I passed the last six days amassing mana in my crystal, they are full now.

During this time I manage to claim a bit more of land, but I can’t do it more, the mana price for one cubic meter is higher than I can generate in two days, even the water that flew out of me and is already attuned to my mana cost an absurd amount of mana to claim. That fact achieved to convince me I had to do evolve myself in some way.

I also claimed a bit more of the bees and the ants, but for the other creatures, I’ll wait for after my evolution to claim them. Like for birds called ‘seagull’ that installed themselves in the seaside cavity. They are eating fishes and crabs they catch by diving in the water, not mine, different fishes, and crabs.

My insides are saturated with so much mana that most of the bugs are starting to evolve on their own. Some are strange and I couldn’t have thought about them myself, like this special beetle that spit out acid to its preys, most beetles are herbivorous but this one like to eat other bugs, this is an interesting evolution I think I will keep an eye on it, see if I will help it spreads his peculiarity.

Anyway, I’m getting off track. My mana reserves are so full they’re leaking out mana, my colorful crabs are standing in formation in front of me. I can start.

I slowly start to focus the mana at my disposition on my core, it’s hard. My core is starting to purify the mana and emitting it faster, I must pour and condense mana faster than my core is purifying it. I slowly increase the amount of mana I’m concentrating on my core, using first the crystals’ stored mana. That way, if I lost the control like for the flea-fly hybrid, the risk of being mana dry is much reduced.

Two crystals later I start to feel a bit dizzy. Something’s happening to me, I can feel it. I focus my mind and keep pouring mana into my core as I’m forcing it to stay there. The dizziness is growing stronger with every bit of mana, but I don’t falter and keep on my work. I can’t stop now, it would be a waste of mana.

I start to feel pain, it’s taking place of the dizziness I felt before. I’m starting to doubt my decision, none of my creatures seemed to feel pain in the evolution process. But I don’t have the time to pounder going back on my decision, the light is finally there.

I start to glow, like my creatures when evolving. But with that glow comes a sharping pain in my core and my mana slips out of my control. Fortunately, the process is not stopping, my core is absorbing ambient mana and sucking it out of my mana pool to sustain my evolution.

I see bugs falling. Shit! My core is absorbing mana form my creatures too, it’s going to kill them to satiate is thirst. The pain is still there and growing sharper every second, but I focus my mind on one goal, draining the mana from the water crystal before my creatures. I’m not trying to stop it from draining mana, just leading it to another source of it. Maybe I should have moved the crystals near me before doing that, it would have been easier to make it a target for my mana-thirsty core.

I keep my mind on the task. I must ignore the pain. If my creatures die it will take me an absurd amount of time to replace them. I must protect them as long as possible, as long as my life is not in danger. With sheer willpower, I manage to force my core in absorbing the mana from the water crystal in priority.

The light coming from my core is glowing more and more, I would be blinded if I still had my previous life’s eyes.

I feel that the water crystal mana reserve is almost empty. Unfortunately, my core is still thirsty. Just before it absorbs the last bit of mana from the water crystal I sever the connection, I don’t want to break the runes in the crystal, that would make it lose its abilities.

This time I must force my core to firstly use the mana in my mana pool and not yet the mana in my creatures. Fortunately, I have a feeling it will be over soon, but I don’t know if I’ll unwillingly kill more of my creatures in the process.

My mana pool is almost empty, just a few more seconds.

It’s done, I’m completely mana depleted, I see bats and bugs starting to fall and…

I’m waking up in my camp bed. I’m in pain. I look around me and see Julia, she’s sleeping on a chair, her head resting on her crossed arms. Did she nurse me?

I move my hand to touch her hair and the movement wake her. She’s raising her head and looking half-asleep at my face. Then the realization I’m awake stroke her and she throws herself on my side.

“... That… hurts…”

She immediately lets go of me and bow her head. It’s been three years I’ve acquired her from her previous owner now, she’s mute but I’ve learned that when she’s nodding her head this way it’s because she’s sorry and asks for forgiveness, and a pat on her head.

I oblige and pat her head, she’s a good girl and has served me faithfully in all her tasks.

“How long did I sleep?”

“3 days.” She responds using the hands’ signs I taught her. They are signs used by our military to communicate silently or for distances where words are useless.

“I was in such a bad state?”

She nods.

“And you nursed me all this time?”

Another nod, I can see some tears in her eyes.

“Thanks. Now go fetch us something to eat and drink. I’m starving and I suppose you didn’t take the time to look after yourself.”

