Barracks

"RUN FOR IT!" Roselyn yells to Zane.

Zane snaps out of his shocked state. Guards burst through the door and start firing at the red clawed hand viciously. Zane stands up and runs towards the doors with Roselyn in tow and pushes past the guards. The second they exit the door's frame, they hear a loud thrashing sound. The guards behind them are mauled by the large Azazel hand.

The auditorium seating stands they were standing on just disappeared instantly with broken planks as the only remains. Both of them ran straight through the corridor as guards run behind them.

"goddamit! where's the exit!" Roselyn says in frustration.

Zane spots a stair exit

"There!" Zane alerts her

Both of them make way through the stairs as the building shakes violently from the attack. The duo run upstairs frantically and enter the main hall just in front of the main entrance. A loud bang followed by violent thrashing, as if the ground tore apart, is heard behind them. They both look behind to see an Azazel looking at them right in the eye. It had torn through the basement and freed its hands out. Zane took a deep look at the monster.

Red scales lined its body and a long white patch on its belly facing them. It had obnoxiously long teeth with even larger canine that could bite a ship in half. Its scarlet claws instead of fingers on its hand were around 10 meters. And its eyes screamed death with the frantic jade color. It almost looked like a dragon if it didn't have eyes like that.

"HOLY SHIT RUN!!" Roselyn screamed.

Both of them ran out of the entrance. The Azazel roared so loud it would've destroyed the brain of a person itself. It followed Roselyn and Zane in a maniacal slither. Zane looked back to see the monster inches away when a blue sort of light slammed its side and knocked out the Azazel. Both of them didn't stop and followed guards towards a safety muster area far away. Zane looked back to see that the blue light is a man. An Exterminator. He had a white sort of armor plates attached to his shoulders, knees, chest, and back while the rest of his uncovered parts were in a black leather-like suit. His hands on the other hand had huge fist like contraptions connecting to his entire arm. A blue sort of light glowed along the wires of his fist.

The Azazel woke up and spotted the man and unleashed a hellfire of flames from its mouth. The exterminator punched right through the fires as if deflecting the fire away.

Another exterminator then appeared on the site clad in the same armor piece as the first one except now he had a large pack strapped behind him. He took a long breath and shot out stark cold white air out of his mouth like superman and froze the Azazel's hands and lower body.

Another guard then came out on site

"SIR THE CORE IS IN ITS NECK" the guard yelled towards the exterminator with large fists.

Immediately the exterminator ran at full speed towards the monster, jumped around 30 meters in the air, accelerated like a bullet with a blue light emitting and punched the neck of the Azazel with an explosive might. The neck ruptured and from it came out an amber like stone that shattered as soon as Zane saw it. The monster fell down on the ground lifeless in an instant. The situation calmed down as fast as it began.

Zane was awestruck by what he had seen. He had seen exterminators fighting Azazel on large scales on the internet. But never up close especially when one was mere inches away from him.

Soon the area was cleaned up and the corpse was taken away. All the cadets were assigned to their teams they would live with and fight alongside. It was announced that the exterminator procedure for the cadets would take place the next day because of the incident.

"good lord…" Zane sighed.

"damn you're a wuss" Roselyn says.

"shut it you nearly pissed yourself" Zane says in frustration.

"whatever pale boy good luck with your team." Roselyn says as she walks away from him.

"damn that girl…" Zane mumbles.

The higherups at the stage were injured but ultimately survived the incident. Zane later found out the two exterminators were part of 3rd group, the second strongest of 300 groups in the entire division. The top most was 11th group.

Zane was given a slip of paper. It wrote "40th group barrack 6A". He then boarded a bus towards another part of the base. Soon the bus approached what looked like a large ware house with others like it in some distance as far as Zane could see. The building was labeled 'A'.

He entered the building along with other cadets and was lead into the ware house. Inside was a large hall with multiple stories of rooms circling the warehouse. He went into the elevator and stopped on the first floor. Turned left and stood in front of 'barrack 6'. He opened the door.

Inside were 9 men, some lounging and some working their chores. They all turned their attention to Zane.

"ay we got a new chick check it out" said the first man towards Zane.

He stood up in front of Zane, filling the door frame of the room. He was large and loomed like a tower in front of Zane. With heavy muscles, a bald head, dark skin and a dominating look. Surely this was the leader. And Zane was afraid.

