They had been walking for some time now...
Graves was still too weak to move properly, so Old Man Lee held him tightly by the wrist, dragging him along. They weren't just walking freely; they had to constantly hide from the devils hunting down anything that moved. The looming danger forced Graves to finally snap out of his daze and pay attention to his surroundings.
"We're almost there," Lee whispered as they slinked through the shadows. "Once we arrive, we'll be evacuated by the NHF military. Of course, we'll probably have to pay them, which is where I come in. So, you'll be owing me a lot more than just five NHF coins," he added, half-jokingly.
Some time later, they reached the evacuation point Old Man Lee had talked about. But as they looked around, there was no one in sight. Gradually, a thick blanket of fear crept onto the old man's face.
"Don't tell me... they left!"
In truth, they weren't the only ones abandoned. At least half the population of their sector had been left behind to fend for themselves, except the vast majority of them had already been mauled and killed by the horde.
Geographically, the sectors were organized as massive rings outside the Great Wall. The Wall itself was a gargantuan circle covering hundreds of kilometers, easily as large as a country from the old world. The outskirts wrapped around it in a massive outer ring. If one looked at it from space, it resembled a circle inside a circle. The outskirts were the least guarded areas on the planet, split cleanly into four distinct zones—much like the wedges of an orange. Normally, the people living in the outside world couldn't move between these sectors freely, unless a catastrophic crisis like this invasion forced a displacement.
The only reason the NHF military had even made an effort to evacuate half of them to the adjacent sector was purely transactional. To the authorities inside, the people living in the outskirts were nothing more than farmland. It was a breeding ground where the NHF came to harvest suitable candidates to serve as expendable foot soldiers for the military. As long as a kid passed the compatibility test, they were a resource. Letting them all die during an outbreak was the equivalent of letting a flash flood destroy your crops.
They kept walking. This time, Old Man Lee muttered under his breath about where they should head next, but Graves couldn't quite catch the words. He knew the old man was just trying to keep moving to give them both a reason to stay alive.
Turning to look at the boy, Old Man Lee let out a heavy sigh. "We're going to the compatibility camp. At least that place should be somewhat secure since it's where the military was stationed. I just hope we can find some personnel left behind."
After what felt like hours of dodging danger and avoiding direct encounters with the monsters, their destination finally came into view. Suddenly, Old Man Lee stopped and bent down beside a fresh corpse. It was the body of a young boy. His eyes were frozen open in fear, but his entire lower half had been completely ripped away.
Old Man Lee murmured a quiet, private prayer to the dead boy before gently closing his eyelids. Then, reaching down, Lee unclasped something from the corpse's wrist. A solemn smile touched his face as he stood back up and walked over to Graves.
They reached the perimeter of the camp, and by some stroke of luck, they spotted a few remaining soldiers stationed beside three heavy APVs (Armored Personnel Vehicles). Around the vehicles, a handful of young outskirt children were hastily climbing inside.
"Yes!" Old Man Lee hissed, a spark of pure excitement bleeding into his voice. "We can still get evacuated!" He turned to Graves, his expression urgent. "Hold on. Let me go speak with one of the soldiers."
Lee left Graves in the shadows and approached the military unit. After a few tense minutes of talking, the old man walked back. His excitement had vanished, replaced by a devastatingly solemn expression.
He let out a long, ragged sigh. "These APVs are headed directly inside the Great Wall... a place we cannot go."
Graves understood immediately what that meant. He had failed the compatibility test earlier that day; he was a Black Tier, forbidden from ever stepping foot inside the Wall. As for Old Man Lee, he was far past the age limit.
"What do we do now?" Graves asked. It was the first time he had spoken in a long time. He knew he couldn't remain a silent ghost forever.
Old Man Lee stared at the ground, a deeply disturbed expression etched into his weathered face. Finally, he looked up and let out a sharp breath. "There's only one way."
Taking Graves by the wrist, he pulled out the item he had taken from the dead boy and snapped it securely around Graves's arm. It was a bright orange band.
Graves stared down at the plastic, then looked up into Old Man Lee's eyes in disbelief. He recognized the marker instantly. The NHF issued these bands to outskirt children who passed the compatibility tests, color-coded by talent: Blue, Green, Yellow, and Orange. Even though Orange was the absolute lowest tier of talent, it was still a golden ticket. It was enough to get you inside the Wall.
When Graves was younger, he used to stare through the fences of the camp, deeply envying the kids who wore them. Now, he was wearing one himself—but not the way he had ever wanted to.
"No... No, Old Man Lee, you can't just give this to me," Graves stammered, pulling back. "What about you? Don't you want it? Don't you want to live inside the Wall?"
"Don't be a stupid kid," Lee snapped, tapping Graves sharply on the head. "Of course I want to live inside the Wall. If I had my way, I'd use it myself. Don't act like you don't know why I can't go."
The rules were absolute. The NHF military only accepted recruits between the ages of ten and twenty-five. Even if Old Man Lee tried to lie about his age, the entry checkpoints utilized advanced biological scanning technology. Lying to the scanners was an instant death sentence.
"Old Man Lee..." Graves whispered. Tears finally welled up in his eyes, pouring down his dirt-stained cheeks. He stepped forward and hugged the old trader tightly.
"Ouch, ouch! Don't break my waist, brat! And stop calling me an old man," Lee complained, though his voice cracked slightly. He firmly shoved Graves forward toward the military perimeter. "You better get inside that vehicle right now before they leave. Move fast."
"Old Man Le—"
"Shhhhh. Go. Just go, and don't you dare die out there," Lee interrupted, flashing a tough, cynical smirk. "You still owe me a hell of a lot of coins."
Graves turned around and walked toward the waiting APVs, looking back over his shoulder every few steps just to catch one last glimpse of the only mentor he had left.
A few moments later, he was ushered into the back of the armored vehicle. Thirteen other outskirt children were crammed inside the dark hold alongside him. Two armed soldiers stood guard in the back, while two more sat in the front cabin—one at the steering wheel and the other riding shotgun.
With a mechanical roar, the APVs started moving. The vehicle Graves was in took its position in the middle, tightly flanked by the other two transports as they drove toward the towering gates of the Great Wall.