Jake's Story, Apocalyse Cultivation, ch 29

Moving through the woods felt even more natural now.  Jake flowed like a shadow.  He grinned in appreciation as his new cloak fitted itself tightly to his body on its own, letting him move without getting caught on things or making extra noise.

The Deep Heavens Solistic Midnight Cloak kind of didn't look like a cloak anymore, more like a cape with some sleeves, but it was definitely living up to the hype of a rank A reward from a challenge room.

Jake checked his internal clock and verified that some time had passed, but it was till night time of the day he’d left.

The Warhounds compound was the same as it had been before.  The Post Apoc Kings  were all gone now, though.  It seemed there hadn’t been a fight--Jake didn’t see any fires, or smell any blood.  There were no recent signs of violence.  Cooler heads must have prevailed.

Hopefully the Warhounds would still be rational.

There were more men guarding the gates than Jak figured there usually would be.  They must still be worried about the Post Apoc Kings coming back.  Jake stuck to the shadows in the forest and used his new, powerful senses to scan the entire compound.  It took no time at all to figure out where all the Warhounds all were.  From that information, he has a good idea of where the families were staying based on the concentration of lives and their power.

Weak life signals were most likely children.

Jake moved quietly to one corner of the school-turned-base and phased before flash stepping right through the fence.  Only a few hours ago in this world, Jake had been a Silver Body Refinement cultivator and a novice with his shadow ghoul powers.  He wouldn’t quite call himself a master now, but he was at least competent...and a Gold-level Body Refinement cultivator to boot.

He moved between two buildings and dropped his phase ability before the time ran out.  Phasing required concentration and time to recharge, but he almost didn’t bother to phase again.  Especially now that he was inside the compound, he really didn’t have anything to fear anymore.  He almost just left his hiding spot, not caring who saw him or if he started a panic.  But then he remembered his promise to himself, to try to remember not to be too arrogant.

In the end, he waited until he could phase again and move to the building he’d judged was the Warhounds’ jail.  How he dealt with these people would depend on whether they were worthy of being treated like people.

He reappeared in a closet.  As soon as he was sure the coast was clear, Jake moved to the two classrooms that had been converted into jail cells of a sort.  At one time this area of the school might have been for special education.

Jake stayed hidden and it didn’t take him long to decide that the prisoners were not being mistreated, at least not within the context of an end-of-the-world event.  He’d been half-expecting to find some sort of terrible torture dungeon and was happy to be wrong.

For the next ten or twenty minutes, Jake stealthy moved around the compound, checking every area he could feel life signs, and even scoping out a few that didn’t have any, just to make sure that they weren’t full of bodies or something.

By the time he was doing searching, Jake was satisfied.  Now he was relatively certain that the Warhounds were not bandits, at least they weren’t yet.

He’d kept an eye out for any personnel matching the description that his sister had given him, too.  As far as he could tell, there were no Warhounds like that.  Their leader had not been lying during the standoff with the Post Apoc Kings.

Jake was satisfied.  Now it was time to have a chat.

He popped back into reality next to the most sparsely populated end of what he judged to be the Warhounds admin center.

Some paramilitary groups formed after Purple Rain might keep the barracks and command area in the same building, but it seemed the Warhounds had them separate.  Due to the fact they were using a school, this sort of made sense.  It seemed like they’d turned the office area into the command post, and the classrooms had all been converted into shelters, or maybe in-progress apartments.

Jake used his senses to dial in on his surroundings and mentally cursed.  He would not be able to keep playing monster ninja.  There were just too many people near his target.

He knew exactly where the Warhounds leader was.  This close, he could actually differentiate the man’s aura, recognizing it from when he’d seen him before.

Okay, no way to get around this, he thought.  He could phase directly into the man’s room, but that was going to cause chaos.  The leader wasn’t alone. And if the Warhounds freaked out and started shooting everywhere, they wouldn’t likely hurt Jake but could kill each other.  He wanted to have a chat without spilling any unnecessary blood.

Jake squared his shoulders, moved up to the double glass doors of the command building, and knocked.  He folded his arms.

An oil lantern burned on the desk inside.  It gave off just enough light to illuminate the entire reception area for human eyes.  These folks are smart, Jake admitted.  Saving batteries right now as much as possible was wise.

From inside the building, he heard someone shout, “Who’s knocking?  It’s open!”

Jake sighed to himself and thought, Why must everything always be difficult?  I’m trying to be nice.  He knocked again and refolded his arms.

A few minutes later, an overweight man wearing a jersey and a baseball cap came out of a hallway into the large room beyond the doors.  He was carrying a cup of something steaming, probably coffee. A double barrel shotgun was in his other hand.

When he saw who was outside the door, he dropped the cup.  It was coffee, thought Jake.  Makes sense, the entire group is probably on high alert, staying up.  The man continued to stare.  Dancing light from the oil lantern cast shadows across his unshaven face, and his mouth worked.

