In high spirits after spotting humans, I decide to keep defeating monsters and growing, all toward the goal of taking human form.
Goblins — the green giants, as I’d been calling them — are easy enough to take down. When I run into a monster, I can scream and defeat it, or if it faints without dying I can touch it and make a meal of it.
(In a pinch I can just burrow into the ground and get a reasonable amount of nutrition that way, so not having to worry about food is a pretty convenient body to have. Maybe being a Mandrake isn’t so bad after all…?)
One way or another, I seem to be coming to terms with my situation. The moment I realized I’d become a Mandrake I was in despair, but now I have a goal, so I’m not that pessimistic about it.
So there I am, moving along in a good mood, when someone suddenly attacks me from the side.
“WAAAAAAAAAA!!??”
Something sharp sinks into my body and pain shoots through me. I scream from the pain, and through my violently lurching field of vision I realize some kind of beast has bitten into me.
The beast hears my scream from point-blank range and crumples to the ground. The impact pulls its fangs free, but where those fangs had been buried still hurts terribly.
(It hurts… something like blood is leaking out… ugh… heal up already, I’m a Mandrake, don’t I have some kind of healing ability…? Can’t I just produce some incredible medicine right now…!?)
I want this wound to close, fast. I want a remedy. The moment I wish it, a sound rings out in my head — different from a level-up, a short little ping. …I’ve heard this sound before. It’s not the level-up sound, so it must mean something else — but what?
(Hm, it doesn’t hurt. …Something is coming out of the hole… glittery liquid… that’s unsettling…)
What had been flowing from the hole originally was a green liquid — probably Mandrake blood. Now it’s glittering with light, and the whole thing is too strange and eerie to look at comfortably. And right before my eyes, the hole starts to close up.
(Is this… a remedy? I can produce it internally?)
So that ping just now was the signal for when medicine is ready? Well — no, I’ve heard that sound before this moment, and this is the first time I’ve been able to make medicine, so that can’t be it. It must mean something else.
The last time I heard it was, if I recall, when I was screaming and running in a panic after being yanked up by that goblin.
(Hmm… I can’t figure out the connection. If this were a game there’d be a log, or at least text displaying so you’d know what was happening… I want something like a status screen.)
And then the ping sounded again, and text abruptly appeared in my vision. It reads: [Status Display] acquired — and I’m so startled by its sudden appearance that my legs give out and I let out a little yelp. …Please don’t startle me like that. Mandrakes scream easily.
(This world has a status system — that’s even more game-like… well, if I can get useful information out of it, that’s a relief. I want to see my status.)
I wish for it, and a mass of text appears in my field of vision. My status, displayed. I take a careful look and sort through the information.
[Species] Mandrake (Variant)
[Level] 86
[Vitality] B
[Magic] Immeasurable
[Skills] Diffusion Voice Medicinal Synthesis Status Display
[Evolution Points] 62
[Description]
A supreme-quality Mandrake raised on dragon’s blood, saturated with abundant magical energy. Capable of producing any variety of medicine when used as a material, but has undergone a unique evolution enabling rapid movement, making capture difficult.
Hearing its voice results in death by curse — countermeasures are essential. Possesses the ability to diffuse its voice over wide areas, and can attack from distances beyond visual range.
※ High probability of becoming a Calamity-class monster if allowed to continue developing. Extremely dangerous.
The description reads very much like a game entry — and strangely, rather than being written from my perspective, it reads like something written for a human audience. It feels like a system built to show humans, not me.
“…Actually I’m a material? — wait, can I speak properly now?”
At some point I’d become able to speak clearly. It was only a few hours ago that I killed that bird accidentally and tried to apologize to it. Monster evolution is fast apparently. …But the ability to speak isn’t listed as a skill.
(The short ping sounds like a skill-acquisition sound. But if my body just changes shape, it’s not something acquired as a skill. The webbed hand is obviously not standard Mandrake equipment, but it’s not listed as a skill.)
My hole seems to have closed entirely. But looking down at my body, there’s now a dent where the beast had clamped down — will that not heal?
(… Wait. Hold on. This isn’t a dent from being bitten…)
On the brown daikon: a bump, a pinch, a bump. An absolutely gratuitous curve.
The only use for something like this is to post it somewhere and let people laugh at it. And there’s no smartphone here, no little-bird social media. Well, there isn’t any little-bird social media in my old world anymore either, but that’s beside the point.
(Sure, I wanted to be stunning, but not like this… it’ll just look ridiculous until I’m actually human-sized and shaped…!)
I slump forward and plant my hands on the ground in defeat, and my fingertips brush the beast lying collapsed beside me. The instant sensation of delicious reminds me — my hands will absorb whatever I touch whether I mean to or not.
That’s not listed as a skill either, so it must be a characteristic of Mandrakes or plant-type monsters in general. Plant roots absorbing nutrients from the things they touch is just the law of nature.
(But this means I can’t touch other living things with my hands. Is there anything else I can use besides the root-hands…?)
After thinking it over for a while, I remember that the upper part of me — the leaves, the stem, the flower — can be touched without any issue. It must be, because otherwise a goblin couldn’t grab my head and yank me out of the ground.
(If I could grow vine-like things from the upper part that I can move freely…! And then grow lots of thin vines and make them like human hair…!?)
I wish for it, and a mass of green thread-like strands cascade down from the top of my head. I can move them however I want. Moving each one individually simultaneously is too much to process, but treating them as bundles — like thick rope — and moving them that way isn’t so hard. Vine whips might be the clearest way to describe them.
I glance at the status display, and notice that the number next to Evolution Points has dropped from 62 to 61. …So these points are spent when I evolve myself.
(One point per change, roughly. …I wonder how I earn more. But with this many, I might actually be able to change into human form!)
Though I’m nervous doing it without being able to check what I look like. I should move somewhere I can see my reflection before making any more changes.
I travel for a while and find a clear, still pond covered in beautiful water-lily-like flowers, and eagerly lean over the surface to look.
The reflection staring back at me is a creature with uneven, tangled hair sticking out in all directions, a brown body with pronounced and peculiar bumps, and two void-black eyes peering out from between the green strands — so naturally I scream. …It had the energy of a cursed doll found abandoned at a dump site, and it was genuinely, deeply frightening.
*(P… progress if I look like a doll… that’s progress… at least *person* is in the word…)*
I’ve evolved from a brown daikon into a cursed doll, so I should be glad that I’ve taken one step closer to humanoid form. …I want to believe that.