Chapter 1736: Staring Contest - Nepherage

Guys! Looks like some of the Affixed are actually more dangerous than we thought!] Hurricroak transmitted to me as I was in the middle of dodging a fairly large attack. I could feel from the bond that she was blocking an attack from something with very large claws, but I couldn’t do anything for the moment.

[Currently in the process of seeing that for myself!] I transmitted back.

When the fighting finally got to a war-like scale, my initial opponent was kind of a disappointment.

It was some young and dumb motherfucker who was clearly an Aether Acolyte before being forcefully promoted to the Aether Grandmaster rank after becoming an Affixed.

Evidently, they were one of the poster children for the idea that experience trumped raw power.

One solid magma hammer to the back of the skull sent the screaming child down into the ground.

I was just about to go and join Hurricroak on the ground in sweeping up the rest of the Collectrix’s rank-and-file when a different Affixed attacked me.

This guy, unlike the dumbass kid who couldn’t control his power even if his life was on the line, was more in control of what he had been given.

The price, however, was that the aether treasure he had become an Affixed with was a crystal ball that had been fused with his face.

He looked like a fucked-up cyclops.

"Hateful monster! I shall have the ladyship turn you into my power!"

[How the fuck are you able to see anything?!] I shouted back.

Evidently, the knock-off cyclops didn’t appreciate my observation.

"You shall bow before the might of the Chieftain of the Cerulean Gazer tribe! [Gaze of Judgement!]

[Whoa!]

At least, that’s what I assumed given the literal eye beam being fired in my direction.

I could feel that it was [Chaos] being used against me, so it was definitely going to do something if it struck, but it also felt...weird.

Like it was [Chaos] forced to follow a function more so than a [Desire].

If Milord were here, he would be trying to figure out why this was the case and see if there was a more efficient or clever way of dealing with the problem before him.

But right now, I needjust this cyclops off my ass.

[If you’re like staring so much, here’s smoke in your eyes!] I shouted as I channeled aether into my palms and caused my skin to boil and burn. [Smoke Serpent Surge!]

A blast of smoke left my hands before it rapidly transformed into the form of a massive serpent that surged forward and swallowed the chief of the Cerulean Gazer tribe.

"Bah!"

Surprisingly, it proved more effective than I anticipated despite the enemy having [Chaos].

My attack, [Smoke Serpent Surge], would normally burn and envenom the flesh of my victims. Granted, this was under the assumption my target was significantly weaker than myself or didn’t have access to [Chaos].

The chief of the Cerulean Gazers only suffered minor burns and minor lung damage, but the smoke did wonders in dirtying the stupid crystal ball that was the man’s eye. At least, I assumed it did, given the screaming that escaped from the Affixed warrior’s lips.

"Gah! My eye! My eye!"

[Yeah, I’m not passing this up,] I said to myself as I saw my opponent recoil and spasm.

[Flash Fire Fist!]

In the blink of an eye, I disappeared in a shower of sparks and fury before reappearing right in front of crystal cyclops with a fist wreathed in flames.

Any other warrior would aim for the crystal eye, assuming that something that big and obvious was probably a weak point.

I decided to aim for the stomach and sent the fucker flying backwards by several dozen feet after a jet of flames went through him.

Why?

Because if they were anatomically closer to us, or anatomically closer to the Grafted.

In other words, I wanted to see if they had a [Core].

We kaijin didn’t have hearts, or lungs, or any other organs unless it was purposely given to us. Instead, the main thing keeping our bodies together is a [Core of Desire] that is located deep inside the center of our torsos.

It’s very hard to reach this portion of internal being, as it required either a concentrated point of [Chaos] or a viciously powerful blast of aether that would be fatal to most mortal warriors.

I had only read up on the latter cases happening to our predecessors, but I bore witness to a case of the former when the late Tortallion dug out his own [Core] in order to perform a forbidden technique.

Regardless, my attack should reveal one of three possibilities upon contact.

Possibility one: the Affixed are like the Grafted.

The Grated gain their powers by using the body parts harvested from dead kaijin, i.e., something that drives me and everyone else, one of my kin, absolutely fucking bonkers. However, despite the violations, they’re ultimately human...ish. Hypothetically, they don’t have a [Core], so they still have vulnerable organs in their body.

Possibility two: the Affixed are like those knock-off kaijin from Dante.

Through a combination of accessing a tear in reality, a piece of technology from another world, and a whole fuckton of [Malevolent Gold], Dante managed to create kaijin by shoving artificial [Cores] into living aether beasts and humans.

These motherfuckers were like us in a sense but were unstable as fuck and could technically have their [Cores] shattered due to their physical presence.

If the Affixed were like them, then this attack would knock the [Core] clean out of them.

Possibility three: Grub.

When any being with a soul comes into contact with too much [Chaos] without being able to handle it, they’ll end up becoming violently mutated and develop into something that only happens to us when our creators die: an Abomination.

Abominations are essentially more [Desire] incarnate, so obsessed with their particular [Desire] that they would damn the world and then fuck it if it meant fulfilling even a crumb of what they wanted.

They didn’t have a [Core], instead, they just had a massive gapin hole in their existence, one that they longed to fill.

Unfortunately for me, the Affixed turned out to be none of these three possibilities.

Instead, it was possibility number four: they were just weirdly fucked-up mortals.

[Huh...]

As my attack made contact, I could feel that it was being resisted against not by [Chaos] made solid, but by flesh and organs reinforced by [Chaos], but not in an intrinsic way.

Instead, it felt like [Chaos] came from an outside source and had infused itself through the outside. Like a sweat pore somehow being used to drink water.

And the source of this [Chaos] was none other than the crystal orb that was serving the Affixed warrior’s eye.

[Huh...]

Evidently, that would explain why the chief of the Cerulean Gazers tribe looked oddly okay despite the fact that my attack had blown a hole into them...for all of five seconds.

Shortly after my attack ran its course, the chief of the Cerulean Gazers looked down at his fuck-up stomach and began to channel [Chaos] not from inside himself, but from the crystal orb that replaced his eyes.

I had half expected the orb to move into the now vacant torso, but alas, all the occurred was rapid cellular regeneration, but with a minor twist.

The newly formed flesh filling up the hole that I left, looked oddly colored.

Like Play-Doh was applied to a toy soldier in an attempt to make it look more like a specific character

Seconds after getting his chest refilled though, the Chief of The Cerulean Gazers looked about ready to melt my head off with his beam attacks.

"Foul monster! See how your attacks do nothing against her ladyship’s blessed warriors!" The chief of the Cerulean Gazer yelled, his voice sounding screechier than before. "Submit! And I know her ladyship will make sure your death is swift and painless."

[When the fuck does that ever work?!] I shouted at the knock-off cyclops. [Seriously, how does...fuck it, I’m just going to kill you now.]

"Try it!" The cyclops yelled as he charged [Chaos] into the crystal ball in his face. "Burn before my righteous light!"

[Prismatic Barrage!]

A dozen bolts of colorful light surged forward from the crystal ball in his face and tried to pierce me.

Emphasis on the word, "try".

Before the attack landed, I summoned a ball of lava in between my hands that I expanded to the point of it becoming full blown cover.

The prismatic beams of light harmlessly slammed into the magma ball, giving me a chance to send my reply back to the Cerulean Gazer Chieftain in spades.

[Magma Cannon!]

With a roar, I kicked the magma ball towards the Affixed fucker at a speed that exceeded those prismatic beams by such a large margin that the guy failed to even realize it was happening before it had already hit him.

This time, I heard a crack followed by the most painful scream I had ever heard.