Isolation is the Best Tactic

A/N: I would like to redesign my characters and start from scratch for this second volume. I know that characterisation has been my main weakness so I would like to improve. I understand that William's reason for ditching Chloe, Rosie and Elrich is somewhat superficial but I needed a way to start new.

A/N 2: I've decided to keep Chloe! I probably sound like a broken record but I constantly change my mind as I try to find the best way to continue with the story...

Several days passed since the incident with the cloaks.

I had completely abandoned everyone else.

I was just slowly rebuilding my army.

However, it was obvious that the Killer Winter was starting to come.

The days were getting shorter, with less time to gather resources and longer nights where zombies were plentiful. I gave up on trying to hold Camp A and Camp C due to concerns with manpower—I didn't have anywhere near enough soldiers in order to defend the camps from zombies. In the end, I was forced to reside back in the small camp, Camp B.

Resources were getting pretty hard to come by and my Minions were also gathering less. I found out that during the day, there were also some zombies which roamed the forest. It seemed even the day didn't guarantee safety. I needed to organise my forces every single night so I've been severely lacking in sleep, as a result, I've been forced to only sleep during the day while my Minions were out gathering resources.

It was pretty clear that the conditions were deteriorating at a rapid pace. Some nights, the temperature would fall to a point where I felt as if I'd die if I left my hut. I was able to gather some warm blankets and other items during my raid of the Cloak's main settlement several days prior, but the nights were seriously cold.

I've spent most of my energy trying to rebuild my forces, but soon enough, I would need to begin quickly preparing for the harsher days which were to come. Killer Winter technically hadn't even started yet.

I needed to get things prepared and prepared fast. There was a good chance that my Minions wouldn't even be able to go out on expeditions during the peak of Killer Winter. As a result, I will likely have to make this camp self-sufficient, even in times of extreme weather and conditions.

The first main thing I worried about was food. Whilst I was gathering it at a pretty good rate at the moment, as soon as I was unable to go out on expeditions, I was going to run out. Currently, my army of Minions was much smaller than it was at its peak.

[Resource Division] (91 Minions)

- 3x Woodcutter Minion

- 11x Miner Minion

- 22x Scout Minion (Mining)

- 25x Scout Minion (Woodcutting)

- 23x Scout Minion (Resource Gathering)

- 6x Scout Minion (Hunting)

- 1x Scout Minion (Farming)

[Combat Division] (52 Minions)

- 1x Advanced Warrior Minion

- 1x Warrior Minion

- 17x Scout Minions (Swordplay)

- 22x Scout Minions (Archery)

- 2x Scout Minion (Combat)

- 9x Basic Scout Minion

[Utility Division] (26 Minions)

- 13x Builder Minion

- 10x Scout Minion (Utility)

- 2x Basic Scout Minion

- 1x Minion Manager

I took some pretty big losses during an expedition one day. I was informed by one of my Scout Minions that there was a horde of zombies sitting in the forest, as a result, I lost a huge chunk of my Miner Minions. The rate at which I gathered resources had also slowed down quite a bit, however, I figured that this winter was not only harsh on me, but on many other people as well.

When I checked the global leaderboards, most of the top-ranking humans have also significantly slowed down their progression rate.

It seemed this season was going to be a very tough one.

I wanted to start by making a farm, this way, I could keep producing Minions without having to send them into danger in the forest.

I looked at the crafting recipe for an advanced farm bed.

{Advanced Farm Bed}

Cost: 200 wood, 50 stone, 1 farming crystal

(Produces a base of 20 wheat per day when farmed)

I was collecting resources at a slower pace but I was still getting enough to make several {Farm Beds} a day. I had also begun training some Scout Minions in farming in order to make them into farmers. In the past two days, I had crafted 6 {Farm Beds}.

As I was crafting more {Farm Beds}, I received another notification.

[You have levelled up!]

Level-8 -> Level-9

Rewards:

- [Unlocked!] Simple Conversion

- More Crafting Recipes

- Inventory space {+2000}

Originally, I had intended to sell the wheat I collected and buy things off the grand exchange. I hoped that other people might be more inclined to trade on the grand exchange since things were beginning to get hard and people had more time to level up. There was a chance that people with some sort of Farming System may have been selling things on the grand exchange.

However, with the new Simple Conversion menu, I had a backup.

100 wheat -> 5 apples

200 wheat -> 1 meat

There were several other conversions but this was the one I was most interested in. Normally, gathering apples and meat was no big deal, but once expeditions were made impossible, it would be extremely difficult to gather those resources. Even if I decided to send my Minions off to expeditions during the dangerous period, the cost would likely be far greater than the reward.

Still, the conversion rates were not great so if possible, I'd still like to buy food off of the grand exchange. There were now quite a few more trades going on with all of the extra people who were now at a high enough level.