I was mana starved and hurt, missing limbs, my mandibles, and an eye. My body was shredded beyond belief. I was hungry. Most of all . . . I was scared.

This time, when the infected carcass of the mantis disappeared from my view, I knew for sure it being a result of its speed and not invisibility. I dropped mana vision for clarity and dropped to the ground as soon as my senses rung warnings in my head. The creature’s split open mouth appeared above my head right after, giving me a sight of the tentacle squirming inside its mouth before snapping close. That sight made me silently stare. My whole head would have easily fit into the gap. No problem.

I fled from under it. It disappeared once again. A whistling sound grew louder around me, and before I had time to take a breath, the thing was swiping one of its bladed scythes at my chest in pure unsheathed anger. The sound of wind grinding against the scythe was preposterously raw. It was bent on ripping everything in its way, whether me or the wind.

I hadn’t stopped moving since it had first transformed, but all I was doing was stretching the inevitable—the meeting of its blade and my face. I was unforgiving slow in front of the creature, and had not a rippling way of stopping the blade from shearing me apart if caught, which I was sure would shortly happen. I could understand from its raging ways that it wouldn’t have stopped at just killing me. No. My death would have only enraged it more. It would have then proceeded to cut me into smaller and smaller pieces until there was nothing to cut. Only to vehemently disappear into a shower of glittering motes that had summoned it from the depths of my mind in the first place.

We met again. This time I came out of it with the whole upper section of my shrunken abdomen completely sliced off. Time was slipping and so was my health. That is when an opportunity presented itself to me. It wasn’t help of a foreign origin, but a familiarly alien strength I was already in possession of.

Out of luck, I had stumbled to a stop right in front of the creature, giving it a direct shot at my life. During this moment of desperation, when stillness had my limbs gripped motionlessly and the world had grown horrifyingly silent to my senses, I reached an unbelievably deep level of calmness and found myself being possessed by a very familiar feeling: one from not so long ago.

It was a surge of untamed strength, of emotions oppressed and caged, of time stopped and momentum stolen.

I transformed a mouthful of energy stored in battery and wished to become faster.

Hot, searing life buzzed my frozen body with the strength I required to dodge death. My scythe ingrained sight, which had been refusing to change, shifted, as I moved (this time faster than ever) and managed the miracle. I dodged death. The scythe went past my head ripping wind with its deadliness. At that moment I was not the slightest bit slower than my opponent.

Battery allowed me to store the kinetic energy of any form and use it afterward, but it was the skill transformer that truly brought the energy to its maximum potential. I had only adopted to evolve battery into transformer because it increased my energy storing capacity. I hadn’t the slightest clue of the skills potential then.

The alien strength flipping inside my body was already draining, however, slipping out through my pores. The mouthful (because that is what it felt like, taking a bite into something physical—a tasteless bite, but a bite nonetheless) of energy I had taken only allowed to take a few steps before ceasing to exist and drowning me in a deficit of strength; unlike any of the past.

The drain brought no aches to my already battered self, but my sight spun and weakness took hold of me.

I hurriedly took another mouthful of the potent tonic and jumped away from a bladed slam performed by the transformed creature, repeating the process for the third time again when it followed with an enraged storm of everything sharp and pointed, managing three cuts into my chest and taking thirty points from my measly health pool. Its dance was still going when I fervently gulped down an unknown amount of that energy and transformed it into vitality. The resulting heat made me dizzy, but also burned away the bleeding effect and made the wounds steam and heal. My health stopped dropping and started regenerating.

Perhaps, it can also fill my mana! It was wishful thinking on my part and I learned the skill wasn’t omnipotent when the thought led to nothing.

Transformer rose to level 2, however, doubling its effect.

For a minute everything went great. The strength flowing through my body hyped me; it made me confident. Then I realized that I wasn’t attacking: that I hadn’t gotten on the offense once since its transformation.

