As the Shepherd left, the problems remained, because he had set a condition to spare the camp.
"Kodji, have you already done what I asked?"
"About Elie? Yes, Marie is doing it. I wasn't just going to do it like that."
"You're right. But now you must have guessed why we asked for these checks on Elie's body?!"
"A little, yes."
He looked at his sister, who seemed overwhelmed. He wondered what could have put her in this state, what the Shepherd had asked of her. It surely had something to do with Elie.
"Can you tell us then what the other guy wanted?! Or are we going to stay like this?"
At that moment, Elie came out of the room with Marie. She kept touching behind her right ear.
"What are you talking about? It sounds interesting."
"Very well, Elie... We were waiting for you. First of all, did you notice the scar?"
"For what exactly?! For a while now, everyone has been on edge."
Yannick, in a fit of anger, decided to spill everything, perhaps because he was tired of beating around the bush.
"Listen, kid! The Shepherd! He wants you!!"
The revelation was shocking. A flood of questions was already swirling in everyone's mind, Elie's first.
"Why! What does he want with me?!"
"We don't know much, but it seems he's looking for someone! And that someone is you."
"That's absurd!"
"But it's true!"
Nico was weighing the pros and cons in his head, but a question came to mind.
"Why would he want to check if she had a post-operative scar?!"
They looked at each other as if they were thinking the same thing.
"If we asked for that, it's because we suspect she's being tracked by something in her body. It sounds absurd, but it would explain how he managed to find this place so easily."
"But that doesn't make sense! I found Elie much farther away in the city. If he really wanted her, he would have looked for her long before."
"I have a theory!"
Michael, who had been silent and just listening, also spoke up.
"Kodji, you told me that when you found her, she looked like one of those filthy creatures but didn't seem aggressive."
"Yes, she never attacked me once. Plus, her body was warm, so I thought she was just blind or had some kind of disability."
"And you, Elie, you tell me you've lost a large part of your memory..."
"Yes, why?!"
"Actually, I have a theory that Elie is the subject of an experiment, and there's a link to what's happening in the world today."
It was completely absurd yet logical. It explained, among other things, why she had a chip implanted in her ear and why she had lost part of her memory. However...
"But! That doesn't get us very far. We know Elie is his target, and if she truly is an experiment..."
Too much information was flooding in at once. In the current context, it was better to comply with the Shepherd's agreement, but they all sensed something was wrong.
"Who... who says he actually plans to spare us?"
Marie, who had been there from the start, was trembling as fear slowly rose within her. After all, she was right in a sense. Why would someone with such an asset—controlling the Biters—want to negotiate?
"Maybe he doesn't see the point in killing us... I don't really know."
But in that moment of hesitation, the person concerned spoke up.
"Fine, I'll go with him!"
"You must be joking?!"
"We don't really have a choice here... Carin, is that it? Tell me when he's supposed to return."
"In two days."
Without quite knowing why... everyone had accepted this situation. Perhaps out of fear, or perhaps as a rational, considered choice. But what truly caused this unanimous decision stemmed from the fact that Elie had never truly belonged to the group. In a sense, it was logical; she had only spent a day there. However, this perspective frankly irritated Kodji. The idea of abandoning someone you didn't know and letting them suffer meant losing a part of one's own humanity.
"Are you sure we don't have any other options?"
No one answered. This silence meant everyone agreed that they had to meet the Shepherd's demand.