Chapter 25 Part 2

“How could there be so many Giant Phagocytic Worms?! These things have such strong territorial instincts—how could they all show up at the same time—”

“No!!! El!!”

“This sudden assault by the Giant Phagocytic Worms wiped out the entire logistics outpost. El unfortunately perished in the attack. The only silver lining was that all the Giant Phagocytic Worms were eradicated in El’s desperate counterattack, buying us time to investigate why they had appeared in such unnatural numbers at the outpost. From this day forward, no logistics outpost will operate independently—all will be relocated to military or training bases…”

“What’s the use in that?” A middle-aged couple sat in the instructor’s office, their eyes red-rimmed. “Our son is dead. Can money bring him back?”

“Take your money back. We just want to know… why did he die?”

Why did he die?

The question from the hallucination pierced through time itself, stabbing straight into Ode’s heart from the distant past. It left him staring blankly as he lifted his head.

Meanwhile, inside the base.

A shrill wail of an alarm pierced the night, its changing rhythm conveying a specific warning.

The dark dormitory building lit up in an instant. Heads popped out from windows one after another.

“Giant Phagocytic Worms alert!!”

“The intrusion’s at the logistics outpost? Weird… what’s the point?”

“Sigh… it doesn’t concern us anyway. El’s on duty at the outpost today, right? Relax, he’s tough! One Giant Phagocytic Worm won’t stir up much trouble.”

“Doesn’t anyone find this strange? If El could handle it, why sound the alarm? And if the alarm’s going off, why’s the follow-up intel saying it’s not that urgent?”

“Wait… what’s that…? Look! Over there! Toward the laboratory!!”

“Shit! Isn’t that the hunk of junk—that thing that’s been a paperweight for decades, the one the instructors treat like a landmine and warn us ‘don’t touch Eva’s invention unless it’s do-or-die’?! Who’s firing it up?! Why?! Is it connected to the alarm?!”

Elder Zhong and Faust arrived beneath the activated Red Flood warship, utterly dumbfounded. Elder Zhong couldn’t hold back and whipped his head toward Pharaoh. “What the hell are you doing?! How did you let a newbie get inside that thing?!”

“A newbie?! I was about to ask you the same!!” Half of Pharaoh’s body had turned to sand as she supported her wounded frame, gasping for breath. That half of her body rapidly regenerated with each breath. “Who gave him the unlock code?! Huh? He cracked the lock on Eva’s gun—that’s one thing. But no one ever told me that damned gun could summon the Red Flood!!”

Heaven only knew what it felt like for her to restrain the student holding the gun, only to look up and come face-to-face with the Red Flood hovering outside the window, engines glowing. “What now?! Which one of you is gonna tangle with that iron beast Eva the maniac built?”

Even Faust couldn’t help but mutter, “Shit.” “Get Eva on the line! This is the golden egg I just poached into the nest—don’t let it get cracked in one night—”

A low hum…

The Red Flood warship, with its distinctly Soviet aesthetic, suddenly vented visible sound waves downward. In the next moment, it shot into the sky.

Another powerful sonic boom tore open the starry night sky, and the massive, heavy hull vanished from sight.

Elder Zhong decisively placed a hand on his two colleagues’ shoulders. In the blink of an eye, they transformed into a streak of light and streaked off in the direction the warship had disappeared.

When they touched down again, chasing the warship’s slipstream, they found themselves at GORCC’s logistics outpost in the Sahara. Three enormous Giant Phagocytic Worms reared up, their bodies spearing into the night sky.

“El!” Faust spotted his colleague at once, the man hurriedly evacuating everyone from the outpost. “What’s going on here?! Why are there three Giant Phagocytic Worms? These things have territorial instincts so fierce that one could claim an entire stretch of the Sahara—”

“How should I know!” The Egyptian hustled the last of his comrades to safety outside the outpost. “How’d you even know something was wrong here? One worm popped out first. By the time all three surfaced, I couldn’t spare a hand to sound the alarm.”

“What? We heard the alarm and followed the newbie here—oh! Where’s that guy?!” Pharaoh suddenly snapped back to attention. She traced the three unnaturally upright Giant Phagocytic Worms upward with her eyes.

In the night sky, a red point of light—like Mars itself—continued to climb, drawing the worms to sway and pursue it with their massive bodies.

The next second, the red star plummeted to earth!

An earth-shaking boom…

The entire logistics outpost collapsed under the immense impact. Amid the earthquake-like roar, sand cascaded down. In the next instant, six gaping abyssal maws, each the size of a city square, yawned open in the ground!

“…My…” El was too shocked to speak, but that didn’t stop him from immediately hurling out his scythe-like sword. He held the blade upright, and the alchemical runes etched on it glowed with dark golden lines in the night. “You’d better get the one flying that warship down here. The four of us can handle this without anyone having to go all out—”

【Don’t stop him!】 Eva’s weary voice carried a note of excitement; she’d clearly been dragged out of bed midway. 【I’m watching the readings right here. He shows zero signs of contamination… How… how… I dare anyone to pull him off the Red Flood. Don’t interfere with my data collection—this is priceless!】

Faust had no intention of heeding Eva’s threats. He pinched the tip of his left index finger, and crimson fire flared to life on the cigar between his lips. “Don’t blame me… Eva, your track record of chasing data without a care for the consequences is way too long. You lot deal with the Giant Phagocytic Worms! I’ll go fish out my—”

An earth-shaking boom…

The Red Flood slammed into the sand for the second time. This time, its underbelly unleashed sonic attacks as well, blasting away dozens of meters of sand in an instant and exposing the things coiled even deeper below.

