DAY 2 Continued.

Slowly, my consciousness returned and, just as slowly, I opened my eyes.

Ting.

[Skill {Pain Resistance Lv.2} has leveled up to {Pain Resistance Lv.3}. Your pain tolerance has increased.]

Ting.

[Skill {Molting Lv.1} has leveled up to {Molting Lv.2}. Time required for the skill has been reduced by 10 minutes. Total time required: 5 Hours and 50 Minutes.]

Ting.

[Skill {Poison Creation Lv.1} has leveled up to {Poison Creation Lv.2}. You can create up to 2 poisons.]

Ting.

[Title gained: {Survivor}]

Ting.

[Skill {Survive Lv.1} acquired.]

Ting.

[Skill {Sensor Lv.1} acquired.]

My mind blanked at the sudden onslaught of notifications. 'Wha-!?'

Slowly I shook myself and winced, when I remembered the last thing that I had done; because if I remembered correctly, I had almost no HP left when I had blacked out. But before that, I searched for the bruised portion, which had turned to pulp, when I had fallen.

No Pain.

I smiled. 'This is awesome! My hunch was right after all! I can use the skill {Molting} to heal my wounds!'

Giddy from the good news, I checked my HP, it read [HP: 13/20].

'So it heals my body but doesn't increase my HP? Makes no sense.' I frowned a little before smiling in relief. I was happy enough with what I had at the moment. 'Hmm… but if the skill doesn't restore my HP, then does that mean that I regenerate HP over time?'

Judging by the small amount that had regenerated, it seemed like that was the case. 'That's good to know but how much do I generate?'

I tried to move out of my shit covered hideout, but, my body refused to move; I was dead tired.

After yesterday's ordeal and the molting that followed it, the energy left in body was miniscule. Still, I think it was the molting that tired me out more than anything else. 'I'd have to be more careful when I molt next time.'

With what little energy I had, I crawled out and looked up to notice the position of the sun.

That nasty bird-creature had attacked soon after I had woken up, so approximately when the sun was rising but, at the moment, it was overhead. From that I seemed that almost 6 hours had passed since my fainting spell. That gave me a regeneration of 2 points per hour.

I sighed. 'I don't even know if that is a good number or not.'

I yawned and crawled back in; I was very, very tired.

Turning back to the notifications hanging over me, I started to go through them, but not without a sigh; I may as well go through them now rather than later. The first notification was pretty standard and so was the second; but the second one confused me a little, so I focused on it.

Ting.

[Skill {Molting Lv.1} has leveled up to {Molting Lv.2}. Time required to Molt has been reduced from 6 hours to 5 hours and 50 minutes.]

I grimaced. What good a time reduction of 10 minutes would do here? It was useless; completely useless. I sighed. Maybe the time reduction would increase with each level of the skill? I hoped that was the case. Oh dear god I hoped. I sighed. I guess I'd just have to wait and watch; after all, the least I could do was hope.

Shaking my head, I focused on the next screen.

Ting.

[Skill {Poison Creation Lv.1} has leveled up to {Poison Creation Lv.2}. You are now capable of creating another poison for whom you have had the sub-resistance maxed out.]

I grimaced. Again.

If I understood it right, to be able to create another poison, I would have to make myself suffer the poison until the sub-resistance maxed out.

What an absolutely shit thing to do! And absolutely shit thing to put as a condition because maxing out sub-resistances would not be fun; not at all. Just who decided such an idiotic requirement for creating poisons anyway? Did that person had a grudge against me or something? Or did they not want creatures spamming the skill to create more and more poisons?

Stupid piece of shit.

Still grimacing, I moved to the next screen. 'A new [Title]? Now, this is interesting.'

Ting.

[Through your Will, Presence of Mind and sheer Stubbornness, you have defied your Death. You have survived. Grants the skill, {Survive Lv.1}]

I frowned. 'What did it mean by "My Death"? Was I supposed to die there? At the hands of that bird? So soon after my rebirth? ' I scowled. 'Th-that better not be true!'

Irritated, I focused on my first new skill, {Survive}.

Ting.

[When activated, stops HP and MP from decreasing below a certain limit for a fixed amount of time. Cost: HP/2. Current Limit of Time: 1 Minute. Current Limit of HP: 1. Current Limit of MP: -]

I read, and then reread the skill description because I did not know whether I should laugh or scowl at it. On one hand, it fixed my HP so, in a way, it stopped me from dying. On the other hand, it consumed half of my HP –fucking half of my HP!- and would limit my HP to a mere 1 point and that too for just 1 Minute.

