Ch.115Semi-Adult (3)

“Hey, it’s time to change shifts.”

“Phew, I thought I was going to die of boredom.”

“The acting captain is calling for you. Go see him before you sleep.”

“Shit, is the guy replacing me working on self-improvement or something? Why isn’t he here?”

The pirate standing guard outside the ship kicked the dirt in irritation.

The pirate who came to replace him gave a bitter smile and tried to calm him down.

“Nothing to be jealous of. He has to write a report about the cargo we sent a few days ago.”

“Oh, that? The Volf slaves we sent to the large camp in the jungle?”

“Yeah. He sent dozens of people, so he probably won’t get any sleep.”

“Hehehe, what an idiot. Should have written it earlier. He’s totally screwed.”

They started chatting, mocking their colleague who was stuck with overtime work.

This boring guard duty was done in three shifts. Without some conversation, it would be unbearable.

“Let’s smoke one.”

“The replacement guy should be here soon.”

“It’s just an e-cigarette, what’s the problem?”

“That’s true.”

The pirate who spoke first took out an electronic cigarette from his pocket and pressed a small switch. After taking a deep drag of the potent synthetic drug in the cigarette, his expression became dreamy.

“Fuck, this is better than sex.”

“Let me have a drag after you… huh?”

The temporary street light above their heads suddenly flickered and went out.

As darkness fell, they turned on the headlights attached to their helmets.

“What happened?”

“Everything else seems fine.”

“What’s going on over there?”

“The street light went out!”

They waved to their distant colleagues who were asking what was happening, indicating it was nothing. The street lights above their faraway comrades were still shining normally.

“Did the power go out? Why suddenly… shit!”

“What’s wrong?”

“A fucking mosquito flew into my ear!”

The pirate with the cigarette in his mouth irritably shook his ear and directed his headlight toward the street light.

“Huh?”

“What is this?”

They noticed something strange as they examined the street light.

A silver moss-like substance was climbing up from the base of the street light buried in the ground. The moss had already spread to the upper part of the light.

“Is this moss?”

“Why is there moss suddenly? And why is the ground so wet when it hasn’t rained?”

Just as he finished speaking, the wet soil began to stir. Then, a plant with vibrant colors broke through the dirt mound and emerged.

The plant looked like a vine with a brilliant red color, with small claw-like stems hanging all over its surface.

“What is this? A mushroom? What?”

“……”

The pirate holding the electronic cigarette frowned at the mysterious plant. Despite its beautiful color that was pleasing to look at, he felt an inexplicable uneasiness.

He pulled out his communicator and called to his colleague who was staring blankly at the plant.

“Hey, we should report this upstairs.”

“…beautiful.”

“What?”

“It’s so beautiful I could die!”

The pirate who hadn’t smoked moved his face closer to the plant with an ecstatic expression. Suddenly, the motionless vine shot out at a speed invisible to the eye and wrapped around his face.

“Holy shit!”

“He, hehe, hehehehe.”

The pirate was terrified seeing his colleague kneeling with his face buried in the vine. He quickly activated his communicator to contact the inside of the cruiser.

If only he hadn’t heard a voice calling him from afar.

“A woman?”

The sound reaching his ears was clearly a woman’s excited moaning. Although it echoed as if coming from inside a cave, there was no mistaking it.

He really enjoyed relations with women.

“Perfect. Time to get some relief.”

The pirate followed the voice with bloodshot eyes. He was so focused that he didn’t even notice the blood flowing from his ears.

“You fucking bitch, you’re dead now.”

Following the voice, he jumped into the undergrowth. Along with him, a familiar clicking sound reached his ears.

It was the sound of a landmine activating. Extreme heat rose from the ground and engulfed him.

–

‘It begins.’

The nest installed deep underground reports to me. It says that large and small vibrations are occurring continuously on the surface.

Lying comfortably in the nest and linked to it, I could observe everything happening on the ground.

The area around the cruiser had become complete chaos as pirates infected by the ‘hallucination bugs’ jumped onto landmines. Even pirates who avoided the surprise attack from the hallucination bugs weren’t safe.

The ‘sticky traps’ growing from the ground were ensnaring them with their seductive pheromones.

As the name suggests, sticky traps are carnivorous plants that devour victims who approach the nest. Though they have almost no direct combat power, they emit unique seductive pheromones to hold prey in place.

According to the settings, the seductive pheromones emitted by sticky traps give fantastic pleasure to prey, similar to drugs. They don’t work on cyborgs or androids whose bodies have been replaced with machinery, but they work very well on species like humans.

