Ex-Human Morphus [A Mutant Evolution Apocalypse LitRPG]
Chapter 161

Chapter 161

As Jake had predicted, the pickup truck had to slow down to navigate through the section of the city marred by giant chasms, giving him a chance to catch up. By the time he reached that area, the truck was maneuvering around the last crack. Beyond it lay a clear, undamaged stretch of road. Once the driver hit that stretch, he could accelerate, and Jake would lose his target.

A thought crossed his mind to reach the pickup truck and jump into its bed. However, he quickly realized he wouldn’t be able to navigate through the cracked section of the street before the vehicle finished maneuvering around the last crack. He simply didn’t have enough time for that. Besides, getting too close to the truck was too risky. While the Cloak was still active, it struggled to keep up with his rapid movements, causing visible distortions in the air. Jake wanted to avoid detection at all costs.

Chasing after the pickup truck wasn’t a great idea either. He wouldn’t be able to keep up for long, and its occupants would eventually spot him in the rearview mirror. Additionally, continuing to run with the Cloak activated would deplete his mana quickly, and if he turned it off, he would be even more easily detected. If they noticed him, the occupants might get spooked, and he could never find out where the resources were headed.

So, he decided to take a different approach. He executed a Gravity Leap toward the nearby building. Once he reached the peak of the jump, he pressed himself against the wall, his Adhesive Secretion securely anchoring him in place. Without wasting a moment, he crawled upward as quickly as he could. Once atop the rooftop, he leaned over the edge to survey the streets ten stories below. The pickup truck had already cleared the last crack and was now speeding along the open stretch of road. He had to hurry.

He sprinted across the roof, heading in the same direction as the vehicle. He no longer needed to remain camouflaged, so he turned off the Cloak to conserve mana. As he reached the edge of the roof, he performed a mana-infused jump toward the next building. Upon landing, he continued to run along the edge, making sure he kept the pickup truck in view.

For several minutes, Jake leaped from one rooftop to another, carefully trailing the pickup truck and ensuring he didn’t lose sight of it. Occasionally, the vehicle slowed slightly to navigate turns, which helped him stay somewhat close. However, the distance between them was steadily increasing. Jake was moving as quickly as he could, but the pickup truck continued to pull away. After every turn, the vehicle accelerated on the clear stretches of road. He hoped the truck’s destination wouldn’t be too far, because otherwise, he risked losing it entirely.

At one point, the vehicle reached a long stretch of undamaged road. Aside from some grass poking through small cracks in the asphalt, there were no obstructions along the entire length, allowing the pickup truck to accelerate to its top speed. The gap between Jake and the vehicle began to widen by the second. He realized he would soon lose sight of his target, but there was nothing he could do about it.

Suddenly, a helicopter appeared a few blocks up ahead. It descended until it came to a hover ten to fifteen meters over a large four-way intersection. A cable was lowered from the chopper, with a carabiner at its end hanging just above the ground. The pickup truck slowed as it neared the intersection.

When the vehicle finally came to a stop, the two bandits climbed out and walked over to the truck’s bed. Moving swiftly and with a professionalism that suggested they had done this many times before, they unstrapped the bundle of planks from the vehicle and secured it to the dangling cable. Once they completed the task, one bandit glanced upward and signaled to the pilot. The helicopter quickly started to ascend.

When Jake arrived at the building looming over the intersection, the helicopter was already fading into the distance, transporting the lumber. He watched as it became nothing more than a speck against the gray sky, pondering where it might be headed. Maybe to the main base? Jake instinctively felt that wherever the main base of Los Demonios was, it lay beyond the city’s borders. That was fine—he would find it eventually. With the ability to access several days’ worth of a person’s memories, he could learn everything he needed about Los Demonios simply by using Mind Reader on the gang members.

He then leaned over the edge of the roof to look at the two bandits standing in the middle of the four-way intersection. They were discussing something, occasionally glancing at the PDAs in their hands. At first, Jake thought they might be heading back to their base, but it soon became clear they had different plans for now. Intrigued, he continued to watch them. Eventually, they climbed back into their car and drove slowly to the building across the street from where Jake was positioned. After parking along the curb, they exited the vehicle and each grabbed a sledgehammer from the back before heading into the building.

Curious about what was going on, Jake decided to investigate. It didn’t take him long to climb down to street level. With the Cloak up, he entered the building the two bandits had just vanished into. To avoid detection, Jake pressed himself against one wall and crawled upward. Once he reached the ceiling, he continued to move across it like a giant insect, following the sounds the bandits were creating somewhere deeper inside. Their ruckus made it extremely easy to locate them.

When Jake finally spotted them, he froze, clinging to the ceiling. The two bandits were swinging their sledgehammers at an old piece of wooden furniture on the far side of the expansive room, breaking it apart with ease. They created quite a commotion, but it didn’t seem to faze them. There were no mutants in the vicinity, and they were clearly aware of that—they likely scanned the building before entering to ensure it was devoid of ex-humans.

Having smashed all the wooden furniture into a heap of rubble, the two bandits took a moment to catch their breath. Then one of them gestured toward a metal cabinet in the corner and proposed they break it down as well. The other shook his head and retrieved a small handheld device from his rucksack. The two engaged in a brief argument, with the one holding the device advocating for its use, while the other insisted on saving the energy for later.

In the end, the bandit with the device proved to be more stubborn than his companion. He approached the corner of the room and aimed the business end of the device at the metal cabinet. When he pressed the trigger, a blue beam shot forth from the barrel. He held the trigger down, enveloping the cabinet in the blue glow. Jake watched as the metal cabinet trembled, cracks appearing across its surface. Suddenly, there was a series of loud cracks, and the cabinet broke apart into several jagged pieces. Once it was done, the bandit released the trigger, and the device stopped emitting the blue beam.

Jake took a moment to examine the device in the bandit’s hand more closely. He could tell it was a magic-powered device that worked on mana. He even spotted a slot for inserting a mana consumable. Clearly, using this device was a much faster and easier way to dismantle an object compared to smashing it with sledgehammers. However, the device worked on mana, and mana consumables were hard to come by. This was the reason for the argument between the two bandits: one wanted to speed up the resource collection process, while the other urged him to conserve the magical energy for more urgent use. 

After that, the two bandits began collecting the broken pieces of wood and metal and hauling them outside. It took them several trips to gather all the debris and load it into the truck’s bed. So, this was how survivors gathered resources—at least in this case—they systematically dismantled furniture and various objects found throughout the city to salvage the fragments. Once the truck was packed with wood scraps, the bandits drove off in the direction of their base. Jake decided not to follow, as he already knew what would happen next: the wooden scraps would be taken to the Sawmill, and then the magic-powered contraption would convert them into brand-new planks.

Jake paused to gather his thoughts. He had previously decided to wait twenty-four hours for the HQ at the Los Demonios base he had recently discovered to upgrade to Level 6. He was genuinely curious about the changes that would occur in the base once the HQ reached the next level. In the meantime, he could continue his daily routine of hunting for XP and searching for mana.

He was currently at Level 74 and only needed to level up one more time to meet all the requirements for evolving into Stage 3: “Apex Manifestation”. Once he leveled up to 75, he would finally be able to transform into the next form, becoming stronger and getting access to a range of new skills and abilities. He estimated it would take him about a day, or perhaps even less, to level up.

After that, he would evolve into the next stage. Then, once twenty-four hours had passed, he planned to return to the Los Demonios base he had recently discovered to see what changes occurred after the HQ upgraded to Level 6. After gathering that information, he would decide what to do next, likely adhering to his original plan to unleash chaos on the base. With this in mind, he set off.

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