“No, No, No! Noooo!!!!” Kiva repeatedly shouted after a sudden explosion had nearly hit him. “How could this be?!”
The two other scientists who were ready to take him on were unsure what exactly was going on. One moment Kiva had been combining the two nearly dead Drill Rhinos into one so that it could ‘pulverise’ them into submission, yet the very next after surviving a blast Kiva was screaming as if it had hit him.
Yet Kiva was more worried about the consequences of this distraction than his near-death encounter.
The magical combination of the two Drill Rhinos required a set amount of mana to succeed. Any more or less would reduce the optimal abilities of the newly fused monsters. What had happened was that a shot from Stalingrad might have failed to get Kiva, but it had perfectly hit the not yet fully formed monster.
Kiva had imbued it with a shield strong enough to deflect any attacks the two scientists in front of him should have been able to use, but the shield had not been enough to counter the explosive force. In fact, the shell nearly killed not only Kiva but also the two scientists in its vicinity. Ayse did shout back at Wolte in the System Channel for not being careful enough.
In essence, that explosive form of energy had affected the quality and quantity of mana given during fusion, resulting in a definite deformity of the Drill Rhinos. Usually, Kiva would not care for failures as he treated most of his specimens as dirt anyway. But right now, it was crucial for his survival and pride when the entirety of the Royal Guards (Not to mention Stolas) was looking at him.
Since his perfectly fused Drill Rhinos was no longer achievable, he decided to mix up the whole combination to make up for any possible defects it might have.
The Ravenous Lord continued to chant magical words furiously in his Raven Head form as he opened his bag and threw various other specimens into the mix like the Bat Bottleflies and Lion Mantis.
“Now he is just mashing all the various monsters into one. There’s no elegance in his current chimaera…” Weslie commented, and Kiva stared at her angrily.
“SHUT UP! YOU DO NOT HAVE TO TELL ME THAT! If not for your friend! You would have seen the masterpiece of my creation!!” Kiva shouted as he feared that even the new abomination might not be able to win against the two scientists, especially after he had seen what power their personal arsenal held.
“Unless… Unless…” Kiva was a little hesitant but knowing that if he lost this battle, King Baal could possibly remove him from his position permanently. Then all his future plans would remain dreams. There was no way for redemption when since his units had failed repeatedly. The very same units that had brought victory after victory since their inception.
Maybe the enemies got lucky in the first try since the Bat Bottleflies were not complete products. However, Moloch and his team of rag tags not only defeated his batches of Lion Mantis but annihilated them with ease despite the enhancement given by the crown. He started to feel that the crown was not as omnipotent as he conceived it to be.
Thus, his only way out was to redeem the failures by winning against the enemy… or the very least die valiantly trying.
“Screw this!” Kiva thought to himself and loudly chanted a forbidden verse of magic which added himself into the fusion process. Weslie tried to intervene by shooting at him, but somehow, even the monster abomination that was being fused was sentient enough to block the attack for his master.
A shade of overwhelming darkness temporarily blinded the people at the scene, and suddenly the fused monster alongside Kiva had disappeared.
———
The System’s alert popped up and stated that an unknown object was flying towards the direction of Stalingrad.
“What, so I am the target?” Wolte squinted his eyes as he automatically aimed his guns towards the flying object and shot everything he had towards it. To his surprise, the flying abomination was agile enough to dodge all projectiles.
“You… This ship…! This ship has been a source of annoyance ever since I saw you emerging out of the waters!” Kiva shouted. He had completely fused with the various chimaeras to become the possibly ultimate monster he had ever created. His fear of fighting was now overpowered by the multiple aggressive instincts inhabited within the abomination.
He had been unaware whether it could work and even if it did Kiva had been worried if he could maintain his sanity with the minds of the various monsters getting connected to him. Still, he was left with no other chance and decided to take that gamble.
However, he did not know that he merely got lucky. The residual crown energy within him was actually the critical key factor that had allowed him to fuse his entire body together with the rest. Without that, the foregone conclusion would have been him and the rest of his creations dying because of the rejection of too many foreign cells, leaving him to die miserably.
“Pfft! Not as if you were here when I emerged out of the waters.” Wolte said in loudspeaker mode and that stunned Kiva for a moment, providing the old man boat with an attack of opportunity to hurt it. One of the shots splattered his left arm off, and Wolte imagined he scored a good hit.
But the annoying abomination still flew steadily towards the ship…with a new arm replacing the old one in a matter of seconds.
“You can’t be serious. That kind of injury and he could regrow that quickly?” Wolte thought to himself as he maintained his firing while telling the Royal Snakes to prepare for a hijack.
“I’ve always wondered where you’ve hidden, you old fool! I cannot believe you stuck your old arse helping Moloch! By finishing you off, King Baal is bound to reward me heavily!” Kiva laughed as he increased his speed and zoomed towards the ship. “Now come out and face me, old man!”
In less than a few seconds, he hovered right above the ship and smirked. Most of Wolte’s heavy cannons were unable to operate at that distance, and the anti air and anti infantry shots suddenly proved to be useless against the Kiva’s new form.
With the fusion of the Bottlefly and Praying Mantis’ wings, he was finally able to adjust to the speed of the shots and evaded them speedily. “Hahaha! Try as you will, but your new toy is no threat to me. You’ve always boasted about being accepting any duels. Now come out and let me show you MY powers!”
“You have to remember that humans might not be as straightforward as those shells and bullets.” Gan Yang’s voice appeared right behind the boasting Kiva, and he stabbed his dagger into Kiva’s neck despite the metal plates all over his body.
Without a doubt, the Ravenous Lord panicked a little seeing how some human had managed to appear this high into the air and had been able to remain undetected thus far. Ignoring the surprise attack the human made, Kiva quickly turned and slashed him with his Mantis Blade.
Knowing it was a suicide attack, Gan Yang fell to the ground with his body split into two. Nevertheless, knowing that his knife had submerged into the enemy’s body, he was certain he had completed his mission.
