I clenched my jaw. There’s no way I’m letting her reach full size, I thought. The thumping continued.

  My tentacles lunged forward as I activated [Serrated Tentacles], aiming to slice off the growing vulture girl's legs. Maybe I should get a job in leg removal. Red blood poured from her torso as she let out an inhuman shriek and flew into the sky. The other vulture girls perched across the corpse turned towards me like a black tide. Dozens of them. Maybe even a hundred.

  “Ah, crap,” I hissed. “Not this again.”

  I swung my arm to cover my face as the flock of vulture girls collided with me. They also collided into Samsara’s scales, and thankfully, her face was still covered by her hand, so no damage was done there. But my arms weren’t so lucky. Scratches formed as the vulture girls’ claws dug into my skin. I clenched my teeth as the pain intensified, sending my tentacles to swat and slice at the annoying pests that thought they could eat me.

  Piles of feathers and meat fell below me. I uncovered my face as the last of the little vulture girls were slain. Floating in front of me was the Kaiju vulture girl, her giant wings beating in the air. She was no longer pouring out a waterfall of red blood. Instead, it was more like a small stream of blue blood. She was slowly healing and had grown to a large size. Even though she had a beak instead of a human mouth, I could tell from her eyebrows that she was in a fit of rage.

  She charged towards me, letting out a deafening scream. There wasn’t enough time to cover my ears. I sent my tentacles soaring through the air to intercept, but before they could grab her, she vanished. What?

  A rush of wind hit me from behind. I could hear the beating of feathers behind me. I turned my head, only to be met with a pair of claws aimed at my eyes. Deep scratches were carved into my face as I felt my eyes being removed. I yelped out in pain and dropped to my knees. I blindly sent my hair tentacles to slice the area in front of me, but they got deflected by the sharp claws of the Kaiju vulture girl. Dammit. I can’t see anything! And did she have a teleport skill?

  “Ramona!” Samsara yelled out aloud. She uncovered her face and swiped at the vulture girl’s wings, causing her to fall to the ground.

  There! Even though I didn’t have my eyes, I shared Samsara’s vision and sent my tentacles to slice off the rest of the Kaiju’s limbs. The Kaiju girl lifted up into the air again, only to be intercepted by my [Serrated Tentacles]. She swiped at a couple, causing them to deflect, but she only had two claws. I had eight tentacles, and the other six went around the swipes to amputate her limbs. Two tentacles cut her arms, while the other four cut through her large wings. The Kaiju vulture girl crashed to the ground again.

  She let out another deafening screech as she squirmed on the ground. Annoying. A tentacle sliced through her neck, bringing peace to my ears.

  “I’m sorry,” Samsara thought.

  I gritted my teeth as my eyes slowly healed. “What are you sorry for? None of this was your fault.”

  “I just kept my hand covered the whole time,” Samsara said, tears starting to emerge from her eyes. “And you got blinded in the process. I shouldn’t have done that.”

  “Don’t worry about me,” I said, beginning to cut the Kaiju vulture girl’s body up with my [Serrated Tentacles]. “It’s fine to keep yourself safe.”

  “But what about you?” she said. “You got blinded by the Kaiju. What if her claws reached deeper? She could have killed you.”

  “The important part is she didn’t,” I replied. “I can heal off my wounds anyway. Now let’s eat the Kaiju and-”

  Samsara faced towards me, and I could no longer see the Kaiju through her eyes. “No, this isn’t right! You could have died twice today. The mech nearly choked you to death. And the vulture girl could have sliced your brain.”

  “Technically, I could have died three times,” I corrected her. “The fall of the Kaiju tiger girl could have killed me.”

  “No, I’m serious!” Samsara exclaimed, putting her clawed hands on my shoulders. “I love your word games, but this can’t continue. We need to stop taking so much risk.”

  “Well, without risk, we can’t get stronger,” I told her, taking her arms off my shoulders. “Besides, I don’t mind being the one who gets hurt. And if you want me to be less hurt, then we have to get stronger. It’s not like we’re just ordinary monster girls. We’re Kaiju now. Hiding isn’t an option. So let’s eat some Kaiju.” I turned Samsara around so she was looking at the Kaiju vulture girl’s corpse.

