Chapter 4: Learning Your Place

A monstrous desire to feed erupted within Michael and boiled just below the surface. The overwhelming instinctual drive took immediate control of his motor functions, and he crept slowly and deliberately toward the aphid-covered leaves above.

The carnal desire was strong enough to turn Michael’s logical mind into a willing passenger within his own body.

O, nectarous buffet, you shall be mine! Gotta purge my mouth after that awful stool-fly!

Upon reaching the first leaf, he nearly swooned at the scene before his eyes. Thousands upon thousands of aphids covered the plant’s upper reaches, and his palps yearned to taste every single one of them.

Michael gorged himself over the next hour. Aphid after aphid was felled by his mandibles after being snapped up within his iron grip.

Puffy white clouds grew together while he ate and the sky slowly darkened, threatening rain.

Michael enjoyed his meal in peaceful bliss, despite the constant presence of other predatory arthropods.

His neighbors were also busy feasting upon the plentiful aphids, and none took any interest in squabbling while so much free food was on offer.

You have defeated Aphid Level 1 x 19. Experience Gained.

Lesser Sapient Mantid has reached Level 5! +4HP

HP 28/28 (+1HP/min.)

While Michael cheerfully mused over his progress and fastidiously cleaned the sweet, flavorful aphid ichor from his forelegs, his antennae stood abruptly at attention.

His compound eyes had located danger approaching from above, but it was too late.

The leaf shot away from under his feet, and he found himself flailing about for something to hold onto while he plummeted deeper into the thorn-bush.

The impact of whatever had struck the leaf caused his tiny foot-claws to slice cleanly through the soft cellulose, depriving him of all grip.

Aphids filled the air around him, all of them knocked from their feeding grounds alongside Michael.

The scene might have proved comical for Michael, if he weren't terrified for his life once again.

Massive, wobbly, undulating orbs with a glass-like appearance were bombarding the bush from above.

Lightning flashed a brilliant blue, illuminating countless raindrops as it wove a fractal pattern across the bottom of the dark clouds above. The image burned itself temporarily into his vision.

Crap! I hate falling!!

He made a failed attempt to latch onto a thin, grass-like leaf from the other plant that pierced through the thorn-bush as he continued to plummet.

His tiny limbs were simply lacking in reach.

Michael’s descent was abruptly halted when he slammed into a vine. An unfamiliar sensation pierced through his abdomen; a mix of sharp pain and numbness.

-5HP.

+1HP Minor Regeneration.

His feet secured themselves at last upon the cylindrical shaft of the vine, and the little mantis nymph pumped his muscles furiously while attempting to seek shelter from the storm's bombardment.

But he couldn't move.

Not again!! This time it's my – shit! I've been...

Michael’s head swiveled about to assess his situation. He noticed that his breathing had become labored as his feet found purchase at last against a nearby stem.

The pain running through his abdomen increased sharply when Michael tried to move. His trembling legs abruptly ceased their efforts.

Michael looked again, and he saw the problem.

Slender red thorns upon the vine had impaled his abdomen in three places near its outer edge on the right side. The slightly-greenish sheen of his own ichor glistened upon the cruel spikes.

Fuck! My engine-room just got crucified! I need to get out of here before I get pummeled to death!

The sharp pain in his abdomen intensified as he labored to lift his backside off the thorns. The slight progress he’d made was negated when an extremely-rotund aphid impacted him from above. Its badly-distended abdomen that had stretched thin from overfeeding, exploded when it impacted the hard chitin of Michael’s thorax.

The mass and momentum of the rapidly-disintegrating aphid shoved Michael’s entire body downward and forced him farther than before onto the slender thorns.

His pain spiked and he felt his body go into mild shock. Aphid entrails and ichor now covered his head entirely, effectively rendering him blind.

-3HP.

Unseen by the now-blinded mantis, a sizable leaf that had been knocked free from above slammed into the vine with the added mass of several large raindrops.

The entire vine, along with its stiletto-like thorns was knocked downward hard enough to free Michael, and his feet latched gratefully onto another vine while he extended his legs frantically to avoid being impaled upon another set of thorns.

A new message flashed across his darkened vision.

-2HP. You are bleeding. -2HP/min.

A raindrop struck Michael’s head, clearing away some of the aphid guts and restoring a portion of his vision.

Two more consecutive flashes of blue bathed the thorn-bush with their transient glow while the thorny vines cast brief, ominous shadows across one another.

Michael spotted a darker region in front of him and hobbled toward it on five legs. A larger raindrop slammed directly into his thorax and head, knocking him prone against the vine.

Fuck!

