Randy

[Open Evolution Menu]!

Evolution Prompt 2

You have reached level 25, now you can reset your level and progress down the evolutionary lines.

1. (Boss Mage Dungeon Cave Serpent) {0%}

2. (Mage Cave Serpent) {0%}

3. (Mage Serpent) {100%}

4. (Aquatic Mage Serpent) {0%}

5. (Airborne Mage Serpent) {0%}

*Values are rounded to nearest ones

Your have 44868 XP stored. Carrying over XP will result in 50% penalty.

Seriously….

That is A LOT of XP!

A whole 45 bloody thousand XP! Imagine all the levels I could rank up with those XP figures!

If that boss really was a Nation-level boss, then that should've meant the XP gained would be shared by the entire soldiers battalion subjugating said boss.

Am I....really that strong?

I really am inclined to believe that I'm just lucky, though.

Yeah, that’s it. I’m just lucky.

Overestimating oneself will only bring demise. I should just keep my head down and do what I do best; laying low.

Now, about the evolution.

There are five choices available, with 3 unavailable, and only one of them seems the have been picked....

Ooohhh.....!

So that’s what the percentiles meant, not chances, but the number of serpents of said species, in percentage! It might work as chance percentiles then, but judging by the figures, it won't work here. It might just so happen that it was distributed similar to an exponential graph.

Does that mean the other Mage Serpents choose manually? I think previously it said something about randomizing choices, so if it really is, should the number figures be similar to before?

I might be getting ahead of myself, but I think I know what that means.

Yeaaahh....

I'll have to keep an eye out for the other Mage Serpents then.

Back to evolution! I’m getting distracted. I need to get this done so I can start actually gaining grounds on this forsaken cave.

Seems like the “Dungeon” and “Cave” means my habitat or something. If so, there really is only one choice.

[Select Evolution Species: Mage Serpent]!

….

I FORGOT ABOUT THIS!! IT HUUUURTSS!!!

GYAAAHHHH!!!! MY MOUTH IS BURNING MY HEAD‘S GONNA EXPLOOODE!!!

IT’S EVEN WORSE THAN BEFORE! MY ENTIRE BODY HURTS! I CAN FEEL MY BONES STRETCH, MY ORGANS SQUIRMING AROUND!

I’M BEING MUTILATED ALIIIVEE!!!!

HGYAAAAGGHHK-

….

….

….

Eeuuurrghhhh....

I still can’t get used to this….

Shaking myself awake, all the open pain receptors previously suspended flares up for the last time until it slowly dissipates, with me clenching my jaw the entire time. Not having teeth to clench is pretty weird in on itself as I’m pushing my folded fangs against soft tissue.

Feeling heavy and clumsy, I try seeing through my Mana Vision. While previously there are only mana in shades of purple-ish lights, there are now a whole lot of other colours. Blue, brown, traces of yellow even.

Might this be the elemental manas?

Attempting to move them around, I quickly notice that they’re significantly harder to manipulate. I can barely shift or carve some dirt, while it’s nearly impossible to create more than a drop of water at a time.

Ah, first levels are that easy after all, especially now that I have a larger pool of mana. The change is barely noticeable, but the earth I shifted earlier is far easier to move around now.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot!

[Low Biological and Mana Healing]!

I feel a cooling sensation rising from my chest, spreading through my entire body. What previously aches now feels great, what’s previously heavy now feels light, and I can feel like I’m more body-conscious than before.

HEALING MAGIC IS SOOO COOL!

Aside of that, I guess either that fainting when evolving or the evolving itself tops my HP up to the brim. Can’t complain about that though, as I’ll be needing it for my next objective;

Finding something to eat and drink.

….

I’ve been feeling hungry since my first evolution, but it has been hidden by adrenaline and the hunger suppressant skill. The correct effect would be closer to stopping myself from feeling hungrier, which means I can still feel hungry.

And I’m scared to confront this.

Why?

I’m a goddamn alien snake! I don’t know how or what they eat?

Can I eat that Megacada from earlier? Maybe?

DO I WANT TO eat that Megacada from earlier? Hell no, that thing looks horrific just from mana sight alone! I can’t even imagine how despicable it will actually look with optical eyes!

