The Three-Headed Demon (4)

The drug in the ampoule I held was called Psionium.

Each use granted the user an enhancement, at the cost of a randomly reduced duration.

I had used it once before, in my battle against Sihyeon Yujin, the Yujin Family's gene-modified enforcer. Back then, as a Juvenile, I'd swallowed Psionium to temporarily borrow the strength of a Sub-adult and hold my own against her.

So I had already burned one use. By the normal rules, my duration should be shorter this time.

But this is the improved version Muriel used, isn't it.

She had enjoyed the enhancement effect far longer than ordinary Psionium allows. Which meant I had no way of knowing exactly how ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠long it would last for me.

Either way, it won't last that long.

Five minutes at minimum, maybe eight or nine at the outside — that was the assumption I had to work with.

In other words, Psionium's effect would wear off before King of Monsters hit its maximum duration. Common sense said I should activate King of Monsters first, but there was a problem to consider before that.

If I run out of energy, the state cancels itself.

The description of Organic Evolution clearly stated that transforming into King of Monsters drained an enormous amount of energy.

God's Whip will eat through energy too, won't it.

Both God's Whip and King of Monsters drew on the bio-energy stored inside my body.

Total reserves shouldn't be a problem, though.

Before my Transcendence Stage 2 breakthrough, I had gorged myself on the Swamp King and the swampland creatures, and just a moment ago I'd swallowed a Horned Gigant whole.

Both of those were mighty predators that lorded over the Saintopia 02 continent. And Amorph was an extremely fuel-efficient organism to begin with — I couldn't imagine running short on energy.

Though I can't be a hundred percent sure.

Both traits were brand-new — traits that had never appeared in the game. Naturally, I'd never tested either one myself.

Still, I had weathered similar crises in the game more than a few times. I'd carried out a mass slaughter against a full-scale Outspacer assault, and once I'd flown all the way up through the atmosphere to intercept Nova, Mega Corp's planet-destroying weapon.

If anything, I was holding more cards now than I was back then. I could afford to call the situation better.

With Amorph's sharp senses and my experience…

As I always had, I would overcome this trial too.

What's left is figuring out when the Cosmic Bolt falls.

There was no way for me to learn that under the current circumstances — except for one.

Predator Sense — the sense that warned me of my own peril. The moment a fragment of the future flashed before my eyes, that would be the instant to strike.

Having settled my judgment, I pulled the Psionium ampoule from Muriel's kit.

Then I tucked the ampoule into my mouth. I wanted to avoid the wrestling match of trying to grip a tiny glass tube with hands built for a body this enormous.

Once I'm in King of Monsters form, I won't be able to handle it.

Preparations complete — but Predator Sense still sent no signal. I activated Organic Evolution and selected King of Monsters.

And then—

Huh?

The transformation didn't happen.

Not here?

The area was thick with trees, sure, but the spot where I stood was flat, open ground. The trait's description only said it required a space with a hundred-meter radius — nothing more.

Obstacles are a problem, then… ah. Wait. Don't tell me.

Distance from allies.

Right in front of me stood No. 26, Adhai, and Mother of the Sky.

[Zzzu zzu-zzu zzu-zzu-zzu (Wait here for me)]

After telling the kids, I left that spot behind.

My destination: the riverbank. No trees or obstacles there, and a good distance from the kids.

With no telling when the orbital bombardment would begin, I ran at full power. Six combat arms, my tail, my thick blunt claws — every organ in my body pushed its muscles to the limit and drove me forward.

Reaching the river, I activated the trait again.

And right on schedule, the message of refusal.

I looked around. This place was the river's edge, but the trees grew sparse enough here that it could pass for the forest's fringes.

No mention of allies this time — only the location. So apparently the obstacle requirement had simply been omitted from King of Monsters' description.

I hurried and plunged into the river. Only when I reached its center did the message finally appear: transformation into King of Monsters was now possible.

At this width, I'm well past a hundred meters, aren't I?

This river was no narrow stream. From the center to either bank was easily more than a hundred meters.

Just how big does it intend to make me—

The moment that thought crossed my mind, something streaked across my vision.

It's here!

