The old man had just reached the tree line when Jake popped out of the shadows in his demon form, grabbing the man by his shirt to ensure he could yell as loud as he could. Before Jake ripped out his heart, he lay it and the old man on the ground before teleporting away.
A group of enforcers and officials ran over to the scream, but all they found was their dead comrade. As two more screams rang out, one enforcer yelled, “Stay in groups, don’t move around alone.”
From the shadows beside the man, a hand grabbed his throat and ripped the man’s jugular out, along with the rest of his throat, before teleporting away once more.
“Stay away from the shadows; the demon uses them to move around.” As the group huddled together, one of them made a break for it and bolted. Jake stepped out from the shadow and struck at the man’s neck, blood splattering everywhere as Jake looked directly at the survivors and smiled. The group stood there for five minutes until one of them found the motivation to move. He moved out from the group, walking past the position where the last person died, and continued out of sight of the others, only for the others to hear his mournful crying as his life became one with the soil.
After another five minutes passed with nothing happening, another survivor spoke up and said, “We can’t just stay here and let ourselves be picked off one by one.” There is no way he can take us all out with his powers. He seems to be the assassin type, so we will be fine if we just push through together.”
The group moved as one until they reached the point where the last man had died. His body hung from the trees, with his hands holding his ripped-off head and a hole in his chest where his heart had been.
“This man is a demon; he has no morality at all.”
“How could someone do this to a fellow human?”
The group felt shaken by Jake’s callous behaviour, but the old men from the government were determined to ensure their own survival, even if it resulted in the deaths of those around them.
The group moved forward at the command of one of the old men. That man stood in the middle of the group, theorizing that being in the centre of the group gave him the best chance of survival. Jake thrust a dagger through the man’s back as his shadow came to life. When the others looked around to see what had happened, all that was there was the old man and a dagger in the centre of his back with a note attached to it. One of the younger enforcers picked up the note. He opened it, as everyone else was just looking at him. The man’s face went white.
“Well, what does it say?” The young enforcer dropped the note and ran. The others tried to stop him, but he slipped through their grasp.
“Where are you going? You’re just playing into his han–”
Bang!
The young man looked back in the direction he came from, and what he saw scared him to the core. Standing in his demon form, with a roaring flame behind him, was the demon, in the location where the young man’s comrades used to be. The demon’s mouth moved as if mouthing the word “run.” The young boy took off running as fast as his little human legs could carry him. Jake let the man go to send a message to the government not to mess with him.
After the young man left, Jake emptied his stomach, which was a surprise to Jake as his stomach shouldn’t have anything in it. What was worse was that the colour of the vomit was bright blue.
“I don’t like this; I really don’t like this,” Jake said before more vomit bubbled in his throat.
After some time, Jake regained control of his bodily functions and walked back to where the largest tent stood. Jake pushed open the flap to see if the man was still there and if he wanted to return with him to freedom.
“Oh, he’s gone. Oh well, that’s his choice.” Jake left the camp and started heading back to the settlement. It was taking a longer time to return than it did to get there, as Jake refused to use his teleporting skill.
About 1 km away from the settlement of Freedom, Jake was hiding in the bushland. In front of him was a group of humans and humanoids, talking about how to enter the new safe zone. They wanted to enter, but there were people outside the barrier telling any of the new arrivals that they weren’t taking in anyone until their leader returned from his hunt or something. Jake listened for a while before he decided to show himself. Jake walked up to the group and asked where everyone came from.
“What’s it to you, stranger?” one human said, trying to peek under Jake’s hood to see if he was human or not. Seeing this, Jake pulled back his hood, revealing his human form.
“That’s not what I would call a welcoming encounter,” Jake said.
“Why should I welcome you? You are just some fool, like the rest of them. You just want a safe place to live,” the human retorted.
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“Well, if I just want a safe place to live, what do you want by coming to this safe zone?”
“I came here to reclaim this land for the humans.”
“So if you were in charge of this safe zone, what would you do with the beast folk that are living there?”
“Well, those who don’t serve humanity shouldn’t have a place in the safe zone. Of course, I would offer them first, as free manpower is always welcome.”
“So you would turn them into slaves, then?”
“No, I’m not a slaver. I would offer them to work for us and pay them in a place to live and safety under humanity’s rule.”
Jake turned to the group and, without hesitation, said, “Eric and Kiki, come out.” The dog and cat pair jumped out of their hiding spot and landed on either side of Jake, speaking in unison. “At your command, boss.”
