Chapter 15

When the creature woke up, the darkness of the night still reigned the sky. The soft green light of the green moon illuminated the world, giving the world almost an unreal impression.

‘When did the rain stop?’ Before it had gone to sleep, the creature had not seen the moon as it had still been raining, however, things became quite clear once it checked its Status and found its lifespan had decreased to 238 days. ‘I slept for an entire day?’

The creature had indeed slept for an entire day and this had been caused by 2 things. The first thing had been the venom that had ravaged its system. And the second thing had been the creature’s Vessel. The creature Vessel was called White Furred Moth, which was a nocturnal creature, as had been evidenced by the fact that evolving into this vessel had granted the creature the Skill, [Night Vision].

The creature scowled. ‘What a waste of time.’

Shaking away the last of its bleariness, the creature thought for a moment and decided to follow through its earlier commitment. It would now begin experimenting with its magic. After all, if last night had proved anything, it had been that the dangers lurked everywhere. Yet the issue of the food still remained. ‘Just what do I eat?’

It was in that moment of the conundrum, that the moth was reminded of a creature that had come to its aid when it had all but given up hope. ‘Of course!’

Hence, after the creature finished its morning ablutions, it flew off to search for the area where its original residence had been. Arriving at the spot, it found just what it had expected. The hole had long collapsed on itself due to rain, leaving behind nothing in its place any longer.

This find would have, once upon a time, left the creature in shambles. After all, that hideout had been its home for almost its entire life as a caterpillar. With it gone, all the evidence of the creature’s struggles and difficulties were gone too. But those time were gone. The creature that had possessed such a fragile mind, no continued existence anymore.

Thus, the moth merely turned away from the patch of mud and soon found what it had come here for. ‘There you are! I have come a long way for you, you know? Come here and fill my stomach.’

With its stomach full, the moth returned to its shelter to begin the much-needed experimentation. The first thing that the moth did was to relax. After all, magic did not need haste. It needed a calm heart; this much the [Reincarnated] knew because of her memories. Thus, once its heart had calmed down, the creature closed its eyes as it activated its Skill, [Mana Manipulation].

Almost immediately, the world dissipated away and the only thing that creature could feel was its body and something trapped within. This something was almost azure in colour and it flowed all across the creature’s body in a network of ethereal veins. However, these veins were not anything that the creature could see in its flesh.

And the something that flowed within those veins, it was even stranger. It didn’t seem like it was the matter and it didn’t seem like it was energy. It was the something. And there was no other thing that could be akin to this something.

The closest it could be described as would be akin to fire. Or better to say that the fire was akin to the something. For the something was akin to absolutely nothing. The something was the something. The something was there, yet not; it was insubstantial. It flowed but it was not liquid. It flew but it was not gas.

Yet that too was not entirely correct. The fire was most akin to the something but the fire was not the something. The something seemed to disappear into nothingness in one moment and in the other, it seemed to appear out of nothingness.

Even though the creature’s form seemed to contain the something within the creature’s ethereal veins, the veins did not lock the something within. The something constantly leaked out and appeared within the veins. The veins were but a guide to the something.

The creature recognised the something, of course. This something was mana. And the creature knew how to manipulate this it. It knew, because of her. But that did not mean it could. For knowing was not doing. And it soon became apparent when the creature tried and failed and failed and failed again, and again and again. It scowled. ‘How had she done it so easily?’

It tried again as it repeated the rules. ‘Guide. Don’t force. Speak. Don’t order. Persuade. Don’t control. For the mana does what it does, for no reason than it does.’

It tried to guide. It failed.

It tried to speak. It failed.

It tried to persuade. It failed.

It tried again and again and again. But the creature did not succeed. With each failure, it felt its head beginning to ache and its heart began feeling like it was being squeezed. Its blood began pumping faster and its body began growing hot.

The creature was angry.

In its anger, it did just what it knew not to.

It tried to force. It failed.

It tried to order. It failed.

It tried to control. It failed.

And then the mana erupted from its body, all at on-

0.0

When the creature woke up next, it was delirious. The world was swimming and it saw colours that didn’t exist. It heard sounds that defied logic and it smelled things that it could not define. But that was not where it ended. The creature was exhausted and lacked the energy to even move. Its body felt sore and it felt every muscle in its body as if the little being had exercised way beyond its limits.

The creature did not remain awake for lo-

0.0

The creature woke up dizzy and confused. The pain in its head caused it to feel the blood as it pulsed and rush by. The creature was miserable. And the feeling was compounded by hunger that burned in its belly. Yet, this hunger was nothing compared to what the Title [Hungry] had forced it to endure.

It clearly, was in no condition to go anywhere, hungry or not. Though when its thirst grew unbearable, it drank the water that had accumulated on the leaves due to the frequent rain. Thus, besides crawling out for water, the creature wisely decided to go hungry and just sleep.

