The Sweet Taste of Leveling Up
Ah… how sweet.
This is the taste of leveling up.
I was level 3, and in one go I leveled up seven times.
I noticed it last time when my level jumped twice at once, but whenever you level up, there's this strange sense of pleasure.
What does it feel like?
It's similar to soaking your body in a hot bath.
But this time my level jumped by seven.
If I had to compare it to something—it's like being left naked in the freezing cold of midwinter and then suddenly discovering a hot spring.
Just when your frozen body finally starts warming up in the steaming water, you take a gulp of ice-cold beer.
Thinking about that makes me want a cold beer.
Will the day ever come when I can drink beer again?
Oddly enough… I didn't feel depressed.
I'm someone who knows how to be grateful.
Well, I wasn't before—but I am now.
I survived by sheer luck.
Just the fact that I've been given a second life is something to be thankful for.
***
To be honest, the impact of the fall was stronger than I expected.
I'm sure a few bones broke.
Fortunately, my body is healing at a speed I can actually feel.
Maybe it's thanks to leveling up.
Come to think of it, after my level jumped twice last time, my body felt like it had grown a little.
It feels the same now.
The inside of the Horn Jaguar's lungs is spacious enough for me to practice crawling around quickly.
Well… that's a bit of an exaggeration.
***
「Rapid leveling has delayed the transformation of your body.」
Huh?
Sure enough, my body's growth had stopped.
It seemed the leveling speed was so fast that my body couldn't keep up.
Which probably means my physical body grows along with my level.
I really hope that's the case.
Right now, I'm just slightly long—but still far too small.
At this size, surviving in the wild won't be easy.
***
I wriggled my body a bit.
It moved just fine.
A Serpent probably has hundreds of ribs, and at least dozens of mine must have been broken earlier—but the pain was gone.
Even my battered jaw had healed.
Actually, getting sucked into the airway hadn't been part of my plan.
My jaw had slipped loose from exhaustion right at that moment.
Setting my Luck stat to average had probably been a good decision too.
Looking at it that way… maybe my stat distribution wasn't such a mistake after all.
…Though if I hadn't been born as a Serpent in the first place, none of this danger would've happened.
***
Grrrrooowl.
The beggar in my stomach was screaming.
Earlier I'd swallowed a bat whole and felt satisfied, but now I was starving again.
I must've burned a lot of energy moving around so much.
If only I'd exercised this much in my previous life.
***
Well, no problem.
Right now I'm inside a jaguar.
Which means the ceiling, walls, and floor are all edible.
I swallowed my saliva like I had entered Hansel and Gretel's candy house.
"Thanks for the meal!"
Bite!
The meat tasted excellent.
A bit tough, but full of flavor.
Maybe because I had clung to the uvula with all my strength earlier, the proficiency of Bite had increased significantly.
Even though I'm not an ordinary Serpent, Serpents normally swallow prey whole and digest it.
But my teeth were sharper—more like a dinosaur's than a normal Serpent's.
With the assistance of the skill, tearing meat apart was actually manageable.
***
Thinking about it, skills are incredible.
If I could learn a skill like "Flight," could I fly through the sky too?
Of course, I couldn't really imagine it.
No matter how hard I tried to flap around with all my strength, I didn't think I'd suddenly gain a flight skill.
***
While daydreaming like that, I kept filling my stomach.
The Horn Jaguar must have been a powerful monster.
Its meat was unbelievably tough.
But I kept chewing and swallowing without stopping.
It was difficult and time-consuming work, but not boring at all.
In fact, it tasted good.
When I was young, I used to complain about side dishes so much that I got spanked almost every day.
What would my parents think if they saw me now?
Maybe they'd proudly say, "Our son has grown up well."
At the very least, they might like this better than me shutting myself in my room as an unemployed bum.
***
Yeah… I really wasn't imagining the taste.
Even the chunks of meat Medusa Mom threw up before were edible.
Maybe becoming a Serpent changed my taste buds.
Being able to eat well is a talent.
With this level of talent, I could probably run a mukbang channel.
***
I devoured the meat in a trance.
Last time, eating one bat filled me up.
Now I'd eaten more than three times that amount, yet I could keep going.
And then—
CRUNCH!
…
Ah!
I had bitten into something hard.
Three of my teeth broke at once—was that okay?
Well… I'm not even two weeks old yet, so these are probably baby teeth.
I really hope they aren't permanent ones.
It doesn't seem like this world has dental implants.
***
…What is this?
What I bit wasn't bone.
Before I realized it, I had dug all the way near the Horn Jaguar's heart.
And there was something like a glowing stone there.
A kidney stone?
No… I'm inside the heart, so it can't be that.
Just thinking about biting into a stone like that kills my appetite.
It was an acorn-sized stone emitting an extraordinary glow.
I could even feel a faint warmth from it.
Unless it was some kind of radioactive stone that glowed on its own, this must be something fantasy-related.
Since it came from a monster's body, it was probably a magic stone.
***
And strangely, I felt a different kind of hunger than when eating meat.
If I ate this… I would become stronger.
I felt absolutely certain of it.
So, hoping it wasn't some kind of kidney stone—
Chomp.
Instead of biting it apart, I swallowed it whole.
Thankfully, a voice confirmed that my choice had been correct.
