Chapter 13: Primordial Adaptability

As I picked up Cecilia again I cast one last look at the old woman who was still calmly sitting at the table sipping her tea. As far as I could tell she didn’t seem to have a care in the world or was it acceptance? She said her vision lets her see the present and into the future… I guess if you already knew the future you could make your peace with it long before it happens…

I asked her if she wanted to come with us but she just smiled and let out another small laugh. In her demeanor, I sensed great sorrow. From where this pain stemmed I do not know, but… I know what it’s like to feel despair. When I lived on the streets in my past life, every day was a struggle. I was a 12-year-old boy, powerless amongst the thugs and gangsters. I’ve seen murders, rapes, police beating those they caught within an inch of their life before tossing their bleeding and broken bodies in the back of armored vans.

She also said that this would be the last time we would meet…

I had a feeling she meant that she would be dead before we get the chance to meet up again. Honestly, these past few days with Cecilia have kind of been a wake-up call. At first, all I knew was hunger but as I ate humans I started to be more introspective. I tried to avoid it, telling myself I’ll figure it out later, or the answer will reveal itself as time goes on. But as I spent time with her I started to think more, I realized I am not the same person I was in my past life. That wasn’t going to change, my body simply didn’t allow me to feel the same things I did as a human.

Still, as I assimilated the human genome I became less monster and more human, or perhaps just more intelligent. I don’t know much about this whole heaven thing, everything I know about them is knowledge. Information without connection, just empty facts, yeah heaven wants to kill me. To be fair, so do the humans and I’m pretty sure most species would want to kill me on sight. I am simply too dangerous, if you are a threat you are an enemy. That is a lesson I learned all too well in my past life...

Act weak when you are strong and act strong when you are weak. That is how you survive…

I suppose it was quite ironic that I become more human as I kill them. I look down at Cecilia who is quietly lost in thought as I cradled her in my arms.

Do I care about her? No, I don’t.

Do I want her to die and suffer? No, I don’t either…

Become more human as you eat them… I suppose there is some grace in this irony…

I shook my head slightly and banished these thoughts from my mind. I need to focus on what I came here for. As I moved through the swamp I started to notice a scent trail. It was faint, but it was there nonetheless. Was this the scent of a Gigant Mantis?

Well, I was just blindly going through the swamp anyway, I guess I might as well check it out.

“I got a scent, not sure what is though,” I said as I turned and began following the trail.

“I guess we’ll see, there are many creatures in this swamp,” Cecilia said as she raised her voice slightly to make herself heard over the rushing wind.

With that in mind, I followed the trail, soon I came across something very interesting. The Gigant Mantises were described to me as giant praying mantis like creatures. They had wings but due to their size, those wings only allowed them to fly over extremely short distances similar to a chicken. Still, a Gigant Mantis is said to tower four meters tall and something large flying a short distance to pounce on you is still quite deadly. Apparently, they kept this unique evolutionary trait because of their home environment. The short-distance flight allows them to gain a burst of speed in the marshy terrain. That combined with their invisibility and powerful claws made them extremely dangerous ambush predators.

For adventurers to hunt them a great many precautions are needed. No team below gold rank should even attempt to fight one. Even then the contracts that involve a Gigant Mantis are regarding ones that wandered out of the swamp for whatever reason. So the adventurers would fight them on better terrain, if adventurers attempted to fight in the marshy terrain, the difficulty of the fight would go up significantly.

The interesting thing here was that I saw two Gigant Mantises fighting what looked to be a stone golem. The golem looked to be made of a brownstone covered in vines, the golem was roughly humanoid in shape. However, it had no head, nor legs and in its chest was a glowing blue crystal that pulsed like a heartbeat. The torso just sort of hovered over the ground as it fought the Gigant Mantises across the marshy soil.

I stopped and put Cecilia down as we examined the fight.

“I think it’s a war for territory… the Gigant Mantises should be mates with a nest. I think they made their nest here but it was in this Earth Elemental’s territory.

As I listened to Cecilia I saw the Earth Elemental grab one of the Mantises and hurl it back. It crashed into some trees with a chittering shriek.

“How tough is that Earth Elemental?” I asked as I examined the odd golem.

“It is stronger than a Gigant Mantis but it should be even since there’s two of them. Normally a Gigant Mantis wouldn’t pick this kind of fight. I suspect their eggs have already been laid and buried so they have no choice but to defend the nest.” Cecilia said.

“Any suggestions on how to approach this fight?” I asked as I examined my future prey. Individually I feel I should be able to take any one of them out one on one. But in a three-way fight, anything could happen…

“Maybe we should let the fight play out, they should wound each other. Once one side has fallen or sufficiently weakened we can move in to finish both parties off?” Cecilia suggested as she looked up at me.

“Doesn’t sound very honorable,” I replied with a small chuckle.

“I never thought I would get lectured on honor by a monster,” Cecilia said as she raised a brow in amusement.

“It’s a joke.” I replied with another small laugh.

“What is? The lecture or honor?” Cecilia asked with a smirk.

“Why can’t it be both?” I replied with a smirk of my own.

At those words, Cecilia giggled and we returned to watching the fight.

One of the Mantises tried to go for the crystal in the Earth Elemental’s chest but the Elemental grabbed the attacking claw before delivering a punch to the attacking Mantis. The Mantis fell back, its claw now twisted at an unnatural angle. The other Mantis seeing the attack chose this moment to strike. It slashed at the crystal and the strike hit home. The Elemental staggered back as the Mantis that was struck struggled to its feet.