She snorts and rubs her eyes then she storms out of the tent.

This new war is starting badly for me. I was supposed to have a peaceful retirement after the last one. I did manage to secure some very important documents that allowed us to reach victory. Well, I found some good documents, the best ones were handed to me by Julia. But I was called back to arms in this war, I’m starting to grow tired of war.

Wars can be good for gathering mana from your enemies, but you don’t really have the time to focus on evolving yourself. I don’t have the time to plan an evolution, I can’t allow myself to skip several days of commands in a raw.

“Sir. A man is here.” I open my eyes and look at Julia. Since her evolution, she regains the use of words. Her ears even grow back on her second evolution, maybe she’ll be able to grow her tail back with her third.

“I know. Send him away, I’ve just finished my evolution, I need rest.”

“He’s not alone. He’s wearing the uniform.”

“They want me to go to war again. I don’t want.”

“He has a letter, there is the royal seal on it.” She hands me the letter in question, it’s indeed the royal seal, I can recognize the shape of it, the unique wax and even the mana used to seal it, it was made by the king himself.

I can’t ignore a letter sent directly by the king, regardless of how much I despise him. I open it and read it.

‘Hello old man.

I’m certain you already know we are at war. And I know you won’t take part in it. You’re a coward and a fool.

But the bastards from Kueop have kidnap my sister Maria.

I’m asking you to save her life as I can’t send my own men to do it. I know you have the ability to do so, you’re a Fourth. You also have the responsibility to save her.

Don’t run away from this responsibility.

In the hope of never seeing you again.

Your king.’

The little shit. He hates me and wants me dead. But he can’t directly act against me, I’m too powerful. He can’t hurt Maria, she’s my niece and his half-sister. I would bet he manages to put her in a dangerous position to force me to act. He must hope that I will die dealing a blow to his enemies, it would be two birds one stone for him.

“Julia, prepare our bags. We’re going to travel a bit.”

“Yes sir.”

Dead. She’s dead.

I’m holding Maria’s body in my arms. I found her yesterday in a Kueop’s fortress. Sha had been raped and tortured countless times by the men, they even used their beasts on her after some time, healing her several time to make sure she would not die. Did they not know I was her uncle?

I’ve rescued her and healed her. She saw it was me and fall asleep immediately. But she didn’t wake up, she let go of life during her sleep.

I’ve already reduced the fortress to dust, but now it will be the whole country that going to burn. They have only three Fourth in this kingdom and I’m a Fifth, they don’t stand a chance.

I woke up in my core room.

The first thing I notice is that it’s completely dark, my stars are off.

The second thing is the number of missing creatures, not as much as I feared, I access their memories and learned that I was out for sixteen days, the bug population grew back and most of the crabs, fishes, and bats weren’t killed but only knock out.

The third thing is my core. It’s twice as big as before, and the mana purifying rate is greater. Same for the mana regeneration, and it’s a good thing cause I’m pretty low on mana for now.

After that I notice the slow flow of water, I quickly put some mana in the water crystal to grow its flow to something more like what it was before.

It’s time to examine the new memories I recalled. Yes plural, I get back three memories this time. Maybe I’ll be able to recall more in my next evolution.

Anyway, I learn that the child I saved manages to survive, she served me for years and is called ‘Julia’. I wonder if she’s still alive, would she serve me in this form?

I also had a family, ‘Maria’, but she’s dead. And I had bad blood with royalty? I went in a war against a whole country. Is that how I died? Those memories are chronological and they’re easy to replace with the previous one, but I don’t know when the first memory I recalled take place in this story.

But the most interesting thing is the knowledge I now have about the evolution process. Any living thing can evolve, and the number of evolution hint at its strength. Each evolution is also really harder to reach than the previous one. Few humans managed to reach the Fourth stage and I was one of the exceedingly rare that managed to reach the Fifth one, meaning I was more powerful than an army by myself. And I was 'human', I don't know yet the full implication of that revelation.

It’s strange, I seem to recall that some dungeons have more evolved creatures than the ones normally found in the wilderness. That would mean they can be overpowered and that they can’t be beaten, but they can. Is there something else I’m not seeing there? Probably. I’ll have to look into that as well.

Now I have a thing to do. I manage to evolve. I call for my three colorful crabs and…

Victory dance!

I make the crabs dance for me. They are the 'Dancing Crabs' and are used for celebratory moments. Yes, they are a thing. No, it’s not stupid. They are the Dancing Crabs, they deserve respect.