Preparing for the Blood Moon

New chapter is live.

Settle in, take your time, and let's see what waits in the dark 🖤

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Bloodlust and agitation churned inside him, begging to be soothed with walker blood.

Yes. Counting from the day they left, midnight tonight was the Blood Moon.

Now, most of that time had already passed. It was close to eight at night.

The Blood Moon above grew larger and larger. Evan was starting to worry he might not be able to control himself.

There were many possible reasons Daryl and Merle had stopped answering the radio.

Maybe they had run into a horde. Maybe survivors. Maybe the storm was only disrupting the radio, and they would need to spend the night outside before returning.

Whatever the reason, their silence gave Evan a good excuse to leave the convoy.

He only needed one night.

If he stayed with the group when the Blood Moon arrived, something would go wrong.

Rick and the others had no experience fighting Berserkers. Against Berserkers, they would suffer.

On top of that, this was the second Blood Moon. More walkers would be drawn in than last time.

Evan was almost certain that if he stayed with the convoy, someone would die in a Berserker's jaws.

"I'm going to find them."

Evan grabbed the Stone Sledgehammer from behind him. Thick veins rose along his arm.

His body seemed to swell.

He looked back and caught Rick's startled expression.

"I'll find Daryl and Merle. I'll also check the nearby gas station and see if there are any parts that fit the RV."

"You hold the camp. I'll be fine."

His voice was hoarse and low. As he spoke, thin heat spilled from his mouth.

Then he took the hammer and reached for the door.

Before he could jump down, Rick shoved something into his arms.

"Take the radio. I wrapped it in thick plastic. Rain shouldn't soak through."

"Whether you find Daryl or not, you come back at first light. If you don't, I won't keep everyone waiting for you."

Evan stared at the radio for a second.

Then he grinned and jumped down.

The moment his boots hit the ground, rain soaked through his combat clothes.

Keeping one hand against his chest, Evan silently transferred the radio into his system inventory. Now it could not get wet at all.

With the convoy staring after him in shock, Evan shouldered the Stone Sledgehammer and sprinted into the black forest like a hunting cat.

"Dad, why did Evan go out?" Carl asked from the rear window.

Unease filled his small face.

He was worried Evan might get hurt.

He was also worried something might happen to the convoy without Evan there.

Carl was not the only one feeling that way.

Shane leaned beside a window, watching Evan vanish into the rain with a grim, unsettled look.

In Glenn and Maggie's car, Hershel and Beth looked back with them, but all they could see was the black line of the woods.

Andrea touched Amy's hand and watched Evan's fleeting shape in the side mirror, worry flashing in her eyes.

Jim and Otis reacted late. Once they understood Evan had left the convoy, they asked the people beside them again and again what had happened.

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Evan moved through the dark forest.

An ordinary person would see nothing here without a light. Tall trees swallowed what little remained of the sky.

But through Evan's eyes, the world carried a faint red tint. Somehow, he could see everything in the woods clearly.

Even a walker lying on the ground and playing dead could not escape his notice.

Only after he passed through the whole stretch of forest and reached open ground did he breathe easier.

"If nothing goes wrong, I can be back by dawn."

"And with Rick there, the convoy doesn't really need me worrying over it. He'll make the right calls."

Evan did not think Rick's threat to leave was a joke.

They were already close to the Prison. If it came to that, Rick would absolutely take the convoy and move on.

From Rick's perspective, first, Evan did not need them to worry about him. He was even better suited to surviving this world than Daryl.

Second, waiting would only increase the convoy's risk. If searching for Evan dragged everyone into a worse situation, it would be a bad trade.

And at the core of the decision was Rick's nature.

Dale and Shane were both alive. Rick did not need to live entirely by Dale's moral compass, and he had been influenced by both Shane and Evan.

Rick would put the majority of the convoy first. That was not hard to understand.

Not to mention Lori and Carl were still with the group. Unless Evan was wrong, Rick already knew Lori was pregnant. He just had not said it in front of everyone.

After Rick settled everyone at the Prison, he would still turn back to look for Evan, Daryl, and Merle.

That would be the rational judgment.

"Looking for Daryl now is a needle in a haystack."

"He and Merle left on motorcycles. Finding them in this storm would be too hard."

"So I might as well survive the Blood Moon first and deal with the rest after."

The red in Evan's eyes deepened as time passed.

Even if he wanted to search for them, he had to handle the second Blood Moon first.

Otherwise, if he dragged a huge wave of system-enraged walkers to them, would he be rescuing them or delivering them to slaughter?

"I don't know how many walkers the second Blood Moon will draw, but it probably won't be fewer than thirty. If it doubles the same way the timer did, maybe more."

"I can use terrain and a building to my advantage. The storm can hide my trail. I can take this Blood Moon alone."

"I remember the map. There's a village near here."

Evan's attention sharpened.

He changed direction and ran toward the village.

An hour and a half later, he followed a muddy, narrow path through the downpour. Rain slapped his body hard enough to sting.

The storm slowed him badly. Moving through it was much harder than normal.

By the time Evan reached the village, sweat and rain had almost become the same thing on his skin.

"The village isn't that large. Once there were no living things left to bite, the walker villagers would have scattered outward."

"At most, there shouldn't be more than twenty walkers left, spread through different corners."

"With the rain covering me, walkers that wandered out of the village shouldn't be drawn back."

Evan lay on a small slope outside the village and studied it carefully.

Out here, even a village could sprawl like a small town.

But it lacked the key pieces that mattered.

No hospital. No police station. No fire station.

Without those basic resources, even a big village was still only a village.

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