348 "Magic?"

Spearheaded by the military and the good guys, an army of volunteer survivors willing to take risks for the general public, everything happened according to their plan. A plan that almost took a week to form with only several keypoints finalized.

The hundreds of thousands of people traveled on the national highway despite the guaranteed chance of encountering hordes. There were other options like traversing the outskirts of the wild forests and vast fields, but the President was another good guy. 

All the initial military planning was overthrown and was changed to accommodate the civilians. All kinds of vehicles that can be used for transportation were gathered. The young and injured were prioritized. The old and women had to walk together with all the other adults, and there was no exception.

Garbage trucks were used as the vanguards to ran over anything that blocked their path. Only when they get near a town or city would they have to be careful about the surroundings and scout first before having to clear the whole town. 

The national army made sure that every capable adult, men or women, were utilized to the best of their capabilities. All logistics were shouldered by the women and the old while the fighting must be done by men and a volunteer job for women. They can fight if they want or contribute more by cooking and other chores. 

Inventory weight has great importance whether people could walk far or not. Even a gram of extra weight over the survivor's limit would make them feel sluggish, so proper logistic distribution was important.

The current plan was to reach the far north using the national roads and resorting to branch roads if it was impossible to move forward.

The reason given by the officials was to plan ahead and capture more land for farming. The northern portion of the country has been a great place in terms of producing food, which is one of the important things in maintaining a working community. 

As for the real reason why the government wants to move up north? Only the president knows. 

The estimated time of travel would be five days if everything went smoothly and six days if something went wrong. Along the way, they would scavenge everything they could and saving everyone that they could. 

Everyone willingly followed the president due to his speech the day before the departure. 

"Just like you I'm also a human being. I have a family, a wife, a son. Yet here I am fulfilling my duty. I could turn around and go back home, search for my family, but I know for a fact. they won't be happy if I left all of you to your fates.

"Trust me. Follow my commands. Let me help you! I beg you! I just want to save you too."

For once, the people started to resonate with the president. They asked for forgiveness and promised that they would work hard and follow commands.

Jun received two great news that day and one that's not so good.

Blackout started tugging their webs and managed to gather important information even before it went public. The good news was the government's departure to the northern part of the country and the promotion of a close friend, becoming the person in charge of the Antipolo Stronghold.

After showing great strategical ability in terms of defense, together with a close-knit relation with Jun, the leader of the opposing faction, President Rodriguez promoted Corwin Homes to Major General, the same rank as his classmate, friend, and rival, Paul Celestine.

A lot of high ranking officers tried to dissuade President Rodriguez since Corwin could switch sides due to being too close with the opposing leader.

However, President Rodriguez simply shut them up with his reason. "Why are you so pessimistic? Don't we have advantages too? We can get information from them too, and we could trade more. Everyone here needs to face the bitter truth. Unless the government can sustain everything that the civilians need, we need our only ally's help. We're still building walls while they're already developing things. We're behind by manpower and technology, and unless anyone of you can magically produce infinite amounts of bullets, we have to tone the aggression down."

That topic ended with no one able to bring it up again, sealing Corwin's position as the new Mayor of the Antipolo Stronghold.

Blackout ears learned of the news directly from the old man's mouth when he was drunk from success, bragging every few seconds by himself.

And the bad news? They lost sight of the VIP they were supposed to tail all the time. Jun personally ordered this job and Blake Shu placed great weight over the matter. When he heard about the news, he immediately gathered the elite people tailing her to find out what's going on.

According to his subordinates, she entered a military-only zone and never came out even when the day of the Northern Expedition started. They couldn't follow her inside nor stick around for too long to investigate since the facility was heavily guarded with armed soldiers and was forced to watch the gates from a distance. 

Jun couldn't do anything about the matter and only accepted the fact that she's gone. He wished that President Rodriguez was honest with the information he told him and moved on with his day. Still, from time to time, he couldn't help but check his smartwatch for any message.

With the government's body leaving the stronghold, only small limbs were left and they won't even count as competitors in terms of technology and fighting prowess. 

Black Haven could easily take over the place if he wanted to do so, but he won't. What's the point? Blackout would be bored to death with nothing to do around.

On the other hand, some developments were being made at Taytay.

After days of exploration, The Frontier finally uncovered several things about the forest dungeon. The treants had a guaranteed chance to drop a tree bark and a good chance to drop branches every time it was killed. The bigger the treant, the higher the quality of the dropped loot. 

The biggest treant seen was fifteen meters while the biggest one killed was five meters. 

Everything was due to the disparity in the overall attack and defense. The treant had average attack damage, average attack speed, but extremely durable defense. To make matters worse, all of its basic attacks could be considered AoE since branches sticking out from its log arms could send anyone flying with a simple graze. Together with a passive ability to regenerate over time, it became very troublesome to hunt treants.

Thankfully, it had a glaring weakness and everyone thought of it on day one of fighting.

Fire damage.

Molotovs crafted from gasoline and empty bottles were thrown at the treants to weaken them and it was extremely effective. Any damage the treant receives during its burning time would be doubled, decreasing the time they have to hack at it.

Unfortunately, the combatants were also affected by the burning fire and can't fight fully. The treants body would be scorched in flames and to attack would mean getting closer, allowing the treant to attack in return. The gasoline could spill and fly around, turning anyone unlucky into a crisp dish. Though not fatal, it was extremely annoying for the Frontier.

Treants had the natural ability to deflect projectiles weaker than their armor. Considering the current grade of arrows, every arrow can be seen as an investment that will never be earned back.

What's interesting was a battle chef who happened to play with a branch suddenly felt an urge to use energy while playing with the stick.

With a wave to the left and to the right like a magician waving his baton, the branch sucked his energy and gathered it at the tip of the branch. The chef felt a bad omen seeing the orange light gathering at the end of the stick, and pointed at an empty space.

He decisively cut the supply of energy, thinking he would pass out if things kept going, and saw a bright star fly into a nearby tree. The tree got enveloped by the bright orange lights and started creaking as it fell to the side.

To the people watching by the side, they just witnessed something remarkable and remained frozen for a good few seconds. When they recovered, they hurriedly surrounded the man only to notice that he was suffering from energy exhaustion.

Energy exhaustion was different from energy depletion. The term was made after several people started to feel weak due to a sudden large consumption of energy. Anything that consumes half of the total energy is guaranteed to cause energy exhaustion. Aside from the weakened state, energy recovery would be halved until a few hours pass.

Still, the party members just gave him enough space and continued pestering him.

"How did you do it? Did you learn a skill?"

"Is that fireball? I promise it looked like one! Just look at the tree over there. It's probably burnt all the way inside. it already looks like charcoal!"

Before the man could entertain any questions, someone from the Frontier dungeon management group came running fully armed with the current best armor available to the public. "What happened here? Are you alright, sir? Why don't I take you to the clinic, so we can properly look at your situation."

The man raised his hand and a few people behind him stepped forward to carry the exhausted man. Then, he faced the crowd. "Due to the incident, we will temporarily close the dungeon. Please go back for now and wait until further notice."