The Wolf’s muscles tensed beneath its smoky black fur. It was a split second away from turning me into a midnight snack when the bushes to my left suddenly exploded.
"There it is! Cut it off!" Barnaby’s voice roared through the trees.
The two mercenaries from earlier burst into the clearing, covered in sweat and carrying their weapons. The Captain had his spear leveled, his rusted iron helmet gleaming in the dim forest light, while Barnaby wielded a broadsword.
They froze the instant they saw the sheer size of the beast.
"Holy gods," Barnaby whispered, his bravado instantly evaporating. "Captain... that ain’t no normal wolf. That’s a Tier 2 Calamity."
The Wolf diverted its crimson glare from my glowing neck to the two heavily armed humans. It let out a deafening roar that sent a shockwave of cold wind through the clearing, blowing away the dead leaves and nearly knocking me off my tail.
[System: Well, look at that. The meat shields have arrived! Don’t just sit there like a stunned sausage, Barry. Move!]
I didn’t need to be told twice. While the wolf was distracted, I scrambled backward, using my Quick Dodge trait to zip through the muck and slide beneath the roots of a giant tree. I flattened my dull slate-grey body against the mud, activating Mud Camouflage. Thanks to the thick roots blocking the view, the glowing blue ring around my neck was finally hidden.
"Stand your ground, Barnaby!" the Captain yelled, his voice shaking as he raised his shield. "If we run, it’ll hunt us down in the dark! Aim for the throat!"
The Shadow Wolf lunged. It moved like a streak of pure midnight, completely bypassing the spear and slamming its massive, smoky shoulder directly into the Captain’s shield. The metal buckled with a horrific crunch, and the Captain was sent flying ten feet backward, crashing hard into a thorn bush.
"Captain!" Barnaby screamed. He swung his broadsword in a blind panic, catching the wolf across its flank. The blade cut through the smoke, drawing a spray of thick, dark blood, but it barely seemed to slow the monster down.
The wolf spun around, its jaws snapping shut on Barnaby’s shoulder armor. The heavy leather ripped like paper. Barnaby let out a blood-curdling shriek as he was pinned to the ground, the massive beast preparing to rip his throat out.
From my hiding spot under the root, I watched the absolute chaos unfold.
Hey, System, I thought, my snake brain working at a mile a minute. ’If the wolf kills them, it’s coming for me next. But if I help them... can I steal the kill?’
[System: Oho! Now you’re thinking like a true grocery store manager. Let them do the heavy lifting, then swoop in for the profit. The wolf’s belly is completely exposed right now while it’s pinning the fat one down. Give it the concrete special!]
I coiled my three-foot body tightly underneath the root. I opened my jaws wide, drawing deep from the cold, tingling mana core fragment in my stomach. The blue light crackled in my throat, mixing with the thick forest mud until it felt pressurized, and incredibly volatile.
I aimed straight for the Shadow Wolf’s front paws, which were currently crushing Barnaby’s chest.
Take this, you oversized mutt ! I hissed mentally.
BOOM!!.
I uncoiled and fired. The Sludge Bomb shot out like a cannonball of glowing blue mud. The projectile slammed directly into the wolf’s left front leg and the ground beneath it.
The moment the magical mud made contact, it let out a sharp hiss and solidified instantly. In the blink of an eye, the wet sludge turned into a massive, block of solid grey stone, completely encasing the wolf’s paw and anchoring it deep into the earth.
The Shadow Wolf yelped in surprise, its crimson eyes widening as it tried to pull its leg free. The solid stone didn’t budge an inch. It was completely stuck.
Barnaby, gasping for air and bleeding from his shoulder, looked down at the sudden block of stone, then looked over at the bush where the attack came from. He caught sight of my glowing blue neck patterns.
"The... the mud worm?!" Barnaby gasped, his jaw dropping in absolute disbelief.
[System: so would you like to make a alliance with them now ? ]
Alliance? Please. Five years in retail management taught me that partnerships are a scam. If you help a coworker with their shift, they take the credit. If you leave money on the counter, it goes missing.
If I helped these two mercenaries kill the wolf, they’d just put me in a jar and sell me to an alchemist the second the adrenaline wore off.
