Kaijin Fighter: So I Have to Make Monsters, So What?
Chapter 1365 - 1365: Difficult Decisions

'Welp, I always figured I couldn't delay it any longer. Just didn't expect this to be the moment...' Zhen Liu mentally griped as he kept dodging poison bullet after poison bullet.

After Dante had started his latest attack, turning the dragon-shaped [Apostasy] into something resembling a Vulcan machine gun of nightmares, the aforementioned false lord had gotten lost in his own sauce and failed to realize Zhen Liu was dodging everything being fired at him.

In other words, Zhen Liu was having a moral crisis while under heavy fire.

Regardless, by a massive technicality, Zhen Liu could've resolved his cultivation issues weeks, possibly months, in advance.

All he had to do was create some random-ass kaijin out of sufficiently valuable material and shove one of the random-ass cores he had on hand in it, all while using some of the many formulas and arts he had stolen from the Cortez Family and the Silver Jungle Dragons.

He just hadn't done so yet because, well...he was a picky bastard.

In the same way every person in existence was born with some inclination towards one aether formula or another, every material and item Zhen Liu could use to make kaijin had their own inclinations.

Case in point, if Zhen Liu had created Nepherage with any material other than [Aged Crimson Jade] but still used the same formula, her personality and effectiveness would've been wildly different.

In the time Zhen Liu had spent trudging through Dozing Salamander, fighting through hell and back against crime lords, Buddhists, and angry deity fragments, Zhen Liu managed to find a wide assortment of materials that were wildly incompatible with the arts and formulas he had on hand.

If he was going to bring unnatural life into this world, he at least wanted to do it right...most of the time.

Excluding the unexpected existence of the Doll Twins and maybe Blazejudicator, Zhen Liu had this mildly grand idea that every kaijin he created should have "meaning" to their existence beyond just being his faithful warriors and living tools. If not that, if they were proto-kaijin, accidental creations, or evolved zakos, then they should at least have the capability of finding out what that purpose was on their own terms.

Nepherage was meant to be a hero.

Frosttusk was made with the idea of fulfilling a long-held grudge.

Hurricroak was the devotion and determination of a singer made manifest.

Arachnidame and Lacerage were meant to help guide and protect his family while he was unable to do so.

Even the Kaijin that weren't under his direct control anymore, Kit and the Neo Storm Knights, had the purpose of being there for someone else and an even grander one because of that.

In other words, he saw the kaijin as his own children, and he would be an incredibly shitty parent if he decided to create life for the sole purpose of exploiting it.

'Well... I suppose becoming a symbol of freedom for the hopeless masses is a pretty grand purpose,' Zhen Liu eventually concluded as he tried to figure out [Core] to use in a situation like this.

That stated, he had other options.

They just weren't that good.

[Milord, I just realized something,] Nepherage piped up as she could still sense Zhen Liu's personal turmoil despite their strained connection. [Can't you just use the Godoku Gourd with us and blast him? It's a more refined version of whatever fucked-up fusion shit this guy got going on; maybe it can hurt him.]

Nepherage's suggestion had merit, since the [Godoku Gourd] has proven time and time again able to take down all sorts of giant bastards.

There was just a massive drawback to this idea: Zhen Liu would only have one shot, figuratively and literally.

Firing the [Godoku Gourd] took a lot of [Chaos] not just from himself, but from his Kaijin as well.

If the attack didn't instantly kill Dante in one shot, there was an incredibly high chance the bastard would retaliate with some knock-off version of the [Godoku Cannon]. Hell, he was technically doing that now with his weird multi-[Core] Kaijin.

Which...now that Zhen Liu thought about it further, maybe he could replicate it too but do it better?

'I could try and recreate Ragnarocker...wait a minute...'

[Wait...what about the tezcatlipocas?] Blazejudicator asked before Zhen Liu's mind could stray further down the thought of fusing his Kaijin for battle. [Couldn't you just quickly whip up some bodies for them once you get your hand on some Malevolent Gold and have them take over?]

