Breath of the Idle King

Chapter 8: Breathing Collapse Ptotocol

Chapter 8: Breathing Collapse Protocol

The rhythmic and threatening thud of boots on concrete echoed. Garou stood in the center of a circle, surrounded by over a dozen men in black tactical gear elite troops with no corporate logos, only numeric codes on the back of their gas masks. The black aura enveloping Garou's fingers began to crawl upward, like thick oil creeping beneath his skin.

"Target identified. Initiate Air Isolation Protocol," a cold voice crackled over the intercom of one of their commanders.

Instantly, a faint hiss was heard from the ceiling of the cramped room. Garou didn't have time to ask what was happening before the air in the room was sucked out with brutal vacuum force. Whuuush!

Oxygen vanished in seconds. Garou staggered; his lungs, which had been working with a mechanical rhythm, now protested violently. He tried to draw a breath, but all he found was a void pressing against his throat. The atmospheric pressure inside the room plummeted, making his eardrums throb painfully.

[WARNING: OXYGEN LEVELS 0%]

[SYSTEM DETECTED ORGAN FAILURE: LUNGS]

[INITIATING EMERGENCY PROCEDURE: TISSUE CONVERSION]

"Dammit..." Garou growled, his voice sounding strange and hoarse as his vocal cords vibrated in the vacuum. His vision began to blur. He saw the soldiers remaining upright, equipped with sophisticated self contained breathing apparatuses. They waited. They knew exactly that he would collapse within minutes.

However, something horrific was happening beneath Garou's skin. The System no longer allowed his cells to die from hypoxia. Instead, the System began harvesting energy from his own muscle mass. Garou felt an incredible burning sensation all along his arms as if his muscle fibers were being unraveled and reconstructed into something else.

"He's still standing," one of the soldiers said, his tone full of disbelief through the radio transmission.

Garou wasn't just standing. He began to move, though every inch of his muscle felt as if it were being torn apart from within. He realized that every breath he couldn't take was now being replaced by a flow of kinetic energy pumped directly from his heart into his bloodstream. He didn't need air anymore; he needed output.

With a single stomp that shattered the concrete tiles beneath him, Garou lunged forward. His movement was no longer human it was pure momentum. A soldier in front of him raised an assault rifle, but before the trigger could be pulled, Garou was already there. Garou's hand, now pale gray with bulging black veins, pierced through the composite material of the soldier's bulletproof vest as if it were mere paper.

Blood splattered, but no scream was heard only the thud of a body being slammed against the wall.

"Vacuum formation broken! Activate suppression gas!" the squad leader shouted.

Thick yellow gas began to fill the room, but Garou no longer cared about what he was breathing. The system had initiated a total "re-routing." He felt every pore of his skin now functioning like gills, absorbing energy from the surrounding environment even from the atmospheric pressure imposed by the enemy's machine itself.

Garou spun, swinging his fist in an arc that created a small shockwave. He struck the wall of the vacuum-sealed room. His logic was simple: if this room was sealed to contain him, then the only way out was to shatter the seal itself.

BOOM!

The twenty centimeter thick concrete wall cracked. It wasn't just due to the physical impact; Garou had released the energy gathered from his muscle tissue conversion into a single focal point.

"He... he's consuming the pressure," someone muttered behind a mask.

Garou stared at them. His left eye no longer looked human; the pupil had transformed into a vertical slit that glowed with a dim light. He felt hungry not for food, but for conflict. The 'Idle King' protocol whispered in his mind, a constant chant urging him to destroy, to dominate, to silence all the noises that annoyed him.

He wasted no time. Garou struck the wall again. This time, a blast of pure energy erupted from his body, shattering the observation glass on the upper floor of the facility. The vacuum chamber collapsed. Air from the outer corridor rushed in violently, balancing the pressure and creating a vortex that threw the soldiers against the walls.

Garou stepped out from the debris, his body covered in strange lacerations where he had "consumed" his own body tissue to survive. However, those wounds were closing at an unnatural speed. His skin now appeared denser, harder, as if he were no longer made of flesh and bone, but something forged under thousands of atmospheres of pressure.

He looked down the long corridor. Flickering neon lights highlighted the logo of a major pharmaceutical company that had been funding the "Vessel Class" research. He realized it now they weren't trying to capture him for experiments. They were trying to trigger his peak evolution.

"So, this is the plan, huh?" Garou muttered, his voice raspy yet calm. "You want to see how far I can be pushed before I explode?"

He didn't wait for an answer. With a speed the naked eye couldn't follow, he lunged toward a CCTV camera mounted on the ceiling, crushing it into a shapeless lump of metal. But he knew it was too late.

On monitors scattered along the corridor, he saw his own reflection clearly displayed. No longer just a common fugitive, but as an 'S Class Anomaly' whose status had been updated in real-time to the global network.

The system emitted a painful ding.

[IDLE KING PROTOCOL PHASE ONE: COMPLETE]

[STATUS: GLOBAL HUNT EXPOSED]

[PRIORITY TARGET: ACTIVE]

Red emergency lights flashed throughout the facility. A long siren wailed no longer an ambush siren, but a total evacuation siren and the elimination procedure.

Garou felt a vibration beneath his feet. It wasn't an earthquake. It was the roar of jet engines from fighter planes approaching the facility. They were no longer sending soldiers; they were sending destroyers.

"Of course," Garou chuckled bitterly, wiping the black blood flowing from the corner of his lips. He felt his heart beating with an alien rhythm, one that accelerated every time he sensed danger.

He stood in the middle of the crumbling corridor, surrounded by debris and plumes of dust. In front of him, the heavy solid steel exit door began to close automatically a final lockdown system to bury him alive in his own grave.

Garou didn't run. Instead, he stood tall, letting his aura spread, compressing the air molecules around him until they vibrated. He knew he could no longer hide. If the world wanted to see a monster, he would give them a show they deserved.

As the steel door slammed shut, leaving only a narrow gap, Garou pressed his palm against the cold metal surface. Not to open it, but to destroy it from the inside.

Crack.

The metal began to expand, turning red from the heat radiating from his grip. Without warning, he punched the door. A sonic boom occurred, tearing the steel apart like wet cloth and launching large metal shards into the hallway beyond.

He stepped out, heading straight for the facility's roof. Once he reached the open air, the sight before him made his heart momentarily stop. It wasn't just one or two helicopters. The night sky was filled with dozens of combat drones, and in the distance, searchlights from dozens of tactical vehicles surrounded the perimeter of the facility located in the heart of this abandoned industrial zone.

Atop a skyscraper across the way, a massive screen a public digital billboard usually reserved for advertisements now displayed only one image: Garou's face captured by CCTV minutes ago, with large, glowing red text.

[ELIMINATION TARGET: TIER-0 ANOMALY].

The sound of approaching helicopters, the thrum of heavy engines, and the spotlight locking onto his position it all blended into a symphony of destruction. Garou stood at the edge of the roof, the heavy night wind tossing his hair, which now looked darker, sharper.

He no longer felt afraid. He felt... free.

The system beeped again, this time with a much lower, more authoritative tone.

[WARNING: SOVEREIGNTY PROTOCOL APPROACHING THRESHOLD]

[REALITY ADJUSTMENT INITIATED]

Garou stared at the drones now locking missiles onto him. He smiled a thin, cold, and inhuman smile. "Let's see," he whispered, his voice carried by the wind, "who's actually hunting whom."

The next second, he didn't wait for their attack. He triggered all the energy stored within his cells; his body transformed into a streak of black shadow that darted right into the center of the surrounding crowd. For the first time, the 'Idle King' was no longer waiting for the system to move. He began to move on his own.