The Mecha-Kai Species During Dimensional Travel

Staring at the intruder's appearance, he was lost.

Those inorganic golden eyes devoid of any emotional color stared straight at him, the various cracks on the skin and the face lacking any sign of life gave the impression that this was merely a puppet.

Chard, who often studied magic by contacting different lifeforms, was certain that the other party did not fall under the category of [organism], yet in a sense, they could still be considered [life]?!

But what confused him most was the halo atop that head.

What was that?

He could only confirm that the other party was definitely not [human].

But if not human, what was it? Puppets didn't move on their own. Could it be some [magic] effect, controlling a puppet to fight?

Chard wanted to ask, but there was no more time to think about such things.

He knew he was about to die, casually slain by an unknown powerful existence.

Among demons, strength reigned supreme; being killed by a powerful being didn't breed any resentment for a demon.

But for Chard, he still had his conviction—he had yet to create that most satisfying masterpiece of his.

One of the large horns on his head had snapped from the impact, and his mask was shattered, revealing a face covered in blood, making him look even more ferocious.

Tap, tap...

That human walked toward him again, this time deliberately slowing his pace, as if mocking him.

But Chard didn't understand the meaning behind this human's action.

He only knew that the other had intentionally left him an opening.

A cornered beast still fights, let alone a demon.

To complete that masterpiece, Chard now had no chance to gather more materials.

So now, in this space, the only unused material left was one thing.

A living demon.

Yes, knowing he had absolutely no chance of survival, Chard chose to use himself as the material.

"Fusion Magic!"

A magic circle appeared beneath Chard's lower body.

Black energy surged from the array, first enveloping his own flesh.

Then, this energy spread across the ground, wrapping up the remaining corpses of various creatures, dragging them all into the magic circle to merge with Chard's body.

Throughout the entire process, Xiu Er made no move to interfere.

He just stood there, his golden eyes filled with streams of data.

It didn't take long before the mass wrapped in black energy completed its shaping and fused into Chard's final creation.

A body with no animal features, identical to Chard's original appearance, appeared above the magic circle.

The next second, it opened its pitch-black eyes without whites, looking down at the waiting Xiu Er...

Chapter 17: Test Ends, The One Noticed

Takuson dodged the dive of that enormous monster.

But the massive impact that followed still sent him flying some distance, eventually making his face intimately acquainted with the ground.

He quickly scrambled up, spitting out the dirt forced into his mouth.

The good news was that the monster, due to its excessive speed, had slammed itself into the earth and couldn't pull itself out for a while.

This made Takuson's next task much easier.

Watching the enormous monster, now a pincushion of light spears, gradually turn to ash, Takuson wiped the sweat from his forehead and found a sturdy tree to lean against and rest.

"This monster this time was really unusual. Apart from its brain, it was stronger in every way than what I've faced before, though still no match for that demon named 'Zera'."

In truth, dealing with large monsters like this wasn't Takuson's first time.

Plus, after fighting that mountain-sized demon, he had plenty of experience with large enemies.

He'd had his own plan for hunting that giant monster just now, but he never expected it to be stupid enough to crash itself into the ground.

That saved Takuson a lot of time.

But he still felt something was off about that monster, as if...

"As if it was completely unfamiliar with its own body, unable to control it at all."

Takuson pinched his chin, staring at the spot where the monster's corpse had long since vanished.

Oh well, it wasn't dangerous anyway.

Shaking off the unnecessary worries, Takuson brushed away the dust that had clung to him during the fight.

After straightening his clothes, he called out to the empty air beside him:

"Teacher, is the test finished?"

As for why he did it that way, it was naturally because that was how it had always been done.

"[Notification] Test complete. Congratulations, you passed."

A voice identical to Xiu Er's but far colder rang out, and a blue-violet figure emerged from the woods behind Takuson.

"Oh, it's Teacher's doppelganger."

Recognizing it wasn't the real person, Takuson felt a twinge of disappointment.

If you asked him how he could tell the difference between the original and the doppelganger, it was naturally by [feeling].

In his words, although Teacher's own speech was cold, it still carried a hint of emotion or something else, while the doppelganger was purely cold—whether in speech or action, it only mechanically completed tasks.

Takuson had asked Xiu Er about this, and her explanation was, "It has no self-awareness, only basic intelligence."

