Chương 38

Oliver wasted no time in whipping out his shovel and jamming it into the flesh edging its way up his legs. It sizzled on contact with the silver as he pried it off and the scent of burning meat mixed with the sour stench of rot.

"Kiki!" he hollered to her. She was only a few feet away. Already, half of her body had descended into the fleshy floor. It was absorbing her, inch by inch. One boot free of the flesh, Oliver pivoted and tossed out salt liberally. In the brief bursts of light from Ben's drone, Oliver thought he saw the flesh slowly shifting away from where the salt fell, but it was too little. He needed more of a reaction than mild discomfort. He took aim and fired a silver bullet.

It whizzed through the air and embedded itself in the flesh by Kiki's ear. The reaction this time was instant. The flesh fled from the point impact and Kiki wrenched her head free of the floor. Though her visor was coated in gunk, the two pink slits of eyes on it still glowed.

"Finally," she spat.

"You idiot! Ass for brained doddering buffoon! What the hell were you thinking? Actually, are you even capable of thought? Or is there too much shit clogging up your neurons?" Oliver ignored the insults while he jabbed his silver shovel repeatedly down at his boot that remained in the flesh.

"The room is alive. It's attempting to absorb us into it."

"No. Fucking. Kidding." He was starting to regret freeing her head. She lacked the Strength to free herself like he had so all she could do was shout at him. Both boots finally free, he stepped up to pry her out. He dug his shovel deep under her arm and pushed his weight down, like digging up a large rock. Her elbow pieced through the flesh and she wormed the rest of the arm out. It was a constant battle between his feet slipping into the flesh again and uncovering Kiki bit by bit.

Once on her knees, katana in her hands, she chopped through the flesh with ease, freeing herself the rest of the way. The flesh didn't die as she sliced through it with her neon blade, instead it fell back to the floor where it was reabsorbed.

"Next brilliant plan?" Kiki snarled.

"Ben's drone," Oliver stepped toward it. He raised his shovel to dig it free. Right as he lowered it, the flesh slipped the metal box the remaining way into itself with a sluuuurp. Darkness. Only interrupted by the soft pink neon glow of Kiki's blade and eyes. Once again, Oliver wished his fairy ring functioned. He cursed himself for wasting the charge. He stabbed his shovel into the flesh over and over in the place the box had disappeared but hit nothing solid. The room shuddered again.

He heard a sickening noise, like sloppy piles of dough slapping together.

"Yooou leeeft meee," a gurgling voice called out.

"Whyyy nooot freee meee?" Blunderbuss pistol in hand, Oliver took aim in the direction of the noise and shot. In the split second of illumination from his pistol's ignition, Oliver saw a familiar shape. Or, rather, the combination of five or six familiar shapes. Those prisoners he'd left behind in their dungeon cells while freeing the werewolf child. A quick Appraisal confirmed his suspicions. Flesh Amalgamation. Monstrosity. Level 33, Level 42, Level 19, Level 51, Level 60, Level 39.

Oliver had never fought a multileveled opponent before. Through context, he gathered that each of the people used in the monstrosity had their own individual level. The already abominably malformed people had been slapped together into an entity of sealed flesh. While they retained individual levels, they'd lost their names in the merge. They were simply a flesh amalgamation now. Oliver's mind flashed back to his first few hours in this biome as a child. The Flesh Weaver had created golems like this.

But, unlike those golems, this creature retained some measure of its mind as it lumbered forward. It also seemed to hold a grudge on him in particular. Running and kiting the monster might have been an option if he had access to his feet. As it was, he was basically rooted in place. He could leap once before his feet got stuck again. The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

Oliver reached into his side satchel and quickly drew out a vial of acid he'd taken from the torture chamber cupboards. He hurled it in the direction of the moving mass of flesh. It shattered with a tinkle and the monstrosity hissed from five different mouths. The wound on the creature glowed a putrid shade of green as it ate into the flesh, which helped him keep the monstrosity in his sights. The verbal conformation of pain from it was a good sigh. It being weak to acid was a solid start.

Oliver readied another vial, preparing to hurl it at the looming opponent. A split second before he released the acid, an idea lit up in his mind and he redirected his throw. He tossed it at the point where Ben's drone communication speaker had been absorbed. The entire room shuddered again as the glass vial broke and the acid ate the fleshy floor. Unfortunately, Oliver didn't have time to waste staring at the damage to see the acid's progress.

