Chapter 23

[You have reached Level 100. Do you want to Evolve now?]

[Yes]     [No]

The creature stared at the notification and took a deep breath in. And slowly, it breathed out. The notification had evoked a mix of emotions within the creature, with jubilation and nervousness at the forefront as they made its tiny heart jump. But they were far from the only ones as the emotional turmoil also had a blend of fear, anticipation and the sheer desire to live.

Without waiting for a moment more, the moth turned and flew back to its hideout. ‘Soon. Very Soon!’

The moth reached its hideout and under the light of the azure moon observed the tree that was a bit young and within which it had created its hideout. Instead of entering the tree, the moth paused and gave the tree a look of careful consideration. ‘Would it be enough?’

The creature’s worry was justified.

This rather young tree had never been meant to be its permanent shelter or even a temporary one for that matter. This shelter had been merely meant to house the creature for just a night to escape the rain. However, those plans had changed when its original shelter had collapsed due to rain.

Besides, the creature had lived here for the past 5 months and it hadn’t felt the need to change shelter as the tree had provided the moth with adequate safety.

Nonetheless, now that the creature was looking to evolve again, and that too in autumn with the winter fast approaching, it was reconsidering the practicality of doing so. Even though the creature had evolved into the moth here itself, it felt the need to re-evaluate the quality of its shelter.

This reconsideration was born from the simple fact that the creature’s previous evolution had taken an entire month. And if it had known this fact before evolving, it would have thought twice about choosing this place. ‘I suppose this tree’s sheer remarkability and young age are what had made it a safe place.’

But the creature didn’t think it could evolve within this tree again for the simple reason that the creature needed to expand the shelter before it evolved. And given the thinness of the rather young tree, the creature feared that the tree would die if the moth expanded its hideout.

The creature wanted to expand the shelter because based on its experience, where its size had increased, it expected the same to happen again. Thus, instead of returning to its hideout, the moth began searching for a new one. It took the creature quite some time to find a new place as it didn’t want to make its shelter in an old and ancient tree. The creature’s reasoning for abandoning the most sought out shelters was just that; that they were the most sought out ones. If the moth evolved there then the possibility of its refuge being discovered was quite high. And if that happened then the little moth wouldn’t even know when it died.

Thus, the creature continued to search and it was only by the time that the sun had begun peeking out of the horizon that it found a tree that it liked. This tree even had a tree hollow that hadn’t been occupied for a long time. The creature had checked through both [Sense] and [Sense Essence], only to receive nothing noticeable. And although the hollowed-out space wasn’t very big, it was big enough for what the creature needed.

Despite the weariness that had begun to hound the moth, the creature did not even think of resting. Setting aside the lethargy, that had only grown with each passing day, the creature didn’t even consider procrastinating. How could it, when it had to evolve?

Thus, the creature pulled its own version of an all-nighter and for the second time in a long time, it greeted the sunrise.

Not that the creature cared much about the scene. It was not a mortal that could understand the subtle meaning of greeting the rising sun when it had finally found hope. It could not understand such subtle concepts and even if could, it would not care; for it was an Immortal.

The moth spent the rest of the day carrying mud within the tree hollow to seal it off. Only when it had collected enough and had moistened it again with its own venom that the went in for the last time and slowly closed off the entrance.

A slow smile formed on the creature’s face. All its preparations were finally complete. And it could finally evolve. ‘Status!’

Ting.

Status

[Unnamed] [Skills] [Spells] [Dharma] [Evolve]

Even without a moments delay, the creature focused on [Evolve].

Ting.

[Do you want to evolve now?]

[Yes]       [No]

Grinning, it focused on [Yes].

Ting.

[Chose your form.]

[Fairy: Your species related evolution path.]

[Pixie: Your species related alternate evolution path.]

[Malfae: Variant. Granted due to your anarchic methods.]

All the excitement drained out of the creature as it stared at the options available to it. And slowly, its face twisted into a grimace. The moth knew all those creatures. For all of them were magical creature’s that had existed within her memories. And from her knowledge, the creature knew that all these creatures, without exception, were nothing more than pests! It scowled. ‘I don’t want to be a pest! I don’t even want to be an insect!’

‘Tch.’ The creature’s face twisted in distaste. It had hoped to get better choices this time around as it had its magic now. ‘It seems like that isn’t going to be anytime soon.’

With a resigned sigh, it focused on its choices before it paused. ‘Are they even the same creatures that I think they are?’

The creature stared at the screen for a moment before it focused on the word ‘Fairy’.

Ting.

[You have chosen Fairy as your evolution. Are you sure?]

[Yes]       [No]

‘What! No! I don’t want to be a stupid narcissist which is too enchanted with its self to even function properly!’