Black fire tearing through the atmosphere, devouring all creation and all life — the image of the Cosmic Bolt falling. The instant I registered it, I transformed into King of Monsters without a moment's delay.

Uuurgh—?!

Unlike every other evolution I'd undergone, an overwhelming agony came flooding in. Pain of a severity I had never once experienced.

And this despite Pain Mitigation being active. If I didn't carry the memory of being burned over my entire body as a child, I would have blacked out on the spot.

Worse, the pain wasn't the only burden. Even mid-transformation, the energy drain was staggering. It felt like firing Psychic Breath three times back-to-back — an exhaustion beyond imagining.

Ghh — ghhhhk! N-now, swallow it…!

Somehow I clung to my sanity and crushed the thing in my mouth. The tiny ampoule shattered, and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the Psionium within poured down my throat.

Unable to bear the agony a second longer, I let out a great roar of anguish.

The river water flashed to vapor, the trees along the banks tore up by their roots, and a violent wave of energy swallowed my vision whole.

"Cosmic Bolt launch preparations complete."

"Energy output charged to 500%. Dark matter regulator operational. Purification operation commencing."

"Coordinates locked in."

"Projected damage assessment complete. Cross-referencing with purification directive."

In the ops room, alive with the final preparations for the Cosmic Bolt's launch, the Captain quietly bit his lip.

His men had never come back. Right up until the moment of launch — nothing. Whether they lived or died, what had befallen them on Sigil 08, he had no way of knowing.

And I never will, for the rest of my life.

Mourning his fallen men, the Captain screwed his eyes shut. All the while, the countdown ticked rapidly downward.

"Sir! Captain! A powerful energy wavelength detected!"

A Cult crewman monitoring the energy flows within the planet cried out. At his words, the Captain opened his eyes.

"An energy wavelength? Could it be a magnetic storm?"

"Unknown! Th-this is—?! It's not planetary-wide — it's concentrated on a single point!"

"What did you say?"

The crewman projected an image with his psychic power. An entire continent on the planet was blanketed beneath a massive energy storm. Every Cult member in the ops room who saw it recoiled in horror.

"My — my gods!"

"I've never seen an energy flow like that!"

Magnetic storms occur across a planet's entire surface. They never converge so artificially on a single point like that. Which meant this energy wavelength had been produced deliberately — by some specific entity.

Don't tell me that's the contamination source?

The orders given to Damos 08's Arbiter were to purify the corrupted Sigil 08. That abnormal storm had to be the work of the beings who had fouled the planet.

Damn it all! So that's why they were all wiped out!

That continent was home to the Volf natives. No doubt the warrior detachment had gone to capture the Volfs and had the misfortune of running into that contamination source.

A contamination source with influence spanning an entire continent. However formidable the warrior detachment's might, surviving something like that was impossible.

"Can we observe the contamination source with the ship's cameras?"

"Th-the energy flow is so intense that… Still, we'll try!"

The Cult crew worked their psychic power techniques while operating the ops room's consoles. Seconds later, an image of the ground below appeared above the center of the room.

The moment the Cult members confirmed the contamination source's appearance, they screamed as one.

The Captain did not chide them. Because the instant he too laid eyes on it, he had very nearly screamed himself.

For some unknown reason the image quality was terrible, but everyone in the room could easily make out the thing's silhouette.

The reason was simple: the thing's bulk was simply colossal. Judging by a rough comparison with the trees around it, its length was estimated at well over two hundred meters.

The contamination source bore three heads in total. Apart from the middle one, the two flanking heads were identical in form.

The two heads mounted on the right and left resembled sharp-muzzled carnivorous dragons, like Manu Arma, the native beasts of Sigil 08 — except they had no visible eyes at all. In their place, horns grew out.

Where sight was absent, the long, thin tentacles dangling beneath their jaws seemed to serve as sensory organs instead. Even in ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the blurry feed, both heads were never once still, ceaselessly swaying their tentacles.

And then the middle head. That one bore six enormous horns and a long, broad rear crest of carapace that called a crown to mind. Unlike the heads beside it, this one had eyes — and those eyes, sly as a serpent's, never stopped sweeping the surroundings.

Horns, rear carapace, eyes. The Captain judged that head to be the one holding the highest degree of command.

