Now, what to do with these points…

Well, first of all, I really do want more tentacles. Maybe not 8, but enough to like… Walk around. Only one is very useless. I think the best amount in order to do this would be four in total, so… Three more tentacles!

6 -> 3

They sprout one on each side, two pairs parallel to each other, and with a mere thought, I rise up. I can stand! Holy heck! I excitedly take a step, only to instantly fall over as my tentacle slipped. Okay. Okay, this might be a little harder than initially expected. On trembling limbs, I stand up once more. I angle my body so that my eye faces forward. Walk. Walk. Walk. One step, two steps. I turn my eye from the road just ahead of me and onto the road further ahead. Like I’m learning to ride a bike.

The asteroid is pretty big, I can keep walking and walking and there doesn’t seem to be any kind of end to it.

But on the other side of it, I find a few little things.

Nibble?

Ohoh. I see buggies!

And they see me. Turn to each other. Regard the corpse of one of their fellows lying lifeless between them, half-nibbled. And slowly approach me.

I grab one, and instantly realize that if I try to grab another I’d likely lose my balance. There are about six of them in total, five of which have now gone on to ignore their comrade, all in favour of nibbling at my tentacles and abdomen. It doesn’t hurt and I’m just about to ignore it when I suddenly buckle down, losing my grip on the asteroid.

Half of one of my tentacles is gone, entirely nibbled up by three of the insects. Panic sets into my heart as I see them continue nibbling, going up my remaining tentacle and beginning to feast on my real body.

G-, ghrh!

I grab one of them, but my last tentacle is too far away to help.

I’ve got no choice!

I stuff the two insects I’ve got into my mouth, feeling how they are much too big to fit both at once, and I start chewing furiously. I grab for the other two, but their carapaces are too slick to catch and they slip from my grip as I chew and swallow their comrades.

3 -> 13

Damn these slippery tentacles! If I had hands, this would be-,

Grow tentacle? Cost: 1 (you have 13)

No, I don’t want to grow any damn tentacles, I want to have han-,

Wait. Hold on.

A hand is just a bunch of tentacles with bone in them, right-?

...Grow three small tentacles on my tentacle. Do it.

13 -> 10

A small three-fingered hand sprouts from one of my tentacles and I throw it at one of the three remaining insects. With these dandy opposable thumbs, I easily grab hold of it and shove it down my awaiting maw. The other two are occupied with chowing down on my open wound (suspiciously lacking any blood) and I waste no time grabbing them both one by one and shoving them in my mouth.

10 -> 20

-Yer damn right! Ohohoho, I feel rejuvenated, even though I know it’s only psychologically since my body still sports a very large open wound! That should heal at some point, right? I mean, dying by an infection in the middle of space would feel really…

Buy Skill Regeneration? Cost: 10 (you have 20)

...I guess it’d be worth it, huh? It better be! Otherwise, I’m getting a refund or something!

20 -> 10

Just with that, my body starts recovering. Very slowly, mind you, but well enough for me to not have to go into a coma while it happens. No, while my tentacle and almost half of my body recovers, I dump some of my other points into making little three-fingered hands out of my other un-eaten tentacles as well.

10 -> 4

...Hm. I wonder, since it’s recovering my tentacle already, does that mean I can buy a tentacle hand for that one as well?

4 -> 1

Whoa! Guess so, huh?

Standing and walking around on little hand-feets is much easier than doing so on bare tentacles, and I can cross the entire asteroid in a matter of minutes, only ever encountering solitary insects, which might be a good thing. I eat them all.

1 -> 21

Uhuh. Uhuh. My fourth tentacle has grown back. The asteroid is somehow both bigger and smaller than I thought it would be. I can walk around the entirety of it in less than five minutes, and during the entire time, I can encounter not a single living creature. Maybe I ate them all? Maybe they live on another asteroid? Maybe they fled me?

Either way, I’ve got some points to waste, and I know just what to do. See, if I wanted to, I could probably make myself look pretty human. I’d just need to stand up on two tentacles and use the other two for something else, but… In all honesty? This is pretty rad! Sure, being a human was neat, but do you know what I don’t need to worry about out here in space?

My rent. And also doing well on exams. Man, I hope my professor won’t miss that work I was gonna write about the nature of paraphilias and why it can’t have a thing to do with OCD. He seemed pretty excited about it…

Anyhoo!

I figure if I’m going to be an alien, which honestly seems more fun than being human, why not embrace it? I always thought that the idea that humans can’t have eyes on their necks was weird, so in order to fully see everything in a 360 direction, I’m gonna develop three more eyes!

21 -> 9

And in a matter of seconds, I can suddenly see on my right, on my left, and right behind me. Where around three dozen large insects are trying to be sneaky and evade me.

...Huh?