Way of the Knights

Chapter 50: Evolved Tapeworm

“How did a Mutated Tapeworm ended up here!?”

It was Bradley who exclaimed. His voice was loud enough to draw the attention of the people inside and as they saw the monstrosity inside the ceremonial waters, they couldn’t help but to draw in a cold breath of air.

There was no mistaking about it’s appearance and it’s ridiculous reproductive ability. It truly is a Mutated Tapeworms.

Tapeworms belong in a parasitic tree of the dangers outside. They are inherently camouflaged which means that it could infect basically anyone that carelessly made contact with it. The tapeworms will attach itself to a host and penetrate their stomach, there they would descend towards the intestines and tax the food it’s host takes in. It will the lay eggs to further infect the body of the host until it grow up to the point of bursting out of the host’s body.

By this time, the tapeworms will have a minimal chances of mutating, and if they did it will transform their bodies to a stronger form which could exist in an extended period of time without a host or if they find an energy filled water source, they could similarly survive there. Either way, the cycle continues and the infection rises.

“How could this be…” Korra felt despair, he truly couldn’t believe at what he was seeing right now. He madly searched for him brain about the possible ways to infect that ceremonial waters but nothing come to him mind.

First of all, the mutated tapeworms would only survive if they are inside of a human or on energy filled water source. The moment they are deprived of that, they die. Korra can’t fathom why this thing is alive even though majority of the time, the place is on shut down. Second, how is it possible for Mutated Tapeworms to be this huge? It would take at least three humans holding each other’s hands to completely wrap around it’s body and it’s at least 23-25 meters long! How long had this thing been in here? And to think that they were completely oblivious about it’s existence really drove his mind insane.

“This is no Mutated Tapeworm.” Raven’s voice echoed beside them. The two looked over to him seemingly asking what he meant. “It’s impossible for Mutated Tapeworms to exist in the ceremonial waters. That is an Evolved Tapeworm, it’s eggs are the mutated once, but given time those too will evolve.”

By now, people started to gather around them forming a small crowd. All of them looked closer and felt an incredible disgust towards the massive tapeworm.

The bad news wasn’t received well as it made their faces uglier. Knowing that this is no mere mutation but rather an evolution just completely made the situation even worse. Then only real difference between a Mutated Tapeworm versus an Evolved Tapeworm, is that Evolved Tapeworms had a fighting prowess and the Mutated ones doesn’t.

Now everyone was worried. Eliminating this thing is going to be extremely challenging. If they trespass the waters with killing intent, the worm would retaliate, and that could result in few scenarios.

One is that they kill it but the ceremonial waters would be contaminated by it’s blood, two is they attempt a battle of attrition but the tapeworm might choose to blow itself up, destroying the whole place in the process. Three, they could try to bait it out of the waters but as if that would work. And finally, they could leave it alone but that surely isn’t a way.

“The reason why the last few batches of people who went here suffered is because they were infected by this huge parasite. It won’t be hard to treat them, just tell them that they have to boil three Green Jasmine Leaves along with honey, instruct them to drink it and wait until stomach rumbles, they will know what to do after that. As for this fucker. I just happen to have the best idea to get rid of it.”

Raven’s words were like a ray light shining upon the people around him. Their attention were immediately gathered towards him and those were looks of expectations and anticipations.

“Anyone who could wield the Lightning Element, step forward and help out.”

As soon as he said his piece, numerous people step forwards bravely, Raven inspected them one by one and nodded. The people with higher cultivations were ordered to stand on top of the totems while the rest faced the invisible walls and held their hands in front of them.

“Is there anything I could do to help young friend?”

Korra was restless, as one of the managers of the ceremonial place, he couldn’t help but feel a bit useless as of the moment, for one he doesn’t have any lightning affinity, two it was pretty much Raven who was doing all the work here which was a blow to his skills and three he felt an incredible guilt because he let this situation worsen under his management.

Raven sent him a message that’s only audible for him and Bradley. The two nodded and went back to observing the whole thing unveil.

“Everyone, the goal is to completely roast this thing to nothingness. Don’t hold back anything and blast away. Do not stop as long as you could see a piece of it. Three! Two! One! Go!”

After his countdown, a barrage of lightning based attacks rained down and blasted the damnation inside the waters. It was a common knowledge that lightning based attacks are amplified by water. And because the Evolved Tapeworm is submerged in water, it was truly feeling pain of lightning now. It screeched and wriggled here and there, the smaller worms who were swimming freely earlier were now dead and some even disintegrated into nothingness.

The lightning barrage didn’t cease, after five minutes of constant attacks, all of the eggs and smaller worms were disintegrated, now only the big one was left and no one showed even the smallest amount of mercy to the parasite.

Raven watched the creature wriggle and screech in pain, he thought that it won’t take long and it will be dead. It was then that he suddenly felt a movement which caused alarm bells to rang in his ears.

Out of nowhere, a black hooded figure with a black veil covering the face, showed up in attempts of seizing him. But before his crusty palms reached Raven, it was already sliced by Korra who emitting a horrifying killing intent towards him. And his head was just a milimeter away from being separated from his body since Bradley’s sword was aimed at his neck.

With one final screech, the tapeworm died and disintegrated, everyone stopped with their attacks and looked over to Raven’s direction only to see the current situation.

Raven wore a mocking expression and asked the hooded figure: “You just have the right amount of gall to attack me when I’m around a Royal Guard, you’re allies will disown you from their ranks if they knew what you did.”

“Damn you kid!!” The criminal roared but can’t really do anything, despite his stupidity he was actually afraid of dying, which was ironic to his actions.

Raven’s gaze were cold, good thing he was completely on guard the moment he entered or else this person would truly escape his senses. Though it pains him to doubt the management of the ceremonial place, he had to in order to not miss any attempts against the kingdom’s safety, and look what he found.

He walked closer to the criminal and ripped off his upper garment, as he gazed at the chest of the person in front of him, his suspicions were confirmed.

“Greetings Fifth Emissary. What wind blew you here?” Raven was back at it again with his mocking tone. “Let me guess…butt hurt about your little disciple? Or should I say your illegitimate son?”

The criminal snarled once more but can’t deny it. Raven continued with his antics and said:

“It is as they say, a dumb teacher will produce a dumb student. But to be honest, your son is smarter than you ever were.” With this, Raven forcefully ripped out the veil masking the true appearance of person in front of them.

When Korra saw his face, his world crumbled, his heart was in pain as he realized that he knew who this person was.

“How could you do this to us Manager Chris? Why?” Korra was truly heartbroken to see his own comrade betraying them. The people around them were also in shock and sympathized with Korra’s pain.

“Save your tears Manager Korra. The person in front of you is no longer Manager Chris. He is the Fifth Emissary under the Demon Prince. Manager Chris’ soul must’ve disappeared or used as a sacrifice already. This is just his former shell being used by this criminal.”

Korra and the rest shuddered on Raven’s words, during the small amount of time that Raven was here along with the actions he showed today, those were more than enough for his words to have credibility behind them. Added the fact that the criminal made no attempts on denying it, this solidified that credibility even more.