Mutagen

Day 154 - 8:51 PM - Santander-Barili-Toledo Road, Barangay Matutinao, Municipality of Badian, Province of Cebu

Standing at the center of the cracked road he landed at, Mark stared at the several-meter tall wave that was about to engulf the whole town.

"H-Help!"

"NO... I DON'T WANT TO DIE!"

"UWAAAHHH!!!"

Those helpless screams echoed into Mark's ear. 

Enveloped by the pressure that made their bodies unable to move, the slaves could only wail in fear as they watched the incoming disaster.

The situation was not too different for the Tamawos left in the area. Although many of them managed to not fall because of the pressure with their sheer will, there was no way for them to move freely.

This unknown pressure enveloping everyone was akin to a quagmire slowly dragging everyone to their deaths.

All of them could only watch the tall waves rapidly inching closer and closer to the town in horror.

What was the most horrifying thing in the world?

Was it a fatal accident? Bandits? Guns? The Infected? Torture? 

No.

The answer was a natural disaster or any event at its scale.

A natural disaster could happen at any time, like an accident. It could be lurking around like a bandit and could kill like a gun. It could even lead to deaths worse than being eaten by infected or torture.

The worst part, no mortal could prevent it from happening.

And to say, being swallowed by a tsunami was one of the worst death a living being could possibly experience.

A tsunami's raging waters could lift and push heavy structures and vehicles, not to mention a human. The victim swallowed by would likely get bashed into debris and obstacles carried or standing against its raging currents. Wounds, broken bones, and many other injuries, many things could kill a human swallowed within a tsunami, not to mention that it could drown a person to death by its raging waters alone.

Now, the male slaves left at the school were facing this kind of predicament. The horror in their eyes as they helplessly watch the tsunami approach the coast could not be explained by words.

RUMBLE!!!

As sudden as it appeared, the raging waves hit the coast with a loud rumble quickly. 

The houses and structures by the coast were destroyed and swallowed by the waves like toys. Whether it be made of concrete or wood, any building did not stand a chance against the raging waves.

The flames caused by the explosions were immediately extinguished as the waves, like a hungry beast, devoured the burning houses.

With the raging waves approaching, Mark opened his wings and soared to the sky. The pressure made him feel sluggish, but it was not enough to keep him in place. After all, if it was godly pressures that he should talk about, he experienced worse from the presence of the Eyes.

Terrae, on the other hand, was panicking.

"MOVE! MOVE! DAMN IT!"

The demon roared loud as he forced his body to move.

Terrae might be a powerful demon. But currently, he was just possessing a body of a Tamawo. Like others, the pressure was affecting him strongly.

"TSK! HOW USELESS!"

Terrae roared in fury as he left Terville's body and escaped. In his soul form, there was no way that these raging waters would harm him.

That decision of Terrae, however, was fatal to Terville.

Terville suddenly woke up from his possessed state, confused as to what was going on. Unfortunately, there was no time for him to think at all as the pressure began to weigh him down as his body returned to normal.

And then, as he raised his head in his final struggle, all he could see was water, swallowing him and everything around him. There was not even a second for him to scream out his horror as water flooded his mouth and nose.

At the sky, Mark watched the scene with rare excitement.

It was like he was watching a disaster movie, except it was happening in reality.

From the sky, he could see how the tsunami swallowed everything.

Tall trees, buildings, and even utility posts, everything that was in its path was swept away like plastic toys.

Since the tsunami was on a large scale, it was not only the town of Matutinao that got affected. The areas more than two kilometers north and south of Matutinao were swallowed by the raging waves.

It included the high school at the south, where the survivors from Liloan stayed until today.

Everything was swallowed by the tidal wave.

Terrae floated upwards. In this form, mortals would not be able to see him, and the water did not do him any harm. However, the pressure was still affecting him. He felt constricted and was having a hard time maintaining his mist-like form.

"You actually left that guy to die, huh?"

Suddenly, a voice appeared behind Terrae.

Of course, it was no other than Mark. He could detect Terrae's presence even without seeing its soul form.

"You! How!"

Terrae's gruff voice echoed in shock.

Unfortunately, Mark was not in the mood to talk any longer.

"It's good that you left that guy." Mark shrugged. "It's easier to absorb you this way."

All of a sudden, Terrae felt something pulling his body. Terrae tried to resist, but it was too strong. That was when he realized that the suction was coming from Mark, who unveiled a crystal embedded on his arm.

"WHA-! WHAT IS THAT, CRYSTAL? ABSORB, YOU SAY?!"

Terrae panicked.

"You know." Mark tilted his head, ignoring the soul's panicked questions. "Souls, ghosts, anything paranormal that doesn't exist in physical form is made up of energy. So, it's actually a mistake for you to abandon your host."

Terrae was a demon soul that had no physical body or existence. Or else, he would not need to rely on a host and behave like a parasite. Now that he left Terville, he was nothing but a clump of energy for Mark to collect.

"STOP! STOP! WHAT DO YOU WANT! I CAN GIVE YOU MORE POWER! RICHES! WOMEN!"

Terrae roared in panic.

"Really?"

Mark suddenly lessened the suction of the [PsyCrystal] and asked.

"I'M TELLING THE TRUTH!"

