It is rather bizarre to experience everything your body does and feels while allowing someone else to control it instead. Especially so if "your" body isn't even yours in the first place.

Zeyl seems to be very familiar with the forest around the village. It makes sense, considering that he spent all five years of his life here. Traveling around his home is a natural thing to do for a cat.

It took him about half an hour to arrive far enough in the forest to be unable to recognize the terrain. Somehow, the atmosphere around changed as well.

Many foreign animal scents, some of them too dangerous for us to approach. If before he was able to catch some small rodents and insects without many efforts, then now we should be cautious.

Was it a good idea to leave the place blindly? But then again, there weren't any big roads that could lead to any neighboring cities either. From Zeys' memories, I understood the fact that this village was isolated from the rest of the world. What was this place anyway?

It doesn't matter, though, for now, I just need to become stronger, somehow. And for that, we need to absorb more animals.

Zeyl sensed another small mouse-like rodent under the tree similar to Earth's birch. It doesn't take long for him to catch it without killing. Then, I changed part of the body in liquid form and absorbed it gently.

The taste wasn't as good as that of a human, but still not too bad. As our hunt proceeded, one fact became obvious - absorbing Zeyl was a special process. Even when I eat those small animals or insects alive, it doesn't feel much different from eating their corpses. Well, I can read their minuscule memories, but there is nothing important in them. I can't change my form to them, and they don't keep any thoughts.

Is it because they are small and unintelligent in the first place? Or because I already integrated my body with Zeyl? I'm not sure, but I still get more energy out of eating them alive, so I'll continue to do just this.

Still, I don't feel that it makes me much stronger - are there other requirements? Should I try to hunt something bigger? Humans would be out of the question. Even if I became stronger, I still pretty much sure that the average human should kick a cat's ass easily. And what if it would be a flying freak like those two from before?

Okey, Zeyl. Try to find a bigger prey. An animal similar to you in size, but somehow weaker. Can you do it?

"Meow! (affirmative)"

Do it then, my loyal servant!

"Meow, meow! (unpleased)"

Ok, ok. I just wanted to say it. Do it then, my good companion!

"Meow! (sir, yes, sir!)"

It seems I started to understand him better. Did his mental development advance after becoming a part of me?

Zeyl cautiously avoided some dangerous scents and tried to find something that could be a nice opponent. It isn't an easy goal as he never was so far in the forest and can't be sure about each scent's owner. Still, after another ten minutes, we were able to find our biggest prey so far.

Indeed, it was about as big as Zeyl. And indeed it shouldn't be much stronger either... What strange is - why exactly it looks like a giant squirrel? And why is it holds a mouse-like corpse in its mouth?

The giant squirrel seems to found us as well and looked in our direction curiously. It then swallowed its prey in one gulp and got ready for the fight.

Is fighting a giant squirrel is considered an upgrade compared to fighting the cat? I'm not sure. But at least I can test our combined fighting capabilities and effects of absorbing alive something as big as me.

"Hiss!"

It wasn't Zeyl who hissed, but the squirrel. It tried to intimidate us, I guess.

"Hiss!"

And my cat didn't like it.

So, the fight started. Zeyl moved significantly faster than when he fought against me. He leaped on the squirrel, and his claw already grazed its head. The squirrel reacted in the last moment, dodging the hit and then tried to run away. But the cat was faster.

Just when I thought that we already won, our opponent changed its actions. Instead of running away, it opened its mouth as wide as it could. Then something strange happened. Its tooths started to vibrate and gather air in the ball. Everything happened in a second, and then that ball of air already moved in our direction at a frightening speed. We were too close to dodge it. Before I can think of countermeasure, Zeyl's head already became a bloody mess. If it was his old body, I guess he would be already dead.

It hurts. It doesn't hurt as much as being damaged in liquid form, but still, the feeling of your head being half-destroyed isn't something you experience daily.

I took away the control from Zeyl and wait. It seems that being damaged in the cat form doesn't cancel it. My best bet, for now, would be to play dead and then counter-attack when the creature tries to approach. It wouldn't be able to make another such attack, right?

Thankfully, either this ability can't be used often, or this squirrel is just stupid, but there was no other attack. I patiently pretended to be dead and waited. At the same time, I also changed my inner body into liquid form. Just come here, little friend.

With my original body form slowly restored, Tactile Zone returned as well. It is only one meter big, but I don't need more.

If squirrel just escaped now, the plan would fail. But how can it abandon its spoil so easily? Of course, it wouldn't.

So, after waiting for a minute and not seeing any reaction from me, it approached without any caution. Caught you.

When it was less than half a meter from me - I acted. The cat body changed into the crimson liquid, and my prey was completely enveloped a moment later.

It tried to move in an attempt to struggle its way out, but it was useless. My liquid was both outside and inside of it. The resistance is futile.

And so, the process of becoming one started. Alas, something unexpected happened in the process.

Mana absorption by a new lifeform is detected.

Analyzing the cell structure.

Access is accepted.

High-level mental processes detected.

Status function initiated.