novelraw Chapter 57 57: What do you want, little girl?
Chapter 57 57: What do you want, little girl?
As soon as Natalia's words settled into the air, the atmosphere in the gym shifted. Almost everyone turned to look at the old man beside her. Hearing the way he'd been introduced, he raised an eyebrow, scratched the side of his head, and let out a short laugh, like someone had told a familiar joke that wasn't actually that funny.
"Oh, come on. Don't exaggerate," he said with mild amusement. "There was a… misunderstanding."
Adam tensed instantly, sliding half a step closer to Natalia. Something openly hostile sparked in his eyes. Patrycja also looked at the old man with suspicion, then glanced at Natalia, clearly waiting for an explanation.
"A misunderstanding?" Adam repeated sharply. "She said you tried to kill her."
Natalia sighed and lifted one hand, as if to calm the situation down. Then, together with the old man, she explained, step by step, what had happened outside. Who'd mistaken whom. Where the theft accusation came from. Why everything escalated faster than it should have.
"…And no," Natalia finished at last, looking at Patrycja and Adam, "he didn't try to deal me any fatal wounds."
Adam let out a visible breath of relief, though when his gaze returned to the old man, it stayed hard and distrustful.
"That doesn't mean I trust him," he muttered.
"Trust is a luxury," Marek cut in. He'd been watching the old man with growing interest the entire time. "But I heard something more interesting."
He stepped closer and extended his hand.
"Marek," he introduced himself. "Nice to meet the old man who took down a level twenty-three creature."
The old man glanced at the offered hand, then nodded once.
"Roland," he said simply, and shook.
The grip was firm. Too firm.
Roland immediately felt Marek deliberately tighten his fingers, trying to establish dominance, so he looked him straight in the eyes and squeezed back. Marek's brows furrowed for a moment, pain flashing across his face where he hadn't expected it.
They released almost at the same time.
Meanwhile, Leon, standing a little off to the side, turned away without a word.
"I'm going to rest," he said curtly. "Don't bother me."
And he just walked off.
A few people watched him in silence, only now noticing he was moving almost normally again, no obvious limp. Natalia lifted an eyebrow, clearly surprised at how quickly his body was recovering, but then she let out a quiet breath of relief.
At this pace, it meant one thing.
He'd be ready to fight again soon.
Roland also watched Leon go, and the image slid neatly into place with everything else in his head.
***
They'd walked toward the gym in silence, Roland leaning on his cane, moving slowly, until Natalia finally couldn't stand it anymore.
"Can't you walk faster?" she asked, irritated.
Roland looked at her like she'd asked him to fly.
"You don't rush an old man," he said calmly. "I've lived my years. Now I'm just a slow old guy who struggles to take one step forward."
A vein appeared on Natalia's forehead, because she knew exactly how absurd that sounded considering his actual speed.
"Yeah… sure," she snorted, but she slowed to match his pace.
After a moment, Roland spoke again.
"This shelter of yours… how many are there, exactly?"
"Over a hundred," Natalia replied without hesitation. "Three groups merged. And… maybe five people actually want to fight. The rest hide."
Roland nodded.
"Understandable," he said quietly. "Fear of fighting is the most human thing there is."
He studied her more closely.
"You're the strongest in your group, right?"
Natalia didn't feel proud hearing that.
Instead, she bit her lower lip. In her mind she saw the huge crimson boar again, its size, its aura, the sheer pressure of its presence she'd felt even standing next to its corpse, and the certainty that she wouldn't have been able to kill it herself.
"No," she said through her teeth. "I'm not."
Roland paused, eyes widening slightly.
"Someone's stronger than you?"
"Yes," she confirmed shortly. "And he's in that shelter."
Roland let out a rough little sound.
"Oho…"
He looked at her, seeing something weighing on her, and then, unexpectedly, he laughed.
"I didn't expect that kind of maturity from you," he said. "Most people your age, especially with your temperament, only stare at the tip of their own nose."
Natalia shot him a suspicious look.
Roland sobered.
"Remember one thing," he added more slowly. "The most important skill isn't strength or magic. It's being able to see the world as it is, not as we want it to be. Anyone who can't do that… won't live long."
After that, they walked in silence for a while.
***
As Leon disappeared down the corridor, his figure vanishing around the bend, the old man's gaze followed him without thinking. He felt something he couldn't quite name, part curiosity, part instinctive caution. And only a moment later, staring at Leon's back, the pieces clicked.
