Chapter 61: The Price of Strength

"And once I brought the fruits back," the old man continued, "I began giving them to the survivors."

He paused, looking down at his hands.

"Those fruits changed things for us. People who had been too weak to defend themselves gained enough strength to fight back. We also discovered that we no longer needed ordinary food as often. Some could go much longer without eating anything else. Considering how difficult it had become to find food in the building, that alone made the fruits valuable."

"Of course, they came with their own problems."

Zarek waited for him to continue.

"The black veins started appearing after people began eating the fruits. At first, I didn’t think much of them. We had already seen so many changes in people’s bodies that another strange symptom didn’t seem particularly important."

The old man rubbed the back of his hand with his thumb.

"Then I noticed that some people weren’t hearing properly. Others had trouble seeing things that should have been easy to see. It wasn’t the same for everyone, either. Two people could consume the fruits and end up with very different results."

"And you connected those changes to the fruits?" Zarek asked.

"I suspected they were responsible. I still do. The people who ate more seemed to suffer worse effects, though I couldn’t establish an exact relationship. Their lifespans appeared to be affected as well."

"Appeared to be?"

"I couldn’t measure how much time they had lost. I couldn’t even tell you how much longer one person would live compared to another. All I had were the people around me and the changes I observed in them."

Zarek leaned back in his chair.

The fruits offered strength and relief from hunger, two things that could determine whether someone survived in this world.

In exchange, they might damage the senses and shorten a person’s life. The worst part was that nobody seemed to know where the limits were.

A person could eat a fruit believing it would make him stronger, only to discover later that he had traded away something he couldn’t recover.

"Did you stop giving them out after discovering the side effects?" Zarek asked.

"No."

The answer came without hesitation.

"People were starving, and most of them couldn’t defend themselves. I had something that could help them with both problems. I knew the fruits weren’t harmless, but I didn’t know how serious the consequences would become."

"And once you did?"

The old man looked at him.

"By then, people were already depending on them. Taking the fruits away wouldn’t have undone the damage. It would only have left everyone weaker and struggling to find food again."

He spoke matter-of-factly, without trying to make himself sound generous.

Mara, who had been listening quietly, suddenly looked up.

"Wait. What about the food you gave us?"

The old man turned toward her.

"The food we received from your people," she continued. "Was that mixed with the fruits, too?"

"Yes. We mixed the fruits with ordinary food to keep it from decaying."

Mara’s face changed.

She remembered the supplies her people had received from the upper floors.

At the time, she had been relieved to get them. She hadn’t had much room to question where every piece of food came from.

Now she understood what they had been eating.

"The black veins..." Her voice faltered. "We would have developed them, too?"

"If you had continued eating that food, yes. Your bodies would have started changing as well."

Mara stared at the old man, visibly shaken. She had brought those supplies back believing they were helping her people survive.

Instead, they had been consuming something that would gradually change their bodies, damage their senses, and shorten their lives.

Then she remembered that she had started eating with Zarek.

She turned toward him, the shock still on her face.

"Good thing I joined you and started eating your food."

The old man allowed her a moment before continuing.

"Even after I began distributing the fruits, I remained the strongest among the survivors. The mixture I’d taken from my son’s research had changed my body. The fruits made other people stronger, but none of them could match me."

He folded his hands on the table.

"That was how I established my position. People needed protection, and I was the one capable of providing it. Some accepted my leadership, while others challenged me. Those who refused to listen eventually learned that they couldn’t force me out. After that, keeping order became much easier."

"Over time, people became accustomed to the arrangement," the old man continued. "I made decisions, kept order, and distributed the supplies. They knew what would happen if they tried to tear the group apart."

Zarek could understand why the arrangement had lasted. In a world where strength determined who lived and who died, a leader who could enforce his decisions didn’t need everyone’s approval.

The fruits had also given the old man another advantage. His people depended on him for their supply, and he had already been stronger than them before they ever ate any.

He had turned that advantage into authority.

Zarek’s thoughts drifted back to the factory workers.

He remembered the broad man he’d killed and the workers who had barely reacted to the commotion. One of them had even stepped aside to let Zarek pass, as though nothing unusual had happened.

At the time, he had wondered whether they hadn’t heard the fight or simply hadn’t cared.

Now he had a possible explanation.

The workers had possessed the same black veins. If they had consumed the fruits, their hearing might have deteriorated as well. That could explain why they hadn’t reacted as he expected.

The fruits might explain more than the changes in the people upstairs. They could also explain the strange behavior he’d witnessed at the factory.

Zarek didn’t need to settle the question immediately. He had enough information to know that the black veins weren’t merely an unusual physical trait.

They were connected to something that offered considerable benefits while gradually taking something away from those who consumed it.

Zarek returned his attention to the man sitting across from him.

He leaned forward and looked directly at the old man.

"So, what do you want to make a deal with me?"