With the death of former Saint Moss as well as the downfall of the God of Life, the world struggled and finally moved on without much trouble. The people of the human kingdom continued on with their lives peacefully while the heroes as well as the king’s army launched a surprise attack on one of the Demon God’s strongholds. Lashing out serious damage, they successfully captured the stronghold.

 

Due to the loss of the strategic fortress, the demons reined in their armies and regrouped. As for the humans, they were able to experience a year’s worth of peace and prosperity. The demons and monsters rarely attacked during that year and the fate of the crops finally turned around, blooming with fruition.

 

Days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months. The vegetation worked hard to flourish and the crops to bear fruit. Everything seemed calm and moving towards a positive light when suddenly, an abnormal pulse of energy radiated from a single blade of grass. As soon as the pulse dissipated, a single eukaryotic cell on that blade turned yellow.

 

DING!

 

SUFFICIENT NUTRIENTS GATHERED

 

COMMENCING AWAKENING

 

3…2…1…AWAKENING SUCCESSFUL

 

PATHOS SYSTEM ACTIVATED

 

INCREASING INTELLIGENCE

 

COMMENCING MEMORY RESTORATION

 

The yellow-colored eukaryotic cell trembled slightly as it continued to mutate. Intelligence filled and consumed the nucleus, turning it into a pseudo-brain with memories of a past life…a pseudo-mind. The cell shook again, and the yellow color deepened into a golden hue. The cell became an intelligent lifeform.

 

I remember…my name…my name is MOSS! The cell started recalling his past life’s memories as well as the hatred and resentment he had suffered through.

 

With a flash of anger, the cell subconsciously released his mutated aura and infected adjacent cells with similar mutations. The mutated cells connected with his mind, allowing him to process information faster than before.

 

What’s this feeling? It’s different…something I or my past life has ever felt before. The cell thought as he tested out his increased capabilities. Hmmm, I recall hearing something like ‘Pathos System’? What’s that?

 

The cell focused on the two words and suddenly heard a ding in his mind. And then, another two words appeared in his mind. No, it appeared before him. The cell adjusted his view and noticed that no matter where he looked, the two words always appeared at the center of his view.

 

<<STATUS OPEN>>

 

S-Status…open? The cell uttered those two words and if he had any form of expression, it would be confusion. Suddenly, the words disappeared from his view and a display appeared.

A lot of information to take in, but Moss seemed to understand the gist of it. He had become a virus – something he had fought hard against in his past life. How ironic! Moss looked through the information carefully, taking note of his title. So, he’s a bluegrass virus eh? As bluegrass was the most common type of grass on the continent, he was not surprised. Moss focused on his rank and a paragraph of information popped in his mind.

 

Rank is the taxonomy level of the system’s host. Current rank is Species, which is the lowest rank. There are currently ten different ranks – Pathos, Life, Realm, Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, and lastly Species. Other than Pathos and Species, each rank has a sub-rank, which is considered no more than just a classification of being midway through a complete breakthrough.

 

Interesting. Moss mulled over the information as he focused his attention on the Infection Progress.

 

Similarly, another description appeared. The ‘Infection Progress’ was determined by how many organisms were infected. In other words, the required one thousand meant that Moss needed to infect a thousand organisms in order to level up. But how many levels does it take to rank up? That, it seemed, Moss needed to find out the hard way.

 

Next up were the eukaryotic cell’s statistics. There were four general stats and what looked to be an unknown or locked stat. Maybe he could only access it once he reached a certain level or rank. Looking at ‘Infectivity’, this meant how well he could affect others. ‘Severity’ referred to how much damage he could unleash onto the infected. As for ‘Lethality’, this meant how easy it was for him to kill the infected.

 

Finally, ‘Durability’ described how long his infection could last in an organism before he needed to either fully take over or lose connection. Infected organisms that have lost connection with him would naturally recover and even become immune to any further infections. The one under his durability stat meant that the infected area could only last a day. As for the skills, symptoms, and resistances seemed to speak for themselves. The descriptions for each were already clear enough for Moss to understand.

 

Wait! My current durability is a day?! Moss suddenly recalled that he hadn’t even taken over one organism yet.

 

The bluegrass he was currently infecting had millions of cells and he only infected four. The sun was already at the peak. He had a little less than half a day left! Moss threw everything to the back of his mind and began focusing on infecting the single blade of bluegrass.

 

Infection Progress (IP): 0/1000

.

.

.

Infection Progress (IP): 1/1000

 

TAKEOVER COMPLETE

 

NEW HOST ACQUIRED

 

SKILL <<POLLINATE>> ACQUIRED