Chapter 101 - 102: Shopping Trip and the Dog Pack’s Cry for Help

Chapter 101: Chapter 102: Shopping Trip and the Dog Pack’s Cry for Help

?? A Small Request to All My Readers ??

Recently, my fanfic has been facing some issues. I suspect some authors may be using bots to report my book, and my reach has dropped significantly. Even my book cover has been removed. It feels like my fanfic is constantly being targeted.

It’s becoming difficult to keep uploading Chapters when these things keep happening, but I don’t want to give up on my stories or my readers.

So I’m asking for your support. ??

If you enjoy my fanfic, please consider leaving Power Stones, honest reviews, and comments. They really help my book gain visibility and reach more readers.

Your support means a lot to me and motivates me to keep writing and uploading Chapters despite these difficulties.

Thank you for standing with me! ??

Chapter 102: Shopping Trip and the Dog Pack’s Cry for Help

Early the next morning, sunlight poured through the windows of the long-abandoned mansion and illuminated rooms that had probably not looked this clean in years. Life in the group’s new home had already settled into a strange kind of routine, although nobody outside the house would have considered any part of it normal. Axel Vance stood in the kitchen with a cup of coffee while sounds of supernatural practice and scientific planning came from different parts of the building.

In the living room, Carrie White sat cross-legged on the floor with her eyes tightly closed. A dozen old dining knives recovered from the basement floated several feet in front of her, arranging themselves into a straight line before smoothly shifting into a circle. A thin layer of sweat covered Carrie’s forehead, but unlike her earlier attempts, none of the knives shot across the room or embedded themselves in furniture.

The exercise had nothing to do with combat. Axel had encouraged her to use small, familiar objects simply because controlling twelve individual items demanded far more precision than throwing one heavy object across a room. Carrie was slowly learning that her telekinesis did not have to arrive as an emotional explosion every time she used it.

On the other side of the room, Lionel Cosgrove was having considerably less success. The smooth dark-red Blood Jade rested within the center of a broad Spirit Binding setup while Lionel tried to establish some kind of response through his supernatural senses. Whatever remained inside the artifact stubbornly refused to cooperate.

Half an hour later, the Blood Jade had not moved, glowed, pulsed differently, or acknowledged Lionel in any recognizable way. He finally dropped into a cross-legged position and glared at it with wounded professional pride. "Come on, buddy. Give me something. I’m supposed to know what I’m doing, and you’re making me look terrible."

The Blood Jade remained silent.

Lionel sighed.

From the kitchen, Dr. Seth Brundle was organizing notebooks and a list of equipment while barely paying attention to anyone else. Without looking up, he said, "Carrie and Lionel can stay here today. Axel, you’re coming into Miami with me."

Axel lowered his coffee cup. "We buying everything from normal stores?"

"No."

Seth zipped his bag shut and looked up with the expression of a treasure hunter who had just discovered a map. "New equipment costs too much, and most of what I need doesn’t have to be new anyway. Universities, failed companies, surplus warehouses, auctions—Miami throws away perfectly useful technology every day."

Axel studied him. "So we’re buying junk."

"Incorrect."

Seth pointed one finger at him. "We are buying undervalued scientific assets that unimaginative people have mistaken for junk."

Lionel looked over from the Blood Jade. "That sounds exactly like junk."

Seth ignored him.

A short while later, Axel drove the battered $800 box truck back toward Miami with Seth sitting beside him. They left the forest roads behind and gradually returned to traffic, noise, storefronts, warehouses, and all the familiar disorder of the city. Instead of heading toward a mall or electronics store, Seth directed him toward increasingly unglamorous parts of town.

Their first stop was a university surplus center filled with old laboratory instruments, office electronics, abandoned furniture, and equipment nobody wanted to store anymore. Seth walked through the aisles like a starving man entering a buffet, stopping every few feet to examine something Axel would have dismissed as obsolete. Within minutes, his arms were full.

"Look at this," Seth said, practically hugging an old instrument cabinet. "Someone threw this out over a minor failure."

Axel looked at the scratched casing. "It looks dead."

"It looks misunderstood."

Seth disappeared down another aisle before Axel could answer.

Axel’s role quickly became porter. He carried Seth’s selections back to the truck while the physicist argued with the warehouse manager over the price of old cable, damaged instruments, connectors, shelves, and pieces of equipment that only Seth seemed able to identify. By the end of the argument, the manager looked exhausted and Seth looked delighted.

Over the next several hours, they visited a liquidation auction selling equipment from a bankrupt biotech company and then a large industrial recycling yard. Seth moved through piles of discarded machinery with uncanny confidence, frequently stopping to pull out one useful component from a mountain of actual scrap. The cognitive changes left by the Color seemed especially obvious whenever he examined unfamiliar technology, because he noticed potential value almost instantly.

The back of the box truck gradually filled with odd-looking scientific hardware, used work surfaces, coils of cable, electronic assemblies, storage cabinets, and enough miscellaneous equipment to make the vehicle look like a mobile laboratory graveyard. Axel did not understand half of what Seth had purchased. Seth, however, looked happier with every new load.

During one of the stops, Axel noticed a German Shepherd standing at the corner across the street. The dog neither barked nor moved toward anyone, simply watching him with an unnervingly steady gaze. Axel frowned but eventually dismissed it, because stray and loose dogs were hardly unusual around Miami.