He tensed for the sharp pain of being impaled to hit him once again, but it didn’t.

His palps tasted water, and when Michael used his right foreleg to wipe away the largest chunk of aphid, his vision was mostly restored.

He arrived in the dark place, and after his eyes adjusted he found he had discovered a tiny alcove set against the massive tree.

Trembling in abject terror while he labored for each breath, Michael collapsed into torpor.

Upon waking, his vision held messages. Michael could hear the distant rumble of thunder and the pounding of raindrops. Wind lightly buffeted his shallow shelter, and he had no idea how long he’d been unconscious.

You are no longer bleeding.

Minor Regeneration has reached Rank 2!

Effects: +2HP/min. May slowly re-grow lost limbs.

HP 4/28 (+2HP/min.)

Hmmf? Wait... I've stabilized? Regeneration!! What a relief!

Lying upon one side, Michael feebly raised his triangular head as far as he could manage, to look around.

A rough awning of thick bark provided just enough shelter to keep the raindrops from slamming down upon him. The nearby thorn-bush still shook and shuddered, but for the moment he was safe.

Heh. I always loved rain and thunderstorms. Never once thought I'd come close to dying in one.

My life was nearly ended today, because I failed to mind the weather... Fucking hell.

How many times do I have to face the reaper before this world is satisfied?!

I'd rather BE the reaper, dammit.. Look! I've got the scythes for it!

Meh. I’m just a tiny, insignificant insect, who probably weighs less than a housefly...

For around five minutes, Michael lay there while severely injured and mostly immobile and wallowing in miniature self-pity.

He was so absorbed with his plight that he almost failed to notice his own strength returning as his HP ticked upward.

Michael turned his head in trepidation to take stock of his injuries and-

Whoa! The holes are gone! What the hell? OH!! Regeneration!

This is amazing! Saved my ass from being kicked, more like it! So awesome! Medical science would kill for something like this!

…And I would have died again without it. Hmm. What the? I can feel my leg!!

Michael leaped to his feet and raised his tiny forelegs toward the storm in triumph.

A brilliant blue flash from above framed his not-so-intimidating silhouette against the cloudy sky.

He looked down to assess his regenerating leg. It was less than 1/3 its normal length and much thinner than the rest, but it was growing back.

That revelation alongside the fact that his abdomen had healed raised Michael’s spirits considerably.

Maybe… being a mantis could be less-shitty than I thought?

If I can grow strong and resilient enough, I could probably survive just fine out here.

I just have to be smart about all of this, if possible.

I just need to leverage my human mind and use this body’s strengths to my advantage!

Hmm. My biggest weaknesses so far have been inattentiveness and panic.

I can probably improve upon both if I manage to keep my senses turned on while I learn more about this forest.

Being walked on by shitty people in my previous life was already bad enough. I don't want to go through the same thing again in this one, regardless of who or what is doing the walking!

Michael stood in his tiny alcove with his tiny, slowly regenerating leg hanging limp at his side. He watched the rain while his tiny brain wandered back and forth between frustration and fascination regarding his surprising situation.

Rihelah was startled out of her own pity-party when she felt the ground shake through the plant’s stem.

Her thoroughly-distended abdomen wobbled and felt uncomfortable after her recent meal.

Apparently, all it takes is for me to become a mantis, and my carefully-managed appetite goes completely “ape-shit” on me, as Michael's father was always fond of saying...

It’s a good thing I'm no longer human, or my thighs would double in size!

A second shock rumbled through the ground and plants, slightly stronger than the first. Her antennae quivered and she stopped the slow movement she'd been maintaining to gain distance from the creepy bush where she had arrived.

I hope this is just-

A third tremor shook her perch, even stronger than the second. More followed in perfect rhythm, while the intensity of each steadily increased.

Can't I have a little time to digest after breakfast? Whatever this is, it had better leave me be! I'm too full to fight!

Rihelah turned upward and began ascending slowly, in an effort to see if she could catch a glimpse of what was approaching.

Hopefully, I can find out whatever that is, and avoid getting stepped on…

The rhythmic tremors caused an old fear to well up within her.

This is not at all what I was hoping for. I was the one who always hated that T-Rex scene where its footsteps caused ripples in the glass of water. Michael thought my reaction was hilarious, but for me it was already bad enough in the movie theater!

She smiled to herself a little as she thought of him.

At least I convinced Michael to hold my hand for that scene.

She sighed to herself.

But that's so long ago, and...

The inner smile faded, and sadness welled up to join her growing anxiety.

Luckily for Rihelah, the heavy footsteps had already begun to recede.

