Opening up his stat screens, the first thing he checked was his ministers.

Minister of Knowledge: Unknown

Notification:

Due to outside interference, the Minister of Knowledge has been marked as unknown. You can assign a temporary title holder until the original title holder has been located. A temporary title holder has limited actions until you either advance your grade or the original title holder returns.

“She’s really gone,” he said, looking down onto the burnt forest below. The burning stretched to the horizon, and Jake didn’t even care; he just wanted his wife back, and for that, he would burn the universe to ash if he needed. Jake then brought up another screen.

Name: Jake Everval

Race: Demon of the Past. Unique

Core: Haven Breaker, First Grade (restricted, fully unlocked at D Grade)

Grade: F

Information on F Grade:

Upgrades: 600 above previous. Anyone below this grade in the open universe will not survive unless protected by life-sustaining means such as planetary shields and the like. No F Graders have ever entered space and survived for more than two years without adequate protection. Note: levels are gained through cultivation; levels must be solidified by practical use.

Solidified Level: 78. Levels required until next grade evaluation: 1000 total

Cultivation Level: 2

Life: 100%

Void: 0%

Mana: 100%

Arcane: 21%

F Grade Energy Storage:

Life: very low

Void: very low

Mana: very low

Arcane: very low

Genesis: very low

Death: very low

Note: Shards will be dropped for each energy type once it reaches the limit for your grade.

“I need to get stronger. Strong enough that no one would dare come after my people again,” Jake said as he pulled out a health potion and began to chug it back. An hour later, he did it again before climbing down the tree to look for the other two beast folk he saw crash not too far from him. Jake was hoping they somehow survived the crash and the fire.

Climbing down the tree, Jake noted the locations of the other two crash sites and rushed through the apocalyptic wasteland towards the closest site, but upon arriving, he knew for a fact that there were no survivors left from this site. The runabout was blown to bits on impact with the ground, and still strapped tightly in his seat was the burnt corpse of one of the beast folk. After checking around the crash site, Jake saw a set of footprints heading in the direction of Jayne's crashed runabout. Jake set out at full speed, arriving at the second crash site in seconds. Lying in the ashes was the second beast folk, the dog man named Onix. Reaching out his hand, Jake summoned one of his last health potions.

“I should have filled up on potions before we left. And we should never have flown.”

“Sir, we all knew the risks; we had to try something.” Onix groaned as Jake poured the potion into his mouth; the man started coughing up blood seconds later.

Jake quickly checked the man's airways and put him in a recovery position. The man continued coughing. “I'm sorry, sir; I don't think I will be accompanying you any further.”

“Stay with me, Onix. I'm not losing another member of this team. We will find Eric and save Kiki. Then I'm reactivating the Demon's Hand mercenary group, and we'll kill this fucken system and all those who get in our way. We will all become free together.”

The man was coughing up more blood as he replied, “Yes, sir.”

“Don't speak, just rest. I will get you out of here.”

Some time later, Jake was pushing his way through the ashes of the forest, sucking air as he went. Then, as he hit the base of a hill, the words of his old sergeant played in his head. He let out a groan and said it to himself, “Lean into the hill.” Jake pushed on, drawing himself and Onix over one hill after the other, the hills only getting higher and steeper as he moved forward. If it wasn't for the fire that burnt everything to ash, there would have been no way Jake would have made it this far. But the fire had long since faded, and now beasts were once again moving back into the area, and their aggression was beyond anything he had seen before— not even that blutung lizard that tried to kill him, and that thing now seemed like a wannabe dragon.

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“Once all this is done, I'm going back there to kill that arsehole,” Jake grumbled as he climbed another mountain. As he scrambled for the peak, he heard voices, and it was one he didn't expect; Eric was at the peak of this mountain, stopping to catch his breath. For a second, Jake could hear parts of a conversation.

“Sir, we can't find the cause of the fire; it seems it might have started deeper in than we thought.”

“Send a report over to—”

“Sir, are we going to head out for Miss Kiki?”

“Yes, we've already wasted enough time with this mess. Pack up; I want to be on the move in two hours.” Just as Eric said this, Jake picked up the pace, and fifteen minutes later, he was close enough for even someone with almost no perception to hear him yell.

“We need help.”

“What was that?” One of the people at the top of the mountain said before looking over the edge of the near vertical drop. “Who are you and what are you doing here?”

“Jake Everval, and I was on my way to see Eric. We were attacked by a dragon, which led to beast folk dead, my wife captured, and this apocalyptic wasteland,” Jake replied. The man mumbled to someone, then the one Jake had come to see peered his head over. “Sir, we'll have you out of there in a second.”

“Don't worry about me, just take Onix; he's in bad shape. So I can't fly him up with me.”

“I'll send some people down; just wait there a minute,” Eric said.

