Kaijin Fighter: So I Have to Make Monsters, So What?

The following is a brief excerpt on the nature of zakos, as collated from the experiences of multiple different Kaijin Lords and made to be digestible to outsiders looking in.

As well, it's to explain a detail that our intrepid protagonist forgot in regard to the nature of zakos.

...

By injecting [Chaos] into mundane objects, pieces of scrap, and trash, Kaijin Lords are able to create disposable minions known as zakos.

Zakos are...weird.

Unlike kaijin, who have a [Core] that composes their identity and "soul" and a robust body that helps them stand out, and proto-kaijin, who have the latter and can develop the former, zakos have...neither.

That stated, the average zako still has most of the advantages of [Chaos], such as immunity to most aether abilities and strength that exceeds the average Aether Warrior.

Prior lords have attempted to understand what exactly marks the difference between zakos and Kaijin and have managed to boil it down to two main traits: intelligence and identity.

The average zako has enough intelligence to carry out simple orders, but not enough intelligence to improvise.

Usually.

Additionally, the average zako has little to no sense of self.

Usually.

In a way, the average zako was like a significantly larger worker bee or a machine.

Unlike worker bees, though, a zakos' evolution and growth wasn't based on a singular path and factor being involved.

Unlike a machine, zakos could learn.

Zakos could grow and change into proper Kaijin, but the type of Kaijin they turned into was highly dependent on environmental factors, whether or not they received active guidance from a Kaijin or Kaijin Lord, and the type of material inputs they received as zakos.

In other words, zakos were the embodiment of the term "nurture over nature."

However, that was more of a bane than a boon under the wrong circumstances.

As a wise man once said, "A child scorned by the village will burn it down in order to feel its warmth."

...

Pop Quiz Time: Why was it a bad idea for Zhen Liu to leave zakos buried in cursed earth?

...

'Alright, might as well see if I can still...uh oh.'

As Dante's Kaijin proceeded to go on alert at the possibility of being attacked by unseen forces, Zhen Liu attempted to contact the first batch of ambushers he had prepared.

Unfortunately, he wasn't able to.

The moment he tried to zero in on his connection to those zakos, he immediately noticed that there was a huge amount of interference and feedback when he did so.

In fact, it was starting to get physically painful to focus on those connections.

'Wait, is the problem me again or something else?' Zhen Liu wondered as he disconnected from the fucked-up link in order to focus on a different set of zakos. Namely, the ones he kept in his pockets in case things went sideways.

'Nope, it isn't me...'

Connecting to his pocket zako was seamless and familiar, so it wasn't a problem on his end.

That didn't make him feel better about this situation, though.

In fact, it made him even more paranoid.

'What the fuck happened to the zakos to cause this to happen?' Zhen Liu asked himself as he thought about the worst possible scenarios.

In the midst of this thinking, and as if the universe was mocking him, one of those scenarios actually played out while he was thinking about it.

One of the members of [Those Who Subjugate], a Kaijin that resembled a horned lizard and a rattlesnake's demented love child, had stepped a bit further away from the rest of the group and towards a rustling bush.

[Hey! I think I'm sensing a surge of Chaos over—]

[GROAAA!]

[WHAT THE FUCK?!]

Oh my!

'Oh, fuck me sideways,' Zhen Liu mentally cursed.

From the bushes leaped out one of Zhen Liu's skeletal zakos that he had made from the teeth of that wretched tiger skin rug.

Zhen Liu remembered the resulting zako resembled a skeletal warrior with a tiger helmet motif; the one attacking the Kaijin at this time decidedly looked...not like that.

This zako, if it even was still that, was a weretiger-like being that reminded Zhen Liu of one of those skeletal Halloween decorations that were anatomically incorrect by every metric.

Granted, the personally hilarious comparison did absolutely nothing to alleviate Zhen Liu's anxiety in regard to the current situation.

'Okay, definitely feels like one of my zakos, but it's also radiating enough cursed power to somehow rival Corpse Doll...fucking how and why?!'

