Became an Evolving Space Monster - Chapter 285
Only Noblemtl
Episode 285 – Fable (2)
There was something like that in a classic movie I saw a long time ago.
It was a thriller genre film with the premise that there are clones inside the Earth who look exactly like humans on Earth.
The encounter between humans on the surface and clones underground did not end well. It was like the legend of the doppelganger, where if you meet a human who looks exactly like you, you die.
That’s the situation I’m in right now.
A man screaming at me. He was ‘me’ when I was human.
‘… I guess we should start by talking.’
I tried to calm him down by imitating the human voice, a trait of my mimetic organs.
But the sound coming out of my mouth was completely different from what I expected.
“Grrrrr?”
‘what?’
A beastly growl burst out from my snout, where sharp fangs were protruding. Perhaps judging it as a threat, ‘I’ held my breath.
‘The trait isn’t activated?’
Is it because it’s an illusion? Or is it because the body is being transformed inside the cocoon? The mimetic organs are not activated at all.
Besides, my body is now only about the size of a human. It is also because my body has become smaller that I can easily fit into a small studio apartment.
Perhaps taking advantage of my embarrassment, another ‘me’ kicked my head with its foot.
“Huh?! ”
‘Ugh?!’
If it had been my original body, I wouldn’t have moved at all, but not now. An intense pain dominated my head, as if I had been hit by the main gun of multiple battleships.
I was struggling in unexpected pain and fell down on the desk where the computer was. While I was falling, ‘I’ quickly ran out of the studio.
‘What is this?’
I rubbed my head with my winged arm to ease the pain.
‘Isn’t this a fantasy?’
The head that had been hit by the kick continued to throb as if to prove that this was reality. I had never felt such pain as I did now when I had illusions in Kochi.
The pain subsided as I stroked my head, but on the contrary, my anger grew stronger. I felt a strong desire to destroy the computer in front of me and chase after my escaped prey.
“Grrrrrrr”
‘… No, let’s calm down.’
I forced myself to calm my quickly burning anger.
Come to think of it, there were elements in my previous fantasies that stimulated my senses, like the strong chemical smells I smelled in hospitals and unidentifiable facilities.
If I could smell, I could feel pain. I just didn’t know it was coming at me back then.
The problem is that the first person to harm me in my fantasy was me.
‘I have to catch it.’
There is no reason why the human form of ‘me’ would appear without a reason. I need him to know why this illusion appeared. Even though it is difficult to communicate, I need to catch him and ask him somehow.
I followed the ‘me’ who ran away out of the studio.
Gray hallways and tightly closed doors greeted me.
I grabbed the doorknob of the room across the way just in case, but the door wouldn’t open. It didn’t feel like the door was simply locked. It felt like a doorknob had been hung on the wall.
‘I went up the stairs.’
Unless he had entered another house, there was only one place for him to go. The hallway rang with each touch of his six long arms against the hard floor.
As expected, the door leading to the stairs was slightly open. Inside, a staircase illuminated by the light of a lamp was visible.
‘Did you go there?’
If the sensor turns it on, then ‘I’ must have gone down there.
The moment I was about to go down the stairs, a thought suddenly occurred to me.
If that being is really ‘me’, how will I react when I encounter the unavoidable monster?
Should I just be scared and run away like I am now?
or not….
‘back!’
“asleep!”
The elevator door on the other side of the stairs opens. I don’t look back and just quickly lower my head. A broken broomstick flies in and pierces the back of my skull.
‘shit!’
“shit!”
I pulled my head back and hid it, while swinging my tail at the enemy. The pincers at the end of my tail flew away, sweeping the dust on the ground. However, ‘I’ was already flying by the time my attack failed.
The pincers on the tail intersected with the one floating in the air. The soles of the shoes of the one were scraping against the pincers, making a sharp sound. The one who had jumped up to avoid the low-flying attack went down the stairs on the other side.
While the bastard was out of sight, I grabbed the sack that had penetrated the back of his skull and pulled it out.
The hardest parts of my body are the skull, chest, and tail pincers, three in total. These parts, which could withstand a battleship’s main gun, were barely punctured by such a crude spear.
“Grrrrrrrrr”
My fierce anger boiled over to the limit of what I could bear. Without realizing it, I bit down on the broken straw and chewed it before spitting it out.
The anger that had been disturbing my mind since a while ago was now difficult to control. I wanted to catch another ‘me’ right away and eat its head.
‘…Calm down, calm down. Calm down.’
I tried to calm my anger and replayed what had just happened.
‘That action read my reaction.’
Now I am convinced. ‘I’ am not just the same as me in appearance. My thoughts are also the same as mine.
‘I’ predicted that I would check the stairs, and hid in the elevator behind me and made a surprise attack. If I were human, and had met Aimov in reality, I would have acted like I did now.
Since I am a monster-obsessed ‘me’, I know very well what kind of being Aimov is. Aimov is a cannibalistic monster that is impossible to talk to or compromise with. It is impossible not to know that it is not easy to escape when being targeted by such a being.