“…!” Faust froze mid-rescue, stunned. There were… more! Giant Phagocytic Worms hidden even deeper!

How was that possible??

“One worm’s drawn by the noise on the surface—it’s going after the evacuees!” El spun on his heel decisively. “I’ll go save them! The battlefield’s yours!”

“No problem, Eva! You handle below the sand layer. Elder Zhong, you take the surface… Elder Zhong?” Faust looked in astonishment at the elder, who stood rigid in place.

“It’s the Black Pharaoh… I saw Him,” Elder Zhong said, golden light leaking from around his eyes like rippling mist. “He’s the one who brought all these worms… He deliberately triggered the alarm for El. A kid in the logistics outpost accidentally disturbed one of His nests. This is His retribution…”

“…Has He left?” Pharaoh’s voice trembled with a mix of fear and thrill, like a snake scenting danger.

“…No. The two of us need to deal with this projection of His, or this won’t end.” Elder Zhong blinked, and the golden light at the corner of his eye winked out like a dying spark. “Faust.”

“…” Faust eyed the writhing white masses of worm flesh carpeting the ground and closed his eyes briefly. “Eva, keep feeding me Ode’s data. The instant any mental pollution shows up, you tell me! I mean ‘instant’!”

【I told you your worries are unfounded. I can’t detect any discomfort in Ode at all. Quite the opposite…】

【He’s exhilarated.】

Eva was right.

No sooner had Elder Zhong and Pharaoh sped off toward the Black Pharaoh’s projection than Faust saw the Red Flood in the night sky wobble upward like an autumn leaf. The next second, it spun out like a shuriken, its razor-sharp wings laced with sonic power slicing open the belly of one Giant Phagocytic Worm in a flash.

“SCREEEEECH—” The wounded Giant Phagocytic Worm unleashed a guttural screech, coiling violently. Its body, thicker than the Empire State Building, whipped like a lash toward the spinning Red Flood.

But in the next moment, the red warship veered sharply, hanging perpendicular to the ground to narrowly dodge the attack.

【I think Ode can handle these worms on his own.】

“…” Faust watched the warship and sighed despite himself, removing the cigar from his lips. “You know I sent him here to fix his psychological issues, not exacerbate them. You’re egging him on, pushing him deeper into the abyss…”

【I think a bit of crazy isn’t so bad—】

An earth-shaking boom…

All nine Giant Phagocytic Worms reared up in unison, their massive abyssal maws snapping toward the red iron lump taunting them from the air.

Eva yelped in alarm, her tone shifting as she urged Faust to jump into the fray and rescue her precious warship. She’d only pounded her desk twice when she glimpsed the truly insane scene through the warship’s monitor—

Deep inside the worm’s belly where the warship had crashed, Ode—his face frosted over with cold determination—recalibrated the panels several times. Confirming the warship was beyond combat viability, he unbuckled his safety harness and rose from his seat. In the next second, he lunged forward and bit savagely into the control console before him!!

Eva: “—!?!”

Was this a normal human reaction?! Even more terrifying: the metal control console tore apart under Ode’s teeth!

“Eva? Eva! Why’d you go quiet? Tell me what’s happening with Ode in there so I know if I need to—”

【…Too late.】

“? Too late for what?” Faust demanded. Only then did realization hit him, his heart pounding. “You aren’t saying he died in there!? Earlier you—”

【I said,】 Eva replied with difficulty, 【my warship… it’s too late for it…】

【You’re right. Ode’s problem needs serious treatment. It’s not that crazy is bad—he’s… he’s gone way too far.】

“?” Faust was still puzzled when the Giant Phagocytic Worm that had swallowed the warship suddenly exploded. Corrosive acid sprayed onto the hides of its kin, enraging the others further.

Amid the flying acid, a slender figure rode the updraft from the worm’s ruptured body, twisting lithely into the air.

A chunk of the warship’s wing was clamped in his mouth. In midair, he locked eyes with Faust, emotionless, and worked his jaw. One chew after another, right in front of Faust, he swallowed the wing piece down.

Faust: “…”

Eva: 【…】

Faust: “……”

Eva: 【……】

Eva: 【Say something.】

Faust felt dizzy and disoriented. “Am I dreaming? How else could I see a human devouring a warship whole? This isn’t normal—it has to be a dream, or some kind of hallucination. Be honest! Has Ode been corrupted?! How else could he pull off something like that?!”

Eva shot back: 【Don’t slander my warship! His readings were the same before and after he boarded. He’s always been this freakish!】

In the night sky, that lean and resilient figure bounded downward, stepping lightly on chunks of flesh like a cat on the prowl. Whenever one of the Giant Phagocytic Worms crossed his path, he slashed open its belly with the last scrap of wing clutched in his hand—or what he treated as rations. If it bit him, he simply spun around and bit back.

The Giant Phagocytic Worms lacked any shred of intelligence, so they couldn’t truly feel fear. Yet amid the downpour of blood and shredded meat, some of them recoiled in a reaction akin to paramecia fleeing saltwater—an instinctive aversion.

At the distant edge of the oasis, El had just delivered the people to a safe outpost. Turning back, he caught sight of the scene through the haze of his alchemy-enhanced vision. “…Whoa.”

Eva’s mood hung heavy now, her usual standoffishness melted away. She wanted to jump into any conversation, anything to distract from the turmoil churning inside her: 【What?】

El’s gaze locked onto the lone figure amid the blood rain—the only one the worms were shying away from. After a long moment, he let out a sigh. “That got me hard.”