'As viable as that sounds, no, I can't,' Zhen Liu answered as Blazejudicator helped him to avoid a particularly nasty poison bullet that reeked of rotting flesh. 'They're taking a nap and requested I only make use of that gold after I somehow puri...wait a minute...'

As Zhen Liu thought deeper on the [Malevolent Gold], he remembered that there was something a bit more potent that he could make use of instead.

Something from his old life, no less. This is a sample from My Virtual Library Empire. Read the rest on NovelFire.

'On the one hand, the transformation is probably irreversible. On the other...fuck it. Dishonor before death. Nepherage. Blazejudicator. Help me make a smokescreen. I'll help with making some much-needed noise!'

[Of course.]

[At once, milord...wait, what?]

'I just realized this motherfucker is a knock-off me. So he probably has knock-off versions of my weaknesses!'

...

[Bahahahahah! Are you so overwhelmed by my power that you can do naughty by dance like a leaf in the wind?!] Dante howled with laughter as he kept firing poison bullet after poison bullet.

Ever since he learned about how to better leverage [Chaos], Dante was experiencing the greatest of highs.

Every movement, every breath, every circulation of aether and [Chaos] in his veins made him feel like he was alive in ways he had never felt or thought of before.

Then again, that might've been the fumes of poison affecting his brain.

[Come on, come on, come on! It's way too boring for a fight between Lords to be this one-sided!] Dante yelled between fits of mad laughter. [You have to at least fight back a little—]

[Illusionary Haze!]

Before Dante could finish making his remake, Zhen Liu proceeded to dismiss Nepherage's [Taboo] in order to have her possess him and give him an additional boost in literal fire power.

Once she was locked in, Zhen Liu tapped into both hers and Blazejudicator's power to release a massive cloud of smoke that shrouded him and everything around him in a five foot radius.

On top of that, while in the process of building up smoke in his chest, Zhen Liu whipped out his [Veteran's Bone Club] and his [Hammer of the Dearly Departed].

Using the power of the latter, he transformed the former into a hollow, ring-like percussion instrument.

An instrument, that when empowered by aether and [Chaos] released an absolutely discordant sound that caused Dante to triple over in pain.

[BAH! WHAT THE HELL?!]

Evidently, Dante had the same weaknesses as Zhen Liu and the kaijin.

Although, the pain Dante was feeling was exponentially worse due to all the additional [Cores] he was tapping into, resonating with one another.

If his flesh wasn't being actively reinforced by aether, there was a very high chance this noise would cause Dante's entire body to rupture.

Alas, he only came out of this moment feeling as if his head was being split open with a blunt axe.

[How the hell did he—oh, come on!]

By the time Dante recovered from the rattling in his head, he started seeing double.

To be more precise, he saw that Zhen Liu had escaped from his own smoke cloud in two different directions.

One was clearly an illusion, but Dante wasn't entirely sure which one it could be.

Even when he used his aether, he found that both versions of his opponent were radiating the same type of [Chaos].

(Un)Fortunately, Dante had an [Apostasy] that could act fairly independent.

[Slavina, you go after that one flying to the right. I'll go after the one flying to the...wait a minute...]

Throwing his senses back to the smoke cloud, Dante could sense an increasing amount of auras manifesting one after the other in the cloud, that were very similar to the ones that just ran away.

In other words, there was more than one clone of his opponent in existence.

[Fucking... damnit.]

Once this fact fully sunk into Dante's mind, the smoke cloud dispersed and revealed over a dozen clones of Zhen Liu all flying off in different directions.

Hell, some even charged towards Dante before diapering into smoke after getting smacked away by Dante's free hand.

The sight of all of these clones would drive most people to go insane out of frustration.

Dante, however, was... still understandably pissed.

However...he had a better idea on how to handle this moment.

Well then...time to switch things up.

Mimicking what he had just saw, Dante swapped Slavina's and Obsidious's places.