Mutagen

Midnight had already pa.s.sed more than an hour ago in the Phillippines. Everything in the base had already returned to normal.

Still, it would take time before the area surrounding the base return to its previous appearance.

After the everyone that evacuated finally returned, they were in dismay. It was not hard to feel that way when the fields they poured their sweat and effort vanished into nothing but a patch of empty land.

Nevertheless, they could not deny that they were relieved that they were still able to return. While looking at the surroundings, it would not be surprising if the base was wiped off the map.

But it still stood. The people only needed to give more effort in recovering what was lost.

As night came, everyone went to sleep. With Chiyo around, the base did not even need a lookout for the night, enabling everyone to get enough rest.

At the main house of the base, etched on the face of the crevice, however, almost everyone was still awake.

"Sis, you should sleep. It"s already past midnight..."

Jaeya complained while yawning.

For some reason, Mei was quite restless. She was trying to contact Mark through the ring, but he was not answering. There was definitely something going on.

She wanted to use the ring to teleport to Mark already. 

If there was a problem, she wanted to help him. The girls were already sleeping. It was also okay for her to be absent from the base for half a day.

However, they were waiting for something.

Spera already woke up before midnight. And there, a problem was found.

The portals Spera created could only connect places that she had seen personally. Simply, places she had been before or seen with her naked eyes. 

It was the same for the place she opened the portal with Mark"s order. In the middle of the Atlantic Ocean where travel routes of pa.s.senger planes were located. 

And the problem was...

Spera had never been into New Jersey.

The bases of Auraboros was spread out worldwide. However, these bases were only located as energy gathering points and hidden places. Those were located far away from human society as much as possible.

And thus, no bases of Auraboros exist in New Jersey. The state also had the thing they called an energy gathering point. However, not only that it was already occupied, but it was also surrounded by cities and towns. It was not fit for the activities of Auraboros.

From New Jersey, the nearest one was far North East of New Jersey. In a hunting grounds in the middle of Pennsylvania.

And the nearest place that Spera could open a portal from New Jersey was at Reading, Pennsylvania, that she had been to before.

Currently, they were waiting for Spera, who was checking the map application that Mark had and was looking for the best place to open the portal. Afterward, they would print a map that Mei would personally deliver to Mark using the rings they had.

While she checked the map, small holes could be seen floating midair in front of her. She was opening portals as tiny as possible that could make her see the place on the map.

She would search the map, peek on the hole, and would end up shaking her head.

The whole world was already devastated, after all. It was hard to find a safe place that they could designate as the receiving point.

"Here, drink some coffee."

Aephelia and Odelina came into the room, bringing some cups of coffee for everyone.

They were all here planning to open a portal at a suitable and safe place. There, they would enter the portal to wait for Mark in advance as it was more convenient to do so rather than randomly opening a portal at the place when they did not know when Mark was going to arrive.

Spera"s portals were also not unlimited. She was able to use these holes to peek, and save energy, but the number of portals she could open that would enable humans to pa.s.s through was still limited in number and duration.

It was more efficient to open one at the right time.

"Here!"

Spera exclaimed.

Finally, she managed to find a good location. Once the sun had risen once more, they would travel to that location and wait for Mark.

On the other hand, Mei would leave as soon as she had the map Spera printed.

After all, she really felt restless.

***

Day 126 - 1:25 PM - Lower Rooftop, Bally"s Casino, Atlantic City, New Jersey, United States of America

On the lower rooftop, Mark"s blade-whips and metal limbs moved without pause.

How many infected was there? And how many infected did he kill already?

Everyone watching had already lost count.

Currently, to everyone"s eyes, Mark was like a killing machine.

Corpses of infected hosts and spiders littered the large part of the rooftop, being trampled by the new ones that arrived.

Still, everyone found it odd that the woman that seemed to be the leader of the horde was just watching at the side, intently staring at Mark. It was not a behavior that an infected should display, after all.

Unfortunately, even though they could see the woman opening her mouth several times before, they could not hear her voice because of the far distance.

If they knew that the woman was actually talking despite being infected, everyone would be in turmoil.

On the rooftop, the survivors started to believe what Ernst thought of more and more.

They could not unsee the difference between the behavior of the battle before and now.

Furthermore...

While the infected with spider limbs on their backs fought Mark, they also started killing each other when the opportunity came.

It only happened to the ones with smaller spiders on the backs of their heads. The regular ones still behaved the same.

And as the battle became centered towards the infected with smaller spiders, it started to become a free for all.

"What the h.e.l.l..."

Mark could only murmur as he noticed what was happening.

As he looked at the sticky stare of the [Queen Type], it was not hard for him to understand what was happening.

