The white spread out ahead of him before he first blinked and with each blink after it began to dissipate, the world came to as Kyle blinked the light out of his eyes. Before he could take in his surroundings his senses alerted him to something.
Kyle glanced around as a sense of sickness drifted through him, he didn’t actually feel sick but just how an animal can smell the scent of sickness he sensed it. Kyle sensed the darkness that drifted through the air around him, tendrils of thin shadows that seemed twitch every now and then.
He eyed the tendrils briefly before Karnage spoke from behind him “Where are we?” she asked.
Kyle took his eyes away from the tendrils of shadow and finally took in his surroundings, with a high ceiling up above them although not as high as a district’s they found themselves inside some sort of massive warehouse. Floating through the air like ghosts he looked down at the ground a dozen meters below them.
Several hundred thousand tubes filled with a greenish liquid lay on top of large metallic cubes, each a few meters away from each other these containers filled the entire warehouse. As he looked in between each tube Kyle watched as several people walked by wearing what looked like laboratory clothing.
As he did so a sudden headache hit him and as soon as it did it disappeared, confused by his own senses he silently floated down to the ground yet stopped a few feet from it.
“Kyll? What is-” Karnage willed herself to follow and saw just as he did what lay inside the tubes. Inside each of the green cylinders of liquid lay a comatose human body, eyes open, mouth, ears and nose covered with a mask from which pipes connected to the box below.
“Human experimentation?...” Karnage guessed with disdain.
Kyle glanced around more before shaking his head “No…” he said before floating towards a specific tube “Extraction” he corrected as he lay his hands over the tube and stared at the person inside. Long brown-black hair spread out in the liquid behind her, her almond brown eyes wide open as she stared back in an utterly dead like state. Kyle stared at his mother’s body inside the tube, eyes wide he stood stalk still and silent.
Kyle’s hands trembled as he fought off the rage building up inside him, yet the guilt and sadness preceded that anger soon enough. “I’m sorry…” he spoke softly as his hand clenched at the tube, it went straight through as if it wasn’t even there.
Karnage hovered up to him and upon seeing the similarities between them she stood back “Is…is she still?”
“No.” said Kyle as he shook his head “I sense nothing from any of them, they’re all dead. Yet I feel the mana being processed inside them, what the fuck is this place?...” he asked in a harsh tone.
“Mana? How is that possible?! How did we even get here?” asked Karnage in surprise as she glanced around at the people walking below.
Kyle pulled his hand out of the tube briefly and glanced down at it, swallowing his pain he reentered the tube. His body going straight through both glass and liquid without feeling a thing, he lay his right hand over his mother’s pale dead face.
Immediately he flinched and backed off “Impossible…how…” and once he did he felt his back hitting the glass behind him as black runes flashed over it’s surface. Understanding went through Kyle’s mind as he turned to face the sealing glass.
“What’s going on? What was that?” asked Karnage having seen the runes.
“These bodies have been killed but the souls are being kept from entering the Spirit realm, as such they have nowhere else to go but back to their own bodies after which…” Kyle explained as he touched the glass with his left hand, black runes flashed into existence again surrounding the surface his hand touched before he backed off “They are trapped”.
Kyle grimaced “This is…” he murmured as he turned to face his mother’s cold corpse again. Spreading his senses he felt around for anything or anyone, faintly he could sense each soul within his vicinity. He felt their sadness, he felt their anger, he felt their loneliness and he felt their despair.
Kyle also felt something else, a distinct difference between each soul that differed it from the scientists below. None of the sealed souls were human. Kyle sensed multiple kinds of creatures, things he couldn’t even begin to picture less so name. Kyle sensed everything from Spirit beast to Demon, Devil to God and each was wailing out for aid.
Anger flared up within him again, hatred towards the people that built this place, rage towards the one that lead it and a mixed feeling of annoyance towards his aunt for trying to keep him in the dark.
“Kyll what do we do?” Karnage asked with a solidified expression, her mind already made up all she needed was his confirmation.
