Maddox had his goblin driver drive him to a few places within Las Vegas that were still open since the evening was fast approaching not many regular businesses were still open. So he was unable to buy anything useful besides some inflatable mattresses and limited food items that did not require any sort of appliance to make.
With that, both he and the goblin drive back to their new home where as soon as they get out Maddox strangles the goblin causing it to blackout.
With the goblin now taken care of Maddox could go ahead and begin his first test with an infected which was seeing if he could view their memories the same that he did with Jack.
After placing everything where it needed to go and making sure that no one was awake or showing signs of waking up soon does Maddox enter one of the offices where he placed his hands on the now unconscious goblin who was peacefully sleeping after Maddox choked him out.
Introducing miasma into the goblin was easy since it was a creature that already had miasma flowing inside it and miasma coming in contact with other miasma causes no reaction at all since they are the same.
Now Maddox would have started absorbing miasma from the items that he had purchased at the auction house back in the underground city which would have allowed him to in turn fight back against the essence that took over a part of his mind-space but he had to deal with the goblin first.
The bastard was horny as fuck to the point that Maddox felt it necessary to rid himself of it as quickly as possible and while he was it he might as well try a few things to see if there was anything that he could gain.
So that is why he was currently reaching into the mind space of it but with a new situation comes new problems.
The goblin's mind space was miasma and Maddox's form was made up of miasma which meant that the miasma within the mind space was constantly trying to absorb Maddox's form and the only thing that kept him together was pure willpower.
So Maddox tries something different this time and essentially tries to program his miasma body to do certain things while he just kept his body intact.
It would almost be like piloting a giant mech where everything is planned out beforehand but the pilot has to make corrections as everything goes back which is what Maddox was experiencing which was a bit weird as he didn't feel like he was in his body but still felt everything. For now, though Maddox simply made his body move around to the edge of the mind space so that Maddox could access the goblin's memories just like he did with Jack's memory.
This time it was different as Maddox kind of willed himself into the memories of the goblin where he once again found himself out of the mind space but this time not in the maze of doors and memories.
Instead, it was simply just a room that Maddox this time could view everything from with no darkness surrounding him preventing him from seeing more than what was ahead.
[Input command]
The same words as before showed up in front of Maddox but unlike last time he seemed to have immediate access.
Coming up with a few ideas Maddox guessed that the maze that he experienced back in Jack's mind was probably some sort of defense mechanism that was used to confuse intruders since Maddox was sure that he would not be able to find his way back had it not been his tether to Jack's mind space.
Still though seeing that he could give commands would mean that he could view memories and learn things.
"Pull up memories of driving lessons," Maddox says wanting to see if he could pull up memories
[Pending...]
After a few moments, a folder materializes in front of Maddox it containing a few pages inside that are memories marked from one to six.
"Copy memories?" Maddox says wanting to see if he could cut some time off from this
[Copying memory folder]
Soon enough another folder appears in front of Maddox that looks similar to the original so Maddox places the copy off to the side and the original on the other.
"Pull up all memories with miasma wielding infected"
[Command not understood, please input a different command]
"Fine then pull up all memories of mana usage," Maddox says wording it a bit differently this time
[One moment...]
This time it takes a bit longer and another folder appears in front of Maddox who sees that this one goes up to twelve separate memories which he then copies.
'Alright then let's get some stuff out of this guy'
Time flies by and soon enough Maddox has a small stack of copied memory files off to the side and the ones he deemed as originals to the other side.
[Awaiting next command]
Maddox had not said anything for a while now since he had already thought of everything that he could from the goblin's memories.
So instead of thinking about it further, Maddox grabs the copied stack of folders and proceeds to leave this space where he is met with the miasma surroundings of the mind space once more and this time with just a thought he ends up back in his own mind space where he sees he is still carrying the copied folders.
These folders would hopefully provide Maddox with some important information however he had to return to his body before his essence decided to get out of hand too much with the essence situation since he was paranoid that it might kill him if he just left it alone. Sure it was a strange paranoia but Maddox wanted to make sure that he would not suddenly burst into flames or something.
So Maddox withdraws from the sack that he purchased and withdraws the corpse of Belphegor since he wanted to get rid of it as soon as possible since the thought of a corpse being on him just felt weird.
The miasma though seemed to have dissipated a bit from when Maddox first bought it which was a bit interesting but not that concerning since there was barely a noticeable difference which meant that Maddox had missed out on some more miasma.
