117

Ep. 117

–

"We have arrived."

"let's go."

Six heavy walkers and one beast disembarked from the transport ship.

They came here under Muriel's orders to investigate whether there were any survivors in the area where the Thunder God's lightning struck.

The rich land that was overflowing with life just a few hours ago has now become a barren space where only fire, sand, and death remain.

They roamed the parched wilderness with various detection devices activated.

"huh? hey! "There's something over here!"

Meanwhile, a walker discovered traces left on the floor and called his colleagues. As another walker approached, making a metallic sound, he filmed the trail with a video camera attached to the walker.

"Have you seen the boss? "There are drag marks."

"Mr. Ha, you crazy monster. "Aren't you dead?"

"I think so."

"Ask Mother Heaven. "What is his condition?"

"Yep."

One walker pulled the large chain he was holding in his hand. The Mother of Heaven, with a chain tied around her neck, was dragged helplessly.

｢Pfft!｣

"Hey, these are his traces, right?"

"As far as we know, it walks on two legs, and if you look here, you can see traces of its body being dragged. "What happened?"

"It would be better to speak directly. "If you don't want to see your 'family' die."

"…Wait a minute."

Heaven's mother had no choice but to look closely at the traces. With her superior senses that surpass those of high-tech machinery, she grasped the state of the object that left traces and opened her mouth.

"…He was half-dragged. Pieces of the skin that fell between the dents and signs of an acid reaction on the floor show that he was injured. If you look in the direction, you've entered the forest over there."

"You're not lying, right?"

"You can figure it out, right? Have you checked?"

Currently, there was a special chip implanted by Muriel in the back of the Mother of Heaven's head.

It is a device that reads the wearer's brain wave flow to determine whether they are lying or having impure thoughts. As long as this chip is implanted in her head, the Heavenly Mother cannot tell lies.

"Hmm? What's good? After all, there is no way you can get hit by the god of thunder and be safe."

"What should I do?"

"I couldn't have gone very far because I was injured. Find it and kill it. The Mother of Heaven could kill. Right?"

"If it's an injured subadult, it can be killed."

"Hehe, you guys heard that, right?"

"Yes!"

After the communication ended, the heavy walkers collected the fallen pieces of shell and followed the trail that led into the forest.

A transport ship flew overhead, checking to see if there was a trail inside the burning jungle.

Muriel's men had no doubt that they would be able to easily defeat the monster that left its mark.

But there was something they didn't know.

Clearly, Heavenly Mother did not lie. Instead, he only answered exactly what Muriel asked.

In the opposite direction they were going, there was a trace that the walkers had not found.

It was a half-collapsed pit.

There were many holes in the surrounding area created when redwood trees and rocks that were stuck in the ground were completely pulled out. So the pirates mistakenly thought it was a similar case to other traces, but Heavenly Mother, who has extraordinary extra senses, was able to notice.

That it was a hole dug by a long-bodied creature like a snake.

'Ha, that morph. After all, it has evolved into a semi-adult.'

Heavenly Mother hid the truth that only she knew.

Her eyes, which were tied to a leash by a pirate, shone coldly.

–

When I start hunting, there are factors I check first.

Information time location.

Information first.

You must know who the enemy is, what equipment characteristics they have, what strategies they use, and how much the enemy knows about you in order to fight the battle easily.

Aimorphs are a race that becomes very powerful the more they succeed in evolving, but the road to get there is very difficult. Because everyone but me is the enemy. So, how much information you acquire is important.

Next is time.

When to go out during the day or night, and whether the enemy is aware of my attack, or if so, when they will recognize it, etc., choose the appropriate time to go hunting and prepare.

Finally location.

You need to know the enemy's location, terrain, where to lure him, and where to settle the battle.

So, how much of an advantage do I currently have in attacking the enemy?

In terms of information, she and I don't know much about each other, but at least I have an advantage over her.

'Muriel is mistaking me for a subadult.'

Her use of Raijin would probably not have been a bad choice if I had been a sub-adult. No matter how fast you run, it is not easy to escape the range of the Thunder God.

'I'm still going to check it out.'

This is a woman who even plants a bomb in case her cruiser is hijacked. They'll want to check if I'm dead or not. As they investigate the explosion area, they will soon discover my survival.

'This is the important point.'

She would think that I suffered fatal injuries from Raijin's attack.

In reality, I was slightly injured by the explosion of Raishin and the cruiser. The outer shell was so heated that part of the carapace was falling off.

Even now, pieces of fallen skin remain in the traces where I crawled into the forest.

They are all left behind on purpose.

To make my enemies believe that I am in bad shape.

Hide my evolution stage and hide my condition so that the enemy misjudges my condition.

The information war began when I came out of the underground and hid in the jungle.

'They'll try to chase me along the trail…'

Here in the jungle, detection machines often make errors. That doesn't mean they'll miss me, but it will take a while for them to find me.

While the enemies slowly chase me, my work is fixed.

Finding out where Muriel is and turning the battlefield in my favor.

Fortunately, the data stored on the ship's computer was accessed before the cruiser flew away.

Thanks to this, I was able to figure out where she would be in advance.

There are a total of two large campsites where she is believed to be.

It is a canyon area with a vast jungle area and a Wolf indigenous village extending from the center of the continent.

I was sure Muriel was in the jungle area.

'Because there is a temple of the Forgotten Earth at the center of the continent.'

Compared to other games, 'Temple of the Forgotten Land' is a type of dungeon where powerful Yuil-level equipment is stored.

Instead, the entry conditions are quite strict and the Wolf statues inside are powerful, so a lot of preparation is needed to attack it.

