Chương 14: Phototoxin

Endless darkness stretched as far as Kayzen's eyes could see. Even his own body had become faint like a fog. Just as Kayzen was wondering whether this was his soul or consciousness realm, another faint figure intruded upon this space. Or to be more accurate, he was the invader. The angelica was now just nine feet tall. It was hard to associate the figure in front of him with the towering plant outside.

'Fortunately, its spirituality is weak.' Kayzen didn't let down his guard nonetheless. The hex he had used came from the fragmented knowledge he had learned while becoming the shaper. He had done everything according to that, but now, he was clueless. One man and one plant stood in front of one another. Unlike monsters who were often ferocious, plants were gentle by nature. Coupled with Kayzen using pain resistance the angelica was most likely under a comatose state.

'Still, it's bound to retaliate once I attack.' Without hesitation Kayzen ran towards the opposite figure and willed to activate his shard. For now, he had decided to call this space spiritual realm while he and the plant were in the soul form. Regardless of whether his assumptions were correct or not, his hex should work. And indeed, it did. A prism-shaped rune appeared in his palm and bound the angelica with red chains.

A strange cry akin to blowing flutes rang across the space, and Kayzen was blasted off by the waves of sound. Before he could even stand up, another horrifying aura permeated the darkness. Dark green mist was spread from the plant. The chains, the hex, and even the space itself started to dissolve under its effect. And this time, Kayzen was unable to use phantom shift.

'Fuck. I still underestimated it!' Kayzen cursed and focused all of his willpower on strengthening the rune. Logically speaking, furanocoumarins shouldn't work in this space without sunlight, but then again, he knew next to nothing about souls. His already ephemeral body was dissolving bit by bit under the yellow fog. Kayzen realized that if he were to disappear in this space, then his body outside would be no different than an empty husk.

Worse, there was even a chance that the angelica might obtain his records instead. He didn't feel any pain, but that was the worst part. To see yourself being erased without feeling anything was horrifying. Kayzen racked his brains to find a solution as fast as possible. Both he and the angelica were on the same rank. The biggest difference was that while the plant was on the verge of breaking through to ravager class, Kayzen was at most in the middle stages of shaper.

'I refuse to believe that a random plant has more records than I do.' Memories of his life flashed in Kayzen's eyes. Playing in the Ashbourne mansion, tagging along his brother to all sorts of places, sneaking around with Vasser to roam the capital, joining Opheim academy, living in Greenford… with each memory the prism shaped hex became more and more tangible. The records he had weren't limited to what was shown on the shards.

Even if his memories were unable to give him any abilities, they were the records of the life he had lived. The prism enlarged and trapped the phantom of angelica within. The space lost its foundations and began to shatter like a mirror. Finally, the hex shrunk in size and flew towards Kayzen's eyebrows.

"…. zen…Kay…"

"Damnitall…wake up!"

"Kayze.."

"KAYZEN."

"Huh…uh.." the first thing Kayzen's groggy eyes saw was Vasser moving from left to right. Or was it his head that was shaking?

"Thank Argia you're safe!" The sharp pain in his shoulders made him fully awake. Ash grey strands of hair smelling like lemons stuck on his face.

"I'm alright Vas, though you might just fracture my bones."

"Hmph, weakling." Vasser laid him down and gave him a reproachful look. Kayzen followed her eyes and shivered when he looked at his arms. Under the cuffed-up sleeves were inch-long burn marks starting from his elbows to his palms. The same thing had occurred below his knees. He didn't recall what happened after the hex was complete. His body felt as if he had just climbed a mountain while his head was throbbing nonstop. First things first, he needed to recover and move out.

"Can you give me the backpack?"

"Here," Vasser placed the Hemogaster backpack beside him. As much as it pained him to do so, Kayzen had no choice but to use his burned arms to take out the medicine. The dragon's blood sap he had collected proved its value at this moment.

"Let me," Vasser snatched the sap from his hand and applied it on the burned areas. His fair skin had now become pale white due to corrosion. If not for him getting the angelica's records, such an injury would be fatal even if had managed to kill the plant. If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it. Damage on the genetic level was nothing to scoff at.

"All done. Looks pretty useful, how many do you have?" Vasser asked after placing the sap back into the backpack. Due to her being an eikon of Argia she didn't normally carry any healing items on her. From the looks of it though, that was a bad decision in this changed world. Kayzen raised his fingers, "Not many, just two more. There are fewer valuable plants than I'd thought. On that note, we should leave this place as soon as possible."

"There's no need, we're safe. For now." Vasser's sapphire eyes looked at the Elgon range, making her fists involuntarily clench up.

"Is there a hazard-type node?" Kayzen asked as he recalled his prior hypothesis.

"How'd you come to that conclusion?" Kayzen then spoke about what he had seen after leaving Greenford and the conclusion he had arrived at. All signs pointed at the formation of a hazard-type Ether node. Based on Vasser's expression though, that didn't seem to be the case.

