And I couldn’t sleep. I tried to, but the rush of excitement, and the adrenaline full past some hours were still keeping me vigilant.

And instead of sleeping, I was waking up more and more. So I decided to not waste time and do something productive with it, and remembered that I had some skills left for evolution.

The skills were stab and pierce. Both attack skills.

I started with stab, and they both combined.

{Stab has reached maximum level}

{Pierce has reached maximum level}

It is possible to combine them both. Would you like to:

Yes/No

I selected yes and another window appeared in front of me.

Two maximum level skills are combining and evolving.

And are presenting you with the option of:

Using strength or using Mana

The word mana made me remember the body cultivation skill I had gotten from the combination and evolution of three different skills.

It had also given me three different mana related skills.

It was an unusual term for me ‘Mana’. At first I wanted to go with strength, but the memory of the fight between that snake and the mantis made me hesitate. I thought whether my strength as an ant was enough to fight with them.

I weighted both of them option and even though I didn’t understand much about the mana, it turned out to be a lot heavier than my own strength.

*Ting*

[Skill: Spike gained.]

Spike: Grow a sharp protrusion from any part of your body. The length, strength, and sharpness depends upon the amount of mana used and the skill level.

I read the description at least three times and still couldn’t understand how a protrusion or spike could grow from my body.

I looked around and when I saw that everyone was sleeping, I stood up. I wanted to see what would actually happen on its use, but when I really tried to use it, nothing happened.

And instead of any spikes growing from my anywhere, a blue box appeared.

The skill needs mana to use, dumbo. You have no mana, dumbo.

And a light bulb glew in my mind.

“Should I!” And I decided to finally cultivate my body.

And I had just thought about it, when a vast amount of information appeared in the form of a blue box.

Apex Body cultivation method.

It is divided into two different parts.

The first is to cultivate the skin to the level of iron.

The second is to cultivate the muscles.

This cultivation method involves the sensing of mana. Absorbing mana from various sources. And nurturing your skin and muscles with the mana.

The change start from the outermost layer of your body mainly skin, and moves to the inside.

Because you have already completed Iron skin. You can directly start with cultivating your muscles.

Remember, if cultivate skin was to temper it until it gained the durability of iron, then cultivating muscles is to increase its load capacity to the level of iron. Which basically means an increase in strength.

I thought that the information was alright. Though most of it was filler and wasn’t needed, if only it told me how to do this cultivation thing.

So the first step is to sit down and relax.

Which was quite easy for me, after all I had meditation at level 7.

I moved away to a place where there was no one, sat down, and activated Meditation.

Next step is to try and feel the mana circulating in the surrounding, and then absorb it.

I read it and closed my eyes. I tried to sense the mana thing, but other than smelling some hot air and feeling nauseous, I didn’t feel anything else.

But although I didn’t feel anything I didn’t stop and kept on meditating, and soon it turned morning.

The whole night passed and I didn't fell even a drop of mana in the surrounding. I even had doubts whether it was there or not, but at least my meditation leveledup to lv 9.

I was happy with that much. Though I wanted to level it to its maximum level, but then Tiny woke up.

He didn’t see me at my usual [lace and got stunned, but hearing my voice he turned his head, and took a breath of relief.

“Phew. I got really scared there. But why are you sitting here? Did you not sleep?”

I told him that I couldn’t sleep and had decided to train my body a little, but that had failed too.

“So… we aren’t going to the central district?”

Seeing his shinning eyes getting dimmer, a smile appeared on my face and I patted his head.

“Why won’t we?” I said and told him to get ready.

We eat our breakfast and cleaned ourselves to our utmost. Bill also woke up soon after that and he woke his goons.

We left the nursery at the noon, and it took us fourtyfive minutes to reach the centeral district.

And what I saw left me astonished.

There were ants. So many of them that I couldn't even keep the count.

Young ants like us were moving around freely.

But the main attration were the various shops the place had.

I didn’t know what a shop was but seing tiny geeting so excited made me want to go too.

We started from the eateries.

It was a small room like anyother. created how the rest of the mound was created and was decorated with leaves.

“Welcome dear customer what would you like to eat.” The keeper ant asked.

And looking on the menu, I saw that he had the meat of all the insects I had seen and more.

There was worm blood soup, tick salted chips, termite milk, termite gravy with chopped tics. They even had grasshopper ticas and bee honey as the sweet dish.

We, the groupofseven ants ate until we were full, and the bill came out to be only fourteenstamps.

That surprised me andthe others equally.

