Debuff Master - Chapter 1160
Chapter 1160
Siegfried ensured that his Coral Imperial Guard was going to be completely bald, and he made himself look like a veteran warrior of countless battles.
[Alert: Do you want to finalize this customization?]
[Alert: The appearance cannot be changed once finalized!]
[Input: Yes!]
Siegfried did not care about looks that much anyway, so he wrapped up the customization without hesitation.
“But how do I activate this thing…?”
After tinkering with the tome for a while, he decided to tear a page from it.
Chwaaak!
Slowly, his body began to morph.
His skin color took on a pale pink hue, and his physique slowly transformed into that of a Coral Imperial Guard.
“Kyuuu! You’re bald, owner punk! Looks good on you!”
“What do you mean it looks good on me? Are you picking a fight with me right now?” Siegfried growled, glaring at Hamchi.
“Owner punk’s shiny head looks perfect! Kyuuu!”
“Why you little! Hey! You shouldn’t say things like that! There are a million bald people in the world, and they are not going to forgive you!”
“Kyu?”
“You better watch your mouth. I already warned you.”
After giving Hamchi a stern scolding, Siegfried set off toward the nearest Coral village.
He flipped through the book, Understanding the Coral Race, while walking, and he tried to cram in some last-minute studying about their culture and lifestyle.
When he finally reached the village—
“Ah!”
“A great warrior!”
“A noble knight has come!”
The Corals rushed up to him, delighted to see a Coral Imperial Guard visit their village.
A Coral Imperial Guard was someone respected and revered by the ordinary Corals.
“Ooooh! He’s bald!”
“Look! He’s got no hair!”
“A-Amazing! Truly amazing!”
Just as the manual described, the Corals were deeply fascinated by Siegfried’s baldness—no, it was more than just fascination.
“Um… May I… touch it just once?”
“Sir Knight! May I feel your head?”
“Please! Let my child touch your head! I beg of you!”
One by one, the Corals brought him offerings and begged for permission to feel the smooth surface of his bald head.
“…”
Siegfried was absolutely speechless.
Asking to rub the bald head of someone was wildly inappropriate, and one could risk getting punched in the face if they did so.
But to the Corals? This was actually normal.
For some reason, they absolutely loved touching a bald scalp.
Due to their genes, being bald was so rare among the Corals that most would never see a bald Coral in their entire lifetime.
“G-Go ahead…”
In the end, Siegfried couldn’t bring himself to refuse the requests and offered his smooth, bald scalp for everyone to touch.
“Ooooh!”
“It’s so smooth!”
“I-It’s so soft… Haa… Haa…
“Nngh! A-Ahhh…!”
The Corals caressed his scalp with glee, and some even quivered in a very suspicious manner.
‘This is absolutely ridiculous…’
Siegfried was dumbfounded by the bizarre situation he was in, but at least he confirmed that the bald disguise had won them over.
However, the problem was that he had underestimated the obsession of the Corals over bald heads.
“Hey! Get in line!”
“Stop pushing!”
“Wait for your turn! No cutting in line!”
They even started handing out queue number slips, lined up like fans at a fan meeting, and waited for their turn to touch his bald head.
Each one of them was like a religious nutjob waiting desperately for their chance to caress the smooth, bald jewel.
‘Stop it! Quit it, you maniacs!’ Siegfried screamed inwardly.
He couldn’t help but sense a hint of madness in the behavior of the Corals.
“I’m sorry, but I’m in a hurry! I must leave now!”
Siegfried hurriedly fled from the crowd, as every second wasted meant a second wasted of his precious disguise time. He couldn’t afford to just stand around and let a bunch of strangers fondle—no, caress his head.
Unfortunately, escaping from the crowd was not easy at all.
“Sir Knight!”
“Please wait!”
“Where are you going?!”
“My child! Please, at least my child! Let my child touch your bald head!”
The Coral villagers chased after him relentlessly, each one desperate to satisfy their need.
***
After that, Siegfried arrived at the Coral Race’s capital city, Basentium.
Basentium was a massive metropolis built deep inside the vast jungle, and its scale was simply staggering.
