Chapter 331: Interrupting a D Rank Trial [2]
From the very beginning since awakening in Neo Tokara, one of the very first things that Leon learned through Talia was the Ascended Trial system, and what happened to Ascended who failed Trials.
Apart from their normal means of reproduction, another way that Neon Beasts were produced in the world were through Ascended who fell to corruption.
’ADE corruption...’
Due to the fact that he was yet to spend a long period of time in this world, Leon was yet to see an Ascended who failed his Trial.
He was yet to see an Ascended transform into a Neon Beast.
’How do ADE corruption works?’
’How does an Ascended become a Neon Beast?’
He’d had this curiosity for a very long time now after completing his very first Ascended Trial, and now, he finally had the opportunity to see it.
...
Inside the reinforced chamber...
Garak was hit!
"..."
"..."
"....."
Silence reigned as the 3 D Rank Ascended stared at him.
The terrorist was heftily built, with short spiky emerald hair, and a handsome face that was marked by a blade scar just beneath his left eye. He wore black leather clothes.
Garak sat cross-legged, unaware that he was just shot, unaware that he was dying and that life was currently draining out of his body.
And for a second or two, Garak remained unconscious, his consciousness still trapped in the echoes of his D Rank Ascended Trial, but then...
His body suddenly jerked violently, and then his eyes quivered and opened.
The moment Garak’s eyes opened, they became blood-shot as he grimaced in pain. He gasped for breath and looked down, finally noticing the holes in his chest and his body with the blood flowing around him- his own blood!
He flinched then he raised his hand in an absent-minded manner to touch his neck, feeling the hole in his neck.
His eyes looked unfocused, it felt like his consciousness was still trapped in the barrier between illusion and reality.
And then it happened.
BZZZ!
His ADE flared, uncontrolled, violent and bright one final time before quickly becoming tainted in a black and sinister hue.
The veins in Garak’s neck twitched and changed, turning black and corrupted.
The black veins rapidly spread towards his entire body, climbing up his face with speed at an unstoppable speed and momentum, penetrating into his eyes as his eyes started turning black...
"Arghh...!" He tried to scream but his scream was cut short, then his flesh squirmed like a monster was hidden beneath his skin and was wanting to break out.
Garak opened his mouth in a silent desperate plea, as if shouting for mercy even as his eyes flickered between desperation, fear, and corrupted depravity.
Then...
BAM!
From different parts of his body, machinery burst out before curling back in and burrowing into his flesh with obscene precision, threading through muscle and coiling through his bone like home.
As they did, something deeper was touched, something not physical as his thoughts stuttered, then became fragmented as foreign signals began flooding in.
Systems began overwriting all instinct, code began replacing his will.
But not completely.
Not yet as for a brief, agonizing moment, Garak was still there as he turned his head and looked at his mentor with pleading and terrified eyes.
Seeing those unfamiliar eyes but sensing the familiar will that was filled with fear and terror hidden inside, Dhruv winced as a look of pain showed on his face. He couldn’t bear to look.
In that short moment of eye contact with his mentor, Garak could feel everything- the intrusion, the rewriting, the cold expansion of something vast and hungry pressing into his mind like a storm.
Just like Dhruv, Leon and Umar also froze as they watched it happen.
And despite the fact that this was an enemy, a terrorist that had likely claimed countless lives, Leon couldn’t help it as watching it unfold he felt sympathy. And finally, he understood why Ascended feared Trials.
He finally understood why Brick was so scared of attempting a Trial.
’This...’ He felt a chill crawl down his spine.
As for Garak, desperate, he tried to hold onto anything- a name, a face, a promise, a thought, anything.
"I don’t want to... I don’t want..." he stammered, then it ended, and then...
BZZZZZZZZZT!
Thick threads of dark corrupted purple ADE erupted from within the chamber, within its body.
This ADE was undoubtedly D Rank!
And then...
THUD!
It rose.
What rose from the chamber was not a person.
It unfolded, revealing a massive monster whose frame strained against the walls of the chamber with metal plates extruding from torn flesh, knitting into armored segments that pulsed with a dim, internal glow.
Its limbs were split and multiplied, 6 on each side with sharp bladed ends, reconfiguring into something that was built for stability and slaughter rather than movement as Geneforms understood it.
The torso, if it could still be called that expanded into a heavily plated core, layered with interlocking armor that looked grown rather than forged.
While beneath the gaps, something wet and alive shifted, feeding the machine from within with malevolent will and malice.
Its head was a mockery of both insect and war machine as multiple eyes ignited one by one, burning red, not with light but with intent.
Slightly down, mandibles split open, revealing not just grinding metal but something deeper, an aperture that pulsed as if it could devour more than flesh, an aperture that could devour ADE!
Above it and mounted seamlessly into its back, artillery bloomed into existence as rotating barrels still warm from their own creation aligned with unnatural smoothness.
This was a corrupted D Rank Cyber Gladiator.
The artillery didn’t need targeting systems, the monster felt where to aim.
Behind it, its tail arched high, segmented and barbed, ending in a massive crushing claw that flexed with quiet, anticipatory strength.
Aside its tail that was even taller, stabbing out of the reinforced chamber where it was, it stood at over 3 meters tall.
This was a Behemoth.
This wasn’t just a beast, this was a Harvester.
Garak had morphed into a living weapon of biology and machinery, a massive Scorpion monster of part biology and part machine, a D Rank Neon Beast born of a corrupted D Rank Cyber Gladiator.
It looked like a shadow of its former self.
It was impossible to mistake this for anything that had once been human, and yet, for a fraction of a second, buried deep within the network of its malevolent mind, something flickered.
A memory, a face, a voice calling its name.
The Neon Beast froze as one of its eyes dimmed, just slightly even as a low, distorted sound crawled out of it.
But then the artillery shifted and the hesitation vanished.
The eye flared brighter than the rest, and whatever remained of the terrorist, Garak was crushed beneath the overwhelming, ecstatic surge of hunger and malice.
Not a hunger for flesh, but for souls, for ADE, identity, and the essence that the Trial had failed to preserve.
This was now a self-sustaining engine of predation that cared not about foe or ally, only food and prey.
Its many eyes ignited, locking into anything living around it... and the first of them was Dhruv. He was closest.
Then it charged.
BOOM!
...
[Special Appreciation to Hoinheim, r03n, ImperialJadeDragon, Yametekudastop, MachaMarvelous, and Shadesworn for the Golden Tickets! Thanks for the support!]