Super Detective in the Fictional World

After a pause, Luke continued, “Your family and friends may have been killed by the spiders. So, you must not underestimate them. They’re still monsters that can easily kill you with one bite.”

He was quite blunt, but it was the truth.

A moment ago, he had to maintain morale and couldn’t have the residents getting depressed.

But now that reinforcements had arrived, he needed to calm them down.

Laying low and staying alive was the most important thing.

Otherwise, what was the point of them fleeing and fighting just now? To be killed for nothing before dawn? That totally wasn’t worth it. “Now, check your weapons and stay alert. I can tell you that the dead spiders may only be half their population. This shopping center is the only thing keeping you alive to see tomorrow. Are we clear?” asked Luke, raising his voice.

“Got it,” replied some of the residents. Luke said, “I can’t hear you! Are they the only people who understood what I said?”

“Got it,” said everybody in a jumble.

“Are you all dead? Are you going to use that attitude to deal with those monstrous spiders? Answer me in loud voices!” yelled Luke.

“Got it!” All the residents finally yelled at the top of their voices.

Their frustration at Luke’s stern criticism earlier also disappeared.

Luke nodded and put on a gentle smile. “That’s great. Everybody, I hope that I can leave this place safely with all of you tomorrow morning!”

After that, he got up and went downstairs. When he passed Selina, who had a question in her eyes, Luke looked around and said in a low voice, “Their mindsets are very shaky. Suppress them with that air of yours from killing the Carlos family shooters in Shackelford so that they’ll listen to you.”

Selina smiled and punched his chest. “Don’t underestimate me, little brother.”

Amused, Luke went to the first floor and saw that while Samantha was shouting anxiously, most of the residents weren’t listening to her. Instead, they were all excited, as if they were about to charge out of the shopping center and fight the spiders outside.

Luke raised his hand and fired.

Bang!

Everybody fell quiet. Since nobody here had been fighting, they weren’t wearing ear plugs. While the gunfire on the second floor was noisy, it wasn’t entirely intolerable because of the distance.

Everybody’s ears buzzed at the M500’s loud report.

As he had done on the second floor, Luke rebuked all the residents on the first floor.

Then, he declared that he could give a hand to the warriors who didn’t fear death, and who planned to fight the spiders.

How, exactly? By throwing them onto the street from the windows on the second floor, of course.

Luke even promised to give those determined warriors a splendid weapon, say, a spear or a knife, so that they could demonstrate their valiance in front of their fellows.

Everybody in the lobby fell quiet.

It was human nature to follow the crowd, particularly in a crisis like this one.

When someone proposed to attack, everybody grew bold.

But if some idiots were picked out and told to take action alone, they would immediately chicken out.

Looking at the residents, Luke said, “If you’re really willing to help, go to the second floor. The people there are still fighting to protect themselves and their families even though they can barely hold up their guns anymore. You can prove yourself there, instead of encouraging other people to do silly things with you.”

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He then raised his voice. “Samantha, replace the defenders upstairs with anyone who is willing to help. Remember, don’t let anyone who is bad at shooting or cowardly go up.”

Samantha nodded, but she knew that most people on the first floor didn’t meet the requirements except for a few like herself.

But her children were here, and she had to keep the residents calm as the sheriff. So, she couldn’t go to the second floor either.

Luke returned to the second floor and observed the situation.

The area outside the entrance to the shopping centre was pretty broad, which made it easy for the spiders to gather, but just as easy for the FBI’s helicopter to launch a barrage.

After the barrage, most of the spiders were wiped out, leaving behind stragglers who weren’t a threat at all.

So, Luke quickly deployed some manpower to the basement stairs to assist Chris with the defense there.

While the entrance to the underground parking lot was blocked by the van, he didn’t know how many black widows there still were outside, so there had to be a line of defense down there.

After completing the arrangements, Luke said a few words to Selina before he quickly climbed out a window.

All the residents on the second floor were puzzled, wondering what the young detective was going to do.

On the outer wall where they couldn’t see, Luke climbed up to the roof with the help of protruding bricks.

With his Sharp Nose, he could tell that there were no longer any spiders on the roof.

After clearing the area here, the two helicopters gradually widened their attack range. Under the searchlights, the spiders couldn’t escape their doom even as they jumped away and tried to hide.

Luke called Charles back. “Charles, I’m going to start rescuing the residents in the areas that you’ve already cleared. Ask your shooters to pay attention and not hit me.” Stunned for a moment, Agent Charles said, “Luke, that’s too dangerous. Why don’t you act with us once we’re done with the clean-up?”

Luke said, “Don’t worry, I’ll stay away from your helicopters. I’ll start with places close to the shopping center.” He then hung up the phone.

He murmured to himself, If you kill all those spiders, I might not get any points for rescuing the survivors!

Now that the fake FBI agents had wiped out the bulk of the army of spiders, Luke could use this opportunity to rescue the residents in the houses around the shopping center.

With his Sharp Nose, he could easily detect the spiders that were hiding and the residents, and he would be much more efficient than Cheney’s team.

Saving one person meant twenty experience and credit points. That was easy income.

In the next two hours, Luke carried out a solo search and rescue operation.

Half an hour later, after the helicopters sprayed the spiders that were still visible on the ground with bullets, it had become much less dangerous, and the agents in the helicopters joined the search and rescue.

Luke asked Charles for four agents to cooperate with him.

That way, he only needed to locate the survivors and kill the spiders, and the time-consuming task of bringing the survivors to a safe place could be given to the agents with him.

Charles moved with another team, while the remaining agents all went to the roof of the shopping center, where they eliminated the occasional spider on the street with sniper rifles and protected the survivors who made their way to the shopping center.