The situation I was in wasn’t the sole effect of mana vision, but I also had mana sense added to the mix. With both of them working at full capacity the change in the world around me couldn’t be compared to before.
The solid world had become changed into an abstract moving picture with multitude of different colored dots painting all the objects.
That wasn’t all, it took one to see the things to understand what that line in the option, ‘See what can’t be seen really meant.’
It wasn’t just about mana. If it was only about seeing mana then mana sense was enough to see it, but mana vision laid a vivid picture of the past and present, those far and near, high and low at the same time and place in front of me.
It was as if the whole world existed at one point. Mana actually was more than just a form of energy. It held the records of all living things from different times and places, and made them available to everyone who had ever advanced enough to touch upon its secret.
“It’s truly magical.” I mumbled with my mind completely engrossed in the world of mana and magic.
“What is?”
I heard senior officers voice and suddenly remembered that I wasn’t alone and we had a very important job to do.
“Huh, oh no, you won’t understand. Just keep following me. We’ll be there soon.”
“There but where? Where exactly are we going?”
He asked and my eye started shinning with murder. I knew where the sinner was, and all that we needed to do was to get there before he moved away once again.
I turned around, our eyes met and I replied him with firm voice.
“We are going on a hunt.”
Thanks to mana visions unsurpassed ability, I got to see a disgusting truth about the powder. In reality it wasn’t powder at all, but a living breathing being. It also had a life and death cycle.
And unfortunately, this powder was everywhere. It was on the streets, on the walls, on the roof and almost everyone was completely covered in it, as if it was dirt.
But thankfully, most of it was glowing grey in my vision. It wasn’t living, but had already completed its life cycle and died or maybe their mana had ran out.
It was as if the powder had very little life span, and wither away like a tree at the end of its life to become a part of nature.
While the dead powdered life form was grey in color, the living ones glowed red, very vibrant red.
And I was following these patches of red colored powder.
But there was one more thing which I was having some difficulty believing. Actually everyone, my senior, the crowd, and even I had a sting connected to our minds. The string was intangible and stretched to somewhere far. It passed through the walls and roof like a specter. I wanted to find out what they were, but the job in hand was an important matter too.
Although there weren’t many such patches, but thankfully it seemed that the powder from different killers glowed with different brightness. Which was probably related to the amount of mana they possessed.
The brighter they glowed the mightier they were and the longer they lived.
Following the patches we left the nursery behind and took a left. Then turned a right and slowly reached a slope reaching the deeper depths of our mound. I checked on my map to see if I was right about my déjà vu feeling and turns out that I was right.
The path had already been marked. The patches were leading us to the pit.
Senior, who had been quite all this time, couldn’t control his nervousness which the dark and eerie looking tunnel was letting out and poked my sides before asking, “Is the killer really hiding here?”
“Yes, this is the place where we’ll find our murderer.” I replied without turning back.
“So the murderer is from the pit?”
“Why can’t it be? Anyways, just keep on following me and don’t leave me no matter what. I think there might be more of them in here.”
He yelled out loud hearing my confession and his voice echoed in the tunnel. I starred daggers at him for making a rookie mistake and he gulped, shivering from tension ever so slightly.
I sighed seeing his sorry face and faced to my front once more, but then I saw it.
Standing in the middle of the road, a pale yellow looking ant was staring at us with its white pus filled eyes.
Even senior cried out seeing someone magically appear out of nowhere and staring at him in the middle of a dark tunnel. Thankfully, I had night vision and from the looks of it senior had it too, otherwise we would have become its food without being able to do much about it.
“Wha-What the hell is that?!” Senior cried out and why wouldn’t he have? After all, our opponent looked nothing like an ant.
Though the base was an ant, but I personally didn’t know any ant that had spike rising from his back, had antennas sharp like spears and exoskeleton looking like a bullet proof vest.
Its color also was mismatched, as if someone had bleached the ant and dried it in the sun. It was missing two of his middle legs and the right side of his mandible.
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And it didn’t have an abdomen. No, actually it was there but its abdomen had shrunk in size and contracted to become a long needle, which was happily swaying behind it like a tail.
Also did I mention it had drool leaking from its mouth, which upon making contact with the ground made it sizzle and bubble up?
I appraised it quickly to see what the hell it really was, but only one useless reply came back.
It is already dead.
It had probably heard us or sensed us two juicy looking living beings walking alone in the middle of its hideout, and had come to eat us.
“Though I have to say, it is quite bold.”
Senior snorted hearing me say that.
Our eyes meet, and I only saw malice inside his eyes. I checked through mana vision and interestingly it also glowed bright red like the powder from before, indicating that it was the source of all of our troubles.
There was no fear, confusion, or dread in his eyes, just hunger. Proper and pure evil being it was.
It didn’t waste time, I knew it was coming, but my senior didn’t.
