Alex was a little bit grateful that Scourge gave him the ability to shapeshift his body so he was able to create a similar armor-like suit he had worn earlier when he was fighting the Angrax to cover up his body.

Shapeshifting consumed a lot of his stamina and energy, but since he was only creating ‘clothes’ for himself, the stamina consumption was very low to the point he didn’t need to worry about it.

The ‘clothes’ looked a bit weird since they were created by his organic matter but the merit of the clothing was that it provided him with some protection against small caliber bullets and sharp objects. 

His body was already strong as it was but having an extra layer of protection wouldn’t hurt and although this was great and all, he still retained Scourge’s fire and explosion weakness so he had to remain careful.

Alex needed to get used to his new body and the abilities that came with it. Thankfully, Scourge compiled the abilities his body had attained into a rather neat format and he was able to view it inside of the Heart Realm at any time.

[Physical Abilities

[Hard Skin]

Provides a protective layer of biomass above your skin. Increasing [Slash Resistance] and [Pierce Resistance].

[Hard Skin] can be developed into [Stone Skin]

[Symbiotic Transformation]

Transform your body into a form that’s most optimal for battle. While in this form, all physical capabilities will increase greatly.

[Symbiotic Transformation] does not possess a further development stage, but its enhancement trait can be continuously upgraded.

Mental Abilities

[Analysis]

Provides insight towards a certain object or organism. Information is displayed directly in your mind.

[Analysis] can be developed into [Inspect]

[Radar]

Scans the area with your psychic energy and provides a rough map of the areas you’ve scanned. The map will display any living, inanimate, and dead object within a 100-meter area.

[Radar] does not possess a further development stage, but its detection range and map detail can be continuously upgraded.

Unique Abilities

[Devour]

Absorbs the target’s biomass to permanently enhance your body's capabilities. Each increment is determined by the quality of the organism that is absorbed. There is a chance to absorb a skill from the target.

Unique Abilities cannot be developed.

[?]

?

?

Unique Abilities cannot be developed.]

Being able to see all of his current abilities and their development paths was pretty good. Scourge said that he was still working on the interface so in the future, he’d be able to see his skill development tree but he would need to upgrade his brain’s capabilities.

“What’s with that skill full of question marks?”

[I’m not sure...it seems that our merging has unlocked some kind of hidden potential within us but I’m not sure what it is.]

“Heh...something that even you don’t know, huh?”

[It’s not like I’m all-seeing and all-knowing but whatever this is, it could only be a good thing. We’ll just have to continue developing our strength and someday in the future, we might be able to uncover the mystery behind this hidden unique skill of ours.]

“Yeah, sure, but let’s talk about all our other skills. How do we develop them?”

Alex asked how he could develop his abilities and Scourge said that he only needed to continue devouring other creatures to develop his skills and if the biomass he absorbed complimented his skill, they’d evolve on their own but for now, he was far too weak to attempt doing any of that.

Alex had killed an alien earlier but according to Scourge, it was only a medical unit that didn’t have much combat ability so it was conceited of him to assume that he had the power to take on those aliens that were coming and specifically geared for battle.

If he let the small victory get to his head and did something reckless, he might die without even knowing how he died.

Alex and Scourged both decided to err on the side of caution and not take those aliens on until they were ready. Fortunately for Alex, Scourge did inform him that after the initial invasion, the aliens would soon send down monsters to clean up the rest of the world which would be the time for them to strike.

These clean-up monsters wouldn’t be as powerful as the aliens and those that have descended already would be busy establishing outposts and camps for the colonists that would appear later.

He did have a target painted on his back because he was an Irregular and had been designated as a priority target to capture or kill by the aliens but they wouldn’t be able to find him if he escaped the city and hid away with the humans.

With their plans settled, Alex immediately sought to leave the area but before leaving, he created a small grave for his girlfriend, put his hands together in prayer, and left the place without looking back. 

His original intent was to move to the field hospital nearby and that hadn’t changed since he thought that it was better to group with other humans and hopefully escape the city that was slowly being overrun by the aliens.

Even now, multiple flaming balls of light were descending from the heavens and smashing through buildings, carrying the invaders inside of them. Staying inside of the city was a death sentence so it was best if he quickly evacuated the city. 

