The Founder's POV

Chapter 24: A Victim

**(Jin's POV)**

After getting enough sleep to refresh my mind, I woke up to some noise from downstairs.

I looked around the room for a moment, a habit I hadn't noticed I had, then at the dilapidated bed I had been sleeping on.

I might not need more than two hours of sleep with my upgraded body, but I still maintained at least six hours to keep my mind healthy.

There's no point in leaving this place if I go insane...

The Resistance's headquarters was a fairly large mansion, but it was still dilapidated as it was in this hell. I thought this city had been built hundreds of years ago, then this giant tree suddenly lifted it into the sky, depriving it of light forever like a violent curse.

The wall paint had peeled off long ago, and the smell of mold lingered even with the windows open.

The carpet was also torn, giving me a clear view of the rotting wood underneath. 'The stench of rotting wood will drive me mad soon...'

I sighed as I descended to the first floor via the cement and tile stairs, oddly still intact after all this time.

I wanted to brush my teeth, but there was no trace of toothpaste here, and even water was extremely rare.

I saw Gilbert, the leader of the group, and Lyra, the Archer, discussing something at a distant table covered with papers and pens.

Elara the poet stood beside them, silently observing. Although his name might suggest otherwise, he was male and could be of great use when he started moving.

It had been almost two months since I joined this group, and we still had two more months before the mission began, determining our future by ourselves...

I felt a bit of anxiety gnawing at my heart, but I didn't show it to those around me at all. Anxiety was like a disease that spread quickly among people, potentially ruining everything.

I passed Asher, who was the group's Tank. He was lifting weights he had found somewhere, training while sitting on one of the dilapidated chairs.

The weight didn't seem to matter to him; it looked more like he was playing rather than training. I didn't blame him since entertainment was almost nonexistent here.

I entered the kitchen and grabbed one of the canned goods on the counter. It had expired 360 years ago, but it still tasted better than black oil.

My body was resistant to bacteria, so eating it now was like eating it when it was fresh, though the taste was unfortunately not the same...

I still had to eat something every now and then; that part of my body hadn't changed much...

I returned to the main hall where the other core members were and looked out the window, specifically at the street.

The closer you got to the Black Ink Hotel, the less aggressive and insane the puppets became. You could see them now walking through the streets to and from the hotel.

After working for more than 20 hours, most of them wanted to consume oil and rest in a random house for a while.

About 200 meters from the hotel, surveillance decreased significantly, and no one was around to stop the chaos, so many puppets fought to steal or seize the oil supplies from others.

For the Resistance group, fortunately, there was no need for us to work all the time, as Gilbert somehow took the best job among the puppets.

For the puppet society leaders, Gilbert was the puppet who hunted travelers outside the tree with a 100% success rate and was completely loyal and satisfactory.