Chapter 11

　　Extermination

　　Maria was covered in dirt, grime, mana infused viscera, and of course the sweet sweet smell of success. She had done a lot, and felt great about what she had done, the gradual and continual Attribute boosts from clearing and connecting minor nodes to her one major node really helped things along, even making it so that her two titles she had gained at the beginning of the night had both evolved.

　　Title: Minor-Node Conqueror I -> XII

　　Minor-Node Conqueror (XII): You have claimed a minor node. +12 all attributes.

　　Title: Nodeling Conqueror -> Nodular Baron

　　Nodular Baron: You have conquered a minor node and managed to connect it to a major node under your command. +15 All Attributes, +15% Strategy, +15% Leadership.

　　In all she had killed a total of five rats, three snakes, two rabbits, one giant rooster, and a weird goatman creature. All of them were minor creatures, and easily handled by her and her constantly increasing attributes, making it so Maria almost felt sorry for the poor creatures.

　　This was it, today was the day, she was almost certain of that. Better still, she had already made quite a large safe area, right away that everyone could go to, when the Integration finally happened.

　　The way she did it was like clockwork, no literally like a giant clock. If the main node of the school was the center point, then what she did was she, starting from her house and neighborhood, went around in a giant circle around the main node at the school. This did two things, first it made it so every minor node she conquered was easily able to be linked up to her main node. Then secondly, it made it so she only had to deal with conquering minor nodes, this last part was key, as it meant the difficulty didn`t increase. While she felt she could take on another impowered necromantic bunny death lord, fighting off the regular bunny death lords, or as she mentally referred to them as zombie fodder, were a lot easier to deal with overall.

　　The best part was, despite having conquered so much territory, enough to apparently make her a Baron, at least according to the new system, she managed to end her trip right back at her house. Which was not too soon as first she needed to take a shower before the school day started, and secondly, she needed to ditch the set of lights that had been weaving into and around the various houses.

　　Maria thought she gave the stalker the slip, especially after she doubled back behind a row of houses, but even now she could see the lights through her drawn blinds of the second story back window connected to the bathroom. This turned out to be the perfect room for Maria to enter by, and the one she was most grateful for right this very moment. For years she had always wondered why older buildings had windows in bathrooms, in the future these would be death traps, as you would be cleaning and monsters would crash through the window to attack you, while you were at your most vulnerable. Not only were you naked, but most of the time you were unarmed. Worse, by the monsters breaking through glass, that would shatter on floor, it often meant your escape was cut off, should you attempt to somehow flee in the small confines of the bathroom. That or if you did manage to make it past, your bare feet would be cut to shreds on the broken shards of glass, making your escape or subsequent defense even more impossible. Again, bathrooms with windows are a death trap during an apocalypse with monsters.

　　That said, pre-apocalypse they were perfect. You only had to take your shoes off outside the window, and then climb in. The window was fortunately still unlatched, as ever since Juan returned the twins often found his lack of manners to be disgusting, never so much as lighting a candle, turning on the vents, or anything, often forcing the twins to open the window and leave it slightly cracked to help facilitate air flow, particularly while the crisp night air of spring was heavy and pungent. And that was the only type of pungent smell the two girls wished to smell when entering their bathroom.

　　Squish, splash.

　　Maria took one step, then a second on the bathroom floors, before managing to jump into the open shower where she began washing herself down, clothes and all. This was something she learned in her past life, or at least it feels like something she would have learned in her past life. Washing down with her clothes on to help make sure blood, flesh, and excrement from slain enemies is removed. Often taking off the clothes would leave folds or pockets where some of these unsavory elements could stay, making it so that even after washing your clothes, they would still be dirty. That was why this was considered a pre-wash, the part where you were fully clothed and often cleaning off the only real set of clothes you had. Also, by doing this, you made it so that should you actually be followed into the bathroom by a monster who lunged through your window, you would be able to defend yourself. In fact, getting caught in a pre-wash attack was often idea, as your feet would be covered, and if you did manage to kill another monster and get more blood and guts on you, you were already in the bathroom and ready to wash off, again.

　　Wow, that was a random memory, Maria said to herself, as she continued washing. For a moment she wondered what someone would do if glass actually broke on her floor, what she would use. Then a quick glance where the window glass would have showed her that mana infused bloody footsteps already covered the floor. For a moment she thought about using the towel to clean up the blood, but then realized one awkward thing about sharing a house and indeed a shower with her brother, namely she did not have a spare set of clothes to change into. Yeah, poor planning on her part.