That was the one the sharp-tongued ice girl had meant.
The one stronger than her.
The corner of Roland's mouth twitched into a faint, thoughtful smile.
Natalia spoke suddenly, not loudly, but in a way that snapped nearby attention to her immediately.
"In thirty minutes, we meet in the conference room," she said matter-of-factly. "We need to plan what happens next."
Then she added without hesitation:
"Someone inform Mr. Kowalczyk."
Adam and Patrycja nodded almost in sync, filing it away without questions.
Roland sighed quietly, feeling fatigue finally start to catch up to him. His body was tougher than it looked, but the last few hours, the cold, the tension, had done their work. And honestly, he was curious to see the shelter, get a feel for the layout.
He was about to walk off when he suddenly felt a sharp tug at his collar.
He spun, and found Natalia staring at him with clear irritation.
"What do you want, little girl?" he snapped automatically, before he even realized what he'd just said.
A second, very obvious vein popped on Natalia's forehead.
Marek, standing nearby, snorted with laughter, apparently delighted by the phrase. He'd already opened his mouth to repeat it out loud…
…but Adam punched him in the stomach without hesitation, muttering something like, "Shut up, idiot," which killed Marek's momentum on the spot.
"You're coming to the meeting too," Natalia said coldly, ignoring the whole mess.
Roland stared at her with wide eyes.
"Have you lost your mind?" he demanded. "People my age need an afternoon nap. I was just about to take mine."
Natalia didn't slow down.
She turned on her heel and walked toward the corridor, tossing over her shoulder:
"You've got thirty minutes. I want all of you at the meeting."
Elena, holding the black cat in her arms, hesitated, then asked uncertainly:
"And… should we tell Leon?"
Natalia waved one hand without looking back.
"No," she said shortly. "Better if he rests for a few more days."
***
Three days passed.
During that time, Natalia and the other Evolvers, and their new acquisition, old Roland, left the safe zone around the gym every day, systematically clearing streets building by building. They collected anything with real utility: food from abandoned stores, clothes from dorms and apartments, medicine from pharmacies and clinics.
And along the way, they pulled every living person they could from the ruins.
The shelter swelled day by day, quickly pushing past one hundred and fifty people, an amount that was starting to become a logistical problem all by itself.
Leon, meanwhile, barely left the shelter at all. If he did, it was only to eat or drink in silence. His only real "entertainment" was talking to Valeria, which almost always ended with him either losing, getting embarrassed, or both. Eventually he stopped pretending he wanted it. He focused on recovery and ignored everything else, like the outside world had temporarily stopped existing for him.
That morning, he got up slowly, unhurried. He leaned against the wall for a moment, then stomped his feet against the floor a few times, testing his body's response, muscle tension, the familiar unpleasant pain he'd been expecting.
It didn't come.
After a moment, he nodded with visible relief and quiet satisfaction, muttering that the burns on his feet and legs had healed completely, without a trace of what had looked, not long ago, like injuries that should've kept him off his feet for weeks.
"I need to raise my Vitality as soon as possible," he added after a moment, more to himself than to her. "The faster I regenerate, the less chance I end up grounded next time."
Valeria, who'd been sitting quietly until then, suddenly turned serious. Her tone lost its usual lightness.
"Be careful," she said, folding her arms. "And don't overdo it with Vitality."
Leon looked at her, startled, then visibly uneasy. He hadn't expected a warning from her of all people.
"What do you mean?" he asked cautiously. "Are there… side effects?"
Valeria let out an exaggerated sigh.
"Your endurance is already, what, ten times higher than the average person's?" she started calmly. "Now imagine you give in to your urges and end up in bed with some woman."
Then, without a shred of hesitation, she grabbed her cheeks dramatically like she was witnessing a tragedy.
"Poor girl would get literally crushed. She wouldn't be able to get up for days."
Leon froze.
His face darkened instantly, and his ears went red as it hit him that she was being completely serious.
"I swear on my mother, one day I'm going to wipe that smile off your face," he growled through clenched teeth, trying very hard not to show how much it flustered him.
Valeria stared at him for a second, then burst out laughing, utterly unconcerned with his threat. She seemed to find his reaction disarmingly cute, especially with how hard he tried to hide the embarrassment that was basically screaming from his face.