Before a vast mountainside spring, numerous large rotund creatures covered in shell-like skin with wide mouths and large tusks pointing upwards were either lazily grazing around or swimming.

Hiding atop one of the trees near the water’s edge, a small canid-like humanoid that appeared as if wearing the skull of a wolf sat on a branch as it observed the creatures’ habits.

From the new knowledge it has stored, it understood that these creatures were called Potamids(*) by the higher races; the thinking races that have actually built a proper civilization.

They are usually passive beasts, but are very territorial against other groups of the same creatures. A herd is usually composed of one male and several females.

The male is the largest of the herd and have the longest tusks while having two sets of them. They also have a large blue gem-like object that is nestled on their back just above their heads.

The females have these gem-like things as well, but are smaller and are spread out across the sides of its body. From what the morphling understands, these crystals are actually their control core for using mana.

Surprisingly, these creatures possess the means to use water directly as a defensive mechanism should they be in danger.

Annoyed at the prospect of having to deal with another creature knowledgeable with using mana, the little beast simply sighed in frustration at its own lacking understanding.

Right now, it wanted to take on the herd despite being only a sixth or eighth of their size, but it was confident it can easily handle such slow and passive beasts.

Just as it was getting ready to pounce, it suddenly heard a twig snap from somewhere behind it.

It immediately turned to see what made the noise and was shocked to see several large quadrupedal creatures hiding in the bushes stalking towards the Potamids.

They were much larger than the Potamids and worse still, there was an entire pack of them like wolves with at least over a dozen.

Their bodies appeared silvery smooth and round from above with layers of scales on the sides. They had lizard-like tails that had serrated edges that ended in a large bone-like spike at the tip.

They moved in a canine-like way and their limbs were bulky with the look of stratified muscle.

They each had four yellow eyes and their triangular pointed heads looked like it was covered in a shell-like armor with four large fangs molded onto the ends. Rows of small razor-sharp teeth lined the inside of their maws.

From what the little beast knew, these creatures were among the common and more dominant predators of this region.

They were called Wargscales(**), and the high races feared them for their intelligence and ferocity coupled with their armored hides and size. Just a regular individual was already a third larger than a maned bear.

They didn’t need a leader to coordinate, but larger packs were usually ruled by an alpha pair.

Fortunately, this packs seems to be a mid-sized pack, so it’s unlikely to have an alpha pair controlling it.

At first it appeared that they were only interested in the Potamids, but three from the pack sneakily tried to surround the tree the little beast was on.

Knowing their game, it wanted to leave them alone at first and let them face each other off, but if they intended to force its hand then it wasn’t against playing by the rules of nature.

One advantage when it came to fighting these creatures was that when a leaderless pack chooses to split their forces, the split forces focus only on their intended targets.

This means that for the time being it will only need to deal with these three.

The three beasts all leapt at the same time from different angles towards the little creature. Their massive sizes rendering most of the tree’s height useless.

Instantly morphing one of the plates on its back into a tendril as thick as a human’s arm, it quickly reached for a branch from another tree and pulled itself out of harm’s way.

The tree it was previously on was instantly shredded to pieces.

Seeing the damage done to the tree, it wondered how creatures with such size can move so quickly.

It didn’t want to think they also possessed stones that allowed them to utilize mana which let them move in such a way. It honestly felt it was being cheated whenever it discovers such creatures, ignoring the fact it possessed unfair abilities itself.

While it was internally grumbling, the three Wargscales circled around the new tree it was currently on.

This time, however, it didn’t leave and decided it wanted to finish this group before the others are done with the Potamid herd.

When the three angry beasts leapt at it once more, this time it jumped upwards.

Using the momentum of gravity, it raised one arm and magnified it to six times its size then threw it downwards towards the three beasts when they intersected.

With a powerful boom, dirt and dust was raised when it smashed all three of the beasts into the dirt at the same time.

Jumping away, a sharp pain radiated from its hand and it looked at it to see that it was bleeding with one of its fingers missing.

As the dust was settling, it looked towards the three beasts and saw that as they were getting up, the top one was chewing on its finger then gradually swallowed it.

After finishing, the scaled beast then looked towards it with hungrier eyes.

These things were tougher than it expected. Seeing that they were mostly unscathed since most of their armored plates were on top, it became clearer that it was a bad idea aiming to hit them from above.

Perhaps thinking they could take the little creature head on, the leading one that consumed the changeling’s finger roared with a sinister hiss-like howl as all three charged at it from the front.

Snorting in derision at their foolish thoughts simply because of a lucky bite, the little beast dove under the creatures as soon as they leapt and were in midair.

As soon as it was under them, several plates on its back trembled as massive bone lances spiraled out to pierce the big scaled lizard-dogs from underneath.

This time they weren’t as lucky as their underside was completely unarmored.

Several spikes lanced through their bodies piercing through softer tissue until they struck under the armored scales on their backs and were completely stopped.

Immediately retracting the spikes, it turned to look at the bleeding creatures that whimpered out before shakily dropping to the ground and dying.

