Chapter 16

Michael heard a rough voice speaking into a radio. "The target has been spotted, permission to engage?"

Michael sighed, it looks like someone's been waiting for me. It's probably not the foundation. They would've just came out and picked me up if that was the case. Unless they were trying to have me killed.

Nah, that's probably not it, that would just be stupid. If they were going to kill me, then engaging me out in the open like this would just bring extra risks. So this is probably a different group altogether then.

Michael stared directly towards the hidden man. He could tell where he was well enough. Apparently the flesh that hates was pretty sensitive to flesh. Given the name, it wasn't unexpected.

I guess I should see what he wants.

Michael yelled towards the treeline, "Hey idiot, come out, I know you're over there!"

No response came.

"Come on, don't be like that. If you don't say something soon, I'm gonna start tossing flashbangs at ya."

...

Hesitantly, a man walked out from behind a tree with his hands raised unthreatening. He had a light machine gun strapped to his back and wore camouflage suited for the environment. Grenades and other weapons could be seen at his sides. He looked dressed for battle.

The man tried, and failed, to put on a convincing smile. "I'm sorry for hiding like that, but I'm not usually the negotiator in these kinds of situations."

"Uh huh, and what group would you be negotiating for exactly?"

"I'm with the insurgency, and we came to offer you a job."

"That's a lot of fire power for a job offer."

He chuckled nervously, "Well, the foundation isn't exactly our biggest fan. This is just a precaution in case they show up."

"Do you expect them to?"

"No need to worry about them, we can take our time talking. We've already blocked the signal for that chip they planted in your neck."

"Alright then, what exactly does your organization want with me?."

"Our organization finds anomalous items and sell them to wealthy clients. With your abilities, we'd welcome you with open arms. You could become rich overnight, how's that sound?"

Michael thought it over for a moment before shrugging indifferently.

"Yeah, you're not really selling yourself here. I don't want my discoveries to sit in some jackass CEO's office as some kind of decoration. What I really want is for them to be shown to the world, but that really doesn't seem viable right now. So the next best thing is having them studied. Which the foundation is currently doing, now stop bothering me."

Michael turned and started walking away, but he could feel people moving towards his position.

The insurgent leveled his rifle towards Michael.

"Stop! Look, I'm sorry about this, but we've already been paid to retrieve you. We're not going to leave without you."

"Are you an actual idiot? I'm guessing whoever you got your information from isn't really up to date on what's been going on with me, not that they should be I guess."

"I'm not going to say this twice, put your hands behind your head and get on your knees."

Michael sighed, "Looks like we're doing this."

Michael quickly broke into a sprint towards the insurgency member. The ground cracked beneath his feet as he ran. He could feel energy filling his body, the billions of souls kept within his crown made their presence known. His speed wasn't even comparable to before, as he bridged the gap between them in no time at all.

The insurgency member panicked and fired upon Michael, but the bullets phased through him harmlessly as Michael's hand sharpened and pierced through the man's stomach.

Seconds later, the remaining insurgency members arrived only to see their comrade gasping for breath on the ground with a hole in his gut.

Michael smirked as the men aimed their rifles and began firing. He'd just learned something important. The flesh that hates hadn't been taking him seriously at all. Those couple minutes of conversation they'd had were completely the whim of that boy, because the infection process didn't need to take as long as it did.

Michael rushed towards the insurgents, as the soldier he'd wounded stood back up covered in fleshy veins and fired upon his own men.

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It wasn't much of a battle, they couldn't really pose much of a threat towards him with the weapons they possessed, and at the end of the fight, Michael stood with five fleshy soldiers at his disposal. The rest were far too damaged to be used. He'd need to work on controlling his strength.

Despite the insurgency members being infected, their bodies were mostly unchanged. This was thanks to Michael's influence. He needed them to still be capable of operating their rifles, and more importantly, he didn't want them looking like chewed up lumps of sausage.