I chose the latter option and scowled. 'What an absolutely fucking piece of shit skill!'

In the end, I decided to let it be. After all, it was not as if I could do anything about it now. I'd just have to wait for the skill to grow.

Moving on, I focused on the last notification and my second skill, {Sensor Lv.1}.

Ting.

[Grants the ability to sense the vibrations and changes in the air pattern. Depth and Limit of sensing increase with level.]

I grinned. Now, this was what I called a good skill. And this also explained how I had sensed the disturbance when that vicious bird had attacke-

A yawn escaped me. Well, I was at my limit.

Closing my eyes, I went back to sleep.

DAY 3

I woke up with a fierce fire raging in my belly. Hunger was here. And it was finally making itself known after being ignored almost all day yesterday

I sighed.

Though, now that I wasn't dead tired, I noticed, that for some reason, my body was itching. And it wasn't just at one or two points, no; the damn itch had somehow spread over the entirety of my body. I shook myself and rubbed my head in the ground, trying to sooth the itch.

Ah, finally, it soothed a little on my face and I opened my eyes. 'Huh!' I stared dumbly. 'What is that?'

From my eyes, and from my face, some odd greenish-skin-type-thingy was peeling off. I frowned for a moment before I remembered that I had molted yesterday and that the odd greenish-skin-type-thingy was most likely exuviate that I had shed while molting.

I sighed and began to rub myself against the walls of my hideout with renewed vigor. Damn, that itched! And that burn! I was not having a good day!

As soon as I could, I removed the dead skin sticking to my body and crawled out of my hole to the nearest plant. The burn was so fierce that I practically ran towards the plant, which resulted in leveling up my crawl skill.

Ting.

[Skill {Crawl Lv.3} has leveled up to become {Crawl Lv.4}. You crawl a little faster now.]

I ignored the screen and began to chomp down on the nearest leaf without any second thought; though, perhaps, I should have when I realized that it was bitter in taste.

Ignoring the taste, I chomped, chomped and chomped as I continued to devour the leaf.

Ah, finally the burn began to subside. But then-

Ting.

[Sub-Skill gained. Skill {Mild-Poison: Plant: Resistance Lv.1} acquired. The effect of the poison has been decreased. A tinge.]

'Oh shit!' I immediately stopped eating and began to crawl away from the plant. That plant was poisonous and while I had a poison related skill, it was just Resistance, meaning it just delayed the effect and lessened it a bit; it did not stop the poison. And also, I did not have the resistance for plant based poisons! Not until now!

'Oh shit!' 'Oh shit!' 'Oh shit!' 'Oh shit!'

I crawled as fast as I could to the next tree. 'Oh shit!'I wanted to reach it before the effect of poison hit me -'Oh shit!'- so that I had something to eat if I was left dead tired and unable to move. 'Oh shit!' I did not want another repeat of yesterday. 'Oh shit!' I wasn't sure if my caterpillar body could withstand two days of fasting. 'Oh shit!'

Reaching the plant -'Oh shit!'- I gave it a quick onceover and noticed that its leaves were of the same shape as the plant which I had been birthed on. 'Oh shit!' That gave me a little relief and I climbed it to reach the nearest leaf. 'Oh shit!'

The poison hit me –'Fuuuuuuuckkkkk!'- soon after that, as my body began to convulse and pain began to rummage through my body. 'Fuuuuuuuckkkkk!' I convulsed and I shrieked yet I somehow managed to stick to the leaf. 'Fuck! Fuuuuuuuckkkkk!'

My body twitched and struggled against my will as the poison ran its course. 'Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!' My vision began to blur and my sense of smell went wonky. 'Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!' I saw the world move and smelled the odd odor of buttercups and mint. 'Fuuuuuuuckkkkk!' I knew there were neither buttercups nor mints in my vicinity but that little tidbit didn't help as my body continued to squirm against my wish. 'Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!'

Luckily, the poison was a weak one and slowly, ever so slowly, the convulsions died down and so did the pain. Finally the world stopped moving and the scent of buttercups and mints vanished along with it.

A sigh of relief escaped me and I began to chomp down on the lovely tasteless leaf beneath me. 'Ah, the tasteless heaven.'

The rest of the day passed in blur as I did nothing but eat. I chomped down on the leaves like the hungry caterpillar that I was and devoured them with little mercy. I managed to level up to [Level: 27] by the time moon rose in the sky which raised my HP to [HP: 32/32].