Thus, without a second thought, it focused on [No].

It scowled and waited for a few moments more as it thought about the conundrum. As a thought popped up in its head, it focused on the words, in front of the choice, rather than the choice itself.

Ting.

[A creature of vanity and pride. It forms the base of the food chain.]

‘I am so not choosing Fairy. I have no wish to remain at the bottom of the food chain.’ The creature dismissed the window and summoned the description for ‘Pixie’.

Ting.

[A creature of strength and mischief. It forms the base of the food chain.]

‘Hmm. Pixie seems like it is a better version of Fairy. Yet it remains at the bottom of the food chain.’ Wanting to cover all its options, it turned to the last option, Malfae.

Ting.

[A creature of venom and malice.]

‘Ominous.’ The creature blinked at the single line. ‘This sounds promising though. Malfae isn’t at the bottom of the pyramid. It beats others just by this fact.’

The creature thought for a few moments more before it made its decision and focused on Malfae.

Ting.

[You have chosen Malfae as your evolution. Are you sure?]

[Yes]        [No]

I focused on [Yes].

Ting.

[Evolution will begin now. Time Remaining: 120 days.]

The beginning of the evolution was different this time around for the creature. This time it did not form the cocoon from its own spit, rather, threads shot out of its pores from all over its body the moment evolution began.

The threads attached themselves to the walls of the tree hollow as threads after threads continued to pour out of the creature. As more and more threads attached themselves to the walls, they began to cover the creature and gradually a cocoon emerged from the thread.

Then the creature, which was no longer a moth, slept.

0.0

The creature woke up feeling confined and bound. Before it could even begin to frown at the situation -that it had found itself rather regularly in- it remembered where it was. ‘Evolution. Right.’

With the situation clear, the creature began wiggling and squirming to free itself. Cracks resounded as its body squirmed and it felt the tightness loosen. As the creature continued with its efforts, it did not have to wait for long before its actions bore fruit and cocoon broke apart even further.

A blue palm shot out of the white ball that was the cocoon before the entire arm followed it. Another blue arm soon followed the first and began to stretch and push the cocoon apart. With each push and shove the white thread ball tore a little more until a blue creature became visible.

The creature was small, barely the size of an adult mortal’s finger and had an appearance that was vaguely similar to that of mortals. It possessed 2 hands, 2 legs and 1 head. However, that was the point where any similarity with creatures ended.

The first thing to signify its immortal nature was the very colour of its skin. Its skin was blue but not the blue of the oceans and the skies but the blue of the poisoned flesh. The blue skin was smooth but seemed tough. It almost had a leathery appearance. This revelation, from the very first look at the creature, was enough to reveal the venomous nature of the creature.

But that was not all. Despite its blue skin, it was the tuft of white fur-like hair that stood the most. The fur akin hair grew not only on its head but also on its back. However, the rest of its body lacked a single hair. As such, it lacked even eyebrows, eyelashes and body hair. This resulted in an appearance which seemed rather sinister.

Its immortal appearance did not just end there. The creature had 2 antennas, almost the size of its own head, poking out of its forehead as if they were horns. Its eyes were completely dark and lacked sclera. This gave off the illusion that the eyes of the creature were just giant pupils.

Beneath its dark eyes was a small nose and thin lips which hid two rows of sharp fang-like teeth. And while fingertips did possess rather long nails, they were nowhere near sharp enough or long enough to be classified as talons. However, neither of those features were quite eye-catching as its ears.

The creature’s ears were quite distinct as they were bigger than its face, almost double the size. The huge appendages seemed like they could move individually and their insides seemed to be filled with ridges. They gave the creature’s face an almost bat-like impression. Though that impression was quite short-lived.

It had a set of wings on its back but instead of the wings resembling a butterfly or a bird, they resembled the triangular wings of a moth. The wings were white and thin enough that they were almost transparent. They gave a clear indication of the creature’s heritage as a moth.

The blue creature removed parts of the cocoon, that still covered its body, to reveal a flat blue chest. There was not even a single mark on the creature body and it even lacked the nipples that marked the mammary glands in mortals. Yet, if a mortal point of view were to be considered, the creature’s body was clearly female.

However, that was a mortal perspective, which was of no value since the blue creature was an immortal, not a mortal. And immortals did not have genders. Immortals were just immortals.

The creature stood up and as it stood up, it stared at its own hand and feet before flexing its fingers. ‘It feels so good to have hands and legs again! Finally! No more crawling! No more biting things! No more digging with my mouth!’

It laughed. ‘I can walk. I can hold things!!’

It laughed again. And it continued to laugh until-

Ting.

[Evolution completed. You have evolved into a Malfae.]

Ting.

