The little Mushman woke up with a start. She half feared she wouldn’t wake up at all, left out in the middle of forest in the middle of evolution. Though she didn’t actually really know what happened during evolution. Did monsters enter cocoons? Maybe the bug monsters at least.
Luckily, she was not in the middle of the forest. In fact, somehow, she was sitting in her own bed, wrapped tightly and warmly, in fact she could barely wriggle in her current position.
Suddenly, the door of the house burst open with a certain Dryad rushing inside. “Oh thank the Gods you’re awake.”
Ellephwen stood there with a hand over her chest, she breathed a deep sigh of relief, but she looked very tired. Another figure also appeared behind her, someone Ellena had yet to meet, not that she had met any of the forest denizens outside of her kin. She strained to get a good look at this new person, instead, as if sensing her curiosity, the woman stepped out into view.
Immediately Ellena felt her cheeks flush, if they could do such a thing. The woman next to Ellephwen was truly beautiful, even beyond the Dryad. It was no surprise given that she was an Elf. A Lake Elf judging by her tall stature and short cyan-blue hair. Her outfit consisted of long white gloves with only one finger hole and a silky white and blue knee length dress. On her legs were thigh length leather boots. The only thing that might have tarnished her looks was a long thick scar that reached from under her right ear to her hair line. Though, to her and likely many others that was a plus.
The Elf gave Ellena a tender smile, causing the Mushmans cheeks to redden even further. Why am I blushing? Is she just that beautiful? I was only ever interested in men in my past life!
Ellephwen cleared her throat, which finally caused the little Mushman to remember the fact that she could read her thoughts. Causing her to blush for a different reason.
“Ellena, this is Samora. She is a very skilled healer. In fact, she happened to be the one that healed you the night we met. You would have met her then, but I did not want to overwhelm you. I asked for her help again when I finally found you at the bottom of that cliff.”
Samora bowed. “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you properly, little Ellie.”
Little Ellie? My name’s already short enough already! Ellena projected her thoughts towards the Elf.
“Sorry Ellena, I should have said. Samora cannot hear your thoughts, telepathy is not a common skill. She knows of your situation, but cannot converse with you.”
That meant that the two of them could never converse unless Ellephwen was there. Though for what reason would it be just the two of them in the first place. Nicknames aside, she wanted to thank the Lake Elf for healing her. She could of course speak through the Dryad, but she wanted to say something directly.
In an attempt to show thanks, Ellena flashed the biggest smile she could, beaming at Samora. For whatever reason, the Elf twitched in response, which took the Mushman aback a bit. She looked over to Ellephwen. Did I do something wrong? Ellephwen simply shrugged and looked away.
“I can’t take it.,” Samora muttered, walking over to Ellephwen and reaching out her hands.
Ellena began to panic as Samora picked her up, wobbling her tiny legs to try and escape. The rather slender Elf was far stronger than she looked. Suddenly, she pulled the Mushman into a tight embrace.
“YOU’RE JUST TOO DAMN CUUUUUTE!” She screamed, rubbing her face against Ellena.
A single thought entered Ellena’s head. A single reaction to the situation that presented itself. Eh?
“I tried so hard! I even behaved myself whilst I was healing you! But that smile, you smiled at me like that. I can’t be blamed right? I had to!” Samora began to ramble on at great speed as she spun Ellena around in a tight embrace.
The little Mushman looked over to her kin with a pleading yet quite squished face. Ellephwen took a seat nearby and sighed.
“You see, child. Samora has a little bit of an… Obsession with Mushmen. I was a little reluctant to ask her for help because of that, but she is the most skilled healer I know,” she explained with just a hint of irritance.
Is that why there’s a Lake Elf all the way out in the forest? Cus she’s obsessed with Mushmen? Ellena asked, still being prodded, cuddled and snuggled with.
Ellephwen’s eyes widened for just a split second. So quickly that it would have been difficult to notice if she wasn’t already staring at her. “Well, something like that.”
Despite having a villagers knowledge on most things in the world, Ellena did know a few things about Elves as she once happened to meet the Lake Elf princess. The only royalty she had met in her past life in fact. She was passing through their village on a diplomatic mission to the Islands capital and happened to grow quite fond of the scenery there. She returned once in a while whilst staying at the capital and Ellena learned quite a lot from her entourage.
The Elves were an odd existence to begin with. Whenever otherworlders are reincarnated to this one they assume Elves are a mortal race, alongside humans, dwarf and other minor races. They are their own existence entirely, separate from Mortals, Demons or Monsters.
Elves were naturally isolationist, even the Lake elves who interact with other species more than most rarely did so. From what Ellena knew, there were six Elven clans. The Lake Elves were the only ones she knew, identifiable by their blue hair and skill with water magic. There were three other elemental clans, Mountain Elves, Sky Elves and Volcanic Elves. She didn’t know much about them outside their names.