The flesh amalgamation threw its weight at Oliver, the flesh of its melded together body opening up into a maw the size of his torso. It revealed an orthodontist's personal hell. Rows of disorganized teeth lined the edges of the large, mouth-like orifice. In a crouched position, with one hand he held the blade of his shovel pointed diagonally up at the monstrosity like a pike. With his other hand, Oliver took aim once again with his blunderbuss. BANG!

The monster's teeth, all sharpened to points, gleamed in the light of the sudden illumination of the ignition. His opponent's weight still fell forward, right into the shovel. Oliver lunged to the side right as the monstrosity collapsed. Stumbling, he caught himself with an arm to the floor. That meant that hand was out of commission. Luckily, it was his non-dominant hand. Unluckily, it meant he wouldn't be able to reload his blunderbuss again until he freed himself.

The monstrosity squirmed as the shovel caught in its open maw. The silver blade of the shovel ripped apart its insides as it struggled to remove it. A kill notification. One of the monstrosities was dead on the creature. Five more to go. Shoving his used gun into his bag, Oliver grasped around and his fingers clasped the lacquered box full of silver powder. He pinched some between his thumb and index finger, then lashed out, bending awkwardly to spray the grains of metal in the direction of the monstrosity.

It wasn't nearly as effective as his shovel or bullets, but it acted as a solid deterrent. A far superior option to the salt he'd used earlier.

"Yooou cooould haaave…" the monster droned. With all remaining mouths moving together, it spoke in a chorus of warbling pitches. Whatever it was attempting to say, its words cut off into a howl as Kiki sliced off a swath of one of its faces. While only a few feet away, the monster had been hyperfixated on Oliver, allowing her a clean cut on it. The sliced face sloughed off, mixing in with the floor.

As the open wound glistened in Kiki's sword's light, the creature shuddered, like experiencing a seizure while remaining upright. Then it expanded. Like a body bloating after being left floating in a lake, the monstrosity enlarged itself at a terrifying speed. Despite the shovel still in its insides, and Kiki's katana pointed in its direction, the wall of flesh slammed into both Oliver and Kiki. The good news was that the impact freed Oliver's hand.

The bad news was that the flesh was somehow expanding to the point of covering the entirety of the room. It was proportionate to a flaccid latex balloon suddenly pumped full of gas. However, unlike a balloon, it didn't pop as Kiki jabbed her blade through the skin. Oliver slammed into the far wall, the air knocked out of him. The flesh pressed against his body, suffocating him. He felt his body bruising under the pressure. His Resilience kept him alive, but in a minute his bones would start snapping.

The four remaining monstrosities mixed into the amalgamation bellowed incoherently. Likely their body parts were now too malformed to make the standard noises for human speech. Unable to lash out with a weapon and with Kiki out of sight, in a split second Oliver reviewed all of his limited options and made a decision. He activated his ring. His body transformed. This time the pain was difficult to even process while simultaneously being crushed by the amalgamation.

As soon as he gained the fangs of a wolf he dug them into the flesh and ripped his head back. The monstrosity tasted rancid and more flesh and blood than he cared to think about slipped down his throat as he bit and spat repeatedly. There were no bones to get in his way, just sinew, muscle, and fat. Once a small burrow had been dug out in the flesh amalgamation, he got his paws out and used his claws to dig as well. It was equivalent to a hamster burrowing into a paralyzed human.

Inefficient and difficult, but possible. His opponent couldn't do anything but squirm. His shirt and pants ripped at the seams as he pulled himself up into the nook dug into monstrosity. A few more bites into the flesh and his teeth punctured through to something hollow within. His foe deflated instantly, a blast of gas slamming him back into the wall. He stared on in horror as the monstrosity deformed in front of his eyes. Random bits of it remained inflated while other bits deflated.

A grotesquely large brown eyeball the size of a beach ball spun in its socket. A lip shank, revealing massive black gums. A pinky finger flailed about, slamming into Kiki, who crumpled to the floor not far from Oliver. He collapsed to the fleshy flooring, his back to the wall. More kill notifications along with a level up flashed in front of his vision but he ignored them. Oliver took in a deep breath of air and released the ring's hold on him, returning himself to his human form.

He slumped against the soft wall, his ripped up clothing now utterly filthy from his experience burrowing into his foe. The final remaining body struggled, attached to five bodies of dead weight that it seemed to have very limited control over. Somehow, it was the level 19 one that still survived. It floundered, flabs of loose, stretched-out flesh rippling but not responding properly.

"I… just… wanted…" it wheezed. Whatever it wanted, Oliver never found out. Kiki stumbled over, using the deflated dead body as a bridge over the fleshy floor. Armor sparking at the joints, she lifted her katana and brought it down on the final head, cleaving it in two.