I carefully made my way around the maze of stalagmites, careful to avoid any further combat. In order to get to the relative safety of the wall, I climbed up one of them to scout out the best direction to go in.

It was slow going since the system absolutely refused to give me what was rightfully mine, namely, the extra agility point I earned. But I suppressed my anger at this clearly unfair treatment because I kept being distracted by shiny bonuses, which the system was handing out liberally to me.

Eventually, I arrived at my destination, the wall. Ever since I hitched a ride on the Reaper Snake, my earlier theory had proven itself to be true. Most of the fighting took place closer to the center of these large caves, and the closer you got to the wall, the fewer monsters you’d encounter. The wall was akin to a safe place to me, and to further prove my point, I hadn’t felt any fighting close to me for a while now.

Happy with the relative safety I now enjoyed, I started taking out my food. I had a ton of food in my inventory and was craving for those XP and additional benefits I’d gain from consuming it. At this point, I could also fight properly, so there was no need to continue stockpiling. With all things considered, I planned to completely empty out my inventory today.

The first thing I took out was a crab since I probably would have a bad time getting through its shell. Gotta get the annoying stuff out of the way early. I went to work, and it did indeed take me a few bites to make even a dent in its protective armor. Well, all I needed was a hole that was big enough to fit me, I could just crawl in after that.

With my task set, I opened up my status screen. Multitasking while eating food would probably become a habit going forward, and I was really interested in what the system shop had to offer.

I wasn’t sure what I expected, but the shop had pretty much everything listed that would help a monster out. The things on offer were heavily limited, but I suspected that would change when my Traveler Tier went up. This opinion was formed shortly after seeing the shop’s name being “Traveler Tier 1 Shop(Monster Type)”.

I wasn’t an expert, but I felt that the data point prices were reasonable as well. They ranged from relatively cheap, up to ridiculously expensive.

For example, I could just buy myself some skill points. They were listed for forty data points a pop, but I was limited to buying five skill points for every monster tier I had achieved. Same deal with attribute points, although those were only valued at twenty data points.

I was offered to buy one mutation for one-hundred data points, or DP, as the system called them in the shop. Sadly also limited by what tier I had reached as a monster. Only one mutation was purchasable per tier.

Then there were the more expensive things, which were mostly related to skills. As a Tier 1 traveler, I was only allowed a single skill tree, but for five hundred DP I could get myself a second slot. Skill trees were extremely useful, but I would need to figure out if it was worth buying a second skill tree if I still hadn’t finished up my first one. Probably not.

So this purchase would need to wait until way later.

I could straight up buy level-ups for my skills, although the higher tier the target skill was, the more expensive it’d become. Giant Spike was an SS-tier skill, and leveling it once would set me back five hundred DP, the same as purchasing an entire skill tree. Crazy.

Still, nowhere near as bad as purchasing a skill directly. While level-ups were capped at five per monster tier, I could only purchase a single skill. And, whoo boy, were they expensive. Sure, I could buy myself an EX-rated skill. Amazing, right? Problem was, that thing cost five thousand DP.

Seeing as I was currently sitting at 254 Data Points, most of which came from killing a tier four monster, there was no way I’d ever get that high.

And the EX skill wasn’t even the worst offender, no. There were two more options that were even more expensive! For one, I was allowed to buy myself a higher tier of system access… for the measly sum of twenty thousand DP. Cheap right? Even worse, a piece of the hidden access key was on sale as well.

For fifty thousand DP.

I was always curious about what that hidden access key was, but judging by how it was priced in the shop, I must have received something absolutely crazy. I could buy myself ten EX skills for that price! Imagine how overpowered I’d be with ten EX skills. On the other hand, I’d just get a piece of a key, with which I could do nothing unless I collect the rest.

Wouldn’t that mean that the full key had a value of two hundred thousand DP? Absolutely mind-boggling.

Trying to not get too absorbed by the implications, I checked the rest of the shop as well.

Only three more listings remained. The first one being a one-day double XP bonus for a hundred and fifty DP. Fairly reasonable, I suppose. It was also capped at one purchase per monster tier, so I’d have to consider if it was worth buying it, or just leveling regularly.

The second one was an achievement called “Loads of Cash”, which was purchasable for two thousand DP. This was a lot, of course, but its effect would make it so I’d receive twice as much DP from kills. Basically, a must-buy, the sooner the better. I’d probably buy the other limited things first, and see how much I was left over with and try to save up bit by bit.

The last one must have been an attempt at a joke by the system, as it was an option that let me transform one DP into one XP. Sure, there was no limit on this, but wasn’t this just pure trash? I could buy things that were infinitely more powerful by saving up. This must be a trap for big dummies.

Well, seeing as mutations were incredibly useful, I immediately purchased the one I was allowed, then went ahead and bought myself another three skill points. I technically still had enough to buy myself an attribute point but decided against it. I already had a lot more attribute points than a tier-one monster was supposed to have, and skill points would net me some attribute points as well, so they had a way higher value.

I was left with thirty-four DP after my little shopping spree. Just six more and I’d be able to get myself another skill point. For now, I opened up the mutation menu.

