They let go of me and stepped back with wariness as I vomited a black and purple substance over the hoodie. "There, the poison should be out of her system! She'll be lucid now. I'm not exactly sure what she saw or heard, but it must have been terrible for her to run so desperately." They didn't say those things?

The vomit kept coming out with little indication of stopping when I realized my hunger was coming back the more I threw up. "That's so much. What gave her that!?"

I didn't want to feel that awful hunger again, so I clamped my mouth shut and forcefully swallowed it back down, which worked immediately, but I was still hungry again. "Uh, did she just stop it?"

I shifted to my feet and stared at them as my world shifted back into place. The fuzziness went away, followed by numbness, and then pain came back, but the worst thing I felt right now was hunger. I want to eat something.

"Well, this is ruined. Man, I liked having clothes." I frowned as my vomit soaked hoodie stuck to my body. I pulled it off and threw it to the side.

"H-hey." My head turned to Pulse, who was offering me a new hoodie. I happily accepted it and quickly put it on, not forgetting to get the knife from the other hoodie.

I looked over them and gave a small wave as I wiped my mouth clean. They gave me a look of pity, which was reasonable, I didn't like it, though. It made me feel helpless. "H-hi? Thank you for getting that awful mask off... And for the new hoodie."

I tensed up as Pulse got close and lowered herself to my level, making me realize that both of them were much bigger than me, with her being the shorter one of the two. "I'm so sorry, we put that on you. It was supposed to help you heal, but we didn't know you were poisoned, and you ran off when we realized."

"So it's my fault?" My mouth felt dry, and my hands trembled as dread started to build in the back of my mind. My eyes closed, and I waited for it.

"What? Of course not! You couldn't think straight, and we should have checked for poison, but I panicked." Relief washed through me as I opened my eyes, only to recoil as something touched my head.

When I looked around to see what touched me with all I saw was Pulse was frozen stiff with her hand held out to where I was. Oh, it was probably her.

That was bad. Oh, this feels terrible. I was jittery all over from a slight touch, and I took a deep breath to calm down. Over and over, I took shaky breaths, but it wasn't working. The impulse to cower was pushed into my mind.

Um, this isn't working... Think of happy thoughts, my friend! Think of her. I tried to visualize myself on that school roof with my friend.

That finally managed to get the feeling to fade, slowly replaced by how my friend made me feel. The warmth she gave me whenever we talked and how her family made me laugh. Her family was nice too?

Now that I wasn't freaking out in some way, I did notice that the weight in my lungs feeling was still there. It's not really bothering me... Oh well, I'll figure it out later.

A deeper and more mature voice came from Pulse's hood. "That was a worse reaction than when she chopped off the shade's head. What did they do to her?"

The words made me realize my hands still had blood on them, and I just felt hungry, not guilt, hunger. What's wrong with me? I felt worse about being touched than killing someone.

I had the instinct to lick the blood, but I shot that down and wiped it off on the ground as Pulse frowned and put arms down. When she did, I noticed a small woman hiding in her hood, staring at me as Pulse talked to me again. "Um, I'm sorry. Do you want to talk about it?"

I could tell Pulse wanted to comfort me, but the thought of being touched or comforted by someone who didn't know me disgusted me. "I don't, and please don't touch me again, Miss."

Pulse looked visibly sad at my rejection, and it let me calm down a bit that she acted like that. "Ah... Ok, but Miss makes me feel old. Just call me Pulse. Could you come with us for now? It's very dangerous here right now and we need to regroup with our friends."

"Not like I have much of a choice with fractals and shadow people around. I don't need to lose any more blood today, right?" They let out a sad sigh and agreed with my comment.

Echo walked over and leaned down with a small smile. "You can call me Echo. What can we call you, little one? Anything you remember?"

My head throbbed for a moment as I tried to recall my name again, but it eluded me. I shook my head at Echo, sullenly. "My name? I don't remember. The only memory I have is being in high school."

Echo's smile faded for a moment before it came back. It unnerved me a bit, but not remembering anything else bothered me much more. "That's fine, I'm sure you'll remember eventually. Me and Pulse are going to talk about some things. Could you wait a bit?"

I nodded and had a moment of rest when they started to talk about what to do now. It was simple tactics like whether to try and sneak by everything until they regrouped or run because they had no idea when they would be attacked again. So I decided to check where Elpis hid during my dive into insanity.

I looked myself over but couldn't find Elpis, and then I patted myself down. "Elpis? Can you come out?"

But I got no response, so I walked over to Echo, who I have chosen as the more reliable of the two. "Echo, have you seen a small ball of pink slime?"

Echo turned to me, confused about the question, and stopped to think. "A ball of slime?... Were they a slimefolk?"

