There is no way to reverse a human infected by parasites.
They all have to be killed.
Before they infect the humans in other cities.
“Mister! You’re really tall!”
As I was steadying my resolve, a child approached and spoke.
Innocent to the point of being ridiculous, the child’s mother approached and greeted with a warm smile.
“Hello, I haven’t seen you around here before.”
I ignored her greeting and walked away.
Beneath the skin, these things were no longer human, and their overly human behavior only made feel more disgusted.
The further I walked through the city, the stronger that repulsion grew.
“Wait up~! Slow down!”
“Hahaha! The one who gets caught is the tagger!”
These people were undoubtedly dead.
Living ghosts, unaware that they were already dead.
And yet, why did they look so happy?
Why were their hearts still beating?
Even to my senses, they still felt like humans, and that filled with conflicting emotions.
But I didn’t hesitate to kill them.
I had already seen them being controlled by parasites to commit suicide several tis.
Their human-like behavior was just an act — a façade maintained by the parasites controlling their brains.
Once again, deng, deng, the bell rang, and the infected people stopped and bowed their heads in the direction of the sound.
The building with the large bell suspended from a pillar was the largest among the structures in D-City.
Undoubtedly, the host would be in the place where the infected were bowing their heads.
As I turned my head to look, the people who had been standing silently began to stare at with blank eyes.
“An outsider.”
“It’s an outsider.”
Their gazes, now devoid of any semblance of humanity, were filled with an eerie sense of alienation.
The infected, who had identified as an intruder, blinked their eyes, as if distinguishing sothing foreign in D-City.
Those who had been watching with wary eyes suddenly approached as soon as the bell stopped ringing, feigning friendliness.
“Are you from another city?”
“Hello, is it your first ti in D-City?”
The parasites that had been visible monts ago now completely concealed themselves.
They appeared entirely human on the surface.
The people who had approached , without any prompting, all pointed in the sa direction.
“It’s been a while since we’ve seen soone from outside D-City.”
“If you’re in D-City, we recomnd visiting the cathedral to offer a prayer first.”
“In tis like these, only God can protect us.”
“Hah.”
Their blatant attempts to lead to the place where the host was located made laugh.
A thought suddenly occurred to , and I decided to follow them.
If I was going to kill the parasites, the first priority was to eliminate the host.
If the host managed to escape while I was dealing with the infected, it would beco troubleso.
And so, I arrived at the center of D-City — the cathedral of Samwon Church.
Is this what they call holy?
Inside the grand building adorned with stained glass of various colors, songs of praise to God echoed softly.
“This way, please.”
Following the woman who was guiding , the massive doors of the cathedral opened silently.
Inside, children stood in perfect rows, singing hymns in unison.
One of them approached and offered a flower.
Between the petals, invisible to the human eye, were countless tiny parasites wriggling.
I dropped the flower to the ground, and at that mont, the man conducting the children from the center of the room opened a book.
“The apostle of God has descended upon this land to punish the sinners.”
“I am a sinner, and those who admit their sins shall be absolved.”
“Out of fear of death, I turned away from my neighbors.”
“I shall offer my body to love my neighbors.”
“Pain and suffering are rely the attachnt to life.”
“I shall not live for pain but shall unite and be eternally happy.”
A prayer to God.
After the prayer, the man, along with the infected children, bowed their heads in silence, then raised their heads with a bright, eerie smile.
The man touched three points with his fingertips — his forehead, left shoulder, and right shoulder — and then stepped down from the platform, looking directly at .
“Ohh... May God’s blessing be upon you.”
“Blessing be upon you.”
Standing before the man, I let my killing intent surge, my face contorting.
The resonance from the man’s body echoed in the sa rhythm as the bell.
This was the resonance of a monster core.
“I didn’t receive any report about an outsider entering D-City. What a surprise.
Nice to et you. I am nothing but a humble servant, the head of Samwon Church.”
“A person, huh.”
Woooong, wooong. The resonance spread # Nоvеlight # ceaselessly.
I realized that the man standing before was the host of the parasite monsters.
“So, they’re calling parasites people now?”
“Parasites...?”
A confused expression.
Could it be that he was just a human infected by the parasite host?
Not that it mattered.
“Kuhk...!”
Shraaak!
Transforming into monster form, I lunged forward, biting down on the man’s neck and crushing his head in one swift motion.
Parasites burned to death inside my mouth as flas erupted.
The thoughts of the dying man exploded within my mind —
“I don’t want to die,” “mories riddled with holes,” “gratitude and worship.”
I could read his mind as easily as when I devoured a human, but the taste was completely different.
“Crunch... crack...”
It wasn’t the taste of a human, nor a monster. If anything, it was like chewing on a rotted corpse that had decayed long ago.
Instead of curses, the monster core swallowed a sense of gratitude, causing a strange, unfamiliar tremor.
There was only one thing I could be certain of —
What I had just eaten was not a human.
“Apostle!”
“The apostle of God has arrived!”
“Please devour !”
Despite having so easily disposed of the parasite host, the children knelt before .
Even with the host eliminated, there was no change in the infected.
They remained completely unaffected by the blood and the corpse of the middle-aged man strewn across the floor.
The children extended their heads, urging to devour them, desperate for to bite down on their skulls.
