Looking more closely at the eggships hull, there was a crack about, going from the ground, to about ⅕  of the height. It was hard to see due to both, lack of light and my poor vision, but it didn’t seem to go through to the other side. The thumping of my three chambered heart grew faster and louder, drowning out the steady hum of thought waves.

Everything. Everything has a positive side to it. I decided I will live this life better than the previous one! Everything is an opportunity! Yeah, I died, and yeah, I’m never going to meet my friends and family again. Yeah it sucks, but I’m in another world you know? A world of magic and monsters! I have to eat INSECTS to survive? I’m EXPERIENCING new cultures! My egg, my house, my fortress, the only thing keeping me alive, my source of security and belonging, only constant in this unknown world, gets damaged due to my own weakness and stupidity? WHAT! A! GreEEEEeaT OPPORTUNITY to IM-PROooVE The CALM SKILL! I can just FEEEL the skill growing. I mean I could have smashed my head against a rock in anger? Or ssscream? Or start biting everyone around me? Instead, I’m just going to stay here in the dark and cry. Except I can’t even do that, as even though I want to, my eyes can’t seem to produce tears.

.. I’m going to be fine. Yeah. Sniff. The noise outside (both mental and auditory) also seems to have died down.

Training! I’m totally not changing the subject of this monologue! I should concentrate on improving my situation. As this experience shows, my current method of meditation has a hole, somehow it doesn’t seem to catch body control signals. As I was busy concentrating on three different things, I didn’t notice anything happening, so I lack any information. No information, no way to make countermeasures. It seems I will have to risk my mind, and SS Snek again. Shit.

I braced myself and slowly moved my head ouf of the shell. This time “SsssssSSss” I did not “rabbit” meditate, concentrating instead on “sssuuunnnnn” my body

Surrounding thoughts seemed weaker this time around. My siblings, wanting to sleep in peace, must have decided to move away from the familial troublemaker. I just realised I haven’t really seen them yet, apart from a quick glance when I hatched, though the later events made the memory blurry.

What’s this dragging ‘Catch” noise? Is’s coming from under “bug” me”... IT’S ME!

Wait! Don’t… think? Concentrate “Fast” on what’s going “no run!” on. How and why are you moving? Suddenly I jumped forward, jaw open, and successfully caught a mouthful of air. Once again, I was in the telepathy-restricting zone.

Hmm… You know how we forget that we breathe until someone points it out? How the body seem to work on a kind of autopilot? That felt a bit similar… No, even that is too generous, it was closer to feeling your heartbeat. It is part of you, you can feel it if you concentrate, and if you concentrate very hard, some people can make it go faster or slower, but even they can't stop it completely. And now, it seems, I have to learn something about as difficult as that. How the hell…

Suddenly I seemed to remember martial arts documentaries, and wuxia novels I’ve read in the past. Wasn't the ability to control your heart, and advanced breath techniques how they got their superhuman strength? Could martial arts be the answer?

Now that I think about it, haven’t I been pretty much an egg-potato ever since I reincarnated? I barely moved at all. There is no way that is good for me! Especially since I know you can get negative skill values, what If I get negative muscle strength, or muscle atrophy skills (assuming they exist)?

Well well well, the mental training arc, has just become a secret martial arts training arc. It’s time to write the first page of the Drunken Fist.. Drunken Snout school of martial arts! Let’s begin by training my… well, my noodle muscles I guess? My abs? 

I moved the part of my body that was outside the egg around. It came natural to me, so I didn’t notice it before but this body really feels completely different. Slithering feels unexpectedly less like twisting the torso around, and more like moving hundreds of little fingers. 

Even If I don’t fully understand them, they are muscles. It should be possible to exercise them. Except, every exercise is an abdominal crunch. Wait, what about my jaw muscles! I should try exercising those as well! I do have that bite skill.

Mother snake woke up, sensing movement. “Danger?!” She started scanning surroundings for unexpected guests. They were currently hidden among roots of a big Beor tree, which created a kind of wooden sieve protecting them from being seen from above. The spaces were also too small to let a jaw of Darkhorn lizard pass through, and they wouldn’t waste their time trying to bite through the hard wood.

What she saw instead, was her… unique child once again doing something weird. Its head still hidden in the egg, its first meal bulging inside, he was moving its lower body up, and down, and to one side, and to the other. And again. And again. What’s even stranger is that he was moving very slowly. “Bad dream?” “Stop bad dream!” 

She slithered closer, and gently bit the child. It jumped up, startled, she could hear him hit his head against the roof of the egg. “Awake. Good.” She turned around, and, as she was about to slither away, the snakeling once again went up, down, left, right… She bit him again, slightly stronger this time. It seemed to get annoyed, and whipped its tail left and right, seemingly trying to make her go away. “Weird child”. She was starting to get angry, but then, she remembered how she worried whether the unusual egg would hatch at all. “Energetic. Good.”, and so she left it to its own devices, though she made sure to find a resting place some distance away from it.

“No man below the heavens can stop the rise of the Drunken Snout! You are like nothing but bugs beyond the might of my tail! Mwahahaha! OUCH!” “Brother. Noisy. Sleep.”

Reisinling

A moment of relative calm for our protagonist.

I’m experimenting with trying to release chapters during more American friendly hours. Also playing around with Krita to create new cover art, suggestions welcome, it’s quite fun! Next chapter in ~24 hours.

Unless, snowstorm problems happen! My glasses were covered in frost when I took a walk outside within 5min, couldn’t see shit (used sunglasses as googles, as I think I left them at my parent’s house). My food delivery was delayed by 5 hours. Fun. It’s supposed to get worse before it gets better.

Snake fact: According to BBC earth, snakes have 10 000 - 15 000 muscles compared to human 800. Couldn’t find any scientific sources to cover that but here you have it. Also, the wikipedia page on snakes has very limited info about their muscles.