Psychic Parasite

Chapter 410: I’m Well-Versed in Hallucinations
”It’s actually Thermal Vision.” Duvic bowed his head in shame, his voice a whisper. ”It’s pretty useless during the day and I cannot even see anything much at night.”

’Any Skill is trash if you don’t even know how to use it in the first place.’ Jyorta sighed, speaking with a calm tone, ”Look…Duvic, what do you think Thermal Vision does?”

”It perceives heat signatures,” Duvic nodded, ”Even I know that. But when I used it, even when a person ran, I only saw some red and blue.”

”That’s what the Skill does,” Jyorta muttered, thinking what Duvic did during his stay in the military academy for him to not even bother researching about the sole Skill he had. He then realised not everyone had the drive to improve. Some were content with just watching the days pass without putting any tangible efforts into bettering themselves.

All sorts of characters existed among humanity. And, it wasn’t as if everyone were striving to become stronger and reach the top. Only the ones who obtained a higher Sync Rate from the start had such goals, for it was realistic to them. As for the rest, they reduced the margin of improvement accordingly.

As he possessed a Sync Rate barely above 50 percent, Duvic had close to zero drive to improve himself. It wasn’t because of his inborn character, but rather he had almost no hope of becoming stronger. So, he chose to sit it out.

The only ones who became powerhouses despite starting with a Sync Rate in the early 50s were those determined to succeed no matter what, having the persistence and perseverance to never give up. It was only normal such characters had their life journey made into books. They were heroes, legends of their generation who started from the bottom of the valley and arrived on the highest crest.

Everyone among the first generation of Ancestors was more or less similar. They were the first of mankind to insert a Wisdom Parasite in their bodies. So, their starting Sync Rates was only to the extent they hadn’t died. Their journey was starting from scratch on an unbeaten road filled with jagged rocks until they reached the peak of a rocky cliff.

”Thermal Vision allows you to perceive all heat signatures. And, depending on how you train, this heat signature isn’t absolute but becomes relative. So, even if a Frenzy Beast is made of ice, if blood moves in its body, it is in a relatively warmer state than the rest of the body, even if it looks no different to the naked eye. Thermal Vision is capable of capturing this difference too. This is an incredible Skill that allows us to detect the presence of Frenzy Beasts that remain in hiding to ambush us by assimilating into the surroundings.” Hearing Jyorta’s answer, Duvic felt his head hurt.

Jyorta smiled, ”Don’t worry. I’ll beat everything about the Skill into your body. You don’t have an option for refusal.”

Seeing Duvic sulk at the corner, Jyorta smiled as he gazed at Sreshta, ”Tell me more about your Skill.”

”My Tier 1 Skill is Focus Vision. But, the maximum I’ve been able to see using this Skill is not that different from my normal self.” Sreshta said, hoping for Jyorta to give her a long lecture too. Unlike her anticipation, Jyorta nodded, ”You just lack training, that’s all. We can work on it this week.”

As if he hadn’t seen her pouting expression, Jyorta looked at Bilena, the one who had loose control over her emotions, ”Let’s talk about your Tier 1 Skill now.”

”It’s Enhanced Hearing,” Bilena replied, her eyes darting away as she was unable to maintain eye contact with Jyorta. Her face flushed red as she tried to speak further but decided to remain silent after her voice refused to come out.

”It’s ample helpful during our Graduation Ceremony,” Jyorta smiled, ”It would allow us to keep track of everything in our surroundings.”

”Altitude Perception to keep track of our position with respect to the ground and detect any traps underground, Thermal Vision to detect any foes in hiding, Focus Vision to observe a scene from far away, and finally, Enhanced Hearing to keep track of everything that happens in our immediate surroundings.” Jyorta smiled, feeling that he was lucky to get such Skills, ”Our detection means are a cohesive unit.”

After a moment of thought, he crossed out the luck part, for he knew the military academy had purposely set the teams as is. So, they would have at least put people with non-overlapping Skills in each team. 

The moods of the four lit up upon his words, feeling like they might be able to improve something through this ordeal. In actuality, Jyorta was releasing a trace of psychic energy after activating his Regen. It was a minute quantity to the extent they were unable to detect it.

