What"s there is a giant rat. A rat that is as large as cats is moving about with a rustle. If regular rats are to be enlarged, they would look like this one.
"Uwah… gross."
My thoughts accidentally leak out of my mouth. Seeing the enlarged figure of an animal that I have seen countless times before is more eerie than I expected. This is my first time encountering such a creature. Does it count as a monster? No… it feels somewhat different. Its presence is similar to that of Momo"s. An existence that is neither a monster nor a regular animal.
"Ah, perhaps…"
Arriving at a certain thought, I feel amazed. Perhaps the rat is an animal that defeated monsters and consumed their magic stones, just like Momo. Since there is a precedence in the form of Momo, this premise is not unfounded.
Because we have only been dealing with monsters, I forgot about such possibilities. It isn"t strange is there are animals like Momo that hunt monsters, raise their levels, and eat magic stones to gain skills. Also, there are a lot of magic stones lying around in the city from fallen monsters. Some animals might have eaten the magic stones that were left untouched.
Is the rat also like that? The rat is keeping its nose down and watching out its surrounding. It is highly likely that it has some skill. In a sense, animals might be better than humans at survival. After all, living in the wild, animals should be used to being attacked by others stronger than themselves. Now, what to do…
"What happened, Kudou-san? What is it?"
Ichinose-san opens her mouth, likely worried about my silence.
"Ah, sorry about that. I was thinking about something… the creature was not a monster, but rather a gigantic rat."
"Rat…?"
"Yes, but it"s not a regular rat. It"s a rat which has strengthened itself through devouring magic stones."
"Eh? What"s that? What do you mean? What"s a magic stone anyway?"
I can hear Ichinose-san taking in a deep breath. On the other hand, Rikkchan doesn"t seem to get what I"m saying.
"A magic stone is a stone which falls after a monster is defeated. When other creatures eat it, their bodies become stronger and they obtain the defeated monster"s skill."
"Legit? I mean, I did see stones falling after the monsters were killed, but to think they were such amazing stuff."
Well, it"s reasonable that she didn"t know until now. In the first place, I wouldn"t have known this either if I didn"t have the Item Box"s list function along with Aka and Momo.
"Should we hunt it down?"
"Indeed…"
I contemplate at this point. Our opponent this time isn"t a monster. While it"s big, it"s still a normal animal. Yet…
"There is a possibility that it carries pathogens. Also, there is a chance that it"s aggressive towards humans… It"s better to slay it… Momo."
"Wan!"
Along with my signal, Momo extends her shadow towards the rat. Rikkchan raises her voice in surprise.
"What?! The shadow is stretching? How come?"
"It"s one of Momo"s skill. There isn"t any danger to this, so please be quiet."
"Ah, okay… amazing…"
During our exchange, the shadow approaches the rat. Good, let"s restrain it and kill it at once.
"Chii!?"
However, the rat notices Momo"s shadow before it arrives. And then with astonis.h.i.+ng agility, it avoids the shadow.
"What!?"
Watching its movement, I exclaim out loud in astonishment. You"re kidding? What a speed. To avoid Momo"s shadow, it requires the speed of a lesser… no, a shadow wolf.
"Chichichi!"
Furthermore, it is avoiding Momo"s shadow by running horizontally on the wall. That has to be a skill. Also, it should possess some sort of a detection skill. I"m not certain whether it"s "Crisis Detection" or "Hostility Detection", but unless it possesses such a skill, it isn"t possible to dodge Momo"s shadow like that a second before it hits.
"Chichi!! Chu!"
Shaking off the shadow, the rat runs away. In the blink of an eye, it disappears from our sight.
"So it ran away…"
"Kuuu…"
Momo"s voice expresses regret.
"It"s okay, Momo. Our side didn"t receive any damage, so I don"t mind."
I stroke Momo"s head. The fact that it escaped probably means that its combat ability is not so high. Also, "Crisis Detection" didn"t show any intense reaction. Its strength should be below that of a goblin"s. Perhaps its enhancement is geared towards agility or means of escape. I mean, I"ll be troubled otherwise.
"I don"t sense any other thing around us. We should be fine now."
Having heard that, the two puts their guards down. Still, animals enhanced with magic stones huh? This is troubling… Monsters are a threat, but this could become the source of another threat. Stray cats and dogs. Crows. There are many animals in the city and 5 days have already pa.s.sed. Enhanced animals like Momo and that rat would keep increasing in number. What if bears, boars, and poisonous snakes from the forests were strengthened? If animals that initially possessed outstanding physiques get even more powerful, how are they different from the monsters? One more thing to worry about…
"Even so… magic stones."
By eating them, monsters and animals can strengthen their bodies and gain skills. But… is this the only way to use them? Or are there other uses that we haven"t found yet? In games, they"re standard items used to power up weapons and abilities.
On a different note, why can animals eat magic stones while we can"t? Oh, how I want to have "Appraisal". While mofu-ing Momo, I wonder how I can obtain the "Appraisal" skill.
-Meanwhile-
Scary. Scary. Scary.
The rat was running desperately. Suddenly, something black had a.s.saulted it. He knew right away that it was something dangerous. Hence, it ran away. It escaped with its life on the line. It was a mistake to come above the ground on a whim.
It had swallowed a peculiar stone, making it bigger and obtaining some strange power. It felt as if it could do anything. But that was an illusion. There was always someone better and stronger, so it didn"t want to experience painful memories. It decided to live carefully underground like before. Thinking so, the rat ran.
"Chichichi."
The hole which it crawled out from appeared in its view. A little bit more. A little bit more, and it would return to its dwelling. The rat relaxed momentarily from relief. However, that created a fatal opening.
"Chi!?"
At once, its movement stopped. Rather, it was forced to stop. Why couldn"t it move? The more it struggled and tried to move, the more restricted it felt. The rat finally noticed "that" which was tangling its body. It was a myriad number of threads.
"Chichi!? Chichichichichi!"
As it looked around, it noticed that the threads were covering various parts of the surrounding. And then it appeared before the rat"s eyes. From the hole where the rat tried to return to, a spider emerged, letting out eerie sounds.
"….tsu.."
The rat"s instinct was raising an alarm at maximum volume. Scary. Scary. Scary. Scary. Scary. Don"t want to die. Don"t want to die. Don"t want to die. But it was too late. The predator was right before its eyes. It wielded sharp claws and fangs. The rat could see countless bones scattered inside the hole. That was the last that the rat ever saw.