Mutagen

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Mark stared at the clump of miasma in front of him that made up the body of the demon's soul. The demon, the so called Deity of Bloodshed, thought that it was his win only to see the flashes of his past in the surroundings the moment he came to. The demon totally neglected the fact that this could be a trap.

"This is impossible! How couldst a w'rld liketh this existeth inside a m'rtal!"

The demon bellowed with his shock.

"I can't understand all your words but I guess, I can tell what you're getting at. You know? Every sentient living thing had something this."

Every living thing that had a soul and intelligence had a world like this, the place where all their thoughts go to and the place where dreams originated. It was the world made up of the person's mind and soul, a world that could only be accessed when a person was dreaming.

At times, the person would still be aware while inside their own world and most people called that as vivid dreams. Most people however, could only enter a part of their consciousness in this world and that were the dreams most people easily forgot.

As for Mark however, he could enter this world due to certain conditions that he had before. First was because his imagination was very wild and vast in the first place. His overwhelming imagination could fit the criterion of being able to create a world in his mind.

Second was because his body became inhibited by more than two sentient souls at one time. Unfortunately, both those souls were gone now.

The third reason was the high compatibility of his mind and body to both PsyPathogen and Mutagen causing such mutation on his subconscious.

The last and final reason was because he was a psychic.

Even though this world existed in his subconscious and he was aware of it, there was no way for him to enter this world aside from one circumstance. It was when another soul would try to invade his body.

This was the very same world where he and Freed met face to face for the first and last time. It was the place where Freed narrated and showed his story to him. Now, he was here once more because the demon tried to possess him. This was the demon's mistake. It was because in this place, Mark was the god.

No wonder the demon seemed panicked.

While Mark stared at the demon, the demon seemed to have noticed something and calmed down.

"HAHAHAHA! Very much int'resting.  Howev'r, thou art already expend'd. Even if 't be true thee has't this w'rld, th're wast nothing thee can doth but becometh one with me."

It seemed that the demon noticed that Mark was expended already which was true. The fight they had outside expended a lot of energy from both of them. But with Mark's current state, he would not be able to deal with the demon even inside this world. To materialize things in this world, not only his imagination but he also needed mental energy.

However…

"Yeah, I'm expended. But who said that I have no way to recover myself?"

Mark smirked.

***

Day 44 – 9:48 PM – San Marcelino, General Nakar, Quezon

Karlene and Edzel were already getting used to the entity inside Miracle ordering them. They built a tent, created a campfire and cooked food under her instructions. Edzel found it hard to believe but Karlene accepted it easily. After all, she was also the same, someone with another consciousness inside her body.

More than a half day had already passed and Mark was still unconscious. His body was still painted in black color and the black smoke continued to leak from his body. Fortunately, the black smoke was just a faint miasma which was too thin to affect them heavily. Nevertheless, it was still impossible for them to touch Mark without getting their skin corroded.

While they were eating dinner rather late, a bright light shone from Mark's right wrist. Karlene and Edzel did not know what was glowing but Amihan, Aephelia and the [Blood Children] knew of it. It was the [PsyCrystal] on Mark's wrist.

As they watched the light, a [Mental Crystal] materialized above Mark. The crystal floated in place as it started to crack and turn into glittering powder that seeped into Mark's body.

***

​ "Done."

Mark smiled as he gazed at the stupefied demon.

"Then, wherefore didst thee not doth yond earli'r?"

The demon spoke.

"Are you asking why I didn't try to recover earlier?" Mark tried to interpret what the demon said by the demon's emotional fluctuation. "You still don't get it? Do you think that I don't know that I didn't manage to kill you totally when I destroyed your large head earlier? I can fully detect you hiding at that altar. But if I tried to recover myself, you won't try to possess me for sure."

"Thee deciev'd this deity!"

"Nah, its strategy you know? Also stop with the deity role play, you're a demon through and through. Thanks to that little sylph, I knew that I can't kill you with normal means. What I can only do is lure you here and destroy your soul."

Mark remembered the possessed sylph. At her last screech, it was not an attack but her final lingering will trying to show him the things he needed to know. After that however, there was no way for the sylph's remaining will to survive.

This demon had no physical body and its existence was the miasma itself. However, one thing was for sure. It had a soul as a living being. Mark could only try and drag it into the world created by Freed's existence inside his subconscious.

Thus, he feigned total weakness. He approached the altar in the thought of trapping the demon inside his body.

It was a huge gamble that could harm him but as Mark seen from both the sylph's will and the demon's past, the body of the person this demon tried to possess would not be destroyed by the miasma immediately even after it abandoned the body. That was what happened when the body of the tribesman the demon possessed was killed by the lesser gods.

