...I almost died.
The transcendent boom echoing from outside and the overwhelming earthquake all around made it feel like a chill still lingered in my bones.
While I was falling toward the ground after exhausting all my stamina and action points, I only managed to regain my senses because my head slammed into a hard rock.
I immediately dumped 700 of the 798 allocatable points I had into stamina and action points.
Thanks to that, I could barely move my body.
And the moment I hit the ground, I softened my body with [Body Transformation] to reduce the impact, then dug deep into the rubble.
If I had been even a little later, I would have died in the fall or been crushed under the massive wreckage of the buildings and gone to the other side.
...Still.
I survived.
Using the faint sliver of light seeping in from above, I bit down on the corpse that had fallen with me.
Crack.
Crunch-crunch-crack.
Gnash.
Crunch. Crunch.
Krrrkkk....
...Tear.
I tore into the flesh in my mouth.
The tender meat was being sliced apart between my teeth.
I chewed and swallowed it, then used my claws to rip through the muscle.
Muscle packed too densely was hard to break through.
But I had found my own method.
[Strong Acidic Body Fluids LV1]
A skill I gained from the thing I was currently tearing apart and eating.
Because I obtained it, all the fluids in my body had turned strongly acidic.
It was a skill that would be useful in future battles too.
However.
Maybe because its effect conflicted while my body was transforming, the [Acid Immunity] I already had vanished.
Still, the thing I got this time seemed to be an upgraded version of [Acid Immunity], so even when the strong acid left behind in the corpse touched my skin, it didn't really do any damage.
In the end, my immunity got stronger and my means of attack increased too, so it was definitely a gain.
Through this experience, I also learned something new: a lower-tier skill gets absorbed into a higher-tier one.
From a profit standpoint, there was nothing better.
And not only that, like this.
Sssssssss....
Using my saliva, I melted the muscle lumps that absolutely refused to be chewed into a soft, mushy mass.
It didn't completely liquefy or anything, but honestly, this was just right.
Feeling the flesh become easy to chew, I swallowed it down.
This was meat from a dragon-level monster I had hunted for the first time.
Of course, the taste was...
"...Ugh, ngh... ngh...."
...I can say this with certainty.
It was the worst taste in history.
The remains of Vaccine Man, also dragon-level, had definitely been edible... so why...?
"Ugh... I, I wanna throw up...."
Even the disgusting moth monster I had barely forced down before was nothing compared to this.
The smell was like garbage rotting for over a month.
The taste was thick, bitter, astringent, and the faint sourness mixed in here and there was irritating.
At least the flesh itself was soft.
But even that was only in tiny amounts, and some parts were so mushy they didn't even feel like food.
I was managing to eat the muscle and bones by melting them somehow, but the taste was equally filthy either way.
"Ah, ahhhhhhhhh...."
After two rounds of evolution and hunting countless monsters, I had gained 17 skills.
I had become so much stronger that comparison to the beginning was meaningless.
My body had grown stronger and more refined.
Unfortunately, my tongue seemed to be the only thing that hadn't improved.
Even after chewing through hundreds of monsters over the course of two or three weeks, I still couldn't get used to a taste this awful.
Still, somehow, I just had to endure...
Grrrrrrr....
"...Ugh."
...No, this was impossible after all.
I really couldn't do it.
What I had eaten started boiling in my stomach and surged up toward my throat.
I couldn't hold it back like this.
I tried chewing and swallowing the surrounding rocks and dirt, but it wasn't enough.
Ah.
Just when I thought I was really lucky.
Why was this kind of trial being thrown at me?
I really can't keep going...
...As if.
There was no way I was going to throw up my food.
I forcibly blocked the strange, mixed-up mass trying to spew out of my mouth, then used [Body Transformation] to move some of my body's muscles into my throat.
Twisting and writhing however I could, I shoved back down what had risen all the way to my mouth.
With tears welling in my eyes, I glared at the remaining corpse.
I grabbed it hard without a word and started chewing again.
This is medicine. This is medicine.
There's a saying that bitter medicine is good for the body.
So this trash-tasting corpse has to be good for me too.
Repeating that to myself, I forced it down bit by bit.
Every so often my throat would convulse and try to send the contents of my stomach back up the esophagus, but by moving even more muscles into my throat with [Body Transformation], I somehow held on.
Saliva dripped everywhere, but I didn't care.
My arms and legs were trembling, but I was used to that now.
My tongue and nose were rotting away, but... I ignored it. Somehow.
I chewed through the waist.
Then I started swallowing the legs.
I was almost there.
Just a little more, and...
"...Gubububub...?"
At last, the melted mass broke through the constriction of my muscles and tried to spill out all at once.
No.
Go back.
I tilted my head up.
I fused my upper and lower jaws together completely, preventing the eruption at the first stage.
Then I pressed down on the leg sticking out of my mouth and shoved it back in.