Jake wasn’t sure exactly what to do, so he uncrossed his arms and waved.  That seemed to be the wrong decision because the man shouted, leveled his shotgun, and shot Jake through the glass door.

Glass erupted outwards.  The night was shattered.  Broken shards rained down on the concrete outside.  Booming echoes returned from the distant trees as the gunshot echoed around the compound.

So this is what it feels to be shot while you have a protection field, thought Jake.  The sensation was like being punched, or maybe slapped, but with no pain.  He could tell how much impact there’d been and what direction it’d come from, but it hadn’t been enough to breach his field.  His energy reserves dropped a tiny amount.

Most of the monsters he’d faced in his first life had lost mana or endurance to fuel their protection, so this made sense.

Just to be safe, Jake instructed his Midnight Cloak to swirl around, covering him in the front like armor.  “There is no need to shoot at me--” he bagan.

The man eeped, cocked a hammer, and fired again.  This time, the buckshot hit Jake’s artifact cloak and didn’t even make a dent.  The blow didn’t decrease his energy this time or have any other effect.  Within the building, shouts and the sounds of running feet echoed.  There was about to be more company.

“Oh for fuck’s sake…” Jake grumbled.  This situation hadn’t been entirely unexpected, but he was still not pleased.  He crossed the broken doorway, taking a single step into the building.  The structure was not a home so there was no threshold.  But even if there’d been one, he would still be able to deal with these yahoos.

Curiously, despite no threshold, he could still feel some sort of residual energy.  Even though it wasn’t entirely unpleasant, it was notable.  While Jake was thinking about that, two more people came running into the reception room.

One was a woman with a tall, lean frame.  She slammed to a halt as she took in the scene.  The other person was a big guy that Jake recognized--the Awoken he’d seen earlier with bone armor growing through his skin.  Sure enough, the moment the man saw Jake, he manifested his spikes and other ridges that grew right out of his skin.

“I just shot this fucking thing twice!” yelled the first man.  His shotgun trembled in his unsteady hands.  He opened the action and fumbled around at his bandolier for another two shells.

“Stay back, Tom.  I got this.”  The bony armor guy stepped forward as the woman faded back.  Jake noticed the 1911 pistol in her hands.  She held her weapon in good grip and moved like she knew what she was doing.

“Hey, I just want to talk,” said Jake.  He knew his voice was still dark, terrible, but he could speak normally now if he focused on it--a perk for being a Gold level Body Refinement cultivator.

“It spoke!” gasped the woman.

“Yes, like I said, I came here to talk or I wouldn’t have knocked first.”  Jake could understand their fear, but he was still feeling a little annoyed by the situation. The clock was ticking.  “I didn’t fuck up your door, shotgun guy did.”

“I’ll get it!” yelled the bony man, and he rushed at Jake.  When he surged forward, Jake was mildly surprised.  The guy was not all talk.  His awakened ability obviously imparted some very serious physicality.

It didn’t matter much to Jake, though.  The guy’s rush ended up with a foot to the face.  Jake diverted the big, awakened attacker down and to one side before using his head as a foothold to hop up.  His cloak spread and actually slowed his fall, giving him a full second in the air.

When he landed, more people were rushing into the reception room from the hallway.  One man raised a rifle, but the tall woman put a hand on his shoulder and shook her head.  “Gary is there.  Let him try first.  We’ve never seen anything like this before.”

“I can hear you, you know,” groused Jake.  “My goal was to have a nice, peaceful chat.  I know I don’t look human right now, but the fact I’m not killing you all should be a cluebat that--”

The bone man, Gary,  got up and punched.  His fist had a layer of spikes on it.  Jake moved Midnight Cloak up in time and stopped it cold.  He was surprised by the power of the attack, though.  It would have pulpedin a normal person’s chest.

Jake kicked out, more of a push than an attack and knocked the man back again.  “Look, dude, Gary, right?  I’ve been pretty chill about you people trying to kill me, because I understand how I look.  But this is twice now.  If you come out me again, I’ll--”

Gary roared and rushed him, throwing a powerful haymaker.  “Fine.”  Jake parried the attack with both hands, kept a grip on the other man’s wrist, and brought Gary’s arm down as his knee came up.  There was a sick crunch as Jake broke the awakened man’s arm. He twisted the devastated limb in its socket and kicked Gary’s foot out from underneath him.  The big man landed in a heap before screaming out all the air in his lungs.  He bit his lip and closed his eyes while cradling his arm, tears streaming down his face.

“Oh shit!  Everyone shoot this fu--” started the man with the rifle, but a newcomer silenced him.

“Everyone stop.”  The man who’d spoken was the tall bearded man Jake had seen before, the Warhounds leader.  To his side was a young guy with a wispy mustache and a curvy young woman with red hair and glasses.

