Annihilation: The Prologue (14)

''Speak''

'Thought'

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~Ryu POV~

To say I am pissed would be an understatement.

The moment this monster was alive, the first thing it did was attack me on sight, ignoring everything, and seem to be hellbent on killing me.

If I'm being honest, this is not the first time it has happened. Still, unlike most times, the monster has power, a regeneration power, and somehow a power that seems to relate to space manipulation or something similar.

This makes me only come up with a conclusion: this thing somehow has Bram DNA.

Of course, this is nothing more than a theory, but considering who am I dealing with, I would not put it past someone like Mary to do this; in fact, I would be more surprised if Mary didn't put Bram DNA in it.

As for the partial spatial manipulation, which looks very similar to Rashomon, I would guess that she used my old arms, that she cut off, and somehow, someway used those arms as part of this monster.

It also probably has Mary DNA because... you know? Why wouldn't it have it?

Not that I care.

But here comes the real problem: this thing is not too strong or too fast; it doesn't have the most extraordinary durability, but what makes it annoying is that it has the power to regenerate, which makes it much harder t kill.

Right now, we are fighting outside the castle, and now in the forest fighting, the monster seems to try its hardest to kill me.

Rashomon kept flying out, cutting, eating and stabbing the monster nonstop, yet the monster did not slow down.

Mary can be seen not far away from here, still writing and observing the monster behaviour and how it fights.

The monster suddenly leaps back, and electricity starts to come out from its body, which I immediately thought the monster would shoot electricity at me.

How wrong I was.

Instead of shooting it at me, the electricity starts to go into the ground. A black substance starts to come out from the ground before forming into a shape that looks like spikes while having some red energy like Rashomon surrounding it, while at the same time, I can hear some humming sound.

"Oh? Isn't that interesting?" Mary suddenly said.

Before I could ask what she was talking about, the black spike launched at me, but my Rashomon was fast enough to react. Still, to my absolute surprise, despite my Rashomon devouring space blocking the attack, it seems that Rashomon is struggling on blocking the attack.

And suddenly, to my absolute surprise, I heard a glass breaking sound, and the next thing I knew, it somehow broke through Rashomon shield, but I was fast enough to roll out of the attack way.

How is that possible?

Is it because it somehow has a trace of my DNA, making it possible for the monster to use a frail version of Rashomon? That doesn't make sense because I know that Rashomon is a cloth manipulating ability, but that monster doesn't have any cloth on or anything, so how the hell does it use my power?

Not only that, but look, my Rashomon also has a weakness which is another Rashomon. It seems that the moment two Rashomon hit each other, they seemed to cancel each other out; the reason that my Rashomon was able to hold out its attack might be because it was only a fraction of my power.

But it seems that due to it only having a fraction of power, instead of using it like me, it used Rashomon to enhance the other attack instead by giving those attacks the same properties as Rashomon.

How interesting.

But there is still a question that I have in my mind.

What the hell is that black substance coming from the ground? And how the hell does the monster be able to control it?

Just how the hell is it doing that?

But before I can think of any solution, several more black spikes launch at me again, and I immediately react by dodging them instead of trying to block it with my Rashomon; it looks like that enhanced physical strength from Bram's arms is coming in very handy right now.

The monster now has a new tactic and is now trying to kill me with projectile instead.

"You probably have some questions like now, and you probably really want an answer for it right now. So I, Mary Shelley, feeling generous, considering how you help to test my experiment, shall explain it to you."

Well, there she goes again, explaining stuff for other people, whether they like it or not.

Hey, wait, she doesn't even know my questions, so how the hell is she going to answer it!?

"You probably ask yourself, what is that black substance that my child is using? The answer is simple; it's iron."

Iron? What the hell does she mean?

"You see, my power is electricity manipulation and generation, and there is one property that electricity has, and that is called electromagnetism, so my child used those properties to control iron, like a magnet.

But then, you probably going to ask, "But where do all these irons come from? Tell me, professor Mary~." said you probably.

Don't worry dear student, I will tell you.

You see, in dirt or just in the ground in general, typically contain 1–5% total iron, so all my child did was to control in that dirt and form a shape out of it; how smart~.

Not only that, she or he, also control those irons in such a way that they can cut or stab through anything. You probably gonna ask me how to, and the answer is very simple vibration.

With these eyes of my, I can see those spikes vibrate clearly, but even without it, that humming sound alone is enough to confirm my suspicion.

Even though she or he only exist for ten minutes, she or he is already smart enough to pull these type of move~

AH~ You are making me s proud right ow~." Mary said in a strangely happy tone, considering her experiment is a success and performing exceptionally well; I'm not surprised why she is delighted right now.

But I must admit, she only looks at the attack for a few second and she already figures out how the attack work. Just how smart is she really?

"Well, I guess that answers that, but how does it get smart so fast!?" I shout while still trying to dodge the attack.

"Do you really want to know the answer? Because you probably don't like the answer."

"Just tell me dammit!!"

"Well... the answer is simple really..." Mary said slowly before continuing

"The answer is... magic." She said while casually shrugging.

"Wha-!?"