This psychic energy was subtly affecting them, improving their moods while making them listen to his words with a better concentration. Jyorta thought about his actions, mentally sighing, ’I’m becoming more and more a manipulator.’

He was left with no other choice. He didn’t wish to pull any punches now that he was this far into the game. Moreover, he barely had enough time to reach Tier 6 ideally. But realistically speaking, time was insufficient. If he was injured in a mission and had to recuperate and recover from his injuries, the time wasted would make all his plans pretty much useless.

He was pressed for time, and he had a lot on his plate that he had to consider and implement to become a powerhouse capable of saving and protecting his loved ones in the future. These days, the number of times his mind generated the thoughts of making a Bone family member into a subsoul was in the double digits. His waning morality was what was keeping it suppressed.

’If it is this bad for me, then what about those at Tier 4 and Tier 5? Are they just imitating morality based on the norms?’ Jyorta thought. It was a simple conjecture he had known for since long. When the Wisdom Parasite had developed to a certain extent in Tier 3, it would begin to speak with the host.

It was from that point did the truest horrors of the parasites manifested. The Wisdom Parasite would constantly play with words and affect the host’s mind, using his weakness, influencing him through words. It would screw up the mind of the host in real-time and continue to do so without rest.

And, it didn’t just resort to that alone. When it was bored, just to prevent the host from having a momentary peace, it played an orchestra in his mind. This orchestra consisted of every sound the host disliked or hated. As it would have developed to the extent it had absorbed most of the host’s memories, its mental attacks would be the most potent.

’I guess, that can also be termed as belonging to the domain of the mind.’ Jyorta thought, which was precisely the reason he questioned the morality of higher Tiered beings. At least, in his case, his change in morality was due to his horizons widening after comprehending the memories of the Frenzy Beasts too.

He wasn’t influenced by their memories, thanks to the method he obtained from Atika Light through his previous stunt. But that didn’t mean he remained unchanged. A person’s mindset changed depending on what he experienced.

As Jyorta’s experience continued to increase at a multiple every day, his thoughts about things were changing too. What he had considered morally questionable a year ago didn’t feel that much alien to him now, and this was just considering a year’s worth of development.

The guilt he felt from making the language teacher lose control and cause the death of his classmates wasn’t as sharp as before. It was still sharp, but relatively speaking, it had dulled a little. He wasn’t losing his emotional quotient or his humanity. Rather, he was becoming a calculative person that tallied costs and benefits in most cases, except those derived from pure emotions.

The innocence that he had maintained in his 20 years as Kaushik and the 16 years of his current life was disappearing. Jyorta had a hunch that the remaining traces of innocence would vanish during his first mission. After that, he would become an adult in the truest sense, an adult that lived in a society dominated by the parasites. The safe bubble, which was the ignorant childhood and the protected military academy was about to burst.

’These guys would play an important role in my graduation. So, I have to train them to the limit.’ Jyorta looked at the faces of everyone, noticing the three girls blush involuntarily upon the eye contact, ”Our detection means are a cohesive unit. As for the attack and defence, we’ll talk about it now. If you have any abilities or specialities, you can tell them.”

Seeing the four members remain silent, Jyorta mentally sighed and continued, ”Alright, we’ll now go into the aspects of attack and defence. This is where my ability comes into play.”

Jyorta snapped his finger as the four students were startled, finding themselves seated within the cafeteria. It seemed to be lunch hours, judging by the way the crowd moved in a hurry. The team members then looked at Rakh Veera walking towards them, flashing a thumbs up in their direction before seating himself at a nearby table.

Followed by clicking sound, the cafeteria now became the auditorium where Madam Mary was talking about the Wisdom and Frenzy Parasites. They then heard Jyorta snap his fingers as they were back in the study room.

But the weird thing was the figure of a Steel Porcupine breakdancing on the table while flailing its tongue everywhere. Jyorta made it vanish as he commented, ”Hallucinations! It’s not Madam Mary alone that can do it. I’m well-versed in this field too, and these are my prime means of attack.”