I barely move a muscle as I stand down the behemoth before me. I’m several feet away from it, and while it feels like a great distance I know the lizard could close the gap in a moment. If this body were capable of it, I’m sure I’d have peed myself. I count it as a small blessing that I haven’t.

The reptile stares me down languidly, seemingly content with the buffet before it, confident in my inability to pose even the slightest threat. I only hope at this point it’s so relaxed because it has no intent to fight me, not that it knows I couldn’t win even if it did. Each tooth in the creature’s mouth is as long as my body, and every time its maw opens I catch a glimpse of a gaping hole that could consume three of me whole.

Basic Appraisal

I use the skill almost reflexively, and quickly scan the window it reveals for any scrap of information that could help me.

Yushuan Monitor lvl ??

A medium sized lizard often found in the forests of Yushuan, this lizard uses its claws and long neck to steal eggs from nests hidden within the roots and branches of the Illphstrana trees. Its main weapons are its large claws and powerful legs.

The level is new I think, I don’t remember seeing it before. Maybe it has to do with the skill leveling. Two question marks doesn’t tell me much though.

Without breaking eye contact I slowly take a step back, but the previously lax monitor quickly locks its full attention onto me. I freeze in place in the hopes that its attention will return to the easier meal it has already stolen, and within a few heart-pounding moments that seem to last for hours, it does.

For the first time since I initially locked eyes with the beast, I glance down at the clutch I was born with to see how much of the time they had bought me I have left. One egg left, plus the one it’s swallowing now. I don’t have time to sneak away over the next hour. I put those point into agility, let’s make it count.

I turn away and plant a foot in front of me to bolt. I make it exactly 3 steps.

SNAP!

The lizard closes its jaws around me. I didn’t even see it move. The last thing I see before blackness overcomes me is one last blue screen.

Critical damage taken!

-9 HP

***************

…

…

…

-0.5 HP due to acid

Warning!

HP has fallen below 15%

A few moments later I groggily come to in a small warm cave that reeks of bile and blood. I try to look around, and while I feel liquid squelching through my downy feathers, and a small amount of stale air above me, I can’t see anything. Did ...Did that really just happen? Was I...swallowed...whole? That means this is its stomach? After all that effort, and I don’t even last a day in my second life. Heh, maybe next time I can be something cool. Like a manatee.

-0.5 HP due to acid

Warning!

HP has fallen below 10%

No. Fuck that. I’m gonna get out of here and I’m gonna kick some ass and I’m gonna live dammit. I just gotta hatch a plan, and I gotta do it fast. Status says I’ve got 1 health left, so I’ve got maybe a minute or two. I don’t have enough space to use Peck, but my feet have talons now right?

I drag my clawed feet against the fleshy lining holding me in place, and I feel the meat part as my talons shred the organ containing me into ribbons.

Critical hit!

5 damage dealt to Yushuan Monitor

The walls around me begin to convulse as I continue pedaling my feet in an attempt to turn my prison into mincemeat. The acids that have been destroying my body rush through the holes into the rest of the lizard’s body as dark blood pumps into the reptile’s stomach around me.

Critical Hit!

9 damage dealt to Yushuan Monitor

-0.5 HP due to acid

Warning!

HP has fallen below 5%

I don’t even spare the notifications a glance, dismissing them as soon as they pop up. I focus solely on digging. Unpleasant images of a certain alien pass through my mind, but I ignore that too. I will survive.

The thrashing around me begins to weaken and slow.

I don’t let up.

I feel a jarring thud. Blood stops pouring into the cavity I occupy.

I don’t let up.

A small breath of nearly fresh air passes over me.

I don’t let up.

In retrospect I know I couldn’t have been in there for more than a minute or two, but in the moment I was so consumed by my drive to escape that it could’ve been years or seconds that passed, and I wouldn’t have known the difference.

I collapsed into the remains of my next, slick with gore and covered by the cooling corpse of the lizard that had nearly led me into the grave without a second thought. I had received notifications, I knew, but I don’t have the energy to check them. Without the energy to even think, my eyes close and I surrender to the sleep that is so desperately trying to claim them, bringing a violent end to my first day.

Spoiler: Spoiler

Status Menu

Name: Grover

Age: 1 day

Race: Rooster (Juvenile)

Level: ?

XP: ?

XP to next level: ?

Profession: N/A

Seals: 1

HP: ?/?

SP ?/?

Mana: [Locked]

HP Regen: ?/day

SP Regen: ?/hour

Mana Regen: [Locked]

Strength - ?

Agility - ?

Constitution - ?

Wisdom - 8

Intelligence - 10

Charisma - ?

Luck - 2

Stat Points - ?

Skills:

Instincts (Chicken)

Chirp

Peck

Basic Appraisal (Lvl:2/10)

Sneak (Lvl: 2/10)

?

Titles:

Reincarnated

Spiritual Bulwark

?