What could we do?

  Samsara turned to the Aberration. “I have to eat it. I have to swallow it whole. Like a snake.”

  I felt a wave of revulsion from her. She hated doing this. She managed fine with bite-sized chunks of meat, but swallowing a same-sized creature was a whole different matter. Samsara had only done this once before.

  And I deeply regretted it. I was curious to see how far her mouth would unhinge. She ended up crying trying to eat the corpse of a dead rat girl whole.

  “Are you sure?” I asked. “That thing is huge. And it’s on fire.”

  “I…I have to,” she stammered. “I’m not losing you.”

  Samsara slithered right next to the Aberration. She placed her hands on either side of the marble woman's hips, ignoring the orange magical flames that licked against her palms. Thankfully, they didn’t seem to do anything against Samsara’s hardened scales.

  The Aberration squirmed, trying to hit Samsara. But its attacks felt like nothing. We were way stronger than it physically.

  She took a deep breath. I felt her jaw muscles shifting, stretching in a way that felt deeply unnatural. Her mouth opened, and then it kept opening. The skin of her cheeks stretched taut as her jaw unhinged, spreading inhuman tall and wide.

  She lowered her massive maw over the Aberration's head. Her fangs skidded against the surface of the Aberration. Gulp by gulp, Samsara engulfed the marble woman as she flailed, causing Samsara’s skin to stretch in every direction. The Aberration’s wail got louder and louder as Samsara’s began eating her.

  “Mmph!” Samsara groaned, tears leaking from the corners of her eyes. Even though her body could do this, it was clear that it was extremely unnatural and uncomfortable.

  Her hair snakes had swallowed their prey whole before, but humans and regular monster girls were tiny compared to us. This was a whole different matter, since the Aberration was around our size.

  Plus, the Aberration was currently squirming. Samsara’s fangs couldn’t break through her marble skin. Years ago, when I was hunting in the wild lands, I saw a couple of snake girls. They swallowed their prey whole since they didn’t have the teeth to chew, but their fangs usually paralyzed their prey. The only one that didn’t do that constricted and suffocated her prey.

  I felt every inch of the struggle. The sensation of a massive, hard, struggling object forcing its way down her esophagus was suffocating. To make matters worse, it felt like she had swallowed a super spicy pepper, probably due to the fact that she swallowed the Aberration while its hips were burning.

  I would have suggested we put the fires out before tried swallowing, but the fires seemed to stop more of the mini statues from being made in addition to the white fog. It would be a terrible thing if the mini statues spawned inside of Samsara. On the bright side, at least the only pain was from Samsara’s body being stretched unnaturally. Okay, that wasn’t very bright.

  “You’ve got it,” I encouraged her, feeling helpless and regretful as I sat there.

  It was all my fault that this was happening to Samsara. Had I not gotten close to the fog and instead performed the [Sacrificial Limb Bomb] [Incantation], we wouldn’t have to do any of this. My corrosive ink would have been enough to obliterate this piece of shit Aberration.

  But because of my incompetence, Samsara was stuck doing something she hated.

  With one final, massive gulp, the Aberration disappeared into her mouth. Samsara squeezed her eyes shut and forced the lump down. It traveled past her chest, sliding heavily into her stomach. She slumped forward, panting.

  “You did it,” I told her telepathically.

  Samsara groaned, rubbing her distended belly. The lump was massive, stretching the skin of her stomach tight.

  “My throat burns,” she whimpered. Samsara had never liked spicy food.

  “It’s kind of ironic,” I noted, trying to distract her from the pain. “The Aberration looked pregnant with that giant eye-belly. Now…”

  “Don't say it,” Samsara warned weakly.

  “Now you look pregnant,” I finished.

  “Haha,” she weakly laughed out loud. I would have joined her if I wasn’t paralyzed. “Also, I think you’re misusing the word ‘ironic’. It should be coincidental.”

  “You got me!” I playfully pouted. “Now we have Samsara, the master of word games. You have defeated me.”

  She looked at me. “What’s my prize?”

  “My eternal humility in knowing that you are better than me,” I giggled in her mind.

  “Why thanks, I’ll make sure to hang that on the wall,” Samsara said, poking my cheek. She squished it. “I think the house would look nice with it.”

  “We’ll have to build a house first,” I said. “Although, I’m not sure how you are going to hang my humility on the wall. It’s just a concept.”

  She stuck her tongue at me. “I was thinking of getting it in writing.”

  “Nope!” I refused. “There’s no way you could get me to physically write that. I’d die of embarrassment.”

  She lowered her arm and pouted. “Aww, then what are we going to hang on the wall?”

  “We can do a self-portrait!”

  Our mental banter continued for several minutes. Eventually, the marble encasing my body started to vanish. Samsara’s stomach had also shrunk, yet was still quite round.