Plus, I’m not that desperate, I guess. This is only skipping lunch hungry, not 3 days of starvation hungry.

I will still secure the carcass though, don’t want the cave critters to rob the spoils. Also, since this is a Nation-level Boss, its body parts must be pretty expensive. I don't want any random cave divers to steal them from me.

…

As this is a perfect chance to test out the item box skill from earlier, I spare no MP in getting it to pop out.

[Item Box]!

It looks like a miniature black hole in which I can tell the contents from the back of my head, which I can move around to take stuff from wherever I want. The further it is the more strain I’m getting, and its range maxes at just around 5 body length-ish.

For starters, I cut all of its legs and put it inside the black hole. The legs just barely fits the diameter of the black hole's mouth.

After further testing, it turns out that it won't take anything bigger than that mouth. The Megacada won’t fit in its entirety, so I leave it as it is. Instead, I make out a crystal cage enveloping it, designed specifically so that nothing twice the thickness of my tubular-ish body can enter.

With that settled, now I can start trying to find food.

Which is really hard as the only cave monster nearby is the agile Tapir-Elephant hybrid which constantly has its back against the furthermost wall looking like I had been doing Kabedon on it since the fight first started.

Is it…scared of me?

I mean, it’s good and all, but I won’t be able to hunt for food this way.

This world is moved by mana, so might it be that? I did have an arbitrarily expansive mana pool...

Actually observing my body for the first time, I can see a little mana leakage from my body. Not too much, just barely visible, and with no apparent or sensible effect to my body.

Could this be those kinds of intimidating auras popular in the writings of OP MC isekai books? Like that one with the blue slime needing a mask or something to mask it?

Concentrating on each of the leakage, I manually plug the “holes” one by one with a thin layer of mana, which results in them opening another hole and leaking out in other places.

Frustrated, I instead try to blanket my entire self in a thin layer of ambient mana, until there’s none of them visible anymore. My body looks more like a mismatch of ambient mana than the natural feeling of my bodily mana, however I should explain that. It feels kinda wrong somehow, as if I'm wearing a thin latex suit.

Can I save this contraption? Save spell [Aura Mask]!

[Keep Aura Mask running indefinitely]

Hey, it works! And I still have 0.3 mana per second after that one.

Nevertheless, the Eletapir seems to calm down a bit as soon as I cover up with ambient mana, and I got myself a new spell.

Now, should I kill that Eletapir? I mean, I’m hungry, but I don’t want to just slaughter everything I see, especially after this particular one got traumatized for life at however large of an aura I’m emitting before.

You’re plenty lucky Eletapir, I’ll give you that. Consider me generous.

I repeat, generous, totally not because I’m too afraid to actually butcher a mammal.

Hold on, can’t I use Mana Expertise to do the dirty work?

Gaaahhh dammit, and it already ran away!

AND I CAN COOK IT WITH FIRE MANIPULATION TOO! maybe…

*sigh* I’m such an idiot.

….

Slithering out of the cave I’m met with a pile of thick rubble blocking what seems to be the only entrance to the cave. Bullet Spear does jack shit, and my Earth Mana manipulation is far too low for this.

This means I have to drop down the sinkhole, huh?

I slither to the hole’s mouth and opened the Megacada cage’s top, before dropping down just above it. It’s surprisingly squishy, which certainly only raises more questions than answers, not that anyone's here to answer. I jump below and look for another path, while closing the cage top back.

What I find is certainly not to my liking nor to my advantage.

One side’s completely buried in rubble, and the other path descends down, hard. Not the Seattle kind of elevation difference, I’m talking about 45 degrees full on dive into the deep right here.

I hate this, especially since going down means I will most likely be going further from the surface…

…did I just say that? You’re a genius Sherlock! Climb up to get higher and all that stupid obvious shit!

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think I’ll be tasting that Megacada first.

I’m horribly embarrassed. Mom’s not gonna be proud of her boy for tasting insects like this. Not like I have much of a choice aside of sliding down the slope though.

I pick somewhere I think might be tasty, or at least slightly less horrible than the others, before conjuring mana crystals shaped like floating utensils and granting myself a perfect block of squishy Megacada meat.

Which can barely be called meat at all.

Now, how do I eat this? Do I eat it whole? Do I gulp it down bit by bit?