At their next destination, something similar happened.

Axel checked the rearview mirror and saw a Golden Retriever following the truck from a moderate distance. It did not sprint after them like an excited pet or wander unpredictably like a lost animal; instead, it maintained roughly the same distance for several blocks. When Axel turned at the next intersection, the dog disappeared.

He remembered it.

Later, outside an electronics-recycling facility, Axel saw a Doberman Pinscher standing partially hidden in the shadow of a loading bay. Once again, the animal remained perfectly still and watched Axel with intense concentration. There was no barking, begging, growling, or uncertainty in its posture.

Axel climbed back into the truck and looked toward Seth. "You notice anything weird today?"

Seth did not raise his head.

He was examining a circuit board as though it were a religious artifact.

"What kind of weird?"

"The dogs."

"What dogs?"

Seth turned the board slightly toward the sunlight. "Look at this layout. Whoever designed this had actual taste."

Axel stared at him for a moment. "Never mind."

Seth immediately forgot the question.

Axel did not.

The dogs had appeared too consistently to be coincidence. More importantly, none of them behaved like ordinary animals encountering strangers in crowded city streets.

By late afternoon, Seth declared the shopping trip successful. They loaded the final batch of equipment into the truck and secured the cargo before preparing to leave. Axel was about to climb into the driver’s seat when movement across the street caught his attention.

A filthy Husky stood at the entrance to a narrow alley.

It looked directly at Axel.

Then it gave one soft bark.

The Husky turned and trotted into the alley, stopped several yards inside, and looked back.

Axel remained still.

The dog barked again.

Then continued farther into the passage.

This time, Axel did not dismiss it.

"That dog wants us to follow."

Seth looked up from another newly acquired component. "What?"

Axel opened the truck door again. "Something’s wrong."

He headed toward the alley.

Seth stared after him. "Axel, I just found a design flaw in this board, and I’m trying to figure out why anyone would—"

Axel disappeared around the corner.

Seth sighed heavily.

He carefully placed the component back into its protective bag, set it inside the truck, and locked the door. "This had better be an extraordinarily intelligent dog."

By the time Seth entered the alley, Axel was already well ahead of him.

The Husky moved at an easy pace rather than running full speed. Every few seconds it glanced backward to make sure Axel was still following, then turned another corner. There was no longer any reasonable way to interpret its behavior as random.

Axel increased his pace.

The dog led him through several narrow side streets where buildings became older and increasingly neglected. Storefronts gave way to empty warehouses, broken fences, abandoned lots, and industrial structures with boarded windows. Seth gradually fell behind while complaining from somewhere in the distance.

Eventually, the Husky crossed through a damaged gate and entered an abandoned industrial property.

Axel followed.

Seth arrived nearly a minute later, bent forward with both hands on his knees. "For a dog, this is becoming an unreasonable amount of effort."

Axel looked toward the dark factory building ahead.

Seth straightened slowly. "There are more stray dogs than people in some parts of Miami."

"This one isn’t acting stray."

Axel approached the entrance.

The factory interior beyond it was unnaturally quiet.

No wind moved through the broken windows.

No rats scratched among the trash.

There was not even the distant noise of dogs barking.

Axel reached into the truck gear he had brought along and kept his enchanted chainsaw ready at his side before stepping through the entrance. Seth hesitated briefly, then followed close behind.

The inside of the abandoned factory was enormous and mostly empty. Rusted machinery, scrap metal, broken pallets, and scattered trash covered parts of the concrete floor, while every footstep echoed through the building. Axel had taken only a few steps when the sensation hit him.

They were being watched.

Not by one pair of eyes.

Hundreds.

Axel stopped.

Slowly, he turned toward the largest open section of the factory.

Dogs filled it.

German Shepherds.

Golden Retrievers.

Dobermans.

Huskies.

Terriers.

Mastiffs.

Old mutts of combinations Axel could not identify.

Every dog he had noticed throughout the day was there, along with dozens upon dozens more.

None barked.

None growled.

None charged.

They simply stood in silence and stared at the two men.

Seth’s expression finally lost its scientific distraction. "Okay."

Axel tightened his grip slightly on the chainsaw but did not start it. The animals showed no aggression, and attacking a room full of silent dogs before understanding what was happening would be both stupid and unnecessary.

Then the pack moved.

Not chaotically.

Together.

The first row shifted sideways while several larger dogs moved backward. Smaller dogs slipped between them, forming new lines and spaces with a precision no ordinary pack should have possessed.

Axel watched without speaking.

Seth did the same.

Dozens of animals rearranged themselves across the concrete floor as though responding to instructions neither human could hear. Their coordination was so exact that the movement looked rehearsed.

Minutes passed.

Then the last dog stepped into position.

Every animal stopped.

Silence returned.

Axel stared at the formation.

Seth slowly stepped closer.

From where the two men stood, the meaning became unmistakable.

The dogs had used their own bodies to form four enormous letters across the factory floor.

H E L P.

[Milestone: 500 Power Stones = +1 Chapter]

[Milestone: 10 Reviews = +1 Chapter]

Enjoyed this Chapter? Leave a review.

20+advanced Chapters on P1treon Soulforger