"I ended up drifting all the way to Sudenia. It's full of high mountains, so it wasn't affected by the flooding. But the area is prone to earthquakes—there was a major one almost every two weeks. We fled to Varden, and the extreme cold hit just as we arrived. That's when we were forced to join the Joyce brothers. With the weapons they had, the two of them took over a mountain in Varden, acting like local warlords and kidnapping many women."
At this, Claudia Schultz's eyes grew red. "We had no choice if we wanted to survive. But two months ago, there was another earthquake in Varden. Then, flesh-eating crows appeared. A lot of people died in the bandits' nest. Titus and Drake Joyce forced us to flee with them at gunpoint, making us find food for them. On the road, he even sold many of the women for food. When we got to Immeasurable Mountain, he was planning to pull the same trick again, but he ended up getting killed himself."
