The Bitter Farewell
Morning came without mercy. The sky, gray and heavy with storm clouds, seemed to share the collective emotion of the bastion. Rob was preparing to leave, and although he had planned it well in advance, the actual moment struck with brutal force.
He walked through the silent corridors of the shelter. The walls, built with effort and sweat, echoed with memories of past laughter, battle cries, and midnight sobs. Every corner of the bastion held a memory, a hard-won battle, or a miracle survived.
When he reached the kitchen, he found Victoria preparing breakfast as if it were just another day. Yet her hands trembled ever so slightly.
"Did you sleep at all?" Rob asked, leaning on the doorframe.
"Just enough not to collapse," she replied without looking at him, eyes fixed on the cup in her hands.
Rob stepped forward and hugged her from behind. He felt her shoulders drop just a little, relieved to no longer carry the weight alone.
"I promise I'll come back," he whispered.
Victoria turned and looked at him with a mix of love, fear, and pride.
"Don't promise me you'll return. Promise me you'll fight to the end. If you die... let it be for everyone. Let your death be worth a thousand lives." Then she gave a faint smile. "Though I'd rather you didn't die, you know?"
They both chuckled softly, with a lump in their throats.
Matthew appeared minutes later. He was only twelve, but the change in him was obvious. His gaze was firmer, his body stronger. He walked up and handed Rob a small notebook.
"So you can write down everything you see. I want you to tell me all about it later."
Rob took it and hugged him tightly.
"You'll fill it too when you go out there," Rob said, feigning a light tone.
"Yeah, but not yet. Mom won't let me."
Behind them, Amélie crawled cheerfully, unaware of the gravity of the moment. Rob knelt down, scooped her into his arms, and lifted her toward the sky like he always did. The little one laughed, oblivious to everything. Then, as he lowered her, she touched his forehead and said:
"Daddy, don't go."
Rob felt his heart split in two.
"I'm going for you. So the world waiting out there... won't be a hell."
Later, in the main courtyard, Alan, Marlon, Marcelo, Carla, and many others were waiting.
"We don't like this," Alan said seriously, "but we understand why you're doing it. Make sure you come back. This bastion is your home."
"And you are my family," Rob replied, emotions tightly held back.
Apolo and Maya approached. Their eyes glowed with intelligence and loyalty. Rob knelt, stroked their heads, and whispered:
"Watch over them for me."
Both gave a soft growl of acceptance and pressed their foreheads to his.
The air was heavy. The farewell fell silent. Rob stepped back. He activated his teleportation ability and, in a flash of light and wind, vanished.
Only the echo of absence remained.
And with it, his journey through the roads of blood and fire had begun.
The First Journey
Rob's first stop was the northern highlands. From there, he began his journey toward Peru.The landscape was desolate. What were once lively towns were now skeletal ruins of concrete, rusted with time and consumed by abandonment.
He moved cautiously through the ruins of Tacna and Moquegua. Weeds grew through cracks in the pavement, and the collapsed buildings stood like open tombs. Occasionally, he found skeletons—some human, others impossible to identify.
On the edge of a small village, Rob found a child hidden beneath the rubble. The child was dead. What hurt most was seeing him clutching a stuffed animal so tightly, as if he still believed it could protect him.
Rob closed his eyes and buried the boy with his own hands."You deserved to live, not me," he murmured with a clenched heart.
Upon reaching Arequipa, he sensed something was wrong. The air was thick and heavy, with an unnatural humidity that didn't match the region's dry climate. That's when he saw the first mutated trees—enormous creatures, with roots that slithered like tentacles, leaves that opened like jaws, and vines that pulsed like beating hearts.
Rob called them plant guardians. They had no eyes, yet they sensed him. With every step he took, the trees slowly turned in his direction.
"I won't back down," he said, drawing his sword.
The trees attacked without warning. Vines lashed out like whips, and a giant root burst from the ground trying to trap him. Rob rolled across the dirt, sliced through one of the vines, and took cover behind a trunk to avoid another blow.
The battle was intense. The creatures seemed to regenerate with sunlight and even communicated with each other. Rob was forced to use all his ambient energy to launch a cutting wave that split the main trunk of one of the mutants. The explosion of toxic sap nearly burned his face.
After an hour of combat, the area was finally cleared. Rob, covered in green blood and breathing heavily, leaned against a rock."This is only the beginning…"
Cuzco was even worse. The mutant trees there were colossal—over thirty meters tall—dragging their roots as they moved. Rob had to climb the remains of a temple to stay out of their reach. From up there, he watched as the trees wrapped themselves around buildings, reclaiming civilization as their own.
"Nature… is taking revenge," he whispered.
