Mutagen

Day 35 – 11:54 PM – Barangay Poblacion I, Real, Quezon

The man standing on the back of the pickup truck had his face filled with impatience. He was already crossing his arms in front of his chest and he was tapping the floor of the truck bed with his foot in a fast rhythm. There were ten outlaws circled around the pickup truck and protecting their leader. These outlaws looked better looking than the others and they exude a different aura indicating that they were elites. Still, these guys could not help but feel the impatience of their leader.

They came here to take revenge on his men that died, especially his higher henchmen, Fang and EagleEye. Even among their whole organization, those two were rare talents especially EagleEye who was a professional sniper. He was irreplaceable due to the fact that very accurate snipers needed years to train even with Evolvers and Mutators that gained sight abilities.

EagleEye was strong enough to be able to shoot the wheels of a speeding vehicle in one shot and in terms of sniping ability, he could even contend with the best snipers in the military of this country.

Fang on the other hand was also irreplaceable. It was because he was one of those who were called [Full Body Mutators]. This information had already circulated nowadays after being disclosed by the military. Many mutations and abilities sprung upon Mutators. Some of them were similar abilities while some were unique but the most unique ones were those who were able to transform their whole bodies.

Those valuable henchmen of his however were killed today which made him furious. Normally, they would capture their victims but now, they were only here to kill.

Yet…

They were not even able to start the attack when their ranks had been broken by an attack that who knew where it came from. The worst part was that none of him men was able to see the figure of the enemy at all even though the enemy managed to kill several people already.

"Boss Drake!"

Three outlaws came running from the direction of the house and called unto the man on the back of the pickup truck. The torches they were holding were already enough to light up the grave expressions on their faces.

"What's the situation?"

Drake asked as calmly as possible to exercise his position as his leader that would not lose composure but the impatience was still present in his voice.

"Boss, we already separated into groups but we could not find even the shadow of the enemy." The outlaw that led the three reported. "We think, night eye saw the enemy. But…"

"Where is NightEye now?"

Drake asked in a stern voice. NightEye was also one of their precious assets as he was not only able to see clearly in the dark but he was also physically strong. However, his men in front of him cutting his sentence gave him a grave premonition.

"Boss, NightEye and our men with him are all dead. By this time, we already lost twenty-three men."

"DAMN IT!"

Drake roared which made his men around him flinch. He was not the boss for nothing. Among these outlaws here, he was the strongest despite his lean build. However, he was not the strongest within their organization. He was just a division leader.

"Wait, you said that you all separated into several groups, right?"

The outlaw boss took a deep breath and realized something.

"Yes, Boss."

"Sh*t! The enemy should be taking advantage of you all separating from each other to hunt them!"

Drake then turned to the man to the side of the vehicle guarding him.

"Liucer, go and make those idiots come back. Make them regroup here."

"Yes, Boss."

The man called Liucer replied and bolted off in a speed that was hard to see in the dark.

Liucer, the ShadowFeet. That was his alias. He was a Mutator that specialized in assassination due to his noiseless movements and very light steps. In terms of physical speed, he was the fastest among these outlaws. Even before the outbreak, Liucer was a notorious assassin for hire. There should be no problem for Liucer to just relay his orders.

"Boss, why don't you just call for retreat?"

One of the three outlaws asked. It was obvious that they were afraid. They had seen what happened to those who died and they did not want to have that kind of horrible death. However, he could not help but flinch when he received the glare of his boss.

Drake did not say anything but his displeasure towards his idiotic men was apparent. To call for retreat, they just needed to sound the horn of the pickup truck. That method however would surely alert even the enemies. It was what he least wanted to do.

Soon, all the remaining men under him retreated around the pickup truck totally abandoning the attack on the house. Still, the remaining number of his men made Drake's countenance turn several times darker. Right now, there were only twenty-one men left of those that encircled the house. Added his remaining men on guard around the pickup truck, they only had thirty-two people remaining out of all the sixty-seven people that came here.

"Huh?" Drake noticed something. "Where's Liucer?"

***

Going around and attacking the smaller groups of outlaws searching for him, Mark had already slaughtered thirty-five people. All of them died in a gruesome manner where not one of them had their corpse left intact. From being bisected, dismembered and decapitated to being diced and sliced vertically, their bloody corpses littered the surroundings of the house.

Actually, even though it was really not that much, but dismembering the outlaws was an inefficient way of killing them. Mark understood that fact. However, he was not doing this brutal ways of killing just for style but for the mental impact it could bring to the minds of the outlaws that witnessed the brutally killed corpses of their former comrades.

It would affect them to the point of fear. They would become more and more on guard towards their surroundings until it reached the level of paranoia that they would react to almost anything in an uncanny way. These outlaws might be hungry beasts lusting for blood but for them, their lives were still precious. To see their comrades in pieces was a nightmare that would make them think that "What if I'm next?"

