Mercenary Black Mamba

A strong arm as strong as tree roots wrapped around his waist. While he knew Samedi was strong enough to raise Jae Mu into the air, this was too much. The strength which could break an African bull's waist cut the air to his throat.

"Uk! Ugh-"

Black Mamba swallowed a mouthful of strong poison as he opened his mouth in fear. His flipped insides vomited the foreign substance back out, but his throat and liver burned as though he had swallowed hydrochloric acid.

The cenote's depth was 120m. Its first layer was the swamp, and the mud particles increased the deeper he went. Still, his sight didn't clear. The lowest layer was sticky and black like squid's ink.

This was a fermented poison that grew poisonous over years of chemical plant particles and chemical releases from animal carcasses, high in toxicity. It was the kind of non-recoverable poison often seen in martial arts novels.

Black Mamba was an Epidium, the kind that could recover from the strongest poison existing, Botulinum toxin. If it had been any other human body, it would have become nothing more than added toxicity to the poison.

Ooooo… A soft vibration rang from his chest. A refreshing feeling, akin to pouring cold water from his head to his toes, washed over him. He could breathe easier. He felt as though he was attached to an air tank, instead of air filling his lungs. His insides, which had flipped at the sensation, also grew relieved.

Eyes in dark water were useless. He could only sense what was moving around him using dimensional sight. Black Mamba slapped at the arm around his waist, his consciousness now fully recovered, as an indication to release him. But Samedi instead wound his arm tighter around him once more. It was some tremendous strength. His spine creaked at every tendon's movement.

"Wait, he wound himself around?"

Black Mamba's mind snapped into reality. This wasn't Samedi. Unless Samedi was a riverman that appeared in movies or some anaconda from South America, he couldn't wrap his arm around his waist twice. Now that he thought about it, the skin against his waist didn't feel like human skin. He hadn't noticed, struggling underwater pressure and minding his breath.

"Damn it!"

The black snake he met at Bang Tae San swept past his head. No, the king snake that Houngan Kran ordered around, the one he met a few days ago, ran past his head. Tsk. The unknown thing wrapped itself around his arms and legs. Bang! Something smacked the back of his head soon after. If he hadn't earned his iron-hard head eating the huvluv back in Sahel, he would have died and ended up a watermelon on the floor of the swamp. That was how strong the smack had been.

"Ugh, this damn beast!"

Black Mamba's anger reached its peak. He immediately released the army rope around his waist and grabbed at the unknown thing around him. It was cold, the kind of temperature from metals. It was slippery, but he felt as though he was grabbing an iron pipe. This thing, the width of his thigh, wasn't the Kraken or a snake. Craaaack! His Billion's Water Armor dug into the monstrous thing.

Kueeeegh! The monster trembled like mad. With his hips stuck, Black Mamba swirled around the water. Whoosh! Something struck. It was targeting his head.

Whoosh! He tried to swat the object away using the blade of his hand. The object avoided his hand easily. Bang! Black Mamba realized he made a mistake. He hadn't controlled his strength well enough to land a critical hit underwater. Kueeee! A scream rang out. The cenote's murky waters shook.

"Ugh!"

A burning pain seared through his left shoulder. The monster's teeth had pierced his shoulder. He could feel its sinister intentions to slice through his muscles and crush his bones. He grabbed the monster's upper and lower jaws with both of his hands and pushed it off. Its neck was thicker than his body. Craaaack! The Billion's Water Armor dug into the monster's neck. The monster hesitated.

The regenerative abilities of an Epidium kicked into place. White particles rushed out of his spine and flowed into his bloodstream. Now sparkling, the blood rushed towards his shoulder wound, where the monster had bitten. His flesh that had been torn open from the monster's razor-sharp teeth started to heal. The monster's body, however, had also healed somewhat despite him using his Billion's Water Armor.

"Damn bastard, die!"

Vvooooom! He stabbed the Billion's Water Armor into the monster's body and released his resonance. Its muscles tore open, but it immediately sealed itself up too. It had a cheat-level regenerative skill like the chimera he met at Ounianga Lake. Black Mamba and the monster tried to kill each other to the best of their abilities, but continued to struggle, unable to overpower the other.

The Pygmy middle-aged man and teenager, oblivious to the fight for life underwater, were peaceful above ground. They chewed on the yakori they luckily found in a limbali bark and waited for the god who had gone into the spring of death.

