Hunter had a good hiding spot, but it might not have been the best one. So they moved. They were very careful and slow and used all of their organs for sensing. The world was large and new, and in many moments the young monster would feel or smell or vibration sense a new thing that they had not known before. There was a Mushroom that was a monster, and hunted by pushing a sharp dart with venom on it through the air, very fast. It killed a cricket. Hunter was curious how the mushroom would eat the biomass, since so far as they could tell mushrooms could not move. But instinct said it was a bad, dangerous mushroom, and Hunter agreed and left as quickly as staying careful allowed.

There was another monster who was much too strong to be prey. It was like the monitors except it was larger, with a thick long body, strong short legs and large, tough scales. Its head was large and wide. A bite with the mouth in that head could probably crush anything except the big monster by the water who stank and had brown fur with green in it. Fortunately, this one did not seem to be fast or good at sensing. Hunter thought it was probably bad at thinking too, though wasn't sure why that felt right.

There were smaller things that were new. Hunter found different types of grass that tasted different ways in the air, many new kinds of mushroom that did not decide to be monsters, and a place where water moved through a narrow channel that fed into the big water. There were also things that were not new. Many of those were monsters, but those were either too strong to be prey or too many to be prey when one did not have kin to help, so Hunter hid and used Stealth. Hunter grew very good at that, and even reached Stealth level 5.

If they had a skill point, it could make Stealth become Advanced Stealth, which seemed excellent. They did not have a skill point, which was bad. The skills they had bought, Survival Instinct, Stealth, and Dodge, were all quite useful. That was good. Hunter was fairly sure that without Survival Instinct and Stealth they would have become biomass by now.

There was a problem with the very careful way of hunting. It was hard to find prey that was alone and weak enough to kill, which meant that one grew hungry. Hungry was an uncomfortable that was almost pain. But the Noble had commanded Hunter to not die and only hunt prey that could be killed in a safe way. Vexing. If good prey could not be found soon, they would need to go back to the mound that was Home and find a group of kin to hunt with that did not include the strong one. It would be better to think of a way to hunt alone though. Kin became biomass at an alarming rate, and Hunter was concerned that soon they would run out of kin to hunt with. That would be fine if one could hunt alone, but bad if one could not.

Hunter was so busy thinking these things that they nearly walked into trouble. Fortunately, their Survival Instinct skill and their good senses saved them. Trouble was a dark hole along a path to big water. The hole had a mass of thin white strands coming out of it. It felt dangerous. Hunter did not know why.

[Survival Instinct has reached level 4]

That was good and not so good. Good, because higher skill was valuable. Bad, because that skill grew when Hunter came very close to becoming biomass. It was just a hole though, with strange stuff that came out of it. Why was it dangerous? Hunter was quite curious and wanted to learn the answer. It was probably a monster, but there were monsters of many kinds that killed in many ways. They wanted to know why this one was dangerous.

There was a large mushroom with a broad cap that draped over the dangerous hole. The top of the cap was even a color similar to Hunter's exoskeleton, which would make it easier to hide on it. Some monsters seemed to have very good eyes, so such issues were important to keep in mind. They slowly and carefully climbed the stalk, underneath the mushroom cap and up on to the top.

[Grip has reached level 3]

Once they were settled into a safe spot to hide on top of the mushroom, they waited. And waited. And waited. When one hid and did not move, it turned out that hunger did not grow worse very quickly. Eventually a thing happened. There was an emerald monitor going down the trail in what was a fast walk or a slow run. When it reached the strings of white stuff that came out of the hole, its legs got stuck and tangled. Then the monster that hid in the hole burst out from it and bit the monitor. That one had eight legs, which was better than most monsters though not enough, a body with two parts that was covered in exoskeleton, and two very large teeth that also could sting. A bite with venom in it was an excellent idea. Hunter knew envy. The exoskeleton had a few hairs growing on it, and that was rather odd.

