As the blood falling on his face entered his faulty circuits, Hikmar could feel the energy surging through his body. It was quite strange that even the blood of this creature named Volem could be used as fuel.
The old cybernetic, his face drenched in blood, looked at the four-armed creature with eyes filled with rage. This horned creature had a more feminine body compared to the massive entity on the road. In fact, from one perspective, it could even be called womanly.
As the horns on its head extended like antennas, it pointed its weapon at Hikmar. Smoke was still rising from it.
"What do you think you're doing?" Hikmar snapped in anger. "Do you have any idea what kind of living being you've killed?" As soon as he stepped onto the sand, the creature spoke.
"Don't you dare take another step…" it said in a woman's voice. But this sounded less like the voice of a young woman and more like that of a witch from ancient ages. A dull, dangerous woman's voice. Yet, strangely, this voice didn't seem to sprout from the creature's vocal cords and leave its mouth; it felt as if it were communicating directly with the brain through signals. "…if you take one more step, I will be forced to fire my weapon. And if you don't find my weapon sufficient, my friend Epra on the road will pounce on you in an instant. Don't let his distance lull you into complacency; he has a speed far beyond what his size suggests."
"Epra, is it… You have names, so it seems you aren't as primitive as you look."
"Do we look primitive? I wasn't aware of that. First, let me introduce myself. My name is Hogna; I am here as the Azt of this friend of ours. And this Veg friend of mine is Epra, a formidable warrior. We are Dermovox…"
"I am Hikmar…"
"Pleased to meet you, Hikmar. You were able to talk to that creature. How? Even though I heard its language, I couldn't perceive much. That was a conversation beyond even my Azt abilities…"
"I wasn't aware I had any responsibility to give you an answer," Hikmar said. "I'd prefer to keep such information to myself."
"Unfortunately… unfortunately, I cannot allow that. I cannot change your mind, but I hope the Holy Shepherd can. That is why I want to take you to him. Will you accompany me and my friend?"
"And if I don't consent to such a thing…"
"We would have to take you by force."
"If you want my consent, I want you to tell me why you killed this creature."
"I cannot tell you anything without the Holy Shepherd's permission, dear Hikmar. For the love of Fuag, please do not question it."
"Those might be the last words to say to a scientist," Hikmar said. "Don't question, eh?" He paused for a moment. "I don't think so!"
He reached his hand toward the ground below the road. His staff, which generated the energy shield, suddenly rose from where it was embedded and flew into Hikmar's hand. Hikmar activated the staff's energy shield and lunged at Hogna with the speed from his cybernetic legs; bullets fired in succession struck the shield and fell to the ground.
At that moment, Hikmar noticed a shadow over his head. The Veg on the road had flown across meters to reach Hikmar with a single leap. It even used both hands as sledgehammers, delivering a powerful blow to Hikmar's energy shield.
The energy shield held, provided it drew a heavy charge of energy from Hikmar's body… But with the Veg named Epra standing right in front of him, it seemed unlikely he could get close to the Azt named Hogna.
Azrak was vomiting blood uncontrollably. Not just the blood he vomited, but the blood flowing from his bullet-riddled body was painting the asphalt of the road the color of gore. If a cybernetic began to lose blood instead of simple mechanical fluids, it truly meant the end was near.
It was, of course, Jul who pulled him from the metal barricade he was impaled on. With the massive creature suddenly leaping toward Hikmar, Azrak could breathe easy for a moment. But he couldn't give up. While Hikmar fought that giant monster, he couldn't hide or flee. Of course, he didn't know Volem had been killed. Therefore, he still thought the mission could be completed, that the mission was still ongoing.
He took his throbbing head between his hands and began to squeeze it to calm the pain. But this didn't seem likely to help much.
Jul grabbed Azrak by the leg and dragged him across the ground toward one of the metal armors. Moving through a group of corpses in metal suits, Jul searched for a module that was still intact. Inside one of the armors, an energy module sat undamaged. Jul pulled it out and injected it into Azrak's body. Then, Jul performed several quick welds to reduce Azrak's blood loss.
The headache and blood loss were receding… He could see the world a bit more clearly now. But from the sounds he heard, he realized Hikmar was in danger.
"Jul!" Azrak shouted. "Can you inject the energy capsules from these metal armors into me? Yes, I want you to inject all of them. Yes… I know… my body can't store that much energy. But with a burst of instantaneous power, maybe I can take down that damn creature. Don't worry… I'm a hunter. And that creature is nothing more than prey when it's alone. I can easily tear it apart."
After two fists slammed into his energy shield, Hikmar took the opportunity to drop the shield and, spinning his staff, delivered a sharp blow to the creature's abdomen. The strike was powerful, especially with the energy circuits at the tip of the staff amplifying it. But the creature hadn't budged.
