Eat.

The thought came into my head out of nowhere. I’d simply stood up, my new body feeling much weaker than my previous one, realized I was standing in my previous body’s corpse, and then heard the word in my mind.

Eat!

My stomach growled. Why was it so aggressive? I hadn’t chosen the Devourer’s hunger… I guess mutating also required a lot of energy. Noted. Next time I’d have a banquet awaiting me. For now?

I looked at my dinosaur corpse. Bile rose up in my throat.

I refuse to eat myself.

A clicking sound had me whipping my head around to see that, even after my apparent death, a beetle had stuck around. It didn’t have any mandibles, but the wicked horn on its head reminded me that I now only had 100 health points.

I took a step back, trying to move away from the creature as it stared at me. No way could I fight one of these guys now.

Another step.

The bug exploded into a sprint, charging directly at me with the spear on its head. I turned, immediately running in the opposite direction. I knew that when I died, I hadn’t been far from the room. All I had to do was get there, and I could let this guy kill himself on the light, letting me level up a few times off of his death.

I could hear the skittering of the beetle’s legs on the stone as it rapidly caught up to me. Just… another… step.

You’re a quick learner! You have developed a new skill: [Sprint Lvl 1].

Light washed over me as I entered the waterfall room. The sound of the beetle running on the stone ceased, and I turned around to see it glaring at me from the darkness, its jagged horn just barely poking into the light.

Wait a minute…

I could see better now in the light, and understood why it had chased me on the ground. This beetle didn’t have any wings.

Mr. Beetle? I asked incredulously. So he was alive. Honestly, I’d wondered if maybe he’d fallen off the edge of the cliff by trying to get to the light. But now I wondered how he managed to get out of the room at all. Was he just able to move a bit, get hypnotized by the light, then move a little further, and repeat?

I stared at him, intently trying to activate my observant instinct.

Come on… It’s gotta be there…

You have developed your sight.

Congratulations! You’ve unlocked the [Observant] instinct.

[Observant]- By carefully viewing an object of interest, you may garner basic knowledge of it.

Maybe now you’ll actually see the dangers you look at.

Were these notifications more… personal, than before?

Jungle Tunneler [Lvl 4]

At least this guy wasn’t the worst thing I could possibly run into. As I tried to figure out a way to bait him into the light, a pang ran through my stomach again.

Eat!

Fine! Fine! Shut up already!

I backed away from the beetle, walking across the bridge. The Macamme nuts should still be in the cave. Though I didn’t have an accurate estimate for how long I’d been out. Hopefully, Karavos was still alive. I made it to the middle of the bridge when I heard something. The waterfall that had been crashing down into the ravine below… stopped.

[Oh! There you are, virtuous one!]

I stopped, turning around. Virtuous one? The only person that had called me that was the Nature Spirit. But the voice in my head didn’t sound like her. This voice was deeper. A male.

I kept scanning the area, looking down into the ravine to see why the waterfall had simply stopped crashing. Then I noticed that all of the water had just… frozen. Frozen in time, not turned to ice. The spray of drops that occurred naturally as the waterfall crested from high above simply stopped in the middle of the air.

What?

[Over here, virtuous one!]

Well, that wasn’t really helpful. I kept looking around before eventually finishing crossing the bridge to hopefully get a better view of the area. Standing near the edge of the cliff, I looked out and saw it now. It had blended into the waterfall before.

Sculpted out of the water, and looking right at me with a smile, was a face. A long beard of water cascaded from its chin, and I realized why I hadn’t been able to see it in the waterfall before. The beard was the waterfall. Well… then again, so was the face.

Um… Who are you?

The face smiled, showing me bricks of water for teeth. He didn’t answer, so I observed him.

Nature Spirit [Lvl ???]

[Oh!] the spirit exclaimed as I observed him. [You wish to know of my identity! My apologies. I am new to conversing with the speechless. My name is Raikam. And I am here to answer your call!]

My… call? The Nature’s Embrace activation, perhaps? I’d thought it failed since I died and no spirit had been around me when I woke.

[You are a bit stranger looking than I expected. I imagined you… differently. But your aura is the same as that which awakened me, to be sure.]

Hmm. If this guy was like the Elder Nature Spirit, then he could sense my emotions, and we might be able to use that to communicate. I tried very hard to dig up emotions for the helpless titan that was drowning in his own blood.

The look in his eyes as he pleaded for me to do something. How I’d been about to kill him, but I couldn’t bring myself to do the deed, no matter how much experience he was worth. Was there any way I could save him? My chest tightened as the guilt weighed down on me. It was my fault he was dying, after all. Maybe this guy could save him.

[You appear to be in need of my assistance regarding healing…] spoke the spirit, before swirling into a hovering whirlpool. Yes! I’d gotten the message across! The watery tornado floated over my head, and landed beside me, dissipating in mist as it revealed a muscular male body made of water. He held out a hand to my head. [Do you mind?]

I shook my head no, and he placed his hand against my forehead. It was a weird feeling, the sensation of water swirling itself around to hold the shape he was taking. His hand was cool, and it brought a bit of peace to me.

[Sorry, virtuous one. Though you appear to have the capability within yourself, you do not have the strength for me to convey my knowledge to you. And I cannot leave my source.]

He looked sadly to the waterfall, stroking his long beard.

[If there were any way I could assist you, I would. Perhaps if you can return to me stronger, I can assist you. I will remain awake until your return.]

Then he swirled into the floating whirlpool-tornado thing once more and disappeared into the waterfall.

The crashing of the water against the ravine down below resumed.

I needed to get stronger… And fast.

But what was the safest way to do it? And also... I'd have to deal with the--

Eat!!!

With that.