Chapter 103 – Shurka's Worries.
Mia held his head as he had a headache.
Recharging the many engines at once was tiring enough. Using many skills at once exhausted Mia's mental strength. Overusing his psychic power and psionic abilities increased his brain temperature, which was harmful to his health.
Even though the game did not have an MP system, Mia could tell that for each electric zap consumed at least five to ten percent of his psychic power.
Even he was immune to high temperature, the burning fever almost cooked Mia's brain from the inside. He had not noticed it yet that his head emitted white smoke from the heat.
This was not the smoke of embarrassment like before. It was from the increasing heat within Mia's head.
Mia covered his face with his hands, feeling the coldness of his palm to reduce the stress.
"I'm so tired."
*Mew* (You can't rest yet, Mish. That bastard is still around somewhere.)
*Mrrr* (Drink the potion! Heal yourself!)
"I know."
Mia picked Shurka's healing potion and chugged another mouthful. The medicinal bitterness enveloped his throat as he could feel better. However, the mental exhaustion remained.
Mia discovered that it could only heal his physical injuries, but it did not heal his psychic exhaustion.
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Looking at all unreasonable demands from the game, Mia was on the verge of yelling back at the game system.
"Ugh, I'm done with this game. Once I logged out, I'll throw away my game console."
"What's wrong? Is there something wrong with the game?"
"I wanted to log out, but this game forced me to complete the quest. Now, there's a system warning that I have to log out in an hour, but the button is still disabled. What am I going to do, fail the quest on purpose, so I can rest?"
"The potion doesn't work?"
"Nope. It relates to my psyche. My brain in the real world might have been fried. I have a severe headache at the moment."
"Okay. I'll report this to my uncle and my father about these bugs later. Please hang in there, okay?"
"Thanks, Tama ... Wait, Tama has a father and an uncle?"
*Mrrr?* (Sorry for the interruption. You are talking to someone else.)
"Huh?"
Mia shifted his glance to Tama's eye, "Wasn't I talking to you?"
*Mew* (You're talking to that cyka, not me.)
"…"
Mia shifted his hands and his palm, looking behind him. Shurka was peaking at Mia from behind the pilot seat. As she was naked, Shurka covered her chest with her arms, but she still revealed her smooth shoulders and her skin.
"Err, Mia. Do you have a spare cloth? My shirt and my bras disappeared, and I don't have anything to wear."
Hearing that the girl behind his back did not wear anything, Mia's eyes shifted to the side and glanced at Shurka's naked shoulders. His fantasy ran wild as he turned around with a red face.
'Tama, where is that shirt!?'
*Mrrr?* (How the heck would I know? You threw it away!)
'Is it somewhere around here? Help me look for it.'
*Meh* (Fine. Whatever.)
Both Mia and Tama looked around inside the cockpit. It did not take long for Mia to find the thrown shirt.
As soon as Mia saw the remaining of the shirt, his face distorted in guilt. Acidic liquid from Sebastian corroded Shurka's cloth to the point that it turned into small pieces of dirty napkins and rag.
Without a choice, Mia turned around, "I'm sorry. Aside from what I'm wearing, I don't have a spare cloth."
"O-Okay. It's okay! It's just a game, and we're not in our real body. Getting naked with our game character won't hurt."
"…"
"By the way, what happened? What are you fighting?"
Mia's face grimaced as he recalled that the fight had not ended yet. His banana mode switched to the combat mode once more.
A minute later after Mia had expanded his sense to the limit, he could not find Sebastian anymore. He sighed in relief and turned around to Shurka again. His eyes also sneaked a glance at Shurka's naked shoulders and her covered chest.
"I'm fighting monsters outside the city. Also, I'm on my way back to my faction."
"Your faction?"
"I've joined the mutants."
Shurka was surprised. Although she did not know what it was like being a mutant in-game, she had learned about the history between humans and mutants in this 23rd-century period.
In this age, mutants were about to dominate mankind as they had superior technologies, better physical power, and abundant food supplies. They could also cohabitate with all queen eggs, which they became food factories for the mutants.
A change occurred in the late years before the 24th-century. A mutant race that all humans thought they were extinct in the late 21st-century, the overminds, made their appearance to the public and established a new organization, anti-hydra alliance.
At the same time, spies within all mutant societies caused a civil war among the demi-humans, weakening all their shelters and bases. Many dragonewts switched side, swearing allegiance to the anti-hydra alliance, while the rest fought to the death.
Wars broke out between humans and all mutants around the world, which was deemed as World War III or the Mutant War.
When the dust settled, the coalition between the overminds and mankind seized the victory, and all demi-humans and demi-hydras became extinct from the planet along with all monsters, zombies, queen eggs, and the hydra viruses.
Humanity stole the mutant's technologies and food sources, and they reformed their civilization again with the help of dragonewts and the overminds.
Later on, the overminds committed another genocide, killing all dragonewts, so they could become the lords of the new world. Humans also betrayed the overminds several years later, but that was another story.
Right now, Shurka worried about Mia's future since he had joined the losing side. There was no guarantee that he could change the flow of history here.
"Is it alright? The mutants will eventually lose in the years to come. Wait, how did you join them? Are you a mutant?"
"… Yes. I'm a mutant now. I'm a dragonewt."
"Y-Your getup isn't a cosplay!? How!?"
"My character has been infected with a symbiosis creature. Well, Tama. Say hi to Shurka."
*MYA!* (Hi, cyka!)
"Stop calling her cyka already. Her name is Shurka, not a female dog."
*MEW* (I'm not calling her a dog. I'm calling her a cyka blyat!)
"…"
Shurka tilted her head in confusion.
"What did the kitten say? Where are you keeping your cat?"
"… It's good that you don't know. Let's treat it as a random meowing."
*MEW* (CYKA BLYAT!)
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Zeris One reached the battle site where Prometheus was. Thorn pulled back his controller, astonished by the sight of the giant mech.
"Wow. That thing is huge!"
*Ong?* (Its legs were still on fire, and there are damages on the front hatch. Has Misha just fought something?)
"More or less. Heck, this area is in a mess ... There's a grassland here?"
Thorn observed the ground in this burrow scorpion zone. Instead of the usual dirt and sand, it had transformed into a grassland plateau.
"Sebastian might have been here. Only he can terraform the earth."
*Meow Ong!* (Let's check her condition first. Can we communicate with her?)
"We don't even know her mech's OS signature."
*Meow* (That's troublesome. Let's get out and talk to her.)
"Okay!"
Zeris moved in closer to Prometheus and waved its hands. Thorn also opened his front hatch, shouting at the red beetle mech.
"MISHA! WE'RE HERE TO PICK YOU UP!"
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Mia heard Thorn's voice. He operated his robot to knelt and open the front hatch as well.
Instead of greeting back, Mia shouted, asking his senior for something else.
"THORN, DO YOU HAVE A SPARE CLOTH?"
Thorn frowned, "WHY DO YOU NEED A CLOTH!?"
"I NEED IT FOR MY FRIEND!"
"FRIEND? WHO? I THOUGHT WE ONLY HAVE BRIM IN THE HUMAN'S BASE?"
"I HAVE A FRIEND ON BOARD! SHE'S ALSO INFECTED, AND I WANT TO BRING HER TO OUR BASE!"
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Listening to Mia from behind the pilot seat, Shurka widened her eyes in shock.
'I'm infected? With what?'
Shurka opened her message log, and she was astonished. Long messages and details about her race change and overmind race flooded her screen.
'Since when have I changed my race!?'
Her jaw dropped as her eyes glued at her race description, the overmind.