Quite soon the monitor became biomass and the eight legged monster began to eat it. Meanwhile, Hunter had stayed very still, hid, and studied that one intently. It was hard to tell if it was safe prey or not. They decided that it was safe prey if fought correctly. It had its stingers in its mouth, which mean that if it could not bite it could not hurt. Hunter was behind and above the prey, on top of a big mushroom. As fast as they could move, they jumped on top of the prey, gripped it with claws and all thirty of their legs, and stung. Prey ran around wildly, but could not do anything to one who was on top of it. Hunter stung again. Prey became biomass.

[You have defeated level 3 Atrax Robustus]

[You have gained XP]

[You have achieved level 4, one skill point awarded]

[You have consumed a new source of Biomass: Atrax Robustus. You are awarded one Biomass.]

[Basic Profile of Atrax Robustus unlocked]

[Atrax Robustus, Funnel Web Ambusher. This evolution of the Funnel Web Spider is an ambush hunter that weaves a flat web on uneven ground. It has a powerful, venomous bite.]

[You have gained one Biomass]

[You have gained one Biomass]

[You have gained one Biomass]

It was a very good hunt. Hunter ate the spider. Hunter ate the monitor. Hunter hid in the hole to digest and think. The prey that was ambusher did a thing very, very well. It was a good thing. It made a trap for prey, then bit prey with stinger teeth and ate biomass. This worked well enough that the spider had even evolved. But it did not seem able to do different things. It put its stingers in its mouth, which gave it a very good bite, but meant that it could not defend if a hunter got to its back side. It hid in a tunnel to make that hard to do. Maybe it should have made a tunnel where there was not a big mushroom to drop down on top of it.

When eating, Hunter found something interesting. It was the core of the Funnel Web Ambusher. Monster cores were a thing they knew of when they spawned. It was valuable, but they could not use it now unless they wanted to make a small spider. They did not. Because the core was valuable, and could not be used now, Hunter had to hide it. The spider's ambush hole seemed like a good place.

The white stuff, now that the centipede had opportunity to examine it thoroughly, was of two types that had different smells. One type was sticking and bad to touch with legs. The other type was fine to walk on, and was what the spider used to run out very fast to bite sting the monitor. Hunter was careful as they climbed into the hole. Monsters like their legs to work, so it did not seem like one would go inside the hole unless they were very cunning and could find the good white strands and avoid the bad, sticky ones. Inside, all of the white stuff was of the type that did not stick. That type was very good for sensing vibrations. With good Tomosvary organs, which they had, it may be possible to imitate the spider and use the trap it built. That seemed like a safe way to hunt. They used their claws to dig a safe place to hide the core, then buried it. It would be important to remember this place.

The spider's hole was also a good place to hide while they upgraded a skill and used their biomass. The skill was easy. Stealth should become Advanced Stealth.

Spend Skill Points.

Upgrade Stealth to Advanced Stealth.

[Would you like to purchase Advanced Stealth? This will cost 1 SP]

Yes.

Hunter again felt knowledge and skill, which was like knowledge but included how the knowledge should be used, fill their mind. It felt good, but not as good as upgrading body parts. Which it was now time to do.

There was 5 biomass to spend. Two ways to spend it seemed best, and both would leave one biomass left. One was to grow stinger from +3 to +4. It would be good to upgrade that to +5. That was important. The other way was to upgrade antennae and legs to +2. It was also possible to upgrade one body part from +2 to +3 and another from +1 to +2. However, their plan was to upgrade their Stinger to +5, because it was the best body part and because it would be good to know what happened when an organ got to +5, and to upgrade all of their other body parts to +2, because of the rest it was not clear that any was better than the others. It was much cheaper to upgrade parts to +2 than to +3. Two upgrades was twice as many as one. So far, Hunter had always chosen more upgrades rather than fewer. But this time, after hard thought, they decided that being better able to kill was most important. If they were to hunt alone, they had to become very good at killing.

Spend Biomass.

Upgrade Stinger to +4.

[Would you like to upgrade your stinger to +4? This will cost 4 Biomass]

Yes.

An upgrade of only one body part did not feel as good as upgrades of many.

It was still incredible.