  My tentacles continued cutting up the Kaiju’s body for us to share, making sure to spare the prized Kaiju Core within. I used my hair tentacles to drop some pieces in Samsara’s hand, while plopping a few pieces in my mouth. The sour taste of the feathers returned.

  Finally, all that was left was the sternum containing the Kaiju Core.

  “Do you want it?” I asked her.

  “You can have it,” she said. “Maybe if you eat it, it will help you heal.”

  “I don’t think that’s how it works,” I replied, picking up the pieces of feathers surrounding the Core. Blue blood leaked out of the last piece of our Kaiju meal, accompanied by a shimmering of orange light. “Since it seems our mana and souls are shared, it shouldn’t matter who eats it.”

  “You can still have it,” Samsara replied.

  “Thanks.” I plopped the feathery chunk of meat into my mouth. I swished my tongue around searching for the Kaiju Core. A burst of sweetness hit my tongue. Let’s see how many souls this gets us. According to my [Tracking] skill, we had 1,038 souls. 25 of those were from the vulture girls on the reptile arm. Assuming it takes 1,000 souls to become a Kaiju, if we got 1,000 more souls from this Kaiju Core, then we should easily break past the 1,500 requirement to evolve.

  I swallowed the Core, eager to gain all of its souls.

  [Souls: 1,339]

  “What?” Both Samsara and I thought at the same time. This was only about 300 souls. Way less than what we got for eating the tiger girl’s Kaiju Core. Did the tiger girl really eat 3 times… wait, no, more than 3 times as many souls compared to the Kaiju vulture girl?

  I clenched my fist. This was completely unfair. Also, my eyes hadn’t completely healed yet. My vision was entirely blurry.

  “Can you face towards the reptilian Kaiju girl’s corpse?” I asked Samsara.

  “Sure,” She said, turning around. “You can have all of it.”

  My hair tentacles grabbed the partially desiccated reptilian corpse and brought it over to me. It was completely limbless. A majority of the scales were missing, revealing dry blue blood. Several of the internal organs looked punctured. I began scooping out the viscera. It tasted mild and bland, sort of like undercooked chicken. I began tearing into the remaining skin and dried blood, adding a crunchy and metallic taste to my meal.

  A burst of red light filled our vision.

  [Hello again. It is I, Devotio, and it seems that you have enough excess mana (12,500) to trigger a new mutation. I can help guide the mana into one of two paths. Please let me know which mutation you prefer, or you can request I not interfere with the mutation process.]

  [Color Camouflage II + Snake Hair]: You can control the opacity of the colors for [Color Camouflage], and a portion of Samsara’s hair on her head grows into a snake.

  [Eye Tentacles + Acid Spit]: Your tentacles grow several eyes over them, and your snake body can spit caustic acid.

  There was no matching theme with the mutations this time. It was just a coincidence that our previous possible mutations were of the same type.

  “And I’m not sure about the usefulness of [Snake Hair] or [Eye Tentacles],” Samsara pointed out. “At least last time, all of the mutations had a purpose in combat.”

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  “Agreed,” I thought, putting my hand on my chin. “Then let’s think about the two that do seem useful. [Color Camouflage II] and [Acid Spit]. We can either become very stealthy, or you can focus on range attacks.” Stealth mutations were very powerful. Most of my hunting before I became a Kaiju relied on [Color Camouflage]. And if I could control the opacity of my colors, then Samsara and I could both become invisible. There was still the issue of my making footprints on the ground. But still, it was very flexible. On the other hand, for [Acid Spit], Samsara could neutralize opponents from afar. The risk here was that if she didn’t immediately kill her target, mechs and Kaiju would target her first.

  “Going invisible sounds pretty cool,” Samsara said, turning to face me. “And with [Acid Spit], I would also need to have a good aim. It would be very bad if I missed, and I don’t want to make a mistake like that.”

  “Okay, we’ll take [Color Camouflage II + Snake Hair],” I said.

  [Excellent, I will guide the mana into that mutation then.]

