The Poor's Strategy, The Rich's Strategy 2
The ecosystem is a battlefield where the strategies of countless creatures clash.
I use the word “strategy,” but it’s not like any creature consciously thinks, I should live like this and then builds a plan. More accurately, every creature simply does whatever it’s good at, and the ones that somehow survive keep doing exactly what they were doing. The ones that die can’t pass on their “strategy,” so the behavior of those who kept doing the same thing and survived becomes what we call a strategy.
Occasionally a mutation appears and they start doing something a little different, and if that succeeds too, well… that’s how it goes.
For a long time, I thought this “strategy” was entirely decided by genes. I believed the programming encoded in DNA was absolute. That line of thinking led to fatalism, determinism, and eventually eugenics. You get the idea.
But when I actually studied it, that wasn’t the case. Even with identical genes, organisms possessed the flexibility to change their form depending on the environment.
The simplest example is intelligence. The ability to think and make different judgments based on circumstances.
But sometimes the body itself changes. For instance, when the environment becomes harsh, some water fleas grow horns and adopt a combat-ready form.
When the environment is mild? They don’t bother making expensive organs like horns and instead pour resources into more productive activities—eating a lot and reproducing.
Insects can alter their bodies to better adapt to sudden temperature changes, becoming more suited to hotter or colder conditions. (Of course, if their climate prediction fails, they die in droves, but anyway…)
Sometimes the changes appear across generations. There’s research showing that children born to generations that experienced famine are more prone to obesity. Even after the famine ends, the body instinctively programs the offspring to eat more and store energy. It’s not as if the parents consciously altered their children’s genes.
This genetic flexibility—rather than relying on rare mutations that appear once every few hundred generations—allows genes to generate appropriate responses for each generation, each individual, and each environment. That is why life has been able to flourish.
In terms of strategy, flexibility is an incredibly important factor. A strategy that can only execute a single pre-programmed behavior is useless in an environment full of variables.
Look at any competitive game—card games, hero-selection AOS titles, or any game with PvP elements. Sure, raw power is great, but the characters or decks that see the most use are almost always the ones with high flexibility, the ones that can find a way to be useful in almost any situation.
Theoretically, if a creature existed that could respond to and adapt to every possible situation, it would truly deserve to be called the ultimate lifeform. Being able to counter and adapt to everything means no threat could ever stop its reproduction. It would never go extinct. The apex of biology. There’s even a grandiose name for it: “Darwin’s Demon.”
I got sidetracked. Anyway… I used to think this only applied to biological threats.
Apparently I was wrong. There existed a mystic-adaptive lifeform that could change its own form according to the surrounding mana density.
“In truth, such creatures aren’t that rare. They’re quite common in worlds where mystery exists.”
“Ah. I see.”
“However, I’m not sure what would happen if one were refined to the absolute limit.”
If a lifeform that changed its survival strategy in response to mana could appear in far more varied forms, the strategic breadth of my ecosystem would expand dramatically.
To be blunt, if these creatures became the mainstream, I wouldn’t even need to worry about mana shortages. I could feed half of them plenty of mana and simply let the other half starve in mana-deprived conditions.
Well, not exactly starve. I’d just help creatures that thrive in mana-scarce environments adapt a little to mana-rich ones.
“I’m not sure if this is truly a good thing or a bad thing.”
Since it would let me save more lives, I decided it was a good thing. I resolved to closely observe the toads that grew gigantic when exposed to overflowing mana in the area.
Using divine power, I first analyzed their physical structure. I could examine their genes in detail, and from that I discovered several things.
First. All toads only gigantified in response to a “specific flow.” I still didn’t know exactly what that flow was.
Sesaisa had said the varieties of flow were practically infinite. It was probably a category beyond what I could comprehend. This prevented the toads from gigantifying in response to just any mana.
Second. The gigantification gene, strictly speaking, existed as an actual organ. When there was no mana around, the organ simply shriveled up and performed no function.
It sounded so absurd I double-checked, but it really did nothing. No matter how I looked, it only consumed energy without any meaningful activity.
However, when that specific flow appeared, the organ suddenly activated.
Biologically, it inhaled and released super-growth hormones along with the specific flow, forcibly restarting growth in toads that had already finished developing and making them continue to grow larger. A toad no bigger than a human palm could become a two-meter-diameter giant monster.
Third. The change was irreversible. Once a toad gigantified, it could never return to its original form.
A gigantified toad became stronger in proportion to its size, consumed far more energy, and had no trouble reproducing (they used external fertilization), so they could still breed with normal toads.
But there was a problem. Their lifespan dropped to one-tenth. And it wasn’t just the shortened lifespan—the cause of that shortening was the real issue.
The gigantified toads suffered constant pain in proportion to their size. As I mentioned before, living creatures cannot grow beyond the size permitted to them. Yet these palm-sized creatures were becoming larger than a human.
Just how far past their natural limit were they going? In human terms, it was like an average-sized woman suddenly growing over thirty meters tall. If their bodies didn’t suffer abnormalities, that would be even more surprising.
They experienced reduced intelligence, sensory disorders, skeletal deformities, muscle ruptures, and every other grotesque problem that comes with excessive size.
So why had this gene survived? Simple. A two-meter toad was insanely strong. Frogs and toads may look incredibly cute and ridiculous, but they are still carnivorous creatures.
