Era of Magic and Martial Arts-Chapter 284 - 268: You Are Not a Cyborg

The voice echoed in the air, carrying a strange metallic quality, and there was not a hint of emotion in the tone.

It was bizarre and cold, as if the speaker was not the same person as before, but had become some non-human creature.

The Peeping Tom's heart sank with a thud, the sound coming through the fog was unsettling, with no hint of any intention to "make peace".

He stood with his feet apart, shoulders uneven, assuming a side-stance, placing his hands in a defensive position in front of his chest, while the blue light in his right eye flickered frantically.

Retinas constantly zoomed in, as a gust of wind blew, the white fog shifted against the wind, revealing a ghostly pale, eerie, faceless... face?!!

The metallic voice came from behind this face: "A cyborg? I never said I was one."

The Peeping Tom's pupils contracted, his gaze a mix of vigilance and bewilderment: "Even the whole face has been transformed like this, yet you stubbornly deny being a cyborg?"

He shifted his gaze to scan below that faceless face.

Twisted bone spikes emerged from the shoulders, sprawling open like two dense thickets of thorns guarding the profile.

Beneath the thicket were two rows of menacing ribs, the surface scarred by explosions with a crack at the center, yet, eerily...

The crack subtly writhed, like a living flesh creature growing and recovering visibly.

The Peeping Tom's face froze with shock: "The implant is actually self-repairing?"

His mind was in disarray, the scene before him seemed beyond his understanding of cyborgs, more like another kind of transformation even more thorough than a cyborg?!!

"What's that type of transformation called again?"

The Peeping Tom's mind buzzed with alarms, he had never seen such a transformation, though he remembered vaguely hearing about it somewhere, but at this moment he just couldn't recall.

Then, he heard that cold metallic voice continue to echo through the air:

"I am different from you, I wouldn't just randomly stick any junk parts into my body."

"Honestly, I quite like the human form, it has a kind of natural rhythm..."

The Peeping Tom's throat felt dry, lubricating oil reversed up from his throat, irritating his esophagus.

As the cold metallic voice spoke, the white mist entirely settled to the ground, revealing a pair of bizarre bone claws resting on the ground, with circular bone plates covering the ankles and knees, glinting ominously in the darkness.

The blue light in the Peeping Tom's right eye flickered to the point of overflowing, he readjusted his vision, looking at the humanoid monster before him, with 80% of its body covered in bone, leaving little flesh connected, his mouth gaped unconsciously, as if a fist could fit inside.

The metallic voice continued, still cold, yet tinged with a strange inquiry into the truth:

"Cyborgs seem to be a hybrid of flesh and machine, neither human nor ghost, which doesn't fit my aesthetic. I've always believed that the natural, original form is the most beautiful state of life. What do you think?"

The Peeping Tom's eyes widened, the non-human creature before him filled him with deep shock, pieces of memory slowly pieced together in his mind.

He vaguely remembered once following the company on a business trip, attending a small but high-standard academic conference.

He happened to pass by a corridor and overheard a young scientist inside a room explaining his theory.

He peered through the door slit, the speaker was young and not very famous, many inside the room did not agree with his theory and mostly refuted him.

Years later, he saw that young scientist's face on television, the person had transformed into a star scientist in Zone 6.

It was rumored that he was to come to Zone 9 as a guest to attend some academic conference.

Back then, he couldn't remember the exact words said in that room, just vaguely the gist:

Implants are merely the starting point of the transformation journey, but no matter how far this road extends in the future, mechanical transformation can never achieve perfection.

Because, there is a fatal flaw in this road—mechanical and flesh are mutually foreign, machines are dead, flesh is alive, and there is always an insurmountable boundary between death and life that cannot be truly merged or transformed.

Therefore, the most thorough and perfect transformation must draw inspiration from the Evil Sacrifice!

The Peeping Tom momentarily lost focus, quickly biting his tongue, his mouth filled with the taste of his own blood, waking him up. 𝑓𝓇𝘦ℯ𝘸𝘦𝑏𝓃𝑜𝘷ℯ𝑙.𝑐𝑜𝓂

His right eye fixated on the non-human creature before him, his lips trembling, stammering: "You... you're indeed not a cyborg!"

He paused, feeling as though the CPU inside his head was about to burn out, almost smoking.

He took a deep breath, coldly saying: "You're not even human, ahhhh—"

The Peeping Tom felt his worldview had been insulted, laughing furiously in anger: "A monster that's not human, educating me, saying I'm neither human nor ghost, do you find it appropriate?!!"

Feng Mu's eyes turned cold, he wasn't talking nonsense with the other party for idle chatter, he was waiting for the fractured bones on his chest to heal, and now, the bones had almost recovered.

"I kindly educate you on the beauty of life, yet you slander me as not being human?"

Feng Mu's voice was cruel, he despised others slandering his "humanity", sneering: "Ignorant!"

The echo of the last sentence was still lingering, but the final word "Ignorant" had carried a vicious wind, shooting directly into the Peeping Tom's ears.

"So fast, nearly twice as fast as before, is it because he's fully revealing his true form and has unleashed his strength and speed completely?"

The Peeping Tom gasped in horror, feeling his left eye blur, and the virtual frame captured by his right eye barely caught a string of blurry phantoms.

This time, those phantoms were purely white, layer upon layer of dense bone spikes, the electronic eye couldn't even distinguish the shape of the person in an instant, let alone lock onto which one was real.

The Peeping Tom's ear twitched, his skin broke out in goosebumps.

He dared not hesitate, quickly contracting and lowering his body, his poised right hand swinging horizontally, striking the side.

Puff!

A dull thud, as if a heavy fist struck the air, creating a depression, the menacing white shadow on the right was instantly pierced through, shattering like a fragile bubble.

"Where are you looking? It's your blinking eye saying I'm not human?"

The sinister bone Mask almost touched his cheek, the coldness emanating from the [Mask] like a chill winter wind, piercing his breath.

In those eerie eyes, a malicious and intense killing intent was unabashedly revealed, making the Peeping Tom feel as though his scalp was about to split open on the spot.

That gaze wasn't human trying to kill another human; it was more like some terrifying carnivorous creature greedily eyeing its plate... of food!!!

…..