Legion vs Stage 2 (4/4)

[DAY 37]

'What the hell is happening here? Where does this otherr Undead Stage 2 come from?' thought Neo as he looked at the strange woman with the horns while the fire danced around her and fanned his prey, the Undead Tree.

The Tree burned very quickly and the entire gorge was lit up by the Bright Fire.

The human bodies on the Tree all started screaming and crying, apparently feeling the Tree die. Meanwhile, the woman just laughed diabolically, arms outstretched, as the fire danced around her.

After some time, some people came out of the hole the woman came from, Neo didn't know that, but they were all of Luma's friends who were protecting her before and some children and women.

Otherwise, Luma killed and ate everyone else in the cave.

When her friends saw Lumas Changes at first, all they felt was sadness and fear. They were sad that their friend died and became the monster she is now. But soon the fear came, fear of being eaten by the monster in form of their friend.

But when they saw that Luma didn't harm them and even freed them from the cave, they also felt hope again, hope to survive. But the fear was still there, especially since her usally friendly and peaceful friend Luma, suddenly turned into a beast and ripped people in two with her bare hands.

When they came out of the cave and saw Luma burning the Tree, the scene seemed like something out of an fictional movie. It took them a long time to believe what they saw.

On the other hand, Neo was furious as hell to have his prey destroyed before his eyes. He decided to act quickly before the Tree burns down completely and therefore he flew with his Misama Disc to the large truck of the tree, which is now mostly on fire.

Neo flew into a gap he made with his attacks earlier before the new Stage 2 arrived.

After that, his Miasma liquefied and put out the fire around him. After looking for the Tree's core he finally found it in a corner of the Tree.

He found a small yellow sphere lying on the ground. The sphere was about the size of an apple and completely round and had thousands of webs of plants hanging from it.

Neo carefully removed the nets and stowed them away along with the Tree's yellow core.

After the core of the Tree was removed, in a few seconds the tree started to spoiled and finally died. Its red full crown of leaves was now black and spoiled. Its trunks became hollow and corrupted, and the Tree collapsed on itself.

After leaving the Tree, Neo joined his elite who previously fought the plant undead.

He found them quickly, but the fight seemed to be over after the Tree died, since all the Undead plants died all together after the Stage 2 Tree Undead, their creator, died.

'Emily, update the ability description in UMI for this' Neo thought to himself and got an answer with a simple "Got it".

'All right, I'll probably have to deal with my loot later, especially since the problem with the strange Stage 2 Undead woman who also has a Stage 1 Soul is my problem for now.' thought Neo as he looked at the said woman from afar.

Neo was exhausted from the fight against the Stage 2 Undead Tree and urgently needs to meditate and gain his strength back. He would have originally done so after killing the Tree Undead, but after the Woman appeared, Neo dared not to show any weakness, especially since she could still be a potential enemy.

At the same time, he didn't want to withdraw either, especially since that might make the Stage 2 aggressive. Therefore, he decided to wait for her next actions.

...

Luma, on the other hand, looked at the flaring Tree with an expression nobody had ever seen on her, before. She saw the fire around her and noticed at the beginning that her will can control the fire.

While Luma was still trapped below in the Tree's captivity, her last thoughts and all will revolve around only one thing. To suffocate and destroy everything and everyone in fire.

For a person like Luma, who was usually seen as a calm, charming, and even-tempered beauty, such thoughts were very uncharacteristic.

Of course, Luma wasn't a completely quiet and passive woman, she was human and as such she hated and lost her temper too. But what she felt in her final moments, was nothing compared to that.

It was a feeling of revealing the pure itself it brought her an incomprehensible sense of power. She feels as if she could move mountains with her powers, as if all the gates had opened before her and everything suddenly seemed possible.

She wants to feel more of it... 'More ANNIHILATION!' Luma thought as she breathed in and out deeply and the fire around her began to dance even harder.

Even though her friends behind her think Luma has changed after turning into an undead, that's not true at all. The truth is that any being that receives a Stage 1 Soul recognizes their desires and would do anything to fulfill them. It is one of the conditions for advancing one's soul in the beginning.

For Neo it was his desire to become stronger so that he never had to be powerless again, but also a desire to discover and explore more about the world surrounding him.

For Luma, on the other hand, it is an insatiable desire to see everything burning and beneath her, she will never obey the commands of others and will always be free and passionate like the fire.

Even Luma's thoughts of her children and her husband pale in comparison to her insatiable will.

...

Luma turned around after a while and looked behind her first. There Luma found the group of survivors from the cave that she didn't kill, which included her old friends.

Without saying anything, she then turned around and saw Neo's demonic figure standing imposingly in front of his Elite, who were eating some undead and parts of the tree.

"HAHAHAHAH... You're funny Woman on fire, you dare to kill my prey and then look at me with a hostile look HAHAAHAH... do you want to DIE!?" asked Neo in his demonic voice.

Luma was very tense all of a sudden, she wasn't scared, just excited, she sensed a slightly higher strength from Neo than hers and controlling her fire has already drained her quite a bit. Luma would love to just sleep right now, but she still forced her eyes open.

