9 Neo entered the building, glancing around to find his way. It didn't take him long to find the light source, likely triggered by Scholar. The whole place was pitch black because there were no windows. Even the oxygen seemed thin. The security was... admirable. And best of all, it made tracing the light source much easier.
Neo suddenly entered the room, making Scholar tremble. A dry smile appeared on his face as Neo walked up to the control deck to check out what Scholar was doing. What he saw made his eyes widen. There were two buttons beeping red. They seemed to be working on some kind of separate energy reserve, so the energy shutdown on the DCC didn't affect them. Beside both buttons were written: ... INITIATING NUCLEAR DECONTAMINATION ... INITIATING PERMANENT SHUTDOWN Neo's fist tightened as he stared at Scholar with murderous intent. His face demanded an explanation. Scholar's lip suddenly trembled, and he replied, "Fine… fine, now that you have found out, I guess there's nothing to hide anymore. All I'm doing is for the greater good anyway, but you just don't seem to understand, do you?" "When this virus was first discovered among three of you, you were quarantined by our seek-out squad. They wanted to eliminate you immediately, but I told them that the virus might be out there and we needed a vaccine, but that was the greatest mistake of my life," Scholar said, dropping his head. A tear fell down his eyes. He lingered for a moment and then continued. "I gathered the best specialists. I received orders from the management, and we headed for the core chamber. I was experienced, the best of the best. I was conceited in my abilities to the extent that I mutated the virus and created a variant that would always seek and destroy the virus in case things went south. I fed it to a coyote, birthing that monster out there. It felt so good. I wanted to do more. Then I proceeded to create the first vaccine. I fed the vaccine to you all, and it worked! It suppressed the presence of that virus in your body. So that's why we were invisible to the monster and wraiths at first, but now that its effects are waning, we will inevitably end up like them. I thought I was the only one who contacted the virus during the research session, but it turned out I was wrong. Everyone perished, and my vaccine only saved a few people. Shame!!" Scholar paused a bit. A maniacal laugh escaped from his lips, and he then continued once again. "I might have failed, but I proved them all wrong. They locked up the monster with us to devour us if I failed, but now the monster is feeding on them. How ironic. But still, I'm a man of my words... I'm sorry, I'll have to clean up this mess myself. If this virus gets out, the whole world will be doomed." Scholar said, his gaze darkening. He raised his weary arms in an attempt to slam a button. Neo clenched his jaw. An expression of cold, icy calculation made its way to his eyes. "I'm sorry too." Neo thrust the bone in his arm into Scholar's chest. Scholar gasped in surprise as his heart pounded for the very last time. Streams of hot blood flowed down Neo's arm, and Scholar's body fell steadily. * A cold, lifeless, bloodied body was lying on the floor. A piece of bone protruded from its chest, with its eyes wide open. A young man was sitting right beside it, weeping. He looked at his bloodied hands, and a pang of regret filled his heart. Right beside him was the first human he ever murdered... in cold blood. It might have been an illusory world, but it felt too real. And worst of all, Reaper didn't declare his victory, which meant that Scholar also wasn't the threat. He felt really miserable, but there was no time to sulk just yet. Death was still looming in the corner. Neo stood up and wiped his tears. He glanced at Scholar's corpse for the last time, then he used his hands to close its hollow eyes. As he cleaned the blood on his hand with Scholar's lab coat, he suddenly felt something in its pockets. Neo rummaged through it and found a silvery liquid encased in a glass casing. There were a few words scribbled on it: DCC SS PRODUCT ARV prototype vaccine "So this is what you've been hiding," Neo thought aloud as he proceeded to read the cautions. CAUTION: Taking vaccine twice or more poses risk of death. "Well, that explains a lot," Neo thought, putting it away. Neo approached the control deck. The vast and complex streams of keys, buttons, and screens befuddled him for a moment. He simply didn't know how to operate them. He stared at the words beside the buttons again, as a sense of foreboding crept into his mind. If he had allowed Scholar's hand to touch the buttons, the DCC would have been shut down permanently without remedy, and there would have also been a nuclear decontamination? Although Neo didn't know what the latter really meant, he could more or less make a rough guess as to its purpose. If there was anything that could destroy any virus, organism even, it's heat… intense heat. So, judging by the name, Neo was quite sure it was some kind of nuclear explosion. Neo suddenly shuddered, not because of his harrowing discovery, but because someone entered the room. Neo quickly turned, only to meet Beauty staring at Scholar's corpse with dark excitement. Her lips curved up slightly as she said, "Ahah!! I see you have killed him, now we are even."10 "Ahah!! I see you have killed him, now we are even," Beauty said, a disturbing giggle escaping her lips. "Yes, I did. That should tell you just enough about me," Neo said placidly, attempting to play the formidable and dauntless assassin. He was already on his last legs. It would be unfortunate if she chose that moment to attack, so he had to put some contingencies in place. "You should understand that there's strength in numbers, right? So why did you kill him?" Beauty said, staring daggers at him. Neo tilted his head. Beauty's understanding of "strength in numbers" made him shiver. Her concept of strength in numbers meant wraith baits, most especially the ones that would transport themselves to the point of slaughter. "How sinister." Neo cleared his throat and replied, "He tried to kill us all, so I killed him first." He tried to maintain his elusive behavior. Beauty walked up to the corpse, confirmed its death, and with her usual sinister smile, she replied again. "Now tha
