(Chapter 24: Drain the swamp)
Lady Dimitrescu and Heisenberg just finished up a long talk with each other on the phone, the countess couldn't believe what she was hearing from her fellow lord of the village. Mother Miranda didn't care for any of them, her respect and love was nothing but a façade, but they didn't mean a thing to her, they were all disposable and seen as failures for her cause.
Now the matriarch of the entire village was planning on taking them all out due to Alcina's newfound love and respect for Ryan Miles, Miranda indeed prophesized the arrival of the ex-marine, but she couldn't foresee what he would do. Finding out that Heisenberg had an army revolting against her and that Ryan Miles was plotting with the magnetic man was the final straw for her, now the entire village was going to feel the wrath of Mother Miranda and Barlow Williamson who was known as "the Man in Black" to the villagers.
Lady Dimitrescu was even somewhat worried, all this information was just dumped on her, and all of what was being said was supposedly about to happen. How bad would the destruction be? Would her daughters' lives be in jeopardy? When would the fighting begin?
She didn't want to believe Heisenberg's words but hearing the urgency in Ryan's voice from earlier when he said that he was going to be paying the Moreau Reservoir a visit made everything seem a bit more real to her.
Realizing there wasn't any time to waste, the countess made the decision to warn her daughters and Donna of what was about to happen. The vampiric woman made her way for the main hall to call the Dimitrescu trio out…
At Heisenberg's factory, the magnetic man watched as the osprey finished another revolution around the perimeter of his base. Expecting it to fly in the same direction it always had, back towards the wooded area just outside of the village outskirts, but this time it seemed to be heading towards the Reservoir.
What the hell are they doing over there? Heisenberg thought to himself as he became alert, would this unknown third party intervene with what he had planned? If so, it would be more agitating to plan ahead than ever before, he had a plan B but he couldn't think of anything else for a plan C.
"Fuck those people." Heisenberg grumbled to himself as he continued to rally up unit after unit of soldats from within his factory, assembling them as best as he could. Each unit having their own tasks at hand. It was a very time-consuming process that would last for most of the day and discovering that Mother Miranda and the Man in Black finding out about his plans didn't help that thought at all.
He would have to go back down into his factory and take the elevator all the way back up to the surface to assemble the soldat unit before going back inside and starting again, it was a very monotonous and repetitive thing to do, but it had to be done. As time went by, he would walk around like a chicken with its head cut off, looking for any lycans that could possibly be making their way towards his factory or if a large assembly of military units were gathering outside of his factory due to the third party starting to take notice of what was going on.
All at the same time, A black cloud fell over the top of a windmill that was situated within Moreau's domain. Emerging from the cloud was none other than Barlow Williamson, looking down over the reservoir with his eyes looking out for Ryan Miles, as he knew this was the first stage in the plan in the rebellion against Mother Miranda.
As of right now, everything seemed relatively silent, but then came the sound of rotors and an engine, this would cause Barlow to look up and notice an osprey flying around fifty feet over his head. Heading towards a flat surface nearby a cave.
When the osprey landed, a small boat was seen heading towards said cave. Barlow locked his eyes on the boat and narrowed his eyes to get a better visual on the person riding in it. A grin would spread across his lips as he seen that it was Ryan Miles. The ex-marine had arrived and was moving forward with the plan. Now it was time to contact Moreau…
"You have no fucking idea what you're up against, Ryan." Barlow said to himself before entering the dark cloud again, the cloud itself slowly vanishing into thin air as a breeze came through the air, it was as if he was never there to begin with.
Ryan had been here for around ten minutes at most and discovered the instructions that he needed to follow to drain the water from the reservoir. A stern look was displayed on his face as he road in the small wooden boat, powered by an engine on the back of it. Guiding it towards the cave in the distance, during his trek to Moreau's domain, he had found himself a new weapon, a grenade launcher that could fire a flashbang and explosive rounds, he figured that explosive rounds would work best, and that the flashbang ammunition would best be used as a last resort if things were going South.
