GTAG Chapter 62: Novelty
In truth, the Blade was only lightly injured.
Although the nuclear blast had scorched all its skin, the damage was only surface-level. Its muscles and internal organs were untouched.
The worst injuries were to its eyes.
When the nuke detonated, it failed to shield them and two were temporarily blinded.
Its stumbling movements were caused not by serious wounds, but by the pain of its burned skin.
Yet this pitiful appearance misled some into believing the Blade was on the verge of death.
As the monster absorbed the rich radiation around it to regenerate its hide, the annoying attacks began again.
The heat of the nuclear core had forced the Blade to move away from ground zero, toward the city's edge.
Here, it could still feed on radiation while avoiding the worst of the blast zone.
But this gave human forces a chance to approach.
Had the Blade remained at the epicenter, they would never have dared.
Even when the fire faded, the radiation would linger for decades.
But at the outer edges, with protective gear, soldiers could approach briefly.
When they saw the Blade again, they were stunned.
Every wound had healed.
Worse, the beast seemed even larger than before.
A fully healed monster was nothing like an injured one.
They feared that even if they exhausted every weapon in their arsenal, they could never pierce its hide.
Still, they could not simply retreat in disgrace.
So they stopped thirty kilometers away and launched missiles to probe whether its armor had truly regenerated before deciding their next step.
What to do if its skin had indeed recovered was a problem left to their superiors.
Resting with eyes closed, the Blade was suddenly blasted in the face by a volley of missiles.
Explosions thundered, and the monster opened its three pairs of eyes in confusion.
The two blinded eyes had already healed. Now all six glared at the smoking battlefield, stunned by the sudden bombardment.
It was like being woken from a nap with firecrackers thrown on top of you.
And unlike firecrackers, the Blade had just survived a nuclear strike. Its scorched skin still stung, leaving it simmering with rage.
Then it spotted the human army encampment thirty kilometers away.
With a furious roar, it charged.
The troops quickly realized the monster was coming straight for them.
Even fools could see their position was exposed.
To stand their ground and wait for it to enter their traps would have been the height of stupidity.
The only sane choice was retreat.
No trap could kill the monster—unless a nuclear bomb was buried beneath its feet.
But they were too close to use one safely.
Besides, smaller nukes had already proven ineffective, while larger ones would consume them all in the blast.
And they could not even trust their leaders not to sacrifice them just to slay the beast.
So they fled desperately, launching missile after missile in a vain attempt to slow it down.
But nothing hindered the monster.
Through a storm of fire, the Blade pursued and overtook them.
Then the massacre began.
The army, armed with the most advanced weapons, was slaughtered without resistance. Not a single soldier survived.
When the last human fell, the Blade reared its head and roared to the heavens, venting its fury.
But when the killing ended, it felt a flicker of confusion.
Its mission here was to gather viral samples.
Yet every zombie carrier had been vaporized by the nuclear blast.
Where was it supposed to find any now?
At that moment, all six of its eyes flared with eerie light.
When the glow faded, the Blade moved again.
It had received a new order from the Overlord: seek the Sun Ladder Flower.
Godzilla had no idea what the Sun Ladder Flower looked like, where it might grow, or even if it truly existed.
But even the faintest chance of its existence was enough to justify the search.
Of course, Godzilla would not scour the world himself.
Still, sending only the Blade to search would be too slow.
So he commanded the Monster Factory to produce a new batch of modified Sentinels.
These Sentinels possessed a unique reproductive trait.
Upon reaching a certain size, each one would split into two.
They already had impressive combat power, and with this rapid self-replication and growth rate, their numbers would swell frighteningly fast.
With their aid, news of the Sun Ladder Flower would surely come.
But what kind of world would remain once the Blade and the Sentinels were unleashed?
That was no concern of Godzilla's.
Back in his own world, Godzilla split his awareness between realities.
Controlling two perspectives at once was a strange experience.
He had never seen through two sets of eyes simultaneously.
More curious still, time flowed differently in each world.
In one, hours rushed by. In another, moments crawled.
The differences grew sharper when compared side by side.
And despite his interference, the time streams refused to align.
It was, without doubt, a novel sensation.
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