Little by little, what had surged up began to go back down too.
After barely getting the foot into my mouth, I finally moved my throat muscles and pushed it below the throat.
Down, and down.
At last, when the foot passed through my throat, I made my throat rattle with one big gulp.
Gulllllk!
"...Phew... haaah...!"
Only then did I finally let out a rough breath.
Wiping away the sweat pouring off me like rain, I somehow got my body back on its feet.
Grrrrrrrrrrrr....
".........Ugh."
...For some reason, it felt like my stomach was screaming and twisting itself apart.
Though there was no way that could be.
Feeling the chunks of meat settle into my stomach and begin to digest, I turned my gaze to the small sliver of light seeping in above.
Just then, the clash of the continuing booms had finally ended.
Maybe I should go out now.
With claws that somehow felt sharper than before, I started digging through the rubble...
"...Ah, come to think of it."
Maybe because I had been too focused on the disgusting taste of the food, I hadn't properly checked my status.
Thinking the word status in my head, I stared at the blue rectangular window that appeared before me.
[Name: Stronger Lizard Monster]
[Alias: Monster Hunter]
[Disaster Level: Demon (promotion conditions not met)]
[HP: 356/4000]
[ST: 5000/5000]
[AP: 350/2000]
[SP: 6000/6000]
[MP: 10/2051]
[Allocatable Points: 20098]
[Skills (17/20): [Super Instinct] LV8, [Quiet Steps] LV6, [Sharp Claws] LV8, [Strong Teeth] LV7, [Tail Severing] LV4, [Hardened Body] LV7, [Super Regeneration] LV8, [Stealth] LV4, [Shock Absorption] LV3, [Might] LV6, [Instant Acceleration] LV5, [Body Transformation] LV5, [Tracking] LV1, [Warp] LV2, [Strong Acidic Body Fluids] LV1, [ㄱ탄], [Psychokinetic Crushing Fist] LV2]
For sure, I had gained psychokinesis... I wasn't really sure by what principle I had obtained it, though.
Still, I was certain it would be useful from now on too.
It'd be good to use it often and build up proficiency.
As I was about to make the status window disappear again...
"...No. No, no, no. Wait. Hold on."
...Had my eyes gone bad?
No. Had my vision gone to hell?
What was this?
Something was a little off.
Had I failed to land properly on the ground earlier, passed out, and was now dreaming?
But if that was the case, then the trash I ate just now was...
"...Ugh."
...Let's stop thinking about that.
Anyway, this wasn't a dream.
No.
It wasn't, but...
".........Is this for real?"
[Allocatable Points: 20098]
Twenty thousand.
What was my total status again?
Nineteen thousand fifty-one...
"...................."
Describe the feeling of having your stats double even though you haven't even been promoted yet.
The answer is, I don't know it myself.
...
I took one deep breath and shifted my attention.
Let's just forget about it for a bit.
For now, the priority was getting out to the surface.
Little by little, I spread the rubble apart so it wouldn't collapse all at once.
One by one, I dug my way upward through the wreckage.
Before long, warm sunlight tickled the corners of my eyes.
"...Huuuu...."
Only then did my breathing finally open up.
Lying down beneath the warm sunlight, a languid feeling spread through my whole body.
Even the strange blue finger in front of me looked rather...
".........Huh?"
I rubbed my eyes and looked at it properly.
It was a finger. A blue one, at that.
The faint sky-blue glow it gave off made it look anything but ordinary.
...Was it a monster's?
Come to think of it, the thing I had just eaten and the octopus-like thing seemed to have had companions.
Guessing that this was probably the remains of one of them, I approached.
"...Works out for me."
As always, free food was welcome.
Just like now.
Then let's take a bite...
Shiver!
"................!!!"
Nothing moved. Nothing changed.
And yet, I still jerked backward as if I had been struck.
Every defense mechanism in my body snapped into a defensive stance.
The alarm of instinct warning me of danger.
My pupils trembled, and sweat poured down under my legs like a waterfall.
My limbs convulsed, and my head wouldn't turn properly, so...
"................"
If I ate it, I would die.
That thing was not some mere companion of those guys from earlier.
It was something higher than that, something superior.
It couldn't even be compared.
It was overwhelmingly superior.
It felt somewhat like the sensation I had when I first faced Vaccine Man.
The difference was that back then he had been wolf-level, while now this was demon-level. And a high-end one at that.
Then...
What the hell kind of monster was this?
................
I carefully poked it.
Nothing happened.
But I still couldn't even begin to estimate the energy inside it.
My instincts warned me that my current body wouldn't be able to withstand it.
Just one finger.
................
For now, I'll take it with me.
I stored it somewhere on my body with [Body Transformation] and hardened it firmly with [Hardened Body].
I had no idea how it might be useful later.
Shaking off my unease, I moved forward.
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