Chapter 286
“It seems it doesn’t suit your taste.”
[No matter what you served, it wouldn’t have suited my taste anyway. I cannot taste anything.]
Rodrick Smith said so as he tightened his steel grip, crumpling the titanium container like a sheet of paper and throwing it away.
It doesn’t seem like a lie. Is it a side effect of full-body modification?
Then again, there’s a reason his nickname is “Chrome Monster”.
He plastered his body flawlessly with unauthorized, high-output cyberware, using his own body as a laboratory, so there’s no way his nervous system would remain intact.
One should consider it fortunate that he only lost his sense of taste instead of experiencing the Cyberpsycho phenomenon like in some other world’s setting.
However, that was Rodrick Smith’s circumstance, and at that moment, only one thought crossed my mind.
'Then why did you order it if you can’t even taste it, you son of a bitch.'
As expected of the leader of a terrorist group, he is incredibly wicked. It pisses me off, but I can’t exactly get angry, so I smiled and said.
“That’s a shame. It should be delicious.”
Honestly, I don’t know if it actually tastes good.
But neutron Star was quite a popular cocktail, perhaps because there are many who want to take on a real man-like challenge despite its fatal notoriety or Thrilling Experience-seeking addicts who enjoy the life-and-death stakes of a single cocktail.
The Chrome Monster seems to have a hobby of undergoing thrilling modification procedures, so wouldn’t he also like a thrilling cocktail?
Rodrick Smith chuckled at my words and leaned toward the bar. As he placed his elbow on the solid wood table, the wood gouged and splintered with a sickening crunch
[Come to think of it, you’re that guy, the Bug/Worm who ran away right before my eyes twice.]
“…”
[If you survived twice, you should have been grateful for your luck and thought about buying a voting right lottery. Yet you appear before my eyes again?]
Damn. It seems even over 10L of heavy water wasn’t enough to quell the anger boiling inside the Monster.
The Monster’s patience had finally reached its limit.
The moment I took one step back, Rodrick Smith bared his iron teeth and shouted.
[If dying is your wish, I will grant it!]
The Chrome Monster’s Iron Fist slammed down on the bar table.
Crashing/Splitting Sound――!
In a world that turned into slow motion, the massive table, nearly 10cm thick, split and cracked apart easily as if it were a breaking block.
A Shockwave erupted purely from his monstrous physical strength, scattering wood fragments!
Even in my slowed vision, the Chrome Monster was blindingly fast. He kicked the broken bar table as it collapsed to both sides. If I were pushed back just like that, my spine might be severed.
In the Territory of instinct, I lowered my body slightly to take a running start and immediately leaped up.
Just as I thought my body had reached its peak, I threw my head back and pulled my knees up To strike.
As I did a backward somersault and fell, my vision briefly caught the table passing beneath my floating body, followed by a pitch-black king-size armchair flying right at me.
“…!”
Gritting my teeth, I reached out over the flying table, smacked it upward with my palm to push my body up again, and twisted with all my might in midair.
―――――Bang!
The armchair, shot like a missile, narrowly grazed my side and smashed into the wall.
Only after spinning several times in the air did I barely manage a landing, grabbing my wrist that ached as if it were broken.
I would never have been able to dodge it before, but the drug I received from Team Leader Hank really did its job.
My physical condition is better than ever. I can even clearly feel the operation of my subdermal systems
Right now, I have a clear certainty that I can fully control and move my body exactly as I want.
The problem was that the opponent was the Chrome Monster Rodrick Smith, an entity I couldn’t dare to face even though someone like me had the best physical condition.
The attack I had dodged with all my might just a moment ago was merely a basic strike, or at most a warm-up, for the Chrome Monster.
[They say even a rolling bug has a talent, and it’s true. You seem confident in your agility? Let’s see you dodge this too.]
Along with Rodrick Smith’s mocking laugh, the frame behind him opened with a hiss, and small embedded launch ports popped out over his shoulders with a rapid tapping sound.
A red sensor sweeps over my body, a moment of crisis that thrillingly heats up my spinal cord.
I realized it instinctively.
I can’t dodge this.
'Microchip, it’s okay, right?'
[Due to the drug’s effects of enhanced metabolism, neural reorganization, angiogenesis, and muscle tissue growth, the test subject’s 'functions' have significantly improved. As durability has increased, doing it about once will not be too much of a strain.]
“Then now. That one time is now.”
Click-
A switch flipped up as if a light turned on.
At the same time, with a swoosh-! sound, hundreds of projectiles, tiny Micro Missiles, are fired, tracking me.
It’s the same as what I suffered in the corridor before reaching the landing pad. My fingertips trembled as the memory of that time surfaced.
Back then, there was Ms. Kali’s intervention, but now I have to overcome it alone.
I take in The Deep blue traces left like contrails by the projectiles flying in while spewing flames. I detect every single one of them like a radar within my extrasensory perception.
One, two, three, four, ten, eleven, twelve, thirty-seven, thirty-eight, one hundred seventy, two hundred twenty-four…
Four hundred eighty-five in total.
The pulsating mass of energy, the barrage of incoming missiles reminded me of crashing waves or the torrent of a falling waterfall.
Inspiration and imagery surged from my hyper-activated brain as if I were on drugs.
Suddenly, and quite out of nowhere, I recalled the memory of my first day at work.
The first drink I ever served was due to the troublemaking of the Self-proclaimed Holmes, the Fallen Angel.
