Demonic Devourer's Development

It was a dragon! A real dragon, that much I could tell. Except, it had a few distinct differences with the dragons I imagined. It had no scales: just a smooth, slimy skin. No eyes, either, but from the front of its snout protruded several long whiskers. Its tail winded like a whip, and its limbs were long and ended in paws with disturbingly long and thin fingers. The wings that grew out of the creature's back were obviously made not for flying, but for combat: there were no membranes between the bones, but plenty of spikes and blade-like protrusions coming out of them.

Its general shape, though, was still that of a dragon. Huge as a house beast with four legs, wings, lizard head and tail. Despite its size, the dragon was nimble and swift. The giant spider the dragon attacked didn't stand a chance. In a blink, it was gone, and the dragon moved on, slithering with grace that looked almost supernatural.

A scary creature. Even from the other side of the giant cave we were in, I could feel the power hidden in its body—it made my hair stand on ends.. I coveted it, but knew that it would be more than I can chew. I was lucky that the dragon didn't spot me, though most of that luck came from simple caution.

No one told me about underground dragons. Too bad orienting in the caves was so complicated. I was very unsure I would be able to find it later, despite my recent increases in power.

I gathered a lot of EXP lately, capturing monsters with my webs and with my hands, enough to evolve into a bugman. They had increased base stats, just as I suspected, and some inherent abilities, including 'Telepathy'. With it, if I concentrated, I could listen into the thoughts the other bugmen translated to their kin.

They didn't use words. Their messages were shapes, commands, ideas, images, but not words. There was never any emotion in them, or hint of any humanity in these creatures. I suspected they were a hivemind.

Now, after this change, my character sheet looked like that:

[Voren]

[General Info]

Species: Giridia

Sex: Male

Age: 127d

Height: 179cm

Weight: 65kg

Emotional state: Calm

Titles: Devourer, Alpha Predator, The Lord of Nine Hells

[Contracts]

Unnamed contract (expiration date isn't stated)

Assassination Contract (expiration date isn't stated)

[Stats]

HP: 9/9

EXP: 632527

STR: 19.38

DEX: 22.33

CON: 19.59

INT: 12.24

[Abilities]

Absolute Devourer (lv MAX) (Evolution options available!)

Mystic Flight (lv 20)

Venomous Stinger (lv 18) (Can be levelled up!)

Invisible Steel Web Spinning (lv 20)

⠀⠀

Form Shifting (lv 20)

Frost Wind Claws (lv 20)

Steel Soul (lv 20)

Cold Affinity (lv 15) (Can be levelled up!)

Adaptive Heat Vision (lv 17) (Can be levelled up!)

Adaptive Enhanced Smelling (lv 17) (Can be levelled up!)

Adaptive Enhanced Hearing (lv 15) (Can be levelled up!)

Telepathy (lv 7) (species boon)

Yes, bugmen weren't actually called like that, but so did every other monster in these caves. I didn't pay attention to these things. Furrypede was still a furrypede, whether I called her a furrypede or Giant Rotinis Centipede.

What did "Rotinis" even mean? Was it a random jumble of syllables, or another language?

Either way, I was nothing compared with the dragon, and I didn't want risking it noticing me. So I turned away and left, but it put me in a predicament. The dragon blocked my way up the stream I followed. Looking for a way around was a challenging task, especially since the dragon was still living in the general area.

It seemed that I won't be able to get out that way. Which left me with another option: to go back to the human fortress, the way from which I had marked, and from there try to backtrack my way past the former rainbow stream and to the big river.

The biggest problem of this plan before were the monsters that lived around the rainbow stream, but now that their source of power found its way in my belly, they didn't seem scary. Lately, everything in the area was easy prey for me. The dragon was an exception.

I didn't hesitate for long. My way was back to the fortress. It was a long road—this cave system was simply huge—but one that I knew. I followed my claw marks, so deep that no other creature here could've left them, and went back down, deeper and deeper.

The fortress was still there when I returned. Nothing changed in it, from the side where I came to it. A stone wall from floor to ceiling with a few narrow embrasures in it. I had to remember this time, that humans were one of the few creatures in this place able to instantly notice the glowing rock in my stomach, and therefore, me, so before I tried to approach, I made Pest cast the dark shroud on me.

With it, slithering inside was much easier. I just ate a hole in the wall to get inside without catching anyone's attention.

There, nothing changed as well, except that the rainbow water lanterns were replaced with bioluminescent mushrooms. They glowed a little duller, but humans overall didn't seem to mind too much.

Hey, they still had their walls and their clean water. It was something that many lacked. Not that I cared if these humans lived or died. I was actually considering eating them. So many creatures of big enough size, all gathered together in the same place… pure biomass. They were humans, though. If I attacked, they'd cooperate to defend against me together. They weren't bugmen with their perfect coordination, but they weren't a herd. I remembered that well enough.

That didn't mean they weren't infallible. Just like many, they were prone to fall for tricks and traps… I smiled to myself. Yes, this place hoarded power and lived where no human should live for long enough. It was time to raze it, at least the inner part of it.