Leaping several meters in a single bound looked monstrous, and their dependence on moisture decreased to the point where one might question whether they were even amphibians anymore.
They simply became super toads.
“Impressive. Even without further improvement, they seem quite powerful.”
I had to agree. After all, the category we casually call “frogs” is actually incredibly broad. (The term “frog” usually refers to all creatures in the order Anura. To give you an idea of how large an order is, dogs, cats, bears, raccoons, mongooses, weasels, and seals are all grouped together in the order Carnivora.)
So I decided to test just how strong they were. Using World Shaping, I tore their habitat away and attached it directly next to the Martial Sugar Lumps’ territory.
“?”
“?”
Both the toads and the sugar lumps looked visibly confused. They had sensed the sudden change in terrain.
The toads immediately noticed the increased mana density around them. Their genes activated. The organ flared to life, and they began greedily devouring everything nearby to increase their size.
The Martial Sugar Lumps were still cautious. They didn’t know how to judge this new, suddenly appearing terrain. If they had been smarter, they might have recognized it as divine intervention, but the concept of sacred harmony was still foreign to the sugar lumps.
Then the Martial Sugar Lumps discovered the enlarged toads. Creatures that had once been palm-sized were now as big as a human torso. The sugar lumps made a brief commotion at the sight of these unfamiliar beings.
“Let’s eat it!”
“Should we try?”
As they approached, the toads didn’t charge—they fled. They ran surprisingly fast, but the sugar lumps were faster. The toads couldn’t shake off the martial artists and ended up becoming a meal.
Oh, and the sugar lumps didn’t know how to use fire. They ate their food raw.
However, they did sometimes bring back jelly-like creatures that ignited when touched and used them to cook their meals. Could that be considered the use of flint? Had these things truly entered the realm of Homo erectus?
I wasn’t sure. The sugar lumps happily devoured the toads, and the toads still had no way to oppose them.
I continued observing. The Martial Sugar Lumps in this area weren’t particularly large. But thanks to the toads hunting food at an absurd speed, in just ten days the size dynamic between the sugar lumps and the toads had completely reversed.
“That one got bigger.”
“We can still catch it.”
The sugar lumps grabbed their weapons and charged at a toad roughly 1.7 meters in diameter that was moving alone. The toad reacted as well. Instead of fleeing, it charged right back.
But the insane reflexes of the Martial Sugar Lumps easily dodged the attack, and they drove their spears deep into its body. Even at this point the hunt was easy, but…
Five days later, a young sugar lump was eaten by a toad. Enraged, the others swarmed the two-meter maximum-sized specimens, attacking wildly and devouring them.
Whether the toads shot out their tongues, swung their front legs, or leaped to crush them, the sugar lumps dodged everything and tore the creatures to shreds.
It seemed the toads simply could not defeat the Martial Sugar Lumps.
But what about the Magic Sugar Lumps?
“Will there be a difference?”
No. There wasn’t. The Magic Sugar Lumps simply watched the toads charge, then casually fired off spells and drove them all away. Mages really are overpowered.
“They’re weaker than I expected.”
Looking purely at size, a two-meter-diameter toad should have been more than capable of hunting both Martial and Magic Sugar Lumps.
The problem was that both types of sugar lumps possessed extremely high intelligence and operated as pack creatures that understood strategy and tactics. Just as a wolf pack can hunt a giant bull, size difference against toads meant nothing.
Then there was no point in pitting them against creatures stronger than the sugar lumps. At best they could only hunt Gamchi, insects, or wild animals that couldn’t use magic.
“A complete failure, then?”
Not necessarily. Because the cost of war was different.
“Cost of war?”
An ecosystem is ultimately a struggle over resources—against other competitors, or even against one’s own kind…
From that perspective, creatures capable of using mystery could utilize not only normal nutrients (matter) but also the additional resource of mana.
In that sense, sugar lumps were creatures with quite a high cost of war. Tough bodies, outstanding intelligence, powerful hunting skills to support that intelligence, and martial arts powered by the strong mana pressure of the Nectar ecosystem…
Within my entire ecosystem, they ranked in the middle-to-upper tier. The Caramel Camels occupied the upper tier, and the Bisyakheet sat at the very top. But the sugar lumps also consumed a considerable amount of resources.
“So the toads simply lost because they were poor?”
Exactly. These toads lived in mana-scarce environments. When the surrounding mana pressure rose, they sensed “there is a strong predator” and simply grew larger.
They were creatures that increased their size primarily for defense. Being able to hunt larger prey was merely a secondary benefit.
In other words, these toads were the middle class of my ecosystem.
Unlike the rich sugar lumps who could splurge on mystery, or the chaebol Bisyakheet who could waste it extravagantly, they possessed moderate flexibility—growing stronger when mana was present and weaker when it was absent.
However, when the middle and lower classes become thicker, the upper class also gains great benefits.
After all, these creatures could occupy the position of “low-grade soldiers” capable of surviving even in mana-poor environments.
What matters in an ecosystem is not simply strength. Did dinosaurs go extinct because they were weak? No—they went extinct because they were too large.
In the end, all you need is an irreplaceable position within the ecosystem.
In my view, these toads had that potential. Before the ninth collision, I wanted to strengthen the survival strategies of these weak creatures who were not rich.