Chapter 2: How to eat if you're a fork?

What really sucks is that I won’t even be able to tell what I’m eating, so I won’t be able to filter out potentially bad stuff. My life is now a lotto draw, except I don’t know if the jackpot even exists. Or any other prize. And they might repossess my house if I’m unlucky. Well, enough of the bad metaphors, time for work!

…I forgot I’m a fork. I can only wait. Looking closer, the first requirement of me having a better life is to first be used as an eating utensil… I’d be bawling my eyes out with depression… if I weren’t a fork. A pinching feeling interrupts me. Never have I been excited to feel so helplessly pressed in between what I assume are some fingers. Maybe I could absorb their hand?

…Even if I could, I doubt someone would keep what seems to be a demonic fork.

Wait, will I be able to control it to only activate at the tip of the fork? Where is my ‘head’ anyway? Probably the opposite end to where I’m being held, I suppose. Well, I’ll just try and focus on whatever I get embedded in. Here it comes!

The sick disgusting feeling washes over me again, the disgusting juices running all around my body. I feel the pressure on my tines as they try to slide into… whatever it is I’m being used to eat. Sliding in, with a brief burst of immaturity, I shout internally: Fork powers activate! Absorb!

I focus on the desire to pull the surrounding material into me, but slowly. I feel the fluids encasing me disappear gradually, and the pressure around me lessens slightly before disappearing abruptly. What? I can’t have consumed it all, that quickly, can I?

Wait, before I panic, wouldn’t whatever I was embedded in fall off if I consumed the matter around my tines, which were the things attaching me to it? That must be it. I hope. I turn my attention to the two windows that had appeared before me, unbeknownst to me.

Fluid of lvl 4 Ooze absorbed

Experience gained: 5.32

Durability recovered: 0.02

Skill proficiency increased: None

Skills gained: Mana sight (Basic)

Traits gained: None

Closure of this window will enact the aforementioned changes. Window will automatically close in 17s (local time)

Flesh of lvl 9 Bronze-horned bull absorbed

Experience gained: 12.74

Durability recovered: 1.33 (Exceeds maximum durability, reducing to 0.18)

Skill proficiency increased: Absorb 0.5%

Skills gained: None

Traits gained: None

Window will close in 18s

Ignoring everything else, my vision was nailed to a single word. ‘Sight’. Since becoming a fork, the only thing I could see was darkness, then after a while, the windows. If I could see, it would change everything. I wouldn’t be left to wallow in misery after meals! At least, probably not… not as much. Staring at that single word, fixated on the simple possibility, the windows in front of me winked out of existence.

A moment of nonplussed disbelief is interrupted by the sudden feeling of my brain exploding. An inaudible screech of pain sounds from me. Of course, as a fork, I have no brain, but the feeling is so similar I assume it to be so. Although, this nonchalant monologue was simply my thoughts as I reminisced that moment, later. Back then, I was still screaming in pain as my vision bloomed into being abruptly. It was very disappointing to the me back then, of course, after I had sufficiently recuperated from the pain.

What greets my vision now is the same old darkness, but it is no longer a single colour. Tiny white spheres drift around, some in large groups, others drifting around on their lonesome. After spending a while overcoming my great disappointment and concurrent despair, I sadly conclude that I should have a better look at that new ability. I think it was a skill? I forgot everything else on the window once I saw the hope of sight. Sighing, I open my Status for a better look.

Status

Name: None

Race: Living Fork

Level: 0

Experience: 21.06/100

Gender: None

Age: 8 days (local time)

Allegiance: None

Fame: None

Strength: 0.0

Intelligence: 10.3

Dexterity: 0.0

Wisdom: 6.7

Charisma: 0.3

Luck: 5.1

Hardness: 13.8

Durability: 4.8/4.8

Titles

Traits

Skills

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

My experience went up, and my durability is filled. I can heal and grow stronger by eating? I would call this a cheat, but I don’t have any of the five senses. Which limits me severely. Skills.

Status

Name: None

Race: Living Fork

Level: 0

Experience: 21.06/100

Gender: None

Age: 8 days (local time)

Allegiance: None

Fame: None

Strength: 0.0

Intelligence: 10.3

Dexterity: 0.0

Wisdom: 6.7

Charisma: 0.3

Luck: 5.1

Hardness: 13.8

Durability: 4.8/4.8

Titles

Traits

Skills*

Absorb (Basic) (Racial, High Rare) 0.5% – Allows the absorption of energy, or substances through the surface of the body. Rate of absorption can be controlled. Although this ability is magical in nature, as it is a form of mana control, and mana is also absorbed, mana cost is 0. Currently the only form of energy able to be absorbed is mana. Absorbing substances has a minor chance of giving traits, abilities and skills relating to the substance.

Mana sight (Basic) (Mid Rare, Passive/toggled) – You are able to see the largest congregations of mana around you within (Intelligence*Wisdom)/5m indistinctly.

