Mutagen

<strong>Day 23 – 8:11 AM – Ungos River, Barangay Daraitan, Tanay, Rizal</strong>

Reaching the riverside near the barrio took him lesser time than yesterday since he was familiar with the way already. Mark totally did not expect that the red blobs would come from the airplane but thinking about it, it was not really strange at all. Even though there was no evidence, it was not hard to assume that the airplanes, no, not only the airplanes but probably all of the air transport vehicles or might even be birds and the like, were suddenly exposed to absurd amounts of Mutagen when the meteoroids struck the atmosphere.

Due to Mutagen being a cause of mutation, a sudden exposure to high amounts of it might have led to the extreme transformations to the exposed people and animals. With this thought, Mark started to suspect that the dangerous looking infected inside the barrio actually came from this airplane. The possibility of that being the case was very high.

"Amihan, you stay here and hide."

"Yes…"

Mark made the little sylph hide further away as he investigated the vicinity of the airplane. This time, Amihan did not say anything and agreed immediately. It seemed that she also felt something wrong about the airplane. He was also the same. Although the airplane looked normal outside with the exception of its damaged parts, he could feel a swelling disgust in his stomach as he moved closer. It was a very strange feeling but he could not explain where it was coming from.

Amihan flew away hiding behind a tree in the furthest corner of the orchard at the riverside. This orchard was just next to the area or the barrio where he cleaned up the infected yesterday. The orchard was the place separating that area from the crashed plane.

Since the little sylph had already hidden herself, Mark started to approach the airplane closer. He lowered himself as he cautiously observed the area around the huge airplane.

There was the dried up pile of blobs under the suspended airplane. The pile could not really be called blobs anymore as they all looked like deformed agar-agar bars with brownish red color. Furthermore, there was not only this pile but there were a lot of scattered dried blobs around the area. How many blobs were here? Mark could not estimate the exact number but it was likely that it was over a hundred.

Maybe due to the number of the red blobs here, the riverside, mostly the stones and soil, was covered in reddish colored mycorrhiza like webs. With the exception of the running river water, the area at the approximate vicinity beneath the airplane was transformed into something else. The place was really eye-catching but he did not manage to see it yesterday when he searched for the Barrio due to the difference in elevation of the terrain. Although he could see the airplane yesterday, he could not see the terrain below it as he did not try to approach.

Not only that, but the place reeked with the smell of iron. Even though Mark uses blood as his main ability as a Mutator, even he could not help but frown as he smelled the thick unpleasant odor. The stench of blood was nauseating and too strong that it did not smell like blood anymore but smelled more like metal that started to get corroded with acid.

As he approached even closer, he tested stepping on the red mycorrhiza that covered the riverside with caution. He did not feel anything strange as he stepped on it aside from the rocks covered with it being slightly sticky and slippery. As he felt no danger yet, he continued to approach the plane through the red colored riverside.

Looking around, it seemed that the state of the dried up blobs were different. Some were totally dried and wrinkled while there were those that were still wet. There were also blobs that looked new but very little in number.

Mark's eyes then lit up. He felt two tugging sensations in his blood as he continued to move closer to the airplane. One was coming from under the airplane while the other unfortunately, seemed to have come from the airplane.

'So… These blobs came from inside the airplane?'

He thought as he felt the second source.

These sensations was similar to what he felt when he saw the first blob getting washed up by the river current. For sure, these two sensations came from two living blobs. He hurried towards the one under the airplane as he could feel that it was rather weak. While approaching, he kept on monitoring the airplane in case that something suddenly popped out while he was distracted.

As he approached, he could not help but notice that almost all windows of the airplane facing his side was actually broken. Strange enough, each window was blocked with something like a film of disgusting and pulsing flesh. He could even see the blood stains on the flesh that covered the windows.

It was then that the flesh covering one of the windows moved and a hole was opened. This sudden movement made Mark freeze in place and heighten his alertness. What he did not expect was that it was not an attack. From the hole, a red blob came out and splattered unto the rocky riverside. Fortunately, it was not a living blob or it might have been a waste. After dumping out the dead blob, the hole on the flesh that covered the window closed once more in a disgusting manner.

This made Mark sure that these blobs came from the airplane and it just showed why there were blobs getting carried downstream and why a lot of blobs piled up in the riverside under the airplane.

Mark found the living blob under the plane without danger. When he approached, the blob was not moving and he could feel that it was very weak. It was dying. Without hesitation, a [Blood Whip] extended out of his palm and he pierced that blob as it did not even try to extend a tentacle towards him.

