Chương 30

Level 4 Player - 52% The moment that buff appeared, his health jumped from two percent to fifty two percent. The flood of vitality and health ripped through his body unlike any caffeine high he'd felt before, shaking through him like electricity. Suddenly, he was already getting back on his knees, standing up straight again. How'd he go from nearly dying to being past half his health pool? How? He checked his health bar. Level 4 Player - 53% It had ticked up by one percent.

That meant it was out-pacing the venom's damage. By a significant factor. Level 4 Player - 54%"Stats! Identify!" Blackrot remained in the debuff, but now something else appeared in the buffs section. Blackrot Regeneration - Anti-mana entity expanding within host tissues. Regenerate health passively. Increases vitality based on total mass infected. Occasional loss of control.

"Increases vitality? By how much?" He muttered looking over at what identify showed him.

"Stats." Health: 164/300 Vitality: 12 (7-2+7) Holy shit. Six points of vitality. Six entire fucking points. Just from the Blackrot. He used to have 150 health after he kicked off his leg debuff. This had doubled his health points. He looked over the debuff, and found the infection was right around 68% of total mass infected. He waited in the dim darkness, half chuckling, half breathing. Then felt the moment the venom stopped its effect.

Maybe in the real world it would have worn off in hours, or had after-effects, or done it more slowly. But with the System in charge of his body, the moment the timer ran out, he felt instantly healed. The health bar started going up rapidly now that his regeneration wasn't fighting against the venom's damage over time. He was regenerating three to four health points every other second. The room stayed quiet except for the occasional scraping on the doorway - the mimic hadn't given up.

And by now Wade should have died, so it was trying to break in for the meal. It started hissing. Upset that the meal was blocked off. The scratching resumed with a more annoyed pace. Wade chuckled, darkly.

"I lived motherfucker. And now it's your turn to try and survive." That thing was going to die. Wade was twice as strong as he'd been, and felt like nothing was weighing him down anymore. His body felt healthy, powerful, adjusted. He stood up from the dark corner, cracking his neck as far as the mithril collar allowed him, feeling no pain or limp in his leg and barely anything from his neck.

He was a kid about to start sprinting around a jungle gym, coked up on caffeine, sugar and other terrible parental diet allowances. Black veins were spreading across his chest, coming up to the lip of the mithril collar before halting against a giant wall. It was official now: If this mithril collar was removed, he'd die. That thing was now no longer just in case. The regeneration wasn't fast by video game standards, about one percent every two seconds or so. But in real life like now?

Within two minutes he'd be back at full health basically. He got to work getting his leftover Illy daggers at the ready, along with his other dagger. When he opened up that door, he was going to kill that mimic. Stab it with Illy's dagger, and then turbo-murder it with the sharp ancient dagger. He didn't need to worry about the venom, or temporary damage it could do. He had a healing factor, making him goddamn budget wolverine. The options he had available were huge. And spite was a powerful motivator.

Armed, he sat down and waited as his health regenerated. The plan taking shape in his head. First, the mimic could move and it could scratch at the doorway. So it had legs of some kind and some appendages to scratch with. Second, its defense was to use the lootbox like a hermit crab, and it had some real twitchy reflexes. Last time he'd thrown shit at the chest, it had sealed itself up faster than he could nail it with his rock point blank. So he'd abuse that.

Assume it would already turtle up, and go for the legs instead. He'd start with a giant rock and crush whatever it was using to move around with. Either the legs or the arms. No way it could protect those with its outer chest in time. After that, he'd adjust depending on what he found. The scratching continued on the other side. The mimic was making its best attempt to break down the doorway. The Nathir might have been giant slave-keeping assholes, but when it came to metalcrafting, they seemed to excel at it.

