[You have EVOLVED]

[Welcome Alpha]

[Level: 3]

[Race: ALPHA]

[Skills: ]

[Mana Absorption(LVL3)]

[Growth(LVL2)]

[Reinforce(LVL3)]

[Body Manipulation(LVL2)]

[All Sense (LVL2)]

[Mana Manipulation (LVL2)]

[Mana Injection(LVL2)]

[Build] *NEW

I woke up with a splitting headache...did I have a head though? Scratch that, I woke up with a pain in my whole body! All of my tentacles were throbbing slightly. But I could feel so much stronger with much more energy coursing through my flesh. Was it because of my evolution...most likely.

Well, I was a [ALPHA] now so I guess my body had to undergo some changes? Haha, calling myself an Alpha made me seem like the top of everyone. Like those werewolves where they had the leader, Alpha, and then Beta and so on and so forth. I didn't remember much about it, so I decided to focus on the changes rather than the name. The most obvious change was the new skill I had received, [Build]. I excitedly concentrated on the skills to see what it did.

[Build]

You can build from a list of multiple structures

Ooo, interesting. So unlike what the description of the race that I selected had told me, I could probably make other structures as well, not just beings out of my flesh. That was definitely a plus for me then. So... let's see what I could make.

[Static Turret]

[Basic Subordinate]

Hmm, only two for now. Well, no matter, system please show me the description.

[Static Turret]

A small turret that can shoot out bone projectiles, size can be changed at will. Uses mana to regenerate projectiles and to shoot them.

[Basic Subordinate]

You have the ability to create a being that will be under your authority/control. These beings will have their own intelligence and emotions. However, they will still obey your orders. Mana would have to be supplied to them every day to keep them functioning and for sustaining their form

Max: 4]

This was incredible! It would increase my abilities and fighting ability many times! I already had some ideas of what I could do with this new skill. The craziest one was that, maybe one day, I would be able to make my own village of Basic Subordinates from my flesh.

If there were other intelligent races, perhaps I would be able to perform trading with them and such. Pretty cool idea. Oh, and if I could make my own village, then of course there would be ones who would try to bring me down. With the basic defenses being Static Turrets, I would be able to defend myself. So that was what I was going to be doing for the next few months, perhaps even years. Unless of course, there was a change of course or something more interesting to do...

Anyhow, I had to start experimenting.

[Static Turret] was up first, as I wanted to save the best for last. I moved out of my temporary shelter, the bear home, moving over to a nearby tree. I then activated the [Build] skill and tried making a small turret that hung upside down on a tree branch. It worked and I was quite happy with the result. When using the skill, flesh immediately escaped my body and began forming into a turret-like object. I activated the turret to test out its fighting abilities by supplying Mana to it, and then spotting a stray rabbit, I decided to mark it as my target. The turret was able to shoot accurately at the nearby rabbit, fast and quiet enough to where the rabbit didn't even flinch as the projectile penetrated its heart.

Bam!

Impressive! One-shot!

The turrets themselves looked quite simple actually. Just small tubes that used mana to rotate like my tendrils. But these turrets could be used with a filter as well, and they would then fire automatically. However, I didn't need to use these filters much, as I was going to hunt and kill things around me quite slowly. Didn't want to disrupt the ecosystem, or alert any strong beings to my presence. So far I only hunted in the inner ring of my growth, where I had at least a 500m radius of surveillance surrounding my kill. Cautious yet effective.

As for the second thing I could build, Suboridantes, I wanted to try it out back at the rabbit burrow. I still had my small friend to take care of.

While moving towards my temporary home, I used surrounding tendrils to pick up nuts that had fallen onto the forest floor. I flattened out my flesh, curving it to become somewhat of a bowl, then I carried the food to the squirrel.

I would probably have released the squirrel as I didn't have any more use for it. It could go back to the trees and do what it wanted. Unless of course, it wanted to stay.

When I carried over the nuts to the burrow, I moved my tendril wall that kept the squirrel isolated. Inside, it sat there looking around in curiosity as it sniffed at my flesh. It didn't seem as afraid of me as before, but it still looked cautiously as my tendrils approached it.

"Hey buddy, look what I brought" I silently said as I placed the nuts down beside it.

At first, it ran away, hiding in the corner. But after a while, as it saw that I didn't do anything, it slowly made its way back over and began scratching at the nuts.

Huh, perhaps it could be my pet, it didn't look as if it wanted to leave after all?

I extended out a small tendril in order to not scare it away, and slowly patted it on the head.

The squirrel paused feasting on the food and looked at the tendril. Then it seemed to shrug and went back to eating.

Haha, it seemed that I have made a friend already. I shall call it...hmm...Nibbles! Yes, that was a good name.

As I happily watched the squirrel eating, I moved away to the other side of the burrow where I would test out my skill, Build. It was time to create a subordinate. I wasn't sure how it worked, but I was too excited to care.

Eagerly, I activated the skill and a pannel appeared in front of me.

[Would you like to create a Subordinate?]

Yep

[Scanning Required]

Scanning?

[Creation must be based on something, have a living being in front of oneself for scaning]

Ah...oh well then I'm not ready yet.

[Subordinate Build Paused]

Hmm, I had to find something to base my Subordinate on. But then I wanted to find something powerful, so the squirrel wasn't an option...

Meanwhile, while I was thinking about what to do, on another side of the forest, my tendrils managed to overhear foreign sounds.

This was where things finally started to get exciting. In front of my expansion, I could spot several humanoids that looked similar to humans. The two in front wore leather gear and had large backpacks on their backs, with the two behind them were wearing long robes that flowed with the wind, one icy blue and one white with gold markings.

They kept walking and headed in my general direction. This slightly frightened me. But I knew to not take action yet as it could have just been a coincidence and they didn't actually know about me. Hopefully.

The "humans" spoke a language unknown to me, so I wasn't sure of what they were talking off. This had not really helped me find out their goal, so I continued observing them.

Soon enough, after talking to each other for a while, they decided to stop at a clearing where they set down their equipment. By then, I could spot most of their faces as they set up camp and cooked what looked to be a hearty meat stew. They all set aside their head coverings as they ate and conversed. And I could then see that the party consisted of three men and one woman, with the woman being the one in the white and gold robe.

From what I could gather from their equipment, one seemed to be a standard warrior that used a sword and another was a rogue that had to throw daggers and a crossbow. Although the other two didn't have any weapons on them. I thought that they were mages. They must have been as they could light the fire instantly, implying knowledge of fire magic at least.

I wanted to test their combat abilities but I also didn't want to reveal myself in the process. For now, it seemed that they didn't notice my presence as I poked a few small tentacles out of the ground. Perhaps for now I could gauge their strength and see if they were good candidates for my Subordinates?