　　Next time, put a spare set of clothes into the bathroom before you decide to go around killing creatures in interdimensional space pockets to save the world. Maria chastised herself, but it was already too late. Moving quickly, she took off and used her drenched, but cleanish hoodie to clean up the blood stains on the floor. Then looking around she found that no other bloodstains remained on the windowsill, a fortunate use of only kicking creatures to death, and she took the hoodie back in to once again be pre-soaked. Then once her clothes were fully clean, she began her actual body ritual of washing herself. Even making sure to use some soap on her clothes. Then with powerful hands, she twisted and wrung out her clothes to dry them.

　　Once her clothes were dry-ish, she wrapped her towel around herself, a towel that did not cover nearly as much of her body as she had hoped, as apparently, she had been growing again, this only made sense given her recent increases, but was still somewhat annoying. Using one hand to pinch her towel closed, while the other handheld her dirty pile of laundry, she made her way quickly and silently to the laundry room. There she found the empty hamper where she placed her clothes and found a clean and mostly serviceable uniform hanging to dry. God bless their mother; she was a saint.

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　　Seeing the clothes, Maria quickly closed the door to the laundry room, squeezed into her school uniform and went about preparing for today. Today was going to be a big day for her, as this time she was certain that the Integration would begin. She even saw the alerts for it and everything.

　　Only once she was done, did she realize that she had put wet clothes on top of other clothes in the hamper, if this was left as is, hen they could get moldy, and God forbid you let mold even attempt to grow in Momma Alvarez`s house. Realizing her mistake, she took out the squeezed dried clothes from the hamper, and even the next layer of clothes that came into contact with hers, put them in the wash and started the washer. No changing the settings, that was another one of Momma Alvarez`s quirks, never change her settings. Oh, you can change the cycle of the wash, put it on spin, pre-wash, soak, etcetera, but never, ever, change her water settings.

　　With the load of laundry going, and with her already being dressed and ready for the day, Maria decided to just go downstairs and Meditate on the back porch, while she waited for the rest of the day to start.

　　The sky was shaded in a beautiful cascade of blues and imperial violets that went on for as far as the eye could see.

　　Looking out into the ambient energy that was now being released at an incomprehensible rate, Maria couldn`t help but feel a little satisfaction with herself. For as beautiful as this morning was, it was in no small part done thanks to her and her efforts.

　　Now that I think about it, it does sound sort of egotistical to say that I made the sky blue, even though I did, Maria thought to herself as she sat and meditated. Each breath in brought in a wave of calming blue energy, and with it a renewed sense of purpose.

　　Whoom.

　　After an hour or so of just cultivating in this mana rich environment that was perfectly suited for her, she felt her body begin to relax. In the back of her mind, she also knew that the ruler of a territory also got a huge bonus for cultivating on property within their conquered domain.

　　That was another thing that was odd, and something that she herself might have to deal with in the future, the fact that she was now a property owner. That`s right, all of downtown Washington was hers, at least as far as the new system was concerned, and that was all that would really matter. Soon, it wouldn`t matter what county, state, or even country she was in, as it would all be system owned property. And the only thing that mattered where it came to the system was who owned the land. With that thought in mind Maria remembered a few stories, of tyrants who ruled over territories like warlords, who were then taken over by different but equally powerful warlords who themselves had their own set of rules. In her mind she remembered it being a bad situation, which was why she hid herself mostly in the supplying, maintenance, and bandaging of soldiers. As the years went on, the last one was the easiest as cultivators healed quickly from any wounds suffered. So often just keeping them alive was more than enough to ensure a full recovery. Then a little further on she wasn`t needed at all, all, until she was hand selected to be the healer for the team she was with, even then her role as healer was just auxiliary in nature as they were all designed to be elite soldiers, capable of handling anything the multi-verse threw at them. Anything but purely psychic attacks.

　　Thinking back on it, that had been the one true downfall of humanity, not enough emphasis on psychics. Of course, it didn`t help that most psychics had a bad rap, as they were associated with people who used their mind powers to bend and enslave others to their will. In fact, Maria was fairly certain that the first psychic, or at least the person who gained the title of the first psychic during her last life had died from being swarmed by droves of people who were enraged by their indiscretions. Who would have known that the works of those few caused so much tragedy to befall them.

　　Blinking.

　　Maria blinked, realizing that more visions had come, and this time she was almost certain that they were related to the fact that she had been meditating, well to be more accurate cultivating, as she had been actively pulling in massive swatch of energy from the mini node in her back yard.

　　Did this have to do with awakening my Seer ability? Or was this just something that I can gradually expect to happen every time I meditate? Maria pondered to herself, as the sun was now officially up, and the sky was bright and shining. Soon her sister too would be up, and then she would be able to go back to her room to grab her supplies and be ready for whatever the day had in store for her.