How massive was this place? It was just as massive as the capital of the Marchioni Empire, making it truly befitting to be the heart of an entire planet.
‘I’ll sneak into their command center first, then…’
Siegfried planned to infiltrate the core of the Coral’s command structure, operate from within, and covertly produce Irradiators there.
Once he was done, he would extract information to find out exactly where the Coral Emperor was hiding.
Unfortunately, there was a small problem.
“Ah!”
“Sir Knight!”
“Please, wait!”
“M-My child! Please, my child!”
A huge crowd swarmed Siegfried the moment he set foot in Basentium.
His smooth, shining, bald head immediately caught the attention of the Corals; they immediately swarmed him to caress his bald head.
‘You damn lunatics!’ Siegfried screamed inwardly and ducked out of sight as quickly as he could.
The sheer madness and obsession of the Corals with bald heads was so maddening that it sent a shiver down Siegfried’s spine.
Siegfried rummaged through his Inventory and pulled out a hooded cloak. He wore it and pulled down the hood over his head.
If he were to keep walking around with his bald head uncovered, he would turn into the biggest superstar of the year among the Corals, which would make him stand out too much.
‘Ugh… This was a mistake. Winning them over is good and all, but attracting this much attention will ruin my plan.’
A spy couldn’t stand out, and trying to earn some extra points from the Corals made him completely forget about this basic rule of espionage.
‘Let’s head straight to their command center. I can’t waste any more time running away from the crowd.’
Hiding his bald head, Siegfried made his way straight toward the command center located right at the heart of Basentium.
“Halt.”
“State your identity.”
The moment he reached the command center, the guards stationed at the gate blocked his path.
Siegfried pulled back his hood and revealed the Coral Imperial Guard uniform along with the insignia.
“Ah!”
“Glory to the Almighty Emperor!”
The guards immediately stood up straight and stiffened after realizing that they were standing before one of the emperor’s imperial guards.
“May glory shine upon you, noble knight!”
“May the Almighty Emperor’s grace be upon you, sir!”
The Corals worshipped the Coral Emperor like a god, so it was only natural that the imperial guards would be treated with respect.
“Stay vigilant and keep up the good work. Remember the grace the Almighty Emperor has bestowed upon you,” Siegfried responded nonchalantly. Then, he gave them a few words of encouragement before slipping right inside without attracting any more unnecessary attention.
“Whoa… Look at that bald head.”
“He’s absolutely striking. A handsome warrior like him is truly deserving of being the Almighty Emperor’s imperial guard.”
The guards whispered to each other with envy clear in their voices.
‘Maybe everyone struggling with male pattern baldness should just migrate over here. I have a feeling they will love it.’
Siegfried couldn’t help but think of ridiculous things as he walked deeper into the command center.
As he made his way through the corridors, he ran into a Coral officer whose ranking looked pretty high.
This could be the perfect opportunity for him to brainwash a high-ranking officer, but the problem was that this guy happened to be too high-ranking. In fact, he happened to be one of the commanding officers in charge of none other than the Coral Emperor’s imperial guards.
“You there!”
The officer called out to Siegfried in a casual tone.
“Erm… Yes?”
“What exactly are you doing here?”
“Huh? What?”
“The Imperial Guards should be training out on the drill grounds right now.”
“Erm… That is…”
“Come with me.”
“Eh? Pardon me?”
“Did you not hear me? I said Come with me!”
“Y-Yes, sir.”
Just like that, Siegfried, who was still clueless about what he had done wrong, found himself being dragged off somewhere by the officer.
***
Inside the office…
“State your unit.”
“Well, that is…”
Siegfried couldn’t answer the officer’s question.
Why? Because…
‘How the hell would I know that?!’
He had managed to disguise himself, but he had zero clue about the actual structure of the Coral Imperial Guards, so he couldn’t answer the question.
“My unit is… erm…”
“Speak up.”
“Well, that is… so…”
“Ha! Did you really think you could get away with skipping out on drills?
“Eh?”
“Do you think being handsome is enough? You think a majestic bald head like yours makes you the master of the universe?”
