Chapter 103: Aether Energy
[Awakened do not get infected until their health goes to zero. Even if they get infected, as long as you have an antidote, you can bring them back to normal but they'll only have 1 hp.]
'That's basically the same as having an extra life…. cool.' Amon mused as he watched the zombies bite him continuously.
Unfortunately for them, his defence stat was so high that they couldn't even go through his skin.
'Why aren't they fucking dying though?'
[Zombies do not have a health pool. Their brains have been hijacked by nanobots so you'll have to cut off the connection.]
'Nano bots.'
With the new information in mind, Amon grabbed one of the zombie's heads and ripped it off it's body along with the spine. Blood spurted everywhere, soaking both Amon and the zombies.
Amon punched two of them right in their faces as he stomped on their foot, crushing their skulls in the process.
As for the last one, it suffered a similar fate.
Once he was done with them, he turned around and noticed the zombie that Jordan had killed wasn't there anymore.
'Hmm… system? You got any idea on what's going on?'
[The dungeon is a Boss Type World Dungeon.]
'Yeah… I know that already.' Amon thought and frowned as he looked around. A few moments later, he walked into an alleyway and peered out, his gaze locking onto the zombies he had just killed.
For a minute or so, nothing happened but then, it began.
The heads that Amon had crushed or separated from their bodies, began to turn into a red mushy paste. This red paste wiggled over to the bodies and dissolved them.
Or atleast, that's what it looked like at first.
As Amon concentrated, he could see it clearly. Thanks to his dexterity going over a hundred, he could see that it wasn't so simple as dissolving the bodies.
It looked more like the red blobs were consuming the bodies instead.
Once the 'eating' was done, they moved to the shop where Keith and the other two were.
'Going to the place where my past self is and ignoring the other buildings… this can't be a coincidence.' he thought, frowning slightly as he began to walk towards the store.
'My damage reflection doesn't really work on them and since it doesn't, my life steal won't be as effective either. I'll have to end this before it gets messy.'
He barged into the store and saw the trio.
"O… kay…" he muttered as he stared at the abomination in front of him.
Deku and Sofia weren't there anymore but Keith was. The only problem? Everything other than his face had completely mutated.
His arms had turned into super long curved blades, his legs became extremely skinny and he only had two toes. In between those two toes, was a circular ball.
'Reminds of of my childhood…' Amon thought as he stared at the monster, 'Maybe a black tail would have looked even better.'
As he thought that, he dashed forward, 'In position. Get ready for a fight.'
Jordan waited for a chance while Nyx used camouflage to hide herself well.
'Hmmm my skills are basically useless in this dungeon…' Amon thought as he rushed forward, activating Aura to buff up his health and defence.
Mutated Keith raised his blades and slashed at Amon who directly tanked it like he always did. Bad habits were hard to get rid of.
-21!
+21!
Tanking the hit ended up showing something Amon thought he would never see in this dungeon.
His life steal skill activating without him having to attack.
'Hey system, what's going on?' he asked and immediately got a reply.
[The zombies themselves are not awakened and they're considered dead.They do not have Health bars like the awakened do, so your damage reflection does not trigger against them.]
[But it is a different matter if the nano bots fuse into a single person and mutate their bodies. In simpler words, it's like a forced awakening and since they're awakened, they'll have health pools. Even if they're considered dead, your skills will work on them.]
'Oh, cool.' Amon mused as he looked up at Keith and grinned, taking multiple more hits before he watched the mutated monster fall.
He stood there and stared at it's body which soon warped into a blob of red goo but he knew that it wasn't some weird slime.
'Nano bots… will these be useful? This technology is something we don't really have our hands on…' he thought as he watched the blob wiggle out of the shop and move to a bakery that was right beside it.
"Jordan, follow it and fight whatever's inside. I'll leave it to you since they're not as strong as I thought they were." he said as he walked out of the shop and kicked the bakery's door open.
Inside, he saw six people who looked alright but then, his gaze landed on the red blob that had split into six equal parts.
'Let's see… there's a few more tests I wanna run.' he thought as he turned to look at Jordan, who nodded and rushed over to the one who had just mutated into a weird looking zombie.
He his tongue thickened and got much larger than any human could ever have while his jaw just fell off.
Jordan reached him right on time before slashing him randomly all across the body.
Amon silently observed as Nyx chopped of one guy's neck with a dagger and used her camouflage skill to evade the rest.
'Jordan's getting better. He'll have to keep fighting like this until it feels like second nature to him.' he thought as he watched the two of them quickly take care of the people inside.
'System, can you tell me more about these nano bots? How do they move around without an energy source? And how do they find their targets?'
[Based on the data collected so far, they run on Aether. It's one of the highest forms of energy created by intelligent beings. Even the most impure units of Aether can be equivalent to 100 mana units.]
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