'Well no use crying about it,' Maddox says as he approached the corpse
From what Maddox was seeing it looked like Belphegor's body had been kept on ice to preserve it longer which is good since Maddox could barely stand the stench of the decomposing corpse. It smelled like rotten eggs and spoiled milk had a baby which was disgusting and then there was the weird glow of the flesh which made the already horrendous form of Belphegor look even more terrifying.
Normally decomposition had five stages to its process which was what Maddox was seeing online right now if a body is allowed to naturally decompose but it seemed like it was being put on ice and its miasma caused its decaying process to slow down. Maddox would like to observe it however the odor from what he was seeing would only get worse and worse as well as it would continue to linger after the body had finished decomposing.
So Maddox will just absorb the miasma in the corpse before he finds someplace where he could burn the fucking thing.
So sitting down in front of the corpse Maddox begrudgingly touches the skin of the corpse which was loose and felt oily to the touch as his hand made contact with it.
This unnatural sensation and feeling caused Maddox to shiver and he felt his stomach churn as the smell seems to somehow get worse.
Not wasting any more time and wanting to complete the process as fast he could Maddox begins to absorb the miasma in the corpse.
As Maddox thought the miasma was enough for him to push back the essence territory back into the river of essence which looked just like before but this time there was his singular essence orb still out there amidst the sea of the miasma. Even though it was transparent it still somehow seemed to glow within the darkness.
"It kind of looks like a star," Maddox comments to himself as he looks at the orb
Belphegor's body had enough miasma to push back the essence within his mind space and a little bit was remaining but not enough to do anything to him. The good news was that his miasma capacity had indeed grown larger by a small margin meaning that he could increase his miasma unlike regular infected.
Maddox couldn't help but grin at seeing this as he takes out the hole that he bought which still had the same amount of miasma as when he bought which was nice to see but kind of curious for him since he had thought that it losing its miasma would be something natural.
'Interesting...'
Maddox shelved that away for now since he had something more pressing to do now as he returned to his mind-space while he had one hand on Belphegor's corpse and had the hole on his lap.
Redirecting the miasma in his space he creates another miasma orb in a shorter time frame than before which he instantly tosses into the essence river.
Just like before the essence within Maddox's body goes crazy and advances outward to take over another portion of his mind space.
This time Maddox was prepared as he begins to simultaneously absorb the miasma within Belphegor's corpse for a second before removing his hand and grabbing the hole in his lap and switching the miasma source.
This time he can prevent the advance of the essence and keeps the essence river intact with it only making a small portion of miasma into essence before being pushed back into the river.
As for the essence orb made had created it was already floating out there in the middle of the miasma of Maddox's mind space.
This process had allowed Maddox to create his second orb and increase his miasma however feeling the amount of miasma that Maddox drained from the hole there seemed to only be a little over half of what was there before remaining. So Maddox creates a third orb leaving only a small portion of the miasma left within the hole which meant that Maddox would have to find some other source to drain miasma from to get stronger.
Unfortunatly Maddox could not presently just leave his place to find more miasma so he was stuck in Las Vegas for the time being until he was able to leave once everyone had served their purpose and satisfied his curiosities.
Even though Maddox had the women from the Coalition and the giant wolf infected Maddox was completely unsure who was the biggest threat that he should work on right now since both sides would attack him once they woke up.
Seeing though there were five women from the Coalition and only one wolf Maddox decides to go for the few instead of the many first.
Standing in front of the infected wolf allowed Maddox to get a true look at how majestic the creature was as its grey fur was clean looking and its size was that of a cement mixer meaning it could easily take off someone's head with one bite of its mighty jaws. Maddox should be scared and he would be lying by saying that he was not but that fear was overshadowed by hate he felt for infected creatures.
Seeing that he now would have to deal with wolves meant that there were going to be more animals that turn into infected creatures which meant things for him would get difficult in the future.
Maddox sits down in front of the wolf's head with its eyes just staring forward which would creep anyone the fuck out as its eye was the size of an adult's fist.
Maddox places his hand on the wolf's nose and concentrates while sending in his consciousness into the wolf.
Maddox after some time opens his eyes to see that he, like with the goblin, is in another mind space with miasma surrounding him but this one seemed to be weaker than what he had experienced before.
To confirm Maddox moves a bit forward to see the boundary of the mind space only to find that this space was really small as not even after a few seconds leads to him hitting a barrier to the mind space. Seeing this Maddox decides to appear in the place he will call the control room where he can view everything within someone's mind.
People with essence prevented him from reaching the true control center and only allowed him into memory rooms with limited controls. Miasma was different since it allowed him to see and access everything which gave him an edge with certain infected since he was unsure if middle and high tiers could defend themselves against his advances.
[Input command]
"Here we go"