He didn't understand what this so-called "intelligence" meant, and Xiu Er didn't elaborate, so he simply understood Teacher's doppelganger as a puppet controlled by Teacher herself.

It had to be said, in a sense, that was indeed the case.

"Doppelganger sister, where is Teacher right now?"

"[Answer] The Commander Unit is currently located 1,934.5 meters southwest, at a depth of 276.8 meters underground."

"Uh..."

"Can you... say it in a way I can understand?"

Hearing the doppelganger's response, Takuson felt a bit speechless.

He knew what "Commander Unit" meant—it was what the doppelgangers called Teacher's main body.

But every time he wanted to ask about his teacher's location, he had to ask again to get a simplified answer.

Xiu Er's doppelganger blinked once.

"[Correction] The Commander Unit is currently beneath the first cave to the southwest."

"Oh, okay, tha—"

"[Addition] Please move ten steps backward to avoid high-risk energy."

"Huh?"

The ground beneath his feet began to tremble violently, as if something was about to erupt from underground.

Before Takuson could react, "Xiu Er" grabbed him by the collar and tossed him backward.

Boom—!!!

The moment he landed, a blinding white light engulfed his original position, shooting straight into the sky.

"Enemy attack?"

Though he didn't understand the situation, months of habit kicked in, and he immediately entered a combat stance.

"[Negation] This is merely an attack from the Commander Unit, named 'Extinction Angel: Cannon Crown.'"

"Huh, you mean that attack was Teacher's?"

"[Affirmation]"

"Whoa, as expected of Teacher."

If this were a scene from an anime, Takuson's eyes would probably be full of stars.

Upon learning that the attack was from Teacher, he relaxed his stance, leaving only admiration for Xiu Er in his heart.

After all, Xiu Er rarely showed off her strength in front of him.

And over the past six months, since the main goal was "training Takuson," there naturally weren't many battles.

Whoosh—

A blue-violet figure shot out from the massive hole blasted by the white energy, with countless flying objects trailing behind.

If you looked closely, you'd see that the figure was holding a lump of something black and unrecognizable.

As it swept past, a powerful gust of wind surged out from the hole.

Raising a hand to shield his eyes from the wind, Takuson stared fixedly at the golden trail streaking across the sky like a meteor.

He knew that was the trace left by Teacher.

So fast, couldn't even see clearly—as expected of Teacher!

But what was that thing Teacher was holding?

As Xiu Er swept past Takuson, he barely caught a glimpse of the black, unidentified object in her hand.

She traced a semicircle across the sky before landing back in front of her student.

"Teacher, welcome back."

The moment she landed, she casually summoned "flames" to incinerate the lump of flesh in her hand until nothing remained. With that, the Demon named "Chard" was completely erased from this world.

Though Xiu Er had given him one last chance, and that Demon had indeed lived up to expectations by merging with himself to gain the abilities of nearly all the Monsters in the testing ground.

But as for the result, it only made him Xiu Er's punching bag—under absolute firepower, everything else is just floating clouds.

After all, no matter how you look at it, the other party was only a [Magic User], not a Warrior, and with that cramped space, how could he possibly gain any advantage in close combat against Xiu Er?

He could only be strung up and beaten. Fortunately, among Chard's fusion materials were abilities providing "super regeneration" and various body-strengthening traits.

This allowed Xiu Er to "pummel" the other party to her heart's content while collecting enough data.

She then analyzed, replicated, and saved his magic, "Fusion Magic," into her database, while his body data and various personality habits were recorded in the [Virtual Combat Arena].

As for what exactly happened between that Demon Chard and Xiu Er underground, that remains unknown.

All one can say is that sometimes, having an overwhelming vitality is an extremely painful thing—especially when facing an enemy you cannot defeat.

After finishing all this, Takuson also rushed over to her in a fluster.

His excited expression was just like a child who scored high on a test, eager to show off to his family.

"I passed this Test!"

"Mm."

Without any extra words, Xiu Er just nodded to indicate she understood.

"Uh... no more reaction than that?"

"[Answer] Because I already know the specifics—the 'Doppelganger' is my Eyes; you don't need to report to me specially."

His teacher was always like this, every time saying something that could douse one's enthusiasm.

But he didn't take it to heart—after all, he was long used to it.

And now, there was another, more important matter that caught his attention.

"But Teacher, when did you change your clothes?"

Takuson pointed at the clothes Xiu Er was wearing and asked curiously.