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The Hivemind was desperately fighting for his life, he had foolishly attempted to fight against her due to his lack of battle experience, thinking she was still weak and that she would be defeated if he tried hard enough, but that wasn't the case, Manationia was actually already stronger than him the moment she cut off his endless source of energy by curing the brainwashing of those that he had brainwashed! There were now barely any members of the cult praying for him, and around 80% of the cult members were all brainwashed as well anyways, so there were very few left for him to gain any power!
His power was slowly fading away by each second, and after unleashing that last super attack against Manationia, the Hivemind quickly realized what the truest fear could be! The horrendous fear he felt made his entire body tremble desperately, he couldn't even keep himself afloat for too long before he began to desperately roar and groan in agony, his entire body was being pressed by Manationia's golden claws, until the very center!
CLAAAASH!
"UUGRRAAAAHH…!"
Manationia mercilessly slashed the Hivemind into two halves! Enormous quantities of his primordial essence making him his soul began to bleed out of both halves as if it were blood itself! The Hivemind desperately tried to use this opportunity to escape, using one of his halves to escape and jumping into the ground, desperately crawling away! As long as a tiny piece of him could survive, he would be able to parasitize living beings and slowly stockpile biomass again… he could do it, he knew he could! As long as he could escape…!
"You're not escaping…" Said Octo, emerging right in front of the Hivemind, as she used her long and black tentacles to catch him! He tried to struggle and even parasitize Octo, but it was impossible, her very being was now of a similar composition than Manationia, and shared her powers with her, so she was also encompassed in this barrier of divine power that couldn't easily be pierced, even less for a weakened version of the Hivemind such as him now!
"Uuuaaggh…! Stop! Let me go!" He cried.
The other half was already caught by Manationia, as she flew towards Octo while gabbing it with her claws. A smile surged in her beautiful face, quite sadistic and completely unlike the honest girl she was often… she looked into the mass of darkness struggling to live, angrily shouting at them.
"I-I am the one that has devoured countless planets filled with life! You can't treat me like this! Don'0t you dare kill me!" He cried. "Y-You bastards! I won't die so easily, I can still fight…! Unngughguh… Aaaaghh! I can't… I can't! Agh…! No!"
The Hivemind struggled so much and made so many weird noises that the two girls couldn't help but watch him for a bit, they smiled cockily back at him, destroying all of his ego almost completely, and even making him cry, although he contained his tears. He suddenly turned into a stupid kid out of nowhere…
"S-Stop this! How dare you bully me… I am… I am just doing what I can to survive!" He cried. "What would I know that there were so many people that cared about other people and life in this planet?! I didn't even had an actual consciousness… or anything like that back then!"
"Huh, so you don't hold any responsibility for the amount of shit you did?" Asked Manationia. "You really messed everything up way too much, I learned more, and you seem to have caused a catastrophe that killed many people! And even now you've kept killing people indiscriminately, forcing others to kill each other and even made them pray to you…"
"Yes… Yes, I have! And I would do it again if I were given the damn opportunity! Just like any living being, I wanted to live! The easy way out of this planet was becoming a god and ascending my soul to this divine level!!!" He cried. "It was the only way! …All living beings are ultimately selfish! They desire power, to live longer, to have all the things they "want" or "need"! I am no different! I just had more means to accomplish such things!!! How am I any different from you who is trying to accomplish the same things ultimately?! At the end of the day, we are two factions trying to accomplish the same things! You have no rights to look down on me!"
The Hivemind began to rant about everything he had understood since the moment he ended in this planet, buried for eons, the tree of the world parasitized him and began draining his life away, and desperate to survive, he began to drain the energies of his surroundings, the pollution, and even the world itself which had a rich core with a lot of energy, but that wasn't enough, he found himself in a stalemate where he couldn't win! He had to find a way out of this, and this is why he did all these things.
Was he evil? He was probably as evil as he can get, and there was only one justification to his actions, survival, nothing more, and nothing else! And such a justification was found in every person that fought to protect themselves and to protect those they loved. Essentially, he wasn't any different from any of such people, he merely had more powers, more means, and more knowledge.
He didn't felt any remorse for his actions, but he felt like he could had done otherwise if he knew that he would end up in such a position at the end. He had no idea this world was so populated and had so many different things… but perhaps there was also something slightly positive about all of this, that he gained consciousness, life, and emotions, which helped him realize all these things, and to better comprehend his own life and the journey he had lived.
Manationia and Octo looked at him expressionlessly… and then, Manationia slurped both of his halves as if they were noodles…
"GRYYEEEHH…!"
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This content is taken from (f)reewe(b)novel.𝗰𝗼𝐦