Kevin rushed straight toward his abnormally transforming opponent.
He attacked straight at his head, intending to crush his skull before he could complete whatever he was trying to do.
After all, it's stupidity to wait for his opponent to power up right in front of his eyes and then waste time fighting a new, batshit-powerful enemy.
Kevin doesn't like clichés.
Unfortunately, his opponent shared his view.
Just as the punch was about to connect, the scientist—who had been standing still with his eyes closed, as if waiting for his transformation to complete—suddenly opened his eyes with a grin that almost extended to the barely stitched muscles painting his lower jaw crimson with his own blood.
"Got you," he said in an unpleasant, growling tone.
Before Kevin could change the trajectory of his fist, the scientist moved forward, placing his head right in front of his punch. Kevin didn't have enough time to understand what his enemy was trying to do by willingly placing his head in front of a devastating attack.
Since it had come to this, he didn't back down. Instead, he increased the force and speed behind his attack.
Bad choice.
Right in front of Kevin's eyes, the scientist opened his mouth wide to its physical limit, but it didn't stop there.
His transformation accelerated instantly, finally reaching his head. The stitches began to break, tearing the muscles of his mouth, widening them like a metal string passing through a watermelon, painting his whole lower body—below the jaw—in his own blood.
Kevin's senses screamed danger, but before he could understand what he was witnessing—
Bite.
Crunch.
The scientist bit his hand.
Munch.
Kevin's eyes widened. He unconsciously moved backward, distancing himself by kicking the man's—no, the monster's—chest in front of him. His survival instincts solely guided his actions.
"Hmmm."
The scientist—who had now transformed into something that could only be described as an incomplete mixture between a wolf, no, a dog, and a man—was too disfigured and defective to resemble a werewolf.
It looked as if he had switched his bloodline in the middle of his transformation.
"A little too hard on the surface, but the inner part is good enough for me to ignore it."
He said this with eyes closed, blood covering his grinning face, as if evaluating the food quality at a restaurant.
Kevin felt chills running through his whole body.
Even though he knew that people like the one in front of him existed—from web series or crime reports—people who could feed on their own kind, experiencing it firsthand was an entirely different matter.
Kevin looked toward his own hand. Bone sprouted out, a few masses of muscle still hung like threads from a cloth torn apart forcefully. The bleeding had stopped; he could even see a few spots where capillaries and veins had begun to regenerate.
This was his first time observing his own regeneration so closely. The previous times, he had been too preoccupied with other tasks. But now, he could say with certainty—it was definitely not a pleasant experience.
Then he felt it.
Not in his surroundings, but within himself.
An emptiness, like something that had existed until now had suddenly stopped existing.
Something like a part of his own self. Something too important. Too precious.
A slight pain appeared—not at a specific part of his body, but throughout his entire self—like several pins, heated in burning flames, had just punctured his whole body.
Kevin didn't get a chance to scream. Even that was too much labor for him.
The fact that he was still standing was proof of his strong mental fortitude.
After a moment, the pain stopped abruptly, but he didn't get the chance to even take a long breath. His present situation didn't allow it.
The scientist had already moved, taking his unresponsiveness as a mental response due to fear—a chance to attack once again.
He moved swiftly, with a wide-open jaw, on all fours—just like a beast from the Canidae family in the animal kingdom.
Kevin tried to dodge when he barely registered his presence—too close to himself through his senses. But his shabby movements were not enough to evade his inhuman enemy's attack.
Crunch.
Again.
The scientist, in his beastly form, had torn a piece from his body—this time, from his left shoulder.
Much deeper than a normal person would survive within a few seconds from bleeding alone.
Even Kevin's regeneration speed wasn't enough to stop the bleeding instantly this time. His body—already enveloped in his own dried blood—was once again submerged in crimson.
But—
He did not react. No cry of pain. Not even a muffled voice.
Because he did not feel it.
The moment Kevin lost a big piece of his body, causing his regeneration to act in emergency,
He felt it again.
That same sensation of losing something too important.
He ignored his surroundings and closed his eyes to focus. To wait for it.
