"Your body is comfortable to imitate!" the Replicator with Jack's appearance exclaimed, his features distorted into a smile that no normal person could make. All of this only increased the discomfort that Jack himself felt.
"Why your obsession with me?" asked Jack, bending his body slightly, and as his entire being was amplified by the Pneuma, the pressure emanating from his person increased, causing the Replicator to squint his eyes and even take a step back, somewhat worried.
"I don't know why, but when I first saw you, something tugged at me, something about you smelled too good, and I couldn't resist it. Our nature is to devour other lives and chase the taste. Your blood tastes good," the Replicator licked his lips, and even the teeth he possessed became longer, different from Jack's usual appearance.
"This is grotesque in more ways than one," Laria said with much disgust in her tone.
The replicator clicked his tongue and turned his gaze to Laria. A strange emotion appeared in the eyes he was imitating, and even the replicator himself didn't quite understand why his body seemed to react so strongly to Laria.
"Genetic selection? Your genes have selected this woman as optimal for mating! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA", the Replicator laughed, before he raised his axe with ease, as if it didn't carry much weight.
All to protect himself from the sudden attack of Jack, who tried to hit the Replicator with a rather powerful vertical attack, even causing the creature to retreat several steps, somewhat surprised by the increased strength Jack demonstrated with this blow.
In an unspoken understanding, Jack's companions stepped back a bit, not wanting to let their partner fight alone, but letting him take it out on the Replicator in a little 1v1 duel.
Although dangerous, it was obvious that the Replicator was being increasingly cornered by the UNMSO agents, so to avoid any drastic action from the Oddity, they let the lone battle take place, but the four were ready to act.
Besides, fighting against oneself was invaluable if one wanted to get stronger, so this experience was also a way to get stronger for Jack, who wanted to cut this creature down.
All because he dared to look at Laria with a look full of inappropriate obscenity, and his desire to protect her drove him to action. He would never let the Replicator get his hands on his girlfriend, and even though he knew she was strong, he didn't like that disgusting expression at all.
"Are you angry, Agent? Come on! Let me feel your wrath!" Seeing Jack swing his axe at him again, the Replicator raised his axe in defense.
Although he was exhausted and his Pneuma was very depleted, he had superior strength to humans, so he was able to defend himself well. Taking advantage of his proximity to Jack, he kicked forward hard, hitting the man in the stomach.
Jack's feet slipped across the floor, and the blow hurt quite a bit, but he didn't have time to concentrate on that. He moved his body to the side, avoiding a cut from the Replicator, before raising his weapon and aiming directly at the creature.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The three bullets fired by Jack struck the Replicator's body, causing it to lose its balance. Black blood stained the creature's body, but it seemed to have awakened its ferocity.
As Jack approached, after slashing a horizontal cut directly into the Replicator's side, it transformed its hand into small white tentacles that caught the weapon.
"I thought you were going to copy me," sneered Jack, who pulled his weapon back several times, but seeing the Replicator clinging to it, he fired at the oddity again.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The last three bullets from his revolver shattered the tentacles that held his axe in place, but as if the heavy damage did not matter, the Replicator leaped at him with its mouth open inhumanly, as if to bite him with its horrible teeth.
Unable to draw his weapon in time to protect himself, Jack raised his right hand even higher and punched forward with his fist. The wind seemed to whistle from the speed of his blow, and as he struck the creature's jaw, an idea occurred to him.
"Transfer!" Jack shouted, and the Pneuma that reinforced his fist flowed smoothly into the Replicator, reacting strongly with his flesh.
Growl!
The brown skin that had mimicked the oddity began to bubble as a terrible scream came from the mouth of the Replicator, which took several steps backward. With its Pneuma on the ground, the oddity could not fight the invasion of human Pneuma ravaging the inside of its body.
"Pathetic, you imitate me, but you can't do anything I do," Jack narrowed his eyes as he held his axe with both hands, strengthening it.
Ommmmm!
An invisible fluctuation ran through his weapon; it was his Pneuma, making it stronger, sharper, more damaging. With a small reinforcement in his legs, Jack moved quickly towards his enemy, leaving several remnants behind.
He had used a Pneuma technique that allowed him to accelerate his body, all for the attack that was brewing at that moment. His body, in perfect tune and with muscle memory from hours of practice, instinctively executed what Jack felt was the best axe cut he had ever made in his life.
It was a horizontal slash, his whole body spinning together, all his muscles working in unison, transferring the full force of that movement to his weapon, which struck the Replicator's flesh with full force.
Swish!
It was an exquisite cutting sound, not loud, barely audible. It went all the way through the Replicator's body, even though he had raised his fake weapon to protect himself.
It was like sliding a hot knife through butter, his weapon didn't even get stained with the Replicator's disgusting black blood when he did it, it just cut through everything.
Laria, who had been watching Jack's solo battle, raised an eyebrow as she felt the subtle change in her boyfriend's Pneuma. For a moment, her senses seemed to be exposed to thousands of sharp blades, all scattered and disordered, but present.