That doorway wasn't breaking down anytime soon. Only time he'd seen these kinds of metals punctured had been by a fucking giant blackrot enpowered spider, and it still couldn't break the entire doorway, just its fangs. Wade figured the concrete walls were less durable than the doorway. Level 4 Player - 99% Level 4 Player - 100% Less than two minutes had passed and he was back to full health. Wade took a deep breath, feeling fully refreshed for the first time in years. It was time.

He was about to murder a mimic in the most gruesome possible manner he could get away with. Oh he was going to make it hurt. Wade grabbed the doorhandles, unlocked the whole thing and swung it open. The mimic was on the other side, mouth wide open where eight spider-like legs originated from, reaching out to lift the entire chest lift up. It would have been horrifying to watch - if a giant rock wasn't already crushing straight through one of them.

The mimic equally had good reactions as Wade predicted, shutting its mouth as far as it could without cutting those legs off, all the while shuffling backwards. It even made the attempt to move that leg out of the rock's way. But it was not that quick. Level 19 Mimic - 89% It started hissing from the dark chest, one leg limp at the side. It had been clearly surprised Wade survived, but that just meant it needed to bite him again a few more times. So it pounced right for Wade, jaw opening.

Wade calculated, and decided he was going to save Illy's daggers. This asshole was going to die by rock. He jumped backwards, completely unburdened for the first time in seven years, giving him the range of motion he'd lacked prior. He waited half a moment, until he felt like the mimic had overextended. A second rock from his other hand raced right into the open mouth, slamming directly down that gullet. Level 19 Mimic - 82% That's right motherfucker. He had blackrot on both arms now.

The mimic was blown backwards, rolling on the ground as it clamped itself shut. Hissing in clear pain. Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Wade landed, yanking two more rocks out of Illy's pack, ready to throw down again.

"Not so fun now that you're on the other end huh? Get back up. Come on." The mimic rolled back onto its flat side and kept its mouth shut, leaving the impervious metal shell. It crouched low to the ground on those spindly legs. They really were thin black appendages that squeezed through gaps in its teeth, letting it scuttle around like some giant demonic jewelry box. Only a line of yellowed teeth showed between lid and base, occasionally clicking together as it moved.

It was watching him somehow, but Wade couldn't spot any eyes on it. He kept his rocks ready, as the thing scuttle left and right around the room. Like a boxer keeping light on his feet to dodge a potential attack. Wade could tell why - the legs. He'd crushed through one, so they were clearly vulnerable. A quick test showed him this was exactly the case: When he lifted his rock as if to throw, the mimic's movements grew far more frantic, almost twitching in place. Ready to leap one way or another.

First time they'd met, his attack had done nothing to the hard metal shell. Only hitting inside that maw or legs seemed to hurt it. So that's what he'd wait for. It would come, try to take a bite, and Wade would absolutely go feral the moment it did.

"Come on, bite me. I want you to do it, I want you to do it, come on." He muttered on repeat as the mimic moved like a crab left and right.

"I'm right here, asshole. Come on. Come on, BITE ME." The mimic lunged forward, lid twitching up before snapping shut and scuttling backwards. Wade held his throw. He'd been about to commit, but the critter had pulled the feint too early. It skittered sideways, tried again, clearly hoping to bait out his ammunition. Smarter than the other animals out here at least, it could tell Wade was the danger and more importantly why he was a danger.

"Nice try." Wade tracked its movements, noting how the health bar continued to tick down.

"But I can wait." Level 19 Mimic - 78% Level 19 Mimic - 71% The skyviper debuff kept eating away at its health. The mimic seemed aware of this too, its movements becoming more frantic as its health decreased. It circled Wade slowly, legs clicking against the floor, teeth occasionally gnashing in frustration. Level 19 Mimic - 68% The enemy lunged again, once more a feint, but this time Wade called the bullshit and lunged forward himself with a nasty kick.

Strength was already augmented twice, and his legs had blackrot all over. Skin under his pants undulated as the blackrot seemed to sense his intent. The kick rocketed the defenseless mimic right into the wall where it seemed outright stunned, legs flailing around. Wade jumped it like it had a wallet to pick, his hand cudgeling a rock down again and again, crushing through leg after leg before the mimic finally seemed to get what was left of itself in position to fight back.