He chose not to enter the city. He didn't have the resources to face them alone. He noted it down in his notebook and continued north. One thought kept repeating in his mind:
"If this is Peru… what horrors must have awakened in the rest of the world?"
His next destination: Lima.
Human Ambush
Arriving in Lima was unlike any city Rob had seen since the beginning of the apocalypse. It wasn't the ruins or the mutated plants that filled the air with danger—it was the silence. Not a natural silence, but a restrained, tense quiet, as if the city were breathing beneath the ground, waiting.
He moved through the central streets, finding traces of what had once been human barricades. There were signs of struggle—but not against beasts. Rusted bullets, dark stains on the walls, broken chains. It became clear: people here hadn't died from creatures… they had died at human hands.
Farther on, in the old district of San Juan de Lurigancho, Rob saw the first signs of life: columns of smoke, buildings reinforced with fresh wood, and a black banner hanging from a crumbling tower. He hid and watched from a distance. Armed people moved with organization—and there were prisoners. Many prisoners.
Then he saw the horror: a woman, barely alive, dragged out of a cell by two mutated men. They bore no obvious deformities, but their eyes gleamed with madness. They beat her for resisting. The other prisoners watched without a word, their eyes empty, resigned. It was a nightmare prison.
Rob clenched his jaw. He moved through the rooftops at night. He spent two days exploring the sector, identifying routes, observing captors and captives. The place was ruled by a degenerate human cult. They had developed a sick ideology: the supremacy of pain. They believed people with abilities were impure and must be punished. Survivors were used as slaves, and those with powers were tortured or experimented on.
On the second night, he heard a faint whisper—a young woman, barely audible from a cell in the basement. Her voice, though broken, carried the clarity of someone who still had hope."If someone's out there... please... I'm not strong, but... I can help. Please… help me…"
Rob crept closer. He broke the lock with his sword and lifted her into his arms. Her body was covered in bruises and burns. Around her neck was a suppression device for abilities."What's your name?" Rob whispered."Ana," she said, tears falling."Do you have an ability?""Yes… 'World Storage'... I can store things. Lots of things.""Rank?""A+. But... I never learned to fight. They captured me fast."
Rob said nothing more. He carried her out under the cover of night. That night marked the beginning of the liberation.
With surgical precision, Rob disarmed traps, eliminated sentries, and stole weapons. Over the next 48 hours, he used the metro tunnels to move prisoners to safety. Each nightly mission freed more people. Ana, though still weak, organized and stored supplies using her ability. Her capacity was astonishing—she could store weapons, food, and even entire groups of supplies inside her "personal space."
Finally, Rob faced the leader of the cult: a tall man, his face covered in scars, radiating strange dark energy. He wielded the ability "Soul Flagellation," which allowed him to torture his enemies' spirits, weakening them slowly. Rob withstood his mental attack and, after a brutal hand-to-hand fight, decapitated him with his Andean sword.
The base was freed. Over 200 people had been enslaved there. Ana, now recovering, knelt before Rob."I don't know how to thank you… I'll follow you wherever you go."Rob helped her up."Stand, Ana. The world needs people like you—not followers, but companions."Ana cried in silence, and the bastion of Lima was purged of its horror.
The Forgotten Towns
After freeing Lima, Rob set out toward Peru's interior. His goal was clear: find more survivors, reconnect the broken fragments of humanity, and plant seeds of hope wherever fertile ground remained.
The following days were marked by deep desolation. The smaller cities of the interior—Huancayo, Ayacucho, Abancay—had been reduced to hollow shells. Entire towns had been wiped out, some by beasts, others by hunger and despair. Rob walked empty streets where the wind dragged scraps of paper, broken photographs, abandoned toys.
In some settlements, he found groups of five or ten people who, upon seeing him, fell to their knees in tears. They didn't know his name, but they'd heard rumors—of a man who liberated cities, of a warrior with a grave stare and a gleaming sword. Rob didn't treat them as subjects, but as what they truly were: broken souls seeking warmth.
One night, while camping beside a collapsed church, Ana approached. The fire cast flickering shadows across her face as she spoke.
"You're different from the others. You don't just fight… you stay. You listen, you understand."
"I don't always know what to say," Rob admitted. "But I've always known that looking someone in the eyes after they've suffered… is more powerful than a thousand speeches."
Ana nodded. She was stronger now, walking with ease, and though still bandaged, her voice had regained firmness.
"Before you came, I thought my days of helping others were over. My ability is useful… but I didn't feel useful. I became a burden. And they treated me like one."
"You're not a burden anymore," Rob said, looking at her sincerely. "You're part of something greater now. And you're not alone."
Ana lowered her gaze and said something that clearly weighed on her.
