NOVEL NEXT Chapter Thirty Eight
Killing the lizards might have been simple, but eating them was a whole other matter entirely. Tearing them to pieces took way too much energy, and trying to use my slicey vines just for that purpose felt too complicated and took up too many nutrients. Okay, so maybe it wasn’t actually a lot of nutrients, to be fair, but it felt like too much to spend on just dismantling something, you know? It’s the principle of the thing, the principle! That’s a special move, it’s meant for killing my prey and nothing else! You wouldn’t use a chainsaw as a kitchen knife, right? Well it’s the exact same thing! I’m not being lazy and stubborn for no reason, honest! I’m not!
So anyways yeah, I totally guilt tripped Til into cutting them up since he didn’t really help me with the fight!
He was super awed still for a while by the way, especially when he was slicing up the lizards and could feel how tough and thick they were. Just looking at the neck muscles in them alone made it super obvious how difficult ripping off one’s head was. Really, it felt like the little bump on my face that pretended to be a nose might just start growing from how big my ego was getting right now!
The skink-type heads that these lizards had were just a little bit too wide to fit into my mouth, so Til and I had to work together to try and break their heads in half vertically. It was totally a work out, and I also feel like it might have really done a number on Til’s sword. Hopefully he has more of those back at his house, or maybe there’s some kind of magic that could use on it. If not I might end up feeling a little bad...
Really, the sooner I figure out how to use my tentacles just like my slicey vines, the better!
Til hadn’t eaten any of the frogs from yesterday mind you because they were supposedly poisonous, so I was hoping he would eat some of this lizard meat today, and maybe grill some of it to eat later too. Oh and hey, I forgot to mention it, but I once tried some of the meat he’d cooked over the past few days we’d been traveling, and I found out that I really don’t care for it. Idunno, maybe heating it up just cooked all the magic out of the meat or something? Who knows. Or maybe I’m just a primal monster who craves raw flesh! It’s anybody’s guess, really.
But yeah, Til actually did want to eat some of the lizard, but it definitely wasn’t the part that I was thinking he would!
Apparently these things really are like skinks? But instead of their tongues being blue or something like those famous ones from my last life, they had um… yellow tongues? And it wasn’t necessarily because it was colored that way naturally, but because these lizards like to lick at the glowing moss that decorates the trees around the place. Basically what I’m telling you is that these lizards had that very same moss growing on their tongues somehow! And from what Til was telling me, these glowing mossy tongues were some kind of delicacy to the elves or something.
Look, sometimes I eat some gross looking things, but I cannot stress enough to you how gross Til eating one of those tongues was to me.
The man might as well have rolled up an old moldy bath mat and cooked it in my opinion!
Like, ew.
It’s a good thing I don’t have real eyes, or he would have been able to tell how hard I was judging him, for sure.
Meh, who cares if it’s gross so long as I don’t have to eat it? I’ll let the elf have his delicacies and go in search of my own.
…Do you think this swamp has any birds in it?
~~~
It took us about two more days to get out of the swamp. I didn’t have any problem with it, especially since I was still riding the high of being able to take down as many lizards as I liked with ease, but Til seemed like he couldn’t sleep very well with how often we were getting attacked. Honestly, the only reason it even took us two days to get through the swamp was just because there was almost an unending amount of those damn skink-like lizards rushing at us. It’s amazing that we even made it in as far as we did before they started swarming us. I mean jeez! Til said it had something to do with their nest being nearby? I didn’t see it though. If Til hadn’t told me their eggs were weirdly soft and see through, then I totally would have gone looking for them! But idunno, the idea of soft eggs just doesn’t sit well with me… And I definitely don’t want to have to look at a lizard embryo before I eat the thing, for sure.
So yeah, we had to beat our way out of there, and there were a lot of lizard bodies that got wastefully left behind. Did I feel super bad about it? Yes. Was this basically a repeat of the last time I was in a swamp, with the same results? Yes. Sure, I achieved my goal of getting strong enough to decimate the lizards, but the constant swarms of them becoming such a big hassle that I couldn’t even eat means that they beat me in the long run. War of attrition: Failed.
It’s not that big of a deal, but it still feels really sad, you know?