'Jack is getting pretty close to developing his characteristic,' Laria thought, smiling slightly as she watched the Replicator fall to the ground and split into two.
While it would have been shocking for anyone else to see the image of a loved one suffer like that, it didn't affect Laria, who was used to seeing corpses and was even a bit fascinated by them.
"What a bad mess to see," Irina looked away slightly, not wanting to look at the Replicator.
Since the Replicator had her partner's face, she found the situation distasteful. It only made her worry about the dangers of their missions, something she and her companions were aware of, but avoided talking about as much as possible.
"Relax, it's over." Alexis approached the Replicator, grabbed the lower part of it in his Pneuma hands, and pulled it away from the oddity, preventing the two parts from coming together again.
"Looks like a little blood won't be enough to imitate Jack," Lisa said as she turned her body around, looking for possible surprise enemies or something.
This was a standard procedure they had to follow in such situations. Who said they only had one problem to deal with? Maybe there was another oddity roaming around, waiting for them to let their guard down.
So they were always on the lookout, and this vigilant job fell to her, the one with the best eyesight of the group. The only thing she noticed was the girl Jack had helped at the beginning of the fight, hiding behind a lamppost and looking at this place with interest in her eyes.
Lisa was annoyed by this, but said nothing, though she had a bullet in the chamber of her gun, ready to fire if anything strange happened. Anything could happen on a mission.
They had already dealt with some meddling civilians who interfered with their duties, so she did not doubt that if this girl approached them, she would get a bullet in the head without hesitation, because Lisa would never put her companions in danger.
At Jack's side, he looked at the top half of the Replicator, which for some reason remained in its appearance. Even though half of his face had melted away, revealing his gradually blackening bones, he still had a hideous grin on his face.
"Your blood wasn't enough to mimic you beyond your appearance, but it did let me see a few things about you, Agent. I detected a high level of stress. Does your life as a human cause you stress?" the Replicator asked, causing Jack to close his eyes for a moment.
"I see, it must be hard being everybody's prey, right? Humans are desperate! But at least, because of so many like you who throw their bodies away in the face of the greatest danger, many can live in peace.
I... wanted to live quietly. But sometimes I don't know who or what I am. Am I a human when I imitate humans? Or am I a man-eating, life-destroying monster?" As if sensing that his life was fading away, the Replicator began to ramble, even his form slowly changing back to its prototype.
"Human... have you thought about the purpose of your existence? When I evolved, the first question that came to mind was: Do I have a purpose? You know, I'm going to die not knowing why that was the first question that came to my mind," as he returned to his original form, the Replicator seemed to lose all of its glow.
At that moment, Jack's sixth sense gave him a strong signal, urging him to touch the Replicator's body. He did not know why he should do this, but knowing that his enemy was dead and that the interference with his sixth sense was over, he followed the feeling.
Putting his axe aside, Jack used his dagger to feel around the Replicator's torso, gradually removing the black blood that had pooled on its surface.
Soon, he noticed something strange drawn directly on the skin of the creature, something that took him by surprise. It was a complex enchantment circuit, quite intricate and advanced.
It made the patterns drawn on his axe look like childish doodles. The lines intertwined in strange ways, forming quite efficient patterns, creating a circuit he could vaguely define as 'Changeling'.
"A natural circuit... damn, I never thought I'd see our first natural circuit in a situation like this," Laria, who rarely cursed, couldn't help but blurt out those words as she recognized what Jack had found on the enemy's corpse.
Her words attracted her companions, who came over to watch with interest. Humans had dabbled in the art of enchantment, but the current enchantments could never reach the level of the ancient civilizations.
At the same time, they could hardly be compared to naturally generated spells. It was not that these enchantments gave special abilities to a creature; on the contrary, it was the creature that gave birth to these miracles.
"Redeeming this would give us a hefty bonus..." Irina was already thinking about what to do with the bonus she would get from UNMSO when the circuit was delivered.
"Jack, you need to keep a copy for yourself and learn it; it looks quite useful," Alexis said with a twinkle in his green eyes.
Although he was not an enchanter like his friend Jack, he was a fan of technology, and although he shared the hobby of gunsmithing with Lisa, he was very interested in the things that could be achieved by combining enchantment with technological work.
"Yeah, just by looking at this thing, I already felt that my axe enchantments could be improved by 15%, I never thought..." As Jack was about to talk about enchantments, one of Laria's hands covered his mouth.
"I need to dissect this thing," Laria said, holding her scalpel with her other hand, and with a serious expression on her face, not willing to argue about this matter.
Even though they were teammates, even Jack felt a strong pressure coming from Laria, indicating that the woman was very serious about her desire to dissect this creature.
"Okay, let's let Laria do her thing, help me map out the area, I don't want civilians approaching," Lisa said, causing her teammates to nod.