For example, one could point to a special energy field around the temple.

Even if you try to detect it from a distance, it cannot be detected due to the energy field, and the closer you get to the temple, the more frequently communication equipment breaks down. If you're unlucky, the moving transport ship may stop working and crash.

So, players who wanted to attack the temple would set up a supply camp some distance away from the temple. Like other players, Muriel must have set up a large camp inside the jungle to attack the temple.

'When I checked the details of the transported goods, there were only weapons.'

And looking at the records of periodic transfers, it was clear that they were all used to attack temples. By now, you may have already completed the strategy and received your reward.

'Was the reward a priest's golden spear?'

This is equipment that increases attack power when you kill an intelligent being. The attack power that increases when killing one person is very low, but there is no limit to the increase in attack power, so the more sapient beings you kill, the stronger it becomes.

If they knew I was alive, they would try to increase their attack power even by killing all of my subordinates and slaves.

'I think I'll have to check this in person to be sure.'

I, who was half buried in the ground because of my work, looked up.

30 minutes ago, I arrived near the large campsite where Muriel was.

To get here, I ran with all my might without stopping, so I was able to get there in one and a half days.

The place where I am is a few kilometers away from the campsite.

There I was preparing a 'battlefield' that would be advantageous to me.

There was no area as far as my eyes could see that wasn't covered in black slime.

The fresh grass was all twisted, and blood-red vines grew in their place. Between the vines were spores that constantly spewed out toxic fog.

Even though the giant redwood trees standing on the corrupted earth looked healthy on the outside, they were rotting on the inside. When the thick bark was peeled off, black slime and bugs came out from inside.

A hallucinating insect, a flying insect the size of a fingernail, flies around to check if there is anyone nearby to infect.

After confirming that the nest was growing well on its own, I released the link and stood up.

'This is the third time.'

I was in the process of building a nest that surrounded the campsite. Just as the physical enhancement type and the psychic enhancement type each have perks that improve related abilities, the nest enhancement type also has perks.

When multiple nests are combined into one, the characteristic effect is doubled.

If that happens, the campsite where Muriel is will be attacked by a more toxic fog than the inside of the swamps on the Saintopia 02 continent.

'If you fight there, your human sacrifice trait will shine.'

Among the characteristics it acquired in the swamp area before evolving into a semi-adult form, there is a characteristic called 'Human Sacrifice'. By itself it has no effect, but if there are corpses in the nest, the story changes.

If you have the Human Sacrifice trait, the nest will absorb the corpse and provide the corpse's energy to the nest owner. Even if my arms are cut off, the energy absorbed through human sacrifice boosts my recovery and restores them to their original state within minutes.

In other words, if there is a continuous supply of corpses, I become no different from a living zombie.

'Plus, it's also a counter to the Golden Spear.'

I moved to find a place to set up a new nest.

Since building a nest consumes a lot of energy, they did not forget to replenish energy from time to time.

"Kkuok?!"

I devoured the ant-headed gorilla with my eroding tentacles.

It is a carnivore named 'Andrill' and has the specifications of a Night Stalker or higher, but it is no match for me as a semi-adult.

'If I can afford it, I'll at least try it.'

It's just a shame that it can't be done.

After catching and eating a few more andrills, I found a suitable place to plant a nest and laid down.

As slime poured from my body and a nest was being built, I heard a strong noise overhead.

'hmm?'

It was the sound of a transport ship flying by.

The transport ship began flying low, paying no heed to the trees. Then I felt seven large objects fall to the ground.

'Have you found me already?'

Even if you use a bio scanner, it is not easy to find me in the jungle. This is because detection devices often fail or are reset in the middle.

'what?'

Enemies that landed from afar started moving in a completely different direction, probably because they had found me with the bio scanner. They were heading towards the place where there were traces of me crawling all the way here.

'I don't know what happened.'

I need to clean it up before the nest gets caught. Because it's more damaging for the nest to get caught than it is for me to get caught.

I broke the link with the fourth nest I made and climbed up the tree.

And moved silently to where the enemies were.

Thanks to its longer body, if the distance between trees was not long, it simply stretched out its body to move, and if it felt like the distance was longer, it used a glide film.

After closing the distance between me and my enemies, I could see how they had followed me.

Their composition was 6 heavy walkers and 1 beast.

I've seen that beast in the lead a few times in the game.

'Wolf who learned deification?'

That creature resembling a griffon in mythology, a beast with the head of an eagle and the body of a lion, was clearly Wolff.

Unlike Aimorph, who aims for endless evolution, Wolf's journey to regain the divinity within his body is an important part of the story.

Wolff's transformation ability is also closely related to this setting. As he approaches divinity, he can transform into sacred beasts such as griffons or unicorns rather than ordinary animals.

Therefore, Wolff, who has transformed into a griffon, can be considered to be at the stage between subadult and semi-adult in terms of Aimorph.

'It's certainly possible for a griffon, but it's strange.'

Gryphon's eyes are as good as Aimorph's extra senses, so they can track the traces I left even at high altitudes.

I understand how they followed me on the transport ship, but a fundamental question remains.

'I think it's named, but why are you with the pirates… huh?'

While I was watching the pirates with my protective colors activated, I immediately made eye contact with the Gryphon, who turned his head.

The guy naturally turned his head, probably because he couldn't spot me. However, with Amov's unique extra senses, I was able to tell.

He recognized me but pretended not to notice me.

'I don't know why.'

To find out more detailed information, you can check it yourself.

I moved carefully over the heavy walkers.

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