0.0

It was only on the third day that the creature began feeling like itself again. And when it did, the first thing the creature did was to go out and hunt snails. It had been hungry for three days and the burn had started to bother the creature. This hunt too, just like the last time, didn’t even result in a single Level.

However, even though the moth had gone out to hunt, it had remained quite vigilant. It had used the skill [Sense] before it had begun eating snail, as that had been the moment when it had been the most vulnerable. Perhaps as a result of its vigilance, the creature returned to its hideout safe and sound.

With its hunger sated, the creature let its body relax and activated [Mana Manipulation] once again. As the world dissolved away, and the creature’s form came into view, the moth shuddered. Never again was the moth going to even think about committing the same folly ever again! Once had been enough for the creature. Even though the creature had known beforehand, the result of its folly because of her, it hadn’t thought the result would be this explosive.

It had known that something like this would happen, but it hadn’t understood.

The creature had been much akin to a child who knew that fire burned. The child knew so because it had been told so his entire life. But unless the child experienced the heat and the unforgiveness of the fire for himself, he would not understand. The creature had been much the same.

And now the creature understood. Yet, this understanding helped it not as the creature stared at the azure mana. This understanding was useless and purposeless. The creature stared. It tried to guide. It tried to speak to it. And it tried to persuade. But to no avail.

And the day passed, just like that.

And another day passed.

Another day passed.

Days passed.

A week had passed in this manner and the creature had gained nothing. And even though it had gained nothing and no matter how angry or irritated it became, it never even thought of repeating its folly. Thus, throughout the entire week, the creature did just 2 things. It maintained its state under [Mana Manipulation] and hunted snails when it grew hungry.

And the week passed, just like that.

And another week passed.

Another week passed.

Weeks passed.

The creature continued to fail and the time continued to pass. The irrevocable march of time continued and 2 months went by in a blink. Yet the [Survivor] had nothing to show for it when it came to mana. The mana had not moved even for an inch under the creature’s guidance.

Instead, the things that had improved in the past 2 months had been the ones on which the creature had not been paying any attention to. The first thing to improve had been its Skill [Night Vision], which had improved leaps and bounds, and reached Level 4. And the other had been its Levels which had increased by 3. This measly amount of progress had been due to the moth’s obstinate desire to focus only on [Mana Manipulation], thus the bug had only hunted snails.

And although snails had been a good opponent for the caterpillar, they were not so for the now evolved White Furred Moth. Hence, even though the bug had hunted the snails almost daily, it had only received meagre experience from them and had levelled up only 3 levels in 60 days.

However, the improvement in [Night Vision] mattered not to the moth and neither did the increase in its Level. It only cared about mana and [Mana Manipulation]. As a result, by the time 2 months passed, the creature felt like it had almost nothing to show for the rather limited lifespan that it had wasted away. Its lifespan now stood at 174 days, down from its original of 240 days.

0.0

The creature stared at the number. It was its lifespan. Something extremely precious. Yet something that it had wasted away. ‘60 days.’

The creature’s face twisted in distaste. ‘More than half the lifespan of the caterpillar. Wasted away. Tch.’

This caused the [Reincarnated] to break out of its routine and forced it to confront reality. ‘My strategy is not really feasible.’

It sighed. Now that the creature had decided to change its ways, it faced another conundrum. And this one was regarding its experience and the future strategy about the Skill [Poison Resistance]. The creature had complex feelings about this Skill. Initially, this had been the Skill that the caterpillar had the invested the most in. For the sake of this Skill, the [Reincarnated] had even regularly poisoned itself and gladly suffered through the consequences.

But it had been this Skill too that had been the reason that she had almost had her fragile mind shattered. The caterpillar had bet its future on the Skill but this Skill had been entirely useless to the little thing. After all, the Skill had only levelled up from the caterpillar’s efforts after the creature had left that Vessel.

This Skill had been the source of trauma for her.

But this creature was not her. This creature was its own being. And while it did not have the trauma associated with levelling of this Skill, it had learned from her mistakes, especially after its misadventure with mana. It had learned and it had been left wary.

But the situation currently, and in the past, was not the same anymore. The Skill was no longer at its Level cap. It had the potential to grow. And even though the caterpillar’s efforts had not born the little being any fruit, the moth had benefitted from the poor bugs efforts.

Therefore, the creature once again decided to work again on levelling up the Skill, with great reluctance. Its reluctance was not born from its wariness of the Skill but the experiences that it had to go through to level up the Skill.

Though, this bore the question, what should the creature use to level up the Skill. ‘I can’t use the same weak poison as her.’