"When I was little, I knew a boy named Carlos. He was kind to me… at first. I considered him a friend. Some time ago, I heard he was still alive… in the north, in Piura. I was happy at first. But now…"
"What about him?"
"I've been thinking. Sometimes… he was too insistent. Jealous. I think he always expected something from me. And now that he's seen me with you… he might not take it well. I'm not sure, Rob. But if you meet him—be careful. He can be vengeful when he doesn't get what he wants."
Rob nodded, processing the warning quickly. It could save lives.
"Thank you for trusting me. I'll keep that in mind."
They spent the rest of the night in silence, gazing at the stars. Ana understood the burden Rob carried. And in that moment, Rob understood something too: he couldn't save everyone. But as long as there was someone left to help, he would keep walking.
The Betrayal in Piura
The city of Piura rose between heat and mist like a shadow of what it once was. Rob and Ana arrived at dusk. The entrance was eerily quiet—too quiet. Unlike other places, there were no signs of recent battles or scattered bodies. But neither was there human movement. It was as if the buildings were holding their breath under invisible tension.
"Carlos used to live here," Ana murmured, frowning. "If he's still here… we'll know soon."
The first group of people appeared near the edge of the central plaza. They were armed but not hostile. One of them smiled upon seeing Ana.
"Ana! You're alive!"
It was Carlos. An athletic man with intense eyes and a charismatic smile… too perfect.
"Carlos…" Ana greeted him cautiously. "This is Rob. He rescued me."
Carlos shook Rob's hand, but his eyes cut like blades. The moment was brief, but Rob saw everything he needed: judgment, resentment… and something darker.
That night, they were invited into a refurbished building. They were offered food, shelter, and access to local intel. Ana and Rob separated briefly as she reunited with old acquaintances.
Rob didn't sleep. Something felt wrong. The watch was too lax. Carlos's behavior too polished. He used his enhanced perception ability to listen from the rooftop. What he heard chilled his blood:
"He's here. The Chilean. The one who killed the southern hordes. If we hand him over, the beasts will leave us alone—like last time."The voice was Carlos's."And Ana?""She… betrayed me. She's with that guy now. She's no longer one of us."
Rob moved fast. He leapt across rooftops, broke locks, and woke Ana.
"We're leaving. Now."
"What's going on?"
"They sold us out. Carlos sold us out."
Just as they crossed the hallway, an explosion shook the building. Claws. Roars. The mutant beasts had arrived. Carlos hadn't wasted time.
The battle was brutal. Rob protected Ana while using the urban terrain to his advantage. He slashed, dodged, bled. By dawn, the last mutant fell to his sword. Carlos was found by the other survivors—beaten and tied up. Rob looked at him with sadness, not hatred.
"You weren't the monster here, Carlos. Just another man who broke."
Ana couldn't hold back her tears—not just for the betrayal, but for how blind she had once been.
"I'm sorry, Rob…"
"Don't apologize. Live. Learn. And move forward."
The Foundation of a Dream
Rob returned to Lima with the survivors rescued from Piura. The journey was slow and exhausting—but also silent. Many of the newcomers were processing their losses; others simply clung to the relief of being alive.
When they arrived, the inhabitants of the makeshift city welcomed them with hugs, blankets, and warm food. Ana, using her A+ "World Storage" ability, released strategically stored supplies: medicine, clean water, clothes, tools.
That night, Rob gathered everyone in Lima's central square. Firelight flickered across his serious features as he began to speak.
"For months, we've fought to survive. We've faced monsters, betrayal, and horrors the world should never have known. But here we are. Together. Stronger."
He paused for a few seconds, then continued:
"But we can't stay here forever. Lima is a safe point, but it's not sustainable. Our base in Chile continues to grow, but it can't hold all the survivors still alive in South America. That's why… it's time to found a new home."
Eyes met across the crowd—some surprised, others inspired.
"I've found a place. High, secure, rich in resources. With room for millions—if we build it right. It's in Bolivia, in a city once called La Paz. There… I will build the Second Bastion of Humanity."
A mix of murmurs and applause broke out among the survivors. For many, it was the first time in months they had heard a real plan for the future.
"And though I must leave again soon, I won't be far," Rob added. "I'll be opening a path for you—for everyone. One that leads to a more dignified future."
That night, many cried silently. Others embraced him. Even the children—many of whom already knew his name as a living legend—looked at him with shining eyes.
Ana approached him at the end, carrying a small case.
"I made this for you. There are blueprints, essential supplies, and samples of what I can create with my ability. I'll be ready to transport when you need me."
"Thank you, Ana. Your support will be vital."
"And… thank you for never giving up."
Rob smiled—for the first time in days—and looked toward the dark horizon.
"There's still so much to do. And it begins now."
[End of Chapter 19 – To be continued in Chapter 20: The Second Bastion]