I'm a Stingray?

"Uh... what did you say?" Timothy followed along, feeling genuinely confused.

"You aren't telling us something about yourself, something important. How did you just turn into a different stingray?" The old man weighed in that grand and head-scratching fact.

He wasn't trying to put pressure against the sea-pancake, but just wanted the truth. That and he felt genuine concern; the little menace had not been the same, ever since he came out of that unique cavern.

The entire group grew even more concerned, once they noticed that the hero was absent-minded even towards such a heavy conversation.

It was as if a large boulder was weighing over most of his conscience, that forced the stingray to give up on normal functions: such as holding a conversation.

That was why the only thing he could answer, was. "Huh... I changed my species?"

The fact that he was utterly unaware of such tremendous shifts of forms, had managed to push the group towards stronger worry!

Dana had heard the whole request for an upgrade that the hero had made earlier, yet she still was worried half to death. It was fair to say that pressure was rapidly building its foundation, in this group conversation.

However, for the sake of fact-checking, the little menace expanded the third-person-view map, and was swift to notice that his skin had truly changed most of its original details!

Such a discovery had forced him to grasp over just a little bit of focus. Which unsurprisingly led him towards catching up on the whole conversation too, and he managed to find a way of replying.

The response was proper, although he was still avoiding the truth. "It has something to do with my new silver blood, probably? There is a weird worm inside me so this isn't a surprise."

"Actually it's a big surprise," The mantis shrimp contradicted, but also felt a bit happy that Timmy could reply properly.

But then he also felt it important to remind, "Worms aren't supposed to turn you black!"

Before this conversation could have developed further, the system pitched an idea that wasn't expected whatsoever. Be it now, or any other day!

[You are allowed to tell them that you have a system, it isn't such a big deal]

"What!" Timothy shouted out in utter shock, completely forgetting that his friends had hearing senses.

As most of them gazed towards the boy in utter confusion, the system began explaining herself.

[There are quite a few reasons, regarding why my guests couldn't openly speak about me]

[One of the reasons was discretion. I specifically preferred for most marine life, to be unaware of my existence. It makes my work easier]

[Second, it's highly difficult for most fish to understand what a system is, so it's less troubling to not inform them about this topic]

[But your friends seem capable of possessing a grasp of understanding. Not to forget, they are genuinely worried about your well-being, and have proved useful to aid your survival so far]

[Tell them]

Such a recommendation had definitely barged forward as a strong shock, but it sounded like a good idea; each word coming from the system, had been coated with tremendous reasoning!

This group of friends was worth sharing a secret with. And it was a noticeable truth, that he couldn't find any proper excuses any longer. Finding ways of explaining these abnormalities, will only become more difficult over time ~ ease was non-existent.

A lot of the upgrades tend to bring along extreme pain, and it was no secret that such a feature will only get worse over time; so it was best if they knew about the system now, rather than later.

And as the little boy returned his attention towards the conversation, he decided to cut to the case right away. "Okay, so I have a system in my head."

The silence that weighed in after that point, was heavier to handle than a bone-crushing boulder. He did not know what reply to expect, but this tension was surely forcing him to become far more focused, so at least it was a win in one way.

Surprisingly, Osira decided to continue the conversation for once, by questioning. "What does that mean?"

He felt utterly glad that his friends wanted to know more, so he deciphered. "There's a voice in my head that has helped me survive so far. It also lets me upgrade my body, you saw that with your own eyes."

"Okay, he has gone insane." The same lady who asked the question, followed along.

And her eyes directly locked with the rest of the team, because she was utterly desperate at this point, and hoped that they could provide any solution if was fair to say, that the black-grouper was yet to understand the whole concept, of what the little stingray had just said!

"Actually he isn't crazy," Dana decided to intervene in this conversation.

She had been mostly staying idle until now, but also felt an even stronger sense of attraction towards the hero ~ so she didn't want to let anyone scorch his name.

That was why she also pressured a fact, "You know how my vibration senses are very strong now?"

"Yes?" The black-grouper agreed, utterly clueless regarding where this conversation was heading towards.

Thankfully the nice skeleton lady was eager to explain, "Well, I can kinda hear some of your thoughts. It's easy, because I only need to focus on your head vibrations."

It was difficult to understand the whole concept at this point, but Dana did not stop there. "I can guarantee that there is a voice in Timmy's head, and I talked with it as well."

"This is... quite interesting." The geezer decided to mumble.

"This is insane," The black-grouper softly contradicted.

"It is insane." Timothy decided to agree for once, but thankfully his focus was grand right now due to the situation.

However, he also wanted to add. "But this system helps me become stronger, we need it to survive."

Osira heavily liked the word 'we', but she didn't want to openly admit that. Instead, she just decided to nod in agreement with the boy, and stretched a healthy smile too.

"I wouldn't mind a system chattering in my head," Gerlach added with absolute certainty, although such a statement had the aura of a joke.

"Uh, I don't know if you can have one." Timmy pointed out, and waited for the system to have a word on this.

[I'm not accepting any guests for a long while. I need to re-evaluate what goals and aid I should provide to any future guests, for the sake of increasing their survival rate]

"Well there we go, she just answered me. You can't get a system in your head." The hero assured, and decided to head towards a sub-topic.

"Okay so all of you know about my secret now. I have a system in my head, and it will help me become much stronger in the future. Nobody else knows about this, so please keep it a secret." Such a sentence had tired the boy out, but he could see that the group were carrying soft smiles across their faces.

Gerlach decided to speak for everyone, by stating. "We won't be telling anybody, we're friends after all. And other fish can be dumb, we can't risk them chasing us just to get a system as well."

"Yeah, we will keep your secret." Osira decided to weigh in her thoughts as well.

She didn't want to be on bad terms with her friend, so she expressed. "Sorry for calling you crazy,"

The peachy aura of which the entire group radiated, was strong enough to make him speak out. "It's okay. Now let's go kill those sharks... my head is starting to hurt from all these emotions."