Chapter 73: Shadows of the Past

Since the military was also following them, the problem of transportation was solved instantly. Imani had meticulously arranged hundreds of trucks and ration supply vehicles in a single night. Salma had to silently admit that the woman’s logistical coordination was impressive.

Such a competent woman was almost too useful to simply leave behind in the dust. Being her Shadow was perfect for her.

Salma thought viciously her green eyes narrowing as she felt a fresh surge of annoyance at the memory of how Imani had manipulated her through Summer’s innocent affection.

Imani had known full well that the Rogue leader was displeased with her. To avoid testing her luck, Imani had purposely stationed her transport vehicle three trucks back from Salma’s lead car.

Inside the cabin of this command vehicle, only Mayor Vincious, Assistant General Jacob, and Imani herself sat as drivers and passengers.

The heavy transport rolled slowly down the cracked, snow-dusted highway, the distant rumble of the engine breaking the suffocating silence inside the cab.

"This... this is too risky. Why did you do this without official permission?" Jacob broke the tension, turning his head toward Imani with a deep frown of dissatisfaction.

Neither Imani nor the old general offered an immediate response. They both stared straight ahead through the frosted windshield, keeping their hands steady on the steering wheel. Jacob’s expression shifted as a sudden realization hit him.

"You knew about this, too?" He turned his accusatory gaze toward Vincious.

The general remained completely silent. That lack of denial was all the confirmation Jacob needed. A wry, tired smile touched the edges of Jacob’s lips.

He understood why they hadn’t consulted him. They must have suspected that Jacob would inadvertently leak the plan to his family, leading his twin daughters, Ella and Ilas, to mention it to the zombie girl before everything was set in motion.

"Whatever the case, it worked perfectly," Imani muttered coldly, her eyes fixed on the empty road ahead as she navigated the vehicle around a pile of frozen debris.

"Still, what is the long-term plan here? Are we just going to follow them everywhere blindly?" Jacob asked, crossing his arms over his heavy coat.

"Of course not. I received a coded transmission from the Supreme Commander’s outpost late last night," Vincious said, his voice unusually heavy. "The main military forces are currently marching south toward the secure island bases in the Atlantic. They expect to rendezvous with surviving columns near Baidu in a month’s time. We only have to survive the journey until we merge with the main army."

"Supreme Commander?" Jacob’s expression twisted into a weird, skeptical grimace. "What do you think the Rogue leader will do if she meets him personally? Have you completely forgotten about what happened to her elder daughter?"

At those words, a struggling expression washed over the old general’s face. Imani furrowed her brows sharply, gripping the steering wheel tighter as she guided the heavy military truck across the ruined highway.

"Her daughter was foolish enough to be influenced by foreign spies, and the consequences had nothing to do with the Supreme Commander," Imani argued, her voice laced with bitterness. "The Rogue leader should, in fact, beg for forgiveness for letting her child become a security threat."

"IMANI!"

Vincious shouted the name in a chilling, thunderous voice that instantly echoed through the metal cabin. The sudden outburst stunned Jacob into absolute silence and visibly froze Imani in her seat.

It was the first time either of them had ever seen the general lose his composure like this. Even on days when Imani had voiced similar harsh opinions about Summer, her father had always swallowed his words and kept the peace.

Imani gritted her teeth, biting back a sudden rush of hot tears that threatened to blur her vision. Vincious Gerald carried another identity that few spoke of aloud, and that was her father.

This was the absolute first time her own flesh and blood had ever roared at her with such raw, unbridled fury.

"Why? Aren’t I telling the truth? Her eldest daughter was a whore, and the whole country knows that!" Imani rebutted, her voice shaking with defiance.

The old general shivered visibly from sheer anger. He closed his eyes tightly, taking a long, ragged breath to steady his racing pulse. When he finally opened them again, all outward rage had vanished, replaced by a heavy, hollow calmness.

He decided that the time had come to dig up the rotting secret he had buried in the darkest corner of his heart for years.

"That girl... she wasn’t lying."

Salma, driving the lead vehicle several meters ahead, suddenly slammed hard onto her brakes, the abrupt stop almost causing the trailing transport vehicles to collide into her bumper.