The word hummed my mind, but I couldn't quite grasp it. I shook my head at her and asked. "What's a slimefolk exactly?"

"It's a race of living slime people. Were they moving on their own?" Echo nodded as I talked about Elpis and how I found them.

"Elpis should be fine. They just got separated from you when you were attacked. We'll go find them when we regroup. Don't worry about them, they can hide in the machinery." Echo reassured me before she turned to Pulse.

"Pulse, where's Jack and GoldenWing? We should hurry." Pulse turned to Echo for a moment before her pink Irises started glowing, and she pulled a pink glass panel of switches and dials from thin air.

"That..." My heart pounded as I watched the air rippled as she pressed or moved each part.

I became entranced in the way she made it, the way it reflected light and travels around the space, its color... It vaguely reminded me of the view on the rooftop. Something that would always amaze me.

"She's really focused on her, Echo. It's almost like she's in a trance." The voice snapped me out of my stupor and turned to the small woman now standing in front of me. Her wolf ears flicked as we made eye contact. Her chest had a weird pole going back and forth at a constant rate. Those ears look nice, it reminds me of something.

She walked to the side as we looked at each other, and then she walked back. I tilted my head, confused at what she was doing before she finally talked to me directly. "Can you see me?"

"Should I not? What's your name?" I asked half sarcastically and half, actually curious. She was stunned, and so was Echo for some reason.

"Oh um, I'm Met, and I'm Pulse's-" Met was about to tell me more when she paused and then frowned as she ran to Pulse. "Pulse found them, they're in the hangout. Hiding in a building, a few blocks from us, and one isn't moving."

The topic died as we started moving towards the other Saints. I was in the back running, and we didn't run into a problem, but I had a problem, a big one.

I was getting a whiff of the two's blood while we ran, and it smelled way better than the fractals. It was so good that saliva kept filling my mouth as we ran, and it was killing me.

The smell dug up a memory of strawberries and red velvet cake, and it would have been a welcome thing if it wasn't coming from two people. I covered my face with my hoodie to block the smells with little success.

My mind was now swimming with how they would taste and how I should go about eating them. I desperately tried to push the intrusive thoughts away, but they wouldn't go away with the smell still there.

I was so busy trying to ignore the hunger that I didn't notice they stopped until I bumped into Echo. "Is something wrong?"

Echo looked uncomfortable as she turned to me, and her body shook as she tried to speak. "Little one, do you-"

She stopped talking as her face completely relaxed, and she collapsed into me, limp. I turned to Pulse to tell her, but she was in the same state. "What happened?!"

Met crawled out from underneath Pulse and looked to me, clearly stressed about what happened to Pulse and mumbled to herself. "Did those shadows use poison?"

I went over her and scooped her into my hand. She was unsteady for a moment, then stood up and looked at me with fear. "Do you know the way?"

"Yeah, it's only a block away now, but why are you drooling? " Apparently, the hoodie fell when I wasn't paying attention. Long lines of drool were dripping from my mouth.

That was probably why she was scared, and for good reason, I was incredibly hungry for the two in front of me.

"I'm hungry." That was the best response that I could think of without making Met run away. She climbed onto my shoulder as I grabbed the two by the shoulders.

"Tell me where to go and... stop me if I try to do something." Met was looking at me warily but agreed to lead me, not like she had choice since she couldn't move the two Saints by herself.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

So I started to drag them to their party. Dragging them wasn't that hard, but the smell was even stronger now now that I was actively holding them close now. I need to hurry up.

It would be a few minutes at the rate we were going now, but my stomach was audibly growling to the point that Met probably understood what I meant now. "Just a little further."

"This is horrible. I can't believe I feel this towards people who helped me... God, why do I want their blood?" I could feel that Pulse's heartbeat speed up when I said that. Great, I said that out loud!

"The entrance is in this alley." Just as I got them past the road, I tripped on some rubble and got crushed by Echo and Pulse. They landed squarely on my ribs.

"You alright?!" I wheezed under their weight. My ribs and lungs hurt, I couldn't stop myself from coughing violently. I managed to push them off in between all the coughing.

"Uh... You need to sit up and take slow breaths." I slogged to sit up and breathe properly as Met tried to direct me on how help me with my breathing. It didn't help.

I was surprised the weight in my lung wasn't bothering me, but I got winded just from getting up. Met was conflicted about something. "Do you think you could keep going, dear?"

"No, I don... Ugh!" I gripped my stomach as it twisted and squeezed itself. It felt unnatural and uncomfortable as it squirmed inside me.

All at once it stopped, It befuddled me and I let go of my stomach since it didn't feel strange anymore but as soon as I did a surge of warmth shot out from my stomach and shifted my insides around until the pain in lungs and ribs was gone.