Kyle glanced at her as he willed his Frostfire to engulf his body, his fangs and claws grew out as his eyes shone a bright light blue, the white fur on his tails and ears mingled with the flames as if part of it “We’ll burn it to the ground” he responded as he raised both his hands to the glass.
Black runes flared awake as he touched the glass as suddenly his flames engulfed the entirety of the tube, the tube grew brighter blue until it shone a blinding white before exploding outwards. Lab-coat wearing men and woman rushed around to check on the disturbance as an alarm rang throughout the warehouse.
Invisible to their eyes Kyle rose from within the shattered tube as his flames turned tendrils reached out to the humans below, like outstretched hands enraged they reached out as if wanting to choke the life out of each one of them. Kyle held his fire back as he briefly glanced back at his mother, laying on the tube’s ground she was pale white and lifeless.
Kyle clenched his hands then opened them wide with claws outstretched, suddenly he reached back with his right “Dimensional Force!” Kyle exclaimed as he clawed away at the air ahead of himself. His flames engulfed his entire right arm forming a claw of itself as reality seemed to tear apart under it’s pressure.
A wide gash like a see-through crystal formed ahead of Kyle as he stared into it, a rift between reality and the realm of the dead. Kyle stepped through the rift as gasps and screams from below reached his ears, glancing down he met eyes with the surprised, the fearful and the guilty.
Because that is what each person here was to him, guilty. From the moment Kyle understood the workings of this place he had become their judge and jury, then naming them all guilty for having a hand in this sickening place. As he hovered down to the ground to stand among them he had decided, he would also become their executioner.
Kyle’s Frostfire engulfed his own body, thicker than before it covered him entirely like armour showing off the prowess of his newly gained passive [Imbue Body]. Kyle stood among the terrified humans, a raging flame of white-blue with two tails and clawed hands. He took a deep breath then spoke out loud with Spirit infused into his voice “Where is Scythe?” he asked with a menacing tone.
Yet no response came back as the eyes of the scientists turned to horror the moment he spoke, most simply froze in place but some turned tail and ran. Kyle sensed their fear, like a drug it empowered him as even without the bars that he could no longer see he felt his Spirit increase the stronger those emotions became.
He also knew his mana was empty, from the moment he had stepped through that rift Kyle had felt his mana immediately drain down to zero.
“Kyll! They don’t know him by that name!” exclaimed Karnage as she peaked her head out of the rift, causing many horrified faces to gain a level of confusion as they glanced up at her.
“Heh…right.” Mused Kyle as he turned towards the closest scientist, a blonde haired male looking within his 30s. The man was utterly frozen in place, eyes wide in fear he could barely keep his own mouth closed as it trembled. Kyle chuckled as he faced the man “You, are you too terrified to even speak?”
The man flinched and instinctively backed away causing him to back out into one of his colleagues, a short blue haired woman who upon contact shrieked and turned to run as he fell back to the ground. The man trembled as he stared up at Kyle’s bright blue eyes shining even through the thick flames “P-pl-lease d-”
“So you can speak.” said Kyle as he moved to stand over the man, he stopped briefly to calm himself to remember back, back when they had Draxxer’s soul. “Tell me then, where can I find Shaun Gerik?”
The man didn’t respond, he simply lay there in fear. Kyle sighed and dissipated his flames, crouching down in front of the man he asked again “Where is Doctor Gerik?”
“Wh-what do you…want with Gerik?” asked an elderly woman to their left, she stood there staring at Kyle just as terrified as the rest.
Kyle stood up as a spark of white-blue burst out from his right palm, it rushed to the man on the ground and engulfed him in flames. The man screamed and struggled as the fire devoured him alive, waving his arms and legs around briefly he then fell still as the fire dissipated leaving behind a charred corpse.
The woman stared down at her cooked colleague in terror and disgust before looking up at Kyle, meeting his bright blue eyes she unconsciously took a step back as the scent of burnt human flesh reached her nostrils.
