#7. The Monster Wolf of Jirisan
#7. The Monster Wolf of Jirisan
[Eel consumed. Experience Points and Satiety increase.]
[Satiety at maximum. Devouring (E) Lv.1 converts excess Satiety into Experience Points.]
[Digestion (F) Lv.3 proficiency at maximum. Digestion (F) Lv.3 → Digestion (F) Lv.4]
[Satiety at maximum. Devouring (E) Lv.1 converts excess Satiety into Experience Points.]
[Devouring (E) Lv.1 proficiency at maximum. Devouring (E) Lv.1 → Devouring (E) Lv.2]
[Experience Points at maximum. Lv.10 → Lv.11]
I had been too focused on the fight to notice, but my skill levels had gone up across the board. I don't think I'd ever pushed so many skills at once before. It drove home just how close I'd come to dying, how narrowly I'd skirted that line.
And what waited on the other side of that line was fruit sweet enough to justify the risk—sweet enough to make the gamble worth it.
The changes weren't limited to my skills. The title that had once belonged to the eel—Master of Baemsagol—had planted itself right in front of my species name.
[*Master of Baemsagol: Ruler of Baemsagol. The inhabitants of Baemsagol tremble in terror and submit.]
...A bit ambiguous. The only "inhabitants" around here were fish, and I doubted we'd be having any meaningful conversations.
When I hauled myself back out of the valley, the increase in my size was unmistakable. Getting out of the water took considerable effort, but once I did, I could see that my body length at Level 11 had already reached 2.6 meters.
'...I'm longer than the eel now.'
The feeling was surreal.
I hadn't even evolved, yet the physical change was more dramatic than an evolution. My outward appearance was the same, but my bulk had multiplied several times over. My weight alone was 30 kilograms—enough to crush animals like chickens or rabbits through sheer pressure. In just a few hours, I had grown by orders of magnitude.
'Even so, I don't think I can beat that Wolf yet...'
I didn't have so much as a 1% chance. If I took a decimal point and tacked on zero after zero until it filled an entire sheet of paper, maybe a 1 would show up somewhere near the very end. I'd thought I'd cleared a major hurdle, but climbing that hill only revealed a mountain waiting behind it. And the real problem? That mountain couldn't be my final destination either.
Still, I had finally reached the starting line.
No settling. No complacency. No stopping. I had to keep pushing forward. I had to find a way to keep growing.
...
Come to think of it, the title's effect said something about the inhabitants of Baemsagol trembling in terror and fear...
***
"Why! Is it! Always! Me! Getting! Dispatched! When! I work! In! Admin! At this rate! I'm—!"
The complaint died in her throat, breath snagging at the end of her lungs before she could force it out. She was dead tired, and the worst part was knowing she still had a long way to go.
Lee Eun-ha lifted her head, utterly drained, and stared up the mountain path. She couldn't see the end of it.
There probably had been a proper trail here once, but that was ancient history. Fifty years of unchecked plant growth had swallowed and buried it.
The thought of turning back was so tempting it made her chest ache... but she couldn't bring herself to do it. With a sigh, she pushed on, and when she finally struggled to the top, a clear stream valley spread out below.
She scooped up two handfuls of water and splashed her face. Washing up helped her feel marginally human again, but the afterthought made her skin crawl.
This was water animals drank from... She should've skipped the face-wash.
She set down her backpack and consulted the map as best she could. This looked like the downstream section. Did she need to make it all the way upstream?
Someone's nagging voice echoed in her head—if you don't know, try it and find out—and Lee Eun-ha grimaced as she stood. She brushed the clumps of dirt off the bottom of her pack and followed the water up. Reaching the upper valley didn't take long.
"...?"
Lee Eun-ha, who had been resting her hand in the water, tilted her head. Something was off.
"...Why aren't there any fish?"
***
'Chewy. Not bad.'
I couldn't taste anything, but texture came through loud and clear. Bones, spines, whatever—my terrifying digestion dissolved it all. Once again, I was reminded that my Sixth Sense hadn't steered me wrong.
I'd tried eating the small fish too, but minnows like that didn't move my EXP anymore. From now on, I only went for the big ones—thirty centimeters or larger.
I left the little ones alone, though. The ecosystem probably wouldn't collapse. ...Probably.
