So he rushed towards the lizard and his hammer met its skull, shooting blood throughout the hall.

He wouldn’t let it leave this facility, far too many would die if he did.

The hit to its skull damn near blew off its head, but it had already begun to heal at an alarmingly fast rate.

Seconds later blood shot from Michael’s body. The after effects of using the hammer, but he was prepared for it.

The blood formed spears that shot towards the mask. Which immediately withdrew into the flesh of the lizard, narrowly avoiding getting struck by the spears.

But Michael wasn’t idle while this occurred, and his hammer and mace quickly struck the beast’s legs.

They broke with a sickening crack and the monster’s jaws quickly snapped towards Michael, who dodged by teleporting down the hall.

His new ability was useful, but had its own shortcomings. For one, he had to know of the place he wanted to teleport to. He didn’t have to actually see the place in person, a description or picture would do fine, but in different worlds like this it made things more difficult.

Which essentially meant that in this world he was limited to only teleporting throughout the hall that he’d walked.

It was still a potent ability though.

Michael rushed the lizard as his heart began to speak, “That lizard is actually quite dangerous. It's hatred is surprisingly dense. Slowing it down is one thing, but nothing you do will kill it.”

Michael dodged as blades sprouted from the lizard's tail and moved to pierce him.

“That’s fine, this world's foundation should have some ways to recontain it. They’ll show up eventually.”

“Whatever you say, take as much time as you want, the longer you spend wasting time, the more of this delicious emotion I get to enjoy.”

Michael scoffed, “Thanks for the concern.”

With each strike that hit the lizard its skin became more absorbent, not really breaking under any of his strikes, and the blood was beginning to have trouble piercing the monster's flesh.

It was a monster known for its ability to adapt to anything and everything, and it was one of the SCPs that the foundation really wanted dead.

He also had serious doubts his spores would have any effect on the creature. Not that he would be using them on it. Especially since its body was currently being controlled by the mask.

It didn’t seem like a great idea to mix his consciousness with that thing.

It would be eerily similar to the situation that had ended the original flesh that hates.

So far Michael’s soldiers hadn’t been doing much in this fight, mainly focusing on providing cover fire, which was quickly proving ineffective.

So he mentally gave them an order, “Y’all are on terrain duty.”

They rushed in on Michael’s position, and their bodies began to spread over the floor and walls.

The lizard hung back for the moment, probably due to the mask’s caution. That was the weakness of this beast. The lizard itself could take an incredible beating without a care, but the second the mask was separated from it, it would lose it's control over it. The mask lowered its combat potential dramatically.

The soldiers covered the long stretch of hall in needle-like flesh in mere moments, and they weren’t small by any means, easily reaching up to Michael’s knees.

He walked through the hall of needles that gave way to his passing like they were nothing but grass.

Once he stood in the middle he laughed and motioned for the lizard to approach, “The exits behind me by the way.”

The lizard hesitated before a raspy voice left its throat, “Fool, I can simply break through the walls. There's no need for me to walk into your trap.”

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“Yeah, you could, but I already kind of assumed you’d try to do something like that.”

Michael disappeared from the corridor with a flash, and appeared atop the lizard. It panicked for the briefest moment, but before the lizard could do anything, both it and Michael disappeared with another flash of light.

They reappeared deep in the mess of needles, and the beast's full body weight fell upon the needles of flesh.

Michael grinned, “Gotcha.”

The needles stretched towards the monster's body with incredible speed, and combined with the weight of the creature were able to pierce it's incredibly durable skin. The needles snaked through its insides, not moving to kill the creature, but to restrain it.

They tore its muscles and restricted its movement, but that was just a side task. Their main task was to find that porcelain mask that had hidden within its body.

It would loose most of its unpredictability once it was separated from the mask.

Black acid dripped down the lizard and onto the needles, although it wasn't able to do much damage due to the rate Michael could regenerate the flesh. The needles burrowed throughout its body, and it progressively became more and more difficult for them to move within its body.

