Chapter 122 Passage

Jay walked alone down the passage to the right, silently contemplating, wondering how passionate the helvetians must have been for revenge, to even give up their own lives and become abominable monsters.

He still had his skeletons with him, but technically he was alone. It was a little darker without Anya’s brighter luminous orb.

He crossed another ring of crystals, and it turned yellow as he passed through.

The scanners only meant one thing.

“Mm, thought so. Must be another laboratory down here…”

Jay proceeded down to the gate, finding another heavy iron bar. He got the four skeletons to lift it once more.

Apparently, the living were prevented from opening it as it heated up and stopped moving whenever Jay touched it – even when he was too close it wouldn’t budge, causing him to step back further.

*Clung!~~*

The heavy bar dropped, and the skeletons pulled the door open.

Jay carefully sneaked in, but he knew that whatever was here was probably in hiding, watching him. It would not be found unless it wanted to be, and Jay’s sneaking was only to keep up appearances – perhaps it would slice him into two halves if it thought he was mocking it.

He began exploring the room for anything that he might be able to use – but he doubted there would be another pit of nearly two million skeletons, so he didn’t get his hopes up.

Maybe only one million this time.

Compared to the other room, this one was quite different. If the other one was used to grow specimens, this one was used to dissect them.

Four different sized tables were in the room, each of them for different sized creatures. Many thick chains and various hooks of different sizes were laying around the room and near the tables, ready to pin down whatever was brought to the cutting slab.

Along the tables laid all kinds of cutting instruments – saws, picks, crowbars, axes, hammers, and knives of all shapes and sizes.

Perhaps the hexamists were trying to salvage any little piece of research or insight they could.

Due to all the chains, it seemed that live dissection happened quite regularly here..

The dihexapede definitely would not have fitted on any of the stone tables, but that was probably because it had grown to an enormous size after it turned on its captors, consuming them centuries ago.

“Hmm… if there were dissections, then there are probably skeletons?” Jay began to smile mischievously, his hopes for finding skeletons were now growing.

Moving deeper into the room, he found some small chambers built into the walls with bars, like prison cells. Some of them had much thicker bars, while others had an interweaving mesh.

“I wonder what could have been in here” Jay thought, he tried to stick his finger through the mesh but the mesh holes were simply too small.

*EIIIIICH!~~*

“Finally.” Jay thought as he turned around, his eyes meeting the atrocity as a shiver went up his spine and he received a notification.

[Chimera Research 22%]

His research went up another five perfect just from laying his eyes on the monstrosity before him.

He paused as soon as he turned around when he laid his eyes on the creature, it wasn’t like he imagined it at all – it definitely wasn’t a dihexapede soul eater.

Five human heads were melded together, it was like they were all melted wax that had been hatefully squashed together.

*REIIIII~~~~~~~~~~~*

The screeching heads were expressionless as they made a high pitched squeal that seemed to never stop, causing Jay to cover his ears.

They all stared at Jay, it felt like they were looking into his heart which only sent a chill up his spine.

The five heads were coated by some sort of thick clear slime. They sat in the middle of a great winding mass of long segmented tendrils, which seemed to be most of what its body consisted of. Jay couldn’t see behind the heads so he wasn’t sure how they attached exactly.

Each of the numerous black stone tendrils had the familiar soul stone at the end.

“Fuck, just leave already!” Jay yelled as he looked at the door, sick of its unending screeching..

Thankfully, the creature didn’t take this as a challenge. Following Jay’s eyes with its own glossy pupils it found that the door was open – it was finally free.

Immediately its long black-stone tentacles began carrying it through the exit. Somehow it was much faster than the dihexapede. The cloud of tentacle-like arms suddenly disappeared – though Jay analysed it just before it slipped away.

Still, it screeched all the way up the passage as it triggered red light to flash from the sensors.

Was this a screech for joy? Did it always screech? Jay wasn’t sure.