At least Til felt remorseful that he couldn’t salvage all of those gross tongues of his, too, so I wasn’t the only one lamenting the food’s loss.
Please, plant body! Seed! Anything! Let me eat more and gain more nutrients so I don't have to feel so sad! Please!
Anyways, after the shiny swamp came a kind of marshy field. Honestly, this was totally new territory for me! I mean, this entire time I’ve only been running like a freak through forests, forests, and yet more forests. And I couldn’t even count the two swamps I’ve been to as being any different, because honestly those just felt like watery forests to me with the large amount of trees they had in them, you know? So this weirdly wet field was truly my first time stepping out of the woods and onto clear (semi)flat land! Just open sky stretching in all directions!
If I was still human then this would be amazing and refreshing!
Too bad I’m a plant though!
Idunno, maybe it had something to do with how I’ve lived this entire life with a canopy of trees over my head or at least somewhere nearby, but this just doesn’t feel right. You’d think I’d be overjoyed with all this unlimited access to unblocked sun. Heck, I still remember wishing for something like this when I was just a tiny little shrub! What a betrayal of my expectations...
Have I become one of those people who have a fear of wide open spaces? You know, the opposite of people who have claustrophobia? Oh, well, no, it’s not really fear per se, I think it’s more that I just feel uncomfortable being here overall? Could it have something to do with the fact that I have no way to blend in here? I mean, no matter where I went so far, I was still able to find a place to blend in if I really wanted to, even with my weird coloration and body shape. Maybe I would have looked a bit flashy for some of the locations, but at least I would still be able to use my inherent ability to look like I was just a plant! But here… Mmm, no. There’s no way I could get away with trying to look like I belonged
here.
Good thing I’m a dangerous murder-plant, so I have nothing to worry about.
Still gives me the willies though!
~~~
Til finally got to have a nice long 10 hour sleep again for the first time in days, while I just sat there and tried not to freak myself out. Really, I don’t understand why he sleeps so long. Maybe since elves are supposed to live longer lives than humans they sleep longer, too? That wouldn’t be too far-fetched of an idea, right? I tried to ask Til a few times, but he always just squinted at me and kept moving along every time, so I never really got an answer for it.
Anyways yeah, we’re in this field. Before he started resting, Til had used some wind magic (which as I recall was completely not listed by him as a magic that elves could use!) to cut down a large area of the waist-high grass that was around us, so nothing could sneak up on us while we stayed there. With my roots and vision, I was sure nothing was gonna sneak up on me like that, but then guess what? I was (partially) wrong! Turns out the things that came at us didn’t come through the grass, but on top of it! If I’d tried to notice them just by vibrations alone, I totally wouldn’t have been able to! My vision could still detect them just fine, but I can’t lie, I kind of doubted what it had even told me in the first place once I saw what I saw.
Apparently the little predators that came after us were these crazy looking tan colored foxes that could run on top of the grass without making it even move? It was super magical to look at. Don’t worry though, I wasn’t so awed that I let them attack my sleeping elf in the night and tear him to shreds; I can’t be the elf’s pet plant if he’s dead after all! I killed a small pack of the things, about 5 of ‘em. They were a really nice size to just pop right into my mouth, so I got carried away before realizing I should save some for Til, and only left one of them for him to eat.
Honestly, they were pretty tasty!
I’d rank them right up there with orcs almost, maybe only slightly under them!
Too bad they’re so very small.
When Til woke up I handed him the remaining fox, and he told me they were called ‘Wind Wolves’, which was totally stupid to me, because they were obviously foxes. To be fair, wolves and foxes are both canines, so maybe I’m in an era where they just haven’t really made a good distinction between the two yet, but like… Come on. Totally foxes here, just open your eyes.
Anyways, while he cooked the fox, I asked him what had been bugging me for over half a day.
=Why do I hate it so much here?=
Til just gave me that look that he gives me sometimes. You know, the one he does when I ask something that he thinks I should totally know already. Really, I may be smart for a plant, but it’s not like I know everything, sheesh!
“...It’s because this territory belongs to The Wind.”
Oh, okay, so that’s why. Yeah, it makes sense that that would be the reason… Except no it completely freaking doesn’t!