"Move the windmills with a crank to start the electricity to the gatehouse, pull the lever in the gatehouse to open the sluice gate, got it." Ryan repeated the instructions to himself as the boat entered the mouth of the cave, the ex-marine pulled up to a small dock before disembarking the boat. The first thing he would notice was a building with a tarp for a doorway, it stood out from everything else in this reservoir, which looked ran down and in shambles, this place looked well kept or at least cleaned up by whoever was here.
The ex-marine cautiously passed through the tarp and was blown away but confused as to what he was currently seeing. Sitting on a table next to him was a large computer as well as two monitors sitting on top of each other, beside the table was a pot with a strange looking plant contained within it. It looked like a dead bush, but the material that made up the plant was pulsating and moving around, resembling more of black mold than wood. Other gadgets and machinery were spread throughout this little shack, and this was confirmation that other people were here, none of this high tech was seen anywhere else in the village with an exception possibly being Heisenberg's factory.
"Research post? Who the fuck is using a research post?" Ryan asked himself, he was soon to find out.
An arm suddenly wrapped around his neck from behind and began to put pressure around his throat and the sides of his neck, squeezing tightly to try and close off the blood flow to the brain for a quick knockout, but Ryan was well trained and he quickly reached up to grab the arm and leaned forward with force, pressing his hip into the body of the person behind him to throw him over his head and have the attacker land out at his front with a basic Judo throw.
This person in particular wore long sleeve, thick clothing, a helmet complete with goggles, and a tactical vest. Totally decked out in military gear! It was a relief to see that somebody was investigating this village and was acting on it just like he was, but right now this person didn't want him here for some reason.
The ex-marine dove on top of the soldier, but the person beneath him expertly grabbed hold of Ryan's arms and drove his knees into the chest, using the momentum to roll themselves backwards so that he could end up on top of Ryan!
"Get off of me!" Ryan exclaimed as he tried to kick his assailant off, but he was met with the barrel of a handgun right towards his face.
"Stay the fuck down!" The soldier yelled aggressively before another voice stopped him from potentially moving forward with a fatal shot to the skull.
"Halt!" The voice commanded, and the attacker stopped, Ryan turned his head to look at whoever the voice belonged to.
Leaning against the wall was a bulky man in all black clothing, a high collared jacket was worn to protect him from the cold of the Transylvanian weather. This man had short hair and a small beard growing on his face, this person seemed to be the leader of the soldiers that were stationed at this shack. Judging by the crows' feet on the corners of his eyes, Ryan made the assumption that this man was somewhere within his forties.
"Who the hell are you?" Ryan asked with a puzzled tone of voice, trying to crawl on all fours, but the man on his back held him down forcefully, pressing his knee on his neck.
"I'm Redfield, and I could ask you the same god-damn thing. You're not one of us, I didn't call in any sort of reinforcements…" The man answered, revealing his name.
"You've got to be fucking kidding me, Chris!?" Ryan screamed, he never thought he would come face to face with the man who defeated the tyrannical Albert Wesker in Kijuju many years ago, and the person who was at the frontlines in the fight against bioterrorism!
"Were you sent here by Miranda!?" Chris asked aggressively, taking a step forward to examine the downed ex-marine.
Judging by the threatening tone he was using, it seemed that Chris Redfield and this squadron of soldiers were against Mother Miranda as well, which gave Ryan extra amounts of relief and confidence that they could bring her down.
"Hold on a second, I'm in the process of trying to bring her down!" Ryan yelled in confusion.
"Well, it sure as hell doesn't seem liking with you sneaking up on us like that. You seem to know me too, who are you?" Chris asked, his voice still sounding as if he was filled with suspicion towards Ryan Miles.
"I'm Ryan Miles, I'm working together with Heisenberg to try and take down Miranda. I had no damn idea the fucking BSAA were involved in this, so cut me some slack!" Ryan explained, revealing his name to Chris and what he was currently trying to do.
"Heisenberg…that's one of the suspects that we thought would be in our way…" The man pinning Ryan down said, his voice had an English accent to it.
"Odd…" Chris said to himself as he thought about the other targets on the list of suspects they had wrote down prior to their campaign beginning in Europe to try and locate and dispatch Mother Miranda.
"Boss, this could fuck up everything." The Australian man spoke, sounding a bit concerned for the mission at hand.
