Teenage Devas (Part 9)

Just as the cockroach fell to the ground, Metro's Eye of Light had also been turned off. The light energy in his body had been entirely exhausted through Metro's continual usage.

The light energy in Metro operated with a very simplistic system, since he had not reached advanced stages yet. The total light energy stored within him was 100 units.

Whenever he stood under any source of light, 1 unit would charge up automatically, but if he formed a sigil with in his hand and chanted, the recharge rate would increase to 2 units. When he took over Nasser Lee's body, the light energy in his body was recharged to only half of its full capacity.

However, using The Eye of Light exhausted 5 units of light energy every minute, and the "Purify" spell he kept on abusing as a heat attack used up 10 units every time it was manifested.

Due to The Eye of Light leaving Metro, all he could see was the absence of light. Panting heavily, he could feel his warm breath on his skin, as the silence around him echoed repeatedly.

The terror in his heart held a firm grip, causing his brain to have all sorts of hallucinations pop up in the darkness. Millions of bugs were crawling on his skin, inserting their young inside of him to consume him from the inside. Eyes were growing on the trees, staring him down.

Metro realised that he needed to do an action to calm himself down. The fear from the total sensory deprivation would take over him and cause him to commit impulsive actions during critical moments.

"Who are you? Why have you captured me?" Metro tried to imitate the "tough" characters he saw before when he was alive, taking an upright posture and staring upwards defiantly.

"Impressive. You can still stand with my hallucinogenic agent in your bloodstream?" A bright searchlight from above penetrated the darkness, letting Metro see that his arm had evolved completely into another creature.

At the center of the arm, there was a mouth that was filled entirely with teeth. Even though the tongue that was being used looked to be organic, the teeth was formed entirely out of the mysterious metal. The vocal chords that the arm was using also sounded strangely familiar to Metro.

Furthermore, the arm had already shedded the skin, replacing it with a metal shell. That was pretty much the only details Metro could make out, considering that he was being blinded by the light.

"Hallucinogenic agents? Why? What did I even do to you? I freed you. Shouldn't you be at least thankful?"

"Just making sure you're not sent by one of my brothers. This agent targets parasites, mental walls, and neuro-transmitters. It will fry the target's head if there are any traces left behind." The robotic arm coldly explained its actions. As it continued to talk, Metro realised why it sounded familiar. It was almost a complete copy of Nasser Lee's vocal chords!

"A master of body manipulation? Isn't this a 1 star world? Why are these powerful demons popping up everywhere? Surely they must have a weakness." Metro took a few deep breaths and put himself into a state of ease. Pure combat was impossible against the arm, who could even control the forest's trees remotely.

"I can analyse your body state. You are in a state of.. fear. The poisonous particles under your breath... Third Brother has already completed his experiment? I've been asleep for so long." The arm murmured to itself, and the content of those murmurs made the gears in Metro's head turn.

"Is this the true meaning of the list that the man was talking about?" Metro's stomach churned. If this robotic being was considered to be part of the list, then he grew even more fearful of the rest of them.

"That means that you're his sacrifice to me. This Worm of Death will surely cause chaos to emerge among First and Fifth Brothers' plans." The light in the trees disappeared, and Metro's legs grew unsteady.

"Sacrifice? But why? I'm so inferior and all, I can't be any use to your great plan!" Metro immediately started bootlicking. Even if that Artifact promised him resurrection, he still did not know how it worked!

"Just accept your fate. It's so much better to die knowing that you have contributed to a major event, right?" The arm dived downwards at Metro's head. Even though Metro could see nothing, he could feel the wind and the sounds produced from the arm's movements.

"All of you people are crazy! Fuck!" Metro suddenly swung his fists repeatedly at the air, trying to ward off against the arm. Every fist contained his desperation, and every breath contained anger. No matter how hard he struggled, the moment he felt the arm's fingers around his head, he felt his body go limp.

"I'm... going... to... kill...every last of you!" Only his mouth still offered any resistance. The arm simply used its appendages to crush Metro's jaw, and there was only silence, as a powerful forge thrusted a finger through Metro's forehead.

The pain that was roaring in Metro stopped. "I'm still alive?" Metro looked directly at the arm. One of its fingers was pointed towards him.

"Huh?" Metro took a step back, but he didn't see the finger anymore. He only saw the back of someone's head, and a fingertip that had appeared from a hole in the head.

"So I really died... but why did time stop then?" Everything now looked grey to Metro. There was absolutely no movement from both the arm or Nasser Lee, who had just been killed.

"Is this the ability of the Artifact that was mentioned? Near-death experience..." Metro's memories flitted back to when he met with the "Guardian" of the Death Clock. The ability to avoid death needed him to pay up the precious hours he had obtained.

Metro glanced towards his hand. Surprisingly, the watch that symbolised the Death Clock was still strapped to his wrist.

"Hmm..." Metro walked through Nasser Lee and checked both hands. The watch was nowhere to be seen. "So the watch should be something only I see. Does it mean that I can change it into other forms?"

Metro willed for the watch to change into an hourglass, and the hourglass instantly appeared in his hand. Holding it tightly, he could now see that the sand in the hourglass had stopped moving.

"The Death Clock stops counting down when I die? Nice trick." Metro's lips curled up. That gave him ample time to plot against the weird "Devas" that had appeared to him.

Metro focused and slowly recollected all the information he had experienced so far, from the words that the "Robot Deva" had given him, the weird skills of the "Body Deva" and his plots, he organised a list of events that had occured since he had arrived.

Metro's brain worked casually, since he had all the time in the world to think. Slowly but surely, the scattered information that had gathered shaped up to be a decent theory.

"Competition, the corporation mentioned in the quest? Is this a Gu Poison jar?" Metro's expression suddenly darkened. Gu Poison Jar was a technique where poisonous insects would be placed inside a jar, and the insects would fight and consume each other until the final, strongest poisonous insect would be left.

It was a technique that had appeared in numerous works of fiction that Metro had read, but he had not thought that a human equivalent could ever appear in the real world.

If his Gu Poison jar theory was correct, if the cycle had been going on for a couple of years, he could not begin to understand the true forces of the corporation that he was fighting against.