’System, I’m going for the kill,’ I hissed mentally, my slate-grey body uncoiling from under the tree root like a snapped whip. ’Keep that speed buff ready.’
[System: That’s my boy! Steal the commission, bury the evidence! The wolf’s neck is wide open while it’s trying to chew through that stone block. Go, you magnificent blue worm!]
The Wolf was completely frantic. It slammed its free paws against the solid block of magical concrete encasing its front leg, howling in a pitch that made my new reptilian teeth rattle. Barnaby was still lying flat on his back right beneath the beast, clutching his bleeding shoulder and staring up at the monster in pure, paralyzed terror.
I didn’t care about Barnaby. I cared about the massive pool of experience points currently pinned to the floor.
Using my Quick Dodge trait, I didn’t just slither—I practically launched myself across the mud, a sleek blue blur tearing through the wet grass.
"Barnaby, get up!" the Captain screamed from across the clearing, finally dragging himself out of the thorn bush. He was limping heavily, his spear raised, but he was too far away to make a difference.
The wolf noticed my approach. Its eyes snapped down toward the grass, its massive jaws opening to snap me out of the air. But it couldn’t shift its weight properly because of my stone trap.
I didn’t try to dodge the jaws. I used the momentum to slide right under its chin, wrapping my three-foot-long body around its thick, muscular neck. The smoky black fur felt freezing cold against my scales, like wrapping myself around an open freezer door.
Crunch.
I unhinged my jaw and bit down with every ounce of strength I had, driving my tiny teeth deep into the soft, unprotected flesh right beneath the wolf’s throat armor.
[Target Critical Status Detonated.]
[Activating ’Gluttony’ Trait... Extracting Tier 2 Calamity Code.]
The taste was absolutely overwhelming. It didn’t taste like the cabbage-flavored beetle or the hot sauce from my siblings. It tasted like pure, concentrated dark espresso mixed with static electricity. The shadow magic inside the wolf’s veins violently surged into my mouth, burning its way down my throat and directly into my core.
The Wolf let out one final, choking gurgle. The fire in its eyes flickered, dimmed, and completely went out. The massive, pickup-truck-sized body suddenly lost all its structure, deflating into a cloud of ordinary black soot that collapsed onto the mud, leaving nothing behind but a glowing, purple crystal core the size of a fist.
[CALAMITY BEAST SLAIN!]
[Biomass Gained: 4,200 / 5,000]
[Evolution Threshold Approaching!]
[Concept Stolen: ’Shadow Step’ (D-Grade - Rare)]
[System Note: Holy mother of margins! You actually poached a Tier 2 kill at Level 1. You are officially the sleaziest snake in this forest. Capitalist greed wins again!]
The smoke cleared, leaving me sitting in the middle of a massive pile of black ash, right on top of Barnaby’s chest. The rings around my neck were glowing a brilliant, blinding sapphire blue now, pulsing from the massive injection of Tier 2 magic.
Barnaby lay perfectly still beneath me, his eyes wide, his mouth hanging open so far I thought his jaw might pop out of joint. He looked at the giant block of stone, then at the pile of ash, and finally down at me—a three-foot-long, slate-grey ditch snake resting on his breastplate.
"You..." Barnaby whimpered, his voice cracking like a dry twig. "What kind of demon worm are you?"
From ten feet away, the sound of footsteps cut through the silence. The Captain was marching toward us, his face pale but his eyes locked dead-on the glowing purple monster core sitting in the mud.
"Barnaby... don’t move," the Captain whispered, his grip getting tighten around his spear. "That thing just ate a Calamity Wolf. Keep it distracted while I put an iron tip through its brain!"
I slowly turned my head toward the Captain, my yellow slitted eyes narrowing.
’Hey, System’,I thought, a cold, dangerous vibe settling into my snake brain.’ I’m only 800 biomass away from my next evolution, right?’
[System: Spot on, Barry. And look at that. You’ve got a heavily injured captain and a terrified grunt right in front of you. They’ve got weapons, armor, and probably some very shiny copper coins in their pockets. What’s the play, boss?]