There was a question I asked myself as I watched the scattering, soaring flutter of an angel’s wings and the pouring trail of alcohol.
“Can I catch it?”
It was the same this time.
Only the target and situation had changed slightly. But I had changed as well.
I reached out my fingers as if answering the question.
Vwoom-
An invisible flow fluctuates.
Dust and debris scatter and slowly swirl between my trembling grip like a magnetic field observed through iron filings stuck to a magnet.
I bring to mind a very powerful image.
In that virtual simulation that would completely fool even my own consciousness, this very spot where I stand is the center of the world.
I manipulate and control all things.
“…!”
In the space halfway between reality and fiction, I grabbed the empty air and pulled.
Unless I can finish it all at once, I shouldn’t apply too much force. I need to find the right direction and strength.
Every time I twitch my fingertips, the tips and trajectories of the missiles slightly deform. Dozens of missiles are pulled and pushed toward a path that passes by my body, seemingly touching but not quite.
No, this won’t do. This is nowhere near enough. Stronger. No, too strong. It’s obvious that a reaction will occur instead. The middle ground. Neither strong nor weak… about this much. But it’s excessive. The efficiency is poor. My head is already throbbing. It’s vastly insufficient to handle all 485 of them.
Let’s change the method a bit. How about making the projectiles collide with each other to cause an explosion much earlier? It’s an application of the method Ms. Kali used.
I calculated the results while retracing the memories in my head. The missiles burst. Explosions occurred. Pressure and impact, tons of energy… I die. I die. I die. No matter what I do, I die.
There were more of them than last time. Way too many. The same trick won’t work twice.
A nosebleed started.
I feel the sensation of my brain cells slowly dying.
If I maintain this state of Super Concentration for too long, even if I block this attack, my brain will eventually melt away.
Let’s go back to the basics. Did I calculate and act on every little thing during the Fallen Angel?
Thanks to the Troublemaker Detective, the heat went to my head and I just committed the act first.
Let’s start by moving. As for the specific method… I’m slowly getting the hang of it now.
I drew virtual solid lines as I moved forward.
Thin threads, like those used to hold balloons or kites, stretched out in layers from all over my body to connect the projectiles.
Virtual geometry and real-world physics connect. What does not exist begins to affect what does exist.
My body can’t handle them one by one, so I tie a dozen missiles to a single thread and pull.
As I swung the fragile connection that seemed ready to snap at any moment like a tightrope bridge, the bundled projectiles twisted in clusters and spun past me.
30 eliminated. 455 remaining.
I kicked the empty air. As I executed a kick as heavy as if it were carrying a thousand pounds, the missiles lost their balance and poured past on both sides.
48 eliminated. 407 remaining.
Keeping both feet fixed to the floor, I grabbed the continuous threads all at once with both arms.
Like grabbing a speeding train, I gripped the connection points linked like a spiderweb and moved forward, pulling with all the strength I had.
An immense pressure squeezed my body, as if I had a truck tied to my back or was supporting a collapsing building.
63 eliminated. 344 remaining.
I can feel every muscle in my body splitting and muscle fibers tearing apart, including forearms and upper arms, biceps and deltoids, pectorals and quadriceps.
But it wasn’t enough.
Glaring with a trembling body and bloodshot eyes, I barely managed to pull the other strings. Imagining them tied to my thighs and ankles, I narrowly took one step with legs that felt like ten thousand pounds.
87 were eliminated. 257 remain.
Two steps. I forced my staggering, collapsing body to stand upright. I even wrapped threads around my buckling knees, using them as propulsion to move further forward.
I mobilized my upper and lower body to move forward, even amidst the pain of my body feeling like it was crumbling.
101 were eliminated. 156 remain.
The sensation of being crushed in a press. Feeling like a caterpillar in a cocoon, tightly wound in thin lines, I stretched out my limbs while trapped helplessly.
As if to hypnotize my ruptured muscles, I repeated over and over that I could do it, winding the tough strings with my teeth.
Clenching my upper and lower teeth tightly, I pull the projectiles.
Squeaking/Grinding Sound-
The faint noise of tearing and snapping, as if only a single string remained, accompanied the precarious final third step where it felt like everything would break.
156, 145, 134, 123, 102, 58, 57, 46,
15, 14, 13, 3, 2, 1…0.
Complete.
The sea and waterfall of missiles parted before me. The swirling trails of flight wrap around my body protectively.
As if a subtle external action drops and settles the soaring wings of an angel, or as if it supports the falling body of an angel with a very light hand gesture.
The world within the subsiding extrasensory perception regains its original speed.
Exactly 485 projectiles wrap around and pass by my body, which, far from backing away and fleeing, dives forward instead.
Who would willingly run toward incoming guided missiles on their own two feet? It’s a suicidal act. Everyone except me would think so.
It was a situation that should have meant inevitable death, but it wasn’t. It was as quiet and safe as being submerged in the eye of a typhoon.
Massive explosion sound―!
Without a single exception, the missiles merely grazed my clothes and split off in completely different directions, exploding and destroying only the innocent lounge.
Rodrick Smith stares at me with the aperture of his modified prosthetic eye wide open as I miraculously emerge unscathed from the gaps of the propelling flames and roll on the floor.
Looking quite flustered, unlike the infamous “Chrome Monster”.
“What, I guess you didn’t expect this?”
The moment I grinned, a sharp light flashed in the sky above.