One of his large horns had shattered in the impact, and his mask was cracked, revealing the blood-streaked face beneath, making him look even more menacing.
The human was walking towards him again, this time with a slow, deliberate pace, as if mocking him.
Zard didn't understand the meaning behind this gesture. All he knew was that his opponent was giving him an opportunity.
A cornered beast will fight its hardest. And he was a demon.
To complete his masterpiece, Zard no longer had time to gather more materials.
But there was one last, unused ingredient left in this room.
A living demon.
Knowing he had no chance of survival, Zard chose to offer himself as the final component.
"Fusion Magic!"
A dark magic circle flared to life beneath his severed torso. Black energy erupted from it, first enveloping his own flesh, then spreading out to gather the remains of all the other creatures in the room. It dragged them into the circle, merging them with Zard's body.
Throughout this entire process, I simply stood and watched, my golden eyes a whirlwind of data streams.
It didn't take long. The mass of black energy finished its work, molding and shaping the horrific amalgamation.
What emerged was not a monster. It was a perfect, whole body, identical to Zard's original form.
It opened its hollow, black eyes and looked down at me.
Takson rolled out of the way of the giant monster's dive-bomb attack.
The shockwave still sent him flying, and he landed face-first in the dirt. He scrambled to his feet, spitting out a mouthful of soil.
The good news was that the monster, in its reckless charge, had buried itself headfirst in the ground and was struggling to get free. This made Takson's job much easier.
...
He watched as the giant creature, now riddled with his light spears, finally dissolved into ash. He wiped the sweat from his brow and leaned against a nearby tree to catch his breath.
"That was a weird one," he muttered. "Stronger than most of the beasts I've fought, but not as smart. Definitely not as tough as that 'Zera' demon."
He was used to fighting large monsters by now. His training in the virtual arena had given him plenty of experience. He'd had a plan to take this one down, but he hadn't expected it to be dumb enough to incapacitate itself. It had saved him a lot of time and effort.
Still, something about it felt… off.
"It was like it was a stranger in its own body," he mused, "like it didn't know how to control itself."
He shook his head. It didn't matter. The threat was gone. He brushed the dirt from his clothes.
"Teacher," he called out to the empty air, "is the test over?"
It was their usual routine.
"Notice: Test complete. You pass," a voice, identical to mine but even colder, replied. A figure with violet-blue hair emerged from the trees behind him.
"Oh, it's one of your clones, Teacher."
Takson felt a pang of disappointment. He could tell the difference between his real teacher and her clones. It was a matter of... feeling. His teacher's voice, as cold as it was, always had some faint, unreadable undertone. The clones were just machines, their words and actions perfectly, unnervingly robotic.
He'd asked her about it once. Her only explanation had been, "They lack self-awareness and possess only basic intelligence." He hadn't understood what "intelligence" meant, so he'd settled on thinking of the clones as puppets, controlled directly by his teacher. In a way, he wasn't wrong.
"Clone-sister," he asked, "where is Teacher now?"
"Answer: The Command Unit is currently located 1934.5 meters to the southwest, at a depth of 276.8 meters."
"Ugh..." Takson sighed. "Can you... say that in a way I can understand?"
He knew "Command Unit" was what the clones called his teacher. But he always had to ask twice to get a straight answer.
The clone blinked once. "Correction: The Command Unit is located beneath the first mountain cave to the southwest."
"Oh, okay. Th…"
"Addendum: Please move ten steps backward to avoid the high-energy discharge."
"Huh?"
The ground began to tremble violently, as if something was about to erupt from beneath him. Before Takson could react, the clone grabbed him by the collar and threw him backward.
BOOM!
The moment he landed, a pillar of blinding white light shot out of the ground where he had been standing, piercing the sky.
"An attack?" Takson instinctively dropped into a combat stance.
"Negative. That is the Command Unit's attack. Its designation is 'Metatron Artelif.'"
"Wait, that was Teacher?!"
"Affirmative."
"Whoa... Teacher is so cool." If this were a cartoon, his eyes would be sparkling with stars. Knowing the attack was hers, all his tension vanished, replaced by pure, unadulterated awe. He rarely got to see her fight.
A violet-blue figure shot out of the newly-formed chasm, a swarm of smaller objects trailing behind it. As the figure streaked past, Takson could just barely make out a black, shapeless mass clutched in its hand.
So fast! he thought, shielding his eyes from the subsequent blast of wind. I can't even follow her movements! He watched the golden trail she left across the sky. What was that thing she was holding?
I looped around in a wide arc and landed in front of my student.
"Welcome back, Teacher," he said, beaming.
I summoned a small ball of fire and incinerated the lump of flesh in my hand, erasing the demon Zard from existence. I had given him a chance, and he had taken it, fusing himself with every creature in his laboratory. The result had been a powerful, regenerating monstrosity.
But in the end, he was just a mage, not a warrior. Trapped in a confined space, against a superior close-range combatant, he had never stood a chance. He had become a glorified punching bag.
….
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