Chapter 1013 - Viral Infection

The Huang Shengjun legion’s latest victory thrilled the Life God King. It was the first time he had ever gained ground this quickly against the Death God King. When they returned, he showered the legion with Life Infusion, healing their wounds and restoring their energy.

He had no idea that the nightmare had only just begun. After the battle, the Huang Shengjun legion had a short break. The Butcher conducted an inspection. When he swept the legion with his senses, he found several anomalies. Some Huang Shengjuns looked different. Male, female, young, old.

The female Shengjuns in particular stood out, but the Butcher assumed they were mutated variants. He had seen mutations among the Huang Shengjuns before, just never a gender mutation. The female Shengjuns were physically different from the males and radiated pheromones that drove the surrounding male Huang Shengjun soldiers wild.

These men had been under combat stress for days. It didn’t matter if the female Huang Shengjuns were as ugly as a sow; they were still excited by them. Fortunately, the Butcher, still in Huang Shengjun’s likeness, arrived before anything happened.

“What’s wrong? You guys didn’t get your fill of fighting during the day?” the Butcher asked sarcastically, pulling the females aside so he could take them away. “You lot, follow me. Everyone else, go back to your camp.”

These few females were only the tip of the two-million-infiltrator iceberg. The next morning, the Butcher exited his camp full of vigor. When he ran another headcount, however, he was shocked to find that the numbers didn’t match. Almost 30,000 Huang Shengjuns were missing.

30,000 was a tiny fraction of a billion, but it was still 30,000 Microcosm rank fighters. Even a God King did not necessarily have that many elite units. The Butcher investigated the situation and discovered that all 30,000 were dead. Every single one was a female Shengjun, their bodies all showing clear signs of abuse.

Despite understanding what had transpired, he couldn’t bring anyone to justice. The number of perpetrators was far too large, and he wasn’t about to kill millions of Huang Shengjuns just to avenge the 30,000 dead ones.

After disposing of the bodies, he ordered the march to continue. The legion fought just as fiercely as before and claimed a massive territory for the Life Faction. The Life Faction’s territory was now twice as large as the Death Faction's.

Another three days passed. The incredible might of the Huang Shengjuns left the officers of the Life Faction and the War Faction stunned. They had never thought that they could take down the Death Faction without using their other forces.

The Butcher, on the other hand, continued to notice the discrepancy growing. The daily death toll climbed from 30,000 to 50,000, then 80,000, then finally 100,000. Something was undeniably wrong, but because the dead were mostly female Shengjuns, he didn’t think too deeply about it.

On the fifth day, the legion crumbled in on itself. Over a third of the Huang Shengjuns were showing bizarre symptoms, including fainting, suffocation, full-body convulsions, and bleeding from every orifice. The Butcher immediately requested the Life God King’s help.

The Life God King intervened at full power, but his healing barely worked. Treated soldiers recovered for an hour or two only to relapse worse than before. He personally examined dozens of affected soldiers; their bodies exhibited every symptom imaginable, yet his senses detected no disease. All he could do was pour Life Energy into them to extend their lives—a stopgap measure at best.

Unbeknownst to the Life God King, the actual damage wasn’t to their Life Energy, but their genes. The Origin of Mutation had implanted pathogens that rewrote the Shengjun genome, creating dozens of gene-level infectious diseases. [1]

These diseases ate away at the Shengjun’s maximum Life Energy capacity. It didn’t matter how much Life Energy the Life God King poured into them. It was like filling a leaking bucket, simply draining right back out again.

The infected grew weaker by the hour, and the number of affected kept climbing. Finally grasping the direness of the situation, the Butcher reported it to the Nine-Eyed Evil God. The Evil God bluntly replied that his Huang Shengjuns couldn’t produce females. The enemy had planted every female in the legion.

The Butcher paled. He had assumed they were mutations, only to discover they were infiltrators instead!

He immediately ordered every female Shengjun in the legion to be executed on the spot. The remaining 800,000 or so female Shengjun were killed that day. However, the infection didn’t stop. More and more Huang Shengjuns developed symptoms with every passing hour.

After symptoms appeared, the infected would deteriorate and die within three days. This was the Origin of Mutation’s specially designed genetic trap.

As the Huang Shengjun legion deteriorated into sickness, their combat power also naturally reduced to a fraction of its former glory. Even their combined Formation Might appeared sickly.

The Death Faction took advantage of this to launch an emergency counterattack, slaughtering massive slews of Huang Shengjuns and reclaiming vast swaths of territory.

Han Wu also joined the Death Faction’s forces.

During the chaos of battle, he used Myriad Martial Caste and the Everchange Jurisdiction to disguise himself as an ordinary Huang Shengjun soldier to search for where the dead Huang Shengjuns were being dumped.

It took some looking around, but he eventually found the site. Mountains of the Huang Shengjuns’ corpses lay piled before him. Dropping his disguise, he shifted into his Nether King form and activated his Netherworld Jurisdiction.

“Arise.”

The corpses stirred at his command, and the Huang Shengjuns stood up one by one, their dazed, confused souls still clinging to them. They were Han Wu’s undead now, bound to fight for him.

1. Think of the prion ☜