Infinite Dendrogram - Volume 16 - Chapter 7

Chapter Seven: Standing and Indomitable

City of Commerce, Cortana, Mayor’s Mansion

Benetnasch noticed the anomaly soon after he finished negotiating with AR-I-CA.

He possessed skills that gave him sight of the surrounding souls and grudge. Walls and similar kinds of barriers meant nothing before those skills, allowing him to clearly see the souls beneath the mansion.

That made it easy for him to understand that the nearly two hundred souls gathered here were now wailing. The sensation froze him in place.

“What troubles you, my friend?” Aragorn asked as he was busy breaking through the mansion’s many walls.

“...This is really bad,” Benetnasch said with a shake of his head and with frustration that was quite out of character for him.

A moment later, a gigantic pale arm broke through the floor in front of them, soon followed by five more. These limbs then flailed about, grasping at any piece of the mansion they touched. Under the creature’s immense weight, the building quickly began to collapse.

“In me, my friend!” Aragorn called.

“...Yeah,” Benetnasch said, jumping inside the skeletal dragon’s ribcage. Aragorn then rushed back to the garden, pulverizing any walls and pillars on the way. By the time they were out, the mansion had collapsed completely.

Benetnasch gazed at the dust-shrouded remains, saying not a word. One didn’t have to see souls to know the fate of the servants who were still inside.

“Below!” Aragorn said right before the six arms that destroyed the building pulled on the rubble, lifting up and revealing the creature’s full form — that of a maggot with human limbs.

The maggot was larger in size than even Pure-Dragons; it possessed six long arms and so many legs that they were hard to count. Every inch of it was made of tiny maggots.

It was so disgusting that the sight alone would break weaker minds.

Still, it wasn’t difficult for Benetnasch to understand what he was looking at.

“My friend, is this...?”

“It looks like the sealed UBM has been released.”

“The Orb held this enormous mass of maggots? How repulsive.”

“No,” Benetnasch said with a shake of his head. “This body is made of living humans.”

“...What?” Aragorn asked in shock. The necromancer hadn’t witnessed the moment De Vermis’s current form was created, but he could see souls, and he saw the many souls trapped within the maggots that composed the creature.

While talking to Hugo, Persephone had explained the relationship between souls, minds, and bodies using ice, fluid, and a cup as their respective parallels. She had primarily focused on the effect that boiling grudge had on souls and bodies, but that wasn’t the only way the relationship could go sour — the flesh could affect the soul and mind, as well.

When put in a repulsive vessel far unlike the original, souls and minds would be tainted just as drinks poured into lead cups became poisonous.

In this case, De Vermis was the lead cup.

Though the people used in its creation had had their cells replaced by maggots, they were still alive. They had died once, but their souls were trapped inside their bodies. Since they still lived, they couldn’t even be melted away by grudge and vanish.

Because of this, to be one with De Vermis was a fate worse than undeath.

“Truly, this is not enough,” said De Vermis. “Eternity requires more power and volume.”

The human-maggot mass then used one of its six arms to pick up the corpse of a maid who had died in the mansion’s collapse and crushed the body with its hand, mangling the flesh both inside and out.

Starting with the damaged cells, the destroyed corpse then began transforming into writhing maggots, all of which were absorbed by De Vermis to make it grow in size.

“My friend, this creature...” said Aragorn.

“I thought it was strange when I saw the mayor grow those ‘legs,’” Benetnasch replied. “Even if that UBM could use its powers from within the Orb, it couldn’t have possibly gotten its egg-laying organs outside to infest the mayor like that. It makes sense now. The maggots weren’t born...”

“...but transformed,” Aragorn finished the sentence. “So it used a skill to turn the body of that lowlife into maggots.”

“...That is probably how it made him healthy too,” Benetnasch added. “I guess maggot therapy exists in real life, but this is just...”

Disgusting, he finished in his head.

That judgment wasn’t just based on its appearance or nature — it was the fact that it trapped souls.

The transformed cells continued to live as maggots, and as living creatures, they bound the souls they had once possessed as human beings to them. Forced into such a form, these once-human souls and minds would eventually become those of maggots.