"Your efforts are in vain…" Hogna had said. "…please accept my offer and…"
"…and do what? Come with you like a damn prisoner? No! You are them! You are our friends who have been following us from the west."
"So you noticed us beforehand!"
"Yes… we noticed! But what I don't understand is why you helped us? You killed those cannibals, didn't you?"
"Yes, we killed those cannibals. But those cannibals were there to protect you from us. The cannibals were your friends."
"Nonsense!"
"No, it's the truth… After killing those cannibals, we retreated, thinking we would draw too much attention. The damn cannibals are settled everywhere here. They gave us quite a hard time… But they weren't exactly of sound mind anyway."
"Were those cannibals on our side? Damn it… that changes everything," Hikmar said, stroking his chin with his hand.
At that moment, thunder roared with great fury… No… that was the sound of an overloaded engine, and it was coming from the road.
Suddenly, something fast enough to pass through the lightly drizzling raindrops slammed into the creature named Epra. Epra hadn't seen the blow coming, hadn't noticed it.
Azrak was in front of Epra, his body overflowing with energy. He was going to exceed his speed limits and unleash the death machine within.
He threw a punch at the creature's stomach… then another, and another… By the time the creature noticed the first punch, he had already landed four. As the punches rained down on the creature's abdomen, sparks flew from its skin. Furthermore, stray electricity emanating from Azrak's energized body was splashing everywhere.
Four punches per second wasn't enough. He increased his speed… 5 punches per second… 6 punches per second… No, 10 punches per second… He was so fast that his metal components began to wear down, and his body began to feel pain. He continued to land punches while screaming in agony.
Azrak noticed something then. When he stopped punching and looked at his hand, he realized that it wasn't the creature's armor that was wearing away, but his own hands. His metal fingers were gone; his hand was almost flat. When Epra reached out to grab Azrak, he moved away with a speed bordering on teleportation; with the momentum he gained, he delivered a kick to Epra's head.
A kick to the head, a punch to the back, a kick to the face, a punch to the skull, a kick to the leg joints, a shoulder tackle to the creature… While each of these happened within seconds, the only things visible were the spreading electricity and the flickering images of the cybernetic.
"Come here!" Hogna shouted.
At that moment, Jul emerged from the shadow of the rock where he had been hiding and glided hesitantly toward Hogna. A cold shiver ran through Hikmar. Hogna was talking to Jul. No—it wasn't even talking. There was no language, no sound. It was as if a frequency had been caught, the meaning injected directly into the mind.
When Hogna took Jul into his palm, Azrak stopped moving.
"Please stop!" he cried out. "Don't do anything to him!"
The Dermovox named Epra pressed his heavy foot onto Azrak's back. Sand filled the space between metal and flesh. Azrak's voice grew muffled, but it didn't break.
"Please…" he said, even with his mouth full of sand. "Don't hurt him… Hikmar, please… do something."
Hogna tilted her head slightly. "Is this man… your friend?" she asked.
Hikmar looked at Azrak out of the corner of his eye. Azrak couldn't understand this silence. Silence was sometimes heavier than betrayal.
"If you demand that this drone lives," Hogna said with calm certainty, "we can accept it in exchange for you coming with us of your own accord."
The silence stretched. One heartbeat. Another.
"Hikmar?" There was wonder in Azrak's voice now. "Why… why are you just standing there?"
Silence.
"What nonsense are you talking, man!" Azrak shouted. The words falling from his sand-filled mouth were wounded. "Do something!"
As Hikmar walked toward Hogna with heavy steps, Hogna signaled with her hand for the triggered Epra to stop. Hikmar climbed the small hill with heavy steps and looked at the drone in Hogna's hand for a long time.
"Can you control that drone?" Hikmar asked Hogna.
"In a way…"
"There is something that has been gnawing at me, bothering my mind since we set out on this journey. This drone's movements are very familiar to me. I wonder… I wonder if I could ask you to ask if it is a VFA-210?"
"What the hell is a VFA-210, man! Please… please stop this nonsense and save my Jul," Azrak said in a pleading tone. He tried to free himself from the foot of that creature on his back, but he sank even further into the sand.
"He says yes…" Hogna said. "He says he is a VFA-210 model."
"Damn it!" Hikmar said, rubbing his temples. "Back in the day, when Dante Shade arrived with those drones, we all knew they were more parasites than assistants. Damn it! We've been watched from the very beginning!"
"What are you saying, man?" Azrak asked.