　　***

　　Officer Jones had been to ten different crime scenes. He did take some pride in the fact that he found four of them himself, just following the bloody trail of parts that seemed to go from the crime scene, and then lead off into a direction. One that if Jonesy followed directly would lead invariably to the next crime scene.

　　"It`s almost like they flew." Officer Reyes said, seeing the crime scenes and then being able to help predict where the other bodies came from.

　　"I know. No sign of even touching the fences, but sometimes, you can see what looks to be a landing spot on the other side, like they at least jumped down on the other side." Officer Jones said. It was good to have a partner in this kind of case, as he was the first one on the scene, he had the misfortune of seeing the animals.

　　"So they go, a pulverize and often decapitate rats, snakes, and rabbits. The speed with which they were going depicts that they almost had to have the creatures on them, only stopping long enough to basically slaughter the animal here, before leaving onto the next crime scene." Detective Erin Quinn said, as she took in the notes of both Jones and Reyes, summarizing succinctly what had taken the better part of an hour to detail to her.

　　"That is correct, ma`am." Officer Jones said.

　　Detective Quinn nodded, as a strand of her auburn covered hair chose that moment to work its way free and dangle defiantly in front of her face. Seeing the strand, she gracefully swept it aside and into her hair, before putting on her patrol cap to keep the strand at bay.

　　"Also, you are correct, that each person did not claim to have any of the animals in question. No pet bunnies were slain, no goat owners have reported any missing, and no one has been suspected of missing a rooster either. Also, no one claimed to own the snakes or rats, in the case of the snakes it was noted that at least one was a poisonous variant that is not typical to these areas."

　　Jones and Reyes both nodded, not thinking of anything else to say to that.

　　"Any pattern? I mean there is clearly a circular pattern, as they seemed to have made their way around, almost in a geographic shape." The detective said.

　　"Yes, they seem to have gone in a giant circle around the school." Reyes said, pointing east, towards the very school in question that could be seen from here. Well at least the scoreboard for their football team could be seen.

　　"Yeah, I saw that too. Also given the fact that these all seem to be ritualized animal slaughters, I can well see that as being something a bored teenager would do. Perhaps multiple, some type of sports team thing? What do you think?"

　　"Well football season is over, so it would likely be one of the summer sports, Soccer, or Baseball most likely." Officer Jones added.

　　"Very good, go check and see if we can see if any of them don`t have an alibi for where they were last night." Detective Quinn said.

　　"So what do we do with the animals? Should we take them in as evidence?" Reyes asked.

　　"Ugh, no contact Animal Control and see if they can come and get the bodies. Also ask them to see if they can also do a cursory investigation of the bodies to see if there is anything else we can identify as happening. We are looking for at least one, if not multiple suspects," Detective Quinn answered.

　　With that the detective took her notes in hand and decided to go and see the sports teams at Washington High and see if she could find anything else about this odd case. That or if there were any other cases reported. Thinking on that, line of questions, Detective Quinn decided to follow up on that hunch.

　　"Dispatch this is Quinn, I`m out here investigating the ritualistic animal slaughters."

　　"Quinn this is Dispatch, I read you ten-four."

　　"Dispatch, can you tell me if there were any recent phone calls made by anyone on or around the High School Sports teams? Any violence, or altercations?"

　　"Wait one."

　　There was a moment of pause, as clicking could be heard as the dispatcher clearly worked to find all recent events involving the school.

　　"No calls on violence, the only one we have is of a missing person who was later found. Apparently, she passed out in a ditch and later found her way home."

　　"What did the officer say who spoke to the individual?"

　　"Nothing, the search was called off."

　　"Huh." Detective Quinn said, as she tapped her steering wheel as she made her way towards the high school. "Can you tell me who the missing person was?"

　　"One second, the information is marked as confidential given the age of the victim."

　　"So they are a child?"

　　"Yes, is this for your active case?"

　　Detective Quinn tapped her steering wheel as she processed the question, ultimately deciding to go with including this as at least an investigatory part of her case. "Yes, go ahead and apply my current case and badge to access the victim information."

　　"Very good. In that case, the alleged missing person is one Maria Alvarez, seventeen, a student at Washington High, and recently tried out for the sports teams, until she went missing. Apparently, she was absent from school yesterday, while her parents took her to the hospital for exams."

　　"You got all that from the file?"

　　"No, I got that from my son who dates Ms. Alvarez."

　　At that Detective Quinn nodded, that was the one great thing and bad thing about small town life, everybody knew everybody else, somehow.