By the time she had risen high enough in the grass to spot its source, she only caught the briefest glimpse of a truly massive creature's backside and tail disappearing from the edge of the meadow and into the trees.

No! Please don’t tell me I’ve been reborn into Earth's distant past as a fucking insect!

Her forelegs squeezed tightly on themselves and her mandibles clenched painfully at the thought.

A giant reptile, nearly half as tall as those enormous trees... My eyes had better be fucking with me!

The tremors faded away entirely, but she clung much more tightly than necessary to her perch upon a thin stalk near the top of a lightly-swaying patch of tall grass.

She noted the blades of the plant were around twice as wide as her body, while their coloration was nearly identical to her own.

It’s nice to know that I blend in, but still… I feel a little too exposed up here.

Slowly and cautiously, Rihelah began her descent beneath the constant aerial ballet of flying insects.

She swayed along with the motion of the grass while turning herself carefully at each crossing where the stems met, as she headed toward thicker cover.

A bright orange flash split the air above the massive bush she'd been traveling away from, accompanied almost simultaneously by a whooshing sound and the brief crackle of flames.

Rihelah’s head swiveled instinctively toward that spot, but all she witnessed was a reddish dragonfly diving toward something that smoked while it fell.

A large number of other flying insects raced away in terror at the sight of the larger predator.

Despite the distance; Rihelah’s potent, many-faceted depth perception proved accurate enough to inform her that the dragonfly was easily twenty-five times her own length.

Holy fucking hell, that thing’s exponentially larger than I am! I bet it’s more than a thousand times my mass!

Scientific curiosity mixed with primal fear to lock her attention upon the unfamiliar sight.

The dragonfly snared its smoking prize and flew directly overhead. It accelerated at an absurd pace that made Rihelah shiver with horror.

A thin, wispy trail of smoke made the dragonfly seem like a tiny fighter jet that had left a contrail in its wake.

Her mandibles fell open in shock, and her sadness gave way to Rihelah’s insatiable desire to know exactly what had just occurred.

She felt especially curious since the dragonfly seemed like it had somehow bent or even broken the laws of physics.

How is that even possible? Did that dragonfly just use fire to disable or kill another creature?

And how the fuck can an arthropod's wings provide such absurd thrust?

Moreover, no living thing could possibly handle such incredible G-forces!

It must've gone from zero to over two hundred kilometers per hour in less than a fifth of a second!

And it did so while carrying the added mass of a relatively-sizable and smoking corpse! It doesn’t make sense!

If I'm remembering my physics right, that’s probably... somewhere in the neighborhood of thirty times the force of gravity!

She considered her perspective for a moment.

Hmm. I have no idea how large or small I am, or whether the assumption I just made is anywhere close to accurate, since I lack the proper instruments to check the validity of my assertions…

But still! Holy fucking shit!

She clung to that spot for another hour, hoping to observe another flash of light and determine whether the dragonfly had anything to do with it.

Her focus was broken by another flash that shone through the blade of grass she now stood upon. A similar sound accompanied it, but her view was completely blocked by the foliage.

She’d failed to catch sight of what had occurred, and that pissed her off.

Damn it! A valuable opportunity for observation, thwarted by my verdant perch! I feel I’m courting a love-hate relationship with you, O kindly host upon which I now stand!

Bleh. That was just my luck! Well, it’s okay. I’m a scientist! This just means more patience is required! I won’t be defeated so easily!

Her compound eyes burned with curiosity, and she resolved to climb higher once more in an effort to secure an unobstructed view of the surrounding sky.

Nothing ventured, nothing won! Have courage, Rihelah! For science!

Michael was startled out of his pondering when he felt the ground starting to shake beneath him.

He crawled backward, up onto the tree's bark and suspended himself beneath the tiny overhang.

The shaking grew steadily, and it followed a regular rhythm for a while before diversifying in both tempo and amplitude.

After a while, it had become a near-constant rumble, and that continued to build.

Birds and insects stopped their songs and mating calls. Aside from the rumble of whatever was approaching, the forest had grown eerily quiet for the first time since Michael arrived.

Oh fuck! Hell no! Michael exclaimed when he spotted a dark hood that surrounded a youthful man's shaven face.

He hauled himself all the way up under the tiny “awning” and flattened himself until only a small portion of his head would be visible.

He peeked just enough to allow him to observe without standing out, in case human eyes happened to look in his direction.

The human's mostly-obscured form was soon eclipsed by a large shadow.

What the hell is happening? A Renaissance Faire with elephants?

The shape soon passed into his line of sight and nearly caused Michael to lose his grip upon the tree.

