Chapter 22—The king and his Mobs

The floating crystals lit up before three bullets were fired at him, much faster and deadlier than before. The crystals' mechanism now includes a prediction bot that anticipates where he will go, by calculating his speed and acceleration—the bullets are much precise. But he isn't bothered at all, as he exhibited feint movements to trick the prediction and avoided the bullets just like before.

There he noticed the one-second pause before the next bullets are fired, which should be enough for him to set the bomb that will destroy these blood-lustful parasites.

By placing energy stones more than the ratio will cause the reactor to overwork, instead of a free flow caused with the right ratio of energy stones in the solution. The energy will build up inside the generator and later on explode, now he just needs to put the exact amount of energy stone to calculate the time before it explodes and how powerful it will be.

He isn't in the alchemist's path but he knows enough about making simple bombs, it was thought in practical battle in school. That's the only class he enjoyed besides swordsmanship.

Valor quickly grabbed the horizontal handle and opened the safe, by sliding the door in the gaps of the soil, the glowing gems were finally seen. Luckily the wheels of the sliding door are oiled, so it opened easily even with the heavyweight.

The bullets came again and Valor avoided it easily by exhibiting acrobatic moves before he grabbed a hand size gem and threw it to the reactor. The solution splashed while a transient glow and lit up with sudden movement, seems like the solution is the same as the phenomenon where waves of the ocean would lit up at night because of special planktons.

Valor grabbed another gem, this time it is as big as his head so he couldn't throw it fast like before as bullets came once again, so Valor avoided them first before he threw the energy stone in the solution, the splash was much larger this time and some drops of the solution even reached the safe, creating sparks when they touched the glowing stones.

Looking at the mutated beings, he can see some are now threading the stairs. Some are pushed out and fell but that didn't stopped them from reaching the dilapidated hallway.

---

As it fully devoured the brain, the parasite has now the size of a human brain. But with all this done, his spawns still hadn't arrived, Causing it to wonder what took them so long.

Displease as he is, the parasite sent stronger waves to express its umbrage. The mobs sensed it so they rushed more fanatic, therefore more parasites are killed and injured.

The hair-like limbs grew longer and scattered throughout the whole body, taking the place of the nervous system and later on commanded the muscles. It moved a finger first before the whole hand was fully controlled, like it is born to exhibit complicated movements, it can wiggle the hand smoothly.

More minutes had passed and it controlled the arm before the whole body followed. Feeding through the data of the brain, it controlled the vessel like a human itself.

The body stood up and made many poses. Some are normal and mostly are weird, and every different pose is paired with different facial expressions. Sad. Angry. Happy. Amused. The peculiar part is that no post matches the facial expression. One is punching while crying ugly, while one is kneeling with a worshiping pose but has a maniac expression of pure evil. Weird as it seems, it was effective for studying the whole body of a human.

A moment later and it stopped, before the body posed as how the bodybuilders would poss to flex their bulging muscles—but the current build of oldkreg has no muscles and is worn by time. So the parasite used its power to the vessel, Old kreg's body suddenly swelled and the before lumpy-stretched skin was replaced a new, glinting and clear. He instantly became forty years younger, the day when the body was at its prime.

The parasite wore the smiling face to express its satisfaction, like how it saw in the data of memories— human smiles when they feel happy and satisfied.

But while exploring the use of its new host, an unexpected turn occurred— abstract pain came that made the parasite scream. Coming from the host, it was also felt by it. Naturally, it took the job of the brain, which means it can feel the pain of its host, but it hadn't felt anything like this before. Nor it expected a pain like this.

The cells of the vessel it optimized are dying at a faster rate; these cells should be strong and will die naturally within seconds after dividing. But the rate of the dying cells is astronomical, ten times faster than the dividing speed. Therefore outpacing the regenerating speed of the muscles. Killing the self-sufficient system of the body.

It pondered why, but it couldn't find anything. The sudden death of many cells is more like an uncurable disease, not defined, nor located. It lumped on the ground while the glinting skin and pumped muscles deflated and stretched like before. Returning to the previous appearance of old Kreg, a senile old man.

The parasite was forced to use its power again and pumped the body to its prime shape, but it needs to continually use its power or the body would deflate again. Finally, it spoke, "this vessel of mine seems to have a grave problem. I need to find another one or main my cells might be affected and get the unknown illness this body has."

The vessel stood weakly, with shaking muscles and ever-changing skin. The eyes looked at the open door, it saw the scene beyond the rectangle hole of the wall—the garden of the manor can be seen, The greenery it thread before to have this body.

