Chapter 370
The first thing Jake did was use Mind Reader on Rex, wanting to see what exactly the base leader had been doing in the last several minutes. Since Jake only needed to access the most recent memories, it took him less than a second.
He learned that Rex had been in the security control room, checking out the legendary shotgun. At some point, he cast an occasional glance at the screens displaying the surveillance camera feeds and just happened to catch a glimpse of Jake leaving HQ on one of them.
Although the angle of the camera didn’t reveal Jake’s face, Rex immediately became very suspicious. He bolted out of the security control room, sprinted down the stairs, and approached some of the guards. They were shocked to see him suddenly come down, having just witnessed him leave HQ.
A brief dialogue ensued between Rex and the guards, during which they realized HQ had just been infiltrated by someone who looked exactly like Rex. One of the guards speculated it might be some kind of magic spell. That’s when Rex and the guards rushed out of the building to catch the doppelgänger.
Jake was pleased with what he had just learned. So far, Rex had failed to realize that the infiltrator was the morphus. Instead, he believed it was a human intruder who had used magic to disguise themselves as the leader of the base.
As a result, Rex was eager to catch the infiltrator and didn’t feel the need to contact Skullface to inform him about what had happened. Not yet, anyway. Perhaps he was never going to inform Skullface about it, not wanting to look like a complete fool for allowing someone to breach not only his base but HQ itself.
This suited Jake just fine. He wanted to keep his ability to disguise himself as a human a secret from Skullface. Humans would eventually learn about this ability of his, but while it wouldn’t matter in the long run, for now, he needed to keep it under wraps in order to successfully infiltrate the main base.
Through the bubble canopy, Jake could see that the guards in the street, who had previously been unaware of the unfolding situation, were now completely stunned, darting their eyes between Rex, who had just rushed out of HQ, and his doppelgänger at the controls of the helicopter.
Rex shouted to the guards, ordering them to stop Jake. Some of them brought up their weapons, aiming at the bubble of the helicopter. As soon as they did, Rex shouted again, instructing them to hold their fire. He clearly either didn’t want the helicopter destroyed or didn’t want it crashed within the compound.
Face twisted in rage, Rex stared directly at Jake, gesticulating wildly and ordering him to get out of the helicopter.
Little did Rex know that as soon as Jake exited HQ, he had mentally reached out to his creatures, which had been lying in wait all this time, instructing them to attack the base. The wingclaws soared from their perches on the roofs of the tall buildings, while the huge crawlers shifted from their spots where they had been clinging to the walls that faced away from the bandit base below.
All those monsters rushed toward the base from every direction, and Jake knew they would reach their destination any moment now. Just as he thought this, the roar of several machine gun turrets reverberated through the air as the first wave of the wingclaws made it to the base.
Jake took a quick glance around. He saw his wingclaws soaring over the perimeter walls while the turrets struggled to track their movements, firing on full auto. A few of his winged monsters took hits, but the damage wasn’t severe, and they remained airborne.
Unlike the previous bases Jake had attacked, this one was protected not only by the turrets atop the guard towers but also by several more turrets positioned within the compound. As all those additional turrets opened fire, unleashing a devastating amount of firepower, his winged monsters found it increasingly difficult to avoid getting hit. Some of them plummeted from the sky, hit by multiple shots.
Then his enormous spiders reached the base as well. They scuttled up all four walls, with some quickly making their way over the tops and into the base, while others continued up the guard towers.
Each turret atop the four guard towers was attacked by several spiders at once. However, the turrets didn’t notice them, distracted by the wingclaws circling the compound. His crawlers launched acid projectiles at the turrets and battered them with their powerful legs and fangs, tearing through metal almost as easily as if it were paper.
It didn’t take long for them to take down the four turrets atop the guard towers, after which they leaped from the towers into the base to join the other crawlers in their assault on the turrets inside. Every one of those powerful weapons was torn apart in mere seconds.
Complete chaos and panic swept through the compound. None of the bandits was paying Jake any attention now, having completely forgotten about him. They fired their weapons at the enormous spider-like monsters, who were dismantling their base, only to be pounced upon by the wingclaws.
As always, Jake had instructed his minions to attack only those who wore anything red, sparing the captives who had been forced to labor for the bandits. However, the captives, unaware of this directive and driven by instinct for self-preservation, scrambled in every direction, their faces filled with terror as they frantically searched for safety.
Jake didn’t wait for his minions to finish their job. With one final check of the surroundings, he fully engaged the throttle, and the aircraft surged into the sky, leaving the ground behind.
He headed for the nearest tall building and landed on the rooftop. Once he exited the helicopter and approached the edge of the roof to survey the base below, he saw that all the turrets were already destroyed while his minions were finishing off the remaining bandits.
Just like that, the last secondary base of Los Demonios was on the brink of collapse.