Benetnasch had already noticed such changes begin to take root in the mayor when he’d met him at the entrance. Merging with De Vermis had only accelerated the process, and that was exactly why Benetnasch called it “really bad.”

The souls trapped within were wailing, lamenting the fact that they had been made inhuman and could no longer die as people.

“...Deadly Explosion.” Benetnasch unleashed a spell. With everyone in the palace now dead, he didn’t have to worry about killing anyone, so he decided to use the High Necromancer’s ultimate job skill on the immense amounts of grudge accumulated by the mayor’s deeds.

The heart of the explosion was the basement, where the grudge was densest, and the fires produced easily consumed all of the mansion’s rubble. The blast even tore out the trees in the garden, sending a giant pillar of flame into the sky.

The firepower of this attack matched that of the Baolongba once used by Master Jiangshi, Xunyu.

“My friend...”

“...I’m seeing it myself. No need to say anything.”

Even the immense flames of the Deadly Explosion couldn’t burn up De Vermis.

The spell would’ve surely scorched even Pure-Dragons with high fire resistances, but the mass of maggots came out of it unharmed.

Great amounts of its body were left Charred, but the blackened bits quickly became white again as they were replaced by new, healthy maggots.

This was what made De Vermis’s Reinvigorating Rebirth so terrifying.

What this power did was replace damaged cells with maggots — its fragments — which made it possible for De Vermis to fully heal itself by simply replacing its own damaged cells with writhing new growth.

“UBMs are always such unreasonable foes...” said Benetnasch.

“Truly,” Aragorn agreed.

“...You should know that you weren’t any better.”

Though the Charred bits were quickly healed, the Deadly Explosion had actually completely blown away a portion of De Vermis’s total size, cells and all, which manifested as damage dealt to it.

However, that hadn’t accounted for even a tenth of its total HP.

“I do not suppose you can use that again?” Aragorn asked.

“Nope. That blew away all of the grudge around the mansion,” Benetnasch replied. Deadly Explosion was a spell that transformed grudge into firepower, making it a one-time spell that could only be used on large accumulations of grudge.

If he’d carried around Crystals of Resentment like Gouz-Maise the Lich, that would have been a different story, but those items were directly opposed to Benetnasch’s goals. Obviously, he would never carry any.

“The only way to defeat it is to destroy it utterly, with not a trace left,” said Aragorn. “What a menacing creature. It must be near-Mythical.”

“An upper-Ancient-Legendary-tier, then...” said Benetnasch. “Wouldn’t that make it stronger than you, though?”

“I am confident I was a match for it in sheer status, though compatibility is so heavily against me that I could never defeat it,” Aragorn concluded, after spending a moment analyzing his own powers compared to those of his opponents.

“...Well, slicing probably wouldn’t do much to it,” Benetnasch agreed.

While they were having this exchange, Masters from all over the city were starting to gather, likely to investigate the source of the flame pillar.

Upon seeing the words “The Rebirthing Infestation, De Vermis” over the large maggot’s head, they all recognized it as a UBM and mobilized to destroy it.

Some were shocked by Aragorn’s appearance and prepared to fight him as well, but they quickly realized he was a Master’s undead minion and immediately shifted their attention back to De Vermis.

“Hmm... For a city of such a scale, few enough Masters have gathered here,” Aragorn observed.

“Based on what Persephone told me, the Murder Princess caused some trouble at the bazaar... I imagine that many got the death penalty trying to deal with her.”

“The girl who shares a clan with that tomb raider? Well, I cannot imagine any ordinary Master being a match for her.”

“...I hope she isn’t as fearsome as Rascal, at least.” While their conversation continued, more and more Masters gathered and focused their fire on De Vermis. The UBM had no proper defenses or resistances, so all the spells, slashes, and debuffs hit it with full effect...only for it to recover from them moments later.

Any part burnt by a spell was fixed in the same way as the parts of its body Charred by the Deadly Explosion.

The weapon attacks only briefly parted the wriggling mass, and any individual maggots that were severed were quickly regenerated.

And then, the maggots afflicted by the debuffs were instantly replaced by new, healthy ones.

No matter what was done to it, De Vermis instantly regenerated itself back to a state of perfect health.

