Frustration

Dilan decided that he shouldn't shoulder all the responsibility and be the savior of everybody around him and that everything should return to the usual just like it was before.

He was excited to fight, but instead of ordering others around about what they should do, and being a chief battle strategist to avoid casualties, ration food, and just about do everything a thoughtful leader of a group would do, Dilan now focused on himself!

'The first two attempts to use mana in my attacks were quite decent. I should focus on that to become stronger, while the others can play leader, or whatever!'

Shrugging his shoulders, he cleared the last few rooms of zombies before taking a last glance at the left side of the T-shaped corridor.

He couldn't see any horned rats or Krendels, but it was only a matter of time before they would flood the corridor.

Afterward, Dilan turned around to go back to the cafeteria.

While passing the hall on the second floor, Dilan heard a loud banging from the left corridor.

This made him freeze on the spot as he tried to listen to the noises carefully.

'Not even the Gluttonous zombie would survive there, and neither the Krendels nor horned rats can issue such noises!'

Excitement spread through his body as he looked at the few dents on the door just to keep walking.

He and Oliver returned to the cafeteria, where they were greeted with smiles.

Some Survivors expected them to bring a few Essence crystals, but only Sarah dared to approach Dilan while the others just watched them curiously.

"Dilan, do you have some Essence crystals for me?"

Because he nodded his head when she requested Essence crystals, it was a given that she would receive, at least, a few crystals of a lower level. Hence, the others grew hopeful that they would receive something too.

However, Dilan just shook his head before he put down the empty backpack.

Cleaning the Reinforced Stone Spear afterward, he placed it aside and started rolling his sleeves down to get ready for a bath.

A frown appeared on his face when he looked at his blood-splattered and dirt-smeared clothes.

If his clothes could be labeled as dirty even before he entered the hospital, they were nothing more than items worth discarding in a trash bin.

There were two huge holes in his shirt; one from being punctured by a tree trunk, and one owing to the nurse tearing open his shirt to take the bullet out of him.

As such, he sighed deeply, ignoring Sarah's disappointed expressions before he asked,

"None of you have spare clothes, right?"

Dilan didn't expect a miracle to happen and suddenly be offered clean clothes, which was why he accepted the fact that nobody gave him a useful answer.

But even then, he couldn't help but feel a little bit annoyed by the attitude of some Survivors.

The three new nurses had red cheeks, and their expressions looked like they had been in a verbal fight with some other Survivors.

Meanwhile, a handful of the Survivors that resided in the cafeteria since day one looked at him in visible disappointment.

He didn't bring them more Essence crystals. As such, they couldn't grow stronger.

Seeing everyone around him, he could only ridicule himself for his generosity to help the other Survivors receive a fair chance at becoming stronger.

To him, it felt as if the last few hours of arduous work from both Oliver and him had been wasted. Even Oliver couldn't help but look at the few Survivors that did the least to help their entire group to have it easier to live in the new era that arrived on Milarn

Even though it had not been long since everybody ensured that they would work hard to ensure that they were useful to the group, there were some Survivors, who went against their words.

"Why am I even trying so hard?" Dilan suddenly grumbled, taking a short glance at the doors before he shook his head once.

At this moment, a whiff of an aromatic smell permeated the air around Dilan, which was followed by his stomach which began to grumble.

He turned to the kitchen and entered it, and saw that Bianne was working hard to cook a delicious meal for everyone.

Thus, he smiled lightly before saying,

"At least, I can fill my stomach with some nice, hot food, thanks."

Bianne had not expected Dilan to open the sliding door, just to mumble something in addition to a 'thanks'.

Afterward, he looked at the food, which caused her to mumble nervously,

"I need..a few more minutes. Please be patient.."

Bianne was still nervous, fearing that Dilan would take revenge on her.

After all, she was the one to have shot him on their first encounter.

Now she knew that it had been a wrong decision, but Bianne was also aware that she had been too frightened.

There was not really an excuse she could come up with to justify her action, and she didn't want that either.

