2771 Enemy Within (Part 1)

Vastor already needed every ounce of willpower he could muster to keep the Chaos ravaging his body in check and he also had to change Grimbark's attack pattern from time to time.

The children knew nothing about strategy and repetitive attacks were bound to fail against a smart opponent.

'Shit, shit, shit!' Almost as if it had a mind of its own, Vastor's Abomination half went on a rampage, requiring more of his focus and slowing his casting speed down.

The Wendigo focused his cold aura on his body. Without the water element or world energy, he couldn't emit Chilling Wail on the outside but he could still manifest it through physical contact.

The Grendel pushed his blood core to the extreme, infusing his spring-like muscles with the Blood Maelstrom to perform a lightning-fast attack. Much to Vastor's surprise, the Chiropteran jumped back and took the sky.

He had no need for air magic to fly, his large membranous wings more than enough to support his weight thanks to the inhuman strength that undeath bestowed upon him.

"What the?" Zogar Vastor noticed too late that all the undead but Dervalos had jumped back, leaving the Blood Warlock free to unleash the energy stored by Blood Tide.

The blast caught the Master point-blank, without giving him the time to formulate a plan or conjure a Spirit Barrier.

Vastor let his grip on the Abomination side go, to use it as a shield again and gain the focus he needed to counter the follow-up attack that he knew would come after the blast.

Yet the Chaos suddenly stopped its rampage, suddenly as calm as a tame mare.

'Seriously? What the fuck?' Vastor's now pink human skin took the Blood Tide in full, not one single centimeter of his body was spared from the conflagration.

He used darkness fusion to block the pain and exploited the extra focus to conjure the Spirit Barrier. Just as he expected, the Grendel, the Chiropteran, and the Wendigo jumped at him while Vastor was still in mid-air, propelled by Blood Tide.

His black and violet eyes were boosted by Full Guard which coupled with his rich battle experience granted him the ability to anticipate the trajectory of the incoming attacks.

He used that awareness to focus his mana where the undead were about to strike, hardening the Spirit Barrier solely where necessary.

Alas, it wasn't enough.

Cunning, battle experience, and power weren't enough against the enemy within.

The Abomination side turned from a tame mare to a frenzied bronco, covering his skin in a single instant and almost devouring him.

Vastor needed all of his willpower to resist the onslaught. He succeeded, but in the process, he lost control of the Spirit Barrier that shattered upon impact.

The Grendel's claws crashed through the emerald wall and cut deep into his throat. They severed his jugular vein and carotid artery, stopping only against the bones of his spine.

The Chiropteran severed the tendons of Vastor's wrists and legs. Quomar knew that he couldn't cut the bones with the strength left after overpowering the barrier, but a paralyzed opponent was a dead opponent anyway.

The Wendigo channeled his frost aura into his fingertips so that when his claws stopped against the Master's sternum and ribcage, the cold still reached his heart, freezing it.

Resnian's claws weren't long enough to pierce through the organs but they still managed to puncture both the heart and the left lung.

'Even if he's an Awakened, he can't breathe anymore. This guy is fucked.' The Wendigo thought as a huge grin appeared amid the white fur on his face. 

At the same time, Dervalos was conjuring his strongest Blood Spell, Cursed Life.

The other three undead jumped back in unison, expecting the blackness to counter attack them like it had done to the Wendigo upon the first clash, and they were right.

The blood spraying from Vastor's severed throat turned black and instead of moving like a liquid it coalesced into a gel that stuck the countless drops together and proceeded to reattach the severed flesh.

The violet light in Vastor's right eye turned white as his mana core faded. His short, plump body grew taller and leaner, sporting thick long hair on his head.

"Dad, help!" Frey's voice reached the battlefield as the undead were getting closer to pry open the Dominator armor. The defensive barrier grew weaker by the second and even Davross couldn't hold forever while spread over twice its intended size.

Yet the thing that had replaced Vastor didn't seem to mind, his lips curling up in a savage smile.

Dervalos unleashed Cursed Life and the smile grew wider.

The Blood Spell used the water aspect to slip inside every nook and pore of its victims, fire to burn them, earth to tear them apart, air to cut them open, darkness to eat their essence, and light to fasten its own spreading.

The Abomination just opened his palms, sealing the red tide inside his hands before consuming it with a shiver of pleasure. Blood Magic was akin to Spirit Magic, but filled with life force and blood from the victims of the Blood Warlock.

The perfect nourishment for an Abomination willing to turn into an Eldritch.

Meanwhile, inside Vastor's mind, the Professor of the White Griffon stood in front of the root of all his trouble.

"Nice to see you again, old man." The young Abomination born from Vastor's tissues and the samples collected from his hybrid children said. "So nice of you to be stupid enough to believe that you had gotten rid of me so easily."

Just like during their first battle inside the gene tank, Vastor's Abomination half had taken the appearance of his dream self whereas the Master looked no different from his physical body.

The Vastor-Abomination grabbed the still-stunned Professor by the throat and lifted him from the ground, choking and hurting him as if their standoff was taking place in the real world instead of the Mindscape.

"It was really arrogant of you to believe to have vanquished me for good. I'm still a part of you. You can't get rid of me unless you take your own life. Maybe not even then. After all, how can you kill someone who's already dead?"

While the Abomination laughed with joy, drinking the intoxicating feeling of having finally taken over Vastor's body, the undead assassins regrouped and strategized.

"Fuck, we never considered that Vastor could be an Awakened. We killed him just to turn him into an Abomination." Resnian the Wendigo said.

"We can't go away like that." Dervalos grunted. "His equipment still bears his imprint and we can't take the kids while offering our backs to a hungry monster. Newborn Abominations are vicious."

Everyone nodded at his words.

"Yet they are also weak and magicless." Quomar the Vampire said. "They are even weaker to darkness magic than us and there's no one who can use darkness element like us undead."

At the same time, in the Mindscape, the confrontation between clone and original Vastor continued.

"This makes no sense. We've already fought and I won. I absorbed you." Vastor half spoke and half gasped due to the choke.