Re:Mimic [MONSTER MC LITRPG]

A week swiftly passed in the cavern. Lucas measured the amount of time that passed using his sleep cycles. During this past week, he had made leaps and bounds with his energy control and use of his skills.

Currently, he was on the prowl once more, stalking some prey. His ever changing color helped him blend in almost perfectly with surrounding cavern walls.

In his sight, he could see a small pack of rat-like creatures moving on the floor of the neon colored cavern. With a guesstimation of their sizes, they were about a ⅓ of his size. Being able to truly look at them now, he could make out their features properly.

Each rat creature had 2 hairless tails and 3 white eyes, with the third eye settled inbetween the other two. The color of their fur was a bright red which blended surprisingly well with the surrounding colors.

The trio moved around swiftly, seeming to be on a hunt of their own. Lucas stealthily followed above them, his arachnid-like form different from before. His two front tendrils looked like two bone-like scythes growing out of him. The other six looked much more muscular yet slightly leaner. His entire form was much more structured and streamlined as well.

Lucas tailed the rats for about thirty minutes before they ran into something—a huge salamander. The lizard was quite large, easily standing over the three rats and was about thrice as long as them if not longer. Its beautiful sky blue scales looked smooth and moist, almost like it had a thin membrane of water covering its entire body.

Its scales also had some rune-like shapes carved randomly across its scales. Thanks to Lucas' [Spirit Sense], he could instantly tell the runes were not physically there. It was its Spirit energy flowing in a unique pattern across its surface.

'Interesting. The other lizards didn't have those patterns.'

This wasn't Lucas's first time seeing one of these salamanders but it was going to be the first time he hunted one. And from the looks of it, this one was a little special.

The pack of rats surrounded the salamander in the wide tunnel, with two at the sides and one facing it squarely. After a tense few seconds, the leftmost rat lunged at the salamander. Its mouth filled with a dim crimson glow as it went in for a ferocious bite.

The salamander, unflustered, slashed out with an energy coated claw. The swipe smashed away the rat easily, smashing it into the tough cavern wall. It's life or death unknown.

The other two rats saw this opening leaped at the salamander at the same time. Sadly for them, the salamander used the momentum of its claw strike to do a full spin. Using its tail like an energy coated whip, it smashed the two rats to meat paste.

BANG!

The right most rat splattered against the far wall while the middle one was smashed apart by the tail whip, painting the tunnel red. The salamander then watched the aftermath of its attack in apparent pride before it slowly made its way forward.

'I will have to watch out for that tail.'

Previously, if Lucas had watched such a scene, his first thought would have been to flee as far as possible from the lizard but now…

'Can I replicate that tail whip with my tendrils? Should be possible but it can't maximize the use of [Leech]… or can it?'

With these thoughts swirling in his mind, he went down and absorbed the dead rats. As he pierced them with his scythe-like limbs, they became encased with a dark red energy. His tendrils didn't just absorb the rat corpses, but also some crimson energy.

Within Lucas, it could be seen that a swirl of crimson energy was revolving around his core while his normal energy weaved across his form. A minuscule about of crimson energy was added to the swirl from the rat corpses.

'No wonder the lizard ignored the corpses, there's barely any Life energy within them.'

Lucas thought in comprehension, all his experimentation with his skills had provided him with a breakthrough in the use of [Leech]. Absorbing this unique energy he coined Life energy was possible thanks to activating [Leech] with his Spirit energy.

When he was done, Lucas began tailing the salamander. He monitored the tunnel like a hawk, trying to scout the perfect spot to launch his ambush. About five minutes later, when he was absolutely sure there were no other creatures present thanks to his heightened perception, he made his move.

High up the cavern's wall, Lucas made a death defying plunge towards the salamander from its right side. Doing his best to aim at its blind spot. His six movement tendrils tensed as he rocketed off the wall, the air whipping at his eyes. Luckily they were protected by a transparent membrane he devised after his numerous battles, giving him unflinching vision.

When he was about six meters away from the sky blue lizard, his scythe-tendrils lit up with an eerie red glow as he anticipated the impact. The instant he got four meters from the salamander however, it abruptly swung its tail upward with a sharp diagonal arc not forgetting to coat it with its energy.

'Shit.'

Was all Lucas could think before he was viscously smacked out of the air like a noisy fly. Mid plummet, he focused all his Will and Spirit energy to make his form more malleable, willing himself to ignore the immense pain from the tail whip.

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He smacked into the ground with a wet clap before hastily solidifying himself once more. When he turned his attention to the salamander, it was already lunging at him with a claw strike.

Instead of retreating, Lucas shot forward and attacked with his glowing scythe-like tendril. Both attacks clashed harshly but both combatants were unfazed by the impact. Lucas pressed forward and hacked at the lizard with his second scythe-like limb. The lizard calmly stepped back lightly, dodging the attack by a few centimeters. It then retreated about five meters away from Lucas in almost the same breath.

'How is it so good at dodging?'

Lucas couldn't help but ask himself. It seemed like the salamander could perfectly predict his moves. This fact just stoked his Spirit further. Without missing a beat, Lucas lunged at it once more. A new plan formed in his mind.

'If I can't strike it to death, I will grapple it to death!'