11 A monster stood gallantly, its back turned to an open gate a few meters away. It looked like it was playing "eeny meeny miny moe" to decide which of the two humans before it would taste better. One of the humans, Neo actually, was struck by an epiphany in the middle of impending danger.-How timely- He had finally realized the reason for their weakness and lethargy. Since the vaccine's effect was waning, the virus was trying to take over their consciousness. He already had quite a similar experience during his test for allegiance trial so he was quite sure of the feeling. But it was of no use anyway; they were a few seconds away from being monster dessert. Speaking of vaccines, Neo had one of them stashed away in his pocket at the moment. At that moment, Neo suddenly had a crazy idea. What if he took it to suppress the virus, making Beauty—the most virus-infected—between them? The caution only said he might die; it didn't say it wouldn't work, so it was a fifty percent chance,
12 "You are on your way to the afterlife." Neo grinned, as the cloud of darkness receded gradually, the faint light of dawn piercing his eyes. He was in a cave; there were crystal cones protruding from the roof and the floor. Neo knew they were called stalactites and stalagmites, but he didn't know which was which, not that it mattered anyway. His happiness had been quenched by the sight in front of him. One look was all it took for him to know that he was not in a human settlement; in fact, he was far from it. The entrance to the cave was in sight, the visage of a glowing white sun towered above the world. "Where is this place?" Neo mused, walking towards the entrance of the cave. He felt something thin press against his pale skin. Neo looked down to check what it was, before he could recover from the shock that he was stark naked; an arrow pierced through the air with insane speed and lodged itself firmly into his shoulder. The force sent him reeling to the ground. Al
13 Neo checked out the skin and phantoms, and they were unsurprisingly empty. They were supposed to be extremely scarce anyway, so he didn't bother himself too much about them. As far as being cool went, skins and phantoms were also considered top-notch, albeit not as cool as specters, but in Neo's own opinion, they were as cool as specters, even much more so. The usage of skins and phantoms was rather simple. A skin will provide the wielder the ability to transform into a creature for a specific period of time. The usage time and cool-down period is dependent on the level of the creature. Phantoms work in an almost similar manner except for the fact that the wielder summons the creature whole without having to transform into the said creature. As for the perks and quirks, Neo already had a probable explanation for that. "[Bone of contention]," "[ten lives per second]," and Neo's second ability "[soul stinger]" were all Reaper's gifts, and they all had perks and quirks, so that pr
14 Neo was trying to fight himself free from the creature that was hell-bent on snuffing out what was left of his life. What's worse, Neo was bleeding from multiple places as blood cascaded down his naked body like a crimson stream. Speaking of blood, upon closer inspection, one would notice that Neo's blood wasn't touching the ground at all. Once close to the ground, it would suddenly turn into a spark of red lightning and dance out of existence. Neo's body also seemed to be undergoing the same transformation. His veins were slowly being replaced by red bolts of lightning as they flickered, and red sparks erupted from and around his body. Then the bolts of lightning made their way around his body, dancing and flickering. Neo's eyes shone a deep red hue as his strength exploded in leaps and bounds. He moved with inconceivable speed, grabbed the Herknidae, and pummeled it with his fists. A huge chunk of flesh vaporized out of existence, revealing the blood-soaked innards of the cre
15 "So uhm, a mutant beast would give me a beast soul, berserk two, and Amok three. The same logic should work for the monsters, devils, and the others I guess." Neo thought, finally alighting from his train of thoughts. Then he moved on. Innate ability— Crimson nebulae Remarks: You wield a tremendous power; its prowess can only be limited by your mortal body. Neo suddenly paused. The memory of him wreathed in crimson red lightning and the backlash to his body that followed flashed through his mind. "Now it all makes sense." Neo nodded weakly in understanding. He then continued. Reaper's gifts— soul stinger Reaper's remark: Energy is the foundation of all things. Perks: You gain great affinity to souls of the living. You can repair or destroy it. Quirks: During each attack, your souls become exposed. Progress— 2 Specter— Ten lives per second (soul tied), bone of contention (soul tied), cave mantle Skin-? Phantom-? Neo stared at "[soul stinger]" for a
16 It was a mural. There were three people, and two heads were missing. Neo stared at it in bewilderment, straining his eyes to make out its shape under the light bioluminescent insect lantern placed in the center of the room. After studying it for a while, Neo discovered the mural was only quite familiar with the portrait in Neo's house, but it was definitely not the same. Neo and his elder brother's head was intact in the portrait, but their parent's head was faceless, for a reason Neo would kill to find out. And strangely enough, as far as Neo knew, that was the only portrait that survived the fire. But the mural in front of Neo contained only three figures: two headless tall people, and a relatively short person with his/her head intact. It was just a bogus cave wall painting made with makeshift colors after all. So Neo couldn't quite figure out the gender or the facial features of the short person. Neo studied the mural for a while, but he couldn't figure out anything s
17 Come night, Neo's bizarre host was back, with a scary creature that looked like an ape from head to torso, and then had the lower limb of a walrus. Neo was… definitely not going to eat that."Dinner here," he said, dropping the carcass with a loud thud. "Nice mantle by the way," he added, his voice as husky as ever.Neo nodded in reply. He then swallowed and summoned up courage. "So what can I call you?" Neo asked grinning."Seeker… call me Seeker," he replied, walking towards his boulder. Seeker shifted the boulder with one hand, making Neo's eyes widen in surprise. As he was about to enter, he suddenly halted. Throwing investigating glances around the room. Neo's blood froze.But his fears didn't come through. Seeker entered, oblivious to Neo's infiltrations. Neo breathed a sigh of relief.*The next morning, Seeker went out to hunt and Neo decided to tag along. He wanted to get familiar with the environment in case he needed to beat a hasty retreat. Walking along with him, Ne