[Mannaton Soul Eater – Level 62]

[HP 392/392]

<[Skills]>

[Congenital Linking – 2/3]

– Shares its strength with other creatures

[Amalgamation] (Soulstones)

– Consumes (Soul stones) to grow stronger

– Has become immortal

[Dire Blades]

– The mannaton strangles and whips its target with its sabre tendrils

– 76 damage per successful hit.

[Acidic Shards] (Passive)

– Each tendril is coated in numerous tiny shards filled with burning acid. pH -0.3.

– 20 damage per second per shard broken for three seconds.

[Brittle Armour]

– 40% damage reduction to slashing, stabbing damage.

– 20% more damage taken from crushing damage.

[Helvetia’s Revenge]

– Magic damage immune.

– Any wielded weapons become cursed.

<[Description]>

[A soldier of the Helvetian kingdom, turned to stone. It stands guard, waiting for its chance to exact revenge on those who would harm its kingdom.]

“Acidic shards? Must be like poison I’m guessing.” Jay had never heard of acid before – he was a butcher in a rural village after all.

“Well, let’s see what I can find in here.” he thought as he began looking around.

*DOON~ DOON~ DOON~*

The deep rolling sounds from above began to shake the pyramid once more. The giant statue guardians were activated.

“I wonder if that’s what they sound like when they step down from their pedestals.” Jay thought as he looked through more of the cages.

Finally, he found what he was looking for – another specimen.

“Awesome, maybe I can get its bones this time.”

[Chimera Research 23%]

He smiled as he looked into the cage and got the notification. It had long since died, but it still had value to Jay.

Jay held out his hand, trying the new function of his ring once more.

“Now… what was that function called again?” Jay hadn’t used it enough to remember so he checked the stats of his new gauntlet again.

“Oh right, ampu- …wait, living blueprints? How did I miss that?” Jay shook his head.

Somehow he completely missed out on reading this new function when he analysed his gauntlet.

He checked the skill and wondered what exactly it meant, of course, he had to try it.

Jay pointed his hand at Sweeper.

Sweeper looked at Jay, tilting its blue wolf skull cautiously as if it were curious about what its master was doing.

“Living blueprints?”

“…”

Nothing happened.

“Hm… amputation?”

Sweepers skeleton body suddenly all broke apart and floated in mid air.

“Oh shit, sweeper fucking exploded” Jay chuckled.

The bones then gathered, forming a cocoon shape with the wolf skull on the front. It was like a bow on top of a present.

Sweeper was now like some self-assembled furniture, a flat pack wardrobe. For some reason it brought Jay a little sadistic happiness seeing his most obnoxious skeleton being folded up like origami.

Green necrotic mana then left Jay’s gauntlet hand and wrapped around all the bones, covering them completely.

Next, the cloud of green then began to seep into Jay’s hand and disappear.

“Awesome… now, to get Sweeper out again.”

Jay held up his hand, hoping it would be just as simple.

“Amputation…”

Nothing happened again. Of course it wouldn’t be simple.

Jay then willed for Sweeper to come back, imagining the skeleton in his head; closing his eyes, he held out his hand once more.

“Amputation” he said, keeping the image of the blue wolf skull clear in his mind.

This time, it worked.

A slither of gas poured out from Jay’s gauntlet, forming a cloud again – the necrotic mana then went back into the gauntlet, leaving the package of bones behind floating in mid-air.

Before Jay’s eyes, Sweeper was reassembled, and in a moment, Sweeper stood before him once more.

Sweeper looked at its skeletal hands, it was like it was wondering what just happened to it.

Jay watched for a moment before looking at his gauntlet.

“I wonder if it’s still conscious while it’s in there” Jay raised a brow, stroking his hand over the pale-grey necrotic gauntlet.

Finally, Sweeper bent down, grabbed its hammer and went back to normal.

“Weird… anyway.” Jay turned to the cage, ready to try this new function once more.

Poor Sweeper.