This, of course, reminded the creature of the spider’s venom. But that venom had been dangerous enough to cause a loss of HP and that had been when that venom had not stacked. If it had stacked, then the creature didn’t know how it would have handled the situation. After all, the moth did not have an HP recovering skill. It could only naturally regenerate it HP.

Yet, the creature had survived the poison. And this poison was the devil that it knew. If the creature tried searching for another being, it might end up finding something that the bug might regret. The creature’s reasoning was the perfect example of choosing the evil that one knew over an evil one didn’t.

With a plan of action set, the creature came out of its hideout and flew towards the area it had last hunted the spider. It did not take the moth much time to find more spiders similar to the one that it had been looking for. And it began hunting the fanged creature in much the same manner. Though, it was when the moth bit the spider at the back of its neck that things went differently.

This spider, unlike the one it had hunted last time, wasn’t frazzled much when it fell from its web. Thus, when the moth tried to bite it at the back of its neck, the hair on the spider’s feet stood up and the spider immediately noticed the flying danger.

The spider then jumped as it aimed its spinneret at the moth and shot a string of sticky at the moth. The moth, in response, tilted and changed its trajectory to dodge the spiderweb and flew away. ‘Tch. What a bust!’

The moth had no intention of hunting this spider anymore. After all, the moth was an ambusher. It hunted using surprise and traps. It did not confront its prey. And now that the element of surprise had been lost, the moth decidedly gave up on hunting this specific spider.

It searched for other spiders to hunt and it indeed found them. But the creature consequently failed the next 3 hunts before it was able to successfully hunt another spider. As the creature stared at the broken chitin of its prey, it scowled. ‘Do I end up hunting the retarded members of this race?’

Well, it was somewhat true to an extent. Both the spiders that it had been able to hunt had been the ones that hadn’t recovered from the fall. Their reflexes had been slow and their responses late. It had been the only reason that the moth had been able to hunt the spiders with relative ease.

‘Whatever.’

The moth dismissed the 2 Level up notifications and carefully removed the spider’s head from the rest of the body before spitting out a few times and cleaning its mouth from the water of the nearby drying puddle. It hadn’t rained in the last few days and the easy sources of water were becoming increasingly hard for the creature to find.

What the creature didn’t know was that while it had been trying to cajole mana to its will, the season of monsoon had almost come to an end. Soon the season will change once again and temperature would begin to drop as the winter would be moving in.

The creature didn’t know any of this though, and after it rinsed its mouth, it began eating the delicious raw bug flesh. It didn’t even realise how far it had come from the being that it had been. Not that it would have cared, had it known.

As it ate the spider if often came across some pieces that were a bit spicy. And after the last time, the creature had guessed that this spice was actually not a spice but rather the creature’s venom. Thus, the creature didn’t eat the spicy parts but kept them aside.

It was only after the moth had eaten the non-venomous meat that it gave the poisoned meat a look. The meat wasn’t much, so the creature warily ate it. If it had been a large amount, the creature had planned to only eat a bit of meat and letting the rest rot away.

Within the hole that it had made last time, hidden away under the fallen leaves, the thing that had kept the moth dreading and waiting, arrived and pain exploded all over its body at once. And once again the bug felt like it had been pounded like the training dummy of a martial artist. And then the said dummy had been passed onto another martial artist to train. The creature’s entire body cried in agony and pain.

It was bad, much like last time. And even though the creature hadn’t been expecting anything different, the moth was still surprised. Bolts after bolts of pain raced all over the creature’s body. They crashed and crisscrossed all over the body.

The ordeal lasted for quite a bit. And by the time it was finally over, the moth had been left gasping for its breath, just like last time. Though this time, when its body exhaled instead of inhaling, it didn’t panic but held its breath all the same. When the entire process was over and the Skill [Poison Resistance] had still not levelled up, the creature couldn’t help but scowl. ‘Tch.’

The [Survivor] then returned to its new hideout and instead of sleeping, it tried to relax. After all, the night had yet not ended and it had to fruitlessly stare at mana in hope of figuring out a way to use it. The creature scowled but shook its head and breathed deeply before slowly letting it out.

It closed its eyes and activated [Mana Manipulation]. Though, just like the past few months, it didn’t succeed. Just like that the day arrived and the night bid its farewell. Much the similar manner, the time continued to march as the entire week passed.

Within this week, it was only its third successful hunt spider that gave the moth an entire Level before the rest of the hunts gave it nothing individually. By the end of the week, it had managed to gain another Level but that had been the result of the accumulation of experiences from the spiders.

By the time the next week started, the moth had grown tired of its routine and decided to take a few days off to explore the area that it had been surviving in for the past few months.

-X-

Within a desolate desert, inside a dilapidated shop, on a simple chair, a youth seemingly slept.

-X-