Due to the new knowledge it had, it understood most of the beasts' anatomy and knew which vital areas to strike. Its earlier mistake was due to it underestimating the hardness of their scaled back.

It also pondered why it suddenly became so arrogant when it used to be more careful. Scratching the side of its head while in deep thought, it suddenly tapped its palm with its fist when it had an idea.

Since the originator of its primary genes had cells that had a will of their own, perhaps some of their will carried over to reshape its personality.

The independent will is no longer capable of taking over, but it believed that some of the will was integrated when it completely absorbed and subjugated the genes.

It wasn’t a complete problem since its currently aware of the shift in its thoughts; it simply needed to remember and be more careful.

Lost in its thoughts, it finally came back to reality when it realized it was too quiet.

Looking towards the other group, it found that they had run away. The herd of Potamids was simply gone.

Some corpses were still left at the shore, but perhaps they became wary of it when they realized the other group was easily taken care of.

This was a problem since it didn’t know how many more corpses it needs before it can fully assimilate their genes.

Frustrated, it went over to one of the Wargscale corpses and absorbed it. Suddenly, it was hit by a massive amount of information.

Reeling on the floor from this sudden unexpected attack, it tried cutting off its pain sensors and receptors, but unfortunately it didn’t work. For some reason, the pain was coming from somewhere “within” itself which it couldn’t understand and was somehow radiating to its entire body.

Seeing as it was useless to try and stop the pain, it filtered the new information that was forcefully shoved into its brain.

Going through it slowly, it found that it was information pertaining to the genetic data of the Wargscale and its entire evolutionary tree.

Organizing the information, it found all the material it needed to completely copy its genetic code.

This was incredibly convenient. It didn’t understand why all the information was readily available and didn’t erode through absorption; the reason as to why it originally needed to consume more than one individual of a species, but it pinpointed that this must be part of the ability of the black monstrosity it absorbed before.

Once again it wondered what that creature could have been and how it could exist.

Having organized all the information, it found that it was no longer in pain. Somehow, the pain was caused by the forceful addition of the information from the Wargscale corpse it absorbed.

Realizing this, it looked towards the Potamid corpses with apprehension.

***

“Blasted snare thorns! That’s the fifth freaking one!”

The large man with a fuzzy brown moustache and wearing dark leathers lashed with his longsword as he was fuming.

Several times as the party traveled deeper into the Faewood, large thorny vines attempted to latch onto them coming from a spiny bush that seemed to grow from a tree’s trunk.

Snare Thorns, as they were often called, were natural traps that attach themselves to trees and would ensnare creatures whenever they would pass by. The ensnared creature would then struggle and be continually wounded by its sharp thorns so that its blood would nourish the plant.

These traps were easily avoidable to an experienced group of explorers, and yet their party has already been attacked several times despite being out of the plant’s normal ambush range.

“…I don’t like this, Gern. I think this is the work of a Fae.” Said a short-hooded figure as he cut down the vines holding onto the large man.

Looking behind the party, a tall lanky man in robes with short pointed ears mused. “Orsley could be right. I’ve been detecting faint traces of nature-based mana for a while now and at first thought it was just the ambient mana.” His eyes then narrowed with a hint steel in his voice. “But ever since the second ambush, I’ve been sensing it getting stronger.”

“And why the hell are we just hearing about this now?” grumbled Gern as he pulled the last remaining thorny vine off his shoulder.

The lanky man simply shrugged. “Because I couldn’t determine the source. So far, I haven’t detected anything trying to do more than just annoy us with those snare vines. I’m pretty sure you can easily handle those.”

“Oh fuck you, Hox!” the man scowled as he rubbed some balm over his cuts to stem the bleeding.

“Shush! Boys… where’s our prisoner?” Delleen, the only woman, pointed out the only one missing from their group.

Seeing the fat man gone, Gern cursed out loudly. “Oh bloody fuckin’ ell! Why was no one watching!?”

“Yeah, Delleen, what happened? You and Hox were supposed to watch him while I freed up Gern, and Hox was busy with his magic.” asked Orsley with concern on his face.

“I’m sorry… I saw something running amongst the trees.” Delleen pointed towards a certain direction.

The three men looked on to where she was pointing and were surprised to see something disturb the underbrush as it ran past them and continued onward to where they were headed.

The little humanoid Fae that tailed the party ran in a panic. Its mana was running low when it tried to stall them once more, so it lost a little bit of control and accidentally pulled in the large fleshling.

Doing this cost most of their attention to focus on freeing that one member, so the fat one that was tied immediately bolted.

It didn’t understand why the others didn’t notice its escape, but as soon as it fled, the little Fae tried to chase after it to stop it.

Little did the others know that the portly man purposely had his shoulder cut by the lashing snare thorn.

As soon as his blood touched the earth, something faint had taken his blood and guided his steps completely muting all sounds.

The man, with madness in his eyes and froth dribbling from his mouth, ran onward as a wild fervor took hold of his thoughts.

***