  I wiggled my toes. I clenched my fists. The paralysis faded, replaced by the rush of blood and mana through my veins.

  “It worked!” I cheered in our mind and said out loud at the same time.

  Samsara slumped forward, her hands bracing against her tail. She let out a cough, but relief radiated from her mind.

  “You okay?” I asked, putting a tentacle on her shoulder.

  “I feel…” Samsara hesitated, rubbing her stomach. “Tired. But good. I can’t believe that worked.”

  We looked over at Aisling. The marble coating her massive turtle body shattered, revealing her green scales and shell underneath. She shook her head and her lure, before looking at us.

  We were alive.

  I grabbed Samsara and pulled her into a tight hug. She squeezed back, careful not to press her swollen belly too hard against me.

  “We didn’t die,” I whispered into her ear.

  “We didn’t die,” she agreed, her voice stuttering slightly.

  Behind us, a high-pitched wail cut through the moment.

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  “My life is over! Look at me! I’m a bird! A stupid bird!” Lucia was squirming in my hair tentacle, sobbing into her feathers. Way to ruin the moment.

  “You should be glad you’re still alive,” I said.

  We ignored the hysterical peacock girl and focused on recovering. My regeneration kicked in. The phantom sensation of my missing arm vanished as black rubbery flesh knitted itself together. My tentacles elongated, reforming into the shape of a hand. A pair of red finger tentacles grew on the tip of each finger. Aisling’s mouth, which had been burned by the explosions, healed just as quickly.

  We stood there for a few minutes, just breathing. Or, in Samsara’s case, digesting.

  It was impressive, really. Being a Kaiju meant biology worked differently for us. What would take a normal monster girl days to digest took Samsara only minutes. I watched as the massive lump in her midsection shrank. Muscles tightened, skin retracted, and within five minutes, her stomach was flat again. The definition of her abdominal muscles returned, looking as hard as rock.

  “Damn,” I thought.

  “Stop staring,” Samsara teased weakly as her cheeks flushed red.

  Suddenly, we felt a familiar tingling sensation. Warmth spread throughout our bodies as we began to stretch and grow.

  A red flash blinded us. Devotio appeared, floating casually in the air.

  [Congratulations,] the entity said. [You have consumed your first Aberration. This grants you a new Special Mutation.]

  Information flooded our minds as Devotio eye’s flashed red.

  [Petrification Ring]: Your snake eyes can shoot out rings that paralyze non-mechanical beings. The target will slowly become encased in marble, but will dissolve upon contact with either acidic or corrosive materials. This costs 500 mana for each ring.

  “No way,” I gasped. “We get the ring attack?” Or rather, Samsara gets it.

  “That’s both terrifying… and amazing,” Samsara said. “At least eating that thing was worth it.”

  [Indeed,] Devotio replied. [However, gaining power from Aberrations requires significant risk. The next special mutation will only occur once you consume 10 Aberration Cores.]

  “That’s a hell of a gambit,” I mused. “High risk, high reward.”

  “I’m not so sure about it,” Samsara said. “You almost got permanently stuck.”

  I grinned. “Then let’s hope our next mutations help us out.”

  [Additionally, let me congratulate you on your third Kaiju evolution, as well as a mutation due to excess mana (50,000). Each grants you access to a set of mutations, which means you have access to two sets of mutations. Your height has gone from 150 meters to 200 meters. And your mana capacity has increased to 40,000. Would you like me to guide you through your possible mutations? Or would you prefer if I don’t intervene?]

  “Definitely intervene,” I said.

  [Excellent. Here are the mutations due to your Kaiju evolution. Please let me know which mutation you prefer.]

  [Sticky Ink Toggle + Double Hair Snakes]: Your black tentacles produce sticky ink. Additionally, you can toggle all ink you make from your tentacles on and off at no mana cost. Furthermore, you will have double the number of hair snakes.

  [Tentacle Mouths + Acidic Spit]: All of your tentacles grow multiple mouths. Additionally, all of your snake mouths have acidic saliva.

  “Sticky ink,” Samsara said thoughtfully. “If we hit them with sticky ink, they can’t move. Or we hit them with a [Petrification Ring]. We can really stop our prey and enemies that way.”

  “Exactly,” I said. “The combination potential is huge. Plus, double the hair snakes means double the eyes to shoot the rings from.”

  “There’s something else,” Samsara noted. “The [Sticky Ink Toggle]. It says it toggles all ink from your tentacles. That includes your corrosive red ink.”

  I paused. “So?”

  “So,” Samsara said softly. “If you turn it off… you can touch things. You can hug Aisling without me needing to be the buffer. You can pick up the monster girls without melting them.”

  I looked at my red-tipped fingers. I hadn’t really thought about that. I usually just focused on how fast I could melt things.

