THIS GREAT KEVIN CAN ONLY OPEN HIS DIMENSIONAL STORAGE TO THE ONE HE’S SHARING A SOUL BOND WITH.

Jacob wasn’t keen on giving away his sword to let the others story the bodies they would accumulate during the extermination, and it appeared that he didn’t need to worry. But, unfortunately, Kevin’s dimensional storage was only open to him since the sword was, apparently, not your standard Interspatial Ring.

Jacob looked at the map in his hands and started sketching out a path.

“We can’t let all those resources go to waste, for Christ’s sake,” Jacob swore. They simply didn’t have enough high-leveled warriors for the necessary back and forth. Moreover, a pick-up truck would only carry three wolves at best. Maybe four?

“I need Helena and, especially, Epagogia at the Oriole realm.”

It was going to be too risky if they weren’t at the Oriole realm. If Jacob was right, there had to be a monster at the Hound realm in the region close to L’Aquila, and possibly more inside the city proper.

That meant that they would meet monsters at the Oriole realm.

It was a given.

Jacob looked at the map again.

We could use the city North of Fort Oak as an operation base. I could have Epagogia set up a Formation to communicate with me. We could field whatever Formations we might be able to put together there. It’s fifteen minutes by car from Fort Oak. We could set up a Spirit Gathering Formation here, Jacob circled a spot on top of the town, and all the monsters would be gathered up there. It’s not the same as going inside the region proper to exterminate the monsters, but it would cushion the blow. We would be grinding them up one by one. No monster would return from there, meaning that more would follow but, without knowing if the region was hospitable, we could virtually keep killing them indefinitely.

The stronger monsters were very unlikely to move there, and it was a safe distance from Fort Oak. They could have convoys with Geneva go back and forth from Fort Oak and—Ochre. That was going to be their forward base.

Jacob quickly wrote down a checklist of things to do before they actually moved up there their best team.

“Move the Alchemical Garden, clean up the Black Forest and nearby zones,” Jacob looked up.

Let’s set up a Spirit Gathering Formation close to St. Peter, and we won’t need to clean up the Black Forest. The wolves will come on their own.

Spirit Gathering Formations were meant to gather more energy than normal in one place. They weren’t that hard to set up, but they usually attracted many monsters. They were a natural beacon, especially for monsters interested in migrating. Monsters could naturally feel the energy’s density of a place. And a Spirit Gathering Formation wasn’t enough to cause a horde or attract stronger monsters.

If they set up one near St. Peter, they would know where to look whenever they needed to kill a monster. And Jacob was going to spend all of his time in St. Peter, granting non-stop protection to the inhabitants.

Well, that’s settled.

…

The next day

Jacob looked at the crowd in front of him, and the crowd stared back.

Well, let’s start.

“So,” Jacob used Qi to make his voice reach everyone in the crowd, “you have received the pamphlet, right? You should already know about the apocalypse, the Contribution System, and how St. Peter is planning on battling Demonic Beasts to rebuild.”

Epagogia had already singled out the people who were most likely to complain, and she had warned them of the risks of interrupting Jacob while he was speaking. She roamed the crowd stealthily, trying to catch people ready to create problems for them.

Jacob hoped that she would do her job properly. However, people were not happy about the apocalypse, and St. Peter could go from ‘savior’ to ‘resource hoarder and secret peddler’ very fast if things went wrong.

“So, we have sacrificed a lot to get our hands on some Cultivation Techniques, Spells, Martial Styles, and Martial Techniques. You can see we have set up a simple Contribution System. You find food, get a crafter job, help as a sentry, as a scouting party, and you get points. Luis Albert, the principal of the Quintus Horatius Flaccus High School, takes care of keeping score. As soon as you have enough points to redeem something, you can ask some of his men, and your points will get updated as soon as you get your reward. Everyone already got a Cultivation Technique, but a weak one. The more you give to mankind, the more you will get back.”

Jacob saw Epagogia put down a man who was going to protest without anyone really noticing. He exhaled.

“For the next few days, no one below the Mantis realm will be allowed to leave St. Peter. As the courageous inhabitants of Fort Oak will tell you, big bad wolves at the Mantis realm are roaming in the region now. We will send an extermination party to Ochre to build a forward base and start killing them off to prevent the formation of a horde. A Demonic Beast horde is…”

Jacob kept on explaining all the necessary information to survive for the upcoming days. He went on like this for twenty minutes. Finally, he saw a young man with ash-blonde hair looking at him with some despise on his face, but Epagogia didn’t approach the guy for some reason. Thankfully, he didn’t seem willing to create trouble.

“Well, that’s all, questions?”