I met with a pissed delivery man who was waiting outside my house the entire night. I apologized to him, but that did nothing to quell his temper. He helped me move the crates inside the garage.
He wouldn’t take tips because of company policy. What a funny dude. I hope he gets overtime for this.
My garage used to be empty, but now three large crates with the institute's name on them sit inside. I pry the smallest one open with my bare hands and look inside. Three individually packaged evolution materials stare back at me. Well, only one of them does.
Inside is the dead body of a [Faerie Dragon], a C-rank mana crystal, and a leather bag that closes with a string. My eyes glance toward the other two crates that are bigger than I am…
Did they include a bathtub with the ozone and lightning I need? How did they ship those things inside a wooden crate in the first place? I’ll find out soon enough, but first, it’s Rob’s and Duchess’ time to evolve.
Rob’s eyes shine as I give him the magic bag and the shadow crystal from that tree. I should’ve asked for one from the dean, but I didn’t want to risk pissing him off if he found out I took advantage of the deal so blatantly to make a few bucks. I totally would've pawned the spare crystal for pocket money.
Rob shoves the crystal in between his teeth before jumping inside the bag. No change is immediately apparent, so I move on to Duchess.
Duchess seems too prideful to resort to eating a knock-off version of a dragon. [Faerie Dragons] are a weird species of fairies with draconic blood, so while technically a dragon, it’s also a cruel substitute.
Duchess relents and swallows the C-rank mana crystal whole before doing the same to the baseball-sized fairy. She shuddered a bit before speaking to me.
[it tastes like imitation meat… Can you explain to thisss one how a creature made of flesh can taste like vegetable protein and have the consistency of tofu?]
“Just evolve already.”
Duchess rolls her eyes and slides off my shoulders. She sits there unmoving.
“...”
I guess she has to finish digesting before she can evolve. My eyes naturally drift back to Rob as the dark brown leather bag he now inhabits starts to turn a dark gray. The magical enchantment on the bag was a minor durability buff and an expanded space inside. Even though it’s at the bottom of the market in terms of quality, a bag with a spatial enchantment has no market price.
Human-made bags are crafted using “fracture” technology, whatever that is. I recall a legend of a dwarven smith who made a coin purse that could fit a mountain of gold.
I take this time to memorize all the monster habits found in my monstrology textbook and some things I found on the internet. Before I can finish, something catches my attention.
The bag starts to shake violently before suddenly becoming still. The leather cord opens slightly, allowing nothing but a skeletal arm to stick out. The hand is elongated and ill-proportioned, the fingers sharpened into finely pointed claws. Loose rotting robes of shadow hanging from the limb like a cheap table cloth. Rob pulls his entire body out of his bag before being shattered by Duchess’ sudden growth.
[Evolution Completed! X2]
[Servitude C lv2 (4/5) > Servitude C lv3 (4/5) > Servitude C lv4 (4/5)]
Her new [Amphiptere] form almost takes up the entire room. Her body has grown three times as big, reaching a total body length of 27 feet. The thickness of her torso is the same as the width of a refrigerator. Her feathers have grown longer and more numerous as her underside becomes more prominently bare, only revealing scales.
Her eyes have grown unnaturally big for her skull. The emerald green basketball-sized eyes stare at me as her yellow tongue flickers.
[...]
“...”
[Thisss one seemed to outgrow your shoulders.]
“...”
Duchess uses her [Telekinises] to open the garage door and slithers out. Her entire wingspan extends for almost as long as her body as she stretches, no longer confined to the small garage.
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
“Get into the backyard before I get fined for breaking some dumb law about tamed beasts and size regulations.”
She casually slithered over the fence and disappeared out of sight. I look up and down the street, and I see nobody. Oh, right. I no longer have neighbors.
Rob reassembles himself like a timelapse of a lego structure before looking around, confused. He seemed to grow a foot in height, now reaching 4 feet. His bag is over his shoulder as a bone shovel and pickaxe hangs off his waist. His eyes which used to be empty, now contain dark purple balls of light.
He looks at me as his new eyes change, almost like he is smiling. He jaunts over, not accustomed to his recent shape and size. His limbs elongated more than his torso giving his entire silhouette uncanny valley vibes.
I rub his charred boney head. “Good job, Rob.”
His eyes smile brighter as he starts to clatter his teeth again.