[Evolution bonus of 30 points has been added to your total Health Points and Mana Points. You have been completely healed.]

Ting.

[Level up bonuses have increased from +2 points per level to +3 points per Level Up for both HP and MP.]

Ting.

[Your HP regeneration rate has been increased to [21 + Level/10] per hour. Rounded down.]

Ting.

[Your MP regeneration rate has been increased to [11 + Level/10] per hour. Rounded down.]

Ting.

[Level limit on Skills has been raised to Level 15. Please Evolve further to raise the Level limit again.]

As the creature read past the notifications, its grin widened and revealed a set of fangs like teeth. Along with the hairless face, the toothy smile of the creature formed quite a malicious picture. ‘Yes! 30 Points extra for both HP and MP and the increase in regenerations!’

Ting.

[Final evolution of evolution tree [Species: Insect] reached. To evolve further consider changing your [Species].]

‘…Come again.’ Joy left the creature’s face like an overfilled dam finally collapsing. Its dark eyes narrowed. Its toothy smile disappeared and the eyebrow-less forehead scowled. Even the creature’s antenna twitched in disbelief. ‘This is a joke right…it has to be a joke.’

The creature shuddered and read the notification again. It still conveyed the same thing. ‘I… can’t evolve anymore?’

Its stared dumbly for a moment before its brain caught up to the rest of the message. ‘No. That’s not right. I just need a new [Species]. But…how do I get that?’

Before the creature could ponder more, the rest of the notifications made themselves known.

Ting.

[Skill [Malfae Shield Lv.1] granted.]

Ting.

[Skill [Drone Eggs Lv.5] granted.]

The creature ignored the new notifications as it frowned. It had a problem to deal with. There was no way that the creature was going to be stuck as a Malfae. That was just an unacceptable outcome for the creature.

‘The screen suggests I change my species.’ With the recommendation from the Status itself, the creature surmised that changing one’s Species was not something impossible. Though, that did not mean that the Malfae knew of a way to do it. ‘But how do I do it?’

The creature frowned for a few moments more before it decided to set the thought aside. The creature did not dismiss it though, the thought was merely sent to the back of its mind.

With its worries postponed, the creature focused on the task at hand, the notifications and began going through them. As the latest one was about [Drone Eggs], thus creature called forth its explanation.

Ting.

[Ability to create eggs that produce Egoless creatures. Cost: 5 times the Level of the Skill. Creates [[0.5[SL][SL+1]] eggs.]

‘Eh?’ The creature tilted its head and its eyes narrowed. ‘Do I…lay eggs?’

The creature was not unaware of the concept of reproduction and the creation of new beings. Though, its knowledge was limited to the process of creating humans. It had her memories after all. The creature had assumed the immortals followed the same principle but after receiving this Skill, the Malfae was not so sure.

The Malfae was correct to doubt this of course; since immortals do not breed sexually. They are asexual creatures that reproduce through a method that is essentially cloning. Immortals clone themselves in their eggs. A majority of these clones do not live long enough to evolve though, as the immortals do not rear all their progeny. An immortal, in any circumstance, will only raise a single young progeny to its first evolution before abandoning the said progeny.

This seemingly cruel nature of immortals exists for only one reason. And that reason was the fact that immortals were not creatures of civilization. To immortals, 1 is complete, 2 is burden and 3 is death.

For this reason, even after laying innumerable eggs, the immortals will choose to raise only a single egg. This choice of the egg is instinctual for the immortals and they’ll choose the egg that has the potential to produce the most mutated clone of the original. This choice to raise the mutated or even disabled progeny, while abandoning the healthy ones might seem like folly to mortals but immortals are not mortals and trying to understand them from the mortal perspective itself is folly.

Immortals do not desire the passage of their traits. The innumerable clones already carried all the traits that the immortal could pass on. One after another, without any deviation, they all carried the same traits. Thus, those that carry the same trait as the immortal were not valuable.

But those that were different, the ones that carry the mutated traits, were the valuable ones indeed. Even if the mutated traits were detrimental to the creature, or were birth defects, the immortals would choose those eggs over normal ones. After all, birth defects were not something that one evolution or two couldn’t fix. And these very birth defects had the potential to change the deformed creature into something entirely new.

Thus, no matter the Species or the Vessel of the immortal, all immortals only raised a single progeny. And this had also been the case with the Malfae’s own creation. It had been born amongst the numerous eggs and had been abandoned as it had been the just another clone. Just another caterpillar. It was through her memories and the creature’s own actions that the Malfae had deviated enough to become what it did.

However, the Skill that the Malfae had just received, was not a progeny creation Skill. It was drone Skill and it created drones, not progenies. This Skill was a result of the Vessel that creature now inhibited. This Vessel was a hive creature and it created a colony to survive; much akin to the ants and termites.

