Chapter 181: Chapter 181: Wish To Awaken
"Because the base owner must already know about it," Kyle finally said, his voice low.
"If no one has dared to try, it means the owner either forbids it or has set things up in a way that makes it impossible. Think about it, Jenna. Do you really believe we are the first ones who thought of reselling food?"
Jenna’s lips pressed into a thin line. She wanted to argue, but deep down, she knew Kyle was right.
In a world where everyone was desperate for survival, ideas like hers wouldn’t be rare.
Others must have already considered it, yet not a single soul had attempted it.
"Then what’s stopping them?" she muttered, her green eyes flickering with doubt.
"Fear," Kyle said bluntly. "The base isn’t ordinary. You’ve seen it yourself. Zombies don’t even dare to enter. Tell me, doesn’t that feel strange to you?"
Jenna’s shoulders trembled as she recalled the eerie sight.
Yes, the gates had been wide open, and yes, the zombies had walked by without stepping in.
She had brushed it off before, but now Kyle’s words planted a seed of unease in her chest.
"Maybe... maybe the owner is watching everything," Kyle added after a pause. "Maybe they want to see who will cross the line first."
The room fell silent. Jenna bit her lower lip, her ambitious thoughts colliding with her fear.
She wanted wealth, freedom from guilt, and a life where Kyle didn’t have to bleed for her. Yet if Kyle was right, taking the wrong step might invite disaster.
Still, her heart was unwilling to let go of the idea so easily.
"But what if," she whispered, eyes shining faintly, "the base owner doesn’t care as long as we don’t cross certain limits? What if we can earn quietly without drawing too much attention?"
Kyle’s gaze hardened. He knew Jenna too well. Once she latched onto something, she wouldn’t let go.
"Alright... but let’s decide a few things in advance... we will only try to sell 1 kg of rice every week, not more than that."
Jenna’s eyes lit up, and she shook Kyle’s hand repeatedly, praising him, "You are the best! I knew I made the right decision by saying yes to you!"
Although Kyle didn’t respond verbally, his actions conveyed his feelings more honestly. His eyes flashed with joy as he leaned toward her lips.
.......
After finishing her daily routine, Ivy returned and started to get busy with the base matters. Now the base was slowly gaining attraction.
With a constant inflow of people, she needed to start with the installation of the solar panels on all the houses.
Hence, she asked Martha to send out the details of those with a professional solar panel installer background.
During the recruitment process, she had asked Martha to collect data about the citizen’s previous jobs. This was to ensure that in case she needed help with the base matter, her citizens would be the ones who benefited the most.
This will promote the base’s economy, and many of the disabled, elderly, or women can survive in this harsh world in this way.
In her previous life, after a decade, 90% of the elderly were dead, the woman-to-man ratio had dropped to less than half, and only the strong were able to live in safety.
The weak were abandoned, treated as burdens, or forced to serve in humiliating ways just to survive. Ivy didn’t want to see the same tragedy repeat in her base.
She wanted everyone to have a chance.
That was why she insisted on recording each person’s background. Skills that had once seemed ordinary... electricians, farmers, tailors, and teachers were now priceless.
Martha efficiently went through the data and soon came up with a list. Once Ivy confirmed the list, she hired a guy named Samuel. He had rented a house alongside his buddy and went to hunt the zombies like others.
The moment he got to know that he was selected for the installation of solar panels, he couldn’t believe his luck.
When he first heard that the base would install solar panels, he considered recommending himself but hesitated at the last moment, fearing that the boss might view him as overly ambitious.
Who would have thought that a pie would fall right on his lap?
Once he got the official notice and the authority to choose his own team as well as decide on their salary, he didn’t dare to slack off.
After staying in contact with many big shots, he knew that Miss Ivy, the representative of the base leader, was testing him.
If he slacked off, hired people for personal reasons despite their incompetence, or paid them significantly more than the market salary, he would fail.
’I have to make sure I don’t let down Miss Ivy,’ Samuel thought.
Unaware that Samuel had misunderstood her thoughts, Ivy focused her energy on cultivating. She wanted to speed up and reach the second level of both of her superpowers soon, and she wanted to see what kind of surprise she would get.
After cultivating, Ivy realized that she had reached a bottleneck and was immediately thrilled.
Her superpowers will be upgraded in a week or so!
The only question was... will they be upgraded simultaneously or at different times?
From her previous life, Ivy had realized that a dual-power superhuman can’t upgrade their powers simultaneously. It was confirmed scientifically.
Some even claimed that this limitation was because the human body cannot handle such diverse energies simultaneously.
However, if a superhuman is capable of doing it, then he or she might be able to awaken a third superpower too.
Ivy wasn’t greedy, but she indeed wanted to awaken an offensive-type superpower.
As time passes and the zombies evolve, dealing with them will become difficult until her superpower reaches level 4 or level 5.
After shaking off the wild thoughts, she entered the temporal storage and started to sort the psychic crystals and space crystals.
Just like always, she counted them, and after finishing up, her eyes started to shine with excitement.