After Surviving the Apocalypse, I Built a City in Another World

Althea felt her ears ringing in apprehension.

She had always known, through Medussa’s borderline mad experiments when she was still in Alterra, that there were elementalist cores inside them. It worked like the combined bone marrow and heart for elemental power.

When they found out, this type of evil had indeed crossed their minds.

It was just something inevitable when it was found out.

People instinctively wanted to grow stronger. Knowing the awe and position that Elementalists occupied in this world, they feared that acts like these could be even more intense.

For elementalists, this was particularly worrying news. Who’d want to know their kind was being hunted down ’for parts’?

It was why the Ministers jointly decided to place a gag order to this finding, and also subtly instructed Loki and the others to watch out for unusual disappearances of elementalists in every territory they had people in.

They reiterated that it had to be low-key lest they trigger people’s curiosity instead.

It wouldn’t do if people were to study elementalists’ bodies specifically because Alterra was so concerned about them not doing it.

For more than a year, there had been no news about this. She had truly forgotten the potential issue that could rise.

Now that she actually saw it happening, her blood turned cold.

Althea wanted to check if the others could be woken up, but she heard the door opening from a distance. She knew that people had come, so she had no time.

She immediately laid down on an inconspicuous table, pretending to be dead, adding some powder to make her seem paler and a bit more purple and brown makeup to make herself look uglier.

This way, they wouldn’t be curious about her. Hopefully, they would actively ignore her existence, even if it was just because of disgust.

She also added some of the aroma orcs disliked to herself. It also irritates humans’, but not too much.

BANG!

”What are you doing, sleeping?!” she heard some yelling from outside, followed by the sound of forceful impacts.

They probably beat up the sleeping orc guard. They did not dwell there though. They came here for a reason, so they headed to the laboratory shortly after that.

The newcomers arrived with a bang (i.e. opening the doors loudly, and Althea had to consciously control her flinch).

”Huh? Why isn’t anyone here?” one of the voices asked, and she could hear the footsteps go around the room as if they’d find someone hiding somewhere.

Althea couldn’t see them since she was pretending to be dead, but she could tell by their footsteps that there were at least four people, and at least two of them were orcs or half-orcs.

”Where’s your assistant?” one asked, and the other shook his head.

”I was certain he should’ve returned with the weakening potions for the newcomers.”

Althea reckoned it must’ve been in the dead assistant’s space, lost forever.

Good.

”That lazy bastard,” another said, as if he did not just take an extended lunch break.

It was here that a rough voice sounded from the door. ”Are we doing the insertion or not?” the man asked. There was a growling sound passively in the man’s voice, indicating he was likely an orc or a half-orc.

Things were straightforward after that. The two human doctors (she surmised) began to prepare for the operation, which would be happening right in this room.

She could hear one of the beds getting rolled to the side, one with an elementalist on it.

At some point, they stopped by Althea’s bedside and her heart tightened, wondering if she had been discovered.

”So ugly. When did this come here?”

”Smells...”

”UGh, disgustinG!”

The other orc—who approached out of curiosity—seemed to smell her, too, and immediately growled in disgust.

Fortunately, she had diluted the scent. It was just enough to keep those getting near her farther away, but it wouldn’t be so overwhelming that people would want to burn her to death.

”Is she a newcomer? Probably, right?”

”Whatever. We’d just have to get more weakening potions later.”

”Can we expedite dealing with this? I want to get rid of it soon. The stench is killing my brain.”

Althea was a little offended, but she was more puzzled. Elementalists were treasured resources elsewhere. Here, these people could not wait to get rid of her.

Was plundering cores more important than subduing the actual person who could actually control the power unpopular nowadays?

”What’s her element?”

”Water.”

”Hmm, the most subtle element. At least the success rate is relatively high now that we know what to do.”

”Yes, out of the three success stories, only one was wind, and the other two were using the water element.”

”Shall we use her today?”

Althea: ”...”

Miscalculation!

.

.

However, fortunately, the orc growled at the side. ”I want fire!”

The two human scientists sneered at the orc’s demand. However, they did not speak. They just continued what they were doing, administered something like a sleeping potion to put him down, and then began to work.

They waited for the other orc or half-orc to leave before they started chatting.

”Fire is the most difficult to control among the basic elements. That thing really dares to covet it,” one said, slicing one of the bodies.

The tone was filled with disgust.

”Tsk, you know how foolish orcs and half-orcs, If only the humans didn’t die when we placed the stones in them, do they think we would bother?”

There was a lot of bitterness in his tone. Obviously, he also wanted to be a beneficiary in this experiment.

It seemed like this scientist’s motivation was not gaining knowledge, but rather to get power for himself.

The other was much more cynical. ”What’s the point if they cannot control it well? They can only use a portion of the original power. What a waste of a good stone.”

”Can’t that Fairo control wind? He looks fine to me.”

”That guy can only do a few showy things at most. Not much attack power. Why do you think he’s only done his sermons once every few weeks?”

”And to think the core he got was a superior one from a rare level 30 elementalist. He could exhibit the power of a level 15 or so at most.”

”But it’s better than nothing, right? Lucky bastards. Even if an experiment failed, they still had the chance of survival. They’d just be considered injured as long as it’s handled quickly.

”Well, orcs have stronger physiques. When we figure out if we can transfer some of the capabilities, then our stay here in the past year is not in vain.”

A pause. ”Perhaps we can even take their physique and create a whole new creature!”

...

The operation on the half-orc began. They approximated it to end in three hours unless the beast’s body repelled it earlier into the surgery.

Althea, still lying down as a ’donor,’ kept thinking of what she should do. She could wait until the scientists left again, but could she really leave these elementalists behind? Some could still be alive.

At the same time, she didn’t want to alarm the enemies. Even if they had caught their tail, they were still unaware of what else could be there behind it.

As for the four other elementalists there. She had determined that two were still alive, and the other two were dead. She pursed her lips and wondered if she could possibly rescue them.

She listened to the clatter of tools as well as the occasional exchange of words. She could, perhaps, get a glimpse of the surgery’s process, too.

”This fire core isn’t very saturated.”

”Means the source is not that talented. Probably has low potential.”

”Heh, then it fits the orc well, right?”

”High potential cores are harder to tame, anyway. So we only experiment with low potential ones. These orcs don’t deserve any more than that.”

”Right. It’s already unfair that they usually don’t die even if the experiment fails, unlike humans who could explode directly.”

”I wonder how other areas are faring. In all our years here, we only had three success stories, and they could barely be considered a pass in our standards.”

”We can’t beat the others. Their resources are much better. Tsk, we don’t even have the necessary magic tools here.”

”I think the facilities in Quo Town are better. Both are orc territories. Why are we here?”

At this, Althea almost flinched. So there were indeed more territories. This one’s a higher-level one, too, and therefore much more troublesome.

”I wish we could get assigned to a human city or even a town this time. This place is too brutish and disgusting! I swear my intelligence has lowered interacting with these brutes.”

”City is too much, human towns are better,” the other said, sounding more self-aware. ”With our levels, I don’t want to face those elementalists stronger than me!”

Althea pursed her lips as she listened, her mind recognizing the name of the town he mentioned.

Quo Town happened to be the only orc-led Town in the world, and was also Warrior City’s close subsidiary.