Chapter 343
For the following several days, Jake developed the main lair. Then, one morning, he suddenly received a signal that Melissa’s base was under attack. The wards he had placed on Catalina and Melissa’s bases some time ago proved effective.
He didn’t know whether it was humans or mutants attacking Melissa’s base, but since mutants usually didn’t try to attack them, it was most likely Los Demonios. He always knew that Skullface would sooner or later learn what had happened and try to take back the lost bases. It seemed like it was finally happening now.
Jake didn’t know how powerful the attack was, but he figured he had to be prepared for the worst. A few days ago, he had taken a group of several crawlers and wingclaws to hunt various mutants, and his creatures had performed surprisingly well.
So he decided to bring them along to assist in battling the attackers. He mentally reached out to all his combat units, gathering them together, and instructed them to follow him.
After that, he left his lair. Instead of jumping down to street level, he decided to traverse the city by the rooftops, as he had done before. He quickly reached the roof and oriented himself toward Melissa Base.
Then, he burst into a run across the rooftop. Once he reached the edge, he performed a mana-infused jump, soaring through the air to the next building. Once he landed, he resumed running toward the next roof in line.
For the next two or three minutes, he kept moving in the same direction, leaping from one building to another. The swarm of his creatures followed closely behind. The wingclaws had no trouble keeping up.
As for the crawlers, they lagged a bit behind. During the past several days, Jake had evolved his ten-legged, acid-spitting crawlers to Rank V and Rare rarity level, which allowed him to impart them with another special ability. The previous two were Adhesive Secretion and Acid Spit, while the third ability he gave them was Mana-infused Jump.
Thanks to this third ability, his crawlers could now jump from roof to roof just like him, albeit at a slower pace.
Finally, he reached his destination. He stood at the edge of the roof, looking down. In the street below, he could see Melissa’s base being under attack. Several combat helicopters hovered over it, firing machine guns and rockets at the base, with explosions erupting inside.
Outside the perimeter walls were several technicals, firing energy weapons mounted in their beds. The energy projectiles slammed into the walls with great force, blowing huge holes in the concrete.
All four of the base’s turrets had been destroyed by that point, reduced to burned, mangled wrecks. From the looks of it, they managed to destroy only one of the helicopters, its charred and smoking remains resting just outside the perimeter walls.
The survivors inside the base were in a state of panic. Some of them tried to take cover behind various machines only to be blown to pieces by missiles exploding nearby. The others tried to fight back, firing at the helicopters above only to be mowed down by the high-powered rounds from their machine guns.
It was obvious that without his help, all the defenders would be dead within minutes. He quickly assessed the distance to the helicopters hovering below him. He initially wanted to jump down right on top of one of them but quickly reconsidered, unsure of what kind of damage the spinning rotor blades could inflict on his armored body.
He gave his creatures the order to attack and then jumped down. When he reached the same height as one of the helicopters, he launched his grappling hook toward it. Once it latched onto the side, he retracted the cord, swinging through the air toward the helicopter.
Upon hitting its side, he crawled to the front, clinging to the cockpit’s exterior. The pilot stared at him in horror. He tried to throw the helicopter to the side, attempting to dislodge Jake, but he held fast.
He morphed his right hand into a drill and bored a hole through the cockpit. The pilot instinctively jerked his head sideways, desperately trying to evade the spinning drill.
Morphing into a smashfist, Jake grabbed the human’s head and squeezed, turning it into a pulp. The helicopter began to lose altitude, spinning toward the ground. Jake pushed off, twisting in midair and launching his grappling hook at another helicopter.
In the meantime, his creatures launched an assault on Los Demonios as well. Several crawlers encircled one of the pickup trucks, effortlessly tearing it apart as if it were made of paper. They then used their front legs to stab at the occupants of the car.
Another crawler charged at a nearby vehicle. The gunner in the back fired the energy cannon, striking it. The massive arachnid staggered but pressed on toward the car. The gunner then shot again, putting it down for good.
As he opened his cry out in sheer joy, another crawler jumped at him from behind, sending him crashing to the ground. In the next instant, the crawler leaped on top of the human and bit his head off.
Now that the attackers realized they were being ambushed by monsters, they ceased their assault on the base, focusing instead on fighting the creatures. One of the survivors below took advantage of this, arming herself with a rocket launcher.
Hoisting it onto her shoulder, she aimed at one of the helicopters. The missile struck its side and exploded, causing the helicopter to spiral down toward the center of the base. Survivors scrambled in every direction to dodge the falling debris and the wrecked fuselage.
While Jake and his wingclaws dealt with one helicopter after another, his crawlers focused on the cars. While some of his creatures were killed in the assault, their losses paled in comparison to the heavy toll inflicted on the attackers. The bandits faced far graver casualties, their ranks quickly decimated in the chaos of the fierce battle.
At some point, the bandits realized they weren’t going to win this fight and attempted to escape. Jake and his minions didn’t let them, though. They chased down every single attacker and dealt with them.
Once all the bandits were dealt with, Jake sent a mental order for his creatures to return to the lair. After that, he turned and headed back to Base Melissa to evaluate the damage.