Yakori were not caterpillars but they were edible. The feeling of something moving inside one's mouth, the freshness of it, the pop as it burst, the smooth liquid wrapping around their tongue, and the overall bitter taste of it was one fine delicacy. Of course, such acquired tastes only applied to the Pygmies.

"Olonge, I see bubbles." Kidamba pointed at the devil's spring.

"God is scolding Bodun for entering the devil's spring."

"Why did the Bodun enter the devil's spring?"

"He went in there to take a bath."

"How long do we need to wait? Should we return to the village?"

"That won't do. God is too scary. We'll die from a press of his fingernail."

Olonge trembled. Even the scariest spell caster in the world had died by the Bodun's hands, a mere servant of the god. The god even killed the large elephant and wild bull with a wave of his hands. Gurgle. Mud splattered up from the devil's spring.

"Kidamba, move back. We are not the Bodun. Our flesh will rot if we touch the devil's spring."

Kidamba rushed back at Olonge's warning.

"How do the god and the Bodun remain in the devil's spring?"

"That's why god is god."

"Won't god be mad at us?"

Kidamba was slightly worried. He still remembered the glare god sent their way before entering the spring.

"Are you a stupid Pygmy? God had already spoken. Don't care about other things and mind saving our own lives."

"Right. You don't know what might happen if we interfere in god's works," Kidamba nodded in agreement.

Olonge, who was old, was wise. Black Mamba might be frustrated, but Olonge and Kidamba had only acted according to the Pygmies' way of logic.

Crash! The cenote trembled in pain. The human and monster continued to upheave the cenote's floor in their fight. Black Mamba felt like dying. He felt as though his waist would be sliced off every time the monster used its strength. He was experiencing the strange sensation of taking a roller coaster ride through the water due to the angry monster's rampage.

This fight would have long ended above ground, but this was the home ground of the monster. He couldn't use his speed or strength to land a strike because of the water pressure and density. He had to fight using half of his strength. He grew exhausted, too. His power which knew no limits were running rapidly low.

"This is driving me mad!"

Black Mamba really did feel like he was about to go mad. The monster's body was sturdier than an iron board. His Billion's Water Armor did dig in, but the hide didn't tear. The Billion's Water Armor could tear through 10mm of iron plate armor. If he could use both of his hands, he would have tried to tear it apart, but he had to beware of the monster's head which continued to bite into his shoulder.

Outer injuries didn't cause much damage. All he could do was send in internal shocks using his fingers as a drill to dig into the monster's body like digging through mud, sending out his resonance and increasing the wound. The problem was that its regenerative abilities instantly healed the wound and only increased its anger. This was his first time encountering such a difficult and absurd situation.

The monster wasn't an easy opponent either. It shook his head like mad trying to rip apart his shoulder, squeezing and twisting his body, and even banged his body with its tail. The monster and human didn't know what to do with each other as they turned and turned underwater.

"I'm a chicken head!" Black Mamba lashed out at himself.

He'd completely forgotten about Vajra. He opened his emergency pouch.

"Huh! What's this?"

Blue light emitted from his pouch. It was the ange sikakuh he got from the old Pygmy man. The light grew stronger and brighter. The low hum he'd felt from his chest had been from this thing. He instinctively realized the reason why he was able to remain underwater for so long had been the ange sikakuh.

Black Mamba immediately grabbed the Vajra and closed the pouch. This wasn't the time to wonder about the ange sikakuh's components. The monster dug its teeth in deeper in the time he took to take out the Vajra. If it hadn't been for his muscles which were stronger than aramid fibers, his body would have long been cleaved in half.

"Kugh! Ugh-"

He swallowed another mouthful of poison due to his scream.

"You damn bastard, you are so dead."

Pop! The Vajra dug into the monster's neck as though it was digging into the mud. Zzzzt! He turned the monster once from the spot he plunged the Vajra in.

Kuuuuueeeee! The monster screamed so loud it seemed to shake the sky. The fight between the monster and man in the heart of Ituri Jungle, deep within the devil's spring, ended just like that - with a single scream. The man's victory had only been possible due to the Billion's Water Armor and the Vajra, both impossible, cheat-like items.

Zzzzt! Zzzzzzt! He sliced at it with the Vajra twice, and the monster's dangling neck fell off. Its body that had wrapped around his also fell apart with a few swings of the Vajra. The large monster's body spewed blood like a firetruck's water hose. The dark yellow waters grew even darker, and a pungent smell spread rapidly.