"We don't want the civilians to think Laria's a psycho," Irina joked, but the smile on her face disappeared when she felt a terrible cold on the back of her neck.
Irina knew that it was Laria's gaze that had made her feel this terrible sensation, so she just waved her hand in the air before running away, making her other companions laugh.
...
"What's on your mind?" Irina asked Jack as they placed yellow ribbons on the street to keep out any civilians who might be interested.
"About the words of that Replicator," Jack didn't hide his thoughts or try to lie to his companion; he was simply open with this topic, because it was unnecessary to hide something like that.
"Oh, you're not the only one, but you know that, with very few exceptions, everything that isn't human is the enemy of humanity, and we can't coexist with them.
We are lucky that the Slimes only eat garbage and that the Bienen support humanity from the very beginning," Irina said simply, but when she saw that Jack seemed to have an uncomfortable expression on his face, she thought better of her words before speaking again.
"Jack, what matters to you is not his words, but the fact that they touched something in you, right? I won't deny it, I felt identified with what he said," Irina lowered her head at that moment, some not-so-good memories came to her mind and disturbed her.
"The meaning of life... thinking about such things always puts people in a bad mood, but sooner or later we all find it. But Jack, don't let your past and our work rule your life, okay?" Irina, somewhat disturbed by some of the things in Jack's story, approached him and put her hand on his arm.
"Don't worry, my vendetta is just a vendetta, my work and duty are important, but they don't rule my life's purpose.
I've never really thought about it before, you know, but I feel like I have an idea of what my life's purpose might be. It's not a goal, like ridding this world as much as possible of the dangers of mankind, or a dream, like enchanting something legendary, it's kind of weird, you know?
I don't even want to grow old with Laria, surrounded by our children and grandchildren. But I feel that the purpose of my life is very simple: I want to live and see more of this world, just that.
Appreciate the world," Jack said with a sigh, but now he had a smile on his face.
"That's a good purpose to live, I can identify with that, can I learn from you?" Irina asked with a smile on her face, acknowledging and accepting the thoughts of her friend, who just shook her shoulders.
"Life is much simpler than what we are exposed to. Sometimes we forget to appreciate the places we visit because of these missions, right? How about we start doing more sightseeing?" Irina asked, making Jack's eyes sparkle with excitement.
"That's a good idea! And who says that one's life can't have several purposes? Even dancing can be one!" Jack, who seemed to have come to a strange realization, raised his voice.
"You just want to dance to happy songs attached to Laria's big butt!" complained Lisa, who approached her companions, followed by Alexis, who laughed.
"That's another good reason to live," Jack smoothly accepted Lisa's words, causing Lisa to roll her purple eyes before looking at Irina.
"You just poisoned that poor boy's mind," Lisa said, pointing an accusing finger at Irina.
"Nonsense! Those thoughts were already in him, I just let them out~" Irina scoffed before suddenly dodging a fist that was about to land on her head.
"Stop fooling around, I already got what I wanted," said Laria, who suddenly appeared a few centimeters away from where Irina was standing.
In one of her hands was a piece of Replicator skin with the natural circuitry on it. Jack was the first to approach and observe, not caring about the strangeness of the situation, as he was already used to Laria's peculiarities.
"Look what a beauty we have here," Jack blurted out unconsciously, and his sixth sense told him that his companions were looking at him, but he played the fool; only if he was embarrassed would he lose.
"Truly a miracle," Jack continued, feeling a strong admiration for nature and the inherent workings of the world.
While it was true that many things in the world were dangerous to humans, as if they hated them, there was no denying how amazing the things that happened in it could be.
To Jack, the natural circuit that had formed in the Replicator's skin was an example of those wonders and those landscapes worth appreciating. Coupled with the fact that enchantment was something he really liked, Jack's emotions ran high.
"Do you want to take it?" Laria's question brought Jack out of his stupor, and he could only shake his head before turning away from the bloody skin Laria was holding, who seemed a little sad that Jack refused.
"Okay, let's put this thing away, Alexis, lend me one of your sealed boxes for now," Laria requested, causing Alexis to nod.
"By the way, we notified UNMSO and the police. The Replicator must have done some damage before we got here," Alexis commented, making his companions' mood a little worse.
"Damn things," muttered Lisa.
"At least we got here early and didn't let it get any bigger," Irina said, and those words were the best consolation for them, who had to see similar cases all the time.
When the police officers arrived and the situation of the buildings near the fight was explored a little more, Irina's words made more sense, because in one of the buildings there had been a massacre caused by the Replicator, leaving only small identifiable remains of each of its victims.
Had they arrived too late, this situation would have been repeated in the other building where this creature was when the UNMSO field agents arrived, which was undoubtedly the best scenario in this horrible situation.
Now that this mission was finally over on their first night in this city, and knowing that they would have no more missions for a while, why not explore and appreciate the hidden surprises of this beautiful city?
Especially the Ballrooms!