The red head gasped.  “The Grim.  Holy shit, it’s The Grim!  Heavenly Grim!”

“What? Asked the tall man, the leader.  He had an AK-47 in his hands pointed at Jake.

In front of the reception desk, the man Jake had first met had finally reloaded his shotgun.  He shouted, “That thing is bulletproof, Vincent!”

“Oh my god!  There’s a fucking monster in the building!”  One of the other newcomers, the young-looking muchache guy dressed in shorts and a t-shirt fired three rounds from his Glock.  Jake had already gotten his cloak up, and every bullet hit, dumped its energy and fell harmlessly to the ground.

“Stop! Holy shit, stop!” barked Vincent.  “Cease fire!” He glared at the shooter.  “What the hell?  It’s not moving.  Are you trying to destroy our hearing for fun now!?”

“It hurt Gary!”

“I know, but it’s talking--in English--and Gary is still alive.  Everyone hold your fucking fire or I will stick a boot up your ass!  Not only that, Gary is in the line of fire!  What is wrong with you!?”

“Gary is bullet proof,” groused the mustachioed shooter, but he lowered his pistol.

“Yes, he is.  But Tom just said the monster that beat Gary is bulletproof, too,” said the leader.  “I don’t want anyone else to get hurt if we can help it.  All of you stay frosty.  But we don’t shoot at other Bloodhounds if we can help it.  Damn.”  He waved a hand.  “Again, everyone hold your fire.”  Then he turned to the young woman while keeping an eye on Jake.  “What did you say, Helen?”

“It’s the Grim!  The monster that spoke and warned people not to be lawless assholes on the internet!  Remember?  I told you about it but the internet went out.  The monster that wrote the rules of Purple Rain survival!”

The leader, Vincent, narrowed his eyes.  He looked around.  “Nobody do anything for a while.  Let me think!”  He fixed Jake with a savage stare before slightly lowering his rifle.  “And you, monster, if you really are intelligent, that goes for you, too.”

Jake was impressed that the Warhounds leader was so level headed, especially given such a strange situation.  Then he remembered how the standoff earlier that night with the Post Apoc Kind hadn’t ended in bloodshed and realized he really shouldn’t be surprised.  He was being nice, but there was a limit, so he said, “You aren’t really in a position to be giving me orders, dude, but alright.  Think fast, though.  We really need to have a chat.”  The man on the ground, Gary, groaned quietly until Jake gave him a fierce look.  “Suffer in silence, dickhead,” he whispered.

The mustache guy suddenly brought his pistol up again and shouted, “Wait!  Don’t invite it into the building!”

“It’s already in the building,” said the tall 1911 woman, voice droll.

“Oh.”

“We should just wait until everyone else gets here and light him up,” said Tom, the shotgun guy.

“Sounds like a good plan to me.”  The guy who spoke hadn't said anything before now.  He held a bolt action rifle.

“I should have known nobody was going to let me think,” complained Vincent.  He fixed Jake with a steely gaze.  Jake knew the man had to be scared, but he wasn’t showing it.  “What do you want, monster?  Are you the Grim...thing?”

“Yeah, I guess.  I have called myself the Heavenly Grim.  It’s kind of a strange name, I’ll admit.  And yes, I wrote the posts on the internet right after Purple Rain.”

“Okay, good for you.  So what do you want?” asked Vincent.  “I would ask what kind of monster you are, but that isn’t even the most important question.  Why did you sneak into our compound and break my door?”

Jake chuckled.  “Your door, my ass.  This was a school before.  And I didn’t break shit.  Your Fudd shotgun guy over there did.  I just knocked and waved.”

Tom the shotgun guy frowned so Jake gave him the finger.

The woman with the 1911 frowned.  “Grim, or whatever your name is… What the hell did you expect to happen?  Do you know what you look like?”

“That really hurts lady,” Jake said sarcastically.  A bit quieter, he conceded, “But it is kind of a good point.”  He rasped out a sigh.  “Oh well.  Whatever.  So you want to know what I want?”

All the people staring at him, some with weapons up, some who looked like they were ready to run away, all nodded.

“Alright, I need an army.  You are going to be the first part of that.  We are going to have an epic fight against evil tonight.  But before we go, I need to go to your armory and stock up on guns, bullets, and some other stuff I might need.

"So, yeah, some light shopping, then we are going to fight a war.”

Tom blinked and lowered his shotgun.  “Go fight a war?”

“Wait, the armory? Are you robbing us?”  The tall woman with the 1911 pistol looked like she couldn’t believe her ears.  “We are getting robbed by a monster?”

“Not just a monster!  The Heavenly Grim!” said the young woman with glasses.  Her eyes were wide in fascination.  “Just give him what he wants, IMO.”