***
「You have consumed a Grade 3 Magic Stone.」
A Grade 3 Magic Stone, huh.
Is that good?
For meat and exam scores, Grade 1 is best.
But for psionic energy, Grade 12 is the highest.
Since I don't know how strong the Horn Jaguar actually was, I can't really tell.
Let's check my status window.
***
[Little White Serpent Lv.10 (-)]
Traits
[Indomitable][Diligence]
Skills
[Venom Fang Lv.3][Fast Crawl Lv.3][Breath Holding Lv.4][Predation Lv.1][Bite Lv.4][Poison Resistance Lv.2][Bleeding Resistance Lv.2][Pain Resistance Lv.4][Heat Resistance Lv.2][Survival Instinct Lv.3]
Status
[Growing][Mana Saturation][Sleepy]
***
Oh!
The status window that used to be empty has become quite full.
There's even a new skill called Predation that I've never seen before.
And I finally reached Level 10, but there's a (-) mark next to it.
That must be related to the message about my physical transformation being delayed.
Still, if I think about it positively, maybe it's something like Major (Promoted) or Captain (Promoted).
Anyway, the status window clearly showed the struggles I had gone through.
Just look at Breath Holding, Pain Resistance, and Bite—their levels had increased quite a lot.
You could tell just how painful that journey had been.
The one I liked the most was Survival Instinct Lv.3.
I knew absolutely nothing about this world.
To survive, I would need information.
Maybe something like instinct could help me navigate things somehow.
Of course, I couldn't be sure whether blindly following survival instinct was always the right answer.
Most animals instinctively fear high places, but sometimes you have to climb a tall tree to survive.
***
[Status], huh? I hadn't seen that before.
Did the status window update in real time?
It said I was growing and also sleepy.
I didn't know what Mana Saturation meant.
Maybe it was because I ate the magic stone.
Anyway, strangely enough, the hunger that had been tormenting me disappeared the moment I consumed it.
Ah… I'm getting drowsy.
***
My adaptability was impressive.
Being inside the Horn Jaguar's body wasn't that bad.
Sure, the blood and bodily fluids were sticky and smelled a bit, but there were advantages.
Every direction—up, down, left, right—was food.
And while I stayed inside this belly, there were no threats that could harm me.
Resting here for a bit might be nice.
Like before, it felt like if I slept and woke up, my body would feel refreshed.
Maybe I should close my eyes for a moment.
And so I was about to surrender myself to sleep once again…
…but I didn't.
***
Something felt uneasy.
I opened the eyes I had just closed.
Was this really the right choice?
This warm, dark place gave me an instinctive sense of security.
But that might just be my imagination.
What was the outside environment like?
What if the place where the Horn Jaguar had fallen was actually dangerous?
When an animal dies, scavengers inevitably gather.
A few insects wouldn't be a problem, but if a monster as dangerous as the Horn Jaguar appeared, that would be trouble.
If something swallowed the entire jaguar carcass whole, I'd end up like a hazelnut inside a Ferrero Rocher—or like the pickled radish inside a kimbap—a delightful little filling.
Maybe this anxiety was also the effect of Survival Instinct Lv.3.
Anyway, I decided to get out and check.
After wriggling around for a while, I found the exit.
Sticking out my tongue, I crawled out through the dead Horn Jaguar's mouth.
***
"Wow… this thing is completely smashed."
The cliff the Horn Jaguar fell from had been extremely high.
Looking around, this place was a basin-like depression surrounded by cliffs.
And the jaguar's body lay exposed on flat ground.
I couldn't quite tell whether this situation was dangerous or not.
Leaving that huge chunk of meat behind would be a waste, so I decided to scout the surroundings first.
I quietly slithered into nearby bushes.
***
Thump—
Huh?
I felt vibrations through my belly against the ground.
Serpents perceive the world not only through sight.
In particular, their ability to detect vibrations seemed far superior to humans.
Thud—thud—
Something was clearly moving underground.
First, I quickly climbed onto a solid rock.
Even then, the vibrations grew stronger.
Something was approaching.
I froze and remained completely still.
***
Ah.
It passed right beneath me.
Whatever had moved under the rock was heading toward the Horn Jaguar's corpse.
Then the ground suddenly bulged upward.
Four legs covered in something like armor emerged.
Crunch.
It grabbed the jaguar's body—
And dragged it underground.
Rumbleeeee—
Just like that, it carried off its harvest and disappeared.
…Thank you, Survival Instinct.
I didn't even get a good look at what the monster was.
But it clearly looked bigger and stronger than the Horn Jaguar.
The thought of something like that crawling underground in this place was terrifying.
***
I stayed frozen on top of the rock for a long time.
Only after I was sure it had completely left did I move again.
I needed to find a place to sleep.
At this point, I absolutely didn't want to sleep on bare ground anymore.
Just before sunset, I found a crack between rocks large enough to hide in.
After crawling inside, I covered myself with dirt for camouflage.
Surely… that thing couldn't swallow the rock itself, right?
I might have nightmares tonight.
Feeling a little tense, I closed my eyes.
But I didn't have any nightmares.
***
My mental strength was just that solid.
In fact, you could say I had a good dream.
Because the moment I fell asleep, a status message appeared.
***
[You have reached Level 10 and can evolve.]
[Would you like to evolve?]
Of course I would!