Well that explains it, I guess. The white spheres must be mana. I focus my mind on pulling the nearest sphere towards me. Nothing happens. Maybe I would need some sort of mana control skill to do that? Hey, my absorb skill said it could absorb mana, didn’t it? I wonder what that would give me?

Focusing on pulling only the mana towards me, I activate the skill, but nothing happens. I suppose it did say it had to be in contact with my body for it to work, didn’t it? Hey, doesn’t that mean I didn’t really need to be careful about my absorption speed? Being cautious is better, though. I am but a flimsy fork you know... I should really check those Traits out now.

Status

Name: None

Race: Living Fork

Level: 0

Experience: 21.06/100

Gender: None

Age: 8 days (local time)

Allegiance: None

Fame: None

Strength: 0.0

Intelligence: 10.3

Dexterity: 0.0

Wisdom: 6.7

Charisma: 0.3

Luck: 5.1

Hardness: 13.8

Durability: 4.8/4.8

Titles

Traits*

Wooden (Ash) – You are made of wood, and are moderately susceptible to fire, insects and rot.

Life energy absorption (Average) – life energy heals you, causing you to regain durability.

Death energy weakness (Average) – death energy damages you, reducing your durability.

Life affinity (Minute) – You find it easier to gain life related skills and proficiencies than if you did not have this trait.

Negative death affinity (Minute) – You find it harder to gain death related skills and proficiencies than if you did not have this trait.

Fame gain reduction (Minor) – The amount of fame you gain is reduced.

Presence reduction (Small +1) – Others are less likely to notice you.

50% Fame added to racial fame – The fame of your race is equal to 50% of your fame plus the added fame of all other members of the species divided by the number of members in your species.

Life presence reduction (Moderate) – Others are less likely to notice that you are alive.

Taste enhancement (Minute) – All food that touches you tastes slightly better.

Piercing enhancement (Minute) (Restricted to food) – It is slightly easier for you to pierce food.

Carry capacity enhancement (Minute) (Restricted to food) – You can carry slightly more food than appearances would suggest.

Skills

Wooden fork, huh? So, is there any way I could be more vulnerable? The racial fame thing sounds cool and all, but I can’t reproduce even if I wanted to. I’m a fork after all. Well, at least nobody will notice me. Ever.

*cries*

Just kidding, I’m a fork. No tear ducts.

And thus, as I have nothing better to do, I begin observation of the little floating balls, hoping for one of them to contact my body. Interestingly, my field of vision seems to be a full 360-degree sphere. I suppose having no sensory organs has a bit of payoff. Totally not worth it though.

Floating balls~ floaty white balls~ I’m really bored~ hey, is that ball drifting towards me? No, it swerved away. But! One that was just drifting passed me suddenly swerved towards me! Get ready! Absorb!

Mana Conglomerate absorbed

Experience gained: 5

Durability recovered: 1 (Exceeds maximum durability, reducing to 0)

Skill proficiency increased: Absorb 1%

Skills gained: None

Traits gained: None

Window will close in 29s

 Awwww… talk about a big lead up to nothing. Well. Waiting again.

Thus, time passes. Meals come and go. Mana drifts and is occasionally absorbed…

6935 forks leaning on the wall… 6935 forks… take one down, throw on the ground, 6934 forks leaning on the wall…

And this is how I pass the time. I have no biological functions, and am thus incapable of sleeping. I started at 10000 just a little while ago, and I’m already this far along. I’ve absorbed all the mana that’s come in contact with me - nothing better to do, after all. Even so, there have barely been a dozen and the proficiency of absorb I’m getting from them is decreasing. You’d think I’d have absorbed more mana, but remember, it has to come in contact with me. Even if it floats 1mm away from me, I can’t do a thing to it.

Oy, what’s that weird ball of mana doing? Crazily moving in a spiral towards me? Is that going to hit me? Thanks. For. The. Meal! Absorb.

Mana Conglomerate absorbed

Experience gained: 5

Durability recovered: 1 (Exceeds maximum durability, reducing to 0)

Skill proficiency increased: Absorb 0.6%

Skills gained: None

Traits gained: None

Window will close in 29s

Trait developed

Mana touched (Minor) – You have consumed mana repeatedly, and it has thus permeated through your body, changing it in some ways. Were you made of flesh and not wood, you would have instead contracted a deadly disease. Lucky you.

Stat unlocked: Mana – The source of most magic systems. Stat: Intelligence +0.5, Hardness +0.2, Durability +0.2, Charisma +1

Window will close in 29s

Viva la Magic! What does that even mean anyway? Oh well, I got magic. Well, mana, anyway, and that means magic, right? Amusingly, at the centre of my vision is now a fork-shaped accumulation of mana. Yeah, I can see myself. How? How do I even see at all? Don’t question the anatomy of a fork, you’ll just get confused.