Those with Reveal would notice one other thing — the UBM’s SP did not decrease no matter how many times it restored itself.

This was the second thing that made Reinvigorating Rebirth so fearsome.

It was a skill that not only didn’t cost SP — it continuously increased its SP reserves.

De Vermis could heal itself countless times and never feel fatigued because of it.

In fact, the fatigue could actually worsen the “cells,” causing Reinvigorating Rebirth to replace them yet again.

The skill kept De Vermis in good health forever, no matter what.

Its lack of defenses or resistances was not really a problem for it — any damaged parts would simply be replaced.

“Its HP is measured by volume, like that of a slime. And it can regenerate...no...rebirth itself without limit,” said Aragorn.

“That reminds me of what Persephone said about the Murder Princess,” said Benetnasch. “Apparently, she can revive herself over and over again... She should’ve been here to fight De Vermis.”

“...That would no doubt have been a sight most hellish.” As De Vermis healed all and any wounds inflicted upon it, unrest spread among the Masters.

Some had actually used ults that matched or even surpassed Deadly Explosion, but the UBM had recovered even from those.

And once it was done weathering all of the attacks, De Vermis went on the offensive.

It held the palms of its six arms towards its surroundings.

“Initiating parallel offensive magic. Firing,” it said, releasing countless offensive spells.

Lightning, fireballs, ice lances, wind-blades, earth spears, and light rays rained down on the surrounding Masters.

They were all spells known by the owners of the bodies that now composed De Vermis. Since most of them had been slaves and vagrants, this magic was obviously very basic. Their power was minimal individually, and though the UBM could release them as a barrage, they merely scratched the veteran Masters here.

But that wasn’t a problem, for a scratch was all that it needed.

“Heh! That barely qualifies as damage!”

“Looks like this UBM’s hard focused on health and regeneration. It doesn’t look any weaker than before, but if we keep going— hm...?”

The Masters fighting De Vermis suddenly realized that something wasn’t right.

Parts of their bodies were itchy, as though something small was crawling on their skin.

They looked at the source of that sensation — the minimal damage done by the creature’s spells — and saw countless wriggling maggots.

“A-AHHHHHHHHHHHH!”

The Masters’ screams resounded throughout the area. Who could blame them? This was an event that defied logic.

The crawling maggots used their tiny mouths to bite into their flesh, which then turned into more maggots.

“You little...! Damn it! I’ll smash you all!”

Some crushed the maggots crawling over them, while others killed them with fire, but the crushed or burned maggots were quickly reborn into healthy ones.

Even worse, the wounds they inflicted upon themselves in the process only became more maggots.

This was the third factor that made Reinvigorating Rebirth so fearsome, and it was no doubt the most terrible thing about it.

It allowed any wounds within a radius of three hundred metels to be turned into maggots.

The Masters present screamed in disgust and fear at the sight.

Even the falls and crashes caused by the panic created minor wounds that quickly became sources of even more maggots.

“Fresh maggots out of its own wounds as well as out of the wounds of others. Its volume cannot be reduced by harming it, yet it can turn its opponents into itself,” Aragorn noted.

The Masters were unable to fight it any longer.

Even through the pain they were experiencing, they could still feel the maggots crawling all over them, slowly conquering more and more territory in their bodies. A single wound was enough for Reinvigorating Rebirth to create a swarm that would encroach over the body for as long as De Vermis was within range.

Some Masters almost instantly used the suicide system, but no one could blame them for that.

“It is best for you to avoid any attacks at all, my friend,” said Aragorn. “Use me as your shield and do not stop channeling your Necro Effect.”

“I understand,” said Benetnasch. Aragorn was tough, but he couldn’t prevent any and all damage from reaching his necromancer. The wounds Benetnasch received were slowly being replaced by maggots, all of which died a moment later.

This was because of a buff available to the necromancer grouping, Necro Effect.

It created a weak contact-based instant kill effect which killed all maggots on Benetnasch as soon as they appeared.

Its flaw was that it only worked on the weakest of creatures — but fortunately, the maggots were exactly that.

“...By the way, are you affected by this? You’re all bones.” Benetnasch asked.