The creature's fear had me bound in more than a few ways. Knowing that wasn’t enough, though. Yet, to actively go against the thing when defending was already hard enough was more troubling than difficult.

But the thought only grew one way after it took root, making me begrudgingly make mind.

Taking two large mouthfuls of the stored energy (to counter any mishaps), I dived forward instead of retreating, transforming the energy to specifically increase my exoskeletons endurance. It was a stupid plan and a dangerous execution, but there was no other way. I was out of options.

Enduring its heavy blade purely with my enhanced bodily endurance, I transformed another mouthful into strength and bit into its left leg, instantly coming to regret my decision.

I managed to shear its leg clean off but soon realized that the wound was more a menace to me than it. Black tar slipped out of the wound, which some fell into my mouth and others on my back.

It was a mix of acid, poison and everything parasitic. It burned and paralyzed and tried to take over my body. My Poison, acid and parasite resistance simultaneously entered a necessary growth period to help endure the invasion, while my limbs grew stiff and unmoving from the paralysis.

Panic spiked my emotions when my health instantly fell to half.

I blindly transformed the stored energy into vitality to counter the reaper's grip tightening around my neck. My health rose back to 50, then fell to 25, then rose to 45 and fell to 20 again; leading to a cycle of simultaneously continuous harm and heal until my resistances came through to the rescue.

Mind me say it if you would, but the creature hadn’t taken the offense lightly. Its volatile reaction to my action was a larger part of my troubles. Hence, even after my High poison resistance rose to level 15, paralysis resistance evolved to tier 2, and acid resistance stopped at level 15, balancing out the invading tar, I was still suffering damage.

My mind was the clearest, most focused it ever had been. It was the effect of mortal danger I was in. Just a little more, I chanted the words and transformed another mouthful of energy and rose from the ground in an abrupt fashion, pushing the creature off my body, and ran. I didn’t look back, but I could sense that the creature was whole again without the slightest blemish, and could give chase if it wished.

It chased.

I inspected my back for signs of damage and found the exoskeleton cracked and chipped.

Not good.

And battery was almost empty. I only had a few more mouthfuls of energy left. Unfortunately, I wasn’t regenerating my pools either. The transformed energy was very demanding, and as I was coming to learn, had a steep price tag.

Learning from my previous blunder, I kept my distance from it, but that doesn’t mean I completely gave up on attacking. I decided to be smart. If only I had mana . . . but there was no point cursing the dungeon either? Heavy heartedly using the remaining resources, I activated weakness tracking, but that showed me nothing, no external weaknesses to exploit.

Examine and inspection which were supposed to show me the internal workings of the infected Mantis showed me a ghastly vision of squirming worms and decay.

Mana vision only gave conclusion to my previous findings. The creature had no mana, no life; it was dead.

My only chance against it was to burn it thoroughly so it couldn’t regenerate, or somehow figure out a way to bring the parasite out of the shell it inhabited. Like: By binding it completely or making the carcass itself a threat to the parasite.

It clicked. Would poison work? The thought sparked my interest, and I was planning not long after. I had some poison stored in my body, but I wasn’t sure the amount would be enough. Unfortunately, I needed energy in the form of stamina to create new poison and my body wasn’t naturally regenerating anything; fortunately, it wasn’t a problem because it was possible to use the energy from the battery as stamina. At least, it had kept me going, so I should be able to create poison with the energy, right?

It worked.

I could transform the energy into poison. Is stamina also but a form of energy stored in the body? Is that why it worked? I was wondering when the system rang in my mind.

It wasn’t a new notification, but a message from Poison engineering, asking whether I would like to look at the various kind of poison available at level 1.

It wasn’t truly my intention to engineer a new kind of poison in the situation, but I’m glad it asked. I agreed, and it presented me with a small list to choose from.

[Poison Engineering][Lv-1][List:]

*****

[Acidic suppressor poison]

[The acid part of your poison suppresses host's resistance, allowing the poison to spread freely.]