“Looks like it’ll be a close fight,” I said.

“It appears so, all the better for us,” Cecilia replied as she gazed at the raging battle.

Then the Elemental landed a decisive hit on one of the Mantises, it landed a hard punch on the side of Mantis. The Mantis landed hard in the mud, brown water spraying in all directions, it flailed in the mud as the legs on the side of the body that was struck struggled to move. The other Mantis backed off immediately, and I could tell it was deciding if it should abandon the other Mantis. I could see significant internal damage from the wounded mantis. Looks like the Earth Elemental was going to win this one.

But the Elemental was also not doing much better, there was now a gash on the crystal and I could tell by the way it was hovering that it was wounded as well. Its hovering was now choppy with it dropping down occasionally before rising up again. Its movements were also sluggish with its arms seemingly shaking under the strain of combat. The arms drooped and rose erratically like a machine that was running out of power.

“I guess this is the time…” I said as I engaged my invisibility and began moving towards the Mantis that was still standing.

I don’t want that one to run, if possible I want all three. Yeah, I’m greedy like that…

The healthy Mantis now finally chickening out turned to run, but I was almost right on top of its position. I saw its head turn as it heard the sound of my tail tearing across the marshy ground. It raised its claws but I have no intention of getting into a sword fight with this one. I grew to my full size which is now almost five meters tall, a good meter or so taller than the Mantis. I shot at it and grabbed its arms that held the claws before wrestling it to the ground. I felt the limbs I held snap under my strength and I brought it shrieking down into the mud. The mantis had four legs and two arms tipped with claws. Unfortunately for it, I had four arms so with two arms I pinned it down and I transformed my two other hands into claws. I crossed the claws around its head like a pair of scissor blades and I drew my hands back. The edges of my blade closed together and just “snipped” the Mantis’s head off.

With one down I looked up to see the Earth Elemental faltering as it faced me. Then it turned and attempted to run, but I was faster. Even on this terrain I easily caught up to it and when it sensed my rapid closing presence it turned in an attempt to defend itself. It raised its arms in an attempt to deliver a punch but I used my arms to catch both the arms of the Elemental. The Elemental struggled to break free, it was stronger than the Mantis, but not strong enough. With some effort, I managed to wrestle it onto the ground and pinned it below me. Then as I gazed at the pulsing crystal below me I instinctively knew what to do. I opened my maw and began to drain the ether from the core.

With each passing moment, the limbs I held weakened, and when the core was empty the rest of the stone body crumbled away into smaller pieces of rock. With whatever magic that once held it together gone, its stone body now became just a pile of inanimate rocks.

Once again I heard that voice in my head:

Lesser Earth Spirit Essence Assimilated

Achieved [Lesser Earth Spirit Ether Script] Level: 1 / 5

[Gravitic Hover] acquired

[Elemental Resistance] improved

[Physical Resistance] improved

[Magic Resistance] improved

[Ether Manipulation] improved

Hmm, [Gravitic Hover] I kind of instinctively knew what it is but let’s test it out, shall we. I felt my body change once again and I looked at my back and saw strange antennae with glowing tips now appearing on my back. As I moved I saw it left a ghostly, wisp-like trail as I moved. I looked down and saw I was now hovering slightly over the ground.

I tried moving and found I could move at full speed, not only that. Since I technically didn’t need to touch the ground anymore, I could move without leaving tracks or be hampered by bad terrain. This is very useful…

With that, I flitted over to the wounded Mantis on the ground. I could see a strange core in its chest, I guess that was what served as its heart…

I brought my blade down on its head and the Mantis stilled. I then began to gorge myself on the Mantis’s body before going over to eat the other one. I was halfway through the second corpse when I heard the voice in my head again.

Gigant Mantis Essence Assimilated

Achieved [Gigant Mantis Genome] Level: 1 / 10

[Mantis Blades] acquired

Augmenting…

[Mantis Blades] has improved [Greater Bone Blades] sharpness

[Chitinous Bone Blades] acquired

[Mantis Invisibility] acquired

Augmenting…

[Mantis Invisibility] has improved [Invisibility] stealth capabilities against detection magic

[Ethereal Invisibility] acquired

[Chitin Plating] acquired

Augmenting…

[Chitinous Keratin Plating] acquired

[Fire Weakness] acquired

WARNING negative trait acquired

Resolving…

Solution Obtained…

[Keratin Plating] overriding [Fire Weakness]

[Greater Keratin Plating] overriding [Chitinous Keratin Plating]

New trait obtained from trait adaptation

Combining [Greater Keratin Plating] and [Gigant Mantis Genome]

[Molt] acquired

[Greater Keratin Plates] can now be shed to purge status effects

New trait obtained from trait adaptation

Combining [Greater Keratin Plates], [Molt] and [Regeneration]

[Armour Regeneration] acquired

Armor plates will now rapidly regenerate when shed

Well, that was a lot of new abilities…

I was a little worried when I heard I got [Fire Weakness] but it looks like my body can automatically adjust the traits I get and discard the bad things I pick up along the way. So that’s useful, well I’m starting to understand something…

I smiled as I muttered to myself…

So this is why everyone wants to kill me on sight

Leave me alone long enough...

And my power will spiral out of control...