"No it won't-"Chris began before shifting his attention to Ryan as the trooper pinning him down stood up, forcefully tugging the ex-marine back to his feet.
"You tell your buddy, Heisenberg, to stay out of our way, and that goes for you too. Miles!" He continued before another trooper entered the room through an open doorway at the far end of the shack.
"Hey cap, we're seeing strange activity coming from the factory. It's Heisenberg and a bunch of militarized bioweapons." The soldier spoke, having a female voice to it. She wore the same clothing that the other trooper had on, their identities being kept a secret.
"Don't worry about it, do you have anything else?" Chris said, the female soldier stood in silence for a moment, confused as to why Chris wasn't worried about the activity going on at Heisenberg's factory.
"We're also getting some serious motion readings out here; we should move on." The female soldier continued, giving her captain more information.
Chris Redfield turned around and approached the female trooper, Ryan stood there, eavesdropping on the conversation between the two of them.
"What kind of readings? What's moving?"
"Unknown, but my guess is we've been here too long, and Miranda knows it."
Ryan stood on edge, the enemy forces were making their move now, and it could only be a matter of time before all hell breaks loose. The ex-marine was instructed by Heisenberg to take down Moreau before the inevitable chaos unfolds.
"What about the sample analysis?"
"It's definitely related to the mold."
The mold? What the hell were they talking about? Ryan had spent too much time being a hermit isolated from the world for the past decade to learn of what went down in Dulvey, Louisiana back in 2017.
Right now, there was no time to be pondering what the mold is, as a loud splash was heard in the distance and massive waves were seen coming towards the shack before gently easing down into mere ripples, a large fin was seen descending into the water as well, this caught the attention of Chris Redfield and the Hound Wolf Squadron. The female soldier dashed outside, rifle tight in her hands, as well as the soldier that had attacked Ryan. The bioweapon was getting closer, evident by the large fins sticking out of the water rapidly approaching the shack, and it shown no signs of slowing down either…
Chris Redfield spun around with a jerk and stomped towards Ryan while pointing towards him.
"Whatever it is you're doing, stay the hell out of our way!" The BSAA founder barked.
"I can't promise anything budd- " Ryan went to speak but was shoved by Chris.
"Watch out!" Chris screamed as he shoved the ex-marine away before stumbling back, the gigantic fish monster suddenly tore through the shack, its large body smashing a pathway through the cave!
Ryan collapsed onto his ass before scooting back against the wall, inching himself up as he tried to locate Chris Redfield through the large amounts of dust that had been thrown into the air when the mutated form of Moreau came through like a bat out of Hell. The ex-marine wouldn't have time for any answers either as the massive fish beast burst from the floor beneath his feet, sending Ryan into the waters!
Ryan's heart pounded in his chest as he was sent spinning and tumbling beneath the murky, disgusting waves, his body smashing into chunks of rubble that was left from the shack. The ex-marine tried his best to hold his breath, but when a great ache began to settle in his chest, he had no other choice than to open his mouth and start gasping, only to suck in large amounts of dirty water, panicking, he would swim as fast as he could towards the surface and emerge in the nick of time before he could start to drown!
Ryan coughed out loads of water before dragging himself onto a floating roof, laying on his back spread eagle, looking at the sky with a groan. It didn't take long for another figure to make his appearance as he came crawling out of the water…
It was Moreau, and Ryan's eyes widened at the sight of him. He hadn't seen the amphibious lord of the village since taking part in Heisenberg's fucked up game when he first entered the village, but he remembered how he looked. Moreau was wearing a large piece of sewn together cloth that was thrown over his back and a crown of bones on his head, but now that cloth had been removed, and the crown of bones was gone to reveal wiry strands of hair on the sides of his head, but that wasn't what was eye catching in the worst way possible…
His humped back was a fleshy grotesque mass of buboes, and even a large eyeball was seen looking in various directions. There was also swim bladders that throbbed and pulsated with each move Moreau made towards the ex-marine.
"Shit, stay back!" Ryan screamed as he reached for the firearm in his holster, ready to attack and spring into action.
"You're too late, Miranda and the Man in Black have been made aware of your plans…" Moreau groaned before starting to convulse.