I blinked a few times, utterly baffled at what just happened. I hesitated before I took a deep breath and exhaled with no difficulty. Met stared at me with bated breath. "What happened? Are you alright now?"

My heart ached as I realized I was going to get used to this. I gave Met a sad smile and went to grab them again. "Not sure, just a monster now... Um, could you tell me which door?"

Met's face fell to a solemn frown and pointed to a red door. "That red one... I'm sorry you have to go through this, little wolf." She brushed my cheek, which I wasn't sure what I was feeling, but it was unnerving. Little wolf?

Her words of comfort were undermined when my hunger got stronger and started to be painful, much to my agony. "I don't want to be this, I'll have to eat something soon."

Finally at the door, I put them down and tried it but it was blocked from the inside so I banged on the door and Met yelled to get their attention. "HighJack! GoldenWing! Open the door! It's Met!"

So we waited for them to open the door. Waiting for the door to open felt like an eternity, and my eyes landed on a small stream of blood on Echo's neck. Relief is right there. Maybe they wouldn't care if I had some of their blood. It would just fall to the ground anyway. Yeah, you should drink some. They won't die~

I inched closer to Echo when a slap to my face let me barely stop myself from licking Echo's blood. I scrambled back a few feet and turned to Met on my shoulder. Who was that?

"I'm busting down the door, I can't wait any longer." I moved in front of the door and got ready to bust the door down.

"Alright, do it!" I kicked the door, not making a dent in it but pushing it open a bit. I immediately did it again and again until it was open enough.

I stepped in and was quickly hit with the scent of rotten fruit. I scanned the room for the source.

The room was an empty old wooden bar that didn't have any furniture, windows, or wall fixtures in it besides three barrels used to block the door.

The only thing in here was a big suit of sliver armor being gnawed on by an injured purple crocodile with a scorpion tail the half the size as me. "Wait, what is that?"

Met tapped my shoulder to get my attention and whispered to me. "That's HighJack, a Saint and a crocorpion. He's fine right now, but... This hurts to ask. Could you kill that? It's level 1."

I turned around and dragged Echo and Pluse behind the barrels as my mind processed what she had just said. Asking a person who just escaped a lab to fight a fractal seems like the last thing a Saint would want to do.

I looked the fractal over trying to figure out what was the easiest way to kill it when my head hummed as the sultry voice whispered in my head. Those taste good enough, That tail would get in the way, get rid of it first, then the soft underbelly~ "Yeah, if I ambush it properly. Tail then stomach?"

"Yeah, that's what I would suggest. The stinger spits acid, so please don't get hit." Met jumped off me, and I took a slow breath and proceeded to creep closer to it.

I slipped my knife out and paused when it thrashed around, hitting the armor with its tail splashing acid against the silver metal. I watched it in silence as it calmed down.

A sharp hunger pang hit me, almost making me yelp in pain but toned it down to let out a sharp breath as my stomach growled with pain.

The alligator fractal didn't seem to notice or care about me and continued to try to get through the armor. It's just a bit closer.

I lined up the knife with the base in the tail, grabbed the tail, lifted the back of the alligator up, and back peddled. The fractal finally acknowledged me and tried to turn around, but it couldn't with half its legs in the air. Perfect! Now-Stop talking and let me focus.

I honestly didn't expect that to work, but the voice did stay quiet as I brought the knife down, slicing into the base of the tail, but not severing it.

The tail started flailing, spraying acid all around, trying to hit me to little effect as I went for another slash.

My knife went deeper each time until the gators back half fell to ground while I held the tail, tossing it aside as blood or ichor went all over me.

I brought my hand and licked some ichor off it, setting my mind ablaze with the bittersweet taste.

It turned around and lunged at me viciously, trying to bite my legs off. I dodged to the side and slid my foot under it and flipped the gator over, brought my knife up, and down.

It went deep into the gator, and I yanked it down the length of it, causing a massive incision like I was dissecting it. I am, aren't I?

I could see a large black pulsating organ next to the normal ones I would expect to see. You need to eat what's inside that black thing. What? Why? You want the hunger to go away without eating people, right?

I looked over to Echo and Pulse as another hunger pang hit me and swallowed my drool. I forced my attention back on the black mass. Fine, what is it? Good girl~ it's a marble sized lump of muscle. You'll feel it.

My hand sunk into the strange sack of meat and fished around for something. The gator started screeching and feebly struggling as I did this, like I put it in a head lock. "Little wolf, what are you doing?"

Met was disturbed at what I was doing, and that made sense. My hand grazed something hard, so I grabbed it and pulled it out.

The thing was a glowing ball, covered in purple muscle and sinew. Something about it made me want it. To claim it. Consume it. Swallow it, don't bite, and just swallow.

