Becoming a Monster

Chapter 505: Chapter 504: How Is This Possible?

As Ethaniel’s gaze shifted again, more frantic than ever as he searched for anything that could possibly help him out of this mess.

It passed over everything too quickly until one figure caused his vision to stop entirely, forcing his attention back onto it as something about the presence didn’t align with what he expected to see.

For a brief moment, he almost overlooked him, treating him as just another monster among the rest, but that initial dismissal didn’t last.

The familiarity was too strong to ignore, making his eyes snap back as his thoughts struggled to catch up with what he was seeing.

Varkesh, the tigerkin.

Recognition didn’t come because he was searching for him, but because his mind rejected what he was seeing.

That was his comrade, the one he had left behind, the one he had already accepted was dead, and yet he was standing there, alive, among them.

Unlike Varkesh, Ethaniel didn’t believe for even a moment that his comrade had betrayed them.

That thought didn’t even have the chance to form before something else took its place, something that made far more sense once everything began to connect.

That was why Noah didn’t react, why his surrender meant nothing.

They already had the one living person they needed.

Everything else had already been decided from the moment they entered this place.

A surge of emotion rose within him, but it wasn’t something he could define as one thing.

While envy, bitterness, and even anger flickered through his thoughts, none of them stuck long enough to matter. They were all overshadowed by something far more important that forced everything else aside.

Panic.

Not just for himself, but for what it meant.

Because even with everything that was happening, with the realization that he wasn’t getting out of this, there was another thought that refused to disappear.

One that had driven him this far and still clung to him now.

Gwen.

If he was to die here, and Varketh was kept alive, then what would happen to Gwen since she would no longer be needed?

Who would gather the forces to come save her when no one knew she was still alive?

Ethaniel wasn’t aware that Varkesh had also begun to believe that Gwen might still be alive somewhere within this place.

As he looked at Varkesh standing there, struggling to look in his direction. The panic that Ethaniel was overcome with shifted to making sure that he made the last moments of his life mattered.

There was nothing else he could do, and with that understanding, his death, or whatever was about to happen to him, was no longer something he could avoid.

The realization settled over him with a strange sense of calm clarity, allowing him to accept it far quicker than he thought he would.

If he couldn’t save anyone, then at the very least, his death could still serve a purpose, and if that purpose meant saving even one of his teammates that he had failed before, then it would be enough.

But before that, there was something he had to make sure of.

He needed Varkesh to know about Gwen.

"Varke—"

He barely managed to get the name out before an intense pain surged through his body.

It interrupted him completely as the faint sensation from before suddenly grew uncontrollable. It was no longer suppressed now that his remaining mana had been exhausted, allowing whatever had been planted inside him to spread without resistance.

His jaw snapped shut under the strain, the force behind it strong enough to crack multiple teeth as he instinctively clenched down.

Yet even that didn’t stop the pressure from building as blood began to spill from between them, his body reacting violently as he struggled to endure it.

At first, he believed it was a poison, because he had experienced something similar before. A foreign substance that spread through his system, breaking him down from the inside.

And with what he had just witnessed with Roy and Samuel, it only made sense that this would be the same, some kind of infection meant to turn him into some kind of monster.

But as the pain continued to spread, that assumption began to break apart.

The pain didn’t stay contained in one place; instead, it spread through every part of him at once, overwhelming his senses as his body struggled to keep up with what was happening.

Within that pain, there was something else that made his thoughts falter. Something that made him believe that he wasn’t simply being turned into a mindless monster.

His body was being ravaged by pain, not just from the physical changes. He could feel his mana circuits, his blood, his muscles, everything was becoming overburdened with a power that was being born inside of him.

It didn’t just tear him apart, but forced him to endure its existence as it took shape.

—

Varkesh watched it all happen, and as he did, a knot continued to tighten in his gut the longer he was forced to witness his comrade being subjected to it.

It became more and more unbearable as he watched his body visibly breaking down in a way that didn’t resemble anything he had seen before.

He wanted to do something.

That urge grew stronger with every passing second, pressing against his restraint, but even then, he knew that nothing would come from it.

And if he tried to interfere now, then whatever chance he had left to negotiate afterward would be gone entirely.

Even with that understanding, he couldn’t help but feel that Noah had gone too far.

Even for a monster.

In all his years as an adventurer, neither he nor his comrades had ever resorted to something like this. Never once thinking to prolong a creature’s suffering in such a way, and even now, the thought of doing so felt wrong.

But that thought faltered the moment he recalled the look Noah had given Ethaniel earlier, that hatred that lingered within his gaze before everything began.

’Just what did you do, Ethaniel?’

The question surfaced as it became harder to watch, yet he still couldn’t fully look away.

He saw Ethaniel’s skin begin to crumble, not all at once, but in sections, as his flesh started to strip away while a dark mist seeped out from what remained.

It spread from the exposed areas as if it had been building inside him all along, eating away at whatever remained.

The sight alone was enough to make his stomach turn.

He couldn’t imagine the pain.

And even trying to do so made him uneasy.

When it reached a point where it seemed as though Ethaniel’s flesh had been fully stripped away, and even the sounds he made had grown quieter than before, Varkesh shut his eyes.

He was unable to keep looking at what should have been left of him.

But then he felt it. A strong aura suddenly burst forth.

It forced his eyes open again, his head jerking back instinctively as he tried to make sense of what he was feeling, because it was familiar in a way that couldn’t be ignored.

It carried something that belonged to Ethaniel, something he had known for years, something he couldn’t mistake even if he wanted to.

And yet something about it was wrong. Ethaniel’s aura had never been this strong.

And more than that, this was the first time he had ever felt fear from it.

There was a detachment within it, something that didn’t align with the way Ethaniel’s aura normally emitted, something that made his senses dull and his soul feel numb the longer he was exposed to it.

Normally, a being’s aura carried intent, whether it was killing intent or resolve; the aura normally carried the owner’s true emotion at the time.

But this...

This didn’t carry that same clarity. It felt hollow in a way that didn’t make sense, detached from the world itself. It made those under its presence feel as if they were inconsequential, as if their existence held no weight within it.

It wasn’t the same Ethaniel he knew. Varkesh couldn’t accept that it was the same person. Slowly, he opened his eyes again and looked forward, trying to see what had caused such a change.

And the moment his gaze landed on Ethaniel, all of his thoughts froze.

What stood before him didn’t resemble the man he had known, not in any way that his mind could immediately accept. Yet there was one thing left to make denial impossible.

The robe he had always worn still draped over him the same way it always had.

But everything else...

Everything else had been stripped away.

His face was no longer visible. There was no expression to read, no sign of pain, no trace of the man who had been struggling moments ago.

What was left was darkness, no different than the monster’s leader. Except that the monster that stood in place of Ethaniel didn’t have eyes.

It was because of that robe, because of that one unchanged detail that remained exactly the same, that Varkesh was forced to accept what he was seeing.

But while Verkesh was struggling with his thoughts, Noah, too, was shocked.

Because the "monster" that Ethaniel turned into was eerily similar to the same being that was used as the shopkeeper back on Earth.