If that’s the case, there’s only one way left: to fight back.
‘I was aiming for the head.’
Aimorph dies when his heart or brain is destroyed. If I hadn’t noticed the attack and lowered my head, the sledgehammer would have pierced my brain.
‘Grrrr, next time I see you, I’ll have to subdue you first.’
Just as he read my mind, I can read his thoughts too. He’s probably waiting for me somewhere down those stairs, armed.
‘I guess he brought a fire axe, ugh.’
Down in the hallway, there are fire axes and fire extinguishers. My skull is so weak that it can be pierced by a sledgehammer. The fire axe simply can’t handle it.
Although I am far superior in size, it is hard to say that it is an advantage in this case, since it means that the attack surface area is wider.
The armed man is most likely hiding behind a door leading to the hallway, not the stairs. There are sensors on the stairs, so it’s not a good place to hide. The space is also narrow, so it’s ineffective for fighting large enemies like me.
I looked up the stairs the guy had run down, then turned my gaze to the elevator he had jumped out of.
I stretched out my winged arm and pressed the elevator button. The door opened with a ding. Inside the brightly lit elevator, there was a broken mop part of a broom lying there.
A good idea occurred to me.
I got on the elevator, hooked my tail on the door, and pushed the stainless steel ceiling away with my wing arms. The stainless steel separated with a loud thud.
I crawled up the elevator shaft through the ceiling, not forgetting to press the down button with my tail tip.
‘The place where he’s waiting, grrrr, probably the hallway and stairs, grrrr, behind the door.’
The elevator beneath my feet descended with a creaking sound. I moved the separated stainless steel back to its original place.
‘There’s a sensor on the stairs that detects movement, so it’ll probably react based on that.’
And on the other side of the stairs, there’s an elevator right in front of me. If I were to use the elevator, I could see it right away. No matter which way I go down, he’ll be ready to chop my head off with an axe.
‘But I don’t know about this.’
“Grrrrr”
I wiped away the drool that was flowing out with my hand. A strange elation that I couldn’t tell if it was hunger or anticipation of the battle was taking over my body.
The elevator stops with a loud thud. The moment the doors open, there is a thud from below.
He must have swung the fire axe at the exact moment the door opened.
“what?”
The bastard’s actions were a waste of time. I slammed my tail against the stainless steel with all my might. The strong pincers pierced the center of the thin elevator ceiling.
“!”
The panicked man steps back. I grab the fire extinguisher he left on the floor with my tail.
The bright red blade of the axe he was holding sliced through the outer surface of my tail.
“… Tch!”
The guy ran down the hallway. I crawled down from the ceiling and grabbed the fire extinguisher with my small arms near my chest.
And instead of doing what he was trying to do, he just sprayed a ton of extinguishing agent down the hallway.
“Cough?! This is it, cough!”
The hallway was filled with powdered extinguishing agent like a fog. The guy coughed wildly, as if he couldn’t help it.
I took advantage of the gap in the guy’s life to run down the hallway.
“go away!”
The axe made a loud noise as it cut through the digestive powder. Its target was slightly above my head. If I had been upside down on the ceiling, the axe blade would have pierced my head. That actually happened to me a lot when I played as Eimorph.
But I was moving so low that my lower jaw was touching the floor. The axe he swung hit the back of my head.
It’s impossible to pull it out easily because it’s so deeply embedded. The thing flinches for a moment. It’s wondering whether to pull it out with force or retreat.
The important thing is that the thing itself is a mistake for him to be worrying. I swung my wing arm and struck the thing.
“evil!”
The bastard screams briefly and is slammed into the wall.
The moment I smelled his blood, only one thought filled my head.
I want to kill him. I want to drink the blood flowing from his body. I want to shove my snout into his stomach and chew his intestines. I want to swallow every last one of his toes.
You have to eat ‘me’ to get the genetic essence.
“Hey, save me! Someone help me! Please!”
The bastard was crawling on the floor, bleeding. I dug my fingernails into his thigh.
“Ahhhhhhh!”
‘Me’ screaming pitifully. That sweet singing voice whets my appetite.
‘Grrrrrrr’
I held him tightly with my winged arms and opened my mouth.
I see his face, wet with tears, snot, and blood. Soon his head will be chopped into small pieces and become the nourishment for my body.
“■Hey■! No■!”
“■■■ ■■!”
Just as I was about to bite the bastard’s head off with my teeth.
Unknown messages and indecipherable waves took hold of my body.
‘What was that just now?’
The message and the waves disappeared in an instant, but the shock continued to echo in my head.
‘what?’
I put down the enemy, or rather, another ‘me’.
‘Why did I do that?’
Now it dawns on me. My plan was to hold him back to talk about what this vision meant. It wasn’t to eat ‘me’.
“Hee, heeeek! Monster! Die! Die!”
He tries to pull out the axe embedded in my skull. I push his hand away and pull out the fire axe instead, throwing it far away.