[Congratulations on killing a Lv1 crocorpion with brutal efficiency! You will be given 1 extra Stat point when you confirm your rewards.]

I popped it into my mouth and moaned at the taste. It was the best thing I ever tasted.

I savored it for a minute before I tilted my head back and swallowed it. *Gulp* The bead went down smoothly and... nothing happened. What now? You'll see soon. Maybe next time we talk, you'll remember your name~

What? Do you know my name?! I was only met with the sound of my thoughts and the growling of my stomach.

"Haaa, I guess I'll block the door for now." I was about to get up, but a hunger pang hit me, and I looked down to the fractal. I hesitantly grabbed the heart and bit into it, and then another bite.

Then I finished it and when I was about to grab a lung, it melted into a purple goop, and then the rest of the fractal did the same, even the ichor stuck to my hoodie fell off. I backed up as it squirmed as if looking for something. "What is it doing?"

The goop stopped before it started moving towards me rapidly, and I stumbled back as it jumped towards my face.

I fell and hit my head on the floor, stunning myself and making me let out a yelp that was cut off by the goop covering my face. Did they want to kill me!? I can't breathe!

My vision blacked out from it, covering my entire face. I frantically brought my hands up and went to tear it off of me, but my fingers just went through the goop.

It pushed itself into my mouth and down my throat. I could vividly feel it go down the esophagus and start filling my stomach.

Somehow, my stomach never filled completely as it was being packed with the slop, only churned and groaned. But I was still panicked at the lack of air and sight, I reached for anything nearby to help to no avail. "Mph!"

The thick slime kept forcing itself down my throat. I think Met was trying to get it off me. The stuff was speeding up, and I was starting to suffocate.

I was nearing the point of passing out when my sight came back as the last of the goop went into me, and I gasped for air.

I went limp, exhausted, and finally free of the painful hunger. My stomach was satisfied with that, and it settled like a mass half my size wasn't forced into it. "Little wolf?"

I ignored the tiny woman and let out a long sigh, sluggishly got up, and went to block the door again.

I moved the barrels and glanced down to see there was no evidence I Ingested the entire fractal, not even a bump.

"Are you fine?" I turned over to Met. Her face was wrought with worry and confusion. Realizing she was worried and not upset calmed me down.

I shrugged as I went to the bar. There wasn't a yes or no to that question. "That scared the hell out of me, but I'm not hungry anymore, and I feel fine physically, great even, just tired."

Met pulled herself onto the bar and stared at me for an uncomfortable amount of time. She squinted at me suspiciously, which made me flinch. "And mentally?"

"Look, a person is behind the bar, and they have wings!" That distracted Met, and she rushed over to see the winged person in a brown leather outfit hidden behind the bar. I could see them breathing, but they were in the same state as the other three.

I slinked away from the bar and over to an empty corner and sat down with a thud, letting my head lean on the wall. Finally, some mild safety.

My eyelids quickly got heavy at the peace and quiet of the bar. I wanted to sleep, but something was nagging at me. Am I forgetting something?

Oh, right! I never confirmed my rewards for my trial! I sat up as excitement, killed my drowsiness for a moment, and brought up the confirm window back.

A smile formed on my lips at the thought of being a saint. When I thought of what I would do as a saint, the events since I woke up flashed through my mind.

Would I be a good saint? I almost ate a Saint. I looked over to Echo. She was still rag dolled, and she was facing me. Her eyes were locked onto me, and when I met her eyes, she sort of winked.

I let out a small laugh at the attempt and made my decision. I inhaled and spoke the word that would change my life. "Confirm."

The air stiffened, and a window with an ominous hum popped up. I glanced around there was a grey opaque bubble around me.

2 N/As have been claimed and need to be used to continue... N/A has been named Random Mutation and Choice Mutation due to effects

[Random Mutation]

.

.

.

Bones have been chosen!

[Choice Mutation]

Eyes

Skin

Head

Flesh

My excitement soured a bit as I read through the window. My reward is becoming more unrecognizable?

Changing even more wasn't Major to me, but the fact that my body is being 'mutated' felt wrong. "Let's do Eyes, the canarys have been awful to deal with."

The window vanished along with the hum, and another window came into view with no hum.

System access, transformation, and mutations will now be implemented, and other rewards will be given.

Please brace for the painful process of implementation.

How painful? The air started crackling all around me, shattering the bubble. Now that it was gone, I could now see Met was freaking out about something.

Everything went white, followed by an explosion. Electricity swept through me, making fall to ground spasming.

Then another blinding explosion hit me, sending chills through my bones. I could feel my bones snap and reform repeatedly.

Another hit me and took away my vision and generating searing pain radiated in my eyes.

Another hit me, and everything cut out abruptly.

.

.

.

"Marri?"