Chapter 72: Security Breach


    As the loud gunshot on the outside went off, the four mutants inside immediately reacted.


    "What was that?" One saidthe first Stage Two Mutant so far who was capable of intelligent speech.


    The tallest and bulkiest one of the four who looked to be their leader pointed at one of the other three mutants. "You, stay here and keep an eye on the cameras. The rest of you,e with me."


    "Yes, sir!" The three other mutants saluted, and the leader along with two of them headed out the doors


    Brushing directly past Cyanide and Kirika, who hid in their invisibility right around the corner.


    Once they were safely out of earshot and investigating the floor, the two slipped into the room without any dy before the doors slid shut automatically, where the mutant who had been ordered to stay behind sat, carefully looking at all the different cameras on-screen with those non-existent eyes of its.


    Too bad he was about to die.


    Swift and deadly, Cyanide drew his knife and stabbed the mutant directly in the neck while grabbing it by the hair, then forcefully tore its head off its deranged neck as he sawed through it with his knife.


    As one would expect, mutant blood exploded from the wound like water gushing out of a fountain, but after experiencing what happened with the two canine mutants during the first Scarlet Hour, Cyanide was prepared. He instantly kicked the body forward and leaped back so that he was well out of the range of the pouring ck liquid, and Kirika, who had simply been watching, averted her gaze, not wanting to witness such a gruesome scene.


    As the body of the mutant disappeared and Cyanide leveled up to Level 27 without gaining any items particrly noteworthy, he took his gun back from Kirika, then holstered it on his hip. Earlier, the reason he had her shoot it instead of himself was because he had the [Silent Shooter] passive skill, whichquite regrettablycould not be manually turned off. Because the bullet would''ve been silencedpletely, the ''distraction'' would''ve been utterly useless. As such, he needed someone else to shoot his gun, and Kirika was the perfect choice.


    "Luna, can you do anything from here?" Cyanide asked quietly, ncing at all the security camera feeds being disyed on the walls.


    "Yes," Luna replied, to Kirika''s surprise. "I should be able to ess and configure all the other cameras in this entireboratory from here, but it will take some time."


    Cyanide nodded. "I see. Then-"


    But suddenly, Kirika''s aura sensing abilities picked up on several presences approaching them, and she quickly turned to Cyanide.


    "Cyanide, the guards from before areing back! We need to get out of here!"


    But as usual, Cyanide didn''t panic, remaining as calm as ever, and shook his head slowly.


    "It''s toote to run but not to hide."


    After ncing around the room, he suddenly reached forward, grabbed Kirika by the forearm, and slipped underneath a table in the room while pulling her with him. Before Kirika even knew it, she was underneath Cyanide, and opened her mouth to protest, but Cyanide covered it with his hand. Their faces were mere inches apart, but strangely, only Kirika was flustered. Cyanide didn''t care one bit, and instead kept his focus on the guards who were about to enter the room.


    As if on cue, they heard the sound of the automatic doors sliding open, and the three guards who went to investigate outside came back into the room. Naturally, however, they found their fourthrade nowhere to be found, and were confused.


    " Where did he go?"


    "Was he killed while we were away?"


    " Tch. They must still be on this floor somewhere. You two, find them! I will alert the others!"


    "Yes sir!" The two mutants saluted as the third began walking away, turning his attention away from that room.


    Big mistake.


    Cyanide, waiting for a moment like this, suddenly kicked up the table they had been hiding underneath, taking the two guard mutants by surprise, but it was toote. Kirika drew her katana as fast as wind, and cut through both the table and the mutants in a flurry of swift strikesthe [Star Ssh] sword skill.


    "Hm-?!" The third and final mutant, who had been walking away, heard thismotion and turned around


    Just in time to see a bullet fly towards it.


    "Nrgn!" It was struck directly in the forehead, but Cyanide wasn''t done just yet. For good measure, he let out another two bullets, striking the mutant in the heart and neck respectivelyboth vital organs.


    The mutant gurgled a bit in pain once more, staggering backwards, before finally copsing to the floor and turning into shards of light shortly after. Cyanide lowered his gun, holstered it, and observed the notification that popped up in front of him amongst others:


    [Obtained Security Pass Level Two x1.]


    " And that''s that."


    Because thest mutant was a strong one with more HP than the others, Cyanide had to use more than one bullet to take it down. Otherwise, he would''ve conserved. That mutant needed to die, though, as he could not allow the other guards in this ce to be alerted of anything. You would think in a world as advanced as Endzone, underground radiomunication would be a thing, but then again, much of the was destroyed as a result of the apocalypse. Hell, even electricity was just recently restored to the city thanks to Cyanide''s efforts.


    "No more mutants on this floor, correct?" Cyanide asked, and Kirika nodded.


    "None I can sense. Though there appears to be some below us?"


    "Right," Luna added, hard at work hacking through the security cameras of this undergroundb. "This is just the first floorthere is another right below us, ording to the cameras I can ess. If you just give me a few moments, I can make them all set to loop infinitely, which will make getting around a bit easier for you two once you head down."


    Cyanide nodded, and together, they decided to take a short break here in this room. Cyanide took this time to distribute his newly obtained 20 CP into STR and INT respectively (10 each) since now that he had unlocked Weapon Arts, it would be wise to further enhance his base attack powerboth physical and Soul Arts. INT affected Weapon Arts as well, but the exact influence depends on the skill.


    For example, upon reading the skill''s description in further detail, Cyanide discovered that the [Vampiric de] Weapon Art''s duration after initial activation varied depending on how much INT he had, with a base duration of 5 seconds plus 1 second for every 5 INT stat point he had. In other words, with his current INT stat of 45, the [Vampiric de] Weapon Art would now remain active for a total of 14 seconds after initial activation.


    Some Weapon Arts like [Shock Ray] had their Soulforce cost reduced as there was nothing else that could scale based on one''s INT stat, but others had more than one factor that could scale with it. For example, Cyanide''s [Toxin Air] Soul Art''s damage per second and duration both scaled with INT, whereas only the duration of [Petrify] did and only the damage of [Skulls of Hell] upon the skulls'' explosions did.


    In conclusion, now that he had ess to Weapon Arts, the INT stat was more important than ever. He still wouldn''t prioritize it over STR, AGI, or VIT, but if those three stats were looking fine, then leveling up INT was never a bad idea. DEX and LUC, on the other hand well, they were only useful if he was nning to useplex weapons or craft advanced items using rare drops. Cyanide preferred simplicity above all else, since being a professional assassin meant he wanted the least hassle possible in his missions.


    Meanwhile, Kirika was busy with Luna talking about Weapon Arts and all that. She had just reached Level 25 and unlocked them along with Cooking, so she needed a good exnation of them (and Cyanide sure as hell wasn''t doing it). Sure, this was supposed to be her A.R.S.A.''s job, but she and Luna had formed a bond that Cyanide couldn''t quiteprehend how or why.


    Either way, even though they were taking a break here, they couldn''t afford to wait that long. As such, Cyanide decided to conserve the 2 SP he had and carefully choose what to spend them onter, once they got back from this ce.


    Or, perhaps, if he ever needed a movement skill to escape certain death like Kirika did, there was always that too.