The fruit was not sweet, instead it tasted meaty. Chewing it, he realized that it felt like a steak. Getting a grip on its strange texture, he tried focusing on the flavor. It was not sweet at all, and instead tasted more like bacon. Trying to figure out what it did, he tried using his skills. Going through them each, one after another. After a small demonstration of his skills, he realized that he didn’t notice any changes. Turning to Luke, he asked him about his reward.

“What did you get? I can’t really tell what mine did.”

Luke jumped at the question and looked horrified. Growing worried, Mash put his hand on Luke’s shoulder, in what he hoped was a reassuring gesture. It seemed to work, and Luke replied to Mash’s question.

“It was the soul of something, and eating the fruit strengthened my own soul. I didn’t know… I just felt like I needed to eat it. What should I do?”

“Don’t worry about it. It was just a fruit.”

Shrugging his shoulders Mash gave him a quick response. He honestly didn’t get why Luke cared so much. All he had done was eat a fruit, even if it did contain another creature’s soul. Mash had similarly felt drawn to the fruit he ate, and he couldn’t even begin to understand what it was. Not being able to check his status meant that he couldn’t understand what the fruit had done. There was only one way to find out and that was to advance his class. He was locked out of viewing his status until then. Not needing any further encouragement, he sat down to begin.

Focusing inwards, as if to view his status, he was swallowed by darkness. In a moment, Mash was floating within his mind. Three pillars of light shone before him. The closest of which was a complex blue, that seemed to thrum with otherworldly power. It felt beyond him, and he needed to pass through a barrier to reach it. The space before him kept stretching, the barrier was for his will not his body. Pushing through, he felt the information enter his mind.

Wood Forged Dragonling: Having tasted the flesh of a dragon, your body has stolen its power. Even as a fledgling you join the realms of legends.

“I ate what!”

Yelling as hard as he could, he looked around slightly panicked. It was nonsensical, but he feared that a dragon might appear to exact vengeance. Obviously, nothing happened, no dragon randomly appeared. Wanting to move past his childish fear, he focused on the other implications of the class.

From his limited knowledge on dragons, he could roughly guess what the class might do. Dragons were elemental in nature, and he had never heard of a wooden one, so he believed that it would offer him another elemental magic. A fire and wood combination had a few creative applications, and he could easily imagine the usefulness. Also, this class didn’t seem subservient like the observer class did, back from when he got his first selection. Although, he wouldn’t rush his selection and moved to the next one.

The pillar was a bright green, and Mash realized that the colors matched with his streaks. That was sort of true for the last pillar too. It was black and matched with the tattoos around his neck. He reached towards the green one and found it nothing blocking him this time. It smelled strongly of flowers, and he reached towards the scent.

Living Wood Sorcerer: Wood is your power, something you made for yourself. Magic is the source of power, and wood is its conduit.

Well, that was not very helpful. It sounded like his current class; he didn’t understand what skills it could offer him. Also, it had the generic sorcerer class, which wasn’t as special or powerful as a Dragonling. He needed some direction and thought of the obvious skills the class would have. Thinking about it, only one thing came to mind, a manipulation skill would likely be given. He wanted the skill but didn’t want to limit his vision. He didn’t want to regret his decision.

He moved on, reaching for the final pillar. It was black as night, and he felt strange as he approached it. Hunger filled him, and he began craving the pillar as it looked like a promising meal. It was taking effort to resist it’s pull, and he tried to push himself away. Even as the pillar was dragging him in, he was flooded with the information of the class.

Scale Wood Devourer: You have eaten something forbidden, something humans should never have been able to consume. Inhuman as you are, you let the wood morph your body and use it to devour your enemies.

Panicking, Mash tried to push himself away. it didn’t change anything, and he continued to be drawn towards the power. He had never heard of a situation like this and could only think of one possibility. The cursed snake gave him this opportunity. The first was the dungeon reward, the second his own ability, the last felt like the snake. The darkness of the pillar corroborating his idea, but he couldn’t understand why. What did the snake gain? Was this a curse or a blessing?

He couldn’t know the answer, and his resistance was slowly failing. The experience was frightening, but he tried to understand his situation. He was trying to grasp what the class would do to him. Only able to understand a little bit, he tried guessing some of the skills.

It sounded like there would be a consume skill, which would probably function to execute a target. The other skills he thought of caused him to shiver. Images of monsters kept popping into his head, he kept thinking about how the class would make him into a monster. There was no doubt that it would make him inhuman. Shivering, he felt like he could hear the snake’s laughter.

His pitiful resistance broke, and he floated towards the class. Accepting his fate, relief settled on him. As he thought on it, he realized he was already a monster. This wouldn’t change anything, only peel away a mask. He remembered his brother’s words and felt more confident as he reached for the class.

A class defined what you were, not what you will become.

______________________________________________________________________________

Red P.O.V

Red watched as Mash advanced his class. She enjoyed watching Jill get her class, it was a beautiful sight. Looking around, she noticed that the others were watching him with just as much enthusiasm. Although, there was one thing that concerned her. The fruit had been suspicious, and from what Luke said, they both were coerced into eating the fruits. Whereas her reward was good, and a lot less concerning. It simply let her change the temperature of the blood she produced. It was useful ability with a lot of versatility.