He was no longer human, but Alex still saw himself as a human being. His outward appearance hadn’t changed at all so except for the weird-looking clothes, he still looked like a human through and through.

Alex made his way towards the field hospital but when he arrived, the entire place was decimated to his dismay.

“Dammit…”

[It seems our original plan isn’t going to work...We’ll have to head into the city. This park is a primary objective to establish an outpost for the rich bio-material available so we can’t stay here any longer.]

“Tsk.”

[Take advantage of the surroundings. Maybe we can hunt a few aliens and Devour them for their abilities.]

“Didn’t you say that we’re too weak?”

[We may be weak but that doesn’t mean we can’t kill them. We just need to plan ahead, take advantage of the terrain, and ambush as many enemies as we can before they find out someone’s hunting them.]

“Why didn’t you say this earlier?”

[I was hoping that we’d escape as soon as we found this place because the likelihood of us dying while we’re hunting is pretty high.]

Alex was a little skeptical now. Scourge was being way too cautious earlier but now he had changed his tune.

“Scourge, you’re being so cautious but your previous allies, are they really as strong as you say?”

[Hm?]

“I killed you all on my own and that was before I gained these powers. Maybe you’re underestimating our power.”

[You killing me was only due to a stroke of luck. I was weakened during my previous entanglement with those soldiers and most importantly, the Zagranid attack squads do not deploy alone. We deploy together in squads, I just separated from mine because we Zaegnid’s are generally looked down so I did not want to cooperate with those incorrigible fools.]

“Heh, so you basically died because of your ego. That’s funny.”

[...]

“Anyway, I want to try things out first. I need to see just where I stand in the food chain.”

[...Fine. Then let me help you.]

Scourge activated his race’s sensing ability and a surreal sensation washed over Alex’s body and mind immediately. He felt like he was having an out-of-body experience as his vision greatly expanded before returning to normal. Alex then noticed that he could feel the presence of every living organism that was within 100 meters of his position.

“Woah!”

[As I thought, it’s weakened. 100 meters is not enough to scout much… it’s still within visible distance so you’d be really close to an enemy…]

Alex heard Scourge’s complaint and said, “Try narrowing the area and focus this...ability, or whatever you call it, in a direct line in front of me.”

[...Smart. If we do this, we can detect the presence of any living organism 500 meters ahead of us.]

Alex quickly made use of his new skill and sent his perception 500 meters all around him and soon picked up the presence of many hostile creatures in his surroundings. Scourge made things easier for Alex by creating a map in his head after collecting the data he acquired from his scans.

It was similar to the minimaps of the games he used to play with his buddies and conveniently, all of the hostile creatures were marked in red. This ability was quite useful to him but Scourge reminded him that the ability was a double-edged sword because since he could use it then so could the other aliens as well. 

He had to be extra careful if he found another alien presence within his detection range because that also meant they could have likely found him as well.

“Damn, there’s a lot of them…”

[This place is one of the designated landing sites since it is a suitable location to create a forward operating base. We were tasked with securing this area first before making a sweep of the city and killing every human in it.]

“...I should find a target quickly before more aliens arrive.”

Alex continued scanning the area and eluding the aliens as much as he could and eventually, he found a single alien that was isolated from the rest.

“Bingo.”

Before he left the ruined field hospital, Alex had searched around the place and found a cache of military-grade firearms. He remembered that explosives were effective against the aliens from the previous time when he saw the soldiers that saved him use grenade launchers to injure Scourge.

He found a grenade launcher that was similar to the one that the soldier from before had used but he didn’t take it as he didn’t know how to use it. Instead, he grabbed 2 M67 grenades from the weapons cache and 2 smoke grenades as well.

He had seen a few movies and knew that to use these grenades, all he needed to do was pull the pin and throw it. With just that as preparation, he rushed towards his target and quickly found the lone alien standing in the middle of an open field in the park.

Bodies were littered all around the alien as it stood there, basking in the glory that it had slaughtered so many people.

“This fucker…”

Alex gritted his teeth before he took one of the grenades and pulled on the pin.

“Goddammit...it’s harder than it looks.”

He finally managed to pull the pin out before he quickly stepped out from behind the tree he was hiding and he hurled the thing straight at the alien.

With his enhanced strength, it was like the grenade had been fired from a cannon and it immediately struck the alien right in the chest.