I looked at their faces becoming hideous hearing the owner asking for money and laughed.

They didn’t even try to stop me from paying at all and neither did they flinch on me calling them leechers. Instead heir eyes shined, as if they had seen the messiah.

And then those thieves plundered me of my wealth.

The eateries we ate at became 10 by the time we returned home.

Things like roach barbeque was too exceptional, and I had to pay the high amount of five stamps for one persons meal.

The fly eye lollipops made my day though. Those little slimy balls attached to the leg of the same fly it originated from was too awesome to leave behind.

And then after we turned from the crossroad we saw something amazing.

An amusement park right in the middle of the district.

Though all the rides were made of leaves, but what could my child heart want more.

Their main attractions was the death dive. A direct jump from the height of ten meters.SucidalI thought, but tiny and bill didn’t even hesitate before jumping down.

I tried to stop them but they said, “Its okay we won’t die just from a fall!”

And before my vary eyes they jumped off the cliff. I worried for them, but nothing danered their fall and they returned back after some time.

“Okay, let’s go to the Hall of Leaf.” Bill started walking at the front after saying, as if telling us to follow behind him.

The hall of leaf was an art gallery. There were many things made by a great artists of our generatio, and seeing them automatically made me smile.

Then after enjoying drone ride, leaf sliding, an ant concert, we decided to go to the ant museum.

There were pictorials on the plain surface of what my appraisal deemed to be a rock.

The pictorials told a story. The story of the first ants courage and the betrayal by his family. The story told how our ancestor had fought a whole army of what looked like horned ants, and won, but diedin the hands of his own brother who wanted to be the hero.

It was good story. Tiny cried, bill stealthly wiped hiseyes and we came out.

“That was good. Who knew our great great ants ancestors had to cope with so many things, but in the end still got killed by the family.”

“Yeah…”

Tiny and bill discussed it between themselves and we entered another room. Which housed crude drawings of various monsters.

The things were drawn in acendingorder, starting with the smallest insect to the biggest living thing an ant had seen until now.

There was an ant who was telling thetourists ants from other colonies, that the list was still being upgraded and new beings was still being added to it with passing time.

And it turned out that there were many things which were smaller than an ant,although an ant was still quite small on the larger scale.

I tried to find the shapes of the monsters I saw outside thinking that they were pretty big, but their order on the list made me frown.

They showed up quite early on the chart.

Then I thought of the moving mountain, and although it was near the end of the list there were still many more dangerous and bigger things than him.

I pointed ait and told the others how I and the team had travessed that monster to collect food for our colony.

“Ohhh! Really brother! You have seen that thing? That’s awesome!”

“so how was it? Was it dangerous?”

I told him how it had stood up so high that I could see every thing all the way to our colony fromthere.

“Oh! That’s a huge monster.”

And after checking out some more we decided to return back to the nursery. It was getting late afterall.

We were just leaving the museum when I saw an ant having a protrusion growing from his neck.

I asked bill if he knew something about that and he said, “A fashion thing maybe?”

I asked him what was fashion, but he simple smirked, and patted my back.

“You don’t need to know. Just come back safely from your every mission, and if its possible help us get stronger too.”

I glared at him for taking me as a fool and we moved out.

On the way we saw a ring with an ant yelling, “Anyone who can stays inside the ring with our mighty Bruno for ten minutes will earn himself ten food stamps. Registration is two food stamps. Hurry up folks! This is a lifetime opportunity. The offer only applies until today evening.”

I asked bill if he wanted to try.

“No thanks. You can ask Tiny if you want.” He said.

I didn’t ask tiny beause I aleady knew his answer, and by then an ant had already registered and entered the ring.

The ant entered, the bell rang, and the fight ended. He was knocked out.

“Pfft!”

I just couldn’t help myself, but I also knew the reason for his so easy win.

The fighter was a rare Boxer ant. A peak second ranker at that. There was no way that novice kid would have been able to handle him.

I was going to go up the ring and flatten him, but decided to simply observe.

We stood there and watched two more novice ants and a soldier getting their ass handed. We had a good laugh and then we came back to the nursery.

The day ended, night came, and I once again couldn't sleep.

I once again thought of cultivation and sat down to meditate after a tired sigh.

Time flew like water in a river and soon it turned 2:00 Pm in the night, and it was then that a change happened.

*Ting*

[Skill: Sleep resistance gained.]

{Meditation has risen to lv 10}

And the world changed. My once serene surroundings changed into one with too much chaos.