[Vapor intoxication]

Released in the form of vapor, the poison spreads easily among the mass.

[Fueled burning]

[The poisonous acid mix reacts inside the host body and burn.]

The list though small was plenty skillful. I thought for a second. Contemplated which of the three I needed in the situation and selected vapor intoxication. Fueled burning and acidic suppressor poison would have both needed me to inject them into the creature’s body, again leading to the previous blunder.

The spotlight was on.

Transforming the energy into stamina I started releasing the created poison. The mantis very possibly sensed something and became frantic. It attacked and the vapors moved as its body passed through the forming mist, sticking and getting absorbed. I dodged and we tussled as battery gradually emptied.

I became immobilized first. It struck a spike through my chest and flung my tattered body away, then dropped to the ground itself—immobilized.

I unconsciously flew through the air and came awoke from the impact. With the regular dosage of the transformed drug no longer flowing through my body, the withdrawal struck, bringing an unprecedented amount of pain and discomfort.

A message from the system notified me of the negative effect: amputated, mana drained, mangled, overloaded, broken, starving, and burdened, being in effect.

Immobilization wasn’t a part of the plan. It just happened. The poison also hadn’t been as potent as I had expected it to be, leading to this situation. Whatever the case, the mantis was down.

It wasn’t the ideal result. However, my opponent hadn’t been an ordinary monster either. So it was a win-win situation; Just that my mind was spinning and along with it, the world.

Now what? I thought over the persistently loud ringing going on in the back of my mind, trying to figure out a way to deal with the harmless parasite when things turned shady.

The mantis shook, and then went forward to expel large amounts of tarry substance from its pores. At first, it considered the sight a manifestation of my mind, then remembered that the mantis wasn’t dead and the sight being one of my desire and shouldn’t be a surprise.

The tar grew around the mantis, covering it from head to toe until the mantis’s body was no longer visible underneath the stuff. Bubbles rose from the slime which popped expelling a vile stinging gas into the air, adding to my nausea. It wasn’t long after when the tar started congregating, ending up becoming a slimy pile and very slowly, started rolling toward me.

It wasn’t collapsing on itself. No. It was rolling and coming closer to me, centimeter by centimeter, one wave of bubbling liquid at a time. I watched it in a mix of horror, frustration, and tiredness as the grotesque slime moved away from its previous container —the mantis— which it had already consumed.

Another cluster of hateful alarm bells rang in my head as the distance between us shortened. It’s no surprise that my fascination toward it dimmed and only horror remained. A prickling sensation covered the cracks of my exoskeleton, pestering me with an itch to make an effort. But the aftereffects of straining my body to such limits weren’t a joke. My liveliness was already a miracle, considering I was stabbed through the chest not too long ago.

It was slow in its progression, but consistent and passionate. I may not have taken its formless shape seriously at the start, but as time passed and it grew closer, the reality of my immobilization and the fate that waited in case it managed to enter my body forced me serious.

The only sound around it was of rot and decay coming from the bark underneath.

I was out of mana, out of spells and out of about everything. If there was something I had, it was but four useless instances of cancel (which can disrupt any mana created spells) memorized, which I utterly regretted wasting both my slots and mana on.

I cursed myself for being dumb as it grew even closer; cursed the dungeon for its existence, the mantis for finding me out in the thick of shade those many nights ago, the bugs for invading the farm and kidnapping Billy and the others, the farmer ants managing the colony for their shrewdness; and screamed in my mind in defiance against the gruesome end which was upon me, emptying my arsenal of memorized skills as my last retaliation while the hateful parasitic slime slowly but surely engulfed and bound me, completing its mission.

The pain came instantly and with it clearness,

though both also disappeared before I could even acknowledge their existence.

The ringing of my mind growing to cover all of my thoughts, I drifted through consciousness a few times before blacking out completely— unable to feel how I was fairing though confident that I would not be waking up again.