“Kah?”

The alien quickly noticed Alex, its arms began changing but before it could reform, the grenade that had been lodged in its mud-like body armor exploded, causing it to fall to its knees.

“I thought you said this was supposed to be dangerous?”

[...Please remain vigilant.]

Alex didn’t hesitate and used the remaining grenade he had brought with him and aimed for the alien’s heart. He threw it and it lodged itself into the alien’s body before exploding. 

He wasn’t expecting the alien to fall from just that so Alex rushed forward with inhuman speed while his hand began transforming into a blade.

The second explosion blew away a good chunk of the alien’s body and when he arrived, Alex swung his blade down in anger on the alien’s head...only to suddenly feel himself go weightless.

“Eh?”

[Alex, run!]

While the grenades did work and injured the alien to some degree, it was mostly fine and it had acted like it was severely injured just to lure in Alex. In his anger, Alex hadn’t analyzed the situation clearly and just rushed in to attack, only to have his attack blocked.

Even though he had gained superstrength or at least strength that was much stronger than a normal human, the alien was obviously much stronger than him. It had only blocked his attack but the block managed to send him flying into the air.

“Shit.”

Alex twisted his body mid-air and landed on his hands and feet. He immediately tried running away but Scourge yelled at him in his head, [Dodge! To the left!]

He quickly reacted and jumped to the left, barely dodging the attack from the alien. It had read Alex’s intent so it jumped into the air, intending to strike him down in one hit.

<Pyq oms iralh?> “Running away already?”

“Fuck…”

Alex now knew the true terror of the aliens. His power-up was inconsequential in the face of the aliens’ absolute power. The alien began walking towards him menacingly, it knew that with its speed, its prey wouldn’t be able to get away though this time’s prey was a little interesting and was much more different than the other ones it had previously killed.

<Agn kiranem hon…> “You’re an interesting prey…”

“...”

Alex didn’t know if it’ll work, but he quickly took out the 2 smoke grenades he had taken with him as a precaution and tossed them on the ground after pulling their pins out with his mouth.

He knew that the likelihood of him successfully hunting one of the aliens that were like Scourge was quite small but he didn’t think it would be this bad. He had taken the smoke grenades earlier just as a form of precaution and luckily, he did.

The smoke quickly covered the area and Alex quickly turned tail and ran. However, just like his scanning ability, the alien also had it so despite obscuring its vision, it was still able to lock onto his presence and give chase through the smoke.

“Oh, shit!”

[He has the same sensory ability as you do. We need to lose him in the city!]

“Alright!”

<Adn asib iralh gna!> “You can’t run away!”

Alex ran towards the direction of the city while Scourge began teaching him how to suppress his presence in the meantime. However, in order to suppress his presence, Alex needed to remain stationary and concentrate on repressing his life force.

[Head into one of those highrise buildings. We’ll lose him in one of the rooms.]

Alex quickly followed Scourge’s suggestion and rushed through the door of one of the highrise buildings nearby. 

The alien chasing after him for some reason couldn’t match his speed which was a good thing but Scourge explained it was due to the size of its body. It was large and had strength but it sacrificed its speed for that strength.

However, it didn’t need speed since it had its sensory ability and its prey, which were the humans, couldn’t run away too far since it would eventually catch up once they tired out.

This was good for Alex since now he figured out one of his strengths, which was speed. He quickly moved towards the higher floors of the building and found a room. He quickly entered it and closed the door before yelling, “What do I do now Scourge?!”

[You just need to stop your heart from beating without actually dying.]

“...What the fuck? How am I supposed to do that?”

[We track a creature’s life signature so if its heart doesn’t beat, it won’t appear on our radar.]

“Stopping my heart...that’s going to be difficult...”

[Nonsense, with our powers you can easily control any organ inside of your body.]

“...Any organ?”

[Yes, any organ.]

“Great!”

Alex quickly sat down and began calming himself. He focused his mind and gradually slowed down his heartbeat and forced it to beat very, very faintly.

[Good, that should be enough to keep us from being detected.]

The alien chasing after him arrived at the ground floor of the building right at that moment. It saw Alex running into the building so it was sure that he was in here somewhere. It used its scanning ability again but it somehow couldn’t find him.

<Adn maladid? anmaiga?!> “He’s not here? How?!”