"Yeah, already figured that out. You really got the short end of the stick when it came to powers, didn't you?" Ryan growled, his question coming off as more of an insult than anything else.
"Shut up, I'll stop at n-nothing to p-prevent you from ruining m-mother's day…" Moreau growled, continuing to violently convulse before Ryan who let out a cynical laugh.
"She sent you to stop me. Fucking pathetic…" Ryan growled before Moreau began to vomit loads of thick, green slime all over the submerged roof they were standing on. His powers began to spiral out of control as he couldn't stop vomiting, stumbling towards the edge of the roof on shaky legs as large squishy tendrils began to emerge from his disgusting back and flail about.
"O-Oh God, m-mother…w-why…" Moreau moaned in discomfort as even he didn't like what was going on with his body now, it was the last words he spoke to Ryan before falling into the waters with a splash, all went silent for a few seconds, but then the waters sloshed around violently beneath Ryan, shaking the submerged roof around as if a bomb had gone off underwater.
"What the he-" Ryan couldn't finish speaking when the now transformed Moreau burst from the water in the distance, the large body was composed of several fish-like eyes and a large fin that would help propel him through the water.
Draining the reservoir on time was a complete bust, and now Ryan would have to take down the merman the hard way. With a determined growl, the ex-marine looked around at his aquatic environment to see what he could do against Moreau. His goal was to still drain the water, but from the way his surroundings looked, it would be easier said than done, especially with Moreau on patrol in his domain…
Back at Castle Dimitrescu, the entire household had gotten into a frenzy. Bela was trying to think of ways to prepare for what was to come soon, Cassandra was furious at the thought of a person she looked up to betraying them all, and Daniela was a complete nervous wreck as to what was going on. The redhead was never a fighter, and even though she was part of a family that was known for murdering people and draining their blood, she didn't see herself as a total killer. To Daniela, it felt like the walls were closing in on them all and there was nothing she could do.
"Wh-where's Ryan?" Daniela whimpered to her mother as she sat on her lap, her silky smooth reddish pink hair being stroked by her mother as a form of comfort.
"He's just taking care of business my Dani-bug, if I know him, he'll come back soon enough." Lady Dimitrescu replied softly as she kissed the top of Daniela's head.
"But we just got him back, and he was in terrible condition!" Daniela said louder than before, her voice trembling as if she was about to cry.
"It's alright, my Daniela. It's alright." The countess said as she hugged her daughter tight, who buried her face into her shoulders and began to sob loudly, her back heaving up and down violently as she drew in breath, almost every two seconds she would sniffle.
Meanwhile, Bela happened to be watching after Cassandra as she went nuts on an armor stand, swinging at it viciously while letting out a ruthless cry, sparks lunging out from the armor each time the curved blade of her sickle contacted it.
"Cass, you must calm down. Hitting a dummy isn't going to magically solve our problems!" The blonde-haired daughter scolded the middle child who turned her head to face her older sister, the right eye of the brunette was twitching with absolute mania.
"I sure as hell WISH it done something!" Cassandra growled through gritted teeth, her mind jumping to all the worst possible outcomes for what was coming to the village.
Bela sighed.
"I wish it did something too."
"Bela, you have been summoned." The voice of a maiden announced from behind, Bela turned around and was curious to know what was going on now.
"Who is it?"
"Miss Beneviento and Angie." The maiden replied, Bela raised an eyebrow. The oldest child didn't remember her mother ever telling Donna of the events that were to come.
"Cassandra, try not to burst open the wall or any windows while you're at it. Am I clear?" Bela told her younger sister before heading for the stairs to approach the entrance hall.
"I'll do my best, but it will be hard not to." Cassandra replied, Bela shook her head and sighed before following the maiden to the entrance hall, when the large double doors opened, Donna and Angie entered, as well as Heisenberg much to Bela's surprise.
"Uncle? What are you doing here? Aren't you assembling your army?" Bela asked with confusion in her voice.
"I stopped by Donna's place and warned her of what is coming, if I were you, I would start fortifying this place as best as you can. It won't be long before shit hits the fan." Heisenberg revealed, Bela took a step back out of surprise.
"Wait a second, all of this is going to happen sooner than later!?" She asked loudly.