"I won't apologize for saving my own life and taking revenge on the Tree for sending me through hell, if that's what you expect then we better fight to the death!" Luma said. However she clearly not meant it at all. As not only was she very tired at the moment, but she also had no experience with her new powers, which she only got a few minutes ago. She needs time, just like Neo, to learn the limitations and possibilities of her control over fire.

"Alright then... I'm pretty well adjusted today, I'll let you go. Go to another district and hope that we don't meet again." Neo said as he pointed to one of the logs that led to a way out of the cave.

Luma nodded and was about to leave this hell when suddenly one of her old friends called out to her. This friend was named Roe and she is Luma's best friend. The friendship between the two only grew stronger after the apocalypse happened and she understood Luma the best.

Seeing what Luma had become she almost lost her mind, but seeing that Luma didn't attack her and her other friends gave her hope that the Luma she knew still exists somewhere.

"Luma! Please don't go! We can definitely heal you, there must be a cure for this nightmare! Please stay with us, we must be looking for your daughters! Who knows where they are or what hell they both have had to go through so far! Luma please!" said Roe with tears in his eyes.

Luma, on the other hand, didn't look at Luma but stood with clenched fists.

To Luma, her children were more than important even as undead, but that sense of more destruction... more burning and power, it's much STRONGER!

So Luma didn't hesitate long and spoke to Roe one last time.

"Thank you for what you've done so far, and especially you Roe, but the Luma you knew is already dead and from her death my flames have sprung... if you find my family and they're alive, tell them that her mother is already dead." Luma said as she jumped out of the cave.

Roe couldn't believe what she was hearing and fell to the ground, she had no strength to move anymore, the hunger and lack of water and now Luma... that was too much for her and she fell unconscious.

'Wow... interesting, although I don't know her, she seems to have completely changed. That she neglects her own children.' thought Neo when he had to think of his mother for a moment.

'What would have happened if my mother hadn't helped this cop? Would she be alive if only she had been a little more selfish? If I had her... No that's enough, I need to rest now.' thought Neo as he sat on the burned but still huge tree trunk.

Neo ordered his Elite to protect him while he meditated to recover.

Meanwhile the human survivors all left the cave too.

...

[DAY 39]

In the end it took Neo two whole days to get his powers back. Neo then opened his eyes to find his Elite and some of his Legion who weren't here before.

These undead were the ones Neo gave Aaron to report.

Neo ordered the undead to come to him with Aaron's messages and now ended up holding three pieces of paper in his hands.

Aaron encrypted his messages using a simple but effective algorithm, Neo sayed him to use before. In the end, after Neo deciphered the messages, he received a full report from Aaron on the situation in the Central and North Districts.

According to Aaron, there are three major survivor groups in the central area that have allied together, totaling 2 million survivors.

The first camp was founded by some students from the university in the central area. They control the southern region of the center and are known for their clever and considered actions. They may not be many, but they use what they have. Their number is around 300,000 survivors, with around 200,000 fighters.

The second camp is very well known to Neo, it is Camp Luma. Neo has some questions for Chief of Police John. When he freed his mother, he questioned the criminals about John's statements before he killed them. They sayed that most of his information were true, but the time the undercover cop fled didn't match the time John gave him. Neo therefore believes that John knew about his mother's location even before he told him about it. Therefore, when Neo attacks John, he will have a LONG and EXTENDED conversation with him about this...

Otherwise, it can be said that the camp has grown quite a bit since Neo left. They have around 1,000,000 survivors and more than 400,000 soldiers protecting them. Also, they must have repaired the mech and looted a lot of weapons and supplies from the cultists. Oh and Neo's former three piggies have built a good reputation and are called the Invincible Three or something, even that quiet and weird woman, what was her name again? Ah Ella?... Oh no matter, even she is supposed to be strong all of a sudden.

'If she could fight, where was her strength when I was with them? I could have had it a lot easier if these monkeys had shown their strength before! Anyway, they'll soon be in my Legion anyway.' Neo thought maliciously.

Finally we have the third group with about 700,000 survivors. All that is known about the camp is that there are many soldiers from the North District there and that they train all survivors to become soldiers, even children and old people.

Meanwhile, the military in the north is oddly quiet. They mainly train their survivors and number around 2,500,000 people out of which around 100,000 are already soldiers.

Neo then spent several hours contemplating which camp to attack first.

'Well, there's no point in thinking too much about it, I'll just go with the order I just mentioned. First the camp with the students, then Camp Luma and finally the soldiers in the last camp. After that I'll only go further north and to ANDROLD!' thought Neo as he clenched his fist tightly.

'But before I do all that...' Neo thought to himself as he took the yellow core out of one of his pockets.

Neo took a look at the Undead Tree's power core and then eat it.

'What will happen now.' Neo thought to himself as he closed his eyes and started to meditate.

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UMI CHANGES:

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NEW CHANGE: UNDEAD TREE ABILITY: CREATE UNDEAD (Explanation: The Undead Tree can create undead from its own body and create their DNA at its own will and ability. Attention: needs a lot of people and the created undead die as long as their creator dies)

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LEGION STRENGTH:

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LEGION COUNT: 108,842 UNDEAD -> 124,927 UNDEAD

ELITE OF THE LEGION: 5 MUTANT UNDEAD

PREFECT: 1 (Aaron)