Chapter 542: Diverting the Trouble

The trade with Henry Dixon freed up six storage slots for Nina Jacobs and rewarded her with a substantial amount of System Experience.

On her way, Nina adjusted her clothes and hat. She was still in the guise of Claire Warner. With her Five Senses Enhancement activated, she could tell that Adrian Shaw hadn’t sent anyone to tail her. Even if she reverted to Nina’s appearance right now, hidden beneath the thick layers of clothing, no one would notice.

However, out of caution, she still walked out of the base. After all, before looking for Henry, Nina had officially exited the base. It was about time for her to return.

However, after she took out a vehicle outside the base and drove for a while, she sure enough noticed a tail following her. She was certain no one had followed her from inside the base. She wondered if someone was waiting for Claire outside, or if they merely wanted to confirm whether Claire was actually inside.

Nina felt glad that she had come out. Better safe than sorry. If she had stayed inside earlier, it would have proven that Claire was indeed in the base.

As for the tail behind her... She wanted to kill them, but that car only dared to follow from a distance. Whenever she stopped, it would disappear.

"Quite smart, aren’t they," she remarked.

Nina checked the remaining time for her Facial Adjustment. She still had three hours—more than enough time to deal with them.

Her car turned corner after corner, ramming through zombies one by one. After driving for an unknown amount of time, Nina heard what sounded like a fight in the distance ahead. It was an abandoned kindergarten, where a group of people was locked in a fierce battle with a horde of zombies.

She originally wanted to drive straight past, but she caught sight of a familiar figure.

"It’s him," she murmured in surprise.

Nina saw Liam Grant standing on the roof of a car. By now, the vehicles were completely surrounded by zombies. Sensing the "tail" following her from afar, a plan suddenly formed in Nina’s mind.

"Liam, I’m so scared! Can you just take me and leave first?" Hannah Grant pleaded, opening a crack in the sunroof to speak to Liam standing on top. Although she was hiding inside, one of the side windows had already been smashed by a zombie, and the monsters could rush in at any moment.

Liam furrowed his brows. Almost all of these were Mutated Zombies, making them quite difficult to deal with. However, the people fighting the zombies alongside him were gathered through considerable effort. He would still need them in the future.

"Shut up and stay inside," Liam scolded.

They could handle these zombies, though casualties and injuries were inevitable. As long as he protected himself and Hannah, it didn’t matter if the others died.

"Liam, save me!"

A woman in a red coat was tightly bound by a vine around her neck. She struggled to reach out a hand, crying for help to Liam on the roof. She tried to use her Superpower to sever the vine behind her head, but under the intense sense of suffocation, she completely failed to hit the attack in her blind spot.

"Hold on, I’m coming right now!"

Though Liam agreed, he didn’t actually want to leave the car roof at this moment, simply because he didn’t want any zombies getting close to the vehicle. Both the trunk and Hannah’s spatial storage contained the supplies they had gathered on this trip.

"You..."

Just before the woman’s consciousness blurred, she suddenly felt the grip around her neck loosen.

"I’m here!" a stranger’s female voice rang out.

The woman looked behind her and saw a woman in a dark green short jacket running out of a car parked by the road. The vine around her neck had been sliced through by a long knife thrown by the stranger.

"Are you alright?" the woman asked with a look of genuine concern as she helped her up. It was as if the two had known each other before.

"I-I’m fine... thank you," the woman replied blankly.

Meanwhile, the rescuer had already picked up her machete and began slashing at the surrounding zombies.

"Nina..."

Liam felt that the figure who suddenly appeared was incredibly familiar, which made him so momentarily overjoyed that he almost called out that name. However, when the mask on the side of the woman’s face fell off, he saw an unfamiliar face.

It wasn’t her.

An overwhelming sense of disappointment crashed over him like a tidal wave. For the rest of the battle, he had no idea what he was killing or slashing at...

It wasn’t until everyone retreated into the abandoned kindergarten behind them that Claire put her mask back on. During the fight, she had noticed that the tailing car remained parked far away in the distance.

"Thank you so much for just now," the woman, Julia Dempsey, said as she held Claire’s hand.

The zombies outside had mostly been wiped out. The reason they retreated inside was that several of them had sustained injuries.

"You’re welcome, but could you do me a favor later?" Claire asked.

"Of course. You saved my life, unlike some people..." Julia wasn’t stupid. Liam had clearly seen that she was about to die earlier, yet he had absolutely no intention of saving her.

Claire didn’t pry. Instead, she handed Julia a car key. "Just help me drive the car back to the base later. You can keep everything inside the car, too."

Looking at the key, Julia asked, "Then what about you..."

"Don’t worry about me. I have other things to take care of," Claire replied.

Those people had been tailing her the entire time, but they hadn’t taken advantage of the zombie attack to strike her while she was down. Therefore, she concluded that they were merely probing her background and wouldn’t reveal themselves. Julia wouldn’t be in any danger driving back.

"Alright," Julia agreed.

Liam also walked over and said to Claire, "Thanks for just now. Want to be friends?"

"You’re welcome," was all Claire said.

Liam had never bought anything from her small shop, so he didn’t recognize Claire’s face. Behind him, Hannah was already beginning to urge impatiently, "Liam, let’s hurry up and leave. More zombies will come later."

"At least wait until everyone finishes tending to their wounds." Liam was getting annoyed by her urging.

With everyone busy treating their injuries, no one noticed that the woman who had just helped them had quietly disappeared.

Nina hadn’t left immediately. Instead, she used an Invisibility Potion and hid on the upper floor of the abandoned kindergarten. Judging from where the tailing car was parked, they shouldn’t be able to see who was getting into the vehicles from inside the kindergarten.

Soon, Liam finally led the group away. Sure enough, Julia drove off in the car Nina had been using. Nina noticed that the tailing car didn’t drive off in another direction until Liam’s convoy completely disappeared down the road.

Only after making sure there was no one around did Nina take the original car she had driven out of the base from her storage slot.

Her actions just now naturally weren’t to help Liam, but to redirect the trouble toward him. If everything went smoothly, those people would most likely assume that Claire and Liam had some sort of connection. As for what Liam would encounter later, that was none of her business.

It was already dark by the time Nina returned to the base that day.

Her family only began preparing dinner when they saw her come back. From Daniel Hale, she also learned that the base had begun recruiting the remaining five elite Superpower Users.

"Tyson Hughes from the Superpower User Alliance has also signed up, but the base hasn’t approved his application yet. The base has been producing a lot of talents lately," Daniel said.

"By the way, didn’t that guy named Caleb Carter sign up? I heard he advanced to the Intermediate level a while ago," Leo Hale asked.

Caleb Carter?

Nina actually remembered this person. At that time, Fern Spencer had taken her and Caleb to the old houses to take down one of Hugo Crawford’s secret bases of operation. Only, back then, she had gone with the two of them under the identity of Claire Warner.