‘Anyone who smells this probably wants to eat all the dirt.’

Plus, I currently possess the pheromone enhancement trait. Since some of my physical traits apply to the nest, it would be difficult for them to resist the pheromones emitted by the sticky traps.

In the past, some player in the community called me “drug AMorph” because I used this trait a lot to lure others.

‘It’s their fault for falling for it.’

Anyway, the Heavy Walkers must be very confused as their comrades suddenly go crazy.

They’ll try to respond to the attacks coming from all directions, but it won’t be easy.

The biological sensors installed in the Walkers won’t detect anything around the cruiser.

And visual inspection is impossible due to the fog surrounding the area. The ‘smog tower’ created from the nest is continuously spewing toxic fog around the cruiser.

Though not as potent as the fog spread in the swamp, this fog is still quite deadly. If you stay in it too long without knowing, your lungs will become contaminated and you’ll die.

In fact, some of the Walker pilots have stopped moving, perhaps because their lungs were weak to begin with. The other Walkers seemed terrified as their comrades suddenly collapsed, coughing blood.

With all this chaos outside, what are they doing inside the ship?

‘They’re probably trying to figure out what’s happening outside.’

But that’s impossible.

The cameras connected to the temporary street lights have all been rendered useless by the ‘gremlin moss.’ The same goes for the storm guns.

Gremlin moss is a counter trait that works differently from hijacking or radio jamming, which control machines.

Unlike hijacking and radio jamming, which control or neutralize machines through unique vibration waves, gremlin moss must directly infect machines with moss. Infected machines are completely neutralized until the moss’s survival time of 20 minutes passes.

The downside is that once a machine is infected with moss, it cannot be infected again, but the advantages are that it can infect enemies from the nest like now, and unlike hijacking which can only control one machine at a time, it can break multiple machines.

‘Though it’s difficult to infect machines that move constantly like Walkers or large machines like cruisers.’

There are still Walkers left, but it seems I’ve neutralized the enemy’s defense line to some extent.

Now it’s time to move to the next phase.

I disconnect from the nest and start digging the ground right above my head.

If I keep going straight up, I’ll be right under the cruiser.

It was about a hundred meters away, but with my 25-meter-long body digging a tunnel, I quickly reached the surface.

As I slightly poked my head above ground, there was a landing gear right in front of me.

Through the auxiliary organs under my now four jaws, I can sense the entire shape of the cruiser.

It’s a Cult cruiser with their characteristic elongated diamond shape.

Rather than being rugged like Megacorp or Star Union, the exterior armor has a smooth, egg-like texture with an ivory color.

‘They made it with moon silver, just to make sure everyone knows it’s a Cult warship.’

Unlike black silver, which weakens psychic power, ‘moon silver’ has the effect of amplifying psychic power.

‘Good thing I attacked the cruiser first.’

The pirate boss is a Cult. The target of moon silver’s enhancement effect.

‘Not anymore though.’

I can hear the metallic sounds of Walkers wandering through the thick fog nearby. They don’t seem to notice that I’m right under the cruiser.

I opened my mouth wide and pressed it against the bottom of the cruiser. The acidic fungal gland near my esophagus began to generate powerful fungi according to my intention.

The acidic fungal gland is a fusion trait created using the acidic blood trait I received as a Morphlet.

Previously, I could only use the acidic blood trait when wounded, but now I can spit highly acidic substances at any enemy whenever I want.

The acidic fungi, instantly generated, spewed out of my mouth.

The yellowish-green acidic fungi that attached to the bottom of the cruiser immediately dissolved the ivory moon silver.

While the fungi were working hard, I activated the tooth fairy nest. The tooth fairy nest inside my back burst open, spitting out carnivorous fleas.

Because they were enhanced by type, the tooth fairies’ appearance had changed from before. They were still the size of a child’s palm, but now had carapaces growing on their heads and bodies.

‘They look like fleas wearing helmets.’

As if reading my thoughts, the tooth fairies saluted. They looked quite cute.

‘Go inside the ship and chew through the wires connected to various important facilities. Feel free to eat crew members if necessary.’

Dozens of tooth fairies entered the ship through the melted hole.

Feeling the carnivorous fleas scatter to various places inside the ship, I waited for the hole to widen.

I could sense the pirates inside the ship becoming confused.

The all-directional attack from outside, the sudden damage to the bottom of the ship. All of this would be beyond their expectations.