At that moment, I stopped eating, and grimaced as a sudden thought struck me. I knew I had to do it; there was, after all, no other way. The only way to gain another poison was going through that.

I grimaced again. Now that my skill Poison creation had reached Level 2, it allowed me to create another poison, but, for that to happen, I had to reach maximum level in an another Sub-Poison-Resistance.

And though, I already had [Poison: Bug: Resistance Lv. 1], at present, I could not level it up as I had no source for it. That left me with the only other resistance I had, {Mild-Poison: Plant: Resistance Lv.1}.

With a defeated sigh, I headed towards to poisonous plant and crawled up its stalk. Slowly I began to chomp down on the tiny stalks connecting the leaves to the stem and allowed them to fall. I broke of 3 leaves and crawled down towards the fallen leaves.

One by one, I grabbed the leaves and slowly, ever so slowly, dragged the leaves towards my little hideout.

After yesterday's scare, I had decided that I was not going to sleep out in the open; after all predators preyed even in the night and I had no intention of becoming an easy meal for anybody. Though this time, I had to widen the hole as I had grown through the day because of eating the innumerous leaves that I had eaten.

Once I reached the hideout, I crawled into the hole but this time, with my ass down the hole and mouth sticking out. Then I began chomping down on the leaves. I ate through the bitter leaves and continued to devour them until, soon, there was just half a leaf remaining.

Ting.

[Skill {Mild-Poison: Plant: Resistance Lv.1} has leveled up to {Mild-Poison: Plant: Resistance Lv.2}. Your resistance to this poison has increased. A little.]

And then I waited with baited breath; for I knew what was coming. My heart raced in fear and anticipation as I waited.

It took a few moments more than the last time but the poison hit me and my body began to convulse as pain began to rummage through me. 'Fuuuuuck!' I convulsed and I shrieked but managed to remain in the hole. 'Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!'

My body twitched and struggled, and this time I let it as the poison ran its course -'Fuuuuuck!'- I knew there was nothing to gain by fighting the poison and it would just tire me out. 'Fuuuuuck!'

My vision began to blur and my sense of smell went wonky, again. 'Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!' The world started dancing this time and I smelled the odor of swamp and rain. 'Fuck!' I knew I was nowhere near a swamp and that it hadn't rained since my birth but that little knowledge didn't help as my body continued to squirm. 'Fuuuuuck!'

Slowly, the poison ran its course and the convolutions stopped.

Panting, I relaxed my body and laid still, tired. That had been rough; way rougher than what I had expected. I grimaced. I, now, had to do that who knew how many times as I hadn't –yet- evolved a skill to know how many levels it took to max it out. I was so not looking forward to doing this again.

Reaching out, I covered the opening with the half eaten leaf and crawled deeper into the hole. With a sigh, I activated {Survive Lv.1} and immediately felt tiredness take over me.

Ting.

[-16 HP]

No I wasn't in any kind of danger and no, I wasn't stupid either. I knew what I was doing. I just wanted to evolve my skills until they were better than they were at the moment.

I found it justified as, well, it was not like I had use of HP while I slept, now did I? And at the same time, with me hiding in my hideout, I was relatively safe. So I had decided to use the safety of the night to evolve my skills while I slept.

The plan, at the moment, was to use {Survive Lv.1} and {Molting Lv. 2} alternatively each night, so that by the time I woke up, my HP -which I would lose through the use of both those skills- would have recovered.

I, knowingly, did not use both the skills together for two reasons. One, {Survive Lv.1} took out half of my HP and I had no idea how much HP {Molting Lv. 2} would consume and I did not want to risk death because of my stupidity.

And two, because even if I used {Molting Lv. 2} first and then used {Survive Lv.1} according to the HP left, I did not want to leave my HP dangerously low as, then, I would not be able to recover that much of a loss in one night.

Sighing, I checked my HP, it read, [HP: 16/32]. 'Good thing my HP didn't plummet directly to 1 to get fixed. Because that would have been bad. Very, very bad.

With the agenda of the day achieved, I fell asleep.

DAY 4

I woke up again, to the feeling of my insides ready to burst. I but my lips and quickly crawled out of my hideout to move towards the non-poisonous plant that I had munched on yesterday. I needed to shit and I needed to shit real fast.

After finishing my morning ablutions, I began to crawl towards the poisonous tree and, just like yesterday, chewed on the tiny stems connecting the leaves to the rest of the plant.

I wanted to get this torture over with as soon as possible.