Even with Swimming and Diving, catching fish wasn't easy—until the title's effect kicked in. After that, I could gorge until I was sick of it. The meal only ended once Devouring hit Level 4 and Digestion reached Level 9. Taking down a single eel had somehow come with an entire all-you-can-eat side dish buffet. I devoured the last fish and checked my status.
[Fear of Baemsagol (Amorphous Slime) Lv.14] [EXP 3474 / 5302]
[Length 3.11m] [Height 12.8cm] [Weight 36.9kg]
[STR 51 (73.7%)] [AGI 39 (44.9%)] [VIT 127]
[Skill List]
Devouring (E) Lv.4, Tentacle (F) Lv.8, Heat Sense (F) Lv.7, Weak Regeneration (E) Lv.5, Weak Stealth (E) Lv.6, Observation (F) Lv.8, Presence Detection (F) Lv.6, Faint Hearing (F) Lv.5, Faint Sixth Sense (F) Lv.3, Faint Sight (F) Lv.4, Physical Damage Reduction (E) Lv.3, Weak Hardening (E) Lv.3, Transformation (F) Lv.7, Faint Poison Resistance (F) Lv.1, Intimidation (F) Lv.3, Digestion (F) Lv.9, Swimming (F) Lv.4, Diving (F) Lv.4, Elasticity (E) Lv.3
[Remaining Skill Points: 5]
The growth was staggering. Devouring had been E-rank Level 2 right after eating the eel, and now it was Level 4. I had, after all, systematically stripped an entire valley ecosystem that hadn't seen human hands in decades. The title alone is proof enough.
'Fear of Baemsagol, huh.'
A dry laugh slipped out. Even without using Observation to check, I had a rough idea what the effect did, though I doubted I'd ever benefit from it again. Every last resident of Baemsagol had become an excellent source of protein.
My System-displayed status had changed in another way too. Numbers I'd been hoping to see had finally appeared—with percentage signs attached. I had a decent guess what they meant. Extrapolating from how the earlier status window worked, this was probably another comparison. When I used Observation to confirm, sure enough, it told me these were averages for the physical abilities of animals with similar body weight.
'VIT doesn't even get a number, does it.'
Incomparable. A way of saying my sheer vitality was monstrous. It hit me all over again how astonishing a slime's tenacity was—I'd survived being smaller than a knuckle.
...I'd lingered in Baemsagol for quite a while. But it was time to move on.
...
Spotting a red squirrel up in a tree stirred my appetite. But I had no way to reach it. If it were a matter of sneaking up with Stealth, sure, but catching a squirrel that was determined to flee was a different story. That said, the question flickered through my mind: was it really impossible?
Could I use Elasticity the way a monkey swings through branches? Even if I messed up and fell, with Physical Damage Reduction and Weak Regeneration, dying wasn't a concern. More importantly, being able to move through the treetops in a mountain like this would be a massive advantage. No more grueling uphill climbs. And if I could climb trees, maybe I could scale rock faces too.
Deciding it was worth a try, I started up the nearest tree. I slipped immediately the first time, but by driving my tentacles into the gaps in the bark for grip, I found I could manage the climb.
The downside: I was agonizingly slow. Three minutes to climb a single tree. I'd been aiming for the lowest branch, but a thought I'd overlooked finally surfaced.
Thirty kilograms. My body weight. Could a branch even support me?
I decided to find out and pulled myself onto the branch. It held at first, but the farther out I went, toward the thinner tip, the more it wobbled and threatened to snap. Rationally, I knew a fall wouldn't kill me and wouldn't even hurt, but some part of me was still scared. Primal, unavoidable fear. I forced myself to take deep breaths and steadied my nerves.
With some mental self-coaxing, I made it all the way to the end. I hung there and began swinging, building up pendulum momentum—and that's when I heard a sound I really didn't want to hear.
Craaack—snap!
The branch broke. I launched myself the instant it gave way, sailing several meters through the air and just barely catching a nearby branch.
A success, technically. Not the exact spot I'd been aiming for, but I hadn't fallen—that alone was a win. I'd also jumped much higher than expected, carrying myself close to the canopy. I should've anticipated this after seeing how well I could move in the water, but Elasticity packed more punch than I'd accounted for.