As I was examining the situation inside with my auxiliary organs, I sensed someone approaching the hole from inside the ship.

‘I guess it’s time to go in?’

I grabbed the still-melting hole with my combat arms. By stretching it in all four directions with my four arms, the hole widened enough for me to barely fit through.

“Gasp!”

“Shit! Everyone fire!”

The moment I climbed up through the hole in the floor, Cult and human pirates wearing reinforced suits discovered me.

As expected of those guarding the cruiser, they calmly fired their Purple Spray Guns.

‘They’re calm, but…’

The problem is that I have psychic reflection armor.

‘It reflects part of psychic power attacks.’

Psychic reflection armor can be seen as a degraded version or psychic version of the ‘Reflection’ technique among psychic power skills. It automatically reflects 30% of the damage when hit by a psychic attack.

Flames made of psychic power wrap around my outer skin. Thanks to the upgrade my outer skin received when I became a Subadult, it’s not very painful anymore.

‘Pain reduction doesn’t even trigger.’

It’s just an unpleasant heat for me, but what about them?

Some of the flames engulfing me flowed back in the opposite direction.

At the end of it are pirates holding Purple Spray Guns. When the purple flame streams flew toward them, their faces turned pale.

“Uh-oh?”

“Everyone dodge… Arghhhh!”

I have sturdy armor, so the Purple Spray Gun doesn’t do much damage to me, but they don’t.

The pirates in reinforced suits tried desperately to extinguish the unquenchable fire, but they know better than anyone that it’s useless.

‘Was the situation room this way?’

Ignoring the pirates collapsing one by one, I moved on.

If I go up from here, I’ll reach the situation room.

–

A defensive position set up far from the cruiser.

The Seintopia02 continent experiences severe radio interference as you get closer to the jungle near the center where the Temple of the Forgotten Land is located. This is due to the unique energy emitted by the temple.

So Muriel had built a fortress between the cruiser and the temple to serve as a bridgehead and temporary headquarters in case of unforeseen circumstances.

“We’ll stay here tonight.”

Muriel and her subordinates, returning after dismantling the camp near the temple, decided to spend the night here. They planned to return to the cruiser early tomorrow morning by transport ship.

There was a reason why Muriel didn’t hurry back despite the almost certain attack from an enemy player. Partly because of the intermittent radio interference near this place, but also to get additional information about the AMorph player from Sky Mother.

“Arghhhh! Cough! Cough!”

“Brother. She won’t die anyway, so pull hard.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Despite it being late at night, torture of the Sky Mother was in full swing in the clearing of the defensive position. As the wheel turned, tearing the intestines tied with wire, Sky Mother screamed.

Muriel watched with a bored expression.

“That must be incredibly painful. Wouldn’t you like to talk by now?”

“You fucking bitch! Even if I tell you, there’s nothing you can do!”

“That’s for me to judge. I’m certain you’ve fought him before.”

Muriel had changed her mind because she questioned Sky Mother’s attitude.

‘She’s definitely met him before.’

She knew that the rank 5 AMorph player had a notorious reputation even abroad.

But Sky Mother’s attitude was clearly abnormal.

She is also a ranker like Muriel. In fact, a Volf ranker at rank 15, higher than Muriel.

Even if the opponent was higher ranked in the past, isn’t he just a Juvenile now?

Moreover, the Sky Mother that Muriel saw here was very skilled.

‘She even learned Incarnate.’

‘Incarnate’ is an advanced Volf technique known to be quite difficult to learn.

As far as Muriel knew, Sky Mother wasn’t as ambitious as other players. Unlike others, she chose to live with the current inhabitants, yet she had learned Incarnate, which clearly showed she was no ordinary player.

‘If I hadn’t brought that equipment, I couldn’t have won.’

It was originally a “weapon” she had brought to subdue Father Land.

Anyway, Muriel couldn’t understand why such an impressive Sky Mother was so afraid.

There was no reason for Muriel, who had subdued a Volf who had mastered Incarnate, to fear him.

‘They must have met and fought in the game in the past.’

That was a reaction only someone who had met him and experienced something bad could show.

‘Sky Mother probably suffered a crushing defeat.’

Muriel thought she was afraid because of that memory.

“If he’s such a fearsome being, you won’t be safe either. If you don’t want to die…”

“Ptui! You killed my family. If I could kill you, I’d sell my soul to that AMorph!”

“Hmm. Is that so?”