The neck supporting the three heads was long and thick enough to evoke a serpent. Where the long neck met the heads, bundles of hair-like tentacles hung in loose tresses.

Even this much was grotesque enough — but the body was something else entirely.

A carapace black as if wrought from the dark matter the Cult itself wielded sheathed the creature's back. Set into that back were eight spiral-shaped pits, and at the center of each pit, pipe-like conduits lined up in rows and ran the length of its body down to the tail.

Gas of unknown composition poured ceaselessly from the conduits and drifted up into the sky. No doubt that gas was what was degrading the image quality of the ship's camera feed.

Below the back's carapace, six legs were visible. Or rather, to be precise: four front legs that appeared to function as arms, and a rear leg far larger than any of the others.

Perhaps the thing was simply crouched so low that he was mistaking its arms for legs.

Every leg was wrapped in carapace of the same material as the back, and the joints seemed more numerous than those of any ordinary creature. The sight — like some long-legged, spidery insect — stirred a visceral revulsion.

Worse still, the space between the legs was crowded with folds of rolled flesh, deeply unpleasant to look upon. He couldn't guess their purpose, but if that purpose was to disgust the observer, they achieved their goal magnificently.

After the horrific legs came, finally, the tail. A creature with three heads had multiple tails as well. Its tail, accounting for roughly a third of its body, split into two branches from some point along its lower half.

In other words — two tails. The right tail bore a massive pincer claw at its tip, while the left was tipped with a stinger resembling a scorpion's barb.

"The… the Three-Headed Demon…"

Someone murmured, staring at the contamination source on the screen. The Captain thought the description fitting.

The thing's form was the very image of the evil dragon from Cult mythology.

The 'Three-Headed Demon' the crewman had named — and the contamination source that threatened the security of the Cult Empire itself.

The Captain roared until his voice tore.

"Burn that blasphemous existence to ash — now!"

"Understood! Adjusting coordinates!"

The muzzle of the Cosmic Bolt trained itself upon the profane abomination.

In moments, the contamination source would be eliminated. As it always had been.

No. As it had to be.

I had gained a new body, yet I had no room to examine it.

Thinking my energy reserves were nothing to worry about had been a complete misjudgment. A staggering amount of energy was draining out of me in real time.

It couldn't be helped. In King of Monsters form, the sensory range of my auxiliary organs had expanded to a monstrous degree — wide enough to monitor a full third of the Saintopia 02 continent beneath my feet.

On top of the energy consumption, I barely held my mind together beneath the torrent of information. I cut away everything useless and focused solely on the Cosmic Bolt descending through the planet's atmosphere.

Finally, I sent a message to the kids through my Monster's Tentacles.

[Zzzu zzu-zzu zzu (Everyone, get clear on your own!)]

Mother of the Sky would surely understand what I meant. No — she had to.

Sorry, kids — but if I let my focus slip even a little, I felt like I'd collapse on the spot. There was no room to spare for anything else.

And then, at last, the moment came.

As though time itself had slowed, the Cosmic Bolt descended upon this place with terrible patience. The sky split, the air trembled, and the earth beneath my feet heaved.

In that frozen, syrup-slow spacetime, I lifted my head toward the heavens.

God's Whip!

Along my blacker-than-night back, the lined pipes lit up gold one after another. A wave of gold surged up my long throats.

The instant the light passed through the Monster's Tentacles and reached my gullets—

Through me, god swung the rod of punishment.

It was lightning — and yet it looked like hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of gossamer heat rays fused into a single strand.

What mattered was this: that lightning-like heat ray erupted from three separate points at once.

Black flame descending to burn the ground collided head-on with golden lightning blazing in glory.

And in that instant—

The sky tore apart.

No metaphor — the planet's atmosphere was genuinely being ripped open. The collision between the lightning fired from three heads and the Cosmic Bolt had birthed a shockwave of staggering magnitude.

The clouds vanished, and in a sky where the magnetic field warped in grotesque patterns, an aurora bloomed out of nowhere. Alongside the freak weather, dozens of fire whirls spiraled down from the heavens to the earth.

The ground I stood on shuddered as if in an earthquake, and the river boiled away at ferocious speed. For kilometers in every direction around me, the trees burst into flame all at once.