However, Bianne never found the right timing to apologize to him.

And just when she thought that it was possible to avoid an awkward situation, Dilan disappeared after he nodded his head at her.

Her eyes were fixated on the sliding door that closed behind him as he stepped out, her mouth slightly open as she had just gathered the courage to say something.

Sighing deeply, she could only feel little bit frustrated.

But Bianne's frustration was insignificant when compared to Dilan's frustration that everyone in the cafeteria could sense.

If one was able to use their head, just a little bit, one could easily figure out that Dilan's earlier exclamation of 'Why am I even trying so hard?' had nothing to do with him trying hard to fight monsters.

Fighting and killing monsters was evidently something Dilan had taken a liking to, even more so if his opponents were stronger.

By adding the words 'At least' to his sentence in which he thanked Bianne for the food, it was not hard to tell what was on Dilan's mind.

The door had been open and his voice had been clear enough for the others to hear outside the kitchen.

Ever since he had arrived in the hospital, Dilan had been treated like a pushover, was shot at and none of the survivors had thanked him for what he did to allow all of them to gain strength.

This was not even something Dilan wanted, and he would simply ignore their words of gratitude.

However, given the fact that they cleared the front corridor up to the nurses' room several hours ago, it was ridiculous to think that nobody thought of taking the extra set of clothes of the patients that resided in the rooms before.

At the very least, one could have thought about moving the mattresses from the second floor to the cafeteria as well.

To Dilan, the majority of Survivors felt like freeloaders that were not even willing to actually fight.

But even then, they would look up to him for an ability crystal, and some of them had procured it, just to waste it on themselves, without making use of it.

This just meant they wasted precious resources due to their selfishness.

One could also see it as an instinctive action of someone truly frightened.

However, Dilan didn't really care. He just felt like he should act exactly like the other Survivors, mind his own business.

He was going out and risking his life every single time to kill zombies and they would just throw him disappointed looks if he didn't get any Essence crystals for them.

The way some of them were waiting to be spoon-fed everything was starting to get on his nerves.

From now on, only those who were willing to be of use would matter to him, and the others could even die, Dilan wouldn't bat an eyelid if something were to happen to them!

With that in mind, he postponed taking a bath because it would be entirely useless to begin with.

Dilan didn't speak a single word during dinner and quickly left when he was done eating.

Returning to the same old corner, he closed his eyes and decided to take some much-needed rest.

His body required sleep even though his mind cursed out the lazy and entitled Survivors who expected the world from the few hard-working ones while giving them nothing but disappointed looks in return.

Meanwhile, his sulky mood didn't go unnoticed by a few eyes that had been trained on him.

"Does he always have such an attitude?" The youngest nurse asked while looking at the now resting Dilan with a scorn.

Earlier, she had found him quite charming despite the fact that his clothes were worn off, and his face dirty.

However, right now, she felt that he was not even acting like a human.

"How disappointing!"

The moment these two words left her mouth, almost everyone stared at her with daggers in their eyes, while Oliver even got up from the ground, and spoke to her scathingly.

"If you want to leave, feel free to go! We would be better off without giving you food…one less stomach to feed, you know? So, at the bare minimum, shut up, will you?!"

His voice was low, but everyone around them could clearly hear every single word he uttered in contempt.

If not for Dilan, half of the crowd would have either gone insane or dead by now.

But that was something quite a few of them had yet to digest and realize.

Most of them were far away from reality, hoping that this was a nightmare that they would wake up from and everything would be alright in the world again.

Too many things had happened during the last few days, and it was already a wonder for them to be alive.

When Dilan had been injured, most of them understood that they were also required to do something to survive.

Even if they were not able to fight due to various reasons such as their fear, or the incapability to react in time and to move quickly, there had been more than enough other things to do.

Yet, instead of working hard for several hours, some did a few shallow tasks for half an hour before deciding that it had been enough.

And that was not all as they demanded something for their menial work.

Not just Dilan but even Oliver was getting fed up by now, only for the young nurse to fuel his anger even more.

"S-sorry…."