The leviathans caught below were a far cry from the terrible bad-things that had brought my death in the previous false-life. Sure, their outward appearance was the same; they were still massive things many not-Needles in length and width. They were still covered in coarse, ugly flesh. They still sported gaping maws and terrible teeth, able to swallow even my now-larger form with ease, and tendrils below their jaws that undulated and twisted as if trying to grab anything that came near.

But the panic…that was new. Different.

Wonderful.

It started with a deep wail, a sound that was long and slow, yet somehow frantic all the same. I didn’t know they could do that. They hadn’t before, not even the one that died when the Echo-Focus exploded. Then again, it probably didn’t last long enough to cry out. It had been a quick death.

Far from what was happening now.

The two leviathans twisted and thrashed below me. Thick, bundled threads snapped one by one, ripped away from their anchors. I sent out more thought-hisses to accompany each one, causing the damaged threads to violently rush inwards, adding themselves to the giant tangle of sticky threads that had the leviathans trapped.

The bad-things rubbed against one another violently in their attempts to escape, teeth gnashing and snapping in desperation. A few threads ripped here and there, but so did flesh, the thrashing bad-things unable to avoid one another’s teeth. There wasn’t much space in the tangle of threads, and the violent twisting of spore-roots only made it worse, causing the thread-trap to close even further. Around their heads, their fins, their tendrils. Anything that might let them escape before I finished what I started.

Then, finally, I made it all the way down. I opened my mouth. I bit down on flesh. The wails grew louder, making the mana-water vibrate around me.

They must have realized they had lost.

That I had won.

Then again, that had only been a matter of time.

 

---

 

It began with the barest of twitches. The flex of a tiny portion of flesh, almost imperceptible on the scale of a leviathan, and even harder to see with the way that the bad-thing raged and thrashed. The two bad-things had long since broken free of the threads that had bound them, and were in the process of attempting to work out their anger on everything nearby - but particularly me.

For the first time, I was glad that the giant things didn’t have legs. If they did, they might have been able to walk onto the shore where I waited and devour me. But they didn’t, and so the worst they could do was send waves of mana-water in my direction.

It was an enjoyable process, even if it was lasting longer than I’d have liked.

The massive bad-things had a lot of flesh. It was somewhat like the roots of the Darkwood all over again; it would take some time to fully convert them.

Luckily, [Verdure Parasite] - though far weaker than it had been amidst the bountiful plant-flesh that the Nature Core had created - was making the wait far shorter than it would have otherwise been.

I turned towards my nearby spore-puppets, letting the leviathans be for the moment. With the success of the thread-trap and the soon-to-be conversion of two leviathans, I didn’t need so many Darkweavers anymore - which was good, because many of them were starving to death from producing so many threads so quickly.

It was past time to cull the weakest among them. Between my Darkweavers, the leviathans, and any other nearby bad-things that I could find, it probably wouldn’t take long for me to receive my next reward - and maybe even push closer to the one after that. Even if I already knew that this life would be focused on putting all of my rewards into [Size], I was still interested in at least seeing what the possibilities for my newest Traits might bring.

And besides, it might be nice to grow even bigger for a little while.

The thought made my scale-flesh almost tingle in anticipation, as if it were already beginning to shift and grow.

Maybe when I was done, and the bad-things of the lake were defeated entirely, they wouldn’t feel quite so big anymore. For all that [Size] had done less than I hoped, it still made a difference - one appeared to grow every time I picked it. The first time I chose it had less of an effect than the second.

Might as well go all in.

I started my feast, ignoring the angry wails of the leviathans of the lake. My spore-puppets stood silent and still, valiantly sacrificing their lives for the Great Core.

Perhaps that sacrifice would allow them to be born without such disgusting legs in another life. There was always hope.

---

Experience Gained!

Level up!

1 Trait Point Gained.

Level 24 Darkweaver Consumed.

Transferred to Core.

Progress Towards Next Upgrade: 7/80.

 

…

 

Experience Gained!

Level up!

1 Trait Point Gained.

Level 14 Darkweaver Consumed.

Transferred to Core.

Progress Towards Next Upgrade: 42/80.

---

By the time the two leviathans were brought under the Great Core’s light in full, the entire shore was awash with trickling mana-water, the result of the leviathans’ frantic jerks and thrashes; the increasing growth of my spore-roots had seemed to only enrage them, and they made that rage known. The blood of my many now-dead spore-puppets mixed with the shining waters, forming contrasting lines of liquid that washed between the legs of the Darkweavers that still remained.

Here and there, bits of the leviathans’ flesh were sloughed off, torn away as the bad-things desperately scraped at the stone edges of the lake - bloody strips that found their way to shore along with the waves the bad-things created.

I fed the pieces to my Darkweavers. There wasn’t any chance that, even if I reached level 60 and chose [Size] for a third time, I would be able to devour a leviathan myself without a quite a bit of time and energy. And though part of me was tempted to do it, if only so that I could find out what Trait the leviathans could give me, another part of me - the part that knew this life was extremely unlikely to be the final one - didn’t think that it was worth the effort.

At my smaller size, it would be too difficult to get the Trait again anyway. It was better to use the pieces to keep my remaining Darkweavers alive just a little longer. I had already called down the ones that stood guard at the thread-trap above; with the leviathans’ spore-roots growing, I didn’t need to focus on Traits like [Streamlined Scales] or [Enhanced Lungs] to help me travel the mana-water anymore - which was good, because it would have taken quite a while to capture enough Blueswifts and Pufferquills to make a difference.

The increasing cost of upgrading Traits could quickly grow past what I could actually manage. Still, the thread-traps were successful; they got me what I wanted.

They got me my leviathans.

And, with the two that I already had, I could find more.

 

---

 

I bit back a hiss as the mana-water surged around me in a tumult, twisting and whirling against scale-flesh, and regretted some of my decisions. Mostly the ones that had led to that same scale-flesh spitting out streams of black from newly-opened wounds, bits of jagged stone still lodged within their edges. As the leviathan below me was slammed against the rocky walls of the lake once more, its gold-blue flecked flesh shedding blood of its own, I regretted it again.

I probably hadn’t needed to come myself. I probably shouldn’t have come myself. The call of quick levels had been too alluring, though, and I had chosen to do it anyway. I didn’t want to wait for my leviathans to bring the bad-things back to me. And, at first, it was worth it. With my spore-puppets swimming by my side, I had quickly captured and killed enough bad-things to reach level 59 - just one level away from my next reward. So close that I could taste it on my tongue.

That was before another leviathan slammed us into the stone walls that bordered much of the lake.

Then, just as the enemy leviathan jerked its head again, teeth shredding through my spore-puppet’s flesh and forcing us to jolt around again, I finally remembered to send a command to my second leviathan.

The giant spore-puppet darted in, teeth clamping down on coarse flesh, tearing a gaping wound in the enemy’s side. A simultaneous thought-hiss caused the leviathan below me to twist at the same time, finally managing to pull itself free in the midst of the enemy’s distress - and more importantly, dart towards the mana-water’s surface.

We broke through. I took in a gasping breath, filling my lungs with much-needed air. The breath caused my scale-flesh to twinge, the jagged stone that lined my wounds pressing down. With an almost reflexive reaction, I activated both [The Golem’s Fading Heart] and [Mana-Life Conversion], biting down on my scale-flesh. Stone-turned-mud spilled out from the edges of the wounds even as life essence closed them, and I was suddenly as good as new.

We plunged back down, slipping back below the mana-water’s surface to rejoin the fight.