Terrae hurriedly replied, thinking that Mark would let him free.

However...

"Sorry, but I hate liars."

Mark smirked as he activated the [Psycrystal]'s suction to a maximum.

"NOOO!!!"

That was Terrae's last roars as the [PsyCrystal] absorbed the energy that made up the demon's existence. And now, without anything for its soul to hold onto and keep existing, the dead demon would go back to the cycle of life and reincarnation.

In other words, the demon called Terrae was not Mark's problem anymore.

Instead, he should focus on the predator that caused the tsunami.

"Hmm..."

Mark scratched his head as he realized that the energy from that demon was quite abundant. The crystal was taking time to create the new crystal.

In any case, he was not in a hurry about this and turned his eyes towards the coast.

With a shadowy silhouette standing by the waters of Tañon Strait, the predator was lying in wait.

Mark remembered Officer Emilio's story about how the settlement in Liloan fell in a single night. The military officer himself said that he saw the monster and that when it appeared, he and the soldiers on duty was frozen in fear.

However, it was not fear that froze them. Officer Emilio was mistaken. Now that Mark experienced it, it was not fear. It was a kind of pressure from an existence much higher than humans or even demons.

Mark stared at the silhouette in the waters.

"Officer Emilio said that it's a crocodile as large as a Roro passenger ferry or larger... But damn... Isn't it as large as Queen Elizabeth?"

What Mark was talking about was a Vista Class Cruise Ship named MS Queen Elizabeth. It was an about three hundred meter length cruise ship with a two thousand passenger capacity. A Roro Passenger Ferry was nothing compared to it.

"Did it grow that much more than a month after destroying the settlement in Liloan?"

But that was not the issue here. It was the pressure it was emitting.

As someone that encountered Bathala and the Eyes, Mark was sure that it was a pressure created by a godly presence.

"I had a hunch, but seriously? I wish I was wrong instead. This guy should be Sinogo, right?"

Mark kept on murmuring as he watched the gigantic silhouette of the crocodile.

The being called Sinogo. He was one of the three winged-giant messengers of the Sky God Kaptan in Cebuano Mythology. He was a handsome man and was the so-called "favorite of Kaptan" among the messengers.

In Cebuano Mythology, Sinogo stole a unique sacred shell from the Sky God. It was a shell that allowed its possessor to transform into anything they pleased. Of course, this treachery did not go unwarranted as the Sky God ordered to pursue Sinogo. Sinogo fled and eventually decided to turn himself into a crocodile, a sacred animal by Visayan beliefs, so he could dive as deep as he could in the body of waters between Negros and Cebu.

However, the faithless messenger could not hide forever and was struck with lightning by Kaptan. The shell was lost for a while but was still retrieved by another messenger.

As for Sinogo, he was imprisoned under that body of water, now called the Tañon Strait. Because of Kaptan's love, he let Sinogo retain his crocodile appearance as it was a sacred beast respected and feared by humans of that time.

And since then, when whirlpools appeared within the strait, people believed that it was Sinogo, trying to break free from his imprisonment.

Mark observed the unmoving predator. It was behaving like how crocodiles idled in their swamps and rivers, waiting for prey to come near for them to feed on.

And then, Mark noticed.

"So, this is how he hunts food."

Mark murmured as he glanced at the tsunami that swallowed the towns in several kilometers radius. If not for the mountains that were seated in this place, the affected area would be much wider.

And while the tsunami would cause the seawater to enter the land, it would soon return to the sea. As it returned, it would drag a lot of things back, including the dead bodies of the victims.

When the water return to the sea, the gigantic crocodile would now be able to feed on everything the water brought back.

Still...

"Why is a messenger of a god behaving like an animal?"

Mark could not help but ask himself.

An imprisoned godly being would definitely begin to wreak havoc after it escaped. It would vent its frustrations for the very long time it was imprisoned and cause chaos without regard for anything.

However, that was not what was happening.

Instead, this giant crocodile was hiding in the waters of the strait and would only come out after it detected activity on the land.

In curiosity, Mark activated the [Photokinesis Mental Crystal] to hide his appearance. Then, he flew towards the shadowy silhouette in the strait.

As Mark flew closer, the gigantic creature became more and more visible.

It was a giant crocodile with dark scales that had a golden sheen. It was definitely large as Mark was not any larger than an ant compared to it.

But when Mark got close enough, he was frozen. His eyebrows could not help but twitch at what he discovered.

"You got to be kidding me... No wonder this guy is not behaving as one would expect an imprisoned godly being to do."

What stood within the waters was not just a godly creature. It was an infected gigantic godly crocodile.

The worst part...

It was a [King Type].

Mark could detect a consciousness from it but it was no different from the one he encountered and captured in Bay City.

No wonder it was not behaving like a regular infected, either.

And then, while Mark was observing it...

The left eye of Sinogo's, no, his husk, moved.

It was staring at Mark.

"You got to be kidding me," Mark murmured. "It can see me even when I'm invisible."

And then...

SHING!!!

"SH*T!"

Mark could not help but swear as he took evasion in a hurry.

It was because the giant crocodile had just shot an energy beam at him without warning. It was the very same kind of energy beam that Diwata Iraya used when fighting Lord Seis.