have a shortage of members" Kallen sighed.

"Shortage of members?" I asked.

"Yeah, they're like the one who's responsible for testing and breaking the drone firewall, so far they found no luck" Kallen rolled his eyes. "The virus in the robot is too dormant, it's impenetrable".

"You can say that again Kallen" one of them looked back at us.

It's another young boy, though he looks older than Kallen. He's a gingery blond-haired young man with an average built. Like any average IT people, he wore a plain white t-shirt beneath his Tosca jacket. He doesn't wear any glasses though, that's a newsflash.

"Come on, brother! We need to solve the firewall quickly! No time for idle banter!" the young girl next to her snorted.

"Oh, sorry Chris" he scratched his neck awkwardly.

The young girl next to the gingery blond-haired man looks pretty fragile. Her skin is pale, she looks paler than the pale Adrian. Her eyes are similar to the young man next to her, it's olive green.

"Ah, did Aria and I interrupt you? I am sorry" Kallen apologized.

"No big deal, I'm bored anyway" the young man spoke to the little Kallen. "So, she's that famous beast warrior?".

I crossed my arm, somewhat annoyed with the title he gave to me.

"Beast?" I asked the young man.

"Yeah, you're quite famous around here big sis! The story of your valor has been passed down from generation to generation!" the young man spoke in a funny way, he tried to humor me I suppose.

"Brother! Isn't that impolite!? Geez, so sorry about him" the female apologized on the behalf of her brother.

They seem to be oddly close, then again it looks like they're brother and sister.

"My name is Tristan, and this girl next to me is my little sister Chrysant" Tristan beamed happily. "We're a big fan of you, big sis Aria! You could talk back to that tyrant! No one in here has ever done that!".

"Sssh, what if he hears you!?" Kallen shushed the young man.

"No worries! I'm not like that blabbermouth Adrian who always talks about his own secret in front of others!" Tristan spoke sarcastically. "That Adrian guy is just so clueless with his surroundings, oh and you should meet Glass as well".

That's right, I almost forgot about Glass because of the deathmatch. We were TOO busy to stay alive and to escape that Vladimir mind games.

"Glass? Do you know where she is?" I asked the jock man, Tristan.

"Ah, she's always in charge guarding the gates! Either that or feeding our mouth" Tristan explained. "Is she a friend of yours big sis?".

I nodded affirmatively, "Yeah, she is my friend".

"Well, what are you waiting for? Shouldn't you greet your long lost friend?" Tristan encouraged me.

"I guess I should, thanks for reminding me" I smiled toward Tristan.

Tristan is a man with humor and friendly, he's very open about what he thinks and feels. On the contrary, his little sister looks pretty private. She looks like the mature one, rather than her older brother Tristan. He is goofy alright, he could make my anxiety dissipate in a matter of minutes after I talked to him.

After I was about to leave, a little child blocked my way. She's so small, she may be younger than Kallen. Her brunette braided hair looks soft and the texture looks pretty tempting for me to touch. She gave me a four-leaf clover, which I accepted with an open hand. After that, she wrote something on her drawing book then showed me writing.

"This is for you" she showed me her writing on the drawing book.

I was confused as to why she didn't speak to me, instead, she used a drawing book to express her words. Another possibility is that she may be mute.

"Thanks" I kneeled to the little girl and flashed her a smile to express my gratitude.

Kallen looked at me silently and cautiously.

The little girl wrote on her drawing book again, she then proudly showed me her writing again.

"My name is Candice" she smiled silently.

"I see, hello Candice" I bowed to her formally. "My name is Aria Schneider, nice to meet you".

Something about this girl made me unwary of her. Her gentle kindness and cute smile, it is something that I can trust. She looks around seven or six years old, I wonder where her parents were though.

"Kallen, where are her mother and father?" I asked the boy next to me.

"Oh, that" Kallen frowned. "They died".

"Oh".

I replied short, never thought an innocent young girl like her has to live alone without her parents. I would like to ask more, to know about the young girl's past. However, Kallen seems to be wary of me, and there's that protective gesture of her around Candice. He put Candice behind her after she greeted me with a smile.

"I'm sorry to hear that" I expressed my condolence to the young girl.

Candice scribbled something on her drawing book, she flipped her book for me to see.

"It's alright, mum and dad are in heaven! Kallen told me that they're happier there!".

I see, so Kallen is her guardian protector. Kallen blushed in a few shades of red, he's a strong boy. This girl may be the reason why Kallen is in this place, as Vladimir soldier. The boy wanted to protect his little sister.