That unbearable pain that had coursed through his whole body just a moment ago.
Moments ticked by.
The scientist moved once again—but this time, to end this play. To injure him enough so he could no longer resist.
Everyone who was witnessing the scene—Isla, scientists from the genetic department, security in charge, even guards—
Everyone felt a slight disappointment in their hearts.
Humans are beings filled with contradictions—even though their goal was being achieved easily, everyone still felt that the process had not met their expectations.
To think they had prepared so much to subdue this first successful subject of their years-long experiment.
It was like preparing an army for a battle against another army only to find that their enemies didn't even have basic weapons or strength to fight.
Kevin didn't know about others' thoughts, but his own were quite jumbled.
Even after waiting for the pain, it did not come.
Instead, a wave of drowsiness hit him.
Like a handful of sand slipping from his grip, he felt himself losing control over his body.
Thud.
He fell to his knees.
Despite forcing all his mental strength, all he managed to achieve was stopping himself from falling flat on the ground.
The scientist stopped in the middle of his track, bewildered at the sight.
He looked toward the supposed leader of his group—who was also staring at him with a 'What the hell did you do?'expression—and spoke with a slightly anxious tone.
"I swear I didn't bite that hard."
Sigh.
The leader shook his head and exhaled sharply.
"Check whether he is truly unconscious or just acting," he ordered.
The scientist moved toward Kevin with carefree steps, though inwardly, he remained a little cautious.
He stood before the kneeling Kevin.
He bent slightly and knocked on his head a few times, like knocking on a door.
"Hello, Mr. Food, Are you still there?" He asked in an exaggerated, dramatic tone, feigning innocence.
Silence.
When there was no response, he crouched in front of Kevin, eyeing his downcast face with a suspicious glint.
He focused on his experimentally acquired animalistic senses—just to make sure they weren't ringing with warnings of danger.
When his instincts remained unresponsive, he decided to make one final check before signaling the others to capture him.
He moved his right hand, placing it on Kevin's chest—just above where his heart was—eyes closed, ensuring he was still alive and hadn't simply bled out.
It would be very problematic if he had truly died.
Feeling the strong, rhythmic beating of Kevin's heart, the scientist sighed in relief.
But before he could pull his hand away, his body flinched.
Not only him—every person present in the building felt it.
Something changed in the air, as if reality itself had shifted for an imperceptible fraction of a second.
The scientist abruptly opened his eyes, searching for the source of the disturbance.
His breath hitched. His pupils contracted.
Kevin was awake.
But it wasn't just wakefulness—he was aware in a way that sent an unnatural chill rippling through the space.
His head remained slightly lowered, gaze vacant, as though he were momentarily existing somewhere beyond the confines of his physical body.
Then, his eyes snapped open.
Dark green thunder flickered within them—erratic, violent, unrestrained.
His veins pulsed with the same crackling glow, green currents flowing beneath his skin in frantic bursts, illuminating the space around his face like fissures in a broken shell.
Then—blood began to pour from his eyes.
Thick. Heavy. Unrelenting.
TSK.
"To think he would fall so quickly after awakening."
The words slipped out, but the tone was different.
Not rushed. Not pained.
They carried an indifference that did not belong to Kevin.
The scientist, watching Kevin murmur to himself, hesitated.
His senses—previously silent—suddenly screamed danger, but before he could make sense of them, his instincts compelled him to move.
Slowly, he tried to retract his hand.
He was careful. Precise.
Yet somehow—Kevin noticed.
His focus shifted.
Those unnatural, flickering green eyes landed directly on the scientist crouching before him.
Then—he looked at the hand.
That intruding hand.
His gaze followed it as though inspecting something foreign, something unwanted—before everything stilled.
For a breath, time seemed trapped in an unseen tension, suspended like an impending storm.
Then—Kevin raised his head.
The green thunder within his gaze ignited violently.
For a fraction of a second, the scientist forgot to breathe.
Not from terror.
From pure enthrallment.
Those eyes.
They were too much.
Too vivid. Too impossible. Too suffocating.
They were the last thing he saw.
The last thing he remembered.
As his severed head fell to the ground.