"Why do you think I came here?" Vasser asked all of a sudden.

"To meet me?"

"As if. Don't flatter yourself."

"Oh, and here I was, venturing towards the Qmarz castle." Kayzen sighed dejectedly and leaned back on the roots. Both of them couldn't help but chuckle after a moment. Apparently, they had similar thoughts. Neither specifically planned to meet the other, it's just that the path they took seemed to coincide.

"My target is the Elgon range. There's a lot you need to know; but before that, we should eat something." Vasser sprang up and ran towards the forest without waiting for Kayzen's reply.

'Well, she seems really confident about this place being safe.' After shifting comfortably, as much of that was possible while laying on taproots, he summoned his newest shard. This was what he had gone through all this trouble for. Rank: Low Phototoxin: After seizing the records of Angelica archangelica; you have gained the ability to create furanocoumarins by shaping ether. The range, potency, and amount of substances converted depends on the quality of the records.

The shard was as he had expected, but this was far from the whole thing. During the fight in the spiritual space he had confirmed that the shards were just a part of one's power.

'The real gain are the records.' While fuzzy, visions and experiences of the angelica plant had been fused with Kayzen's memory; or soul as he had decided to call it. This was a sensation similar to when he'd returned from the cosmic library. The general strength of the soul was in this order: Humans > Monsters > Plants. Despite this they were all on the same level when it came to combat prowess. The plants were unable to think, yet their closeness with nature allowed them to comprehend things with extreme ease.

Kayzen closed his eyes and filtered out all the useless stuff. Things such as how to kill insects and how to manipulate roots were useless to him. After discarding over 90% of the memories, he was left with two things. One, the quality of records and how to reach the next rank. Unlike shapers who could have up to five abilities, the plants were different. It turned out that even with just one or two abilities they could reach the next class, so long as their records were up to quality.

'It's a pity I can't use Ether before resting for a while.' Kayzen realized that while all of his records were at a low level, there was still a difference. Pain resistance should be the weakest since it came from someone who wasn't even a fiend. Record extraction and phantom shift should be similar in quality, while the Phototoxin was the best one. The way he had seized records was a double-edged sword.

On one hand, he was able to seize complete records and more, but at the same time, the damage taken on his soul could be life threatening. Nonetheless, the reward was worth it. Kayzen closed his eyes and sensed the ether around him. Apparent by the range of his hex, he could sense and shape ether within a 10 meter radius. At this moment, he recalled the angelica's memories of spreading and controlling its roots. In spite of its innate limitations in mobility, the angelica had spread its roots over a kilometer.

How did it accomplish that? The answer was simpler.

'Disperse, branch out.' His perception in the ten meter radius scattered and turned into a meter wide cross, multiplying his range of attack by over seven times. And this was the case when he lacked proper training. It wasn't as if no one had thought it before, but most of the times, stretching one's perception thin was a suicidal move as it would leave behind blank spots. One needed to be something like an archer or a scout to make the best use of this method. Kayzen found this to be even more suitable for him.

Did it really matter how much he could scout? All he had to do was spot an enemy and hex from afar. As long as he could shape the ether around the target and connect the hex, they would die.

'And the lines of hex don't have to be as wide as roots.' He opened his eyes and did some mental calculations. With a radius of 10 meters his perception range was 314 square meters. With the current wide cross shape he could reach more than 70 meters in four directions. Coupled with the Phototoxin shard, he now had proper means to attack while avoiding close combat. As he took a sip of cold water in celebration, Vasser arrived with her arms full of green fruits.

Even from afar the aroma of guava made its way to his nose.

"Here." Kayzen caught the fruit in his hand and took a bite. The sweet and sour juices flooded his mouth in an instant. He couldn't help but ask, "Where did you find these?"

"There are a few in the west. That's how I discovered those deer. You healed up pretty quick by the way," Vasser spoke as he took a close look at his arms. Under the effect of sap the burns were much less noticeable.

"Yeah, it's working better than I'd thought. Should be able to move out by evening."

"Perfect. Now then, let's start from where we left off," Vasser took a huge bite and stood up to get a nearby stick.

"This is west and south. Here's the Elgon range and Elgon pass. We are somewhere around here. You said you suspected there being a hazard grade node, right?" Kayzen nodded and followed the trail Vasser was drawing. Down the hills and toward the west, right at the bottom of the biggest mountain in the Elgon range. There, she drew an oval circle.

"Is that where the node is?" he asked as her hand stopped moving.

"There's no node. It's something far, far worse." After seeing her serious gaze, Kayzen lost his mood to enjoy the fruits. Ether nodes were the greatest threats within the empire's territory. If there was something far worse than that, then it could only mean one thing.

"A monster that came from the rift?" he spoke out loud, but Vasser once again shook her head.

"What we saw right after the ether collider failed were temporary rifts. This, is permanent. They have appeared all over Erde." Kayzen gulped down half the bottle of water to cool off his head. This was indeed an Apocalypse.