The lizard was already adapting to the needles, but Michael wasn’t sitting idly by while this occurred.

He readied his weapons and his heart beat heavily as he focused the refined emotions the lizard had been emitting into his weapons.

They glowed slightly red, and stuck the beast's head, completely ripping it from its body with a violent explosion.

The adaptations of its insides slowed as its head began to regenerate. That was all the time Michael needed as he felt one of the needles wrap around the mask and hastily begin to extract it.

Seconds later it was ripped from within the lizard and placed in Michael’s hand.

It seemed pissed, “You ignorant little worm. You think you can just steal from me like this? I earned that body, toiled for it, and you think you can just steal it from me? I will cast y-”

Michael tossed it aside, “Ok, ok we get it.”

Glancing over, Michael could see that the lizard's head had regenerated, and its insides had become completely resistant to the needles.

It hissed towards Michael, “Flesh, don’t think I appreciate you for this. Your very existence is a mockery upon all that is right.”

“Why can’t you guys ever just insult me normally.”

The lizard ignored him, “A body tainted by so many aspects that it makes me sick to look at. You're a human, but not at the same time. You're somewhat sane, but tainted by your soul being in the body of a dead god. I don’t even know if I'm supposed to kill you, so I simply won’t. My father can decide your fate.”

“Moving past all the foreboding shit, I don’t think you could kill me right now if you tried, you’re kinda stuck if you didn’t realize.”

The lizard scoffed and began to struggle, ripping the needles from its body alongside a generous amount of its flesh.

Seconds later it was free, but missing large chunks of flesh, and its front leg had been completely torn off.

It stared at Michael for a moment before walking back to a corner of the facility and waiting for its wounds to heal. There wasn't much more for it to do, considering all the staff had likely been killed by it already or simply fled the facility.

Michael sighed, It had referred to the crown being the body of a dead god, and while the ramifications of that were concerning, it's not like he could really do anything about it. He’d simply follow his motto of not worrying about something he couldn’t change.

Moving past that, Michael lifted the mask up to eye level as black liquid dripped down it and sizzled on the floor.

“Yeah, that’s not gonna work on me.”

Michael flashed his jade ring to the mask, “I’m immune to acid.”

The mask scoffed, “Fine, what do you want? You could always just put me on, I might even make you stronger than you are now.”

“I’m not gonna wear you. I’m not completely retarded. What I wanted to propose was a deal.”

“Of what kind?”

“Well you're supposed to be a genius right?”

“I’ve been called that.”

“Well here's the proposition, I’d like to carry you around with me and you can give me your input on the worlds I visit.”

The mask's expression shifted to one of confusion, “Why would I ever do that?”

“Well in case you haven't noticed, I’m a dimension hopper. I could leave you in a void with literally nothing in it if I wanted. Or contrarily, if you help me enough I might provide you with your own body. The choice is yours.”

The mask weighed its options for several moments.

Michael could see the gears turning in its head.

“I can live with this deal.”

Michael smiled, “Great, now we’re just gonna need you to move past whatever supervillain scheme you're cooking up right now.”

“What?”

“Oh don’t bullshit me. I know you’re gonna try to fuck me over at some point, but let me be clear. You fuck me over and I’ll leave you in the worst place I come across, buried as deep as I can get you. You will fail to kill me and you will regret it, but if you work with me like a normal functioning adult for a while I’ll get you a new body eventually. Now answer me honestly, do we have a deal? You can say no. I'll just toss you aside and let the foundation deal with you.”

The mask paused longer this time, before reluctantly answering with “I'll take your deal.”.

“Great, now sit tight while I try to put the lizard back into its cage. I'm sure it'd end up killing anyone else who tried.”

The lizard simply rolled its eyes in response, "Fine, I don't wish to kill my own kin, even if it's as disfigured as you are. It won't be long until father comes here anyways."

With that is sauntered back into its cell.