Regardless of his panicky thoughts, Zhen Liu managed to maintain a cool expression as Dante and his horde of monsters dealt with his…technical ambush.

Zhen Liu's original plan was to have a singular skeletal zako show up, spook a bunch of the enemy kaijin into chasing after it, and hopefully ditch them in a danger zone somewhere. Or at the very least, so lost that they wouldn't be able to return to the [Mines of Malevolence] until after all of the action had taken place.

But that plan was now out the window.

Instead, Zhen Liu had to adapt to the fact that he now had a curse-infused zako going bersek.

[Get off me you stupid—AH!]

The tigerman zako had bit down on the horned lizard-like kaijin and had done so with [Chaos]-infused fangs aimed at her throat.

Correction: fangs that were infused with both [Chaos] and cursed energy.

The effect was immediate as Zhen Liu could sense that the bitten kaijin was starting to suffer from necrotizing wounds.

[Blood Stinger!]

Enraged by the injuries to the point of mental clarity, the kaijin proceeded to fire off jets of pressurized blood from her eyes and pierce a pair of holes directly through the zako's torso.

[GAH!]

[Get off!]

The sudden attack had caused the zako's jaw to significantly weaken, freeing the lizard kaijin and giving her a chance to land a push kick that separated the two of them.

An attack combination like this would normally be fatal to an ordinary zako, resulting in immediate dissipation.

That didn't happen this time around.

[Take that you...wait a minute, are you getting fucking stronger?!]

What ended up happening instead was that the zako suddenly surged with cursed energy, which had a strange chain reaction with the [Chaos] baked into the zako, and proceeded to regenerate and heal the wounds that had just been inflicted upon it.

Not only that, but the portions of it's body that was injured from the attack had inexplicably grown stronger.

[Oi! This bastard was healing abilities!]

I can see that. [Those Who Hate], attack.

[Move, you scaly bitch!]

[Whoa!]

At Dante's command, several of the kaijin with potent fire in their veins, rushed forward and began to release jets of [Chaos] infused flames against the skeletal zako.

Engulfed in these hellish flames, the skeletal zako couldn't even let out a cry of alarm before being rendered into ash.

Evidently, the flames proved too much of the zako's regenerative abilities to bear.

^Ah, wait! I should've captured it instead of burning it to a crisp!^ Dante admonished himself while smacking his forehead. ^I could've used one of the hounds to track down the bastard who made him.^

'Thank the gods you didn't,' Zhen Liu thought to himself while verbally saying, [How unfortunate].

[Hey, wait a minute, do you guys sense that?]one of the kaijin called out to the rest. [I'm feeling more spikes of Chaos!]

Oh?

'Shit.'

All around the hunting expedition, more and more spikes of [Chaos] began to appear one after the other in rapid succession.

Zhen Liu picked up that these signatures definitely belonged to his zakos, but he could also detect that mixed into the energy was massive concentrations of cursed power.

It was at this point that Zhen Liu realized why this happened.

'Kaijin and proto-kaijin have enough sense to use [Chaos] as a means to repel the cursed energy and worse from affecting them,' Zhen Liu put together, 'but zakos are basically meant to absorb whatever energy, whatever information they got on hand to promote their evolution into kaijin. And I made the stupid mistake of leaving them unattended in a volcanic jungle that's actively curses people. Fan-fucking-tastic.'

Once this fact sunk in, Zhen Liu was rightly pissed.

But then this anger gave way to confusion, once he realized something rather odd about these spikes.

'Wait a minute...I didn't make this many zakos...'

Shortly after Zhen Liu made this realization, all hell broke loose.

ROOOOAAAAARRRR!

[HOLY SHIT!]

From the bushes, the skies and the ground itself, the hunting expedition found themselves being ambushed by dozens and dozens of curse-infused zakos.

Normal human forces would see such a horde and panic, believing that hell itself had finally flung open it's gates and that they were now being punished for their sins.

This horde of monsters, though, composed of bastards who relished in inflicting suffering and sorrow...they were thrilled.

Because for the first time in a long time, thet were goong to have a decent fight that wasn't going to end in cannibalism.

[BRING IT ON!]