Her attention was drawn to Mash, as darkness flowed into him. Rather than covering him, it just seemed to pass into him. There was no source, it just formed in the air and was drawn slowly towards him. Like a million bugs they swarmed towards Mash as if he were a fire. She felt drawn to him too and started running when she saw the blood.

It only took a second, but she and Luke were beside him. Patches of skin were tearing, his mana scars opening into rivers of blood. She tried to heal him, but nothing was working. Whatever was happening, it was not harmful. Looking towards Luke, she saw him nodding in confirmation. That made sense, this was his class upgrade and should be beneficial. Class upgrades were never harmful, though they could make someone go crazy. Stopping that line of thinking, she moved to check Mash’s condition.

She removed the blood that was stuck to his body and yelped as he opened his eyes. With the blood gone and his eyes open, she could only see him as a monster. From the edge of his right eye, she saw black scales leading beneath his hair. Although, it was the eye itself that frightened her. The whites of his eye had become black, and his pupil was now like a snake but was pure white. His other eye was still the same as before, and the difference made him seem even more monstrous. His voice was the only thing that stopped her from attacking him.

“What’s wrong?”

Mash sounded just as frightened as she was, and she couldn’t find the words to respond. She looked to the others but noticed that Jill had reacted similarly. Luke spoke confidently though, seeming unfazed by Mash’s transformation.

“You’re definitely not human anymore.”

Luke handed Mash a small mirror as he said the words. Absorbed with changes to his appearance, Red looked over Mash more carefully. All the mana scars on his body had become pitch black, and he had small patches of black scales across his body. They radiated a similar feeling to the snake from earlier and she grew more cautious. The snake clearly singled him out, but she didn’t know why. She hadn’t been suspicious of him when they first entered the dungeon but wasn’t sure anymore. Feeding her skepticism, she questioned to Mash.

“What class did you get?”

______________________________________________________________________________

Mash P.O.V

Mash could hear the accusation in her voice, and he knew why. Looking at himself with the mirror, it was clear that he resembled the snake from earlier. Easily able to come up with a hundred quetions he wanted the answer for too, he couldn't say anything. He didn’t have the answers , and he took the opportunity to finally check his class and use his free stats.

Name: Mash Class: Scale Wood Devourer

Level: 30

Health: 700 / 700

Energy: 1550 /1550

Fortitude: 55 → 70

Endurance: 60 → 65

Strength: 50 → 60

Agility: 55 → 60

Intelligence: 80 → 90

Wisdom: 60 → 60

Charisma: 27 → 30

Free Stats: 0

Skills: Persist, Mana-wood Creation, Artificial Meditation → Inhuman Hibernation, Mana Sphere → Mana Territory, Monks False Core → Unnatural Energy, Inhumanity, Wooden Body, Carnivorous Tree

Persist: Go beyond your limits. Continue current action even after depleting energy. Stats improve while at 0 stamina.

Current Bonus: +100% stats

Inhuman Hibernation: You have stolen the techniques of mages and monks to form an artificial technique, your inhuman body morphing it to fit your corrupted nature. Hibernating will increase the rate at which your body recovers, healing most wounds.

Current Rate: +200% recovery

Mana-wood Creation: You know how deadly sticks can be. Forge your mana into wooden creations.

Wooden Body: You can connect with the wood that you are touching. By expending your energy, you bring your creations to life as another one of your limbs.

Mana Territory (Passive): Your eyes just weren’t enough. Sense the changes in the mana around you. Connect to the mana in your space and inherently understand the nature of the mana.

Current Range: 9 → 10 feet

Unnatural Energy (Passive): An unnatural mana core has fundamentally altered your body. Stamina and Mana combine to become energy. Your inhuman body is better able to handle the changes to your core.

Current Bonus: +25% efficiency

Inhumanity (Passive): Giving up your humanity has improved your body, improving your physical control, natural defenses, and animalistic intuition.

Carnivorous Tree (Passive): Devour your enemy in battle to temporarily raise your stats. The fresher the victim the stronger the bonus. Removes the negative effects of things you consume.

Mash was startled by the stat improvement. The class upgrade itself had improved all of his stats, but by a smaller degree than he expected. He ended up using his free stats to bring up the skills that were slightly behind. With them he managed to raise his stats to what he wanted. Though the stats mattered little, when compared to his skills.

Looking through his skills, he instantly realized the effects of inhumanity. The animalistic intuition was letting him understand how to utilize the skills. Now he understood how unintelligent monsters were able to use their skills effectively. He guessed that any monster would have a skill with a similar effect. The physical control was noticeable too, he felt as though he could move every part of his body. This would be incredible with his other skills.

Assuming wooden body worked like he thought, he should be able to create things like wings or tails. He thought that the two skills in conjunction would give him the ability to fly. He intuitively knew that he could make mouths out of his wood and use it to activate his carnivorous tree skill. All the skills he received worked well together, and the changes to his other skills were impressive. They were all better, and the bonus to his recovery and efficiency was incredible. There was only one problem that he noticed. He was starving, desperate to satisfy his new hunger.