Absolute Cheater - Chapter 500
Chapter 500: Bionics III
Asher stepped into the chamber, and the moment his foot touched the floor, the entire room began to shift.
Metal groaned.
Void energy hissed.
Demonic mana pulsed like a heartbeat.
Something huge was waking up.
The walls peeled open like blooming steel flowers. Thick cables—no, veins—slithered out and merged together in the center of the chamber. The air rippled with heat, cold, and void all at once.
Then a shape lifted itself from the floor.
A monster—massive, unnatural, and wrong on every level.
A chimera.
Not a natural fusion—but a forced creation. Someone had stitched three entirely different types of beings together:
Liquid metal for the body,
Voider essence for the core,
Demonic flesh and limbs fused into the outer frame.
The final result looked like a living nightmare.
Its torso was molten alloy that never stopped shifting.
Its arms were demonic—covered in black armor plates, fingers ending in hooked claws.
And at its center, where a heart should be, was a swirling void so dense the air bent around it like a black sun.
It towered four times Asher’s height, with six eyes burning blue, red, and pitch-black all at once.
It took one step.
The ground cracked.
A second step.
The air vibrated.
Then it let out a sound—a scream mixed with metal scraping, demon roaring, and void whispering all at once. The sound tore chunks of stone from the walls.
Asher stopped walking, tilted his head, and blinked.
“…Okay,” he said. “That’s actually impressive.”
The chimera’s response was immediate.
It launched forward faster than a creature that size should move.
Its right arm—demonic—swung at him, claws slicing the air. The nails were coated in void energy, meaning one touch could erase matter.
Asher raised his hand and caught the strike.
The impact shook the chamber. The floor broke beneath him. The chimera pushed harder, trying to crush him into the ground.
Asher didn’t move.
He pushed back.
The beast stumbled one step, metal skin rippling.
It roared and changed tactics—its liquid-metal torso reshaped, forming massive spikes that shot toward Asher like giant spears.
Asher leaned to the side.
The spikes sailed past, carving trenches in the floor.
The chimera swung its second arm, this one fused with liquid metal, forming a hammer mid-swing. Asher took the blow on his forearm. The hit echoed like a cannon blast, pushing him back half a step.
Asher smiled slightly.
“So you’ve got some force behind you. Good.”
The chimera responded by opening its chest.
The void core flared—
—then discharged a blast of collapsing energy.
The air folded, twisted, then detonated outward.
The blast hit Asher dead-on.
For a normal Second Stage being, it would mean instant erasure.
But Asher slid one foot back, lowered himself slightly… and held his ground.
Void wind ripped past him, tearing the floor apart behind him. Huge chunks of stone vanished into nothing.
Asher’s hair and coat whipped violently, but his expression didn’t change.
When the blast ended, he looked up at the chimera.
“That all?”
The void core pulsed angrily.
The monster lunged again.
This time its movements grew erratic—demonic speed, void distortion jumps, liquid metal reshaping mid-strike. Each hit was strong enough to flatten fortresses. Each attack aimed to overwhelm him from every angle.
Asher activated Crimson Initiate.
Red veins lit under his skin.
The next time the chimera’s claws came down on him, he caught the entire arm, twisted it, and tore it clean off.
Black void blood sprayed across the ground.
The chimera shrieked and stabbed at him with a liquid-metal spike from its other side. Asher sidestepped and punched the spike. The entire liquid arm exploded.
The beast stumbled back, torso rapidly reshaping as it tried to rebuild its lost limbs. The void core pulsed faster, overclocking its regeneration.
Asher activated Bloodlit Dominion.
A red aura filled the chamber, heavy and crushing.
The chimera’s regeneration slowed.
Its metal skin stopped flowing smoothly.
Its demonic flesh warped and cracked.
The void core inside it flickered like a dying star.
Asher walked forward.
Slow.
Calm.
Confident.
The chimera panicked.
It reshaped its entire back into a dozen massive blades and fired them at once. They flew like meteors, screaming through the air.
Asher didn’t dodge.
He raised his hand.
A red wave burst outward—
—and every blade melted mid-flight.
The chimera’s six eyes widened.
It tried to reform its body again, but the Bloodlit Dominion kept suppressing it. It staggered backward, its form destabilizing.
Asher appeared right in front of it.
He grabbed the creature’s chest—the metal, the flesh, the void—everything—by force.
The void core thrashed violently, trying to absorb him.
Asher tightened his grip.
“You’re strong,” he said calmly. “But you don’t know how to fight.”
Asher’s fingers dug into the chimera’s chest—metal grinding, flesh tearing, void energy screaming.
The monster tried to push back, but Bloodlit Dominion kept it pinned like a trapped animal.
Then something changed.
The void core inside the chimera pulsed hard, like a heart being shocked back to life.
A ripple spread through its entire body.
Metal plates tightened.
Demonic muscle bulged.
The void at its center spun faster—no longer unstable, but controlled.
Asher’s eyes narrowed.
“…Oh?”
The chimera’s body stopped collapsing.
Instead, it restructured.
The liquid metal hardened into armor plates.
The demonic limbs snapped back into shape—longer, thicker, reinforced.
A second void core appeared behind the first, forming a twin-core system.
In seconds, the creature evolved—no longer a screaming, chaotic monster.
It took a single step back from Asher, lowering its stance.
Its six eyes focused.
And for the first time…
it moved like a fighter, not a brute.
Asher let go and stepped back, watching with interest.
The chimera shifted its legs, claws curling into a guard stance.
Its liquid-metal arm thinned into a blade, while the demonic arm tightened into a crushing fist.
A new tail of molten steel formed behind it, swinging slowly like a predator ready to strike.
Asher raised one eyebrow.
“Oh,” he said slowly. “So you can fight.”