Chapter 165: [Symphony]

A few moments before, Clara's artificial hero prospect crystal was sealed.

The moment Philo and Lyra fused using the common skill [Symphony].

This skill is normally able to buff each other but because Philo have a unique way of upgrading the capabilities of his wife, they were able to make the whole battlefield stop for a moment, even the other generals who were being stopped by the dead generals (except the summoner because he was momentarily being distracted by a lot of soldiers) that are poised in preventing the transformation were amazed by their look.

Not only Philo, but Lyra's flesh started to flow like fluid as they slowly combined, their flesh kissed as if intimate lovers as they grew several more bones, nose and ears as if to fix their new form, until soon, the new sprouting rotten organs morphed back as pure pulsating tissues, and alongside it, the amalgamation of the husband and wife duo stabilized into a ball of flesh with hundreds or even thousands of eyes, before some eyes closed and morphed the shape of a vague humanoid.

From vague humanoid into a featureless one, from featureless one into a humanoid with a lot of eyes, that once again closed as well bones that sprouted out of his hand again and again before, finally, the new "fusion" of Philo and Lyra was completed.

The combination of Philo and Lyra is the amalgamation of the term disturbingly captivating, they have a towering 6 feet 10 inches height, of course, like always they have smooth grey skin that has seemingly endless hills of lean muscles, in their face were vertically arrange row of 10 large red eyes, circling the otherwise blank space, the eyes extends from a little bit away from the nose to the ears, hairs, and jaw, leaving no space for the said organs to exist, instead a hole connected somewhere inside the innards of the fusion is present in exchange of nostrils, their tummy also has one horizontal red eye that refuses to blink no matter what.

Finally, in their left arm is a crossbow made out of bones that still drips thick wads of blood. It was half the height of their body, yet the couple was able to lift it as if it was a normal-sized, better yet, a toy crossbow.

In their mind, the couple communicated.

"Un... com... for... table..."

Lyra's mind was fleeting, making Philo worried, this bizarre effect in a common skill is due to his new ability given by his upgraded [Adaptation] skill called [Assimilation Adaptation], it let's anything that Philo eats to be absorbed, this will make Philo's body, somehow, someway, be able to create a version of the weapon, the person or anything within his level of power of the same use but with added power and of course other addition or subtraction from Philo himself, this time, the assimilated is Lyra's archery mastery and her eyes, Philo use his muscles to improve the three tissue layers of the eyes and even give it a better, 360, eagle eye view, making Lyra be able to reach the enemy, alongside Lyra's experience and her natural archery talent, they were able to seal the enemy.

However, there is one big problem, anything or anyone assimilated will be synthesized into nutrients by Philo as part of the uses of the new unique skill ability, meaning that as of the moment, Lyra is literally being eaten by her husband, and she normally wouldn't mind being eaten, but only metaphorically, thus Philo immediately answered.

"Two shots, we only need two shots."

Philo, despite transforming into a very intimidating monster is not complacent at all, he immediately took action, putting his arm that is turned into a bony crossbow in front of their eyesight whilst the hole in the middle of their vertically inclined eyes started to droll as it slowly spat out an arrow made out of bones, in it were squirming flesh with eyes glaring on every single soldier that protected the duo still or tried their best to stop their bow loading as well as jagged-teethed mouths, it's about a meter in length, it entered the flight groove of the crossbow, Philo then, with great force pulled the string made out of a muscle fiber and stuck it in the latch.

"Aiming..."

Lyra spoke in the mind of their fusion. She controlled the eyes that squirmed eerily but soon seemed to lock down on the target.

"Fire..."

Lyra said, weakly, and as she did, it was as if the crossbow has a mind of its own, the string immediately reeled back to its original position with great force, causing the arrow of bone and flesh to shoot with great speed, the muscles in the fusion's body recoiled visibly as the dust in their radius fly up as a result of the backfire of the crossbow, the hand with the bone made crossbow slumped to the ground in a heavy thud, but Philo and Lyra was elated.

Lyra fired the arrow to miss the enemy who is currently in great pain because of her desperate attempt to eliminate the two of them in the remainder of the 2nd elven undead war, but they also knew that she is a warrior longer than the two of them, thus have a great sense of danger, so Lyra intentionally made the eyes of the fusion focus on a hill and not on the target itself, this caused it so that the target was only able to sense the danger through the eyes of the flesh, which made her stunned for a split second, something that the instinctive intelligence of the meats in the arrow caused by the curse of Lyra used to explode, latch on the body of the enemy, and seal her.

"Remove all flesh..."

Lyra said, in this moment, even though she is younger than the woman that lays way beyond the battlefield, they were reared in different ways, Clara was used in confrontations against one or 2 opponents, while Lyra only has 2 (including this one) one on one fights and all her experience in archery came from being attacked by a lot of opponents and thinking how to dispatch all of them preferably at the same time.

It's like an overload of practical and system experience, something that Clara doesn't have.

"The last shot."

Philo said in the mind of the fusion, and once again, Lyra focused her upgraded eyes on the opponent.

________

Clara's eyes widened; the notification board that, as a veteran, she now ignores serves as the wall that makes the earlier notification echo in both her ears and mind.