“I have business with Doctor Gerik, might you know where I can find him?” Kyle asked with a less hostile tone than before, replaced by a cold and distant one.
“G-Gerik is…within District 1…” the woman replied fearfully.
Kyle raised a brow in question “Which district are we in?” when a sudden cracking sound caught his attention, glancing back he watched as the rift suddenly closed on itself leaving Karnage on the other side.
“2…We’re in 2…” replied the old woman as she also watched the rift close.
“Huh…” murmured Kyle as he dropped the mana speak, his ears twitched as he heard a disturbance nearby (“Here they come.”) he thought just as dozens of armed soldiers moved to surround his position. Their guns lay strapped over their shoulders as they stood armed with mechanical gauntlets that seemed to hum with energy.
Kyle snorted as he turned to face one squad of Androids, having no mana he had to entirely rely on his Spirit for which he required more living adversaries. Just as he took his eyes off them the scientists turned tail and ran the opposite way, rushing through the Androids they cleared out the way.
Kyle stared at the Androids as they lifelessly stared back at him, before suddenly two of them charged at him. Like an explosion Frostfire rushed out from Kyle’s body engulfing everything within ten meters, the flames ate away at anything it touched, being flesh or metal it did not care.
The two Androids disintegrated within the flames as they lingered briefly before dissipating, revealing that Kyle was long gone. Kyle had taken the chance to rush through the opening the two Androids had made through their blockade, he surged through and at full speed ran towards one end of the warehouse.
Blind as to whether the Androids were giving chase or not he also did not care, tails dragging behind him Kyle rushed through anybody that stepped in his way, surging over androids or even summoning a claw of blue flame to shred through them he in the end made it to one of the warehouse’s walls.
Kyle glanced behind him to see the nearest squad of Androids long behind him, looking back at the wall he figured it was a mixed stone reinforced with metal. (“If metal is the same as flesh then stone shouldn’t be a problem either.”) Kyle thought as he summoned more flames along with a red ooze.
“Slime Armour” The red slime formed out of his skin and moved to cover his entire body as dark red almost black shelled scales grew on it’s surface. Like a suit of armour the scales fit themselves away from his joints to allow movement, leaving only red slime to be visible between each section of scale. Kyle stepped to stand inches from the wall as he raised his right arm, the scales that covered it changed and took the form of claws as suddenly Frostfire burst out from the armour’s cracks re-engulfing his entire form.
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Just as the ooze reached his neck, as the armour fully covered his body it formed a helmet to allow sight. With the visage of a fanged beast, long curved claws and two tails the red and black armour completed itself as white-blue flames burst out from it’s cracks.
Cold hatred burned within Kyle as he lunged at the wall ahead of him, his blazing claw shredding through both stone and metal before the flames exploded outwards wrecking a hole into the wall. Kyle stepped out of the warehouse as his flames dissipated around him, his Spirit running low he made sure to use as little as he could.
Kyle glanced around at the outside of District 2 of the Mars colonies, long from looking like home 2 was nothing more than large warehouses laying side by side. He couldn’t get himself to imagine what else lay within this place, what other nightmarish experiments were being conducted under Scythe’s guidance.
Kyle grimaced as he watched several humans turn tail and run as they watched him burst out of the wall, vehicles flying over sped up the second they did so too. “None of you have the balls to look me in the eye? What you do here…what is the point of making you feel guilty?” he asked with a harsh voice and menacing tone.
A flash of light from behind him caught his eye and Kyle surged to the side as several more followed, energy weaponry was too much even for his slime armour to handle. As the flurry of light projectiles ended Kyle took a few more steps away from the hole he made.
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Author: Down to business :3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wieBE_75fAM
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“Gatling Slime” As Kyle spoke the skill’s name he raised his right hand forward and briefly waited, nothing seemed to happen except for more slime to ooze out of his armour. Suddenly multiple androids peaked their weapons out of the hole and took aim at him, without warning they immediately opened fire.
