Dirty Rat

Feeling hungry this soon after eating was strange and somewhat worrying (parasites are a thing; they just so happen to be the worst thing since sliced disease), but I rationalized it as my points not drawing purely from the ether or where ever the system’s power comes from.

I tore into my fallen foes corpse, devouring as much as I could In great mouthfuls. Even eating until I was bloated and well past full, I could barely eat a third of my prey; which was still rather impressive considering it was more than my total body weight in meat.

I held my bloated stomach in two paws as I stared at the remains of my meal. Even missing a third of its mass I could easily tell this wasn't just a bigger version of myself: its fur was rougher and shaggy-er, its claws were longer even considering its size but also duller and visibly serrated, its teeth were actually smaller than mine and closer to the teeth of a shark, and its yellow eyes were beady and sunken.

Skill Gained: Observe

Well, that's a rather self explanatory skill that anyone who knows anything about gamer type stories would know what it does. I decided to immediately test it on my fallen foe.

Observed: Giant Ferocious Rat

Well, obviously that needs to be ground like crazy to get worthwhile data; but still, even just knowing what is apparently this creature’s race tells me quite a bit. Obviously “Giant” and “Ferocious” are modifiers on “Rat” similarly to “Plague”; but does that mean this is a completely separate species of rat, a higher evolution, both?

This creature could either be a rat that evolved into a giant rat then a giant ferocious rat, a rat that evolved to be ferocious then giant, a giant rat that evolved to be ferocious, a ferocious rat that evolved to be giant, or it could be its own base level evolution. However, the title “Giant Slayer” specifically told me that this was at least two evolutions above me, meaning it must have evolved twice or been born on a higher level with a base of just “Rat”.

Was “Plague” as a prefix on my race evidence I was actually not at the lowest evolutionary rung of the rat tree? Possibly, it's also possible it's just random chance or a result of being infected somehow changing what this system considered my race. Frankly, my current level is far less important than the knowledge that apparently at least the next two evolutions (possibly only one if I am at a second stage) are simple modifiers upon the base of rat.

Now that doesn't necessarily disprove the idea of becoming a higher tier of creature later on, I only have one piece of slightly inconsistent data to work with. I'd need far more information to form an effective hypothesis and the best way to get that is to just evolve. However, if my next evolutions are modifiers, how are they decided? Will I get to choose or will my actions choose for me? If it's the later, I'll have to tailor my actions for how I want to evolve; though, not knowing what my possibilities are, I can't really know what would be the optimal choices.

Annoying.

Still, needs must and all that. The only way to figure out how evolution works is to ask someone that's done it (not exactly possible) or to just evolve.

I had more pressing concerns, though very much related. I attempted to drag the huge carcass of my former prey and future bait to an optimal location for an ambush, but found even enhanced as I had been I simply couldn't move it more than a few millimeters per minute; not even close to acceptable.

Deciding quickly I started tearing into their corpse, rendering it down to smaller and more easily transported chunks. It was bloody work and I ended up leveling Scent Scrubber thrice based shearly on how many times I obsessively attempted to clean myself; this is truly a terrible place for someone who hates getting dirty, though it's not like I'm unused to being deeply unhappy by now.

I scattered the rat chum all around my work place, attempting to make it look like it wasn't done deliberately in case something with the intelligence to spot a trap came by, but also set it in an optimal configuration for an ambush. Not the easiest task, though it was quite the work out for my brain.

Intelligence +1

I stared at my handy work with an artist's eye, appraising the work to see if it looked natural but not unnaturally natural. Just to be sure I used observe on a chunk to see if my own skill could give away the trap.

Observed: Rat Meat Chunk

Observe +1

I raised a proverbial eyebrow, casting observe again on the same piece of meat to see what a level had gained me.

Observed: Rat Meat Chunk: A chunk of rat meat.

Truly a grand expansion to my knowledge, an absolutely unguessable piece of information only possible to acquire from this sterling skill; my life has been enriched and I have been elucidated beyond my wildest dreams, I have truly expanded my horizons of knowledge.

At least it didn't give away my trap; though, whether that's actually a good thing or not is debatable. With a sigh and a shake of my head I moved to test a plan thought up earlier; poisoning the meat.

Blighted told me I could infuse my attacks with the essence of the Blight. Closing my eyes, I drew upon the concept of the disease that should be a fundamental part of my every cell.

I felt something; a screamingly silent, violently placid, overwhelming feeling of grey. Focusing the feeling into the short claws on my right hand I swung forward, sinking them as deep as I could into a random chunk of meat.

When I opened my eyes I was met with a startlingly grey chunk of meat, as if all colour had been drained from it. “Well, nothing that can see colour is going to be fooled by that.”

Great.