“I believe it only replaces parts that receive damage or are afflicted by disease. It seems it does nothing to flawless bone. I do not rot, after all.”

“...Then I guess zombies wouldn’t be very useful here. And the parts where you’re damaged are actually being replaced... I guess there is the possibility that it can replace any creature even if they have no flesh or bones.”

Benetnasch and Aragorn had been calmly conversing and analyzing De Vermis ever since it appeared.

Even when their surroundings were flooded with panicked screams, their minds remained as serene as the surface of a still lake.

This didn’t mean that either of them — or at least just Benetnasch — had superhuman mental fortitude though. He was merely used to such hellish battles.

“Anyway, we have enough grudge again, so...there you are,” Benetnasch said. Still using Soul Sight, he looked at the mass of maggots and found the soul of De Vermis’s main body.

He then used his skill as King of Tartarus to focus the grudge created by the trapped souls and the terrified Masters into a single spot...

“Deadly Explosion.”

...and incinerated the fly that was the original De Vermis.

With it gone, De Vermis froze in place...

“Did it work?”

“...Doesn’t look like it.”

...only to resume moving a moment later.

The fly was the main body, but not the core.

Even with that initial fly-body gone, De Vermis as it was now was a gathering of maggots. The only way to win against it was to destroy it completely.

“It doesn’t seem to have a physical core. The soul is still there,” said Benetnasch.

“So the only way to defeat it is to annihilate the entire mass outright,” said Aragorn. “I see we shall have to work our fingers to the bone.”

“...Is that a joke?” Benetnasch asked, his face serious. “Anyway, I can see why Huanglong...that Draconic Emperor sealed it away. It seems easier to do that than to actually destroy it.”

While saying that, he considered another possibility.

Or maybe he thought that it was better to seal it away in order to later release it in enemy lands as a bioweapon? I mean, if he could seal it, he probably could’ve overcome it a second time.

Ironically, it had been stolen by a third party and had now been released in a major city of a potential enemy country.

“To my knowledge, the only dragons that can conquer this foe are the king of all skydragons and the long-missing Extinction Dragon King...as well as the Gloria whose name I have heard spoken in rumors,” said Aragorn.

All three were Mythical or higher in status and excelled at wide-scale extermination.

No Masters here had such power at their disposal...

“So, my friend...what shall we do?”

“...If burning it all away is what it will take, then I will make it burn.”

...but Benetnasch had a means to deliver what was necessary.

“For better or worse...I know some people who have enough firepower.”

“...Them, eh?”

“Yes. Though I’ll have to meet up with Persephone, make sure the area’s evacuated, and get approval. Doing this won’t be good for Cortana...but I guess that all actually depends on how the negotiations with her will go.”

Benetnasch recalled the sky-blue Magingear he’d fought not too long ago, and it made him a bit uneasy. It was hard to imagine that Caldina would ignore this problem for long, however. They would likely accept Benetnasch’s help simply because he could take care of it faster than anyone else.

“Something needs to keep the UBM occupied during the evacuations and preparations.”

“I will gladly take the role...is what I would like to say, but separated from you, Necro Effect would expire, exposing me to the possibility of becoming sustenance for the maggots.”

“Yeah. That’s why whatever’s buying us time...must be something that cannot be damaged,” Benetnasch said as he took hold of something under his clothes. “The only one we can count on...is him.”

“Good grief...so you will end up using it regardless.” This was the thing he’d almost used while fighting AR-I-CA — a strange pendant that looked like the lower half of a gargoyle.

“Since the last time we used it, I’ve taken every chance I had to pour MP into it. Now it has 6,000,000...which should be enough to keep it active for at least half an hour.”

“...As expensive as ever, that one.”

“He’s worth the price, though, and there are some things only he can do, so...”

Benetnasch held the pendant and raised it in front of him.

Then, he called out, “Awaken, Standing and Indomitable: Greatest Bottom!”

Light enveloped the accessory and...

◇◆

As De Vermis attacked the Masters and turned them into maggots using Reinvigorating Rebirth, it thought that things were proceeding smoothly.

Even now, the UBM was swiftly growing in overall volume.