The crowd looked shaken. Even those who had high prosecution didn’t even notice that the two beast folk were there. Jake said to them, “You heard what this man said. Would you agree to him taking command of the safe zone?” The man was hopeful, for some strange reason. As he said, his voice infused with mana, “You will agree with me.” A wave of mana swept over the group. Jake instantly pushed out his mana as he felt the stranger’s mana enter his body. Jake’s mana washed over the crowd, pushing back the man’s attempt at influencing the answer with his power. “If you try that again, you will die,” Jake said.
“What are you accusing me of? There is no proof of anything. All I did was say five words, then you attacked us all with your mana. Why would you need to blast us all with your mana? Were you trying to force those two behind you to go along with what you want?” the man retorted.
“As you have influenced those two servants behind you, maybe we should just enter the safe zone and ask what they think about it, and this time, don’t try to trick us.” Jake just looked at the man and said with a smile, “If you want to enter the safe zone, go right ahead. Maybe you will do better than the government did.” Jake stretched his arm out and pointed at the barrier. Then he said to Kiki, to go get Emma.
The man didn’t hear what he said to Kiki as he was more focused on his goal. He just wanted to get inside, then he could use his skills to take over the people inside and finally have the power back, like what he had before the system happened.
He walked into the barrier, followed by most of the humans. Around five of the humans stayed behind, not wanting to follow the man.
“So, did you not want to follow him to his death?” Jake said. The group of humans shook their heads.
“So, do you agree with his statements that humans are the only race that matters?”
“The man is an idiot. In the system, the only thing that matters is strength, and he didn’t even check your level.”
“I see. So what if I said I was a demon?”
“That wouldn’t matter to us,” the group said, including the beast folk.
“Okidoki, you are welcome to enter my territory. There are rules that will be told to you by the person who will arrive soon. If you follow those rules, you will be safe inside the barrier. But I will warn you now, if you are hostile towards anyone in the barrier, you will activate the defence system, and that is not the way you want to die.” Emma arrived a second later. “Emma, can you take these people through the barrier and inform them of the rules?” Jake turned back to the group and said, “If you are looking for work, we are recruiting people into the Demon’s Hand Mercenary Group. Just speak to Emma or these two nice people here.” Jake pointed at Eric and Kiki before he left to tell the two council members that they will have more refugees to support and to give them a promotion to add employees to the council if they need to. They just need to compensate the workers. Inside the meeting hall, the two old council members stopped Jake before he left to ask him a question.
“What is the plan with the new arrivals, and if we are going to have humans in the safe zone, would it be wise to have a human in the council as a member? Our choice would be Emma.”
“It can’t be Emma as the human representative. But if she wants to join the council as my representative, I will allow her to do that. As for the human representative, I will go talk to them and get them to pick amongst themselves. I might even speak to Emma about you.”
“Thank you; we will await our new colleagues.”
Jake walked out of the meeting hall and had a look around at the growing settlement. There were now streets and log cabins instead of tents. He poked his head back in the hall and said, “Make sure they don’t build in the area surrounding the old army camp. I plan on using that area for myself. And send some people out to look for metal for me to use.” Then he went to find Emma. After looking around for longer than he would admit, Jake asked one of the beast folk for help to find her. Surprisingly, she was only five buildings down from the meeting hall. The building was maybe three-quarters the size of the meeting hall and was full of people. Jake walked in and headed towards the outer area where there was a young cat girl serving the customers.
“Do you know where Emma is?” Jake asked the young girl.
“Yes, boss, she is upstairs in the meeting room.” Jake then asked the cat girl, “Who are all these people, and what is this building used for?”
“You don’t know? This is the main building of your Demon’s Hand Mercenary Group, and these people are new members. We’re actually just waiting on approval for the design for the membership badge; that is what Lady Emma is working on right now.”
After talking to the rather talkative young girl named Isla and getting a rundown on the happenings around the settlement, Jake went up to the meeting room that he was told about. In addition, he spotted a second door at the end of the hall with a sign that read “director’s office,” and another door on the other side of the hall with a sign that showed it was the “testing staff room.”
“He left you to do all the work again, Emma. Why do you let him dump all this work on you?”
Jake was thinking to himself, “I don’t remember telling Emma to do anything for me except help the people that just arrived. Have I been taking advantage of her somehow?” Jake pushed the door open and walked in. Emma was sitting behind a desk with a stack of paper in front of her and her face buried in them. The lady that was talking to Emma, a dog folk Jake hadn’t seen before, turned around and, without batting an eye, said, “Boss, welcome to the new jobs hall. Do you like i