  Through our shared senses, I felt a tingly sensation on Samsara’s head. “I feel something at the back of my head,” Samsara said, turning around. She stopped when my eyes saw what was going on with her hair. The pink hair began to shift and merge, transforming from soft keratin to hard scales. It looked like someone was braiding her hair into a ponytail. A mouth and a snoot formed on the scaly hair, along with two black eyes.

  And I saw myself through them. So we also share our senses with the snake. The snake forked out its tongue and let out a cute hiss.

  [You will need 17,500 mana for the next mutation.]

  A flash of red light filled all six of our eyes, and Devotio vanished again. [Tracking] told us that we only had 500 excess mana.

  I tapped my finger on the pink snake’s nose. The snake seemed soothed by it.

  “Are you petting my hair?” Samsara asked, smirking.

  “Technically, I’m just tapping the snake’s nose,” I explained, putting my hands on my hips. “I didn’t touch the top of its head. This is petting your hair.” I patted her on the head.

  “Hey, I’m not a pet,” She playfully pouted, folding her arms.

  “I’ll just pet your snake from now on instead then,” I said, giving her hair snake a head pat.

  It hissed again, tongue flicking like a pink ribbon in the air. It turned its narrow head toward the ground. I could see from its eyes that it was looking at the turtle girl and lizard girl, who both seemed to be paralyzed by fear.

  I turned around towards them. “We should eat them.”

  “What?!” Samsara mentally exclaimed. Her incredulity seeped into my mind.

  They could become Kaijus just like that vulture girl. And then we would have to fight them. Better to just take care of it now. So we should eat them. I was interested to see if they have any exotic flavors like the vulture-

  “Wait, wait, wait a minute,” Samsara quickly thought. “They aren’t feral like the vulture girls. And they don’t seem interested in attacking us either. Completely benign.”

  “That’s just because we’re 50 times larger than they are,” I rebutted. “If we were the same size, who knows what they might plan on doing?”

  “But with this line of thinking, you may as well eat every single non-feral monster girl.”

  I didn’t have any objections to that.

  “What if only you were a Kaiju?” Samsara asked. “Would you have to eat me because I could become a potential threat to you?”

  “No, that’s different,” I said. “Because I know you. You would never harm me.”

  “These people could be just like me,” Samsara said, putting her hands on my shoulders. “Please, just give them a chance.”

  I took her hands off my shoulders. “Fine.”

  Samsara gave me a smile and then slithered over to the duo. She gave them a wave. “Hello, are you two alright?”

  “Yes…” The turtle girl said tentatively. The pitch was extremely high, which almost made me burst out laughing.

  “That’s good.” Samsara gave them a thumbs up, ignoring my thoughts. “But it seems that you two are still injured.” The turtle girl’s shell was still cracked, and the lizard girl’s tail was still cut in half. I could see dried blood on the end of her tail where it had been sliced off. “I have a skill called [Sacrificial Mana Transfer], which can give some extra mana to both of you to heal. Do you want me to use it on you two?”

  The turtle girl nodded. Samsara slowly lowered her clawed hands toward them. She pointed her finger at them once it reached their height. “Can you two walk up and touch my finger? It requires direct contact to work.”

  The turtle girl and lizard girl looked at each other, and then the turtle girl pulled the lizard girl along with her. They both placed their hands on Samsara’s finger. They were both cold. Samsara activated [Sacrificial Mana Transfer], and I felt our shared mana drain from our bodies. The cracks in the turtle girl’s shell started to vanish, and the lizard girl’s tail began to grow.

  Samsara slowly raised her hand back up. “That should be good. I’m Samsara by the way.”

  “I’m Aisling, and this is Nara,” the turtle girl said, introducing her lizard girl friend.

  “And I’m Ramona,” I said, waving. It was time to reuse my kind ‘human’ personality. I had thrown it away since becoming a Kaiju. Why would I need to be kind to any strangers? They would probably just be food. Although Samsara thought differently. Thankfully, Aisling and Nara couldn’t read my thoughts. Only Samsara could. I wondered what they would have thought if they knew I had wanted to eat them. “Is there anything else we can do for you? If not, we’ll take the vulture girl meat.”

  “Actually, could we take some of the vulture girl meat?” Aisling asked. “We’re hunters for our village, and we’ve been running low on meat.”

