Chapter 155

  Jake was ging to the front of a high-rise building at a two-story height, Adhesive Secretion anch him in pce, Cloak rendering him invisible. It was a new day. He had retly emerged from the sewers, having leveled up from 73 to 74. He was now just one level away from meeting all the requirements to be able to evolve into Stage 3. After leveling up, he spent four skill points to acquire an additional, fourth upgrade for each of the following skills: Swords, Enharength, Enhanced Regeion, and Enhanced Reflexes, all of which he had retly advao Rank III.

  The upgrade he acquired for Swords exteheir length, providing increased reach. The upgrade for Enharength gave him greater damage resistance, boosting his Pierce resistance by a remarkable 30% to a total of 44%. In his several battles with ex-humans, he found that weaker mutants like walkers and leapers could no longer infliy damage on him. Meanwhile, stronger foes like sshers and chasers dealt minimal damage, which healed almost instantly, thanks to the fourth upgrade for Enhanced Regeion that signifitly increased regeion speed at the cost of more mana. When they mao hit him, that is, because the fourth upgrade to Enhanced Reflexes made him even mile in battle than he had been before. While all these upgrades made him more powerful, the y to find additional methods of colleg mana only intensified.

  That left him with one more skill point to allocate. Jake decided to hold off on using it because he wao spend it on Mind Reader to increase its Rank from II to III. Its current progression was stuck at 85%. At its current Rank, each use of Mind Reader progressed it by about 5%, give or take, depending on how deeply into a target’s memories he vehus, he o use Mind Reader three or four times on different targets to adva to 100%, after which he would be able to upgrade it to Rank III, which could potentially allow him to explore even deeper memories of his targets.

  He had to learn the location of Los Demonios’ base, and advang Mind Reader to the Rank was the easiest way to aplish that. Which was why after emerging from the sewers, Jake spent some time looking for Los Demonios. Eventually, he stumbled across a group of them. Their vehicle ositioned in the ter of a four-way interse as the gangsters fired at a swarm of ex-humans emerging from a nearby building. Jake wasted no time sprinting toward the Demons. However, as soon as they spotted him, they immediately fot about the mutants. The gangsters jumped into their car and took off with a screech of tires, not even b to fire at him. They simply wao get away from him.

  Jake watched them disappear into the distan amazement. It was the very first time something like that had happened. Previously, every enter with Los Demonios had ended in an attack against him. He recalled passing a message to Skullface through one of his soldiers. Perhaps, after receiving his message, the gang leader had finally decided to leave Jake alo seemed highly unlikely, though. A more pusible expnation was that rumors of his dangerous reputation had spread among the lower ranks of Los Demonios, prompting at least some of them to avoid any frontations with him to prevent being killed.

  That’s why Jake was currently ging to a building, hidden from sight by Cloak. His pn was to wait for a Demon vehicle to drive by and then push off the wall, perf a mana-infused jump and nding in front of the car or, if he timed it perfectly, even atop its roof. It seemed like a solid pn, but the problem was that he had no idea how long he would have to wait for a Demon car to pass. While there were plenty of Los Demonios around, the city was enormous, so he could be in for quite a wait.

  An hour ticked by, and Jake was growiless. Sitting idle wasn’t his style, even if it was only figuratively speaking. When he wasn’t battling mutants, he was usually colleg mana ables or searg for various quests and challehis hour of inactivity felt like an immense waste of opportunity. There had been a couple of occasions in the past when he had hidden away after suffering severe wounds to allow his body to focus solely on healing. However, remaining in one pd doing absolutely nothing while waiting for a Demon vehicle to pass down this particur street, which might not even happe like a great misuse of his time.

  Just when Jake was about to give up, an SUV showed up, its sides and hood adorned with red demon skulls. He got ready. As the vehicle approached his position, he prepared to jump. To his surprise, however, the SUV began to slow dowually ing to a halt right in front of him. Jake watched, pletely motionless. Nothing happened for a couple of mihen, some of the doors swung open, and four armed gangsters emerged. They gathered in front of the right side of the vehicle, staring at the building’s front wall. Jake g to the space between two windows on the sed-story floor, remaining pletely motionless and invisible to the naked eye.

  He watched as the gangsters exged tense words, their ay palpable. One of them, a burly figure with jagged tattoos snaking up his arms, frow the PDA in his hand.

  “I dunno,” he said, gng at the others. “Acc to the ser, the freak should be right before us.”

  “Well, it’s clearly not here,” anang member replied, staring at the building before him.

  “Any idea how far it should be?” another one asked.

  “Should be just a few yards in front of us,” came the response from the burly one, irritation creeping into his tone.

  “Maybe the ser is ag up?” someone suggested, sing the street lit by the m light with suspi. “Has that happened before?”

  “I don’t think so. It should be w just fihe tattooed man insisted, his voice steady.

  “Could be ihe building,” the angster specuted nervously. Sweat beaded on his forehead.

  “Yeah, probably.”

  “Where’s it at now? Still there or moved somewhere? The freak always zips around chaotically at incredible speed.”

  The tattooed, burly man g the PDA he held in one hand.

  “Nah,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s still in the same spot. The ser would’ve let us know if the freak moved.”

  “Unless it’s ag up,” the wary gangster said again, ay creeping in.

  “Well, like I said, the ser seems to be w just fihe burly gangster snapped back.

  “The freak must be sleeping or something,” another man piped up, his voice low. “I mean, it should sleep sometimes tht?”

  “I guess.”

  “e on inside. If the freak is actually sleeping, it’s our ce to get the drop on it. We’ll be the oo deal with the freak, and Skullface will reward us awesomely.”

  “Let’s just be as quiet as possible,” the anxious one warned. “The freak has already taken dowy of uys.”

  The fangsters nodded grimly at one anripped their ons tightly, and began their cautious advaoward the building. Jake waited a beat longer, letting them get a little closer, then sprang into a.