  “I guess that’s useful,” I admitted, even though I was indifferent. “Fine. We take the first one.”

  [Excellent, I will guide the souls to form that mutation then.]

  Black ink started to form on my arm and hair tentacles. Samsara’s hair began to stretch, and three new sets of eyes joined my senses.

  [Here are the mutations due to the radiation of excess mana. Please let me know which mutation you prefer.]

  [Double Hair Tentacles + Third Snake Eye]: Double the amount of hair tentacles and each snake head you have gains a third eye.

  [Ink Toss + Snake Tongue Grab]: Can perform [Ink Toss] for 200 mana, sending a glob of ink in any direction. This skill can be used even when paralyzed. Additionally, your snakes tongues triple in length and gain extra dexterity to grab objects nearby.

  “The first one is tempting,” I said. “More eyes for the rings, and more tentacles for grabbing or slicing. I could make more use out of [Serrated Tentacles].”

  “Look at the second one, though,” Samsara urged. “[Ink Toss]. Usable even when paralyzed.”

  I flinched, remembering the feeling of being trapped in my own body while Samsara fought alone. “Yeah. That sucked. Being useless sucked.”

  “I hated seeing you like that,” Samsara said gently. “I don’t want you to ever be defenseless again. Even if you can’t move, you could still shoot ink. Sticky ink or corrosive ink… you’d have a weapon.”

  “Thanks for looking out for me,” I said, a feeling of warmth spreading in my chest. “Even if you don’t get a useful mutation.”

  “I’ll always look out for you,” she smiled. “Who knows, maybe we’ll get a mutation later that will make [Snake Tongue Grab] useful. Still, even if I don’t get a useful mutation, at least you can defend yourself.”

  “We’ll go with the second one, Devotio,” I said.

  [Excellent, I will guide the mana into that mutation then.]

  Samsara flicked both her and her hair snake’s tongues. They flicked out far, almost as if Samsara had evolved into a frog.

  [Congratulations on evolving. You will need 20,000 souls for the next evolution. You will also gain an extra mutation for converting 100,000 excess mana to radiation.]

  Devotio’s red eye flashed, and they disappeared again.

  “Cool,” I said.

  One of Samsara’s hair snakes hit me with its tongue.

  “Hey!” I cried out in Samsara’s mind, wiping the saliva off my cheek.

  “I think she likes you,” Samsara giggled. Fine. I gave the snake a nuzzle.

  “Sure, let’s leave though,” I said. “We don’t know when another Aberration will come from the Rift.”

  “Wait, we have to bring the enslaved monster girls with us!” Samsara pointed out.

  We turned toward the cave entrance. The monster girls continued entering and leaving, depositing an ever-growing pile of stone chunks. The ores looked shiny and reflected sunlight.

  “Lucia!” I called out. “How many are there?”

  The peacock girl sniffled, tears leaking from her eyes. “About thirty. They were mining ores we could use for manufacturing mechs.”

  I looked at the group. I was quite curious about their tastes, although I knew Samsara would be upset at me if I ate them. Hmm, I could just eat the ones without clothes.

  “Better not to risk it,” Samsara said. “Even the non-feral ones have their clothes reduced to rags. Who knows if the ones that are nude were also non-feral.”

  “But what if Lucia fixes them and they go back to being feral?” I asked. “Wouldn’t that be an issue. We should just eat them now.”

  “We can use [Sacrificial Soul Transfer] and [Sacrificial Mana Transfer] on them,” Samsara replied, folding her arms. “That way, we can prevent them from harming anyone in Lateo.”

  “Then we can eat them afterward,” I said, licking my lips. I began moving towards the cave.

  “Okay, you can eat them then,” she relented. Hooray!

  I toggled my ink off completely.

  I unfurled my fully regenerated arms, my tentacles spreading from each other. They reached out towards the closest set of monster girls. They squirmed against my tentacles, but didn’t bother fighting me.

  “What are these?” I asked, poking one of the glowing red collars with a tentacle.

  “Monitoring devices,” Lucia squawked. “They track vitals and location. If they leave the designated zone, they alert the network. Or well, I’m not really sure now since the base is… gone. But I imagine it’s uploaded to multiple outposts for redundancy purposes.”

  Better safe than sorry.

  I pinched the metal collar on a shivering goat girl, easily destroying it. I took special care not to suffocate the goat girl. My tentacles crushed the rest of the collars and cuffs.

  “What are you doing?!” Lucia shrieked. “You’re destroying imperial property! They’ll know the signal is lost!”

  “That’s the point,” I said, continuing to break the tracking devices. “If I break them all, they can’t track them back to us. They’ll just think they died in the attack.”

  “But the data we gained—”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Samsara growled. “We’re leaving no trace.”

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