As the [Blood Whip] pierced it, the color of the blob started to change like how the first blob reacted to his. He could feel that it was getting stronger and started to recover from its dying state. When he carefully picked it up with both hands, it actively extended two tentacles which it curled on his hands and it started to rub its jelly like body in his palms.

'It seemed like these blobs also had different personalities.'

His current connection with this one was way weaker compared to the first blob but it seemed that it had a sweeter personality that the latter. After all, Mark could tell the faint emotions of these blobs through their connection with him.

While holding the newly acquired blob, Mark hurriedly ran away from underneath the airplane. It was because he could feel some tremors coming from the inside and the airplane was creating creaking and squishing sounds. After he ran a few meters away, the movements and sounds stopped but along with those disappearing, the tugging feeling he felt coming from inside the airplane also vanished.

It was very likely that the blob inside that was alive died.

'Is there something inside killing the living blobs?'

He thought as the sensation vanished. If that was really the case, then, it was no wonder there was only two living blobs among the dozens of blobs he saw before and considering the weak state of both blobs, it was likely that they only escaped by accident.

As he suspected that something was killing the blobs inside the airplane, he went back to Amihan to leave his backpack where he kept the two blobs. The two blobs seemed to have acknowledged the existence of each other and did not try to devour one another. Rather, Mark felt that the two blobs seemed to have found playmates and started to poke each other with their tentacles.

Leaving the backpack behind being hung on the tree and under Amihan's guard, Mark went back to the airplane. This time, he was going to the part where the tail was supposed to be. Since the tail of the airplane was detached when it crashed, there should be an opening there for Mark to enter as there was no way for him to stealthily enter the airplane through the door that was suspended over the river.

When he arrived by the broken part of the airplane, the disgusting rotten smell of flesh and blood became several times thicker. As he looked at where the opening of the airplane should be, he saw a wall. It was a wall of bloodstained and pulsating flesh.

It was like a hive from an infection video game where disgusting formation of flesh covered a building along with several pods on it. Just in the airplane's case, there were no pods. One the wall of flesh stained with blood, the bulging dark colored blood vessels and its rather unnerving continuous pulsing.

He had not seen anything like this from the videos he downloaded from the internet that contained the footage of the airplanes that crashed. For sure, a unique mutation happened in this airplane for it to look like this.

Should he enter or not?

Mark started to contemplate. He was not really affected by the stench or scared by this scene but if he entered the plain, it felt like he would be entering a completely different territory. If the windows and the tail part of the airplane was covered with these flesh walls, for sure, the inside would be dark, damp, and would likely look like a scene from the point of view of a schizophrenic protagonist in a psychological visual novel.

However, he needed to know about the source of the blobs. If he could exploit it, then he would as he needed more blobs to increase the production of [Blood Metal] and start on his base already.

Confirming his goal in his mind once more, he pulled his katana out of its sheath.

Trying to not make noise as much as possible, he slowly pierced the tip of the katana into the wall of flesh causing a faint squishing sound as if he was scraping on a wet rubber. From the hole made by his katana, blood started to flow out. The wall of flesh was bleeding as if he wounded it.

Slowly, he pushed the katana downwards diagonally to the left making a large slanted slit and causing more blood to flow out of the wall made of flesh. From the top of the slit, he made another slanted slit on the opposite direction creating an upward pointing arrow. Without the support from the upper part, the flesh inside the arrow slowly fell down with a squishy sound making a triangular opening which Mark could get through.

He took a peek into the opening. Aside from the suffocating stench or rotten flesh and something that faintly smelled like ammonia, it was very dark inside. However, due to the light coming in from the opening he made, he could see that the floor, the walls and even the surface of the seats were all covered with this disgusting flesh like membrane.

Seeing that there was no immediate danger, Mark proceeded to seal the corners of the opening he made with [Blood Metal]. Even though it he was just overthinking it, he would not risk entering without securing the opening. After all, it was a flesh wall. Who knows if it would not regenerate and seal the opening on its own?

After securing the entrance, he stepped in. It seemed that this should be where the galley at the back of the economy class seats as he could see the flesh covered seats for the staff and the doors leading to the toilet at the back.

While his steps made the squishing sounds on the flesh covered floor, he passed by between the pair of toilets and entered the back of economy class seating area. Finally, he could see that traces of the passengers of the airplane before it crashed.

Still…

Why did he feel that it was like a scene from those tentacle based hentai dojinshis?