"These drones weren't just assistant drones. They were given to Shade and most members of his team because they acted as overseers as well as assistants. They were drones expert in data collection, analysis, and most importantly, directing the person they assisted. Where they came from was a mystery. But now I see and understand that the VFA-210 was alien technology."
"What does that even mean?"
"John Crowrift was watching us with this damn drone. Not just that, he was constantly manipulating you. He was turning you into a machine that was loyal to this mission and didn't question anything. This… this drone is your parasite, dear Azrak!"
"No! He is my friend!"
"Then let me ask you a question! Do you remember how you met Jul? No! You didn't find him! He found you! This wasn't a coincidence because nothing is a coincidence!"
"Just like you finding me, right? You're a parasite too! Then admit it, wise Hikmar! Admit that you're a parasite who entered my life for your own interests!"
"If I admit it, will you give up on Jul?"
This question echoed repeatedly in Azrak's mind. "I… I can't live without him! Damn it! What are you saying! Don't be ridiculous! Don't touch him! If you touch him, I'll kill you!"
"No, I won't kill him, but I can neutralize him. Never to be opened again!"
"Don't you dare lay a hand on him!"
"Don't you understand? Look how he has blinded you! This damn friend of yours is nothing more than a camera following you. John Crowrift was doing everything in his power for Volem to reach the delivery point. Just as he was the one who hired Labiba, he was the one who hired us. Doesn't it seem quite normal that he would want to follow us?"
"He needed transport guards for this mission. But how could he trust those transport guards? If he could follow one of them, if he could enter their mind and control them, that was perfectly possible." Hikmar gripped his right hand, which was trembling with rage. "Did it never make you suspicious that this damn Jul could only talk to you? A parasite that can only live with you, only talk to you, where your thoughts always align. You wanted to get rid of him at first, so how did you become so attached? How can a human become attached to a parasite?"
A moment of silence. After standing with an angry gaze for a while, Azrak began to speak word by word, gritting his teeth.
"I tried to save you. I could have run away from here. I could have left you to die."
"Thank you, but…"
"But you want to silence my friend!" Azrak said. "You lowly man!"
"If you don't want to die, as I said, I can silence him."
"To hell with you, you damn bastard!" Tears were flowing from his eyes as he continued to writhe on the sand. "May my name be a curse upon you, old man! Curses upon the day I saw you as a sage, as a teacher! If I am to fall with him, I am willing! If I am to die with him, let it be so! Because I would rather die with him than live with you."
Hikmar took Jul from Hogna's hand. He could still put him to sleep and keep Azrak alive. Even if he continued to live as a parasite, he could do nothing more than sit on Azrak's back. But… but from what he could see, Azrak's mind was already gone.
As Hikmar crushed Jul between his two hands, Azrak was shivering as he passed away. When Jul was shattered, Azrak lay lifeless on the sand.
"He sacrificed his own life for a parasite," Hogna said. "Humans are very strange creatures."
"Yes… we are… especially after becoming half-machine, we became even stranger," Hikmar said. He dropped the pieces of Jul to the ground and knelt down. "It was too much emotion for one day."
"Yes, Hikmar… it certainly was, but we need to set out, assuming you will come of your own accord," Hogna said. "The Holy Shepherd will definitely want to see you."
Hikmar looked at Azrak's lifeless body for a long time. A young life had been silenced pointlessly on the sands. His eyes remained open; as if he still wanted to say something, but his words could no longer reach anywhere. Hikmar hadn't sensed a single bad intention in him since the beginning of the journey. Neither ambition, nor betrayal, nor calculation… there was only blind loyalty and a painful hope in that young man.
Now, all that good intention had scattered like grains of sand blown by the wind. Hikmar felt a heavy emptiness in his chest; this wasn't the weight of a victory, it was the decay of a choice. What killed him wasn't Jul, it wasn't the parasite… what killed him was the fact that he could still believe.
Hikmar bowed his head. The shadow falling on his face was not from his old age, but from this grief he couldn't carry. Some deaths were the price of war… but some were the very punishment a person fashioned for themselves.
"Where are we going?"
"To Tophak Town… It's far to the north, a bit to the west of here. If we start walking now, we'll only make it by evening."
"Then we still have a little time," Hikmar said.
As the sands began to fill with parasites, Hikmar shouldered Azrak's body and carried it toward the road. Epra and Hogna watched Hikmar with curiosity.
Hikmar lit a small fire. He couldn't bear to see the pieces of flesh remaining on Azrak's body being meticulously removed and eaten by parasites or cannibals, like meat pulled from a crab's leg. He owed this young man at least this much… So he committed Azrak's body to the fire.
As Azrak's body burned in the flames, a priest of Cyoh Katum knelt down and began to pray. Cyoh Katum priests only prayed for machines. But this time, an exception could be made.