The lizard watched him approach with an eeriely calm gaze. The runes on its sleek body glimmered brightly with a sky blue light. The membrane on it changed as well, becoming almost a second skin as it perfectly replicated the scales on the lizard.

This transformation didn't deter Lucas at all. He Willed his core to move his life force across his entire body. He could immediately feel a difference, his senses became more powerful, his strength, body coordination, and toughness shot through the roof as well. His speed soared as he shot towards the lizard like a crimson comet. The spike in speed caught the lizard off guard as it hastily struck out with a claw.

'Chance!'

Lucas watched its attack almost in slow motion. With ease and confidence, he jumped above it and hacked at its head with all his might. The attack pierced the veil around the lizard with some difficulty before piercing into the soft eye underneath.

HIIISSSSSS!!!

The lizard pulled back with a pained hiss, trying to create some distance but it was already too late. With the tendril sinked in, Lucas activated [Leech] from within its vulnerable skull. Instantly turning its brain to mush and securing the kill.

The next instant, the lizard collapsed to the floor in a quiet heap. The membrane on it lost all its luster rapidly becoming moisture that evaporated in the following moments. Standing next to the corpse, Lucas pulled out his tendril as he fell into thought. Blood pooling around the salamander.

'What a fight. I didn't think it would create such an opening due to my sudden acceleration. Thankfully, [Leech] came in clutch as always—'

{[Leech] has leveled up from level 2—> level 3.

Congratulations, you have leveled up to level 3.}

Before Lucas could even finish the thought, he received a series of notifications. Reading them, his already good mood became even better.

'Finally! [Leech] leveled up. It took quite a bit for me to level up though. It seems it's as I guessed, the stronger the creature I kill, the faster I level up.'

Forcing himself to calm down, he spread his senses out once more. After making sure a spider wasn't lurking in the shadows, he thought to himself.

'Let's calm down and inspect this lizard corpse first, those runes it had were very interesting.'

Lucas brought his attention back to the lizard and checked out its scales, sadly all its runes seemed to have faded away after its death.

'Hmmm… With the salamander dead, there's nothing manipulating the Spirit energy so it makes sense for the runes to fade. Well, if it could create runes, I can definitely do so as well!'

Not getting the runes didn't dampen Lucas mood at all. After all, he had an Attribute point to spend and he just faced off against something as powerful as the salamander without flinching. He felt truly powerful at this moment. The Lucas from two weeks ago and the Lucas now were worlds apart… literally.

Seeing there was no need to keep the lizard's corpse, Lucas used [Leech] on it to drain its lingering Life energy. The moment he impaled it with his glowing scythe tendril, it immediately shriveled up like a decaying weed.

'Woah, now that's more like it!'

The power of his [Leech] had ramped up considerably. That one level difference seemed to be much wider than he thought. With his business with the lizard carcass wrapped up, he made his way to his den.

A few minutes later, he was sitting within his nook. On its walls, you could see tally marks counting his sleep cycles. With the neon lights of the cavern slightly piercing into his crevice, Lucas brought his mind to his status screen.

———

[STATUS]

Name: Lucas Maverick

Species: Mimic

Tier: 0

Level: 3

Essence: Freedom

Achievements: [Anomaly]

Attributes:

•Physique: 2(+)

•Spirit: 1(+)

•Mind: 1(+)

Skills:

•Guide [Special]

•Mimicry [Level 3]

•Leech [Level 3]

•Spirit sense [Level 3]

Attribute points: 1

———

'Okay, let's make a choice. Physique, Mind, and Spirit…'

Numerous thoughts flickered across Lucas' mind as he tried to deduce which stat would be the most effective to place a point in. A few minutes later he had come up with what he deemed as safe assumptions.

'Physique is my best bet. So far, I have no clue what Mind will affect while Spirit will probably increase my core's energy which I don't really need more at the moment thanks to [Leech]. So Physique it is.'

With the choice made, Lucas began preparing his mind. He could still remember the last time he gave himself a stat in Physique. After preparing his mind, Lucas mentally clicked the plus sign. The transformation began instantaneously.

He felt an influx of energy barge into his core but surprisingly, it wasn't as painful as the first time around. His formless core easily took in the influx of energy and redirected it throughout his entire body.

The feeling was almost magical, his mind felt at ease as the energy raced within him. Altering and enhancing his body wherever it went. Lucas tried to watch what was going on, but a sudden and sharp sting to his mind forced him to retract his focus.

As the process went on, Lucas felt more and more comfortable. A few minutes later, when frost had built up within the entire nook, he suddenly felt a sharp pinch. Bracing himself, he felt the pain pinch multiply across his form. In just a few moments, it felt like he was getting stung by millions of flaming bees.

Lucas' form writhed and contorted but he held on to his consciousness firmly. His mental fortitude had taken a massive jump this past week. After an unknown amount of time had passed, the pain slowly began to recede. Eventually, he felt perfectly fine again.

He slowly opened his eyes. After a few moments of relaxing, he pulled out a tendril to see what had changed with his body. The tendril appeared in a split second even without the mobilization of his Spirit energy. As he analyzed the internal structure a bit closer, he felt a rush of emotion.

'With this level of control, I should be able to transform back into a human. But first, let's go get some revenge on that slime.'