The faint white light allowed Elynn to see Shawn's face clearly.
His laughter carried a hint of desolation and misery; his world was gray.
He laughed until tears streamed from the corners of his eyes, whether from sadness or pain, he didn't know.
Seeing Shawn remain silent, Elynn, gasping for breath from laughter, began to speak.
"The Auction House is under your control, but North Carolina is small, so small that every area can accommodate one or two The Cult members."
"There are at least nearly 2,000 Zealots distributed across this land. How can you control them alone?"
"You think you just need enough time, but in reality, they will be faster than you, finishing everything before you even react."
"Do you think no one has resisted before?"
"But in this apocalypse with blocked information, the The Cult members scattered in various regions actually know nothing."
"Even now, the only face they recognize is still this one."
As he spoke, Elynn pointed to his own face.
"That's all."
Looking at Elynn's face, Shawn felt as if he had grasped something, but he was still one step away.
His face?
It had been repeated too many times: his face, his face. What was wrong with his face?
Or rather… no, he said 'Elynn's' face!
Shawn had a guess, but this guess made him gasp.
If this guess was true, then Elynn not only didn't disappoint Shawn, but his imaginative actions even made Shawn marvel.
"He truly is a genuine overlord!"
Shawn felt a tingling sensation all over his body, and heat continuously surged from his chest upwards, rushing all the way to his brain.
Elynn's words completely overturned the 'truth' Shawn had previously speculated.
Those Supporterss were not the ultimate controllers of the Zealots The Cult!
This The Cult Leader truly played his cards well.
Perhaps it really aligned with Shawn's previous guess: even if the Zealots The Cult were to completely fall in the future, he would never die.
Instead, he would quietly go to another state and secretly plan everything anew there.
Thinking of this, Shawn suddenly acted, his two large hands abruptly clamping onto Elynn's shoulders, the instinctively applied force causing him pain and making him grit his teeth.
"I want you to tell me everything you know." Shawn looked directly into his eyes.
At that moment, Shawn's figure seemed to constantly magnify in Elynn's consciousness; smelling the scent of blood emanating from Shawn, he seemed to truly see that person.
Just as Elynn had just said, they were too similar…
There seemed to be a quality in both of them that converged, intensely impacting Elynn's consciousness and the reality before his eyes, making his already abnormal mental world even more chaotic and increasingly difficult to distinguish.
The world seemed to spin in his eyes, and eventually, only Shawn's figure remained.
"You are…?"
"…Alright, I'll tell you, I'll tell you everything."
Shawn only felt that the look in Elynn's eyes seemed to change, and the man suddenly became inexplicably submissive.
However, this was good, as it saved Shawn a lot of effort.
Shawn clarified all the questions that had been in his heart during this period, such as the confusion he first experienced when encountering the Zealots on that jungle road at the North-South border.
Why was the Zealots' skin this strange pale color?
Why did their pupils constrict to such an extent in their normal state?
Why did everyone need to wear a neck ring?
Why…?
Gradually.
As Shawn and Elynn engaged in a question-and-answer session, the true nature of the entire situation slowly unveiled itself before Shawn's eyes, as if a dark curtain was being lifted.
North Carolina has ample sunlight, and thanks to this, trees grow tall and sturdy, and even the undergrowth is tall enough to reach one's knees.
The Zealots are active in jungles and abandoned houses for long periods, and they regularly receive baptisms at specific times and places in light-proof locations similar to the 'Auction House'.
Over time, these people were constantly deprived of sunlight, and without ultraviolet radiation, there was no melanin deposition.
That's why their complexions looked pale, especially under white light.
The content of the baptism in the Auction House was that after reading the 'Scriptures,' the Zealots would one by one bleed themselves.
According to their doctrine, during the process of blood loss, one could experience the feeling of life fading away.
And at that moment, they were closest to 'God'.
Clearly, this was also one of the reasons for their pale skin.
"Is pupil constriction also due to prolonged stay in the dark?" Shawn asked.
"…No, that's because everyone has been injecting that damned fentanyl for a long time!" Elynn suddenly became agitated.
"fentanyl?"
"An opioid, a synthetic powerful sedative that can make everyone calm down."
Shawn had not expected that behind the Zealots' constricted pupils was drug abuse and control.
No wonder, no wonder these Zealots weren't even afraid of death, let alone Zombies.
Perhaps sometimes they couldn't even distinguish between fantasy and reality.
It was precisely because of this that the simple divine abilities Shawn displayed appeared to them as if amplified hundreds of times, creating a shock akin to a god creating the world.
fentanyl was originally an internationally controlled substance, but they somehow obtained large quantities of fentanyl, enough for so many Zealots to use for several years.
And originally, behind the neck ring, there was a needle through which the drug could be directly injected into the Zealots' bodies.
However, due to the Zealots' frantic way of acting, the drug would often be inadvertently lost.
So they simply canceled the injection and switched to oral medication, but the neck ring was retained as a token for them to identify their own people and also as a symbol of the The Cult.
Hearing this, Shawn couldn't help but want to complain.
"Do you even need an identifier in your state?"
"It's obvious from a mile away."
Their pale skin was whiter than a corpse dead for three days, and their pupils were smaller than the whites of their eyes, making them look eerie.
This kind of aura was impossible for others to imitate; even Shawn was startled for a moment when he first saw them. The Zealots' mark was too obvious.
However, after Shawn learned the truth, he understood this group of people.
Under such an extremely harsh long-term survival mode, it was difficult for them to be like normal people.
They were constantly in an unhealthy physical state, then on drugs, and regularly bleeding; it was already remarkable that they hadn't died.
Through this, Shawn also understood why, even though Elynn had controlled North Carolina early on, there were only nearly 2,000 people left in their organization.
Admittedly, for the current Survivor Camp, the Zealots were definitely a powerful force.
But for a state that once had a population of over 10 million, it seemed a bit meager.
The initial survivors were certainly not just this handful of people, otherwise, it would be a pipe dream for them to clear out all the Zombies in the entire state.
Shawn boldly guessed.
Perhaps initially, even tens of thousands of people survived, but gradually, only less than 2,000 remained.
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