“Brother. Ssssmall” SHIT “Full” SHIT “Hide and wait” SSsssHIT “Pollinate” 

I didn’t realise my mistake until it was too late. As If wanting to refuse reality, I tried putting myself back inside the egg. As expected, my meal blocked me from passing through, getting stuck about a third of my length in, but the head was in.

“Child hiding” Most intrusions stopped. Only thoughts coming from my mother, “Smart” who both worried and curious moved next to me, could be felt. While I appreciated “bad place” her care, I hoped she would move away. One person's “tail see” worth of being worried was enough, thank you very “doesn’t know?” much. The best way to describe, when I felt the same emotion from two different sources, “teach” was as if you watched an animation of two bright images blinking very quickly- the effect of constant change worse than the image itself.

“Ow!” - I got nibbed on my tail! “Now see, bad place” Well, yes, I know, can’t do much okay? “Child good?”

I tried moving my tail happily like a dog to show being fine. Seemingly satisfied, she left, now that her children were fed, to eat herself.

I just laid there, too exhausted to move. Slight hum, a kind of brain tinnitus still accompanied me, increasing the mental strain. I wanted to sleep. My breath calmed down after a while, but my mind was still too shaken with the events of the day, to fall asleep. Breathe in. Breathe out. Meditate. All thoughts to the ball. All thoughts to the ball. Companion ball loves you. Companion ball is your only friend.

…

…

…

Tall grass surrounded me on all sides. I felt a sense of familiarity, as if I’ve been to this place hundreds of times.  I slithered forward, sure of my path. There was a clearing nearby, and I was sure I could find something to hunt there.

I slowed down, smelling something in the air. Peeking through the grass, I saw two white rabbits, munching on a bushy plant. One of them, was big, bigger then me. It’s fur lustrous, and well kept, beautiful even to my eyes. But I could not see much meat on it, not very nutrient prey. The second rabbit was smaller, it’s fur not as bright, dirtied here and there. Also unlike its companion, it was very plump! So plump! Could it even hop away from me with all this weight on it? Wouldn’t it just die of a heart attack if I jumped out?  It would last me a long time!.

I twirled my tail, deciding which to eat. My instincts screaming me to jump on the plump one. But my pride felt hurt, am I not a mighty hunter now? A king of the hunt! Rosebugs tremble in front of me! Yes, It’s time for the bigger prey!

I lept into action. My mouth opened impossibly wide, and devoured the bigger rabbit. Satisfied with the result, I wanted to move away, but couldn’t. My stomach was too heavy. I wouldn’t bunch an inch, even when I used all my strength, as If I ate a boulder. And it felt.. It felt as it was growing bigger! And bigger! I screamed, screamed with my human voice, not snake voice, but I couldn’t do anything! I could only look in terror at my ever expanding stomach.

POP!

I woke up.

Damn those dreams. I’m getting nightmares from all the stress. Also, you shouldn’t eat so much before sleep. Basing on the feeling on my skiing, I guess it’s night outside. The hum of other thoughts got less noticeable. Perfect time to hatch plans. Let’s see, Status!

… what do you mean advancing? WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY ADVANCING?! 

Okay. Okay. Let’s practice our new calm skill! And let’s use our new Judgment skill! The result: I’m fucked. Apparently, the skill is now going to advance no matter what. Not knowing whether it’s going to create a new skill, or upgrade the existing one makes me even more anxious. Calm, calm, lets stay calm. Okay.

How about panicking about the newcomer instead? Negative value next to fear resistance? As if mind resistance wasn’t enough of a problem, it got a very synergistic friend!

I must do something about these two, or I will go insane. Or die. Or most likely, both. The only reason I have any chance at all is my egg shell, my fortress, my greatest ally in this world. For whatever reason it seems to block the “mind waves”. It really does feel as if I was inside a batiscafo, deep inside an ocean of thoughts, ready to crush me at any moment. Now that there is a window, some thoughts get in, but it’s still much better than being outside.

As my earlier predicament shows, this won’t work for long. I’m getting bigger. Even if I don’t grow as big as my mother any time soon, even a third of that would be too much to make my head fit in. Even if that wasn’t the case- this egg won’t last forever. While it’s currently in pretty good condition (especially considering how i tried to break it when hatching), it will deteriorate with time. I also can’t be sure if the mind blocking effect will last forever.

I need to get stronger. I could increase my mind defence skill, or get an alternate one that would deal with both negative problems. When trying to fall asleep, I used meditation out of a habit, formed during my life as an egg, and it really seemed to help. Maybe I could try to meditate while moving? I’ve heard some people talking about using physical exercise as meditation - it should be possible to connect the two.

The problem is the other thing that happened during the Rosebug fight - it wasn’t only thoughts, even my body seemed to sometimes get hijacked by signals sent from other people. And you know, due to the whole BEING A BEAST IN A JUNGLE thing (calm! Calm! Practice calm!) not being fully in charge of my own body during fights is extremely dangerous.

Fortunately, I’m full now. As far as I know, snakes don’t need to eat that often. That gives me some time before we move again to do some training and prepare for the next fight.

We all know what time it is. TRAINING ARC! Except it’s far less exciting when you are the one that has to risk his life and sacrifice your comfort. Damn, I really liked to read about those parts, but now that it happens to me it stinks.

With the enthusiasm of an average successful twitch streamer, I started my preparations. First, start meditating. All thoughts, moving towards the dark sphere in my belly. All senses, as well. Relax, and repeat. Breathe in, breathe out. In. Out. 

When I felt ready, I started to slowly move the top of my body out of the shell. Having a gigantic lump in the middle made it more difficult than it was before. Having to, at once, clear your mind, while carefully moving AND monitoring your mental defences was hard. Centimeter by centimeter i moved out, until finally, the mental assault made this balancing act impossible. I saw a grass field. I was slithering through it and... Wait, stop! STOP! Don’t let it lead you on, meditate! Grass? To the dark ball. Ground? Ball. 

I concentrated on clearing my mind so hard, that I didn’t notice that my tail was moving in sync with the dreaming snake, pushing both me and the egg forward, until eventually we hit something. That something “HURT!”, being apparently “BAD” one of my siblings, who was not very “ANGRY!” appreciative of being woken up “BITE” from a nap. He snapped “NOM!” and slightly bit my tail, which in turn made me hiss in pain quite loudly, which woke up even “ATTACK?!” more animals “DANGER?!” around me “tttireedd”, in panick “Sssssneeak attack?” I quickly hid my head back as deep in the egg as possible. And while doing this I noticed something - the collision seems to have visibly damaged my SS Egg..

Reisinling

Sorry for the delay, I overslept.

Coming up: synopsis poll, then short lore chapter about the races we met until now.

Next “real” chapter tomorrow.