Jake made a face.  “Robbing, borrowing, call it what you want.  I didn’t kill this dumb fuck, so think of it as payment.”  He used a food to point at Gary where he whimpered on the ground.  “I need to tell you about some things going on, and you are going to help me.  Giving me weapons and supplies is part of that.”

“And why should we listen to you about any of this?” said Vincent.  Jake noticed that the man had not relaxed at all, and still held his rifle at the ready.

Jake thought for a second.  “Two reasons.  First, this entire city, maybe even the state is about to be taken over by vampires and you are going to all likely die unless you follow me.  Second, I could just take it all anyway if I wanted to.  You would not have even known I’d been here.  In  fact, the only reason I’m talking to you right now is because for the moment, I think we are on the same side.”

Silence met that proclamation before Tom snarled, “Bullshit!  It’s a monster, Vince!  Let’s gas him!”

In a patient tone of voice, Vincent said, “Gary is still on the ground.  And bullets didn’t work before, what makes you think they’ll work now?”

One of the men in the room who hadn’t spoken yet, one with his rifle aimed at Jake, said, “We should just wait for one of the mages to get here. Maybe magic will work.”

Jake scoffed and said, “Again, you know I can hear you, right?  Besides, it won’t make a difference. And what do you think I’m here for?  I could have easily killed all of you by now.”

“Shut up, Monster! You make a move, you’ll have a dozen guns going off in less than a second!” shouted mustache guy.

“I am really beginning to dislike you, mustache guy,” said Jake.

“Oh yeah?  What you gonna do about it?  You--”

“Ben, shut up,” said Vincent.

“Yeah, shut up Ben," said Jake.  “Vincent, leader guy, you understand my predicament here, right?  I really don’t want to hurt you people, but you are not making this easy for me, and I really need to have a talk with you without all the guns pointing at me.”

“Why not talk now?” asked the tall woman.

“Because in a moment, your people are going to get here and start shooting me, and they’re probably going to shoot some of you by accident, and then we will have zero chance of working together.”

“Guys, he’s the Heavenly Grim!  You are all threatening to shoot the Heavenly Grim!”  The red head stomped.  “Some of us are alive because of him!”

“There is no proof of that!” argued Tom.

Vincent narrowed his eyes, but didn’t say anything else.  Jake noticed how most of the people he could see were all subtly looking at Vincent for guidance.  They were freaked out, and probably all only acting as rational and calm as they were because of his presence.

Jake noticed two men in the hallways, hugging the corners and ready to bring their rifles to bear.  He heard the sound of running feet getting closer.  Voices echoed around the converted school, people forming groups before investigating all the shooting.  These people had learned quickly after Purple Rain about group survival, it seemed.

In just a few seconds, he was going to be surrounded by Warhounds, and if he didn’t sway Vincent’s mind before then, he would likely have to kill some of these people.  “Pay attention,” he growled.  “Everyone calm down.  I am going to show you something.”  Sounds of running feet were getting closer.

With a thought and much less effort than it had taken in Swampland, Jake crafted a Demonic Contradiction Wave.  One portion was natural energy, and one was his own.  He spent a few more seconds packing in power, filling the containers he’d created with his energy to the brim, putting it under pressure.

He had a clear sightline to the distant trees, so Jake leveled a hand, aimed right over the fence, and fired his attack.  The resulting explosion rattled the glass, decimated the foliage at the impact point, and left a new hole in the forest the size of a house.  Branches, dirt, and pieces of shattered tree trunks rained down all over the compound.

The running footsteps were louder.  Shouting grew in volume.  Lights were coming on from buildings all over the area.  Inside the building with Jake, the Warhounds stared at him silently.

Jake narrowed his eyes.  “I’m running out of time, which means I’m running out of patience.  Are you all going to play nice and listen to me, or do I need to write you off as not useful?”  He really didn’t want to kill these people if he could help it.  Hopefully they’d buy his bluff.  For dramatic effect, Jake willed his eyes to glow blue, and with a bit of surprise, realized they’d already been glowing a bit.

There were yells from outside and people hollered questions.  Some ran toward the explosion.  Others ran away.  Inside the reception room, about half of the people watching Jake looked ready to bolt.

Finally Vincent ran a hand over his face.  “Okay, fine, you made your point, monster, Grim, or whatever you are.”  He turned to his people.  “Let’s go along with this for now.  He’s bulletproof and can level the place, and I don’t want to move locations.”  He gave a lopsided grin.  “I also don’t want us all to die.”

“Good decision,” said Jake.  “Also, since we’re friends now, you can call me Jake.”   He tried giving them a smile, but mustache guy recoiled and looked like he was about faint.

Alright, no smiling, thought Jake.  Then he slowly, carefully moved deeper into the building and stood behind the reception desk, allowing Vincent and his people to meet the scared, angry mob that had just arrived outside, looking for answers.