Its mottled, lithe, and muscular greenish-brown body shone with smooth scales.

Long legs ended in birdlike feet with short claws. The creature’s movements were graceful and fluid, its whip-like tail undulating smoothly side to side; like a crocodile swimming through air.

The head reminded him of a bearded dragon’s, though with longer spines, and many orders of magnitude larger.

Michael estimated its body at around twice the size of a bull elephant. The childlike wonder he felt turned to apprehension as he realized the beast wore a saddle – one that blended almost perfectly with the coloration of its hide.

Following the enormous dragon-lizard was a line of what he assumed to be humans.

Most of those were clad in a handsome mix of dark blue plate armor and black chainmail.

Polished helmets with a T-type slit in the front obscured their heads from sight. One-handed swords hung at their sides, but none carried shields. The warriors walked solemnly, in single file.

Oddly, Michael heard no familiar, telltale clink of metal, nor the patter of human footsteps.

Despite the procession passing as close as what he estimated to be four meters from his position, the only audible sound was the heavy, staggering footsteps of that dragon-lizard and the resulting thunder that sounded like more sets of the same.

Well, shit-house leg and a bucket of snot and three green turds tied in a knot!

I'm pretty sure now that I wasn't reincarnated on Earth; though that one guy’s face did look an awful lot like it was human.

As the procession passed his location, Michael noted two cloaked figures in extravagant, gray robes with silver embroidery. They wore some symbol he didn’t recognize upon their chests.

Darkness and shadows extended outward from the pair, obscuring a third figure whose features he couldn’t discern. However, he did catch the expressions of the first two, and they gave new meaning to the expression, “resting bitch face.”

They’d take first-prize in a competition for that title without even entering!

Yeesh. Giant lizard-dragons and what I have to assume are humans…

I'll have to be more careful than I thought. They don't look like they're bound for a Ren Faire. I can practically feel their killing intent from here, and they don't even know I exist! I hope.

Another line of armed men followed, and bringing up the rear were two more dragon-lizard mounts, each slightly smaller than the first, and these had a reddish tint to their scales.

Cripes! This is all I need... I'm probably only one centimeter long. I'm an insect, and apparently I've been reincarnated into some fantasy world with humans and giant dinosaur-beasts.

Rihelah used to talk about Japanese stories where someone is reincarnated into a new life on another world, but my family wouldn't let me watch any of that “foreign crap.”

It figures I would end up in this kind of situation myself after being denied the opportunity to study it…

Where's all the flashy magic and the overpowered abilities I'm supposed to have?! I mean, protagonists in those stories get superpowers, right?!

What do I get? Heh. I'm tiny and smashable!

This is has to be real life. Just like always, I’m stuck near the bottom of the food-chain and one misstep away from being walked on. Again.

When the procession had passed, Michael risked venturing out into the path for another look.

He took care to duck and hide in the leaf litter as he did so, but somehow he missed the opportunity to get a clear shot at them.

He could still hear and feel the footfalls of the huge dragon-lizards, but they’d begun to fade with distance.

Where the fuck did they go? The path is visible and I can hear them, but I can't spot the lizards or the humans!

Maybe they turned off the path, or perhaps it branched somewhere? Damn.

Michael decided to return to his hiding place, and he felt discomfort in his abdomen.

Oof... can't this body digest any faster? I thought mantids had a nearly-endless appetite! This sucks! Too full!

A glint caught his eyes. Across the path, he saw something glowing slightly within a large bush.

The glowing thing shifted, then shot upward from the bush at tremendous speed to impact a smaller bug that had been flying past.

The glowing thing tumbled about for a moment before it released its victim.

The glowing creature gave chase, while the other seemed unable to maintain flight.

A conical blast of frost engulfed the falling creature. Michael noticed its legs begin to curl inward as it was frozen alive.

The victim's relatively-huge mandibles snapped ineffectually at the air a single time before they stopped moving.

He recognized the shape of the one that had created the cone of frost as it darted in to pluck its hapless prey out of the air once more. It zipped away with its catch.

A dragonfly! And that fucker can breathe ice?! I'm definitely not on Earth anymore! Holy crap!

Just as he arrived back in the relative cover of his shelter, Michael noticed he'd begun walking upon six legs once again.

It finished growing back! I'm a whole mantis once again!!

Oof... Ugh! Nope. No happy dance right now. Too full. Need to digest!

Michael returned to the underside of the bark overhang and jammed two leaves he'd plucked from the thorn-bush into slots within the bark. The leaves formed makeshift curtains, obfuscating his location quite nicely.

Feeling slightly less exposed and vulnerable, he fell into blissful torpor.