Besides that, Clara could also feel it, the heat in her chest slowly fading away, causing several of her veins to start turning black as if to protest the lack of a pumping station. It's true, the artificial hero prospect crystal was sealed by the enemy!

Clara's chest started to tighten as she clutched it; her body started to slowly weaken and turn cold as it radiated heat without being able to produce it continuously.

_How is that possible? This is the invention of the King of Elves, the smartest man to have ever grazed Pentateuch! This crystal is supposed to be complicated, only understood by the minds nearing the genius of my Lord! This is blasphemy! Blasphemy!_

Clara went into a frenzy as she felt all her beliefs crumble, she thought that his King was invincible, she thought he was the smartest, she even continuously mocked Sophia for daring to fight against him, but then, she suddenly witnessed a flesh that stopped the bombardment of mana of the crystal as if it was a matter of course.

Unfortunately, unknown to her, being one of the smartest people in the world, the king of the elves has immense pride, so immense it is that he doesn't delve in peer reviews. For context, Sophia created the arc reactor alongside a team from two different worlds, making the arc reactor not only more effective than the hero prospect crystal, but it can also be used as a bomb with only one of its generators.

As per her, the little boy and fat man will be called sperm cell and egg cell if she decided to use it against a country, while the artificial hero prospect crystal can only be used, at best, as a very effective and potent grenade.

Clara's countenance continued to pale, an evidence of her slow death.

_Damn it..._

Clara refused to give up, she grabbed her weapon familiar and then aimed it at the enemy that already transformed, she intends to bring them down with her, but as if reality wanted to slap her again and again, she realized that the string of the bow made out of light was already extinguished, and not only that, the buff in the vision of Clara is now gone, reduced to mere 10 kilometers, Clara gritted her teeth, her face turned nervous and desperate as she cursed.

_Will I die slowly like this?_

Clara is frantic, yet she is also starting to feel an indescribable sadness.

All her life, she only have three goals, remove the parasites on her eyes, something that only needed some remnant eggs to be destroyed for a year or two, second she wanted to please her king as gratitude and lastly she wanted to see the cadet, and told him that she love him too, that he is the reason for her view of the world, besides being naive, if not because of him, Clara will not think what palaces and other countries looks like, what does other races look like, how does plant and trees differ, she will just be a depressed idiot that wanted to die and is just restraining herself because of the hard work of her parents.

Little did Clara know, that she will in fact, not die silently, for as she was about to shed a tear, she felt a squirming that is oh-so-familiar to her in the places that was splattered by the explosion of the meat filled bone arrow, it once again stimulated the waning will in the core of Clara, but the meats that started to expand and sprout mouth with jagged teeth in them paid her determination no heed as they continued to morph larger flesh and more mouths and started to eat away in the body of Clara, this is the essence of the [Assimilation Adaptation] ability of the unique skill [Adaptation], if not for [Symphony], this effect will not be blocked and Lyra will be literally eaten, fast instead of gradually that is happening right now.

Clara clutched the flesh at her nape and ripped it off, causing blood to spurt out as he flesh was mangled slightly, exposing the starting part of her spinal cord, but Clara didn't care anymore.

"Parasites again!"

She shouted in indignation, the flesh she have ripped off already started to gnaw in her hand, Clara was indignant, she refused to die like this, she was already riddled by very disgusting and loathsome worms in her eyes, she refused to perish once again riddled with flesh eating meat, as she saw her hand being invaded as her nape's parasite expanded continuously looking for her eyes, she bit on it and ripped it off completely, the flesh of mouth was gone, alongside 4 of 5 of her fingers.

"LET ME DIE IN PEACE YOU FUCKERS!"

The meat of mouths did not stop, biting off the lips of Clara who started to trash around, she used the hill she was in to bang her head and nape again and again in an attempt to kill the parasites, yet in did not yielded anything, but still, the lady did not give up, she shouted and shouted, even though her vocal chords and ultimately, her lungs are already filled with flesh that started to invade her innards, yet again, she never yielded.

Until, with her still somehow intact eyes that ironically cannot be easily pierced through by the parasites saw a bone arrow, not absent of any flesh descend upon her slowly, a curse called [Halt] was on it, stopping any resistance from Clara as it pierced through her heart, and just like that, the lady of the sinful eyes, the warrior that wanted to defy fate... the lover girl that wanted to confess to her man, became the first living general to perish in the hands of the undead

The parasite without Clara's willful and determined resistance ate all of her body soon, she then morphed, her body becoming the same as that of the fusion of Philo and Lyra, except this time, the amalgamation of flesh has now womanly breasts, not as impressive as Sophia or Eleanor, but still womanly nonetheless.

Such is the main power of the [Assimilation Adaptation].

________

On the other side of the battlefield, Philo and Lyra undone their symphony and as they do, two being in the shadow suddenly emerged, one is living, his breathing ragged as if being chased by a thousand horses while the undead is unperturbed, though has several dislocations the undead is fixing constantly left and right.

Simoun, the elven assassin, shouted as he continued his entanglement with Kabuto.

"Clara!"