"Hell, it may or may not happen sooner than later at this point. Just fortify the castle and I will come back eventually to provide aid." The magnetic man replied before taking a glance back towards the vineyards to see several soldats waiting for him.
"I've got some of my troops stationed in the village already, expect something to happen anytime soon. I just need an update from Ryan, he is supposed to get back here when he takes down Moreau." Heisenberg announced, Bela gulped as she feared that the huge battle would be coming to them all sooner than expected, the blonde dreaded that they wouldn't be able to fortify and prepare the castle in time before the great fight began.
"Alright…w-well, I'll hurry." Bela said with a hint of fear in her voice.
"Yeah, that would be a good idea." Heisenberg replied as he started to think about what was going on over at Moreau's Reservoir.
As for Ryan Miles himself, the ex-marine was still in the process of opening the sluice gate. He had spent the last several minutes surviving against Moreau while making bridges for him to get across, now he was standing at the top of a windmill, climbing a ladder to reach a zipline which would grant him easy access to the second windmill.
Ryan's body was soaked in sweat and water, which made his clothes feel heavier on him as he ran from place to place. The entire area felt like a glorified puzzle that he had to solve, and he was getting tired of running, he was wanting to be the one doing the fighting.
He just needed to get the other windmill in place to activate the sluice gate and when powered on, all the water would be drained which would give the ex-marine a significant advantage over the now Mutated Moreau. Seeing that the other windmill was a straight shot across the reservoir with the zipline giving him effortless access, he jumped up and began to ride across the reservoir like Indiana Jones.
What he didn't expect is for the gigantic fish abomination to burst from the water and perform a fantastic vertical leap, the mandibles of the mutated merman opening up to reveal a gaping void for a mouth, Ryan let out a scream as he felt the breath of Mutated Moreau shoot past him like a great gust of wind, nearly knocking him from the zipline, but Ryan held on tight with one arm and eventually made it to the other windmill.
Stepping onto the turntable now, Ryan would insert the crank and turn the windmill into place. There was a flash of sparks coming from the gate and a grin spread across his lips in satisfaction, now all he had to do was head to the control room and open the gate.
"It's on now!" Ryan exclaimed as he power walked towards the control room, ready to start the fight against the amphibious lord of the village.
What the ex-marine didn't see was Barlow Williamson watching him from afar, standing on the windmill that Ryan had rode a zipline away from. The Man in Black was starting to doubt Moreau and he felt that a different path would need to be taken if Ryan Miles was to fall.
"You won't be winning this, Ryan. Your love for Alcina will be your end…" Barlow growled before vanishing once again into a black fog, as the cloud began to fade away into thin air, the Man in Black took a quick glance over the shoulder to examine what was going on. To the dismay of Barlow, the waters of the reservoir began to recede, the submerged homes and vehicles were slowly but surely becoming more revealed as time went by, the sluice gate had also been opened.
"Killing Moreau shall only dig yourself a deeper grave." Barlow mumbled in irritation right when the cloud completely faded away from view, there would be hell to pay soon enough depending on what happened.
Now Ryan was darting towards the drained reservoir, seeing the large amphibious form of the Mutated Moreau. The large mass of eyeball-like tumors remained, a large tail was flailing around as he crawled on his two front legs that was aided by a few support limbs on the underside of his stomach, something that Ryan didn't notice. The tendrils also remained, jetting out from the disgusting back of the slimy beast.
"My precious water, n-no!" Mutated Moreau complained loudly, crawling towards where the water used to be. Ryan gave chase, but surprisingly, the mer-monster had disappeared a bit too quickly for the size it had.
Now it was time to hunt the grotesque lord of the village and put him out of his misery, Ryan followed the path that he assumed Mutated Moreau took. It didn't take long for the most god-awful stench to blast his nostrils with vile authority. The stench of the drained reservoir was unlike any odor that had hit him in his life, it was like a septic tank had burst next to a rotting landfill on a hot Summer day. Every building that was once submerged underwater was coated in layers of slime and mucus, the vehicles weren't safe from this either. Dead leaves littered the entirety of the area, bones of decayed animals and humans were laying all over the place as well.