Langley's Fifth Division of the Intelligence Analysis Team was a secret division that checked on the locations of predators that the CIA and Socrates members released into each corner of the world as a part of the MK Ultra project. The room, which was sealed with gold, was filled with monitors. The monitors were divided into four groups, and each group had two agents assigned to it to check and record the data and monitor.

The council had embedded GPS chips into each Grendel predator in Area 51. This was a measure taken after their two humanoid Grendels in Ounianga Lake went missing.

Nearby translators conveyed the location of the chip to the Keyhole satellite using the signals coming off of the predators' bodies. The Intelligence Analysis Team's Fifth Division took the satellite signal and analyzed and tracked the predators' movements.

Steve Coleman, an analysis agent, was bored. The Grendel predator he was in charge of was being tested in Ituri Jungle's cenote. The cenote he called a puddle was barely 1000m2. As small as the predator's allotted space was, there were six monitors left on for the predator.

The kind of boredom that came from monitoring a screen that never changed for the past decades was indescribable. He stood to stretch, chasing away his sleep, and looked at the monitor again. He'd have to leave his behind to the manager's heel if he missed a single movement.

The Grendels they had shoved inside Ituri Jungle were the Serpent, Octopus, and Turtle. The Serpent was based on an anaconda and was a Grendel with a mix of great octopus' genes. The Octopus' genes were made of the great squid and silver oarfish's, while the Turtle's genes were made of the turtle and white shark's.

They placed three large Grendels into a confined space because they couldn't find a suitable place like the cenote in the Ituri Jungle. They went through three testing stages; the first - a poison test, life test, and immunity test, the second, its attack test, and the third, its survival rate in the Pacific Ocean.

"Haaaaahm!"

Steve yawned widely. He didn't know how he came to be looking at a screen for twelve hours under the tyrannical rule of an evil woman. This was all because he fooled around with too many women, he supposed. Steve, who began drinking his cold coffee once more, flinched. Not because of the take-out coffee, but because of the monitor.

"Is that bastard mad?"

The serpent-shaped figure in the lower left of his monitor began to move up and down like mad.

"Benny, I think the serpent is fighting with the Octopus."

Steve turned to look at his assistant.

"Impossible. The Octopus and Turtle aren't moving one bit in their sweet home."

Benny pointed at his monitor. An Octopus and Turtle logo was floating deep underwater in its lower right. It was an underground cave attached to the cenote.

"That's strange. Why is this guy going mad when it's been quiet for over three years?"

"Perhaps it needs a female partner? Hehehe!" Benny laughed at his own joke.

"Shut up, Grendels don't have reproductive systems. Benny, analyze the movements and aim of the Serpent. I think there's a problem here."

"Okay!"

Benny began typing away at his keyboard. Steve was unable to take his eyes off the monitor. Twelve minutes had passed since the Serpent went into a frenzy. Suddenly, its manic movements stopped. Black Mamba had mistaken his fight to be an hour-long when it had only been 12 minutes or so.

"Huh!" Benny, who had his eyes glued to the screen, shouted in surprise. The serpent shape underwater blinked off.

Beeee! A machine went off. Steve rubbed his eyes. Something impossible had occurred.

"What kind of a fu**ed up situation is this?!"

Steve jumped to his feet. His paper cup tipped over. Coffee soaked the papers on his desk. He didn't even turn back as he ran out the door. This was an emergency. Steve banged into the manager's office without knocking on the door.

"Steve, are you in such a rush?"

Matilda, who had been staring at a document on the couch, raised her head. Steve was distracted by her light blue eyes. She lowered the paper she'd been holding onto the coffee table and twisted her legs. She licked her lips and glared at him with her eyes. It was the kind of seductive gesture even Buddha would have been lured by. Steve glanced at her legs. His lower body twitched.

"No, not now!"

Steve rushed to chant a mantra. Samantha Matilda, also known as the female mantis. It had been three years since he was lured by her and became her slave. He wouldn't have felt so unjust had he actually done the deed with her, but he was enslaved with just a kiss. Well, someone had his private parts removed trying to harass her, so he was considered fortunate. His lower half grew calm at the 32nd line of prayer.

"Miss, the Serpent has just died."

"The Serpent died?" Matilda's light blue eyes grew two times their size.