Chapter 80

  Jake remained rooted to the spot, his hands still raised in the air. When he saw Frank bring up the assault rifle he was armed with, he instantly transformed his hands into cws. Due to one of the upgrades he had acquired for this ability, the transformation took less than a sed. One moment he had human-looking hands, the hey were long, intimidating talons. This abrupt ge caused the survivors to freeze in shock.

  Jake maintained his posure as the ptform tio asd. He had no iion of attag the four of them unless absolutely necessary. He hadn’t gohrough all the trouble ing them to this point just to sy them. However, he was ready to take down Frank if the man gave him a reason to do so. Jake khat withiight fines of the elevator shaft, he could easily reach Frank in a split sed, long before the man could aim and fire his gun. Even if by some miracle, Frank mao shoot, the bullets would hardly harm Jake. He was well aware that it would take much more than a few bullet wounds t him down. Frank’s shots wouldn’t even be able to slow him down.

  For a moment, silence hung heavy in the air as nobody moved or spoke. Then Archie whispered, “What the hell? Those cws look nasty.”

  His hushed voice seemed to snap the others out of their trahey shifted uneasily, and then Frank snarled, “Fug monster.”

  Muttering these words, he ti his on up, and Jake prepared to unch himself toward Frank. However, he immediately halted in his tracks when he saw Isra, standing by the leader’s side, swiftly grab hold of his assault rifle, guiding the gun barrel downward toward the floor.

  “No,” she shouted at the leader of the group. “Don’t shoot him!”

  Frank was taken aback by Isra’s ued rea, causing him to momentarily fet about Jake. He turned his head to look at her, a mix of disbelief and anger evident on his face.

  “What are you doing, you idiot?” he s her. “Let go!”

  “He’s not attag us,” Isra said. “If you fire at him, you’ll only make things worse.”

  For a moment, Fraated, his gaze shiftiween Isra and Jake, who stood utterly still, him with his rge, unblinking eyes. When Frank aowledged that Jake appeared non-threatening, his expression softened ever so slightly, taking the edge off.

  “I don’t trust him at all,” he said, still tightly gripping his assault rifle but at least not making further attempts to aim it at Jake.

  “If he inteo attack us, he had many ces to do so,” Isra pointed out. “But he hasn’t made any aggressive moves toward us, has he?”

  Jake lowered his hands but otherwise remained motionless. His hands hung at his sides, still transformed into long, curved talons. He noticed that the two fingers he had lost during the fight with the very first ssher had already grown back. He had no idea whely it happened. He had been so preoccupied with dealing with the survivors he hadn’t even bee aware of that fatil now.

  “Look at those,” Rick said, his voice tinged with awe, gazing at Jake’s cws. “They look nasty. Aurned his hands into cws so freaking quickly!”

  “Well, I guess we now know who killed all those mutants on the first floor,” Archie added.

  Frank nodded his head. “That freak is dangerous. We o keep a close eye on him all the time.”

  “Don’t call him a freak,” Isra said firmly. “His name is Jake. Despite his appearance, he’s still human on the inside. He uand everything you say.”

  “I couldn’t care less! Who knows what’s going on in that messed-up head of his? Just because he hasn’t attacked us doesn’t mean he’s our ally.”

  “He was a survivor, just like us,” Rick pointed out meekly.

  “I still ’t believe he was human once,” Archie mused. “How did he bee a mutant? What happened? How is this even possible?”

  “I’m more ied in why the System says he’s dead,” Rick mentioned, pointing at the PDA held in Isra’s hand.

  “Yeah,” Archie nodded. “I’m curious about that too. The System says he’s dead, but he clearly is not.”

  “I think wheransformed into a mutant, the System simply stopped reizing him as a survivor,” Isra specuted. “The System probably cssifies him simply as a mutant now.”

  “I wouldn’t just bel him as a regur mutant,” Rick said quietly, casting a fearful g Jake’s menag talons. “He turned his hands into those cws so freaking fast. I bet he use them effitly. And who knows what else he’s capable of? I’ve never entered a mutant like him before.”

  “That’s what I’ve been saying all along, you morons,” Frank grumbled. “We know nothing about him, so we ’t trust him. And who knows where he’s leading us now?”

  “Why do you thiaking us somewhere?” Rick asked.

  “Use your brain, you fool,” Frank s him. “The ptform didn’t move wheepped on it. It only started asding wheepped on it. He must be trolling it somehow.”

  “You might be onto something,” Archie said quietly.

  All four of them shifted their gazes toward Jake as if anticipating him to provide an answer. With no mouth and struggling to write, he cked the means to vey his iions. Even if he could unicate with them, disclosing his goal might not be wise. He doubted they would be pleased if they discovered he was maniputing them for his own gain. They would receive no rewards at all for helping him plete the tower climbing challenge.

  Before any of them could speak further, the ptform finally arrived at the eighth floor. The survivors exged puzzled looks, uain of what y ahead. Ign their uled chatter, Jake pivoted aed the elevator shaft into a broad empty corridor extending in both dires. In his expanded field of vision, he saw two survivors position themselves on his left and the other two on his right. When they briefly sed their surroundings and found nothing of i, they g one another in puzzlement.

  “Why did he bring us here?” one of them asked. “There’s nothing here.”

  It was then that a message emerged in his mind.

  Wave 1 has started!

  Targets killed: 0 out of 75

  Immediately afterward, magical portals began to tear open all around them.