This was done through the same Reinvigorating Rebirth skill. It simply transferred any of its fragments that left its range back to the main mass. Because of this, even if the injured Masters who were being consumed by maggots managed to escape, the fragments created from their bodies would always return to De Vermis.

From a purely animalistic perspective, the right thing to do might’ve been to let the Masters run with the maggots to spread itself far and wide and expand its territory.

However, that wasn’t what De Vermis thought was the best course of action. Its optimal scenario was one where it turned more and more creatures into fragments, so that they lived forever in De Vermis’s collective existence. In this UBM’s mind, that was an act of goodwill...even if other creatures saw it as a violation of their very being.

Since fragments that left the effective range of Reinvigorating Rebirth couldn’t be replaced and would die if they were further harmed, De Vermis found it only natural to retrieve them.

However, it would be a mistake to think mankind ought to be thankful for its non-expansionist inclinations.

After all, as it grew, so did the range of Reinvigorating Rebirth.

The size of the body it originally planned to have was three hundred metels, but if it grew beyond that, the effective range would grow as well. It grew slowly, but if it was able to do so unimpeded, there was no telling how vast De Vermis could become.

Perhaps it could one day cover an entire country.

“Not enough...” De Vermis said as it looked around for more food to turn into maggots.

The fear of the writhing monstrosities and the futility of fighting this foe had caused most of the nearby Masters to flee, and the UBM did not appreciate that.

It did not enjoy having fewer creatures to share its life with.

That was why what it saw next made it immensely happy.

“This is...”

It was a gigantic silhouette.

De Vermis could sense and understand that the thing before it was a powerful being, but at the same time, it was glad that it would be able to corrupt something so large. That would no doubt help it grow, after all.

Following those thoughts, De Vermis attacked it with magic — a focused onslaught of countless offensive spells.

It was hard to withstand the barrage unharmed, and even the slightest scratch would be enough for Reinvigorating Rebirth to start replacing the injury with maggots.

No one could escape it, no matter how strong they were.

“Hm...?”

That was why De Vermis was puzzled. Despite the many attacks it had just unleashed, it couldn’t feel the ability activating on its target.

That could only mean one thing — the target wasn’t even scratched.

“...Who are you?” it asked.

There was no response.

There couldn’t be a response, because it had no mouth.

No eyes, no ears, or even a head.

No arms, no torso, and no heart.

It was nothing but two legs and a tail, standing tall before De Vermis.

The silhouette was a lower half, shining in a way similar to, but unlike, silver.

It was the gigantic, fifty-metel-tall bottom half of a gargoyle.

A loud hum resounded throughout the area. It wasn’t caused by a mouth of any kind, but by the massive tail it was swinging.

The tail was vibrating at immense speeds, stirring the air around it.

Despite not having eyes, it flawlessly pulverized the six arms extended towards it with a single swing of its tail.

Those six arms were instantly reduced to bits smaller than grains of sand. This was achieved by the gargoyle’s Hyper Vibration offensive-defense skill, which thoroughly destroyed anything it touched.

De Vermis focused and quickly regrew its six arms before resuming its offensive magic barrage. However, once again, none of the spells did any damage to the gargoyle. The countless magic attacks were negated by a skill which made it immune to offensive magic.

Realizing that, De Vermis then tried to attack the legs, which weren’t vibrating like the tail.

But no matter how hard it tried, all the damage its arms might’ve done was negated by the gargoyle’s immense defense and damage-decreasing skills.

The creature rendered all of its attacks impotent.

“Just...what is this?” De Vermis asked.

The bottom half of the gargoyle statue had no mouth with which to respond. However, words weren’t needed for anyone who witnessed it to know its power.

A body made of a Superior Metal that surpassed even the Mythical Hihi’irokane.

An offensive-defense skill that easily pulverized the attacks of an Ancient Legendary.

And finally, an overwhelming aura that surpassed the one possessed by De Vermis itself.

This was the creature summoned by the Superior MVP reward once acquired by King of Tartarus, Benetnasch.

This was the creature only barely defeated by the combined efforts of the King of Beasts and King of Tartarus.

This was the strongest gargoyle in Infinite Dendrogram...and the first SUBM. The “Lone Yet Unmatched, Greatest One.”

Or, at least, one half of it.