The head of the ex-marine jerked and twitched with disgust at the foul stench, his face scrunched up from resisting the urge to vomit and to hold his breath for as long as possible.
The ex-marine searched around the drained reservoir, finding large tracks of webbed footprints complete with a long tail trail. Strangely enough, these clues would come to an abrupt stop next to a building that appeared dented and damaged, the destruction caused was recent. Indicating that Mutated Moreau had scaled the building and went to the other side.
"Moreau! Come out and face me!" Ryan boldly challenged the mutated beast, pacing around out in the open, his voice echoed off the walls of the ruined buildings, but he received no response.
"You're even in your final form! Don't tell me that you're a coward! After all…would mother be pleased…?" Ryan taunted, and his final comment about Miranda was enough to get the Mutated Moreau out from hiding as he burst from a wall of slime!
"Don't ever talk about mother like th-that!" Mutated Moreau roared as he crawled towards Ryan as fast as his limbs could allow him to travel.
Without hesitation, Ryan opened fire with his grenade launcher. An explosive round rocketed right into the hideous mug of the amphibious lord, the eye-like tumors flashed red as if it indicated damage had been done.
Another thing that surprised Ryan is when the mouth of the fish beast opened, the humanoid figure of Moreau was seen inside, clasping his head and wailing in agony. That pain was quick to turn into rage and the jaws shut around the humanoid tongue of the Mutated Moreau.
"You l-little worm…" Mutated Moreau growled hatefully as he began to charge forward while roaring at his opposition.
Ryan figured that the humanoid contained within the beast was the weak point he could target, and that the grenade launcher would be his best option if he wanted to damage him. However, there was an unfortunate downside to this weapon, the time it took to manually slide a round back into place would be too slow. Being a soldier, Ryan could get it done quite fast, but there was no time with his environment and the enemy he was facing could close the distance too quickly.
Holding onto the weapon with one hand, he would run away from Mutated Moreau, the ex-marine could hear the heavy footfalls behind him, the hot breath pounding against his back.
"This is my domain! I-I will not l-let you leave!" Moreau roared before lunging forwards to try and take Ryan out, but thankfully the former soldier had approached a corner he could round, and he would quickly sling himself around it by grabbing hold of the wall with one arm, watching the fish-monster smash into a slimy wall headfirst.
The heart within Ryan's chest raced like a marathon runner, that was a close call, mere seconds away from a gruesome demise, a phrase that could summarize the entire time he has spent in the village to a tee.
While Mutated Moreau was getting his bearings straight and shaking off the impact he had against the slimy wall of sediment and mucus mixed, Ryan took a quick glance back for half a second to see an explosive barrel in the distance.
Now he had a grenade launcher and another explosive on hand, this couldn't have been more perfect for Ryan, who quickly sprung to his feet and darted towards the barrel as Mutated Moreau gave chase once again. The ex-marine had a head-start and would manage to put some distance between himself and the fish monster, but Mutated Moreau would be fast to close the distance.
The ex-marine turned around after rounding the corner, backpedaling before pulling out his LEMI and firing upon the barrel right when the Mutated Moreau began to emerge from around the corner, the blast knocked the beast against the wall of a ruined building, letting out a groan as his humanoid form was again revealed.
Without hesitation, Ryan fired with the grenade launcher straight into the vulnerable humanoid within the belly of the beast. Mutated Moreau let out a loud moan of agony as the explosive round burst against him.
"You're fucking pathetic!" Ryan screamed furiously as he reloaded his grenade launcher, only to see Mutated Moreau climb on the top of a building while growling coldly.
"Sh-shut up!" The beast groaned before the entire body began to ripple and bulge, rearing up to face the sky.
"What the he-" Ryan's sentence was cut short when he would see large amounts of toxic acid eject into the air from the gaping maw of Mutated Moreau, having faced this type of danger before during his first battle with Barlow, he was fast to take shelter in the nick of time under the roof of a tin shed.
The former soldier shook his head in disbelief as he watched the acid slam into the ground, making a sizzling noise as steam rose from where the drops had connected with the Earth, in the distance, Ryan would see the acid eating away the wood of a ruined home.
"Good Lord…" He said to himself, wondering what would have happened to his body if he was caught in that attack.