Kyle surged to the right appearing in the middle of the road but the androids only turned to retake aim, he grimaced and raised both arms forward as a greenish-brown ooze burst out of his palms. The swamp slime formed a small shield ahead of him before the androids opened fire yet again, it was too slow a slime for him to fully cover himself in time but it served enough to block a few shots as he charged towards them.
Projectiles of light blasted through and around his half shield of earthly slime, surprisingly his armour withheld some shots itself protecting him from taking deadly injuries yet the uncovered red slime parts did no such thing as he suffered multiple wounds to his waist and shoulders.
Kyle’s shield fell apart from the powerful energy weapons midway through his charge, as it dissipated around his arm he surged forward with claws wide open. Like a beast in a frenzy he shred through the androids and their weaponry, turning and spinning in ways he thought not possible for a humanoid body.
As he stood there surrounded by torn flesh and shredded metal he glanced down at his armoured claws and a thought came to mind (“This world has no system for skills or casting…Is magic entirely through sheer will and shaped by the mind?”)
But he was given no time to test that theory out as several more androids appeared down either side of the street, immediately kneeling down and taking aim with their rifles they then opened fire. Each with burstfire they peppered Kyle with projectiles, his armour only capable to withstand one or two shots on the same spot before it pierced through whilst not withholding at all around the joints.
Yet Kyle felt none of it, the projectiles that made it through his armour and body only passed through to the other side mostly stopping on contact with more armour but sometimes even shooting back out. Kyle chuckled as he noticed his mastery skill [{True Slime}] in action, meaning that skills he possessed where still available but casting was no longer an option. If he wanted to use [Gatling Slime] or [Slime Cannon] he had to re-create the weapon with his mind.
In this moment that was not an option, rather he saw a different one available. Not one to waste an opportunity or waste resources Kyle morphed his scaled armour down to red ooze allowing each shot fired to pierce through his body. As the projectiles easily made it through the slime exterior Kyle noticed that once they pierced his flesh that too turned to slime, letting the projectile go straight through before being refilled by more slime which would then turn to flesh.
(“This is why real slimes would be overpowered…”) he thought as the highly accurate androids aimed for his limbs, waist and head but not his chest. The chest where his slime core was located. Yet he wasn’t the type to take bets against luck and reformed his chest armour, thicker than before he made sure to use swamp slime behind the demonic shell so as to protect his core.
Seeing that their weapons were having no effect the androids stopped their gunfire and turned to explosives as several of them began to lob spherical devices towards Kyle who also noticed this change. As the first grenade flew through the air towards Kyle he surged not away but instead towards it, quickly grabbing hold of the spherical device with his claws he threw it back at the androids who stood there unable to comprehend this outcome.
Quickly Kyle surged out of the way as multiple other grenades landed nearby him, each one exploding along with the one he threw back. In flashes of blue light the grenades exploded sending concrete dust all over, giving Kyle a smoke screen as he turned tail towards the warehouse he came from.
But instead of rushing back inside he gripped at the stone with his claws as demonic armour gauntlets reformed around them, cracking the stone and bending the metal under his body’s strength Kyle climbed up the wall by digging his long monstrous claws into it. Using both sets of claws on his hands and feet Kyle rushed up the wall by leaping in between gripping at it.
The androids below simply stared in confusion, their programming unable to come up with an effective solution to defeating a creature that could withstand their gunfire and evade their explosives. They weren’t made to fight this sort of thing.
They watched as Kyle reached halfway up the wall then stopped, glancing back he snorted at the vehicles flying behind him. As he suddenly appeared into their vision the drivers swerved from the usual elevation of flight to get away from him, causing several to crash into each other or simply into the warehouse walls while others sped up and flipped the vehicles ahead of them to go off-course.
Waiting for the right opportunity Kyle leaped up and onto one large vehicle, a transportation truck like many of the vehicles around him. He dug his claws into the vehicle’s dark green ceiling causing the driven inside to shriek in panic and swerve the large vehicle into another lane. Kyle felt their panic, he sensed their fear and felt his Spirit rise from it.