Realizing that there was no way to reverse this, I actually felt a sense of relief.
At the very least, I could end their suffering without prolonging it.
Just as I was about to sever the heads of the children, one of them who had been kneeling stood up.
“...Well now, they said the Black Cat monster follows humans.
I was curious whether such a peculiar mutation could be tad, even if it was a Despair-Class monster...”
A strange atmosphere filled the pure white cathedral.
Along with the unsettling aura, a symbol of three overlapping circles appeared on the child’s forehead.
Simultaneously, a monster core ford inside the body of the child, who had been just a parasite monts ago.
This child had just beco the new host.
And it wasn’t just that —
The child now retained the mories of the man whose head I had just bitten off.
“So, the Black Cat can transform into a human form.”
[You are...]
As I raised my guard, the new host stroked the heads of the children still bowing and then stepped into the center aisle.
“No way... Are you an experintal subject?”
The word "experintal subject" made flinch, and the host noticed, his smile widening in delight.
The fact that he could say that word ant that the thing standing before was also an experintal subject, just like .
“Ohhh, a fellow experintal subject. Well then, how about a little chat over a drink?”
With that, the host walked over to the platform and picked up a jeweled dagger and a chalice.
Then, he drove the dagger straight into the heart of the child standing next to him, collecting the blood and presenting it to .
“Freshly squeezed blood. It’s quite delicious.”
When I said nothing and just stared at him, the host lifted the chalice to his lips and drained it in one gulp.
Inside the empty chalice, parasites wriggled.
“To resist the temptation of freshly drawn human blood right in front of you... quite the self-control.”
[So, he can transfer his consciousness to another body infected by parasites.]
“Correct. I call it the power of resurrection. By uniting monster, human, and soul into one, I am proving that even death can be overco.”
[In other words... as long as even one parasite remains alive, you won’t die.]
Within the lingering remnants of the middle-aged man’s thoughts that still lingered in my mouth, fragnted mories conjured the term "hive mind."
An ability to transfer to a nearby parasite the mont one dies.
The range... the entirety of D-City.
What a ridiculous ability. No... perhaps it isn’t even an ability, but rather a trait inherent to the monster itself.
The host chuckled, then casually sat down on the corpse of the middle-aged man whose head I had just bitten off.
“What number are you?”
[CXI.]
“CXI? What’s that? I was asking for your number.”
[What’s your number?]
The host tilted his head like a curious child and held up three fingers.
“I’m Number 3.”
Number 3 — a single-digit Number.
A specin created long before .
Most likely one of the first subjects created alongside the inception of the lab.
“What a pity. I thought I’d get a Despair-Class monster under my control with ease, but you turned out to be an experintal subject.”
Despite his disappointnt, Number 3 clapped his hands together, smiling.
“Still, thanks to you, I’m relieved. You protect humans because you’re an experintal subject. It ans the lab’s objective hasn’t changed. In other words, I’m still on the right path.”
[What does being an experintal subject have to do with protecting humans?]
“Hmmm? Well, the lab’s objective is... Ah, CXI... That’s a Roman nural, isn’t it? So, you’re Number 111? They made quite a lot of you.”
Interrupting his own explanation, Number 3’s eyes widened as if he had just realized sothing.
He doesn’t know about Roman nurals?
More importantly, what’s the connection between being an experintal subject and protecting humans?
Noticing my confusion, Number 3 sighed deeply.
“To think they made that many without a single successful product. How ironic...”
His tone suggested he was fully aware that I was a failed experint.
Sothing was off.
From the start, we seed to have completely different information regarding the lab and the experintal subjects.
“Well then, what do you say, CXI? Why don’t you beco one with ?”
[Beco one?]
“Just as I said. Beco a part of .”
With that absurd suggestion, Number 3 extended his hand toward .
Thin, wriggling parasites slithered from his fingertips.
What he was proposing was to infect with those parasites — to make one of the infected.
“If you’ve seen D-City, then you should know. I am already standing right in front of our objective.”
[Objective?]
“...You don’t know what the objective is?”
Still making no sense.
Number 3 furrowed his brow and sighed again.
“Perhaps the newer subjects aren’t told anything... Well, it is a rather absurd objective. Especially since those created after Number 10 probably weren’t voluntary subjects.”
[Tell what the objective is.]
“If you beco one with , you’ll know it automatically.”
[No thanks.]
“In that case....”
That was the end of the conversation.
I tore him apart along with his core.
Imdiately, the child next to him opened her eyes, and three circles ford on her forehead, marking her as the new host.
“Even if I have to do it by force....”
Crunch.
I crushed the entire cathedral space, grinding it into dust.
All the infected hosts that the parasite had been preparing to transfer into exploded and died instantly.
The parasites crawling across the blood-soaked cathedral floor gathered together, solidifying into a form reminiscent of a monster core.
Wooooong!
A heavy resonance, similar to the bell’s toll, echoed, and the entire D-City blared with a monster alert.
I’d heard it several tis in W-City — the Despair-Class monster alert.
From outside the cathedral, waves of abilities surged toward , resonating with the bell’s sound.
There wasn’t just one superhuman in D-City.
Boom!
The cathedral’s ceiling was blown away, and countless heroes appeared before .
“We have no choice but to beco one!”
On each of their foreheads, the three-circle symbol was prominently displayed.
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