  “See, they’re providing for their friends, just like you did for me,” Samsara pointed out. Fair point. Although I would prefer to hoard all the meat for our evolution and mutations. Other people mutating and evolving don’t help us out at all.

  “You don’t know that,” Samsara said. “They could give us useful information, like the layout of the forest. You hadn’t gone in this direction of the Wild Lands before, right?” That was true.

  Green hooks emerged from Aisling’s shell, latching onto the nearby vulture girl carcasses. It looked like she had about ten hooks. And then she also carried another corpse with her arms. Nara’s tail lashed out and pierced through a handful of dead vulture girls.

  “Thank you so much,” Aisling smiled at us. She elbowed Nara.

  “Thanks,” Nara muttered. She must be shy.

  “Is there anything we can do for you?” Aisling asked, walking with her collection of corpses. A brilliant thought occurred to me as they said this.

  “See, we can ask them for information about the forest!” Samsara cheered.

  And we could also make them worship us.

  “What?” Samsara mentally gasped. I could feel her surprise spread into my mind.

  “Remember what Devotio said?” We could gain souls in one of two ways. Either by eating Cores and creatures with souls, or by having people worship us.

  “Wait a minute, that’s way better than eating them,” Samsara said. “We could get both information and souls, without harming them at all.”

  Well, it wasn’t without its risks. If they died, we would lose the souls. Plus, we only got half of their souls from worship. In contrast, by eating them, we would permanently gain their souls. Hmm. Hopefully, they won’t get killed soon.

  “Actually, there are two things you can do for us,” I said, putting my hands on my hips. “The first is that you can worship us.”

  “Worship?” Aisling asked, tilting her head. “What do you mean by that?”

  “You should kneel and pray to us,” I said, pulling up old memories of videos I used to watch. While my family hadn’t worshiped any Demiurges, I had seen videos of humans from illegal cults worshiping them back when I still had my phone. My phone was probably destroyed when that tiger Kaiju girl landed on us. All the luxuries of modern human electronics were gone for us.

  Anyways, back to the topic of worship. The humans had knelt on a golden carpet while praying to the marble statue of Demiurges before them. Like Kaiju, the Demiurges were supposedly gigantic. I said "supposedly" because they haven’t been around for the past 150 years, which was before any cameras or video recorders were invented. But if they were real, and this was truly how they were worshiped, then Aisling and Nara should be able to worship us the same way.

  Aisling knelt, followed a few seconds later by Nara.

  “I worship Ramona and Samsara,” they said. I felt a soothing sensation in my lower back, as well as the part of Samsara’s tail that was connected to it. That was where our Kaiju Cores were. I [Tracked] our souls and saw that they had increased to 1,350. Since that was an increase of 11, that must have meant that between Aisling and Nara, they had a total of either 22 or 23 souls.

  “Thanks, just make sure to do this daily,” I said. That seemed to be how often humans did it in the videos. I wasn’t sure what would happen if they stopped worshiping us. Would we lose the souls? Also, this confirmed that the Demiurges probably did exist. “And could you also show us around to a lake, or maybe even a waterfall? We would like to wash this dried blood off of us.”

  Aisling sprung up with a smile on her face. “Sure, follow me. It’s not too far from here actually.” Aisling began sprinting through the forest. I walked several meters behind her. The air grew cooler, damper. The trees thickened, and soon the roar of crashing water filled the air.

  A waterfall loomed ahead, clear liquid tumbling from a cliff as tall as the Collum trees. Since most Collum Trees were at least 1000 meters, or at least 10 times our size, it was a pretty big waterfall even for us. The water pooled into a large lake, with a river flowing out of it. Mist clung to the air, catching the sunlight and scattering it into a soft rainbow. The sun was beginning to set.

  “Your guidance is deeply appreciated by us,” I said. “Could you come back here tomorrow to help guide us around the rest of the forest?”

  “That shouldn’t be an issue,” Aisling said, nodding her head. “Come on, Nara, let’s get this meat back to our village.” She waved at us. Samsara and I waved back.

  As I stepped into the water, a burst of red light appeared.

  [Hello again, I see that you have obtained a couple of worshipers. Congratulations. I have a proposition for you.]