Not having collected quiet enough he leaped off the truck as it crashed head to head into another vehicle, soaring back towards where he came Kyle surged forwards before clawing away at the warehouse’s wall again to hold on. Having found or more so made a grip he turned around to face the street.
With a maniacal grin, he willed his Frostfire to engulf him once more sending any that passed by into a horrified panic. He felt himself absorbing their fear, the more he terror he caused the stronger he felt himself get. His Spirit reached a high point yet it wasn’t quiet as incredible as it had been back at Eslet, (“Let’s fix that”) so he thought.
Kyle dissipated his flames and moved his slime armour to engulf him like a cocoon, turning entirely bright red he began to weave thin tendrils of slime out and like a spider weaving it’s web the slime suddenly expanded out into several hundred tendrils. It formed around the walls and ceiling of the first warehouse before expanding away and off into the road while falling, like little spiders flying off to another wall it reached out to the other warehouses before separating into multiple other tendrils on contact.
Kyle sensed some vehicles stopping nearby him, human guards by his guess yet he did not care and paid them little mind as they inspected his cocoon. He continued to fully focus on his web, on creating his network of slime and engulf as much of District 2 as possible. The small tendrils of slime separating and multiplying dozens over dozens of times as they covered a vast distance with Kyle at it’s centre.
Feeling the guards getting too curious as they poked and prodded the cocoon he also felt several parts of his slime web being cut off and disconnecting, he knew this was as far as he could go with this method and waited no longer. Kyle activated the slime’s special property and it’s red surface suddenly gained a blueish glow.
He pictured the illusion he would show them, crafted the monsters that would appear to be as shadowy and quick as possible to let their minds to come to their own conclusions. As the illusion took effect on any that even saw the slime out of the corner of their eyes, half of District 2 fell under a wide spread panic.
Kyle showed them shadowy creatures that ran on all fours, long blade like claws and a serpentine tail he only made the creatures run around and leap from the building to building and run in and out of doors yet that was enough to cause every human under his spell to fall to their own horrific imagination.
Their own minds formed the creatures to seem more terrifying than they actually were, their own minds made them hear snarls and hissing as the creatures only passed by. Confusion built up throughout the district before it bore fruit to fear which exploded into sheer panic.
Humans being scientist, soldier, businessmen or workers ran from the shadows that bared their fangs and swiped their bladed tails at them, they hid from the creatures that snarled and hissed around the corners of their eyes.
Kyle sensed their fear, he felt it engulf him in a rush of power that he feared would overwhelm him. So much so that he ended up filtering the income of Spirit, slowing down the rate at which he absorbed it which was a new feeling for him. As he did so he felt the Spirit he did not absorb linger around his body, similarly to environmental mana it simply stayed there like another part of the air.
Suddenly feeling that he was reaching his limits of Spirit, Kyle tried to force his income down to zero. Similarly to closing away his emotions he shut off his soul from absorbing more Spirit, only leaving what he had already absorbed to slowly leak away and back out into the atmosphere around him.
Having no more use for his network of illusionary slime he changed it, the massive web of red suddenly turning a light blue before freezing over. His own cocoon too changed, a sphere of frozen slime that oozed cold frost out into the warm air. Kyle shattered the cocoon that was around him letting himself fall, turning around he clawed away at the wall as he fell to slow himself down.
Glancing up he saw four heavily armoured vehicles that once hovered to surround him, the men that had peaked out of one’s back quickly rushed back inside as the drivers turned to follow him down. Reaching the ground before them Kyle wasted no time and rushed for the hole in the wall several meters to his right, charging at full speed he also surged from time to time and within a mere two seconds rushed back inside the warehouse.
Immediately Kyle flared up, Frostfire engulfing his body as he rushed through several squads of androids that lay in wait for him. Unable to use their guns as to not damage the warehouse’s inside the androids and their shock gauntlets stood no chance against the flaming beast that clawed away at them like bread.