Then there were the other two. Light Elves, who were very low in number, but highly influential and powerful. Whilst the Elemental Elf clans all had matching hair colours, that was not the case for Light Elves, though they all have golden eyes and pale skin.
Finally, there were the Dark Elves, younger than the other clans, the Dark Elves were born from the love of a Demon King and Light Elf Queen a few thousand years ago. It was a union that shouldn’t have worked, it was only possible due to the Demon King exhausting his mana to gift the Queen a child. This child went on to become mother of the Dark Elves. Thanks to the unique union, the Dark Elves are quite different to the other Elves. They’re also distinct due to their dark skin and white or black hair.
That was all the Lake Elf Princesses staff had time to teach Ellena’s old village. Perhaps, with Samora around she would have the chance to learn more, she certainly hoped so. The hair colour and element of each Elemental Elf clan seemed quite obvious and straight forward, but she knew so little outside of them.
Whilst zoning out to rack her memory of all knowledge she had on Elves, it seemed as though Samora had finally grown tired of spinning, though maybe it was more accurate to say she was satisfied, judging the smile that had been spread across her face.
The Mushman couldn’t help but wonder what this Elf was doing all the way out here in the first place, not that she was going to complain about having her life saved.
“I can ask her for you if you wish. Samora is not one to be shy about her past.”
Hearing merely one part of the conversation did not quell the Elf's joy as she immediately parked herself on Ellena's bed, a big grin stretching her mouth. “Is little Ellie curious about my past? I’m happy to tell you the surprisingly short tale,” she promised with a friendly wink.
Ellena simply nodded, sitting next to her as she cuddled up. A small squeal of excitement darted out of the Elf, which seemed to only exacerbate Ellephwen's irritance.
“So it seems like you already know a bit about the Lake Elves. Your past life I’d wager? Anyway, as you know we all live at the Great Lake, but I always had a huge amount of wanderlust, quite rare for an Elf. As you might’ve guessed, I love Mushmen. Came across a whole family of them, getting chased by a pack of Iron Wolves,” she paused with a look of realisation. “Oh, if you haven’t seen one before, Iron Wolves are even tougher than Black Wolves, not the strongest, but they’re up there. Anyway, back to my story. I fought them to protect those adorable little Mushmen and ended up quite badly injured. Was pretty weak back then. Ellephwen found me and decided to help me after she saw the Mushmens' concern for me. Took me to the closest human village she knew of, one of the few that exist within the forest. The villagers treated me and frankly I owed them my life. I stayed there for years as thanks.”
So basically she sacrificed herself for a bunch of Forest Mushmen… Ellena let her thoughts simmer on that fact for a moment then shook her head. The little Mushman truly wished she could speak directly to Samora, as speaking through Ellephwen had been quite awkward thus far. She looked over at her kin. Does she still live there now? Where is this village?
“That was at least fifty years ago now. Samora has far too much wanderlust for that Ellena. She still considers it her home as far as I’m aware though,” the Dryad answered.
Samora nodded. “Oh I visit once a year at least. Sometimes i’ll stay a few years even. They see me as something of a guardian I think.”
“As for where it is. You’ll probably get a chance to visit, only a few hours walk south.”
Ellena only hoped that these humans would not attack her on sight like the last ones she had run into. She wanted to keep talking to Samora, or talking to her through someone else, but, she had only just noticed something. She was extremely hungry. It had been at least a whole day since she had last eaten properly and evolution surely took some out of you.
She hopped of the bed and began walking over to the kitchen, before stopping in her tracks. Wait… Evolution… I evolved last night! I completely forgot! She turned to the Dryad. I evolved! What do I look like? Why didn’t you tell me!?
Ellephwen brought her hand to her mouth and giggled. “Why didn’t I tell you? I thought you might have known Ellena.”
Well, what do I look like?
Two hands placed themselves on the mushroom's head and turned her towards the storage area where a full body mirror stood against the wall. “Why don’t you see for yourself.”
The now slightly less small Mushman excitedly trotted over to the mirror in question and took a deep breath, taking in the new Monster in front of her. It was not a Mushman she had seen before.
Most Forest Mushmen grow to be about three feet tall, she stood about half a foot taller than that. The usual cream coloured skin you would see on most Mushmen had been replaced by a light grey. Her helmet was darker and had a slightly different pattern to the dots, but it was still dots. It also seemed smaller, at least in comparison to her body, it was probably still larger than it was before. The small stubby legs found on all Mushmen were a little longer and a little thicker, sturdy was the right word for them.
Also, despite her regeneration skill, the worst wound she had received from the Wolf mother was still there, scarred and a lot smaller, but still there. It had remained even after she had evolved, so scars remained during evolution. She worried if she would still be as effective with a small gash out of her main form of attack.
