Hunter of Mysterious Creature-Chapter 392 - 40: Zero Percent

The noblewoman with a blasted head stood stiffly in place, her exposed pale skin gradually turning red, and within seconds, it had transformed into the same shade as her long gown.

In the next moment, her body suddenly liquefied and collapsed, scattering onto the ground like a localized blood rain.

The exorcist landed on the ground again. Sun Hang was about to call her, but unexpectedly, she leaned backward and fell.

Hundreds of mycelium strands instantly wove into a cushioning net, catching the exorcist’s body.

Sun Hang quickly ran to her side.

The exorcist’s complexion was grave—despite the terrifying scars all over the remaining half of her flesh face, it was still evident that her complexion was very pale. The artificial tracheal piston in her throat constantly emitted abnormal sounds, and at the junction of her human and mechanical body, there was even faint seepage of blood.

"Even if you’re the expert, this isn’t easy for you..." Sun Hang helped the exorcist up, and she quickly adjusted her condition. In just a few seconds, her breathing frequency had stabilized, and her legs could barely support her body.

"The last time I had to fire three shots in a row was at a mysterious creature whose serial number ranked in the top twenty..." the exorcist said.

Thanks to the artificial voice device, her voice did not sound weak at all.

The exorcist raised her right hand.

The two fingers she had bitten through earlier were now shrunken and withered like dried orange peel, as if all the flesh and blood had been drained away, leaving only a layer of dead skin covering the bone. She lightly flicked it with her other hand, and the dried skin instantly turned to powder, revealing two segments of stark white finger bones.

"Sigh, I’m down two more fingers," the exorcist sighed.

"Was that the price for those three shots?" Sun Hang asked.

He suddenly thought that the gun the exorcist used was quite similar to Ling Xiao’s ’Godslaying Spear’, except that the ’Godslaying Spear’ could kill all mysterious creatures, not just spirit bodies, and the price paid was the more abstract ’life force’.

As for the exorcist’s shotgun, the price for firing seemed to be merely the user’s flesh and blood.

"Yes," the exorcist replied. "Actually, this gun and I are one; I’m its ammunition."

She carefully placed the shotgun back into its case, then took dozens of sealing talismans from another bag and reattached them to the surface of the case.

"So these artificial parts on your body weren’t from injuries, but because you ’used’ them up?" Sun Hang asked again.

"Most of them, yes." The exorcist nodded, "Every time I fire, this thing devours a part of my ’parts’, so to speak, I’m just a consumable."

For some reason, when he heard the exorcist say this, Sun Hang immediately thought of Mr. Wang.

Before his ’rebirth’, Mr. Wang also saw himself as a ’consumable’, something to be discarded once all its value was drained.

"How much ’human percentage’ is left in your current body?" Sun Hang asked, glancing up and down at the exorcist’s torso wrapped in the heavy raincoat.

"About a third," the exorcist muttered, "I’m not really sure. Anyway, I can fire over a hundred shots... With current artificial body technology, even if I only have half a brain left, the techs have ways to get me moving."

"This definitely is a double-edged sword... Can any other hunter use it besides you?" Sun Hang asked tentatively.

"No," the exorcist shook her head decisively, "You must’ve noticed; I’m not just a mysterious creature hunter but also an appropriate candidate for deceitful equipment. And this gun is my deceitful equipment. My synchronization rate with it initially was 41.5%, and after using it many times, it went up to about fifty percent... Honestly, the Dubhe Tower has always been searching for my replacement, but they’ve tried many people, both infected and uninfected, and none exceeded a synchronization rate of five percent."

"It’s a pity," Sun Hang said softly.

If this gun were used by him, the side effect of devouring flesh would virtually be non-existent—provided there was sufficient nutritional intake from the external environment, the Taishui meme could always replenish the consumed flesh. Theoretically, not just Sun Hang, but Taishui meme infectees like Song Yarong and Jiang Yu could use the exorcist’s shotgun with no loss.

Even Wang Xiyi could use it—the self-healing capability of the Black Dragon meme is no lesser than the Taishui.

Of course, there’s also a solution of implanting the Taishui meme into the exorcist’s body, which would not only solve the issue of usage frequency but even allow her currently missing body parts to regrow.

However, Sun Hang didn’t rush to say anything.

So far, the Taishui meme in his body had only infected two people, Song Yarong and Jiang Yu, who were both uninfected before infection.

But the exorcist is different; she is an infectee, and no one can guarantee whether implanting the Taishui meme into her would cause the meme to clash with her own, or induce unpredictable mutations in her memetic structure...

Even if the Taishui meme could perfectly integrate with the exorcist, it would still inevitably alter her own memetic frequency, leaving the synchronization rate between her and the mysterious creature shotgun all uncertain.