“Go to the backyard with Duchess, and be a good boy.”
~
I move the surprisingly heavy crates into the backyard. Duchess got longer with each evolution, and Khan got bigger with his first one. If every member of his swarm gets suddenly bigger, I will need to pay for repairs.
One of the crates holds a giant metal washing machine with a large set of nobs and a glass door. The other container harbored a canister of O3.
The washing machine is supposed to stimulate the inside of a thundercloud for Khan’s “lightning bath,” and the canister stores pressurized ozone. With a slight jury-rigging, I could combine the two and get Kan’s evolution out of the way.
Ozone will dissipate in the lower atmosphere even though it’s heavier than normal oxygen. I grab a roll of duct tape and a funnel and “pour” the ozone inside the simulator. The ozone has a distinct smell as it vaporizes into gas, filling the chamber. As a test, I close the simulator and don’t notice any leaking.
I shove all of Khan inside the machine and top it off with ozone. I quickly slam a button that jumpstarts the thundercloud simulation.
Crackles of lightning fill the chamber as I can barely see flashes of Khan swim past. Blood splatters the glass. I scramble to find the emergency shutoff in case the worst happened and Khan is getting slaughtered by his evolution. But I realized that I was right, in the wrong way.
I don’t know if the specific conditions of his evolution, or if this would happen regardless, but Khan went into a feeding frenzy against himself. Reminiscent of the time he took my arm, he started self-cannibalizing until there was only one.
What caused Kahn to get exiled in the first place? Was his entire race sentenced, or was it just him and his other bodies? Does Kahn even have a race, or is he his entire race?
At least watching this evolution is more exciting than watching Duchess or Rob evolve. The blood and thunderbolts create a scene of carnage and primal fury. The battle starts to die down as only one is left. I go to open the door, but a familiar feeling tickles my neck.
The hair on my body starts to stand as my eyes widen. I jump as far back, using all the might I can muster. Unfortunately, I still get hit by the remnants of the massive thunderbolt that fell from the cloudless skies. Right onto the machine. Metal shrapnel and spare ozone flood the backyard.
~
I wake up facedown in the backyard. I pull my body to its hands and knees. The machine I was planning to pawn is wholly destroyed. None of my tamed beasts are within eyeshot. My wooden fence is slightly on fire as huge parts are no longer burning but are heavily charred. Thankfully, my house is undamaged, besides the broken windows from the shrapnel.
My ears are still ringing, and the smell of ozone will probably never lift from my backyard again. Flash Gordon floats over to me.
“Thanks for checking up on me. Where are the others?”
“...”
[Master, we left for cover once we noticed you tinkering with the delicate machinery.]
“Thanks, Duchess. But where is Kahn?” Looking around, he is nowhere to be seen. Only scorch marks in the soil where the machine used to be.
[Look up.]
I glance at the skies and spot a 3-foot-long Khan floating 90 feet above me. Circling me like a vulture.
I don’t bother asking him to come down. I whistle, and he apparates next to me like he was always there.
Khan now has a sleek and smooth body of a 3-foot shark. Dorsal fin included.
His new placoid scales are a mixture of white and blue, contrasting dramatically with his blood-red eyes and mouth. He starts circling me like I am a wounded seal in the ocean. I pet his back, and his skin feels as rough as sandpaper. I thought he would be smoother.
He started to get agitated when I stopped giving him attention. I relented to his demands and started to pet him like a cat. Rob gets envious and also wants attention. All of my beasts are so clingy, Duchess’ pride won't let her ask for attention, and her size makes it awkward for her to be constantly on my shoulders or wrapped around me like she used to be.
I check my phone, and it looks like I was only unconscious for a few minutes. My [Second Heart]’s added regeneration showed its worth. Something shifts in my gut. I reach underneath my clothes and pull out a 6-inch shard of metal. I toss it to the side as the hole in my stomach closes with my healing.
I check my backlog of system messages now that I have the chance.
[Evolution Complete!]
[Servitude C lv4 (4/5) > Servitude C lv5 (4/5)]
[Class Change to Unique Master C
Tame at least three beasts with rare traits: Completed.
Level Servitude C to level 5: 5/5 Completed
Memorize a minimum of 10,000 different species of tamed beasts and their habits: Not Completed]
I sigh and continue memorizing. It should only take me the rest of the night.