Chapter 48: The Woman in the Cellar

Inside the repair shop office, Ethan instinctively took half a step back the moment the iron plate came loose. He held his sword horizontally in front of him as he peered into the darkness below.

The cellar was roughly two meters deep and almost completely dark. Damp walls covered in patches of mold surrounded the narrow space, and a musty smell drifted upward. Beneath it, Ethan caught the faint metallic scent of blood.

"Who’s down there?" he called, his voice echoing through the confined space.

There was no answer.

The knocking he’d heard earlier had stopped completely. For several seconds, the cellar remained so quiet that Ethan began to wonder if the sound had been his imagination.

He pulled a flashlight from his Survival Space and switched it on. The beam cut through the darkness, revealing the damp floor and stained walls.

Then came the unmistakable sound of chains scraping against concrete.

Ethan’s grip tightened around his sword.

At the edge of the flashlight beam, something moved.

A woman was curled up against a concrete pillar at the far end of the cellar. Heavy chains were wrapped around her ankles and secured to the pillar, the metal digging deeply into her flesh. Dark red blood had dried around the wounds, with fresh blood still seeping from several cuts.

Her clothes had been reduced to little more than filthy, torn fabric that barely covered her body. Bruises covered her exposed arms and legs. Some had already begun to heal, while others were still raw and bleeding.

Then the flashlight passed over her face.

Ethan froze.

It was Morgana Sykes.

Her once-beautiful hair was tangled and matted with dirt and dried blood. Her cheeks had become noticeably sunken, and her lips were cracked and peeling. She looked nothing like the woman Ethan remembered.

But what unsettled him most was her expression.

There was no fear.

No surprise.

Not even relief.

Her eyes were dull and empty, like she had already stopped expecting anything from the world around her.

"Morgana?"

Ethan frowned deeply.

He hadn’t expected to find her here.

Wasn’t she with Talon?

How had she ended up chained inside a cellar beneath his repair shop?

Under normal circumstances, Ethan would have considered someone like her a problem he didn’t need. She had chosen to follow Talon, and people who survived by attaching themselves to ruthless groups weren’t necessarily people he could afford to trust.

For a brief moment, the thought of simply leaving her crossed his mind.

Then another thought followed.

He could kill her now and eliminate the problem completely.

The moment that thought formed, a sharp pain suddenly shot through the hand holding his sword.

Ethan’s expression changed.

The pain wasn’t physical.

It felt as though something inside his body was resisting him.

Fragments of unfamiliar memories suddenly flashed through his mind.

Morgana handing him a glass of wine at a bar.

Morgana standing beneath an umbrella in heavy rain.

Morgana’s terrified expression when the Apocalypse began.

The memories disappeared almost as quickly as they had appeared.

Ethan stood motionless for several seconds.

’Was that the original Ethan’s consciousness?’

He finally understood what was happening.

The consciousness of the original owner of this body hadn’t completely disappeared. Whatever remained of him was still buried somewhere inside this body, and his attachment to Morgana was strong enough to resist Ethan’s decision to kill her.

Ethan stared at Morgana for a long moment before slowly lowering his sword.

’Sigh. The original Ethan really was hopeless when it came to her.’

He wasn’t going to kill someone who couldn’t even defend herself.

More importantly, if he wanted complete control over this body, he had to deal with these lingering attachments eventually.

"Wait here."

Ethan turned and climbed out of the cellar.

He searched through the repair shop office until he found Talon’s key ring hanging on the wall. More than a dozen keys were attached to it.

He took the entire ring back to the cellar and tried them one by one.

After several attempts, one of the keys finally slid into the lock.

Click.

The chain loosened. ℴ

Morgana’s body swayed slightly as the restraints fell away. She seemed almost too exhausted to realize that she was free.

Ethan reached into his Survival Space and pulled out a windbreaker, two bags of compressed biscuits, and a bottle of water. He placed them on the floor in front of her.

"Put this on. Take the food and water, then leave."

For the first time, something shifted in Morgana’s eyes.

She slowly raised her head and looked at him.

There was no gratitude in her expression.

Only an emptiness so deep that Ethan couldn’t tell what she was thinking.

After nearly half a minute, she finally reached for the clothes and food.

Her movements were slow and mechanical, almost like someone operating on instinct rather than conscious thought.

Ethan didn’t wait for her.

He climbed out of the cellar and stood in the courtyard.

Several minutes later, Morgana emerged.

She had put on the windbreaker. It was far too large for her thin frame, hanging loosely from her shoulders, but at least it covered the worst of her injuries.

She clutched the biscuits tightly against her chest.

Without saying a word or even looking back at Ethan, she walked through the repair shop’s gate.

Ethan watched her disappear down the street.

He couldn’t help thinking that something had changed inside her.

Perhaps it was hatred.

