Chương 93: 6 - WILL LOOT FOR FOOD

"Over there!"

"I see it."

"We've got it cornered. Keep on it." The creature's screeches rumbled through the trees. The shadow of its giant-bird-like frame zipped above them, dodging their lines of sight. But there were 3 pursuers on its tail. Once it realized running wasn't an option, it made for the road where it had space to flex its massive black wings. It was a being with once the form of a black crow; feathers, eyes, and beak matching the shade of the night.

Now it had grown to the size of three men, wings extended with finger talons at each end. Its body was armored with sharp bone covering its body and outlining its wings. The people at the Hunter's Club called it the Bone Crow. Ellie flung light arrows as it flew above them in an arching motion. It dodged with fighter-plane-like precision, swooping down to dive-bomb them. It screeched as a trail of bone emerged from its chest, reaching to stab her with a sharp point.

She was able to roll out of its flight path narrowly as the bone ripped her pant leg. The bird flipped on its axis, landing on dark, ostrich-like feet. It expanded its wings again, this time in an attack of bones that would've shaped its wings if it were inside them. It sought to crush her. Cannon leaped to her aid, blocking with his forcefield. The Bone Crow's animal instinct kicked in, and it attacked the forcefield wildly with its talons and bones, hoping to overwhelm it with razor-sharp aggression.

That was the trap. Like all the demons, once it saw a person trapped within its grasp, its bloodlust overwhelmed it, and it flailed like a crazed banshee. Acelin sped to its back once it was safe for him to do so. When he extended his arm, the Bone Crow stopped moving, held by the power of Acelin's mind.

"Alright. Keep it still, Acelin." T'balt stepped out of hiding, finishing up a note in his book.

"Bones can double as attack and defense. But doesn't seem as durable as something dedicated to one or the other," he wrote.

"Uhh.. this thing is kind of strong. It's resisting." Acelin was struggling to keep it still with his psychic loot. Its body contorted as it fought for freedom, twisting bones in and out of its body.

"Ok. I'm coming." Ellie had her Holy Bow aimed at it, just in case it got loose. But her finger twitched on the string of the bow.

"T'balt, is this really the thing you want to try this on?"

"Just one second." He fished out a bag from his pocket labeled "Property of Hunter's Club" and dug around for the loot inside. German had filled him in on all kinds of knowledge about loot that he had no idea of before. They talked for what felt like minutes, only to have the man tell him it had been an hour. His little notebook was beginning to fill from front to back. He was excited to see what he learned for himself.

With the beast restrained, he put two pieces of water loot up to the thing's neck, watching the critters leap from his fingers onto the bird's feathers. The first seeped into its skin, phasing through like the barrier didn't exist. Once inside, it formed the symbol the coin represented, glowing for a split second. The second followed, clinging to the beast, almost waiting for its brother to go in first. Then once it did, it phased in afterward, but the glow was in the same location as the first.

And under the mark in the middle of the symbol, appeared a Roman numeral two. At the same time, the demon attacked with a screeching caw as it reacted to the new intruders in its body. They must've given it a burst of strength because as soon as T'balt saw the two appear, it broke free from Acelin's grasp, causing everyone to leap back. It took back to the sky, this time with mythical flying water trailing its wings. A skeleton emerged from its back, forming a ball of circling water within its grasp.

The Bone Crow flung it at the kid, a ball of bone with a tsunami of water inside. Acelin extended his hand to stop the thing. The bones stopped, but the water inside didn't. He was swept by a wave of water, sending him careening backward.

"Acelin!" Ellie loosed more shots at the bird, which blocked with a shield plate of thick bone. She ran to the boy. Thankfully, the water just washed him up on the open street and disappeared in the grass off to the side, leaving Acelin choking up a bit of water from his throat. Cannon used his massive strength to kick off the ground, launching himself up at the bird, who wasn't expecting to be met in the air.

Cannon plunged his fist right through the bone, shattering it and the Bone Crow's fighting spirit with one punch. It crashed to the ground, flailing until its body went still. Without anything to slow his fall, Cannon came tumbling down right after it, eventually bouncing and rolling off an abandoned semi truck. You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version. T'balt continued writing in his notebook.

"The second added loot does seem to multiply the first's power, but not by much. I wonder how many times they can be stacked."

"Acelin, it's okay. Just breathe." Ellie said, calming the kid's coughs. T'balt looked up, slowly walking over.

"You okay, kid?"

"I'm… good," Acelin wheezed, sitting on the ground.

"Ahhh…" Cannon groaned in pain, like an old man getting out of his chair for the first time in a while. He looked like it, too, holding his arched back and limping over to them.

"El, I could use a pick-me-up. That fall was not kind." It wasn't long before both the boys were healed up and back in shape. T'balt retrieved the Bone Crow's loot to add to the bag. He also tore off a piece of its outer skeleton to go with it.

"There's extra proof. Just in case."

"Wasn't this a little reckless?" Ellie said behind him, averting her gaze so as not to come off as directly accusing him of anything.