But the Malfae did not know any of this, thus, it read the description again and its forehead crinkled in thought. ‘This Skill consumes MP?’

The need for MP confused the creature. Its knowledge from her memories told the creature that the only thing needed for the creation of a new being was another individual and a ritual involving the two on a horizontal surface. There was no magic required of it and there certainly had been no need for Skills.

‘Does this mean that the Skill is more magical in nature than physical?’ The creature hesitated for a moment before it activated the Skill. ‘[Drone Eggs].’

At that moment, however, it felt its stomach turn and its eyes widened. Its mouth opened dumbly as an ache began to spread in its belly. ‘It’s physical after all!’

It felt its heart race before the ache started descending. With the descending pain, the creature that had evolved just recently, apparently began urinating as liquid squirted out of the creature’s crotch and drenched its thighs and legs.

As the creature’s eyes fell on its drenched legs, it seemed to calm down instead of becoming increasingly alarmed. As the ache continued to descend, it calmed down even more and the Malfae breathed deeply.

The descending pain had calmed the creature as it was something that the Malfae had been familiar with. For even though she had not created another being, she had known about the process rather deeply. She had even tried the progeny creation ritual a few times but had failed to create her own new being.

Thus, as the process progressed and seemed to go in the same direction as her memories, the creature gained a sense of familiarity with the process. It even became a bit curious about the result. Thus, when the white and cylindrical egg finally fell out of the creature’s crotch with a wet splosh, the creature looked at it curiously.

However, much to the creature’s surprise, the process was not over. In fact, it was far from over! Another pain manifested within the creature’s belly and began to descend until the creature popped out another cylindrical egg. The newly evolved creature stared at the egg incredulously before another shot of ache manifested in its belly and began to descend. ‘Heavens above! You have got to be kidding me!’

Eggs after eggs popped out of the Malfae and the creature’s little tree hollow became drenched in its bodily fluids that were released from its crotch before each new egg popped out. The creature gasped with wide eyes and its incredulous gaze fell on the ever-increasing pile of eggs.

Fortunately for the [Reincarnated], its body finally stopped popping out eggs after 15 eggs had been created and the creature panted. At that moment, it also remembered that the number of eggs created had been mentioned in the notification. ‘That had to be the effect of its Level. This Skill started at Level 5. Why! Why is it this Skill?!’

It took the [Survivor] quite a few moments before its breathing calmed down and its heartbeat stabilised. The creature breathed deeply for a moment before its curious gaze once again fell on the eggs and the Malfae hesitated for a moment before it poked an egg.

The creature waited for something to happen but when nothing happened, the creature circled the egg once and carefully activated its Skill, [Sense]. Instantly, the creature’s own thick scent, mixed with the scent of sweat and bodily fluids, hit the Malfae’s antennas and its face twisted in distaste. ‘Ugh. That was a mistake.’

Despite the unpleasant odour, the creature was pretty happy with its experiment. At least it now knew that the eggs were not something to be wary of. The scent of the eggs was completely its own, along with it something purely benign.

The creature still hesitated for a moment before activating [Sense Essence] and observing the egg. Once again, it found nothing suspicious. The essence, though unclear and hazy, matched its own shade and even the vapoury form seemed to be visible. This vapoury form didn’t seem to be in the Malfae’s own form though. Rather it seemed quite unstable and malleable. At this point, it was but a blob and nothing else.

Still, this marked the first time the creature saw the form of an Essence of another creature except its own.

Ting.

[Skill [Sense Essence Lv.1] has increased to [Sense Essence Lv.2]. The depth of sensing has been marginally increased.]

The creature was so engrossed in its observation that it jumped at the sudden sound. Though it was the content of the notification that surprised it even more. It hadn’t expected that [Sense Essence] would be the first Skill to Level up after evolution. ‘Tch. Marginally.’

After all, the true usage of this Skill required [Mana Manipulation]. What the creature was doing currently was akin to using a top-grade magic sword to cut vegetables at a roadside stall. It was an utter waste of the Skill.

‘There is no point in wallowing over things that I have no control over.’ The creature sighed as dismissed the screen and focused on the next one, the [Malfae Shield].

Ting.

[Ability to create a shield that imitates the shape of the Malfae’s wings. Cost: 10 times the Level of the Skill. HP: 20 times the Level of the Skill.]

‘Well, that’s convenient. A magic shield that blocked physical attacks? Finally, something usable!’ The creature smiled and dismissed the notification

Having dealt with the notifications, the creature brought forward the thought that it had decided to deal with later. It was time to deal with its [Species].

-X-

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

-X-