Adam's POV
The moment I stepped out of the narrow crack that led from the small cave, the air there changed.
It pressed against me strongly.
Not like wind type of air per say, but more like standing right in front of an incoming train, the kind where the pressure hits your chest before the train even touches you.
Or like someone pointing a gun at the back of your head. Or that split-second drop when you miss a step on stairs and your stomach lurches.
I couldn't see very much.
The darkness here was thicker, deeper than the cave I'd just left. The faint green-blue glow from the fungi didn't reach far.
And everything beyond a few meters melted into black.
But I could hear, alright.
Growls, low and bubbly, somewhere far to my left.
Scary roars echoing from way down below, like they were coming up through layers of stone.
Creeping sounds, like small claws scratching, and wings fluttering high overhead.
And other noises I couldn't quite name, but every instinct in me screamed they were all dangerous.
My head came down with a nasty headache, as the red panels started to flash inside my vision, one after another, fast and relentless.
[Cave Troll]
[Man-eating Rat]
[Carnivorous Bird]
[Cave Troll]
[Cave Wolf]
[Man-eating Rat]
[Armageddon Cat]
And more names and levels, more warnings. They kept pouring in, overlapping, until my skull felt like it was splitting.
I shook my head furiously, and the panels vanished.
"No good… now I'm hungry AND have a headache."
I pressed my palms to my temples and glanced back toward the relative safety of the small cave behind me, then back at the darkness outside:
No way.
There's no way I'm heading down into that while I'm this weak.
I could feel them... eyes on me. And not one pair, but multiple.
Watching from the dark, and probably waiting for my one wrong move.
I backed up slowly, step by careful step, until I was inside the crack again. And the pressure eased a little.
Not really gone, but bearable now.
I leaned against the wall for a second, breathing.
Okay.
Think, Shizuka!
I beat that lizard mostly because of luck.
Dumb luck.
But also because I used my head a little: I played dead and waited for the opening, then struck as fast and hard as I can.
If I'd just swung wildly like an idiot, I'd probably be dead already.
This place isn't going to let me brute-force anything. I'm too weak to start brute forcing thing, so I have to be smarter and more careful.
Use tact and Intelligence for now.
That old man… he must have been protecting this spot somehow. Keeping things away until I woke up. That's why non of those horrors came in here before the lizard. I can't expect such mercy now...
Incidentally, who was that old man?
God?
Some kind of guardian?
Or maybe that system admin fellow we see in Light Novels, except he was just playing dress-up.
Anyway, he gave me two unique skills: [Comprehension] and [Consumer].
[Comprehension] has to be what let me see things like that lizard's name, level, and the venom warning… and all those monster names just now.
It's feeding me information when I need it, I suppose.
But what about the other one? [Consumer].
[The unique skill Consumer allows the user to devour and obtain the skill and power of the consumed.]
The moment I thought the name, a new information spilled into my head through another internal red window, clean and direct.
I blinked.
So that's it?
Eat something… and take what made it strong?
But I didn't hear a voice anymore.
It seems he system's voice only announces the big stuff: like the defeats, the level-ups, or the rewards.
But for the trivia, it just gives them to me muted. Like it knows I don't need fanfare for every detail.
It felt oddly lonely, though. Like even the system thing didn't care enough to talk to me unless it was important.
I kept walking back the way I came.
Soon I reached the small cave and entered it.
That familiar rotting smell hit me first, almost seeming stronger now. Maybe it's because I was away for a while?
But weirdly… it wasn't as bad as before. I mean, it's like my nose was already getting used to it.
Or maybe I just didn't have the energy to be grossed out anymore.
I sat down close to her.
The woman who'd been my mother here, even if not MY mother, but the elf's who used to be me.
Her face was half-gone, but the remaining side still looked peaceful.
Her brown skin was like mine, but her dead blue eyes stared at nothing.
Her pointed ears pierced with those little bone shards, and her silver-white hair matted and dried with blood.
It was supposed to be disgusting and gross to see...
But for some reason… I liked looking at her.
She looked like me. Or I looked like her.
Maybe it was because she looked like me? The same delicate features, and the same fragility.
But she'd carried this body inside of her... And probably died protecting the vessel too.
I wonder if I and her could have gotten along... What is her personality like?
It is the first time in my life that i was interested in a lady, but she was my mother, and a dead one too.
She was wearing some kind of tribal cave-woman's outfit, with her torso exposed.
Actually, I have to get clothes soon; I'm naked.
Ah, maybe I should use it as a joke, and when that old man arrives and asks for me, "Adam, wheere are you?"
I'll then say, "I'm naked!" Something like tha--!
GRUMBLE.
My stomach twisted painfully again.
I sighed.
"Why am I so hungry…? Has it even been three hours since I got here? Wait, has this elf boy not been eating properly?"
My eyes, brows furowed, drifted to the lizard's corpse.
It laid where it died, with blood congealed around the neck wound, and its scales dull now, jaws slack.
Hinestly, it didn't look edible. Not even a little.
But dying of starvation sounded way worse.
So I reached forward, my fingers closing around the thick base of its tail.