"It could've gone smoother, but we got what we needed out of it."

"I mean, Acelin could've gotten hurt fighting your battles for you."

"But he didn't. Even if he did, you were there to heal him. That's the point of the formation I made for you all." Ellie sighed.

"If only you knew what it was like to stand next to you sometimes." T'balt patted her head and gave her a small kiss when he knew the others weren't looking.

"You've been a little uptight recently. This is a new situation for both of us. But remember, I'm a Redeemer. I've got us." T'balt walked back to the car, leaving her to think to herself.

"Uptight?" At the Hunter's Club, there was a group of onlookers curiously awaiting their arrival. T'balt's company immediately made their way to the collections counter, where a dark-haired woman in a business suit smiled, greeting a new customer. He wasted no time, pouring all their collected loot on the counter. 3 water. 4 fire. An earth, poison, and, of course, the bone loot.

"How much does this give us?" he asked.

"You got all this today?" the lady responded.

"Well, your security took the rest of what I had, so yeah."

"Let me do the calculations for you. One moment, please."

"Make sure you remember the Bone Crow bounty, too." By the time the tallies were up, they had made enough to last a night and meals for all 4 of them. The woman added the required credits to T'balt's hunter's club pass and marked the Bone Crow off their bounty list. The whispers started piling up.

"They hunted a B-grade demon just like that."

"They don't even look hurt."

"You think the kid fought with them?" The demon didn't feel much harder than other demons. But T'balt had to remember that most people likely didn't coordinate their loot stacks as well as he did. When Zero Day started, people were likely taking the first loot they could find just to defend themselves. He imagined that Bone Crow might've been an issue if the loot they carried was unoptimized. Still, he was feeling a bit full of himself with people talking about them like that.

He just had to be reminded that he had a huge handicap, usually by Ellie. Since they had enough for meals, their first stop after cashing out was to the dining area, where they were served a fine meal of meatloaf and mashed potatoes. They even had dinner rolls for appetizers and lemon cake for dessert. It was the best meal any of them had had for a long time. T'balt was sure he hadn't eaten a whole meal like that since he was in school.

Each one of them was rightly stuffed, which was the greatest gift one could ask for in the apocalypse.

"I think I'm gonna go find our room," Ellie said, getting up from the table.

"Sounds like a good plan. I've got the itis after all that food," said Cannon.

"I think the meatloaf did it."

"It's not even dark. I'm not going to bed," said Acelin.

"Then why don't you come with me?" T'balt scooted back in his chair, giving the maid room to clean the table, before refusing a pouring of wine.

"Where?"

"To go see what else there is to spend credits on." The kid stretched his body to the ceiling before suddenly taking a lap around the table in excitement. Which took about half a second.

"Awesome. Let's go." After a quick scolding from Ellie for activating his loot inside, Acelin followed T'balt around the building. The whole place was like a resort of long hallways of marble, wood, and glass. It even had a functioning elevator.

"Who do I gotta fight to stay in a place like this?"

"Just a bunch of demons, apparently," T'balt answered the kid.

"So this Corlander person owns all this, huh? I wonder what kind of guy he is."

"We'll find out as soon as we meet him."

"And when will that be?"

"A question I don't know. But what I do know is that over there sure looks like a loot store."

"Seriously?" There was a room opened up like a small store in a mall. It was organized like a medieval weapons shop but built with post-modern architecture. On the shelves and taped to the walls were pictures of loot coins of all ranges. There was a sign on the door saying, "Loot is kept in secure area to prevent thievery. If interested, please tell clerk, and they will retrieve once you pay." T'balt and Acelin perused around, as the clerk kept a stone smile on her face, waiting for them to buy.

Though most of them were things he'd already seen before, he had tucked them away in his stolen bag. Nothing belonging to the higher-grade demons on the bounty list or anything like them. That didn't mean the store was useless, however. With his new knowledge of loot multiplying, which was what he was calling it in his brain, having more than one of the same loot could prove advantageous. Ellie's healing was limited, but if she had a large multiplier, then who knew what the bounds to her abilities were.

Same with Cannon's strength or even Acelin's psychic. He did struggle holding that beast today. He stared at one of the pictures with an intense expression of thought.

"What's that one say?" Acelin asked.

"Need nullification. The user will not thirst, hunger, or require other basic needs."

"Whoa. You mean I wouldn't have to, like, go to the bathroom?"

"I guess not… that'd be great for someone surviving on their own, but… maybe it's. Oh god. It's an S-grade loot, which means there's no way I can afford that."

"Maybe if we stick around for a while." T'balt sighed.

"Listen, I know it's nice here, but Ellie is right. We can't get too comfortable. It'd probably be months before I could afford that, and it's probably not worth it."

"But what if we are here for months? The German man said Corlander is a busy guy."

"He was exaggerating. I'm sure he'll be able to see us as soon as tomorrow." But as they made themselves comfortable in the Hunter's Club, several days passed. And then several more with no word from Mitas Corlander.