Ugh—!

Adult form, King of Monsters, and on top of that God's Whip charged with the power of the Thunder God.

I'd thought this much would be enough. It was not nearly enough. Even as I vomited lightning, I gauged my remaining energy.

Three minutes at best!

Psionium's effect wouldn't wear off, but King of Monsters and God's Whip were another matter. The instant my energy reserves hit bottom, both would cancel.

Just a little longer!

Little by little — ever so slowly — my lightning began to push back the black fire of the Cosmic Bolt. Push just a bit harder here, and the Imperial Mothership would overload and be forced to abort the strike.

I thought I only needed to hold out a little longer — and then dozens of heat rays rained down on me from the sky.

The carrier squadron!

I'd been too focused on the Cosmic Bolt to notice, but at some point the Cult warships had filled the heavens. The fleet under the Mothership's command had come to support it, having realized it was locked in battle with me.

Splitting my attack to hit them is impossible!

Perhaps thanks to King of Monsters' effect, their heat rays failed to deal me a mortal wound. It hurt, unquestionably — but I could endure it.

The problem was that the unending barrage made it genuinely hard to keep my focus.

There has to be a way… ah!

When a good idea suddenly surfaced, I ran the numbers on my remaining energy.

It's possible!

Even while sustaining God's Whip, I had a means of swatting those bothersome gnats of warships. The only cost was shaving a little time off King of Monsters' duration.

My Monster's Tentacles stirred at my will. With three heads, the tentacles growing from my rear crest and necks had manifested at three separate points.

Which means I can fire Psychic Breath in three directions too.

I had never once bothered to control the direction of my Psychic Breath before. There had never been any need.

The only constraint was maintaining focus — the direction itself, I judged, could be steered.

The one problem was that I'd never actually tried it.

I hated having to gamble yet again, but there was no choice.

If I fell here, it was total annihilation. Now — now was the moment to throw the die.

The pipes that had blazed gold moments ago now flashed violet. Much like God's Whip, the purple light climbed from the tips of my tail upward, pipe by pipe.

All the while I strained to aim my Monster's Tentacles toward the targets. Controlling the tentacles on three heads simultaneously was anything but easy.

Had Amorph's ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠extraordinary senses not come to my aid, I would have failed outright — the task was that delicate. Blood trickled unbidden from my eyes and mouths, and I ignored it.

Pain like my brains burning alive closed in around me — but at last, I succeeded. The Monster's Tentacles obeyed my command and trained themselves on the direction of the enemy fleet.

That's it!

The tentacles, drinking in every drop of violet psionic power, swayed smooth and fluid as a conductor's baton.

Before the dragon heads that breathed lightning in time with the baton, violet spheres rose into being.

Even in the past, my Psychic Breath had been sizable — but now, scaled to a body exceeding two hundred meters, their size was staggering.

Perhaps sensing the very pinnacle of psionic power I had forged, the enemy warships began scrambling to retreat.

Where do you think you're fleeing to!

The dragons' breath lashed out at their retreating tails. Where the violet heat rays, reaching kilometers across, grazed the ships, nothing remained but massive detonations.

The ships beyond my heat rays' range fled swiftly beyond the planet's atmosphere. Those that couldn't make it fell to the earth as rain of molten alloy.

Two minutes left at best — no, maybe one?

Having driven off the fleet, I poured every last shred of focus into sustaining God's Whip.

With my energy reserves nearly at the bottom, my vision blurred. The arms and legs that held my massive frame steady went weak and trembled.

Only the auxiliary organs beneath my jaws — my companions through every life-or-death struggle — kept reporting my energy consumption, over and over.

Come on—!

With one last scream of a roar, I unleashed everything.

And perhaps that was what did it.

The Cosmic Bolt, descending to annihilate all in its path—

The black heat ray spanning hundreds of meters in radius flickered like a dying lightbulb — and then simply ceased to exist.

The way an imugi sheds its serpent form and ascends into a dragon, my lightning soared skyward without a single obstruction in its path.

And then, high in the heavens, a second sun rose.

The moment I confirmed it was the final flare of the Imperial Mothership, annihilated by God's Whip, I slipped into darkness.