His head stayed stationary looking at us and its body rotated 180 degrees. It relaxed its legs, its head moved to face senior and it jumped.
Was he fast? He was super fast. Faster than me when I use haste and speed demon together. The moment he jumped he reached senior, who actually was able to move his body out of its way.
It missed and flew past senior screeching in anger.
It flew through the air like a rocket and rolled on the ground some distance away, before standing back up.
That one exchange between us was enough to tell me that he was faster than me. Though its reaction speed was… not good at all.
It showed no mercy or sentiments for anyone and made decisions on the run.
“Made decision to run? Fuffu…!”
Or maybe, it only saw us as food and nothing more.
“Fuck… I almost died there! It almost killed me. And you are laughing at it like an idiot. Fuck!”
Senior yelled at me in a fit of rage, while I appraised it once again.
And it turns out that luck was on my side.
{High Appraisal has risen to lv 10}
[Appraisals ability has improved. Please finish your work as your status demands an update.]
I was surprised that it reaching level 10 didn’t unlock a skill, but I guess am update is good enough too.
But the result only told me how near my senior really was to his death, because that dead ants stats were nowhere near a normal second ranked ant.
Level
37/50
Species
Zombie ant
Rank
2
Job
Minion
Health
---
Stamina
---
Health Reg. (---/min)
Stamina Reg. (---/hour)
Mana reg. (---/min)
Conserves (----)
Stat Tier: Insect level
Strength
72
Intelligence
1
Agility
54
Knowledge
2
Dexterity
14
Luck
---
Perception
19
Defense
8
Endurance
---
Vitality
---
Skills
Jump(10), death shriek(4), eviscerate(7), Berserk, Pain nullity, Damage nullity, Absorption, Integration, Vision(35), sense, Absolute Dark resistance, Absolute water resistance, Miasma breath(7), Pod shooter(5), Spore manipulation(-), Mana manipulation(9), spore creation(7), Spore wall(7), Acid spit(7)
I couldn’t believe my eyes. First the appraisal had changed once again and was now giving data with actual stats rather than percentages and next was the zombie ant’s health and stamina, which it didn’t have.
Moreover, it had stats which were already near the limit of what an ant could get and it was only a second ranker.
“A squad leader?”
“What?”
Both senior and I started daggers at it, tried to see who it actually used to be, but all the changes it had gone through made it impossible.
I told Senior about his specialty and he shivered in fear.
“Are you for real? A squad leader with 4th ranked stat, that’s absurdity at its height.” he complained; as his eyes opened wide in hate.
I also told him to stay out of the fight, because he didn’t have the strength to fight it, but like every other individual, he was also full of pride and didn’t listen to me.
But it only took another jumping attack from the zombie for my senior to rethink about my offer, and he gladly accepted it too.
“Okay, you can handle it on your own. I won’t interfere. Call me if you need my help.” His behavior was truly fitting of an officer of his rank and experience.
The zombie stared at senior like a predator. I actually didn’t want to let senior become its food, so I used provoke.
“What the fuck are you looking at!?” I yelled out and it turned its head full one eighty degrees which gave me the scare of my life and its body followed and performed the same… trick.
“It can fucking rotate its fucking head! Fuck!”
[You have used Provoke! The agro of all nearby enemies shifts toward you.]
Our eyes met once again and I once again saw its pus leaking pearl white eyes, which made me shudder.
[Kyaaaaa!]
It roared and ran toward me. It opened its mouth and attacked me in full fervor, but unfortunately for it, although it was fast, faster than me, but it had no technique. It simply charged toward me like a bull.
I activated [Haste], [Fury], [Fire body] and finally [vengeance] to tip the balance toward me and easily dodged its forward charge by side stepping and using its momentum against it, stabbed my spike turned leg directly into its chest.
*Bam*
A shower of black venomous acid like blood came out of its back with my spike.
The impact was so strong that its momentum dragged me backwards full thirty centimeters.
I felt a burning sensation on my leg and hurriedly kicked it away and pulled my leg out of its chest.
And when I checked I saw that its blood was actually acid which was fighting against my iron skin and fire body to burn away my leg.
Though it failed to burn my leg, it still stung like hell and made me grit my teeth in pain. I looked at its dead body and smiled seeing the hole in its chest having turned into charcoal thanks to fire bodies unique attribute.
I checked to see if anything was broken, and it turned out that the impact was so strong that my leg had ruptured from various places and there was fluid leaking from it.
I gave the now completely dead zombie one glance, before I turned and started walking toward my senior.
“That’s it? You ended it so quickly, and here I thought that yo...!”
I didn’t know whether it was intuition, ant sense, or simple prediction, but I sat on the ground the moment I saw my seniors eyes getting bigger than the moon.
It wasn’t dead. I had pierced a spike through it chest, but it still hadn’t died.
*Snap*
I heard the sound coming from directly above my head and I yelled out loud, “How is this fucker still alive and kicking?”