Chapter 119: Matthew: I'm a Ditto. Pay Up.
The office.
Once Ada's brief comedy had passed, Matthew turned his attention to the System panel.
The interface was as cleanly organized as always. After recent expenditures on recruiting various people to his side, his remaining System points sat at roughly twelve thousand.
Twelve thousand was, in his estimation, more than enough to work with the Megamycete he had received the night before.
He moved it to the optimization slot and got started.
[Megamycete: The root source of E-Type Mold. An ancient fungal superorganism with a collective consciousness; simultaneously a vast information repository capable of recording, fully absorbing, and storing the DNA, memories, and personalities of infected subjects. It can preserve the "data" of countless deceased individuals and alter or transfer consciousness. Note: The Megamycete possesses its own independent will and thoughts.]
[Defects: Autonomous Will / Supreme Authority / Ultra-Low Compatibility]
[Advantages: Living Database / Personality Download / Potential Development]
"Only three defects?" Matthew looked at the Megamycete's panel with mild surprise.
Though on reflection it made sense. In the world of Resident Evil, the Megamycete was arguably the closest thing to a perfect bioweapon. Where every other virus worked through physical enhancement, the Mold had taken an entirely different direction: something closer to the supernatural. Superpowers. The theoretical possibility of restoring the dead to consciousness. This was not the kind of thing Resident Evil's setting normally produced.
[Autonomous Will: The Megamycete possesses a high degree of independent self-awareness, to the point of inducing and negotiating with humans, and exerts subliminal control over infected subjects through the mold. Can be optimized for 500 System points.]
[Supreme Authority: The Megamycete holds supreme authority over all E-Type Mold. Even a perfectly compatible host becomes only its "proxy." Can be optimized for 1,000 System points.]
[Ultra-Low Compatibility: Organisms capable of adapting to the Megamycete and E-Type Mold are extremely rare. Organisms that adapt and additionally develop new abilities are rarer still. Can be optimized for 5,000 System points.]
He read through all three.
His gaze stopped on Ultra-Low Compatibility.
Five thousand points.
What the hell. How low did compatibility have to be to cost five thousand points to fix?
He sat with this for a moment, internally calculating. If he skipped the compatibility optimization, he couldn't even be certain he was one of the rare organisms capable of adapting to the Megamycete at all.
That settled it.
"Optimize everything."
[Optimizing all defects requires 6,500 System points. Confirm?]
"Confirm."
[Optimizing...]
[Optimization complete.]
6,500 points gone. Every defect on the Megamycete's panel cleared.
He shifted his attention to the advantages. The first two held limited interest for him at the moment. The one that mattered was Potential Development.
The Mold's development track was the whole point of this. Heisenberg's magnetic control had come from it. And if he was remembering correctly, in the Shadows of Rose DLC, Ethan's daughter Rose could physically retrieve objects from within dreams.
[Potential Development LV1: After fusing with E-Type Mold, greatly strengthens regeneration and physical constitution, with a small probability of activating latent potential and gaining a superpower. Can be upgraded for 3,000 System points.]
"So even after improving compatibility, activating a superpower isn't guaranteed. Still comes down to luck?"
He looked at the description.
Silence.
Then he chose to upgrade it. He had no interest in games that came down to luck. More importantly, the whole reason the Megamycete mattered to him was the potential it could unlock, and an outcome that still depended on chance at the end was not acceptable.
3,000 points gone.
The Potential Development entry changed.
[Potential Development LV2: After fusing with E-Type Mold, greatly strengthens regeneration and physical constitution, with a high probability of activating latent potential and gaining a superpower. Can be upgraded for 10,000 System points.]
He looked at LV2. Then he looked at the cost for LV3.
His fingers twitched involuntarily.
Three thousand to go from LV1 to LV2. Ten thousand to go from LV2 to LV3. He genuinely felt the urge to express some thoughts directly at the System, but the System on this subject was as responsive as a dead fish. Zero engagement.
He stared at the LV3 price tag and assembled a justification.
This was probably just the cost of that final gap. The difference between ninety-nine percent and one hundred percent always cost more than everything before it combined.
LV2 wasn't ninety-nine percent, he acknowledged to himself. But at least it wasn't small probability anymore.
He opened the fusion interface. He placed the Megamycete and himself into the fusion slots.
[Megamycete (E-Type Mold Aggregate) + Matthew Lawrence (T-Virus + V-Virus + G-Virus + Green Goblin Formula + Spider-Man Serum): Compatibility 90%. Note: 10% chance of rejection. Fatal systemic failure. Cost: 1,000 System points.]
One thousand. Manageable.
But then Matthew thought about the Megamycete's actual physical form. Its body was the size of a castle. If he fused with it directly, would he end up similarly sized?
He opened the Customization interface and stated what he needed.
"Scale the Megamycete's form down to match my dimensions."
[Proportional Scaling: Scale target's physical form proportionally. Cost: 500 System points.]
"Apply."
[Processing...]
[Complete.]
The Megamycete's icon in the modification slot showed no visible change. The modification was done.
He returned to the fusion interface.
The last thousand points disappeared.
Ada had finished with the fish tank some time ago and moved through to her private office. The main office was empty. No one to see anything.
Blue-black veins spread beneath the surface of his skin, branching and extending.
As the Megamycete became part of him, the G-Virus already in his system began adapting to accommodate it. In the process, something else happened.
Matthew's face changed.
Not once. Continuously. Face after face cycling through him in rapid, uncontrolled succession: Ada, Leon, Eleanor, Hunk, Tony, Logan, Nikki. Then animals.
Within a few seconds he had passed through several hundred forms.
If anyone had seen this, they might reasonably have assumed a Ditto had taken over him
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