It was the same woman who had delivered the report moments earlier.
After handing over the folder, she didn't step back. Instead, she deliberately tightened her clothes, bent forward, and flashed Elric a suggestive wink.
Her voice dropped into an oily, practiced tone.
"Mr. Elric... you look tired. Before everything ended, I ran a massage studio. How about I help you relax a bit?"
As she spoke, she reached forward, clearly intending to touch him.
The air in the hall instantly turned cold.
Every woman surrounding Elric stared at her as if she were already dead. Their teeth clenched audibly.
To seduce him right in front of them—the audacity was unbelievable.
Jenna, and Erin had already rolled up their sleeves, veins popping. They were only holding back because Elric hadn't spoken yet.
"No need," Elric said calmly, his expression flat. "I'm not tired."
This woman didn't just fail the appearance threshold—her quality score was barely above forty. She wasn't even close to being qualified.
Naturally, Elric rejected her without hesitation.
But she didn't get the hint.
"Don't be shy, Mr. Elric," she pressed on, smiling smugly. "My skills are very good. I've satisfied many important men before."
She genuinely believed she was top-tier—that she wasn't inferior to Natasha or Grace. If Elric wanted them, why wouldn't he want her?
That arrogance was her fatal mistake.
"Are you deaf?" Jenna snapped, taking a menacing step forward.
"Someone like you dares to seduce my husband? Right in front of us?"
"You're looking for a beating!"
She launched forward with a vicious flying kick that connected directly with the woman's face. Crack! The force lifted her off her feet.
The plastic-surgery woman hit the ground hard, her head bouncing once.
Before she could even scream, Jenna, Nini, and Lily piled on top of her like wolves on prey.
Fists rained down. Kicks landed with brutal precision. No mercy whatsoever.
In seconds, the woman's face was swollen beyond recognition—eyes puffed shut, nose clearly broken, lips split and bleeding. If the others had joined in, she wouldn't have survived.
Grace stood up coldly.
"From now on, you're expelled from the Star God Shelter effective immediately." Her voice carried throughout the hall. "Your rations are revoked. Your housing is forfeit. You have one hour to leave our territory."
She gestured sharply. "Guards—drag her out."
Two armed guards rushed in, seizing the unconscious woman by her arms and hauling her away like trash. Her feet dragged limply, leaving a faint blood trail.
No one protested. The message was crystal clear: you don't touch what belongs to Elric.
"Alright," Elric said lazily, completely unbothered. "Let's continue with business."
He pulled Grace back down onto his lap with casual possessiveness. She melted into the position naturally.
Only now did he fully appreciate that the former police officer's figure was far more dangerous than he'd initially remembered.
Surrounded by familiar warmth and faint fragrance, Elric casually resumed reading the progress report.
Several minutes passed in comfortable silence.
When he finished, setting the folder aside, his expression showed genuine approval.
Overall, Natasha and the others had done exceptionally well. Far better than expected.
The shelter population had reached over 1,800 people—a substantial community by post-apocalypse standards.
Most were original residents of the Ginkgo Community who had survived the initial chaos. But they'd also expanded recruitment, bringing in survivors from several nearby residential zones who'd heard rumors of a safe haven.
The territory wasn't massive—but it was stable, defensible, and self-sustaining. That mattered more than size.
More impressively, they'd established a strict hierarchy governing every aspect of shelter life:
SS Class – Elric's women. Absolute authority below Elric himself. Unlimited resources and privileges.
S Class – Personal maids and immediate family members of SS-Class individuals. Excellent treatment and protection.
A Class – Major contributors, managers, skilled professionals, and explorers who brought back valuable resources. Good rations and housing.
B, C, D Classes – Ordinary shelter residents, ranked by usefulness and behavior. Basic survival guaranteed, but quality of life varied significantly.
The system was ruthlessly meritocratic. The higher your rank, the better your supplies, housing, food quality, and overall treatment.
Promotion depended on three primary factors:
Finding supernatural resources – ability crystals, Devil Fruits, mysterious beads, anything with power. Discovering talented or beautiful women – those who might qualify for Elric's adoption standards received significant rewards. Expanding territory and influence – successful raids, new settlements absorbed, strategic victories.
Beyond the practical hierarchy, Natasha and the others had gone all-in on ideological indoctrination.
Elric was being portrayed not as merely a powerful survivor, but as a chosen being—someone sent by higher powers to save humanity. A prophet, a messiah, a living god descended to Earth.