"are you lost lil' boy?" the man spoke in a deathly tone. Zane was reminded of his trauma of the Azazel he saw earlier.

"cut it out Pierre!" a voice from behind the man said.

Pierre frowned disappointingly.

"sorry captain" Pierre moves away.

Behind him was a man a bit taller then Zane. He had dark but luscious and well kept-hair, with black eyes and a fair but battle-hard skin. He was well built and lean and stood with a fine posture and calm expression. He looked strong, strong enough to beat up even Pierre into pulp but he didn't look intimidating whatsoever.

"state your business.." he paused and looked over to Zane shoulder to find any patches "cadet?"

"I'm Zane Raphael, I'm a cadet and I've been assigned to your group" Zane said in a proper voice.

"oh yeah right well I'm Captain William Fredricks, 4th division 40th group. Well then come in, i'll show you your bed"

Zane enters the room. It's a long hall like room. There are beds sticking to the wall, some with curtains and that have been personalized heavily. At the end of the hall is a t-section with 3 bathrooms to the right and a kitchen to the left with another room past the kitchen and 4 large windows overlooking the entire base. Zane's bed was to the end of the hall at the entrance of the t-section. There were all kinds of other amenities that one would find in an apartment.

"so here is your bed with your belongings and" he turns towards the other men "these are your fellow exterminators" said captain Williams.

He then started pointing out the men.

"that big black guy over there who nearly mugged you is sergeant Pierre, the small guy beside him is lieutenant Rodney, these other guys are PFCs Robert, Archie, Harold, Yousaf, Ben and Greg. We have been fighting Azazel's since the last 3 years and we a bit new so we it was just us and now you're the 10th man. You can call me Captain Will and my room is past the kitchen, understood?"

"got it captain" said Zane.

It was all new for Zane. He was usually always lonely. The only interactions he would have before joining the corps was either with mike or with the teacher for necessary school work. He had good reason to be gloomy. Being torn away from family does a lot to a person.

"so!" said Archie, a slender tall figure with long green dyed hair "got your core?"

"well not yet the attack postponed it to tomorrow" said Zane politely.

"oh damn too bad" said Archie.

"BUT! you did see how Azazels are killed now right? You were lucky too, that was the 6th attack on a base in a 7 year span that too a category 5!" Archie said.

Zane wondered in horror what a category 7 or 9 would look like.

"why is the 11th group the strongest here? Why are the numbers jumbled up?" Zane asks

"oh c'mon bro its not the same as in all the damn mangas or comics, this is real life! Once a group's members are killed, promoted to warrant ranks or have been discharged for some special reason, that's when new recruits are admitted. The last batch of our group were all killed in a tactical error 3 years ago and that's how we came into the 40th." Archie said.

"that's also why the 11th is the strongest they have the toughest members with all of them being type 8 exterminators" Archi goes on.

"type-8?" Zane is confused.

Archie is interrupted by Robert.

"like Azazels, exterminator's powers are also measured using types. Type 1 is the lowest while type-8 and 9 is the highest with type 10 being quite mythical. And not just here its all over the world."

Zane had learned quite a lot from these two. Robert looked much older then all the other exterminators. He resembled a little like the captain but he had a beard.

"so what are your types?" Zane asked.

"can't say it until you get a core, its just protocol sorry" Robert says.

The other men in the room also greeted Zane and introduced themselves as he went around introducing himself. Harold is the group's healer always wearing a joyous expression, Yousaf was the intelligence department of the group and had quite a middle-eastern face but he is the most American man Zane has seen, Ben and Greg are brothers who act as shock troops, Archie and Robert are the tactical force of the group while sergeant Pierre is the tank and heavy lifter of the group. Lieutenant Rodney is a recluse and is second-in-command of the group. Zane was amused meeting such people.

"well then I guess its time you got some sleep, tomorrow you're gonna be an exterminator good luck!" says archie.

"thank you" Zane said.

He felt all of it. Some eyes of just cause, some of good intentions while others with ulterior motives and some that thought Zane was not worthy at all. Zane wondered what would come of him when he became an exterminator. This place was like another world, everything and everyone was different. He might not know how to talk but he could understand a person motives.

He slept, wondering what tomorrow would hold and how his sister was doing.