I gasp. Fresh, crisp air fills my lungs as I immediately struggle to sit up. But… there’s nothing around me. At least, I don’t think so. My vision had suddenly gotten very blurry… did something go wrong? I rub my eyes in an attempt to clear them, which didn’t help but *did* serve to remind me that I had two small pieces of plastic on my eyes that I had completely forgotten about. I quickly pull them out of my eyes, hygiene be damned, and… oh. OH. It fixed my eyes. I... I've spent my whole life dealing with shitty vision, and suddenly... I'm whole. Despite everything, I'm smiling.

My head is killing me, throbbing like mad. I’d never been knocked out before, so I don’t know if this is how people always feel or not, but 0/10, do not recommend.

A notification attempts to mollify my suffering:

[Congratulations! Genetic/Anatomic restructuring successful! +10 to all stats!].

G-....genetic? It rewrote my DNA!? WHAT. COME ON MAN THAT WAS ME! FUCK.

Well I guess I don’t exist anymore. Or the me that was me doesn’t...fuck it. I guess I get to be born twice. How exciting. I mean, If the genes you’re born with stick with you for the rest of your life, that pretty much means they’re you, right? As much as your arms or legs or organs. But if my genetic code got changed then… All of my cells must have been changed… so there probably isn’t any of the original ‘me’ left. Well it’s official, the game straight up killed me and copied my memories over to a substantially better human. I should have known.

Griping aside, it’s definitely a little weird to move in this new body. The notification mentioned something about stats, but I haven’t really looked into that.

Good news: my hand is healed. Even in energy vision, I can see nothing wrong, which is great because the new colors were freaking me out and I didn’t know how to deal with them.

Bad...strange news? My thoughts are faster. Noticeably. Which is good, because my body is also faster. Even when I was startled awake, I was taking breaths way too forcefully without even trying. I thought it was the adrenaline response, but no, that’s just how I breathe now. Like a fucking forge bellows.

Usually, you gain strength and mental acuity too slowly to really notice the difference. You can count the pounds you lift, or assume mental growth by how long studying and problem solving takes you, but you never try pushing yourself to your feet and accidentally way overshoot and land on your face.

Not that I speak from experience, or anything.

But it turns out, when a weird alien game REWRITES YOUR BODY you can experience growth rapid enough to cause a hypothetical ‘falling on face’ incident. In which case, it would be totally understandable!

Regardless, I can now continue. Judging by the sun… it seems like midday. I was out for a bit, apparently. Unfortunate, but very necessary considering my newly fixed hand. The less fortunate side is… that was a one time thing. The notification is gone, so if my tendons get torn again… or if I lose a limb…

Ahem.

Then I will have to fix that using just my Energy healing, which I have so little grasp on that it’s almost comical.

Perfect.

Maybe when I have some actual safe, free time to experiment. I’m actually a little surprised I didn’t get eaten by some homicidal rock while I was out. This part of the mountain seems relatively devoid of life, mostly just loose stone and dirt. Without any small life forms running around, I guess it makes sense that nothing lives here.

There’s nothing to eat, which could be a problem.

I’m starting to rethink my choice of being a mountain hermit, but I don’t want to be stuck running around in the dark anywhere close to that monster camp. Hopefully I can find a cave or rocky outcropping to shelter under.

I’d better, or there isn’t going to be much sleeping tonight. As I’ve climbed higher, the wind has picked up substantially. It isn’t particularly cold yet, but it’s definitely going to be after the sun sets. Fortunately, it... still looks like midday. Maybe the days are really long? There's some weird structure in the sky that looks like it might be moving toward the star... which would almost certainly block the light.

I quickly upgrade 'finding shelter' to top priority. Taking the time to actually search my surroundings, I notice that the mountain loses most of its loose rock only about a 5 minute hike upward, meaning that the worst wind and weather is up there. On my left, facing the mountain, there’s about a quarter mile till what appears to be a drop off. I can’t say how steep without going to look, but my curiosity won’t keep me warm tonight, so I’m nixing that idea. To my right, there looks like there are some reasonable sized pits in the side of the mountain… worst case they’ll shelter me from most of the wind.