Still, the time to stealthily kill these outlaws came to an end. Someone must have realized that they became easy pickings after they split up and they started to join back together and left towards where their boss was.

Mark was about to seize the last chance to kill a few more but he was blocked by someone.

The face of the person was hard to see not due to the darkness of the night but because he was wearing a facial mask. That aside, he was also wearing a whole set of black clothes different from the other outlaws that were wearing an assortment of barbaric clothing. The man was wielding two weapons, a silenced handgun on his left and a triple bladed Haladie on his right. The Haladie was a strange looking dagger but it was a good weapon for assassination.

"So, you're the one coming after us huh?"

The man said while looking at Mark with vigilance.

"Isn't it the way around?" Mark said while pulling the blade whips and caused the blades to retract into a whole blade once more. "You trashes are the ones who first came to kill us here if you don't remember."

The assassin frowned because of the way Mark spoke. He was a professional assassin trained in many fields. One of the things he specialized on was to determine the stance of the enemy in front of him through voice, gestures and expression. However, he had never ever encountered anyone that could give him such sense of emptiness. Still, he was also away that these kinds of people were the most dangerous. They would not get affected by their surroundings and they would not get affected by the killing they made.

Most people, even normal ones, would get affected mentally after the killing they made. Some would lose their selves to bloodlust while others would deny what they had just done. In Mark's case however, no matter how many he killed tonight, it was just to fulfill his goal and nothing else.

"I want to ask something." Mark suddenly spoke. "The guy that found our location, did that guy come with you here?"

The assassin did not say anything but Mark found the answer from his gesture.

"That guy is not here huh? I'll just kill all of you then to lessen the troubles in the future."

Mark said before he vanished in a puff of black mist.

The assassin was taken aback and stood on guard. He noticed some movements from above and quickly rolled to the side. On where he stood before, two square shaped blades landed with Mark appearing from above.

Liucer quickly aimed his handgun and made several shots but with a blur of Mark's body, the bullets all phased through his body.

Mark vanished once more and appeared to the side of Liucer and was already hacking the two swords to his side.

CLANG! CLANG!

Liucer warded off the attack by blocking and changing the direction of the blades using his Haladie. With the two blades changing its direction of attack, it should have been an opening. He charged towards Mark trying to stab him with the third blade of his Haladie.

At the time the Haladie was about to stab Mark, he suddenly turned his body around and let the Haladie hit the shield on his back.

Liucer was already surprised that Mark had a shield on his back but he was even more stupefied when the centerpiece of the shield that was hit by the Haladie was pushed inwards.

Hidden from Liucer, Mark let out a slight sinister smile. The shield of the [Darkness Shade] set, the [Defier]. It was named as such since this shield defied the true reason a shied was made which was to defend and protect. [Defier] however, had several forms that could attack and counter attack.

The centerpiece of the [Defier] was not easily pushed in. Unless it was pushed heavily on purpose or received an attack from the enemy that it would be pushed in.

With the center of [Defier] pushed inward, its second form was activated, [Defier Second Form: Counter Attack – Hundred Needle Rain]. Several layers of [Defier] around the centerpiece snapped open in an instant revealing a hundred needle sized holes.

Liucer had a bad and dangerous feeling about this and tried to retract his blade and retreat. Unfortunately, the mechanism of the [Defier] activates the moment it received an attack. Before Liucer was able to pull his hand back, a hundred needles shot off from the holes which the majority of the needles pierced through Liucer in different parts of his body including the eyes and skull.

Dozens of needle sized holes could be seen on Liucer's arm, face and torso and all of the holes were bleeding lightly. However, even though each wound looked small, the needles that pierced through his vital parts had already killed him. The assassin fell on the ground. Although his body was intact, his death was not any less painful.

Mark picked up the handgun from Liucer's hand. This was the first gun with a silencer he saw in the hands of the outlaws. All of them had guns but for who knows what reason, none of them had silencers so far aside from this gun. That was also the reason Mark did not pick up the guns and use them since it would reveal his location through the noise.

Clicking and snapping sounds was heard from Mark's back as the [Defier] closed up and the centerpiece returned to its normal position. A hundred needles had already been shot and he still had two volleys of needles left. It had the same reloading mechanism to the crossbow but the space inside the shield was smaller and could only fit that amount of needles.

Mark looked at the corpse of the assassin by his feet. This guy was a tough one. Fortunately, he had several things up in his sleeves or else, it would be hard to defeat this guy that had both ability and experience.

Still, this guy died in his hands, no, his back. It was time to slaughter the remaining people in the open. Unfortunately, the person that could end the trouble was not here for some reason. It should have been a good opportunity to end this troublesome matter.