A little while later, four ropes were thrown over the edge and four humans descended, followed by a female Venusian.

“Sir, I will take him from here,” the Venusian said as the four men untied Onix from Jake's back and put him on a makeshift litter. The four men carried Onix back to the ropes as the Venusian checked his injuries. “He's going to need to be sent back to the princess for immediate treatment.”

The four ropes the men came down with began lifting Onix to the top of the mountain. Then the four men went up. The Venusian turned to Jake and said in no uncertain tone, “Don't you read? If you did, you wouldn't have tried to fight a dragon; instead, you would have just run. Just look at what mess you caused; that man is barely alive thanks to your stupidity.”

“Miss, I suggest you shut the fuck up right now since you have no fucken idea what fucken happened out there.”

“You think I'm scared of you, a man that plays at being king but really is just a boy with an anger problem?”

“Miss, go to your princess and ask her to send you back home because I don't need people like you here.”

“You think you can tell the princess what to do? Ha! You are more delusional than I thought, Mr. Jake Everval.”

“Xi, shut the fuck up and get your arse up here now. You're lucky the boss hasn't killed you yet,” Eric yelled down to her.

“Fine.” She yelled up at Eric, then clipped onto the rope and, with a snarky grin, said, “Why don't you just die?” as she kicked out her leg, hitting Jake in the head as she was pulled up. Jake was sent tumbling off the cliff; he plummeted towards the ground, but just as he was about to hit, his wings sprouted out, lifting him high into the air. He circled around the mountaintop before he came in to land right in front of the lady. Jake raised his fist as everyone's faces went pale—that was everyone but Xi; she had a smug look on her face like she was untouchable. Jake was about to hit her head off when he decided to stop.

“I fucken knew it. You can't hit m–”

SLAP

The sound echoed into the distance, then Jake simply turned to Eric and said, “I'm truly sorry. I owe you so much; please accept this as a token of my apology.” Jake handed Eric the token, then asked what direction Kiki was last seen. Eric, still shocked at what just happened, simply pointed in the direction of the Murray River. Before anyone could say anything, Jake had already teleported away.

“Sir, what just happened?”

“He showed mercy; that's what happened here.” Eric then looked down at the token in his hand and gasped in shock.

“No fuken way.”

“What is it, sir?”

“Nothing, just got a little too excited for a second there.”

“Are you all just going to stand there? Help me up.”

“Get up yourself; you just can't fucken do as you're told, can you? What did I say before you went down there?”

“Not to irritate the man.”

“And what did you do? For fuck's sake, your fucken princess sent you to me so you might learn to temper your arrogance, but who the fuck could have known you would fuck up so bad? Are you aware that man has never shown anyone mercy, not even me? But you thought it would be a great idea to piss him off.”

“So what if I piss him off? He's still just a man; he's there to be used, just like all of you,” Xi said before stomping over to the ship she flew here in. Her face was imprinted with a Jake-sized imprint on her cheek. She started up the engines and took off, leaving behind Eric and his men. “That fucken bitch. Wait, where is Onix?”

“He's on the ship with her,” one of Eric's men said.

“Well, fuck, was anyone else on there with him?”

“It seems not, sir.”

“I hope she takes him to the princess quickly. Alright everyone, we're moving out.”

“Which direction, sir? Are we going after Xi or the boss? We will need to split up; two of you come with me, the rest go after that stupid girl.”

Three runabouts shot off after Jake while ten chased Xi. The ones chasing Xi would never catch up, as the single-engine runabouts they were flying were not designed for speed but emergency transport. Their speed was that of Jake using Dash, so at least the ones going after Jake might have a chance to catch him.

It took them nine hours to finally catch Jake, and they only managed because he stopped for a rest. The three runabouts descended on Jake's position; Jake was actually facilitated by the modifications that were made to his design.

“Very interesting. They've forgone any weapons and removed two engines. Oh, what's that? They put on a powerful shield instead? That would explain the removal of the weapons and engines, but for what purpose?” Jake said to himself. It took them a little longer to land, as the power output of one engine just wasn't enough to split over the many lifting thrusters on the bottom of the runabout, leading to a more circular motion than a direct vertical descent. Then there was the final part of the landing: landing gear extended from the hull of the runabout just before the three ships landed. Jake watched as Eric and two others of beast descent of some kind got out. “Thanks for stopping, boss; there would have been no way we would have caught up with you.”

“I was just stopping for a rest, so what brings you here, Eric?”

“Firstly, I would like to help you get Kiki back, and secondly, I need to give this back. I can't expect such a thing.”

“That's yours, and it's also a gift for your people. They need more options than just living in my land. Plus, I don't want to make you all enemies of the system by proxy.”

“Sir, if you don't mind me saying, screw that. This is our home, and if the system makes us an enemy, then it can just go and die,” one of the beast folk said, followed by the others nodding in agreement.