"HAHAHAHA! Thee very much bethink yond 'twill beest easy? If 't be true I died, the miasma shall destroyeth thy body completely even if 't be true thou art not human."

"Nah, once you died, the miasma will try to corrode my body because it became ownerless. In that case, it just needs to have a new owner right?"

Hearing that, the demon found it both ridiculous and inconceivable. However, it could detect that Mark was not lying.

"Wherefore? Art thee not afraid of death? A demon's pow'rs is something a m'rtal shouldst beest afraid of! A deity liketh me shouldst beest the source of feareth f'r m'rtals liketh thee! Wherefore doth thee not feareth?!"

The demon bellowed with his almost incomprehensible language.

"Seriously… Can you speak clearly? In any case I get you. Something like you should be feared by mortals. Even the spirits and lower deities should fear you."

"Then, wherefore?..."

"Because there is something way scarier than you."

As Mark said that, he snapped his fingers.

The scene around them changed from the aftermath of the demon's story to a place that seemed to be a wasteland. With the sudden change in the surroundings, the misty body of the demon wavered. When it looked at the scene behind Mark, it froze.

Quite a distance behind Mark, an army of monsters marched forward. Behind them, a monster as tall as a mountain glared at him with its eyes that reached the quantity of a million. At that glare, the demon started to feel an emotion that it never felt before.

FEAR…

It felt that it was staring at death.

"So, you can even feel fear." Mark smirked. "With your prowess, you killed people, destroyed tribes and waged war with lesser gods."

Mark then pointed his thumb over his shoulder towards the gigantic monster behind him.

"This guy behind me however… It not only destroyed a whole civilization but a whole planet."

SHOOOOOOM!

As Mark finished his sentence, a beam of light was released from the eye of that monster. The demon tried to flee but with a snap of Mark's fingers, it froze in place and the beam tore through its body which immediately reduced the density of its body.

"GAAAAHHAAAAAAAA!"

The demon wailed in absolute agony. It was not a pain on his body after all but his soul. While the demon agonized in pain, Mark asked it a question.

"With this guy behind me… Why should I be afraid of a mere demon?"

SHOOOM! SHOOOM! SHOOOM!

"GRAAAAAAAAAAAA!"

Millions of thin light beams flew towards the demon from the million eyes the monster had on its enormous body. It caused the demon to ceaselessly wail in pain. Until…

"AAAaaaa…."

Its wails lessened and finally vanished. From there the demon floated before, not a speck of smoke was left and it was totally obliterated.

Mark turned to the psychic mutants and monsters behind him and sighed.

"I wanted to use robots or even use magic here but you guys will do I guess… I need to kill the guy as fast as possible after all. I don't have much time to waste anymore. Seriously, I wish, I can use this world outside but…"

BAM!

Mark did not finish his words as he fell kneeling on the ground. The scene around him immediately vanished and became pitch black. It was the original appearance of this world, a blank one.

He kneeled on the ground gritting his teeth and clutching his chest. The miasma in his body became ownerless and started to rampage. It was several times more painful than the times he recovered his Empathic ability and at the times he became an Evolver. He felt like his body was going to tear apart. Nevertheless, he could feel that rather than rejecting the miasma, his body was trying to absorb it. He could also feel that the Mutagen and Psypathogen in his body was trying their best to make his body control the miasma.

Still, with the pace it was happening, for sure, it might take several days or worse for this to end. He could not let that happen. Despite the suffering, he needed to hurry.

If he had to wake up in several days, the people he wanted to return to would be gone already. It was a failure in his part. Even though the demon was severely weakened, he should not have underestimated its abilities.

While in pain, Mark racked his brains for possible solutions. He could probably raise the amount of absorption of his body but he would suffer even more.

In that dilemma, an unexpected thing happened.

He suddenly felt the miasma being reduced which lowered the toll on his body. At the same time, he felt the existence of a certain [Physical Crystal].

He remembered this crystal. The ability inside it seemed to be turning a person into something like a chimera. He only saw the glimpse of this ability since he killed the guy as soon as possible but he saw him having characteristics and abilities of several different animals. That ability belonged to one of the lackeys of the disgusting cougar from Death Valley Settlement. It was strange why a woman like that kept a lackey with this ability.

It was quite confusing as to why this crystal would come out. Nevertheless, this was not the first time that a crystal moved on its own.

Mark's eyes turned stern, it was the last gamble this time.

The crystal floated towards his mouth and he swallowed it. The crystal immediately crumbled inside his mouth. He could not decide whether it was just his soul or his body outside really swallowed the crystal. However, he could feel the energy from it flowing inside his body.

As the major details of the ability inside the crystal were drilled into his brain, his eyes widened.

"DAMN! Why the f*ck is something like this existing in a toyboy?"

Mark could not help but swear before his consciousness drifted into nothingness.