I make my way over to the right and use what I can of the overhead light to search for the best interim housing. After looking into a few of the pits, it becomes clear to me that there is some kind of cave system that… could possible connect them together. Which: yay cave! But also, not-yay: lots of possible threatening cave monsters. Some quick searching and running around reveals the ideal candidate, which doesn’t continue very far past the cave entrance and only has a few small holes along the ceiling that are too small for anything larger than a small dog or bird to get through.

It’s not safe, but it’s free real estate.

As I enter the cave, I immediately notice a strange smell of… wet. It’s uncomfortable, but not a deal breaker. The part that worries me is that the cave doesn’t appear to be wet. Maybe the holes in the back lead to a mountain cave lake? Maybe I can take a peak before I hole up here…

I walk over to the back of the cave, my newly perceptive eyes taking in everything in the dim light, and cautiously haul myself up to look into the hole. It’s about six feet off the ground, so it isn’t much trouble if I stand on my toes. I am rewarded for my troubles with a hiss and bright red eyes launching towards me. I narrowly avoid the angry missile, but there’s no way for me to recover my balance after dodging and I fall to the floor with whatever launched itself at me.

My vision whirls as I launch to my feet (still not used to that) but when my eyes focus, I find the nature of my assailant.

It’s a giant rat.

Ok, 'giant' may be an overstatement but it’s more than a foot long and about half a foot high and it looks very unhappy to see me. It lunges at me, all teeth and claws, but with just the one threat I don’t have much trouble sidestepping it.

I have a spark of inspiration, that maybe I can steal Power from one of these things while alive. The conversion seems to happen automatically when monsters die, and it doesn’t give me the time to use the heightened conversion rate with Imbue Energy I learned in the tutorial. Maybe the monsters have the same property as the gold rock? I wait until it goes to lunge again, gathering energy in both of my hands, and strike. It speeds toward me as I simultaneously sidestep and crouch, hands out, and grab two legs. My ungainly movement is made worse by the sudden momentum change as I grab the rat-missile, but I’m focussed only on testing my theory, so I ignore the muscle pain and push my energy through with everything I have. There is a momentary resistance, as if slamming against a wall. I push harder, as hard as I can, while the thing claws and bites at me. Whatever, I can heal that later. I feel the pressure start to release a little, then all at once as my energy rushes through.

Elated with success, I start to open my eyes to see what notifications popped up, but something catches my attention. Something is flowing against my Energy and back into me. They look like Energy threads, much like mine, but their color…

Black. Not the ‘Energy emptiness’ black, but the terrifying black of the hostile unknown. My Energy is mostly ignoring the tendrils, but when they touch, my Energy noticeably weakens. As the threads progress further into my hands, I notice a dull pain followed by a creeping numbness. It’s…

It’s attacking me back!

I stop everything I was doing Energy wise and snap back to the reality of this thing desperately biting and clawing me, but much less effectively than before. I roll with it and try to throw it away from me, but it manages to catch me with its teeth and gouges deep lines along my arm as it flies away. My hands aren’t working right anymore, it hurts, there’s a wrongness with my body that goes beyond a physical level. The dull ache stops progressing, but is replaced with the searing pain of the many wounds on my arm. Needs healing, quick, but this thing isn’t going to stop and let me do that. It dies first.

I roll to my feet, planting my hands on the ground, which give almost immediately and land me back on the ground face first. I hear the rat scrambling, I can’t let it get at me while I’m on the ground. I roll onto my back and use only my legs to get me back to a kneeling position. As I finish, however, the monster lunges again, aiming for my throat. I fall back as fast as I can and try to kick out with my leg. I feel something connect, loud hissing, and a thud. I flail back to my feet to find the monster scrambling only a foot to my left.

I waste no time taking advantage of its broken stance and bring my foot down hard on its chest. Crunch. Still moving. Crunch. I feel like I’m going to throw up. I slam down a final time. Splortch. Before vomiting all over my leg and the corpse.

[+1 Will] [Congratulations! Giant Rat defeated! Gained 10 Power. (180)]

Great.