Yikes, that was brutal. Kind of regret doing that, but oh well. Now I know not to kill children, so long they arent asking for it. Good thing I managed to reinforce the area of impact. Still killed a lot of cells in the guts. Gonna have to fix that with some more animal cells, but that wouldnt be too difficult to do.

Vita stood up on unsteady hooves, guts falling out from the cracks in the exoskeleton. Vita picked up some grubs, and the guts were sucked back in with a wet slurp. The cracks were also filling up, quick enough for the naked eye to see the progress.

The new area Vita got to was a bit different from the usual. There were the usual trees that covered the land, but there was also a violent river with large boulders on it. On the side that Vita wasnt on, there was a large mountain wall with some smaller trees growing up its side. Every know and then, salmon could be seen jumping and moving up the river. They do have one thing that makes them a bit different from normal salmon however. They have a rather dragonic looking head, some of them even had a crystal in the space between their eyes.

One of the salmons with a crystal saw Vita when it jumped up and stopped midair. No, rather, the water on and around the salmon was holding it in place. Water surged up towards this single salmon and lifted it higher over the river. The salmon that were caught in the floating water didnt seem to panic. They swam towards the one with the crystal and swarmed around it. The light from the crystal shining through both the fish and water.

The large blob of water startet to change shape into something not quite blob like. The blob grew teeth,scales and horns made out of water. Its water eyes opened and stared down at Vita with malicious purpose and a cold light beaming out. Just as it was about to attack, the odd creature before it ran away without any prior signs of doing so.

The large dragon head stood there confused. It looked toward where Vita had ran to, and fell apart. The salmon with the crystal in its head looked ashamed as the other salmons swam away with visible annoyance. A random salmon even slapped it as it swam past.

God damn! Why is even the fish here able to use magic. It must be the crystals. The ogre had one and the salmon has one. I must get my hand on one of these motherfuckers in the future. Imagine if I could turn into a giant monster of death with the ability to breathe black fire and creature massive weapons of ice! Considering my skill of stealing other things genes, if I managed to get my hands on an magical infant, I could use magic too! Wait a second. The massive mushroom reacted so aggresively when I killed its child, so a magical parent would react with magical rage if I did the same thing again. Oh well, there arent exactly any of those here right now so no need to think about it for the moment.

Vita jogged through the forest, looking around for anything new or interesting to eat. Another horned rabbit, but with a blade instead of a horn on its head and with a more fantastical color scheme. No real need to eat it, but it wouldnt hurt to try. After all, who would care about being hurt when they dont have a real nervous system to feel pain with.

Vita also found more ants, and even a snake! But it was as average as they get. Black on the top, pale on the bottom and a poison only strong enough to kill small animals. The only thing that made the snake worth anything is the ability just about every snake has. Heat-based eyesight and a tongue used to taste/smell the air!

After Vita ate it, the space between the six eyes startled to bubble. One large bubble grew for a bit more before popping. In its place, a singular eye was seen. It, together with the other eyes, gave Vita a rather interesting look. It kind of looked like a hexagon with a point in the senter. If someone was to find the current Vita, they might have thought that they what they were seeing was a demon of some sorts. Vita took some time to get more used to the new vision before moving again.

Further ahead, a roar was heard. Vita slowed down and sneaked into a bush to see what was going on.

A massive bark bear was fighting with a dozen enemies. But these were undead like the rat from before! They even had the same kind of soul fire in their eyes. Even the bark bear looked familiar. It was Half-face! The bark bear still had half its face missing from when they fought the cancerous bone elk.

Now it was fighting a group of skeletons who held rusty spears. Poor thing was always fighting something related to bones. Maybe I should help? Help the skeletons that is! Just look at all that biomass for me to use! If I could use all of that, I could become a massive monster of muscle and power! Hell, it might even have a magic crystal in it!

Bao! Babao!

On one of the trees, a couple of baby bark bears were making noise. Whenever one of the skeletons tried to move towards the tree with the cubs on it, Half-face would immediately bash it down and tear it to shreds. But whenever it did that, the other skeletons would charge into its large rear with their spears.

Seeing the cubs, Vita felt a tinge of guilt for thinking about killing their mother. Maybe if I help with the skeletons, Half-face would maybe give a crystal to Vita?