And this close, the mimic did the only thing it could - it leapt for Wade, mouth opening up to chomp down. Wade's foot shot out to the bottom teeth, impaling himself against it. His left hand grabbed the top row of teeth, equally seeing the sharp things punch right through. He didn't feel a lick of pain. Just a mild echo of it. Because blackrot was already on both. A new debuff was applied: Mimic Venom III Wade laughed his ass off, unhinged.

The venom had been injected into his arm and foot - where the blackrot already was. The rest was dribbling down his arm, from the fang that had punctured through his hand. The mimic tried to bite down, and found that it couldn't - because Wade was pushing back, slowly forcing its mouth fully open. Both his hands held the lid, and both feet pried the bottom open. Blackrot undulated under his skin, enhancing his already improved strength. Legs. Back. Arm.

The human body was a wonder in power when it wasn't being held down by anything and boosted past natural limits. And he was using all of it. Inch by inch the mouth was pried open. The mimic was clearly starting to panic, the little legs that still worked flailing around. At first it tried to lift itself and Wade up to shake him off, but too many of its legs had been smashed. So instead it tried to scratch desperately at him. It was in vain.

Wade shifted his grip until he could free one of his hands, then lifted his dagger and threw it down with as strong a throw as he could. Point blank into the mouth. Luck triggered: Critical hit! Level 19 Mimic - 32% The damage was drastic, chunking right through the health bar. It gave a wet bloody cough, the body recoiling as the weapon ripped through its insides. The jaw went slack for a second, and Wade made full use of that, pulling its mouth wide open.

The debuff continued eating through another chunk of the mimic's health, as it sputtered up red-black ichor. Level 19 Mimic - 21% It tried to fight back, the last two spindly legs slapping at his side in pure panic, doing nothing but tickling him. The teeth were the weapons the mimic had, and those were pinned into place. Wade continued to pull, feeling the jaw weaken as he passed the angle it could exert any kind of force. Then he heard a snap on the rear.

The crushing force he'd been fighting against instantly cut off completely. He'd broken the mouth off its hinges. Level 19 Mimic - 14%"That didn't sound too healthy buddy." He cackled, free hand reaching down into the bloody gullet, fishing around for his knife handle.

"Let me take a look in there. I think I might know what the problem is." Hard to feel for it within all the squishy bits.

"Identify." He hissed, finding the nametag floating slightly off where his hand was. He fished through the ichor pooling, and felt the handle, then drew the bloody thing back out.

"Oh, was this what was cutting you up? Now how on earth did that happen…" The dagger stabbed down deep into the throat. And then Wade kept stabbing as the mimic's legs flailed, jaw broken, completely helpless against his fury. Ichor splashed all over him, the legs twitched violently, losing any real plan. And the mimic's health continued to tank downwards, percent after percent. Level 19 Mimic - 0%"What? Already?" It died faster than Wade expected.

"I only got ten or twelve stabs at best, get the fuck back up." He stood back up, unhooking his punctured hand and foot from the mimic's broken maw. Blackrot squirmed around the wounds, as if fussing about the damage.

"Yeah, yeah." Wade said, looking at his injury.

"You'll heal it up." Mimic blood was just about everywhere around the dead creature, and nearby was his discarded phone. Fortunately, it had been spared any damage. A text was there as he expected. LETS GO AYYYO (((o(°▽°)o))) Wade laughed, for once Play's bloodthirsty antics actually felt right. He could just imagine the god must have been eating popcorn, pointing at the screen like a fan at his small wins.

He was still going to strangle Play the instant he got a chance of course, but with a tad less spite than originally planned. Waitwaitwait, we're not done yet!! Wade looked over the dead mimic corpse, one eye raised.

"It'd definitely dead Play. What's left to do?" The best part of course: LOOT