NTR Rogue in the Apocalypse-Chapter 169: A Window

Winter was approaching and the night air was chillier than usual. John and Zara sat outside the base, leaning back in their seats, watching the moon rise into the sky and reflecting off the nearby buildings and vehicles from the parapet. The wind was bitter, but the warmth of a small fire pit was just enough to keep them comfortable.

Zara sipped from a cup of coffee and glanced over at John, her eyes narrowed and her expression stern.

"So, they know..."

John quirked an eyebrow at her and she could tell his confusion just from his expression.

"Your... women. I thought you were doing it behind their back."

John’s head bobbed up and down in understanding, "yes, they know."

Zara sighed, rubbing her forehead, "I don’t get it."

"Get what?"

"Why are they okay with that? Isn’t it demeaning?"

"I can’t speak for them, but all I can say is that the world has changed. Look over there," John pointed at the horizon.

Zara’s eyebrows creased, "there’s nothing there."

"Exactly."

"Are we playing a game?"

"No. You know what used to be there?"

"What?"

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"The city centre. All those skyscrapers and other tall buildings, gone. Just like that."

Zara’s gaze swept across the horizon again, and her shoulders sank in realisation, "okay, you’ve got a point."

"Humans are fragile creatures. In a world where everything can kill you, and you can die at any time, maybe it’s not the most demeaning act to be with someone stronger than you, even if you’re not the only one for them."

"That so?"

"That’s what I think," John replied, but his mind flashed back to Dalia. He had noticed her unstable mental state lately and was worried she was regressing, and there was nothing he could do to bring her out of it. Now with Stephanie and Julia gone, Dalia’s mental state had deteriorated further. She was paranoid, prone to panic attacks, and even lashing whenever John got close to anyone.

Not all of his women were okay with being part of a harem, especially not Dalia. Just a few days ago, a female survivor was found beaten almost half to death and John had recognised her. She was a young survivor whose class gave her skills similar to John’s and she wanted to learn from him. John didn’t have proof, but something told him Dalia had something to do with it.

This only confirmed his suspicions, and he knew Dalia was slipping out of control, and he didn’t know what to do about it. She could be an invaluable addition to his team, especially if she learned how to control her class skills, but at what cost? Would he have to watch his back all the time to ensure that no one else was caught in the crossfire of her jealousy?

"John," Zara’s voice pulled him out of his reverie, and he looked over at her curiously.

Zara gestured towards a tablet that was lined up against the wall, "it’s time. Let’s go."

John stood up and jumped over the wall. Zara followed by disappearing into a burst of flames.

As John’s feet touch the cold and damp ground, Zara was already waiting next to him. They looked at each other with determined expressions and set out towards the city centre.

Professor Myers had found out that the energy that dissipated in the city centre always did so at the exact same time every day at 2 AM, but that was not all he found. For whatever reason, powerful monsters congregated around that same spot so only someone with skills could get close.

As John grew stronger, the amount of stats he received from monsters diminished, but he had been fighting and killing almost non-stop ever since Julia and Stephanie got taken. It seems that reaching this point meant he needed to fight much stronger monsters and this was not only a clue to his women’s whereabouts, but also a chance to grow stronger.

His eyes narrowed as he looked at his stats before leaving for the city centre:

[John Sarack]

[Age: 21]

[Strength: 48.2]

[Vitality: 27.1]

[Agility: 58]

[Energy: 36.1]

[Skills: Quiet Steps (C), Critical Hit (D), Shockwave (D), Appraisal (A), Shadow Claw (D), Haze Veil (C), Dagger Aura (B), No Skills (S)]

[Skill Borrowing: Muscle Strengthening (B), Strength Buff (B), Berserker’s Rage (C), Fire Control (C)]

Aside from his upgraded stats, his Appraisal had been upgraded to A and his Love Meter had disappeared. The most curious thing was Julia’s and Stephanie’s incredible gains. Their skills had gone up by two ranks in just two months. That was not that fast considering John’s rate of growth, but it was much faster than everyone else he knew.

He thought that wherever they are, it must be dangerous and filled with powerful monsters for them to grow this quickly.

"John, look," Zara pointed to the sky above the city centre.

John’s eyes locked on a spectacle of lights shimmering in the night sky. It looked like a cloud, only brighter, with shades of pink and orange dancing against the darkness.

It was breathtakingly beautiful and eerie at the same time. The cloud appeared to be made of thousands of tiny, shimmering specks, like tiny fireflies frozen in the sky.

John and Zara stared in amazement. It was like something out of a dream, like a cosmic display designed to entice and mesmerise.

It had to be some kind of anomaly, but what was it and why did it appear so consistently?

As they approached, the shimmering mass shifted and brightened, a beam of light emerging from the centre and shooting upwards towards the sky, shattering the darkness like a supernova, as though something was using the cloud itself as a source of energy, as if it were trying to communicate with something.

"Zara, now!" John shouted and Zara pointed a device they obtained from Professor Myers. It looked like a radar with a display that was constantly changing, shifting and flickering like the colours of a kaleidoscope.

She waved the device frantically, scanning the cloud for any hint or clue about what it was or where it came from.

They had assumed it would be a beacon of sorts, a way to contact whoever took the women, but what they found was a puzzle within a bigger mystery, and they were desperate for any clues, but they looked deeper into the mass, and they saw something incredible.