Furthermore, the more he killed the ones with smaller spiders, the emotion from the feeble consciousness of the [Queen Type] was getting stronger.

l.u.s.t? No, it was not that, but close. It was the instinctual urge to breed. It was an instinct that was highly present in animals and insects.

And of course, Mark felt unpleasant as that instinctual urge was targeted to him.

That was when Mark remembered.

The [King Type] was looking for a queen.

Then...

The [Queen Type] might also be looking for a king.

This instinctual urge of the [Queen Type] should be targeted towards a [King Type].

However... As if that was easy to happen.

There was no doubt that [King Types] and [Queen Types] among the infected was very rare.

If the suspicion was right, he had two in his base. In the wild, however, Mark only encountered one [Queen Type] and one [King Type] among the tens of thousands of infected he faced since the start of the outbreak.

"And there was another factor."

Mark said as he waved the [Slicer] on his right hand, downwards, and sliced the head of the infected in front of him vertically.

He then moved his eyes, looking at the limbs of the [Empress Spider] that was present in this angle.

The factor that might have affected the judgment of the [Queen Type] was the urge of this spider.

These two moved as one. The [Queen Type]"s and the [Empress Spider]"s instincts and consciousness were mixed.

It led to the two looking at Mark as a candidate for breeding.

"Ugh..."

Just thinking about it made Mark feel uncomfortable.

NNNNNNGGGGG!!!

Suddenly, Mark felt his hand vibrate fiercely. He was surprised.

Without thinking twice, he turned into a wave if black mist and escaped the area of the battle. He flew straight towards the rooftop of the tower, materializing in front of everyone that was staring at him in shock.

Before everyone could even close their open mouths, a blinding light shone beside Mark. They could not help but cover their eyes.

The moment their sight returned, a beautiful woman clad in crystal armor stood beside their savior.

That was when they heard Mark speak with a stern voice.

"Mei"er, why would you appear like this? You should have alerted me beforehand..."

As the question was asked, the crystal armor of the beautiful woman melted into a slime-like creature, revealing her slender figure. Then, the woman embraced their savior affectionately.

When her body touched the black cloak of mist, parts of it vanished as she directly embraced Mark"s body.

"I tried alerting Gege for almost an hour already... Gege is not responding..."

Hearing that... Mark knew that it was partly his fault.

He was too concentrated in the events around him, along with the battle, that he failed to notice his vibrating ring.

"Hah... Alright, my bad." Mark shrugged. "I"ll ask you later why you came here. We still have some business to finish."

Mark said to Mei while pointing at the situation below.

Even without Mark, the skirmish of the male spiders continued. However, the regular ones already started climbing the hotel tower under the angered orders of their Queen.

After all, she could not let her potential mate escape.

Mei, on the other hand, was glaring at the Queen as if she saw her mortal enemy.

"Gege, can you let me take care of that woman?"

She asked.

"Hmm? You want to kill her? I"m planning to catch her, though..."

"Why?"

"We have that [King Type] at the base, right? I want to see his reaction if we bring him a genuine [Queen Type]."

"That"s a [Queen Type]?" Mei said with a bit of realization. "I"ll do it. I"ll catch her."

Mark looked confused for a bit. Even though he could feel Mei"s emotions, he could not understand why she was too eager to fight the [Queen Type].

"Hah..." Mark sighed. "Alright. I already wanted to end this, but it"s fine if you really want to. Just be careful, alright?" 

"Don"t worry."

Mei showed a beautiful smile at Mark, which immediately mesmerized the witnesses.

Then, without waiting for them to recover, the slime-like creature, Oracle, turned into Mei"s armor once more. And to everyone"s surprise, the angelic-looking girl sprouted demonic wings from her back, not that different from the ones their savior had.

Wielding the large white blade she had on her back with both hands, she jumped down from the hotel tower.

"Crimson, protect her."

Mark murmured, and a small surge of black smoke followed Mei.

The new enemy immediately alerted the spiders climbing the face of the hotel tower. Without delay, they all tried to charge towards Mei.

And then, with a flash of light, Mei vanished, appearing past before the group of the first attackers.

Losing their target for their attack, many of the infected lost balance and fell while Mei continued flying down the face of the building.

Mark, who was still watching from the rooftop, could only shrug. After all, Mei had just arrived, and she was already jumping into action. It was as if she expected that there would be an enemy for her to fight.

"Well, I better follow her."

Mark murmured as he turned into a puff of black mist once more.

He charged towards the hundreds of infected climbing the hotel tower.

With a few swings of his two blade-whips, pieces of flesh and blood rained below.

Mei immediately reached the lower rooftop.

Contrary to her usual style using a sniper rifle, she decided to fight the [Queen Type] face to face for some reason.

As Mark kept an eye on Mei while he fought his own battle, a thought sprouted in his mind once more.

"Women really are strange creatures."