Muriel knew better than anyone how painful that torture was, as she was the designer. Yet Sky Mother didn’t break.

Muriel gestured to a pirate to stop turning the wheel.

“Then shall we talk to your beloved family?”

“What?”

At her snap, other pirates brought in Volf prisoners. The Volfs with chains around their necks were all young boys.

“You fucking bitch!”

“Come on, brothers. Bring the wheel.”

“Stop it!”

The pirates brought a wheel similar to the torture device used on Sky Mother. The young Volfs began to tremble pitifully at the sight of the savage torture device.

“I’ll ask one last time. If you don’t answer, all these Volf friends will have to perform a talent show.”

“You insufferable bitch! You’re a person just like me! How can you do this?!”

“Ah, so noisy. Come on, tell me quickly. Otherwise, my brothers might do something bad?”

Sky Mother could tell that Muriel’s words were not a bluff.

That vicious pirate boss was more than capable of doing so.

“…I’ll talk. I’ll tell you everything, just don’t touch them.”

“That depends on your attitude.”

“What do you want to know?”

“You’ve fought him before, right? Tell me about that first.”

Finally succumbing to Muriel’s threats, Sky Mother began to speak with a submissive attitude.

“…You know about this too, right? The Battle of Shepherd Planet.”

“You mean that battle where four clans gathered to fight on that jungle planet? They made such a fuss just to catch one player… Oh. Could it be?”

“Yes. That was to catch that AMorph player. I was the leader of the Savage Clan, one of the clans that participated.”

Even Muriel didn’t know that Sky Mother had once been a clan leader.

That’s because Sky Mother was famous for rejecting all invitations from famous clans in the game.

“At that time, he wasn’t a ranker. He was only a Subadult in terms of evolution stage. So we thought we would win easily. But…”

“But?”

“He destroyed our ships within an hour of us entering the planet. He also destroyed all but one of the communication towers responsible for contacting ships outside the planet.”

“…What?”

“It was a plan to cut off our retreat. After that, we were hunted one by one in the jungle by him. He acted as if he knew our plans completely, so whatever plans we made were useless.”

“……”

“Skinned corpses? That was nothing. He tormented us with all kinds of extraordinary methods. Because of him, we split up and fought each other. Well, that was probably his intention too.”

Sky Mother spoke calmly, but there was a deep emotion embedded in her words.

“…You said one communication tower remained? Couldn’t you contact the outside for support?”

“Kukukuk, we did. Only one communication tower from one of the four clans remained, so at first we thought they had betrayed us. But as time passed, we could rely on each other. While waiting for the reinforcements called by that clan.”

Sky Mother spoke bitterly.

Seeing her attitude, Muriel could predict what happened next.

Probably the reinforcements never came.

But the truth from Sky Mother’s mouth exceeded her expectations.

“I found out later that there was a reason why that communication tower remained.”

“What was it?”

“He deliberately left it.”

“What?”

“The clan members of the communication tower were already dead, and he had been impersonating them all along. He knew everything we discussed in meetings and had been making false reports to the outside.”

“……”

“After that, he deceived us many times. We couldn’t hold out and were annihilated, and my clan was completely split. We couldn’t trust each other because we had been deceived so many times by him.”

Hearing those words, Muriel thought.

That AMorph player was truly insane.

And that she was in a properly fucked situation.

“W-well, it was just a game…”

“Yes. It was a game. But this is reality. He’s come to reality. How can you be so calm when you can’t even imagine what terrible tactics he might use?”

“…But he’s just a Juvenile!”

“While you’re being complacent here!”

Sky Mother’s shout cut off her words. The momentary spirit was so formidable that Muriel flinched.

“He will have finished all preparations to crush you. The cruiser is probably in his hands by now?”

Hearing those words, Muriel began to feel increasingly anxious.

‘Maybe? No. That’s impossible.’

Trying to appear calm, she called a subordinate in charge of communications. It was to contact the cruiser.

Due to the radio interference in the jungle, it took some time to connect communications with the cruiser using special equipment.

After a while, the subordinate brought the activated communicator. Taking it, she asked the cruiser with a voice that was trembling without her realizing it.

“Brothers, nothing’s happening there, right?”

“Crackle crackle”

Instead of an answer, all that came back was static. When her gaze turned to her subordinate, he gestured that the connection was already established.

“If anyone is alive, answer!”

“Crackle, who·are·you? Crackle”

At the words coming through the communicator.

She felt fear and trembling.