I'm beginning to get tired of the taste of spiders.

Yes, there are a lot of different kinds, but eventually, they all boil down to either tasteless or awful.

[Joule?]

[Yes?]

[Is there anything nearby that I can hunt that gives more energy than spiders?]

[Hmm... I'm detecting a larger lifeform nearby that could give quite a bit more. But it might be a little more difficult.]

[Let's go for it!]

My antennae pick up a pathway of pheromones leading me further from the anthill. Since when could she do that?

A few minutes later, I'm staring at a small furry creature sitting in the grass under a shady tree, eating a nut. It's a small mouse with wings.

[What if it gets away?]

[It shouldn't be able to if we're fast enough.]

I crouch and activate Void Bite, ready to charge.

[Go...]

The mouse drops the nut and runs.

[NOW! GO NOW!]

Joule's shout startles me, but I start running regardless.

Get back here, food!

It probably looks a little strange, an ant chasing a mouse.

Its wings start to open, and I panic.

[Joule! Do something!]

[Understood! Processing...]

I take a jump and barely miss. My mandibles snap shut just behind its tail.

As I fall back towards the ground, Joule says, [Temporary solution discovered!]

I land on the shadow of the tree and pass straight through.

For a moment, I'm blind, and only have the sense of being in an indescribably enormous space.

And then my eyes work, and I'm falling on top of the flying mouse.

It squeaks in shock at the sight of seeing an ant pop out of a shadow and tries to change direction.

Despite my discombobulation, I still manage to activate Void Bite. It cuts towards the mouse, but at the last second, it dodges. My bite hits the mouse's wing instead.

It comes off cleanly, and I hurtle towards the ground. Thankfully, the distance isn't far, and I land without an issue.

Turning, I see the mouse crash into the tree and fall to the ground.

Time for food!

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

After I'm done eating the mouse, I ask the obvious question.

[What exactly happened back there?]

[I, uh... I don't really know, to be honest. I think I shoved you into a sort of... shadow space? It's difficult to describe in words, but I detected some pretty absurd amounts of raw Void energy in there.]

The words make me perk up.

[Can we go back and get it?]

[Unfortunately, no. I'm amazed that it worked so well - once we went in, emergency conditions kicked in and I automatically warped us out of it. I don't think my matrix will let me do that again until we've got more power to work with.]

That's disappointing, but at least I got the mouse.

[How much energy did we get?]

[Quite a lot, actually. It's equivalent to a lot of spiders.]

[How many?]

[...You still don't know anything about numbers, so I can't really accurately tell you.]

She raises an excellent point.

[How can I learn about that?]

[Our options are limited. Either we spend a significant amount of time going over all of the numbers that you'll need to know, or I forcibly download all of the numerical information I know directly into your head. It's much faster, but it's not going to feel great.]

That captures my attention thoroughly. [Is it going to be as bad as when I got bigger?]

[No, nothing like that. That was your existence being rewritten on an atomic scale - this is basically just going to knock you out for a while.]

Well, that still doesn't sound great, but it's definitely better than the other option.

[Let's do that.]

[Beginning process.]