With the fighting settled, Michael turned back towards his infected soldiers, "Well I don't need you right now so go bury yourselves or something. Just make sure your weapons don't get damaged."

With that settled, he took a peek into their minds. Afterall, they were his memories now.

...

"Ah, what the fuck?"

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With the insurgents dealt with, Michael walked idly through the woods, and half an hour passed before he heard the foundation personnel coming to pick him up.

He wasn't in the best mood. The memory he'd extracted was a rather upsetting one. Apparently, one of the infinite Tommys running around had managed to dimensionally shift to this world, and the foundation had gutted and dissected him like a rat. Although they'd done this long before I'd seized this body, the important part of the story is that he still shifted back to his dimension despite being literal chunks of meat.

The Chaos Insurgency wanted to exploit that. Anything I'm touching gets shifted along with me after all. So carrying bits of me around like a sacked lunch would have let them loot other dimensions.

Michael sighed, and disregarded the new information for now. It wasn't something he needed to stress over. He casually greeted the foundation staff sent to pick him up with a wave, blood and gore still covering most of his body.

One of the guards quickly jogged up to him, "Holy shit, Michael is that really you?"

Michael was confused for a moment before he realized what he was talking about. His body had improved dramatically since the dimensional shift. It had grown much more muscular and rugged. He wasn't quite sure whether it improved because of the crown constantly filling his body with energy, or if he subconsciously improved his body using the influence of the flesh that hates.

Whatever the case, his current body was comparable to someone who frequented a gym, a lot.

Michael nervously chuckled, "Yeah, it's me. I had a pretty interesting shift this time."

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Michael sat in his room as Hearthgrieve peppered him with questions. Through the speaker of course.

He had decided to divulge what happened in the last shift willingly, although he omitted his run in with the Chaos Insurgency. It wouldn't take a genius to discover something was different with his body. At this point he was pretty sure he didn't even need to eat or breath.

With that being the case, Hearthgrieve had decided not to get close to Michael for the time being. The flesh that hates is a dangerous entity after all.

"Mr. Stevens, I'm grateful for you telling me all of this information, but you should know this puts me in a tough spot."

Michael leaned back in his chair and sighed, "Can I confess something to you doctor? I honestly can't wrap my mind around why Tommy was given a 'safe' rating in the first place. He could have transported anything he came into contact with in the other dimensions back to this reality. How long do you think it would've realistically taken for something like a dragon to eat him and get transported to this facility."

Hearthgrieve paused in thought, "I suppose that would be possible, but why are you bringing this up? You're not exactly helping your case here. Some of the staff are skeptical about how to handle you at the moment."

"I'm bringing this up, my friend, because I don't think your organization can really do anything to me anymore, and even if they could, I don't think they'd want to."

"How do you figure that?"

"Look, I'm just an explorer, I find things and you study them. Our dynamic works as long as you don't forget what I've told you. I'm not Tommy, don't try to fuck me. Follow that simple rule, and we'll be fine."

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Michael sat in his room, there wasn't really much to do. He didn't really need to work out anymore since his body was already in tip top shape and was unlikely to change anytime soon. He did still take lessons on how to properly use his mace, but he was hesitant to actually use the thing now. Using souls as fuel felt a little bit bad, although the crown was already doing that without Michael's input.

Nevertheless, he'd only use the mace when necessary.

Other than that, he'd finally gotten them to give him access to his game account. So at least he wasn't too bored. Sweet Jesus, he'd missed his games.

Just like that two weeks passed before weightlessness once again overtook Michael's body as space consumed him.

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When the shift had ended, Michael couldn't see a thing. He stood in the most absolute darkness he'd ever experienced.

Not wanting to be ambushed, he quickly lit a flare and immediately saw the void that surrounded him. Looking down at his feet, it didn't seem like he was standing on anything, and yet he could feel the floor beneath him.

A couple minutes passed and nothing odd had happened, the place simply seemed empty.

"Hey what gives, did I finally get sent to a world that isn't going to complete shit?"

He chuckled, "About time."