Jack and a few members of Rainfall arrived at District 8’s checkpoint and noticed a guard shocked to the core. Jack looked around and saw a dead guard with knife wounds all across their face, the right leg covered in blood.

“What the hell happened?”

A coroner who was looking inspecting the dead guard responded to Jack. “He’s been dead a while. The cause of death could be blood loss; judging by the number of knife wounds, it seems whoever did this is a master with a knife and knows how to keep someone alive.”

Jack looked at the shell-shocked guard. “What about him?”

“He hasn’t said anything since we arrived. Poor fellow, it must be tough seeing someone get killed in this sort of manner. Jack! Go easy on the fella.”

Jack approached the rookie guard and asked him if he was okay, but he didn’t respond. Jack noticed the rookie badge and asked if this was his first major job; the rookie nodded his head.

A quiet “shit.” escaped Jack’s mouth. He reassured the rookie that he was safe and that everything would be okay.

“Jack! You might want to see this.” Anakin yelled.

“Look.” Anakin pointed at the graffiti on the wall inside a small room. “I do believe our masked friend is back, as he’s no longer working with Stallone.”

“Fuck! If he’s gone rogue, that’s another issue we need to worry about.”

Anakin approached Jack in an intense state of curiosity, eager to discuss their next course of action. Jack, however, was deeply engrossed in contemplation, puzzling over the motives behind the masked man's betrayal of Stallone and the potential danger of their current predicament. After a rapid return to the rookie, Jack probed him for details on the recent events.

The rookie summoned his courage and disclosed that the masked man had spared his life and even entertained him with a guitar performance while departing.

Although the rookie's revelation did little to assist Jack, who found the guitar detail insignificant, it did lead him to the chilling realization that the masked man was not only sending a message but also taking pleasure in toying with them.

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Jack asked where the masked man walked to. The rookie pointed at the trees that were covered in darkness.

“Perfect hiding spot.”

“That masked cunt is probably watching us right now! Let’s fucking get him!” Troy yelled out.

“Ease up, Troy. I need to let my father know what's going on.”

Jack got on the hologram and contacted his father to inform him of the situation.

"Jack? What's the situation?" Harry's voice crackled through the hologram.

"Bad, I mean really bad," Jack replied urgently.

"How come?" Harry's concern was palpable.

"The man who’s responsible for this attack is our old mask friend," Jack explained, his voice tense.

Harry's tone changed to a more concerning one. "Do you know if he’s still there? If so, get back to base ASAP!"

"From what we’ve gathered, he’s retreated to the tree in the distance; we’re about to go and check it out. Don't worry, Dad, I’ll be fine," Jack reassured his father.

"You better be," Harry replied sternly.

The hologram link between the two ended. Jack gathered everyone and instructed them to be ready, as they were about to head out to see if the masked man had left any clues for them to work with.

Entering the woods, everyone had one hand held tightly on their swords; others drew out their pistols and were looking around, waiting to see if the masked man would jump out and attack them.

SNAP!

Everyone turned around; it was the same scenario that they found themselves in the first time they encountered the masked man.

“What should we do?” Anakin asked.

“We wait... If our friend thinks we’re falling for the same trap again, he’s dead wrong.”

Another snap could be heard this time coming from their right.

Jack instructed Ellie to go and check out the noise while they followed close behind. Walking ever so closer to the noise, they were relieved to find out what caused the noise.

“Oh, thank God. It's just some GMs,” Ellie said.

Jack walked over to one of the GMs and sliced their heads off, gaining the attention of the other GMs. They rushed towards the group; Troy sliced two GMs with one single swing while Anakin sliced one GM head off before unloading all of the bullets in the pistol into the other.

Ellie picked off the rest of the GMs with her rifle. Once finished, they looked around and concluded that the masked man was completely gone, thinking that they were done and ready to leave, but they weren't. The black goo that came from the dead GMs started to merge, creating a tall, massive GM.

“What the fuck is that?” Jack yelled out.

“Don't know, just fucking kill the cunt!” Troy said before creating a vertical beam from his blade that did not affect the GM.

“You’ve got to be shiting me,” Troy said stunned that the beam did not affect the monster.

The new GM variation started walking slowly toward them, ignoring any attacks that the group had on the GM. Any ideas that the four had didn't work, bullets didn’t affect the new variation, and any attacks with their swords they did didn't work as well.

Jack looked at his left arm and had the idea of using his electric powers to see if that had any effect on this new GM.

He sprinted at full speed before jumping up, putting all of his power into his left arm, and punching the GM on the left side of its face.