Flicking my tongue to taste it a bit, I find my entire human instincts clash with my snake instincts. One side claims this is horrible, embarrassing, gross, and stupidly futile. The other claims this as an astonishing galactic-level delicacy Gordon Ramsay would kill for.

Go figure which claims which.

*sigh*

Here goes nothing….

….

I can only barely taste it, because I gulped the entire thing down like some prostitute swallowing a sausage.

But, in the little time it did hit my tongue, MAAAAAAAANNNN THAT’S GOOD!

It’s like Gordon Ramsay himself cooked an entire Kobe Beef steak for me, that’s how good this is.

But snakes don’t actually “taste” food, do they? Might it be the meat’s mana?

Ahh well, WHO CARES? I’M TAKING SECONDS!

NOMNOMNOM!

…

…

That hits the spot! I finished half of the entire thing before I got full though, so I probably will need to look for more food. Where did they even went? It’s like every person reincarnated in a magical world has magical black hole stomach…

…I really did just ate an oversized roach, did I?

Gross.

But also delicious.

Whatever, I guess it’s better for them to be delicious than gross. I would probably die of indigestion if the dungeon food tastes like what that Nai Waa~ spider girl experienced.

Time to descend down the slippery slope!

I guess I’ll take a look at my stats while I’m at it.

[Open All Stats and Skills]!

Name: Randy

Species: Mage Serpent (Early)

Level: 13/25 (3268/3900 XP to level up)

HP: 650/650

MP: 327/7441

Fortitude: 50

Strength: 65

Luck: 90

SP: 12

Status:

- Exhausted

- Tail Crippled

Resilience: 80

Intelligence: 200

C̷̢̡̪̪͉̦͎̹̳̣̹̤̜̱͉̍̑̄́̒͌͐̒̿̂̆̆̎̚͜ơ̶̢̧̲̖̣͍͇̤͓̦̘̹̰̝̪͖̟͔̣̅͋̐̏̈́͊͆͋̒̾̎̋̌̀̑̀̓̈́̈͂̐̾̊̑̔͘͝͝͝m̷̛̙̬̤̥̥̺̯̘͉͔̠̻̰̮̪̙̳̖͎͋̈̌͑́͜ͅṃ̴͙͓̘̦̲̳̘̩̂̉̉͑̈͌͋̾̓̈́̋͐̃̂̈́̌͊͑̄̌͘͠: %

Skill Table 1 (Passive)

Parallel Whispers Lv. 1

(MAXED)

Blessing of God Lv. 1 (MAXED)

{+50 Luck}

Impossible Grinding Start Point Lv. 4 (LOCKED)

{+100 Intelligence}

Reincarnator Lv. 1 (MAXED)

MP Self Regeneration Lv. 2

{0.4 MP per second}

Hunger Resistance Lv. 1

{Increases Metabolism Efficiency}

Fire Resistance Lv. 1

{Slightly Fireproof Scales}

Aura Mask (SPELL)

{Hides presence, -0.1 MP per second}

Skill Table 2 (Active)

Mana Expertise Lv. 5

{Effect: Manipulates Mana}

Mana Vision Lv. 6

{Effect: Filters mana detected}

Venomous Bite Lv. 1

[10 MP]

{Effect: Paralyzes Enemy}

Mana Condenser Lv. 4

[Max : 100 MP]

{Effect: Creates Mana Crystal Objects}

Bullet Spear Lv. 1

[75-100 MP]

{Effect: Makes Bullet Spears setup.}

Item Box Lv. 1

[250MP per usage]

{Effect: Infinite space item storage pocket-dimension}

Elemental Trifecta Manipulation (W, F, E) Lv. 2

{Effect: Manipulated Water, Fire, and Earth}

Low Biological Healing Lv. 1

[2 MP per 1 HP, 5 HP/s]

{Effect: Accelerates natural healing}

Low Mana Healing Lv. 1

[5 MP per 1 HP, 40 HP/s]

{Effect: Heals body with mana}

Second Wind Lv. 1

{Effect: Down to 1 HP before dying}

Constriction Lv. 1

[1 MP/s]

{Effect: Constricts enemy}

Mana Fine Control Lv.1

{Effect: Surgical Mana Precision}