After a few more moments, the acid rain stopped falling, and Ryan would leave the shelter he had momentarily took cover under. Mutated Moreau had vanished, and not a single noise could be heard. Did that attack happen to be his last act of defiance?
Curious but cautious, Ryan started to hunt for Mutated Moreau, clutching his grenade launcher tightly in his arms. When he began to think that his efforts would be fruitless, he was proven wrong in the worst way possible as the tail of Mutated Moreau burst through a weakened wall and slammed into him!
Ryan screamed in pain and terror as he was launched back by the attack, smashing through a wall and rolling onto the floor of a ruined house.
"B-bastard!" Mutated Moreau was heard roaring, crawling towards the house where he had witnessed Ryan being smashed through.
The ex-marine groaned as he equipped the grenade launcher yet again and turned to face Mutated Moreau being mere inches away from the large hole in the wall, terrified, he squeezed the trigger in a blind panic and it managed to deter Mutated Moreau again.
When the humanoid was exposed, Ryan popped off as many shots as he could into the humanoid tongue of the merbeast, eventually, the firearm began to click, having an entire magazine dumped into the amphibious lord of the village before he crawled away through an open doorway, reloading the grenade launcher in the process.
It was only then that the ex-marine realized that that was the last bit of ammunition for the explosive rounds, his racing heart began to beat even faster, he was relying on this powerful weapon, and now he only had one available shot left to spare.
Frantically, Ryan would look around in desperate search for another explosive round in case this last one didn't do the trick. Thankfully, there was a case of one laying on a desk underneath a roof of a ruined building.
He would make a mad dash for the building just to be grabbed by one of Mutated Moreau's frontal limbs…
"No!" The ex-marine screamed in terror as he was lifted off the ground, being dangled by his legs as he held tightly onto his grenade launcher.
"N-no… you aren't going anywhere…" Mutated Moreau began as he reared up once more, opening his mandibles to reveal his humanoid tongue which had been smeared in blood from all the rounds that was put into him.
"EXCEPT INTO MY STOMACH!" Mutated Moreau roared coldly as he released Ryan's leg, allowing him to plummet straight towards his opened mouth, the humanoid's mouth being open as well.
"Fuck you!" Ryan screamed in determination and defiance, squeezing the trigger of the grenade launcher to fire an explosive round into the mouth of the humanoid Moreau, the weak point of the mutation would burst into flames and slimy gunk, killed instantly by this last-ditch effort attack.
Moreau had been defeated by the ex-marine.
The feeble-minded lord of the village had zero last words, but his mutated form began to bloat and expand, swelling up more and more by the seconds.
Ryan ran for a nearby doorway and ducked into the house when the ballooned-up body of the Mutated Moreau burst like a pimple, green gunk and chunks being thrown all about the drained reservoir with a loud explosive boom.
Once he believed the coast to be clear, Ryan emerged from the ruined house to see that all that remained of Mutated Moreau was slimy chunks of organic material lying all over the ground. The monstrous stench returned once again, causing Ryan to scowl.
"In death as he was in life…disgusting…" Ryan said before heading up the hill towards Moreau's labs within the caves, unfortunately for him, the path appeared to be blocked off by a gigantic wall of moldy sediment…
"What…?" Ryan asked himself, using his firearm, he shot a few rounds into the wall made from the mold, a few holes were made, but they instantly filled in and regenerated within seconds.
"What the fuck?" He asked himself once more, would he not be able to make it back to the castle to give the battle report to Heisenberg?
"Dammit, I have to find another way out." Ryan said to himself, he wasn't going to waste any more ammo on this wall of the mold, so he went back down into the drained reservoir to search for a pathway back into the village from which he could also use to return to either Castle Dimitrescu or Heisenberg's factory, picking up some extra ammo for his grenade launcher as he made his way through.
With Moreau defeated, a huge part of the plan had come to fruition, but that was merely the calm before the storm, it was still fairly daylighted outside as the morning proceeded into the noon hours.
The Man in Black watched from the top of a ruined windmill, what he knew would happen came to be. Barlow shook his head in disbelief before vanishing into a dark mist yet again, having another trick up his sleeve while the lycan horde was still on their way to the village.