Chef in the Apocalypse

Leah composed herself, before speaking. "When we were forced to separate at the orphanage, I bounced around a few different homes over the next few years. That was until Tony’s sister took me in."

She looked towards Tony and smiled warmly, it was clear to see that they had treated her well while she was growing up.

"Bella was her name, she was visiting China for business and we met after I had run away from the foster home. Long story short, she decided that she would adopt me and take me back to her home in the states."

"While I was reluctant at first to leave the country, she eventually convinced me by promising to let me try and find you Lianna." She looked at her sister with pained eyes before continuing.

"Unfortunately, there was no way to get any information out of the Chinese government about kids who were in foster care. We would have to wait until you turned 18 before the laws would no longer apply."

Lianna’s hand gripped her sisters tightly, feeling the emotion within her words. If the Apocalypse did not descend, she would have found out that Lianna had killed herself by jumping out of the window just before her 18th birthday. Fate was a cruel thing.

However, Leah did not know this.

"She took me in and gave me a place to stay. This is where I met Tony and the rest of her family. Bella ran the family’s Italian restaurant, and I worked there part time serving so I could save up enough money to buy a plane ticket to China."

"This continued on until almost a year ago when the Apocalypse happened." Leah’s face turned forlorn, reliving the past. Tony’s gaze also dropped to the floor, sadness creeping onto his face.

"The restaurant was crushed by an earthquake... I was at school and Tony was out running errands when it happened. Suddenly, we were on our own." 𝐟𝕣𝗲𝕖𝕨𝗲𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝗲𝚕.𝗰𝚘𝐦

Jayce’s face turned solemn. He had been one of the lucky ones who had survived the initial descending, there were many people who did not even have a chance to be assigned a class. It was as if the world had deemed they did not deserve it.

She continued the story, trying to contain her emotions. "Tony rushed to my school, and we managed to find shelter somewhere. We stayed there for about 6 months before the whole city was overrun by monsters and we were forced to flee to the forest."

"The forest never used to exist before, it just suddenly appeared out of nowhere some time after the Apocalypse."

Jayce nodded, "I have seen similar things back in Asia, forests, lakes, marshland; all sorts of places started appearing after the Apocalypse." He said, backing up her theory.

Lianna threw him a look, as if to tell him to keep the comments to himself. He held back a chuckle and shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly, he just thought he would help her clarify.

Leah saw this interaction and smiled, but in the next moment her face turned serious. "While there were a few monsters on the outskirts, they were not that strong. The 50 of us managed to take them down with relative ease and venture further into the forest."

"That’s when we came across the giant tree. I thought it would be a good place to set up a camp, so I used my skills with nature to create a fortress for all of us to stay somewhere long term."

"The tree was already set up with multiple rooms as you see it now, minus all of the furniture. It was as if it were placed here for this very reason. We made the tree the centerpiece of the town."

"At first it was smooth sailing and we had no issues. However I began to wake up with headaches. Eventually I began to feel a calling within my heart, to venture further into the tree."

Lianna tensed up in response to those words, she had felt the same feeling upon entering the other tree with Jayce.

"The feeling got harder to ignore the longer I was within the tree, until one day I relented. It felt like I was in a fugue state and did not have control of my body. I remember waking up in front of a shack with a wooden staff that was on top of a platform in front of me."

"And in the next moment, I reached out to grab the staff and that’s when I felt my heart constrict. Then I lost control of my body for good, and was forced to watch as it did unspeakable things..."

Leah hung her head, feeling the breath get caught up in her throat. "I began to devour my own people through the vines to satiate its hunger. It used my powers and position within the camp to put everyone under its control, like a puppet master pulling the strings."

"I-I thought that it would never end. I thought..." It was then that Leah broke down, crying into her hand. Lianna quickly pulled her into a hug and let her cry on her shoulder.

"It’s okay, it’s over now sis." She consoled, rubbing her back softly.

Jayce began to have a better understanding of the situation. It was likely that in his past life, the Dryad continued to devour these poor souls and eventually moved out of the forest after they had all been used up.

This was why he had never heard of this town, and why he heard that Life Warden went crazy and began to kill the elites of the human race. It wasn’t until some of the top players got together and took her down that the Dryad was stopped.

Tony looked at Leah with a mixture of sympathy and guilt. He had been the one to see what she had turned into firsthand. Yet he couldn’t bare to do anything against his adopted niece, therefore he continued to look the other way as long as she was safe.

Yet it turned out that he was the one who had not protected her, allowing that monster to control her. He was just a useless and sad man, not able to protect anyone. He bowed his head in shame and anger, wanting nothing more than to sacrifice himself to make amends.

It was then that he felt a heavy hand rest on his shoulder, startling him. He raised his head and gazed at Jayce whose clear blue eyes were seemingly staring straight through him.

"There was nothing that you could do. Thank you for keeping Leah safe all this time." Jayce said simply, not mincing any words.

The bearded man blinked a few times before he began to bawl his eyes out. Those words were too kind for him, yet they filled him with warmth and comfort.

As he continued to cry, he made a vow in his heart. He would never let Leah suffer alone anymore, even if it meant putting his life on the line. This was something that he would do, now that his sister and brother-in-law were gone.

Jayce sighed, he pitied the bearded man. Yet he was relieved that they had at least prevented the worst case scenario which had occurred in his previous life.