She quickly shifted gears and restarted the engine, her sharp eyes scanning the snowy roadside as a few wandering zombies drawn by the noise rushed out from behind an abandoned billboard, only to be instantly obliterated by Maya’s silent shadow blades from the undercarriage.

Inside the rear truck, Jacob stared at the general in utter disbelief. "Are you joking right now?"

The old general was never a man to crack jokes, let alone during a crisis of this magnitude. If his words were true, then what did that mean regarding the Supreme Commander?

"It wasn’t the Supreme Commander himself. It was his son..." Vincious stared blankly into the distance, looking toward a shattered skyscraper on the far horizon where a faded propaganda poster of the Supreme Commander still hung on the concrete shell.

"That boy was a complete lecher. He happened to spot that girl by pure chance when she was working a civilian shift near the inner district. He tried every dirty trick in the book to buy her compliance, but the girl had too much pride to ever sell herself for status..."

So, when his initial attempts failed, the young master hatched a disgusting scheme to drug her drink during an official banquet and quietly satisfy his depraved urges.

But on the exact night of the planned assault, something came up that required her presence elsewhere, so she arranged for her close friend to cover her late shift instead.

"...The Supreme Commander’s son was furious to miss his prize. He became even more enraged when an anonymous warning was delivered to him telling him to stay away from her. Looking back now, that warning probably came directly from Salma herself. Sure, that warning worked for Summer, but for her friend..."

A deeply pained grimace twisted the old general’s features.

"When that bastard finally finished with her, the poor girl’s body had been completely drained. The forensic residue left behind pointed back to the sperm of more than two hundred men..."

Imani’s hands clamped onto the steering wheel so hard that the joints of her fingers turned stark white. Tears streamed freely down her pale cheeks now, hot and unheeded.

"The Supreme Commander had to protect his son... to protect the regime... all under the excuse of a father shielding his blood," Vincious muttered bitterly.

"Bastard," Imani choked out, the word tearing through her throat like broken glass.

Vincious ignored the sting of her insult, pressing forward with the grim truth. "That girl blamed herself for her friend’s death. She tried to leak the records; she wanted to expose the predators, but—"

"You all framed her instead? You turned her into a scapegoat and let her be cursed by millions of people?" Imani snarled, baring her teeth as she glared at her father through the rearview mirror. "Father... I am utterly ashamed of you. I am glad mother is already dead. I am glad my husband and children didn’t live to see what kind of coward you became..."

Vincious closed his eyes once more, every single word acting like a physical blow striking directly against his chest.

"And you still choose to follow that disgusting animal?" Imani spat, her voice dripping with pure venom.

Vincious snapped his eyes open wide, his voice hardening into steel as he defended his broken reality. "I don’t respect him as a man! But as a leader who holds the last remnants of human infrastructure together—"

"If I had been the victim in that room, would you have felt the same way?" Imani cut him off sharply, her voice choking him into sudden silence.

"You—" Vincious opened his mouth, completely at a loss for words to defend himself. "I was helpless back then, too! There were too many things at stake, too many lives I had to protect, including yours!"

"Spare me," Imani laughed bitterly, the sound devoid of all warmth. "Those are just the words of a spineless coward. Mother must have realized the exact same thing, which is why she ended her own life years ago..."

Pa.

The sharp crack of flesh hitting flesh echoed through the cabin.

The old general had struck his daughter across the face, his hand trembling as he lowered it. "Say that name again, and I will throw you out of this vehicle!" he commanded, his chest heaving as he forced her into silence.

Imani turned her head back toward the road, her cheek burning bright red. She didn’t utter another syllable, but the look in her eyes had changed forever.

Any remaining shred of respect or filial affection she had held for her father had been completely burned away, replaced by disgust.

Vincious slumped back against his seat, realizing that the fragile illusion holding their family together had finally shattered beyond repair. He stared blankly out the window, his voice dropping to a harsh, final whisper.

"Just remember... we cannot afford to offend the Supreme Commander. Not with the old world’s power, and certainly not now in the ashes of the new one..."