The women around him? They were publicly framed as participants in a "divine reproduction mission"—selected vessels meant to carry humanity's savior's bloodline into the future.
In normal times, before the apocalypse, such rhetoric would've been laughed at. Mocked as cult nonsense.
But in the apocalypse?
With abundant food when others starved, with safety when death lurked everywhere, with literal miracles performed before witnesses—flying through the sky, summoning lightning, erasing monsters—
People believed. Desperately, hungrily believed.
Because belief gave them hope. And hope was the rarest resource of all.
Elric smiled faintly, setting the report down.
He wasn't particularly comfortable with the god-worship angle, but he understood its utility. Fear and reverence kept people in line far more effectively than threats alone.
Then he looked up.
Natasha had returned while he was reading. She carried two ability crystals—one white, one faintly blue—and was accompanied by a girl being gently guided forward by Grace.
The moment Elric saw her, his eyebrows rose slightly.
An acquaintance?
Not someone he'd met in person—but someone he recognized from online, from the before-times.
Before civilization's collapse, he had learned about physical-strength Devil Fruits through watching her livestream. She'd been one of the early viral sensations—the girl who'd eaten a supernatural fruit on camera.
The girl standing nervously before him now had fair skin, twin ponytails tied with yellow ribbons, and a slightly oversized yellow hoodie. Large, anxious eyes darted around the room, taking in all the beautiful women surrounding him.
She was unmistakably the former internet sensation who had briefly broken the internet.
As her information panel materialized in Elric's vision, he spoke calmly.
"You're... Custard, right?"
The girl's eyes widened in shock.
"That's your streaming handle, isn't it?" Elric continued, leaning forward with interest. "I watched your video about eating a Devil Fruit. Quite the performance."
Name: Custard
Age: 20
Appearance: 88
Figure: 86
Quality: 100 (Pure)
Overall Rating: 87
Monthly Exchange Reward: 18
System Evaluation: Meets adopter criteria. Adoption will promote Devil Fruit Tree growth. Subject possesses existing ability—integration may provide enhanced benefits.
Elric's smile widened slightly.
Another qualified woman with an existing ability. The system seemed particularly interested in those cases.
This day just kept getting better.
Custard Bun swallowed nervously, her voice small. "Y-yes... that's me. How do you know...?"
"I make it my business to know valuable things," Elric replied simply.
He stood up slowly, Grace sliding off his lap gracefully.
"Tell me," he said, his presence washing over her like a wave, "what brings a famous internet celebrity to my shelter?"
Custard trembled slightly. Her hands twisted together nervously as she tried to find the right words.
"I... I was hiding in an abandoned convenience store nearby," she began, voice shaking. "Your patrol team found me three days ago. They said this place was safe, that there was food and protection..."
She glanced around at all the beautiful women surrounding Elric, clearly intimidated.
"They brought me here and told me to wait. That you'd decide what happens to me."
"Smart of them," Elric said approvingly.
Natasha stepped forward. "She has a physical enhancement ability from the fruit she ate. Quite strong, actually. She killed two mutated dogs single-handedly during transport."
"Interesting." Elric circled around Custard slowly, evaluating her like a collector examining a rare find.
She wasn't as stunning as Elsa or as elegant as Natasha, but there was something appealing about her—a mixture of innocence and hidden strength. The twin ponytails gave her a youthful charm that contrasted sharply with the hardened survivors around her.
And more importantly, the system wanted her.
"Custard," Elric said finally, stopping in front of her. "You have two choices."
She looked up at him with wide, frightened eyes.
"First choice: you can leave. We'll give you three days of food and let you take your chances in the wasteland."
He paused meaningfully.
"Second choice: you stay. You become mine. You follow my rules, accept my protection, and in return, you'll never go hungry, never be cold, never face the monsters alone again."
The girl's breathing quickened. Her eyes darted to Natasha, to Grace, to all the other women who clearly "belonged" to Elric in some way.
"If I stay..." she whispered. "What exactly does 'become yours' mean?"
Elric smiled—not unkindly, but with absolute certainty.
"It means exactly what you think it means."
Silence stretched between them.
Custard Bun looked down at her hands—hands that had killed monsters, hands that had scraped for food in ruins, hands that had trembled with fear every night in the darkness.
Then she looked back up at Elric.
"I'll stay."
Her voice was quiet but firm.
"I choose to stay."
There is 70 chapter Advance, in my patreon. If you are interested can check it out.
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