The hunger kept rising as I made my way back, yet there was still nothing edible in sight.
"What is this place? Why isn't there a single edible fruit?" I muttered. "Do I really have to slay a monster and eat it?"
The frustration deepened with every step. Hunger gnawed at me relentlessly, but the thought of eating a monster after killing it, especially when I myself was a monster now, felt disgusting to the core.
Still, the longer time passed, the stronger the urge became. My moral restraint began to crack.
I could feel it in my muscles, in my veins… an overwhelming desire to devour.
I continued searching, refusing to give in. Tall trees loomed overhead as the moon slowly rose, but not a single fruit hung from their branches. Eventually, I reached the foot of the mountain where I had hatched from the egg.
The broken eggshells scattered around me suddenly looked… appetizing.
My beastly urge slipped past my control for just a moment.
I grabbed a piece of the shell and bit into it.
But the instant it entered my mouth, I spat it out violently.
"Thoo! Thoo!"
And then it happened.
The world turned red before my eyes.
Every muscle in my body flooded with adrenaline. My veins pulsed as my heartbeat thundered loudly in my ears. My mind loosened its grip on my body.
I felt my consciousness shoved into a corner of my own brain, reduced to a passenger while my muscles moved with a terrifying precision.
I wanted to turn left.
My body turned right.
A system chime echoed.
[Due to the body being in Polyphagia necessary survival skill unlocked
Predator's Eyes – LVL 1 Predator's Instinct – LVL 1]
"What? What?" I screamed inside my head.
But my body stopped moving on its own. In the red-tinted world, my eyes locked onto a small blue light drifting upward like floating particles.
[Target found. Distance – 1.5 miles]
"OHH! So that's a target marker!"
And then my body rolled forward at extreme speed toward the drifting blue light.
I could see everything.
As if I were watching myself from a third-person view, trapped inside my own body.
I never knew my body could move like that.
The moment I closed in on the target, the rolling stopped abruptly, and my view shifted.
"What? How is that possible?"
"The monster was in front of me just now… so why is it beneath me?"
Then I felt my muscles coil.
My arms tensed as small claws pushed out from my fingertips, sharp like carved blades. Before I could process it, my arms swung forward again and again, snapping like whips.
SHHK! SHHK!
A frenzy of slashes tore into the body beneath me. The monster collapsed to the ground, completely motionless.
Under the blur of motion and blood, I finally realized what it was.
A baby fire wolf.
Just like the one from before.
For a brief moment, its eyes met mine.
They looked like they were begging. Then the light faded, and its eyes closed forever. I wanted to stop. But my body didn't listen.
My jaws sank into its flesh, tearing it apart as if driven by madness. I didn't just eat; my body was ripping into the meat with a frantic and desperate hunger that I couldn't slow down even if I wanted to.
I couldn't control myself.
Only one thought echoed faintly inside my mind.
"When the first baby wolf attacked me… was he also this hungry?"
"Was that his survival necessity, the same way this is mine?"
The hunger eased, and the red world slowly dimmed, colors returning bit by bit. But even as it faded, I still hadn't regained control of my body.
Fear didn't just crawl in; it anchored itself in my chest.
"The hunger reduced, but… will I ever regain control?"
Then-
AUUUUUU! AUUUUUU!
Multiple cries echoed through the forest.
Baby flame wolves.
A pack surrounded me. At least fifteen of them.
And strangely, my fear vanished.
"In my conscious control, I barely survived a single baby wolf," I realized. "But in this state… one was killed like it was nothing."
The thought sharpened my focus.
"That movement earlier… that must have been Blink. I didn't feel my legs jump when my view shifted."
Even without control, my awareness deepened as the pack charged together in perfect sync.
And then it happened again.
My view twisted, and suddenly I was in the air. My body spun in a somersault without any jump at all. This time, I felt it clearly.
Blue particles.
Endless streams of them flowed through the surroundings, through nature itself, and through my own body.
"So Blink works like short-distance teleportation…"
My realization barely formed before my body moved again.
Warmth flared inside my mouth.
A pillar of sparkling blue energy erupted downward, scorching the ground beneath me. Blue particles scattered outward like the target marker earlier.
The earth burned.
Several wolves were instantly reduced to ash. Two were left half-burned, collapsing in agony and the rest fled in terror.
My body landed lightly on the ground.
"That must be Helion Breath…"
Without hesitation, my body moved toward the wounded wolves. A clean swipe ended one instantly. The other froze in fear, but my body ignored it completely, as if it no longer registered as a threat.
It dragged the slain wolf away.
I felt my nose flare.
My body was searching.
After some distance, a clear watering hole appeared ahead.
"Water… so after eating, it looks for water."
Before I could react, my body was already drinking. For the first time, even through the lingering red haze, I saw my reflection clearly.
Deep blue fur, rich and almost royal. Paws covered in shining white fur. A long, beautiful tail.
And eyes that still burned ruby red.
"With level one skills…" I murmured in disbelief, "this body killed monsters more than four times its size."
Then the system's words returned to me.
I was a Helion.
The hatchling form of Heliox.
An apex predator.
After drinking, my body dragged the dead wolf again. I recognized the path. It was heading back to the mountain.
At the foot of the mountain, the sensation returned. Blue particles flooded my awareness, merging my body with the unseen flow of nature.
BLINK.
BLINK.
From the mountain's base, my body reappeared halfway up its side. Then it pushed off the rock face and appeared again near a cave opening on a small cliff.
Still carrying the dead wolf.
It placed the carcass down gently.
Then my body sat at the edge of the cave, legs hanging over the drop.
Slowly, the world returned to normal.
The red haze faded completely, and sensation flowed back into me. I could feel my body again. My arms. My legs. The cold breeze brushing against my fur as I lay near the edge of the cliff.
And then realization hit me all at once.
"Predator instinct," I whispered.
"It killed and ate to reduce hunger. It defended against an outnumbered ambush. It carried food for later. It drank water. It brought the body to a safe place… and rested."
My body ached with exhaustion. I clenched my fist as I stared up at the beautiful silver moon hanging quietly above.
"It was a survival tutorial driven by necessity," I murmured. "But those blue particles… this world has some kind of special power."
The wind on the cliff felt strangely comforting against my fatigue. My eyelids grew heavy, and before I could think any further, my body fell backward onto the rock.
Sleep took me.
It carried me away from the fear, guilt, and the unanswered questions, leaving behind only one lingering thought.
"Even if it was survival… it was too monstrous for me."
[Status:
Level: 10
Experience: 120/600
HP: 200/200
MP: 170/170
Stats:
STR: 19 + 45
AGI: 19 + 45
INT: 31 + 15
SPD: 19 + 45
Skills:
Rolling Dash – Lv. 2
Scratch – Lv. 5
Helion Breath – Lv. 2
Blink – Lv. 5
Predator's Instinct – Lv. 1
Predator's Eyes – Lv. 1]