Eventually, through several clashes with androids as he burned them away, clawed them to shreds or simply evaded them all together Kyle reached the centre of the warehouse. Wanting to do as much damage as possible to at least this place he did not know how far or how powerful his flames would become once all his stored Spirit was fed to it.
Hearing a mild racket behind him Kyle turned to see a massive wheeled vehicle had crashed through the stone wall he had already broken through, pitch black gleaming armour and four massive cannons the tank turned it’s turret towards him at unfair speed.
Kyle smirked “So you’ve given up on this place.” He guessed as the tank after briefly charging up white energy within each of it’s four barrels opened fire at his location. In quick succession the tank fired four blasts of bright yellow energy that whizzed towards Kyle faster than any projectile before.
Knowing full well he wouldn’t survive the first shot Kyle had already surged out of the way before the tank even fired, the four blasts spreading out on contact and engulfing the area in a thick gas-like blue flame that disintegrated any material it made contact with.
Kyle whistled at the tank’s destructive power “Not bad…” he mused as he stood over one human-containing-tube, staring straight at the tank he raised his hands to shoulder level with palms up and claws wide open “My turn”.
As he said so Kyle unleashed every drop of Spirit within him, turning it into Frostfire as it escaped his body the flames grew at insane speed spreading out through the entire warehouse within mere seconds before exploding out and into the District itself.
Like a chemical fire spreading through a dried up forest Kyle’s flames roared out in a single massive wave of white-blue that reached the furthest border of the district under a minute. Buildings disappeared within it’s all-devouring white as people fell frozen before dissipating to ashes on contact with it’s blazing blue.
Kyle felt his body grow weak as suddenly the air began to thin out, willing the fire around him to engulf his right arm he formed a claw and used what Spirit he hadn’t used to claw away at the air-afire ahead of himself. Reality tore away behind his claws as a rift opened up in the shape of a wide gash that rippled light.
Kyle stepped through the rift as his body gave away, falling to his knees he felt the effects of mana-exhaustion but on an entirely different level. He collapsed forwards and to the ground as all feeling was lost to his body, he couldn’t move a single finger less so stand back up.
“Kyll?!” exclaimed Karnage as he suddenly collapsed out of the rift, she had been watching and stuck in the Spirit realm the entire time. She rushed to a crouch by his side and turned him over, seeing his overly pale face and lightless eyes she expected the worst “Kyle!? Hey! Don’t die on me dammit!” she exclaimed in a panic while raising his head up from the ground with her right hand.
“I’m still here…put me down…” Kyle choked out a few words as his eyes turned to her. Karnage laid him back down and leaned away as suddenly a massive chunk out of the District’s ceiling crashed down on top of them, the white flames around them devoured the material within moments.
She glanced around herself, at the raging flames that were clearing out the Districts very existence. Frost had long formed into ice on the ground as the white fire continued to rage like a star all around them, at the very edge of the district blue flames tendrilled outwards entirely out of control like solar flares reaching out to other districts nearby.
(“This…is insane…”) she thought before glancing down at Kyle who lay half asleep on the ground, his eyes half open yet his exhausted breathing keeping him awake. She couldn’t believe the raw power he could summon up, a cold flame that ate away at even metal and stone. “How did you…” She couldn’t understand how this was possible, such power shouldn’t be realistic in the slightest.
Within moments a District, a massive environment meant to hold an entire country, it’s buildings and towns, it’s people and their homes… no longer existed and in it’s place burned a cold sun.
Karnage momentarily pondered (“This is what he’s capable of now…what happens if he loses control?...”) she thought while looking down at him, frail from exhaustion his eyes had now fully closed and sleep had taken over him. She now understood fully what Kyle feared, more than the monster he would morally become he feared the power of the creature he would turn into.
After an exasperated sigh she chuckled “What am I going to do with you?…” she chuckled at the insane reality she was now part of.