‘This shouldn’t be happening. We need to talk.’
I caught the ‘me’ who was fluttering with my winged arms, and wiped his blood with my small arm near my chest. Then I wrote on the floor.
“What, what is it?”
‘Conversation’. My eyes shook as I saw the two letters. But soon after, I started making a squeaking noise.
“Dude, shit! Lies! What the hell is Aimov talking about! There’s a monster here! Please, someone, help me!”
I felt annoyed again inside me, but I suppressed my feelings. I was also careful with my wing arms, for fear that I might accidentally use more force and cause him pain.
I continued to write persistently, to convey my intention that I had no intention of harming ‘me’.
A few minutes passed after that. ‘I’ had become quiet.
‘Is it real now?’
I asked him a question while bowing my head.
Who are you?
“Who am I?”
When I saw that, I raised my head.
“You idiot. You know that best, don’t you?”
‘what?’
His blood-covered face was expressionless.
Soon, he raised the corners of his mouth as if he was reproducing a programmed emotion and grinned.
“You seem to be carrying all the world’s misfortunes. There are so many people suffering in the world. You’re just trash. What do you need a family for just a burn? You abandoned your parents who devoted themselves to you.”
When I heard that, the strength in my wings and arms disappeared without me knowing.
Now free, he stood there like a wooden puppet hanging from a string.
“You like monsters? There’s only one reason you like monsters. Because kids tease you and say you’re monsters. It’s like, ‘You teased me by saying I’m a monster, so I’ll become a real monster.’”
“Grrrrrrr”
“Your tastes, no, it’s embarrassing to even call them tastes, are nothing more than a miserable act of masturbation.”
He picked up an axe that had fallen in the hallway and hurled accusations at me.
“The reason you got addicted to games. That’s the same. You just escaped into the game world because you couldn’t overcome reality. Even now, you’re killing people in that world with the same emotions as in the game. That’s why you can’t kill your ‘real self’. You’re afraid that it’ll turn into real murder.”
He raises both hands holding the axe. The axe’s blade glows coolly in the light of the lamp.
“You’re such a retard, but I’m also ‘you.’ I’ll help you. So that you can live in reality.”
“… … .”
“Then go away, you coward.”
As he finished speaking, blood splattered across the hallway. My body flinched in excruciating pain.
The axe blade stuck in the ‘wing arm’ was quite painful.
“you…?”
[Zzuzuzu zuzuzu zuzuzu zuzuzu zuzuzu zuzuzu (You’re not completely wrong. Except for two things.)]
My monster’s tentacles quiver to convey my message. He’s human anyway, so he probably can’t understand my wavelength, but that doesn’t matter.
I grabbed his wrist with my other arm.
[Zuzu zuzuzuzuzuzuzu zuzu zuzuzu zuzuzu zuzuzu zuzuzu zuzuzu zuzuzu (I cherish all the experiences I had in the ‘other world’. It’s not like I’m running away)]
It might have been like that at first.
Because of the life-threatening situation, he made excuses to achieve his goal of returning to reality, but somewhere in his heart, he was using the ‘world of space survival’ as an escape.
But not anymore. If you ask me now whether ‘the other world’ is still a place of refuge, I can firmly deny it.
When I reach Ascension, I might have to part ways with the kids. Or I might lose them before I get there. Or I might fight another ranker and get defeated, or I might die fighting a strong opponent before I reach the conditions.
However, I do not think that what I experienced with them was worthless. No matter how my journey ends, I want to help them live a happy life.
So until then, absolutely, no matter what happens, you cannot die.
‘and….’
The reason I don’t kill myself here is not simply because I’m afraid of murder.
[Zuzu zuzuzuzuzu zuzuzuzu zuzuzuzu (Because I judged you necessary)]
“You little shit! Let go!”
[Zuzu zuzuzu zuzuzu (You won’t kill)]
‘I’ will not die until it is determined what this illusion wants from me. I will simply remain subdued by Aimov.
He was caught by me and ran wild with a devil-like face, but he had no choice but to escape from Aimov’s arms.
“You idiot! I don’t have time for this! Kill me! Or let me kill you…?!”
He froze as if he had been paralyzed after spitting out an unintelligible word. Then, his body began to convulse violently. As he began to tremble, the colors of the surrounding hallway became blurred.
‘Space is disappearing?’
Outside, in reality, my evolution seems to have been completed.
The body of ‘me’ that was being held in my hand became blurry, just like the hallway. He, who had been wearing a sinister expression until just now, had a blank expression on his face.
“Oh ■ ■life, ■water ■body∬⫱⪿… .”
He disappeared, leaving behind an unknown message.
As soon as ‘I’ disappeared, my senses were also plunged into darkness.
When I woke up from a brief sleep, I was immersed in sticky mucus.
I stretched out my arm and tore open the cocoon, revealing a familiar pink body.
“Hello, big baby!”
Number 26, who waited by my side until I finished growing up.
My new family welcomed me.