At first, I couldn’t get a good bite in, because the circumference was just too much, but I did bite in enough to get a start. Every bite thereafter was bigger and bigger. I kept the main body busy with more undead to fight occasionally and had my second breakfast. I knew it was in pain as it focused less and less on getting me off of it and more on simply squirming in agony. It was, so damn disgusting. If I didn’t somewhat get over how repulsed I was by nope-ropes, I’d have never been able to do that. There was now a gaping hole in the snake, and the chimera could ignore me no longer.

It tried to turn around, but couldn’t exactly blow fire on itself, and neither could it use its front paws, so it kept rotating and making wild movements, almost like a wild horse as a rider attempted to tame it. I whirled about in the air then got dragged about on the ground. Its best attempts at getting me off was trying to use its paws, but the position was so awkward that it couldn’t get good leverage. If the snake tried to bring me closer to the front so the lion could use its paws or mouth, then I’d just climb closer to the base of the tail, near the lion butt. If the chimera attempted to fall on me and crush me or drag me around, I could just climb a bit farther along the tail.

Eventually, I ate enough to severe muscle control, then I noshed through the bones of the snake and completely bit it off. Half the tail fell down, and with it, half the field of vision and sense of smell from the snake was gone.

Now the real problem was the main body. The minute I began to think about what to do, it sped off, going back to the direction of the forest. The second it got out of the valley its wings shot up. Fuck no you won’t! I cast Shadowbind specifically on those wings, then separately cast more Shadowbinds on other parts of its body like legs and mouth. They only held in place for a few seconds, but that was more than enough to take a wild chance.

Here goes… I chomped down on the base of one wing. The chimera blood was getting everywhere now, but I kept going and going until the chimera found it too painful to move that wing. Eventually, I moved on to the other wing, and midway through eating the meatiest part of the wing, I could no longer spare the mana for my repeated use of Shadowbind. Oh, well that’s not good.

The golden beast was apparently a stuntman, it jumped into the air and barrel-rolled, managing to fling me off of it. With no undead and no mana for apprentice spells, I was down to carefully using novice spells and skills. But I relied only on skills. I couldn’t afford to remove the enhancement from my body, lest I get crushed under its weight. So, my entire defense now depended on my durability and agility, and my offensive power was exclusively my bloodthirsty carnivore mouth.

The chimera and I eyed each other, but it then did something I weren’t expecting it to do. It, started running away. I removed my skills from everywhere except my legs and arms and gave pursuit to my meal. However, there wasn’t much of a chase. The beast just collapsed. I squinted my eyes in confusion.

It was only when my dreary eyes reverted to where we came that I noticed a long line of blood. The thing was bleeding to death. Wow, well, who’d have thought? Well, I breathed heavily and sat down to catch my breath, that was fucking anticlimactic. I made a mental note to never rule out blood loss as a valid strategy, and biting too.

After I gave myself a minute or two to catch my breath, I got to work on that apex predator. I tore a large piece of leg meat. “Betcha nefer shought shome random mofo woug eatch yhou alive, huh?” I spoke with my mouth full and the greatest feeling of achievement I ever had in my past life and new life combined. An apprentice-level wizard took down an A-rank monster by biting it! I spent so much time cleaning my plate that I wasn’t sure if I had enough time to make it back to the bitten-off tail.

I went back to the valley to finish my work and get the 95% threshold under my belt. There were some vultures circling the tail. Phew, I made it in time, I think. Alright, time to finish brunch. The first few bites of the remaining tail and I felt an incredible amount of strength surging through me. I was now officially at superhuman levels of strength, speed, and agility without using skills.

I jumped as high as I could an almost made it to the top of the cliff. “Wh-ho-holy shit!” Of course, I landed badly, but my body was now so tough that it felt like a tap on the head from an angry military officer.

I kept the most exciting part for last, which was my HP and MP. I opened the grimoire and my mind was blown by the numbers I saw. In fact, my excitement somewhat turned to fear when I saw them, because I really began seeing things from Doran’s point of view. Each time I used Consume, the HP, MP, and physical bonuses I got from each meal would be different, depending on the general level and strength of the meal.

H-how fucking strong was that thing?!