Perhaps it was the determination to become strong enough that nobody could ever put her through something like this again.

Either way, people who survived experiences like hers rarely remained the same.

In the Apocalypse, people either broke completely or became harder than they had ever imagined possible.

As Morgana disappeared around the corner, Ethan suddenly felt a strange sense of clarity.

The resistance he’d felt inside his body vanished completely.

It was as though the last thread connecting the original Ethan’s consciousness to Morgana had finally been severed.

His control over the body suddenly felt smoother than before. Even the flow of Ability energy seemed slightly more responsive.

"The original Ethan’s consciousness... is it finally gone?"

Ethan flexed his fingers and looked down at his hands.

A complicated expression crossed his face.

From this moment on, there was no longer anything inside him pulling him toward the life of the original owner.

This body was completely his.

He didn’t dwell on it for long.

There were more important things to worry about.

Ethan left the repair shop and headed in the opposite direction from Morgana.

His immediate priorities were finding somewhere safe to rest and figuring out how to remove the Snake King mark from his arm.

---

Morgana hadn’t gone far before she turned into a narrow alley.

The moment she was certain Ethan was no longer watching, she leaned against the cold wall and tore open one of the packets of compressed biscuits.

She began eating immediately.

She ate quickly, almost desperately, as though someone might take the food away from her at any moment.

Then tears began falling.

They dropped onto the biscuits, leaving tiny dark spots on the surface.

Morgana didn’t wipe them away.

It wasn’t that she didn’t hate what had happened to her.

She hated Talon for what he had done.

She hated herself for being too weak to resist him.

She hated the decisions she’d made before ending up in that cellar.

But she couldn’t bring herself to hate the part of herself that had simply wanted to survive.

If she hadn’t needed protection after the Apocalypse began, she might never have followed Talon in the first place.

Was wanting to survive really a crime?

No.

The real problem was that she hadn’t been strong enough.

Morgana wiped the tears from her face and stared at the remaining biscuits in her hand.

Her expression slowly hardened.

She finished eating, tightened her grip around the remaining packet, and turned around.

Then she headed back toward the repair shop.

When she returned, Ethan was already gone.

Morgana knew the place well enough to move through it without making a sound. She went around to the backyard, where the small cabin Talon had used to stay was located.

She searched along the wall before finding a loose brick.

After prying it open, she pulled out a palm-sized metal box.

She opened it.

Inside was a small silver handgun, a magazine filled with ammunition, and a pale blue Core that gave off a faint energy.

Morgana had stolen the Core from Talon while he was drunk.

He had questioned her repeatedly about where it had gone, but she had refused to tell him.

She knew exactly what would happen if she did.

If she kept silent, there was still a chance he might keep her alive.

If she told him where the Core was, he would have no reason to keep her around.

The handgun and ammunition had been obtained through one of Talon’s men. She had deliberately hidden them here, knowing that one day she might need something to defend herself.

Morgana closed her fingers around the Core.

Its cold surface gave her a strange sense of reassurance.

"Ethan came here alone and walked out alive."

She looked toward the direction he’d taken.

"That means Talon and Blaze are probably dead."

Her fingers tightened around the Core.

"Ethan, you can become stronger."

Her voice was quiet, but the determination in it was unmistakable.

"So can I."

She slipped the Core into her pocket, tucked the handgun behind her waist, and pulled the windbreaker over it.

Then she disappeared into the fading light.

She had only one goal now.

Find somewhere safe and use the Core.

If it allowed her to awaken an Ability, she would never allow herself to become helpless again.

---

Meanwhile, Ethan had found a temporary resting place on the roof of an abandoned building.

He sat beside a large water tank and checked the supplies he’d collected throughout the day.

Diesel.

Seeds.

Canned food.

Bottled water.

Tools.

The harvest hadn’t been bad.

He pulled a can of food from his Survival Space and was about to open it when a strange sound reached his ears.

Ethan immediately stopped.

It wasn’t a zombie’s growl.

It wasn’t the roar of a mutant creature.

It sounded more like metal rubbing slowly against metal.

Creeeak.

The sound came from the opposite side of the rooftop.

Ethan’s hand immediately went to his sword.

He silently moved behind the water tank and lowered his body, using the metal structure as cover.

Then he carefully looked toward the rooftop access door.

The iron door had been forced open slightly.

A hand was reaching through the narrow gap.

The fingers were slowly working at the lock from the outside.

Ethan’s eyes narrowed.

The hand looked completely out of place in the Apocalypse.

It was clean.

The fingernails were neatly trimmed.

There wasn’t a single visible wound or layer of grime on the skin.

Whoever was outside had taken unusually good care of themselves.

Ethan tightened his grip on his sword and remained completely still.

Someone had followed him onto this abandoned rooftop.

But who would come looking for him here?

And more importantly...