It grunted angrily before a shout echoed with stronger malice and waves mixed in, "WHERE IS YOUR LOYALTY TO THE KING!!!"

Angry with the mobs it stood up and walked to the door stuttering, troubled with the deteriorating body.

But it soon managed to control his balance set foot on the grass, it smelt the air first before it sighed and activated a skill. Hair-like limbs then came out all over the body and wiggled with a screech, it is now using a skill called locate. Shooting radio waves from every direction of its body, the waves will them bounce back to it and will be read by the tentacles. The parasite will then instantly convert the waves into a three-dimensional image of the manor to see the extent, more than what the eyes can see.

The ability isn't like x-ray so it can't see beyond the walls, but knowing the way is enough for it right now.

---

"Shit! We're fucking doomed if we're found! Valor's right, we can't do anything about this monster." Marcus while building bounding mines, exclaimed about the sudden increase of malice.

"This can only be emitted by Named monsters, How the hell one can suddenly appear now?" Angela asked on Valor's balcony, while she draws the magic circle for quick travel. Using magic chalks, and other mana-conductor, the spell is nearly half done.

"It is now 5:30, one hour and thirty minutes more to go before this mansion go boom. I hope we don't die." Marcus said after he completed another bounding mine, he placed it to the pile beside him, and took a scrap of wood from his other side before he used his power and turned it into steel.

"How about the suit of Valor? From my calculation, he should be getting out the basement now." Angela said while she drew another circle and inscribed it with words, "I already sent it, after the drone sent waves he got it, we will commence phase B. Scatter the mines all over the house." He answered while Angela nodded and inscribed another circle.

"Things are changing fast, aren't they? We just returned from the forest this morning, and we are now having another problem. I wonder what we are doing now if we didn't assemble to the hut." She asked while arriving at the last step of setting the quick travel. "One thing is certain, we are fighting the orc in that forest. Not knowing about the problems happening in our town... Not knowing about the dangers that lurk, probably prone to sudden changes."

"Besides, this is just another reckless mission we always do. Just more dangerous than the others." He said and screwed the bound mine, setting the mechanism completed, "More like a special mission with high fatality rate..." She answered after she was done with the quick travel, it glowed white and green. Just a trigger and it will change the scenery they see.

"I will start deploying fake projection of us." she made marcus aware of her next step for the sake of information, he just nodded and focused on his job.

She opened her palm and magic circles started to form, they rotated with different colors and runes inscribed. Linked with bonds and axis they rotate to. "Sly magic, multiple images."

Marcus who is low-key watching saw the circles glow, they rotated more intensely and the magic circle started to work.

"Knock knock."

But a knock echoed, it caused her to lose focus and the magic spell failed, wasting the mana input she placed. Angela is using real magic so her focus is required, the spells she got weren't downloaded in her arsenal of spells, the magic pocket of her silver system wasn't changed a bit.

The two quickly knew it was Rein, even before when her voice echoed, "Can I come in?" Rein asked behind the door so Markus quickly stood, walked giddied before he opened the door with a smile. "Hey Rein." he welcomed her.

Rein who asked calmly, hurriedly went in, and just smiled as a greeting. Like she's running from something, well she is running from something. So Marcus who saw her hurried pace quickly closed the door, light but fast.

Rein who just got in signed them to be quiet, by placing her index finger against her lips. The two didn't made a move and listened.

Three seconds of silence and they felt the increase of malice, the walls vibrated and the water in the glass fluttered. Before A growl was heard by their ears. Rein standing silently gestured to the two, wanting them to know that the boss is in the near hallway and the mobs have now arrived. The two can only agree with silence and didn't moved.

Beyond the door is a hallway, continuing to the right and the way is split to two. Right and left. And to the right continuation is where the malice came from, there the body of old Kreg stood highly. Looking down at the bowing waste monsters, asking for mercy while expressing their happiness of its appearance.

The waste monsters just got there, while others are still arriving. There are ten thousands of them after all, even this manor cannot accommodate them all.

"What took you all so long?" It tried to be merciful enough and asked their reasons, the parasite with an alligator vessel answered. The vocals of the crocodile worked but they are still using magnetic waves to communicate.

"All of the gateways were blocked?" it asked and the other nodded, causing it to contemplate deeper, "Could the humans of this property knew we were coming? But as this vessel remembers correctly, only four little chimps remained. They should be weak... but looks like they're much clever than what I had thought."

Oldkreg's body then smiled and thought out loud, "then their body is worthy to be my three wingmen, while one should be my next vessel." he then nodded and had already forgiven its underlings, before he said his commands, "Whoever brings the body of this four humans will be favored by me, now, scatter my spawns and capture these chimps alive!"