So I chewed on 10 leaves and let them fall; after all, I had no idea how many leaves it would take for me to level up my sub-poison-resistance skill. That left me with only one thing to do; dragging the fallen leaves back to my hideout.

Slowly, ever so slowly, and steadily I dragged the leaves and finally managed to bring all the 10 back to the hideout.

Ting.

[Skill {Crawl Lv.4} has leveled up to {Crawl Lv.5}. Your crawl speed has increased.]

I smiled; at least something good came out of all this dragging leaves back and forth. I guess most caterpillars don't crawl as much as I do. But then again, most caterpillars didn't have sentience either.

Closing the screen with a single thought, I began munching on the bitter leaves one by one. It was on the fourth leaf that I heard the now familiar sound.

Ting.

[Skill {Mild-Poison: Plant: Resistance Lv.2} has leveled up to {Mild-Poison: Plant: Resistance Lv.3}. Your resistance to this poison has increased. A bit.]

I immediately stopped eating and, as quickly I could, I crawled out of the hole, grabbed a leaf and covered my hideout with it before burrowing deep into the hole.

The quiver, the shakes and the motion sickness started a little later than usual and so did the scent hallucination. I suffered through them all. Though, nausea hit me then and I was not prepared for it. I tried to bite back the bile as I had no intention of vomiting in my hideout. You know what they say, 'Don't shit where you eat' and all that stuff.

Thankfully, the nausea did not last long and was soon gone but that did not mean that the rest of the symptoms left with it. I suffered through the rest of the ordeal with as much dignity I could, but, let me tell you, there was nothing dignified about being poisoned.

When the torment finally ended, I made my way towards the non-poisonous plant which had become my new source of food and began munching on one of its numerous leaves.

The day passed by quickly; what with me munching, again and again aimlessly on the tasteless leaves, and trying to use my newest skill, {Sensor Lv.1}. Using it, for the first time, had been enlightening experience. I was left marveling at the difference between what I had felt, on the day of the Attack, and what I had felt when using the actual skill.

Where earlier I had just felt the disturbance and hadn't known that the disturbance was coming from above, until the idiotic bird had screeched, now I could easily tell from which direction the disturbance had originated; though, I still couldn't pin point the disturbance to a particular point or to its actual cause.

By the time when the sun finally set and moon rose in the sky, I had been working the skill all day long; along with eating the leaves of course.

Ting.

[Skill {Sensor Lv.1} has leveled up to {Sensor Lv.2}. Depth and Limit of sensing increased. A tinge.]

Ting.

[You have Leveled Up! Level up bonus of +1 HP granted.]

Grimacing, I dismissed the screen before noticing that I had reached [Level: 36] which caused my HP to increase to [HP: 41/41]. It did not make me smile though, because I was making my way towards the poisonous plant; after all, it was, again, the time for my torture.

I repeated the process from earlier and let 10 leaves fall before dragging them to my hideout. Though this time, I did not crawl completely in the hideout as I did not want to puke in my new home and, in case I did puke, I wanted it to, at least, remain outside the hideout.

Thus, I let my head remain outside and covered both, the hole and myself, with the leaves as soon as I heard the familiar sound.

Ting.

[Skill {Mild-Poison: Plant: Resistance Lv.3} has leveled up to {Mild-Poison: Plant: Resistance Lv.4}. Your resistance had increased. Slightly.]

The ordeal, as usual, was not over soon. It seemed to stretch on and on and when it was finally over, I sighed in relief and crawled in completely. Making myself comfortable, well, as comfortable as I could after going through the ordeal that I had just gone, I used the skill {Molting} as I had used {Survive} yesterday.

Ting.

[-21 HP]

I sighed and called for my status.

[Name: Unnamed]

[Species: Caterpillar]

[Race(s): Insect]

[Level: 36]

[HP: 20/41]

[MP: -]

[Titles: {Sentient}, {Reincarnated}, {Hungry}, {Survivor}]

[Skills: {Crawl Lv.4}, {Molting Lv.2}, {Poison Resistance Lv.5}, {Poison Creation Lv.2}, {Survive Lv.1}, {Sensor Lv.2}, {Pain Resistance Lv.3}, {Observe Lv.1}]

[Spells:-]

I smiled at the growth that I had seen just in the past few days, though, my HP –or what was left of it- still made me grimace. This skill had eaten up a little more than half my HP. I guess my decision, to use only one skill a day, was an intelligent one after all.

I sighed and with one last glance, I dismissed the screen and went to sleep.

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P.S. Unbeta'ed but edited to the best of my ability.