Chapter 558: Extra Chapter 6: The New Era (Part 2)

It wasn’t just the two of them. Several of the closest kids from the Summers Family had also arrived early.

A dozen or so young people worked together. Some were setting up the outdoor venue in the garden, some were preparing food in the kitchen, and others were on the phone, hurrying along deliveries. In short, everyone had a role to play. They all wanted to make the birthday party lively and cheerful so Paige Summers could relax and have a good time.

Preparations proceeded in an orderly fashion, and by the afternoon, guests had begun to arrive early.

In recent years, human territory had been constantly expanding.

Most of Bloodfall’s original members had been dispatched to build new cities. As the surrounding areas were developed, they began to border Concordia, creating an increasingly prosperous corridor that stretched from south to north.

As the cities and cultivation zones expanded, they became increasingly busy.

But no matter how busy they were, they all made time to come after receiving Paige Summers’s birthday invitation.

After all, the members of Bloodfall had been through trial after trial. Regardless of age, they were all filled with admiration for Paige Summers and couldn’t wait for an opportunity like this to show their appreciation.

Consequently, the gifts they brought were an eclectic assortment.

Rare metals, woods, and ores; design blueprints for uniquely shaped weapons; even scale models…

Michelle Monroe glanced over the gifts, the corner of her mouth twitching. She pulled Anton Monroe aside and said, “Just what you’d expect from Mom’s friends. A bunch of textbook pragmatists!” Despite her words, she was actually quite intrigued.

She was deeply influenced by the Summers Family and had a keen interest in shipbuilding and seafaring. As soon as she graduated, she went to work under Kane Summers, striving to become Concordia’s first female admiral!

Anton Monroe was different from her.

He was already a renowned combat elite in Concordia.

Although the apocalypse was over, small-scale warfare had not ended.

There were always those who sought to rise through plunder, and outside their borders, other nations stirred restlessly from time to time. Thus, his High Combat Power was still very much in demand.

Strangely enough, very few children were born during the apocalypse.

Anton Monroe and his peers were born near the middle of the apocalypse, making them some of the oldest among the new generation. However, almost none of them possessed any obvious superpowers. It could only be said that their physical conditioning from birth was far superior to that of children from the old world.

Take Anton Monroe, for example. His physical condition was, in all respects, no weaker than a Superpower User’s. Yet there were no signs of Enhancement; his strength was completely natural and well-balanced. Then there was Michelle Monroe. Her physical health was also excellent, though not on par with Anton’s, but her spiritual power was relatively strong. However, she was incapable of using it the way a Spiritual Ability User could.

It wasn’t just them. Essentially all children born during the apocalypse were the same.

Superpowers, in contrast, seemed to be possessed only by those like Paige Summers who had lived through the entirety of the apocalypse.

Levi Young was also puzzled by this. He researched it for a long time without reaching a definitive conclusion. In the end, he could only theorize that superpowers were a type of virus and these children were simply lucky enough not to have been infected.

Whether one had superpowers or not wasn’t important. What mattered was one’s perspective on it.

When they were little, upon learning they wouldn’t have wondrous abilities like their parents, both Anton and Michelle Monroe had been dejected. But as time went on and they experienced more of life, they discovered that not having superpowers wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. They could still achieve their goals through their own hard work, without making terrible mistakes born from an inability to control powers they possessed.

There was a reason for this line of thinking.

Among the generation born in the early days of the apocalypse, those a dozen-odd years their senior, many were emboldened by their superpowers to entertain wicked thoughts and stray from the right path. Their crime rate was significantly higher than that of the generations older or younger than them. Others were deeply troubled by their inability to control their superpowers. A prime example was Erin Quinn, whom they all knew of.

Technically, they should have called her Auntie Erin; they’d heard she was very close with their mother.

Her superpower was quite unique and was known as the Mind Reading Technique.

But Anton and Michelle had met Erin Quinn once when they were young, and even then, she hadn’t been in a good state. She was rail-thin and deathly pale.

Their mother had said that Erin’s superpower was mentally taxing to begin with, and to make matters worse, she was a chronic overthinker. As a result, her life had become progressively worse.

Beyond that, their mother refused to say more.

It was Uncle Raines who told them a bit more.

He said that as the Mind Reading Technique was Promoted, the user could hear the inner thoughts of more and more people. This, however, was not a good thing, because the more one heard, the more easily one was influenced by others. It might be manageable for someone with an exceptionally strong will, but it was nearly impossible to control for anyone with the slightest weakness.

The human heart is a very complex thing; even the kindest person is not immune to a fleeting evil thought.

Not knowing about it isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

After all, a wicked thought might just be a passing notion that never affects a person’s actual behavior.

But for Erin Quinn, even when someone performed a kind deed, she found it difficult to stop herself from dissecting their every possible motive.

Over time, this took its toll, and her own body broke down.

When they were younger, Anton and Michelle couldn’t fully grasp the meaning of those words. But as they grew older and met more people, they finally understood why their mother sometimes taught them that “ignorance can be a blessing.”

By that time, Erin Quinn had already passed away in Central City.

Their mother had murmured through her tears, “If only she hadn’t had a superpower…”

Anton and Michelle took their mother’s words to heart. From that day on, they no longer felt disappointed about their lack of superpowers. They may not have had any, but they had strong bodies, the best teachers, and an environment many times more stable than before. They were free to choose whatever they wanted to learn to better and arm themselves.

Now, they were filled with confidence.

Their mother, of course, deserved much of the credit for them being able to live so happily.

That was why they had poured all their effort into making their mother happy this time.

The birthday banquet, which had been in preparation all day, officially began as Marcus Monroe’s car pulled in.

The moment Paige Summers stepped out of the car, she was greeted by a sea of familiar faces and the sound of thunderous applause.

In a daze, she heard Marcus Monroe’s voice reminding her, and it was only then that she remembered. ‘Oh, right. It’s my birthday today!’

Hand in hand with Marcus Monroe, she walked toward the long table where her mother, children, family, and comrades-in-arms were standing.

Paige Summers broke into a brilliant smile and squeezed Marcus Monroe’s hand.

‘I have no regrets about coming here!’

‘Having your love is the greatest happiness I could ever ask for!’