Chapter Fourteen: Setting an Example

As Claire began setting up a Stall with a sign I prepared beforehand that read 'The Garden of Eden, to those curious, approach and to those Hostile...𝘣𝘦𝘸𝘢𝘳𝘦'

Seeing the Spore Carriers no one dared to come close, so I told Claire to put one of the boxes on the old foldable table that I found in the vault and reveal its contents.

Once everyone saw the box filled with fresh juicy fruit a panic went across the people.

Within moments someone had the courage to approach.

"U-um miss...w-what are you selling?" Asked a man who looked to be hungry and wearing scraps who was clearly ready to run at any sign of danger.

"Mostly Food and Water for a cheap price, We only sell to the Sick, Starving, Poor, the Elderly, and the Children," Claire announced loud enough for the crowd to hear.

"H-How much for the F-fruit?" Asked the man.

"3 Cap per fruit, and as an added bonus, if you buy two fruits, then you only have to pay 5 Caps," Claire announced once again.

"And, as for the Clean Water we sell, it costs only 5 Caps per Jug bought, with the deal of buy two, get one free," Claire informed the crowd.

Upon hearing this news, the people in the crowd went into a frenzy.

With almost everyone soon approaching the Stand and buying Food or water and both if they had enough money. Some were also taking advantage of the good deals offered by Claire.

Then, the classic idiots decided to show up and ruin the good atmosphere.

A group of 10 thugs came strolling up to the Stand with arrogant smiles and their chests puffed with pride.

"My oh my! Someone selling food and water on our Turf without any notice? How rude! Hey boys, what do you think we should take as compensation for such rude behavior? Ah, I know! Come on girl, your gonna come with us, boys take the food and water and kill whatever the hell those things are," The leader of the thugs spoke.

Not needing to hear anything else, I commanded the Spore Carriers to attack and infect the men with their spores, without killing them or dealing any lethal damage, I need to set an example and these thugs will do nicely, plus I really wanted to see how far I could infect someone with the spores before completely turning them into the Spore Carriers that I have without them losing their intelligence.

Suddenly seeing the green Spore Carriers charge towards the Thugs everyone in the crowd watching gasped and began backing away from the conflict, meanwhile the Thugs pulled out their weapons thinking that the Spore Carriers would be the same weaklings that they bullied daily, well...they were about to find out they were dead wrong.

[A/N: Imagine it like this, the Thugs are at most, Level 5, while the Spore Carriers are Level 15, it's not much of a fair fight even if the Thugs have two more people than the Spore Carriers]

Everyone watched as the Spore Carriers charged towards the Thugs like wild beasts and before the Thugs could even react, the Spore Carriers were already upon them...

It couldn't even be called a fight, the Spore Carriers almost immediately defeated the Thugs before they infected them with spores and dragged them away from the Scene and returning minutes later to Claire's Side.

The people just looked at this scene with fear.

And while it took some time to get the business going again, I focused on controlling the spores infecting the Thugs.

I first used the Spores to spread and multiply within their lungs before having the Spores begin strengthening the men's lungs.

I wanted to test the limits of my spores, so why not use the perfect lab rats before me?

Once two hours passed and Claire ran out of goods to sell, I had her return to the vault through the desert where we could easily lose any followers.

Meanwhile, due to my control of the spores, their transformation into Spore Carriers was much faster than what the Vault dwellers experienced.

At this rate, it would take only days to completely transform them, but instead of just letting the Spores go out of control and turn them into a living fungal colony, I wondered if I could create some kind of cooperative relationship between the host and the spores.

One where the Spores would upgrade and maintain the body while the host would provide the spores with the needed water to survive.

But, while I had the spores upgrading the Thugs' bodies, I also had the spores begin spreading through the body via the thugs' blood and through the blood, I gained access to the thugs' brains with the spores.

And after some thought, I made an important decision.

Using the spores, I had them begin removing and erasing the Thugs' memories, making them completely forget themselves, but still have the knowledge of a normal adult, basically, I induced amnesia.

But instead of turning them into mindless soldiers, I reestablished the Cooperative Relationship between the Host and the spores by pulling the spores out from the Thugs' brains and back into the heart, where they could at any time, distribute themselves anywhere within the body via the bloodstream and make the necessary repairs in case the hosts are hurt.

The most difficult part of this process was creating a cooperative relationship with the host's white blood cells in order to have harmony in the body, and as an added bonus, now I can even have the spores help the white blood cells in defending the person's body from diseases and illnesses.

All in all, this took me all day and night, while the Thug's were unconscious, I had the spores take control of the thugs' motor skills and walked them to the vault dead in the night where no one could see them.

And of course, if the Hosts ever turned violent or became traitorous I could just take control of the spores in their bodies and manually kill them.

Although this is cruel it is a necessity with how harsh this world is.