“N-No, sir!”
“Such arrogance! The Almighty Emperor’s imperial guards shouldn’t be skipping training, not especially during times of war when—”
‘Ah, screw it.’
Siegfried lunged forward and ambushed the officer, subduing him before things could escalate further.
There was no one else in the office, but it was only a matter of time before his cover was blown if the questioning continued.
“Mmph! Mmpf!”
The officer struggled, but Siegfried’s chokehold soon knocked him out cold.
‘I’d better turn him into a pupper real quick.’
Siegfried immediately injected the officer with his radioactive microbes, turning him into an Irradiator.
Five minutes later…
“Your humble servants greets you, Master.”
The officer knelt on one knee before Siegfried.
‘Damn… These Corals can sure take a lot of microbes.’
The Corals were innately resistant to poison and were incredibly tough, so turning them into an Irradiator was no easy feat. The sheer amount of radioactive microbes required to turn an officer of the imperial guards was so massive that turning one into an Irradiator had put quite the strain on Siegfried.
‘Anyway…’
Siegfried started questioning his new slave to extract the intel he needed.
One by one, he managed to obtain useful information.
1. The Coral Emperor’s imperial guards were divided into eleven units.
2. One of those units is shrouded in mystery, an elite force composed of those considered to be monsters among the Corals.
3. The Imperial Guards would undergo Forced Blooming courtesy of the Coral Emperor and are recruited from various places, so even they barely know each other.
“Can you slot me in as a rookie in your unit?” Siegfried asked.
“As you command, Master,” the officer replied with a bow.
It turned out that the officer Siegfried had converted into an Irradiator was actually the commander of one of the eleven units, the lowest-ranking unit in charge of guarding the perimeter of the command center.
This worked in Siegfried’s favor, as his goal was to dig up information on the Coral Emperor’s whereabouts from within the command center. This way, there was no reason for him to be deployed to the frontlines and clash with his own people.
“Okay, slot me in your squad. Then do whatever it takes to find out where the emperor is hiding. Got it?”
“As you command, Master.”
“Good. Now tell me anything I need to watch out for. I don’t know a damn thing about this place.”
Just like that, Siegfried secured the basic information he needed to properly pretend to be a Coral Imperial Guard. Of course, he was not a Coral, so there were bound to be gaps in his act, but it was a good start nevertheless.
“I’m officially on patrol inside the command center under your orders, correct?”
“Yes, Master.”
“Perfect. Get back to your post.”
Siegfried was about to leave when the officer, who had become an Irradiator, suddenly spoke up cautiously.
“Uhm… Forgive me, Master, but…”
“Yeah? What is it?”
“Would it be alright if… if I… touched your head, just once?”
“What the fuck…?”
“Just once… I will be gentle, Master.”
Ironically, the Coral’s primal instincts toward smooth, bald heads couldn’t be suppressed despite becoming an Irradiator.
“…I’ll let you pat it once if you do a good job. Got it?”
In the end, Siegfried reluctantly promised the officer to have his head caressed, as he couldn’t stand the pitiful light in those eyes.
“T-Thank you, master! Angh…!”
The officer looked absolutely ecstatic at the promise.
“Unbelievable… Just what the fuck…” Siegfried shook his head in disbelief and hurried out the door.
‘The infiltration’s going better than I expected. Now, all I have to figure out is how to access top-level intel…’ he thought while pacing through the corridors.
It was then…
“Psst! Owner punk,” Hamchi whispered.
“Hm? What’s up?”
“Do you want Hamchi to sneak around and gather intel? Kyuuu!”
“How?”
“I’ll shrink down and scurry around! Kyuuu!”
“Oh! That’s a great idea, man!”
Siegfried realized that Hamchi was literally perfect for the job, as he could shrink down to a tiny mouse or grow larger than an ogre at will. Thus, there was nobody more perfect than him when it came to going around and eavesdropping on the bigwigs inside the command center.
“Okay. Meet me back at the office tonight.”
“Kyuuu! Got it!”
With that, Siegfried and Hamchi split up, each hunting for the crucial information they needed in their own way.
