Chapter 32 – Inside The Structure
The deeper they moved into Boiling Springs, the more the town revealed what it had become.
From the outside, it had looked intact, almost stable in a way that contrasted sharply with everything else they had passed. Up close, that illusion fell away. The buildings still stood, but they were no longer neutral spaces. Every path, every doorway, every open stretch of ground had been folded into something functional, something controlled.
People moved where they were supposed to move.
Others didn’t move at all.
Jack kept to the edges as he advanced, using the spaces between buildings to stay out of direct sight while Blood Sense mapped the patterns ahead. The density of signals increased steadily, but what mattered more was how they behaved. Some moved in loops, repeating the same routes with only minor variation. Others clustered in fixed positions, their presence constant in a way that suggested confinement rather than choice.
The difference was easy to read now.
Guards.
And the ones being kept.
Hanna moved close behind him, her steps quieter than before, her posture aligned with his without needing direction. She didn’t speak. There was nothing to say that would change what they were walking into.
Jack slowed as they reached the back of a larger structure, one of several older buildings that had been repurposed. The windows were covered, not boarded, but obstructed just enough to prevent clear visibility from the outside. The door stood slightly open.
Movement inside.
He paused at the edge of the wall, letting his awareness settle fully before acting. Three signals within the structure. Two moving. One stationary.
Guard pattern.
He glanced at Hanna briefly.
“Two inside,” he said quietly. “One deeper.”
She nodded once, already understanding.
Jack stepped forward and pushed the door open just enough to enter.
The first guard turned at the sound.
Too late.
Sanguine Surge activated.
The shift sharpened everything, the confined space reducing variables instead of complicating them. Jack closed the distance in a single step, the scythe cutting cleanly through the man before he could react. The motion carried through, controlled and efficient, leaving no time for the second to fully process what had happened.
The second guard reached for his weapon, his movement sharper than the others they had encountered outside. Jack adjusted immediately, stepping into the line of attack instead of away from it.
The scythe struck low.
The man’s balance broke.
Jack ended it before the recovery could begin.
[You have defeated: Human Guard (Lv.7)]
[Experience Gained]
[You have defeated: Human Guard (Lv.7)]
[Experience Gained]
The notifications passed quickly, the system treating the fight no differently than any other.
Jack didn’t dwell on it.
His attention had already shifted deeper into the building.
The third signal remained.
Stationary.
He moved forward without hesitation.
The interior space opened slightly as he passed through the next doorway, the layout more defined here, less like a storage area and more like something that had been intentionally arranged.
And then he saw them.
Several figures sat along the wall, their posture slumped, their movement minimal. Some looked up as he entered, their expressions slow to change, as if the connection between what they were seeing and what it meant had not fully formed yet.
Jack’s gaze moved across them quickly.
Not his family.
But—
Alive.
That mattered.
One of them shifted, pushing themselves up slightly as if unsure whether to move or stay still.
“You’re not—” the man started, his voice rough, uncertain.
Jack didn’t answer.
Instead, he stepped aside slightly, making space as Hanna entered behind him.
Her reaction was quieter, but not softer. Her gaze moved across the room, taking in the same details, the same condition of the people here, and something in her posture tightened as she understood.
“They’re keeping them here,” she said, more to confirm than to question.
Jack nodded once.
“For now.”
He turned back toward the doorway, his awareness extending outward again.
This wasn’t the center.
It was part of the structure.
A holding point.
Which meant—
There were more.
He stepped back toward the entrance.
“Move,” he said to the people in the room. “Stay behind us. Don’t make noise.”
There was hesitation.
Not refusal.
Uncertainty.
That was expected.
Jack didn’t repeat himself.
Instead, he focused outward again, tracking the movement beyond the building. The disturbance from the fight had already begun to ripple outward, subtle but present.
Other signals shifted.
Patrol patterns breaking.
They didn’t have time to clear this piece by piece.
Hanna stepped up beside him.
“This is going to spread.”
“Yes.”
She glanced back briefly at the people in the room, then forward again.
“Then we don’t slow down.”
Jack’s grip on the scythe settled.
“No.”
They stepped back into the open.
This time, the movement around them had changed.
Guards were no longer following clean patterns. Signals shifted toward their position, drawn by the disruption they had caused.
Jack exhaled slowly, letting Blood Sense expand just enough to track all of them at once.
Five.
No—
More.
Closing.
He adjusted his stance.
“Stay behind me.”
Hanna didn’t argue.
The first guard rounded the corner at a run, his weapon already raised.
Jack activated Blood Shield.
The barrier formed just as the man committed, absorbing the initial impact of the strike and stopping the momentum before it could carry through. The force pressed against the shield, but it held long enough for Jack to step forward into the opening it created.
The scythe cut across the man’s midsection.
He dropped.
[You have defeated: Human Guard (Lv.7)]
[Experience Gained]
The next two came together.
Jack activated Sanguine Surge again, the shift settling over him as he moved to meet them instead of waiting for them to close the distance. The first strike disabled the closer one, breaking his movement before it could become a threat.
The second adjusted, trying to circle.
Jack didn’t let him.
He stepped through the first and ended the second in the same motion.
[You have defeated: Human Guard (Lv.6)]
[Experience Gained]
[You have defeated: Human Guard (Lv.7)]
[Experience Gained]
The remaining signals slowed.
Not retreating.
Repositioning.
Jack let Sanguine Surge fade, his breathing steady as he recalculated the space around them.
The structure was breaking.
Not completely.
But enough.
He glanced briefly at Hanna.
“More coming.”
She nodded, her grip tightening slightly on her weapon.
“I see them.”
Jack looked forward again, his awareness extending deeper into the town, toward the center where the densest cluster still remained.
That hadn’t changed.
That was still where this ended.
He stepped forward.
Not waiting for the next wave to fully form.
Not giving them time to rebuild the pattern.
“Stay close.”
Hanna moved with him.
Behind them, the people they had freed hesitated for only a moment before following.
The structure of Boiling Springs was no longer intact.