'If I'm jumping higher, I just need to jump farther too.'
I spotted an unobstructed straight-line trajectory and launched myself toward it.
[Red squirrel consumed. Satiety and Experience Points increase.]
A small accident mid-jump. The squirrel I collided with slid right into my food vacuole and dissolved in an instant.
I hadn't meant to eat it, but hey, a bonus is a bonus.
The sheer force of the impact really sank in. When you think about it, I was essentially a 30-kilogram projectile hurtling through the air like a cannonball. Just imagining it was horrifying.
Of course, if I got any heavier, the branches would snap, so that trick had a shelf life.
Still, I'd reached a significant height. A slime body couldn't exactly stroll into a city, so I needed to start thinking about solutions. I couldn't stay in the wilderness forever.
'If I could just eat that Black Wolf...'
That would be a massive leap in growth all at once. If I used Transformation to adjust my shape just enough, slipping into a city might actually be possible.
Even if eating the Black Wolf turned me into a Wolf myself, with the Transformation skill, I'd still have some ability to change shape—maybe not as freely as now, but enough. As my level increased, that control would only improve. With Transformation in my arsenal, there was no reason to cling to being a slime forever. ...It might be time to start seriously considering an evolution into another creature.
[Evolution Available List]
1. -
My immediate objective was clear: evolve into that Black Wolf, the creature that was almost certainly the undisputed ruler of Jirisan. And to eat it, I obviously had to become strong enough to beat it. I couldn't afford to stop growing. That was when a shape caught my eye, and I blinked.
A water deer, grazing. I pulled my body taut at the sight of it—drawn tight like a bowstring at full draw—and then released everything at once. I shot forward. On impact, the water deer was instantly reduced to something grotesque.
It splattered across the ground in a shape too horrific to describe, a ruin of what had been a water deer. The sight was ghastly. I forced myself to repeat that this was all EXP, deactivated my Sight, and tried not to think about it as I scooped the remains into my food vacuole.
An effective attack. Highly effective—but it came with recoil. The collision had cost me a significant chunk of my own body mass. And that was even after using Weak Hardening at the last moment.
Still, I'd gained a weapon worth the price. Think of a 37-kilogram boulder falling from the top of a tree... I might have already become the apex predator of this ecosystem. Except for that Black Wolf.
Weak Regeneration quickly restored the body surface area I'd lost, and consuming the pulverized deer didn't take long.
[Water deer consumed. Experience Points and Satiety increase.]
[Digestion (F) Lv.9 proficiency at maximum. Digestion (F) Lv.9 → Digestion (F) Lv.10]
[Digestion (F) Lv.10 has reached its maximum level. Digestion (F) Lv.10 → Empty Stomach (E) Lv.1]
I'd expected Tentacle to hit E-rank first, but Digestion beat it to the punch.
Digestion evolves into... Empty Stomach? That feels like a strange leap...
[Empty Stomach (E): Increases appetite and aids digestive activity.]
...I honestly couldn't tell what was supposed to be so different. At least the original digestive ability seemed to have stuck around, which was a relief. Actually, skill evolutions don't erase the previous skill anyway.
As I continued on my way, I felt a strange presence behind me. It was beyond the range of Heat Sense, yet intense enough to register anyway—far too much energy for any ordinary living creature. It felt like a bomb had gone off somewhere in the distance.
And I had felt that massive energy once before. Back before my evolution, when the mere act of clumsily using it had rocketed my Stealth level upward in a single moment. A monster.
It was different from the Black Wolf. This wasn't a question of odds. A gut feeling—no, a conviction—told me that as I was now, I couldn't win even if I threw a fleet of trucks at it.
[Faint Sixth Sense (F) Lv.3 proficiency at maximum. Faint Sixth Sense (F) Lv.3 → Faint Sixth Sense (F) Lv.4]
Every time I thought I'd gotten stronger, something even more powerful showed up, one after another. Fight a rat. Battle a chicken to the death. See the monster Wolf in Baemsagol. Kill the Master of Baemsagol. Just when I'd finally started to believe I was strong, the world made sure to shatter that illusion immediately.
As if to remind me, over and over, that there was no time to rest.
'...Run first, think later.'
Brave and reckless are not the same thing. I had no interest in dying a pointless death.