A gentle hand stroked the top of her head as Ellephwen appeared behind her in the mirror. She looked almost proud. “I wasn’t entirely surprised when I found you in the forest already evolved, but I am impressed. Though we are going to have to talk about the risky method you used to evolve,” her expression turned sterner. Ellena filed that away for big trouble to avoid.
“Where as I… As happy as I am for you Ellena, please stay cute a little longer yeah? Don’t grow up too fast.” Samora, still sitting on the bed, seemed quite dejected on her evolution, though she probably knew that the ex-humans end goal was arms and not an even bigger Mushman.
With that evolution, would also have come a jump in stats, so Ellena decided to check them too.
Name: Ellena
Age: 51 days
Species: Lesser Mushman Guardian, Mushman
Height: 3.4”
Sex: N/A
Level: 01 +53
Health: 36/36 +22
Mana: 8/8 +5
Stamina: 53/53 +27
Energy:16/53 +27
Attack: 31 +19
Defence: 75 +46
Magic Attack: 9 +6
Magic Defence: 33 +20
Titles: Kin of Ellephwen
Skills: [Pain Resistance lvl 5] +2 [Night vision lvl 3] +1 [{Mushroom Helmet lvl 8}] +3
[Tough Stomach lvl 2] +1 [Unarmed Combat Novice lvl 7] +5 [Swiftfoot lvl 4] +2 [Warriors Heart lvl 5] +2 [Warriors Will lvl 4] +2 [Lesser Regeneration lvl 4] +3 [Guardian lvl 2] gain!
It seemed as though the evolution gave all of her skills an extra level, which was something she had never heard about before. Also a small boost to all of her stats, defense especially, it was almost double most of her other stats. Apparently that was what she did best. Though she still didn’t have the same stats as the average human adult. It was early days yet.
There was something new though, a skill that was clearly related with her subspecies. She turned to her favourite living encyclopedia. Ellephwen, have you heard of a skill called Guardian before?
The Dryad brought a hand to her chin. “Yes actually, I believe so. As far as I’m aware it gives its owner an overall boost to their defence stat and also makes them emit an aura that basically draws already aggressive foes towards them. As far as I’m aware those that gain it are usually those with a lot of health and defence that are fine to draw the attention whilst the rest of their party does the damage,” she tilted her head at Ellena whose expression of annoyance was very telling. “It might seem a bit pointless now, given that you fight alone, but as you level it you’ll be able to gain more control over the aura, it’ll also strengthen and increase your defences even further.”
Ellena pouted. She may have chosen that evolution, but another defensive skill wouldn’t help her win fights faster. She fought alone, it was certainly not the most useful skill for her, at least not yet.
It seemed clear that she was built to be tough. That much was obvious, then again even in her past life, her only skill that was significantly higher than the human average was her toughness. Even the bandit that got the killing blow on her seemed surprised that her skin was nearly as tough as leather. She had always assumed it was due to her farm work, but perhaps that was her natural inclination. Probably meant she shouldn’t fight so recklessly and aggressively.
Unfortunately, the Mushman had once again forgotten that she needed to eat food, to which her grumbling stomach reminded her. Causing their guest to giggle. Ellephwen tried to stifle her own.
“I’ll cook some dinner, Samora, you are welcome to stay to eat with us.”
“Are you sure? Won’t say no to that!” She turned to Ellena, cupping a hand. “Ellephwens cooking is famous even in that human village I live in. Oh the village is called Windy Stream by the way. When humans live out here they don’t generally waste a lot of time on names.”
It was already late at that point, and Ellephwen would no doubt refuse to let Ellena out, so after the three ate, Samora stayed a few more hours just chatting. It was nice for the ex-human to have another sapient to speak to, even if it wasn’t a direct conversation.
Still, she wanted to go to bed early that night, she wanted to test out her new abilities. Of course she also had to hear a word full from Ellephwen before she did, certainly, but still, she was incredibly excited.
So, earlier than intended, Samora left them to go back to the village. She had been staying a few months at this point and would be staying a little longer, so no doubt Ellena would see her again.
So with the ordeal and excitement of the past few days still fresh in her mind, Ellena went to bed grinning, even with one nagging thought in the back of her head. This bed feels a lot smaller than it did before. It turned out, she had also evolved to be significantly wider than her Mushling body.
I doubt anyone will remember the exact stats from this evolution in the original book, but these numbers are decently lower than before. One of the biggest issues was how massive the numbers were getting in that story. By the point I reached in that story, I think Ellena was a few thousand times tougher than the average human? How ridiculous are those numbers. I think I said that stats eventually became diminishing returns in the setting, which was always the plan, but eventually the numbers reach so high it feels kind of pointless. So, anyway, trying to keep them low enough that they still have meaning.
Also changed her evolution name to have Lesser at the start, for... Reasons... Anyway, hope you enjoyed the chapter!