I briefly considered getting myself some ears but decided against it. I was doing just fine by detecting vibrations, and I was actually kind of starting to enjoy the silence. Plus, not being able to hear made me immune to sound-based attacks. Win-win for me.

No, what I wanted was more synergy for my spellcasting. It was becoming apparent that I was walking the path of a sorcerer, so I’d need my mutations to help me out with that as much as possible. So far I had mutations to store more mana, help me restore mana faster, and help me cut down on my casting time. Those effects were of course very nice, and I considered upgrading one of them, but ultimately decided on a mutation that’d concentrate the mana to be more potent. As a result, I’d need less mana to cast my spells. It’d lower the cost only by five percent, but hey, once I upgraded this mutation, it’d become a lot better.

For now, this wouldn’t even allow me to cast one extra spear, but hey it was something. This was more of an investment for the future after all.

After that came the skill points. Together with the two level-ups I got earlier, I had a total of five skill points. As I had already planned, I bought the rest of the unlocks from the first segment, which set me back by two points. I gained three points in intelligence and got the Poison Mist spell which I could have used earlier.

I was still left with three points, and since the unlocks in the second segment cost two points each, I was able to buy myself one more skill. Seeing as two of the unlocks were attribute bonuses, I went for the passive effect.

And what a passive effect it was! My poison would mutate to gain venomous traits, so as long as my poison entered the target’s body, my poisoning would be a guaranteed success. Poison Spear had a decent chance to poison, but with this, it’d become guaranteed. It’d also make poisoning enemies a lot easier in the future, in case I got other spells that penetrated my enemies.

In conclusion, the shop was extremely useful.

I returned my attention back to my task of feasting on my kills. Going through the shop hadn’t taken me very long, so I only managed to get through the two crabs so far. My goal was to empty my inventory, so that was what I’d do.

Let the feast… continue?

I happily munched on what was left of the Reaper Snake. I’d kept the best piece for last, and was reminded of just how crazy this kill was that I’d gotten. After eating the ten monsters from the earlier fight, I only got forty-one XP, but I wasn’t even done with this piece of snake and had already gotten way more than that!

Eventually, the last piece of snake disappeared from this world. The ten monsters didn’t even get me up a level, but the snake remains managed to get me two extra levels! Truly amazing. In the end, the total payout looked like this:

Due to the effect of Gluttony, you have gained the following attribute points:

1 Strength

2 Agility

5 Constitution

I quickly threw my level-up points into Intelligence and spent two skill points to go down the middle tree. There was a passive effect in the third segment which would lower the cost of my poison spells by ten percent, and I absolutely wanted that. This unlock gave me another five intelligence, making it my highest attribute.

Seeing how crazy the attribute gain was from merely having my Gluttony skill, the attribute points in the shop became even less desirable. I could get enough as is, so I’d be better off saving my DP for more valuable things.

After being done with all my eating and point distribution, I finally redirected my attention to the blinking exclamation mark that had appeared once I reached level five. The system obviously wanted to tell me something, so I mentally clicked on it.

Evolution Goals:

Reach level 20

Bonus Objective:

Reach the third layer.

???

Ah, my new evolution goals finally appeared, I was wondering why I hadn’t received the new goal immediately after evolving. It’d seem like the system gave these goals out on a case-by-case basis, and I was deemed strong enough to already descend to the third layer.

Since I definitely wanted to clear my bonus objectives, that was definitely what I was going to do.

Since I was such a slow monster, It’d probably be best for me to start descending immediately and kill my way up the levels on my way down. Otherwise, I’d be stuck at level twenty forever, until I got down there.

Which maybe wasn’t even a bad idea. Maybe the hidden quest for leveling existed for tier-one as well… But even if that was the case, killing things in the lower layers would net me more XP anyway, helping me clear the objective faster.

With a clear goal in mind, I immediately started crawling along the wall. I was still unsure how to descend, but I’d wager one of the side tunnels would be my best bet. I’d just need to find one that went down, and I’d see where it would take me. So long as I headed downwards, I was sure to get to the second layer eventually!

Name: Gary

Traveler Tier:1 Type:Monster(P2W)

Species: Elder Slug

Level: 6

Max HP: 130(143)

Max MP: 220(242) Base: 20

Strength: 6

Agility: 4(permanently fixed at 1)

Intelligence: 29

Wisdom: 26(7 max MP until 25)

Constitution: 20(8 max HP until 20)

Attribute Points: 0

Skill Points: 1

Data Points: 34

Skills: Fatal Poison Mucus Armor Lv.3(E), Compress Lv.3(F)

Magic: Fatal Poison Shot Lv.10(E), Fatal Poison Spear Lv.2 (D), Giant Spike Lv.1(SS)

Passive Skills: Bottomless Inventory, Stealth, Turret, Giant Hunter, Gluttony

Mutations: Fatal Poison Mucus, Mana Gland, Mana Concentration Gland, Mana Absorbent Skin, Spell Attuned Brain, Tier 1 Monster Eyes

Skill Trees: Poison Magic (1/1)