N10, Fierce Rat

‘Ah, that was some good sleep.’

After the lizard hunt, I woke up incredibly refreshed, maybe because my efforts were finally showing results. From now on I would bring my gang to catch more of those reptiles, it would improve my minions' combat and cooperation skills. If things went as expected they would be our main source of food in the near future.

There was also the fact that being able to go into the lizard’s territory would let us further explore the hallways, there had to be a lizard nursery out there somewhere.

‘Not that I plan to be a lizard.’

But newborns might be easier to catch, just like rats and crabs. Thinking about that, those humans had called them spawners, they also called us monstrosities.

‘I guess it’s appropriate since we are born from those things.’

We definitely weren’t normal animals, the way those nurseries worked it felt like, rather than being born, we were being produced.

‘Uh? What are you looking at?’

I noticed that my minions inside the lair were focusing their attention on me. That was strange, they would normally be interacting between themselves unless I gave them an order.

‘Was I hurt in the fight?’

It was improbable, I hadn’t realized before, but I was very sleepy after the hunt. I started examining myself.

‘This…’

My body had changed. My limbs were thicker. I turned my neck, there were bulging muscles in my torso and my tail had some fur patches. I had no way to see my head, but the sensation was a bit different. I touched it with my paws, it felt familiar, but its shape had changed a bit, my snout was broader and my ears were less round.

‘I have grown! No, wait, this isn’t growing, how long has it been since I went to sleep?’

I took a look at my underlings, they seemed fine, if too much time had passed they wouldn’t be there staring at me, there would be chaos or missing members that had left to look for food. I could only come to one conclusion. I had slept for less than a day, probably no longer than normal.

My body wasn’t bigger than before, but I had transformed, I couldn’t call it growth. This was more like a mutation, or rather, an evolution.

‘Yes! That’s it, I have evolved.’

That term seemed to be the best fit for this sudden change. From now on I was a fierce rat.

I was bursting with happiness, besides my success with the hunt I had also accomplished my personal goal, I couldn’t wait to try this new form, but first I had to take care of this situation.

‘Let’s put some order in the gang.’

“Shrii, shriik.” My followers’ attention was already focused on me, but I had to assure them that I was the same rat that had been leading the pack until now. I patted the ground to make them stand in place.

Everyone reacted to my orders and their stance changed slightly, it seemed that all my underlings recognized me. Just in case I went one by one patting them on the head, this and soft headbutts had become common a common way of asserting one’s position and superiority.

‘Next… it’s time to test my power as a fierce rat!’

I had shown everyone a calm demeanor befit of a leader, but internally I could barely repress my desire to test my new body.

‘Hmm, how should I check it?’

I looked around and saw the rocks we had piled near the entrance. I approached one of the biggest ones, even with my growing body I used to need help to move this particular chunk. I pushed the rock with my head, at first it didn’t budge, but when I applied more strength it was dragged along the floor, leaving scratch marks on its way.

‘Whoa! It’s a lot easier than before.’

This test had gone well, but it wasn’t enough, I was full of energy and had to unwind it someway. I left the lair, took a look to make sure there was nothing around, and started running and jumping in the hallway. I was clearly faster than before, but the most amazing part was that the height of my jumps had doubled.

‘Not bad at all.’ This body was better than expected.

After the exhausting exercise, I licked some water from the wall, then I searched for some crab to crunch.

‘Eew.’

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The crunchy texture was like eating sand. It was as disgusting as ever, but I could tell my teeth tore the shell a lot easier than before. My bites had gotten stronger! It was time to go find another lizard.

For the next few days, I focused on hunting lizards. My original tactic of leading the reptiles toward another pack of rats had not changed, the only difference was that the scaly creatures seemed a bit more reticent to follow my taunts.

After that, I only had to wait until both parties were worn out to enter the fray and reap the benefits. During the battles, I had taken the task to stand in front of the beasts and distract them while my minions bit them from behind and the sides.

Of course, things wouldn’t always go well, sometimes the packs of rats would get killed without doing much and I was forced to choose between a risky fight or a prudent retreat.

Between hunts, I had also added a few more members to the gang. There were now eleven goons, my three numbered subordinates and me, for a total of fifteen.

Talking about my subordinates, they were munching on our last catch. Now I could easily tell them apart at a glance. Lately, they had grown quite a bit. I would have to be careful with them, but I was sure our hunts would be a lot easier once they evolved.

“Shriik!” One of the goons cried after being headbutted by another one.

Some of the new underlings still didn’t understand their position in the gang. The older goons were now also organizing themselves and making a new stratum of senior rats.

Number One brought me a piece of meat, this fellow genuinely cared about me. I had yet to eat, but there should be more than enough food here.

I stopped liking my wounds, the lizard this time had caught me off guard and had slightly bitten one of my arms. I stepped on the ground with the injured leg, it hurt, but at least I could walk, that was a good sign.

‘I have to be more careful.’

After evolving into a fierce rat I had been a bit too reckless. Now I would need to take some time to heal this injury.

‘No more lizard hunts for a few days.’

There should be no food problems with the humans still massacring all rodents in the hallways. My biggest worry was catching an infection.

I ate the meat that Number One had left me and moved toward the reptile’s corpse. My minions noticed me and promptly made way for me to feed. Their loyalty had increased since I evolved and currently, all of them treated me almost with reverence.

“Shriik?” Except for Number Two, he obeyed me but was a lot more casual about it than the others. The now considerably bigger rat had seen me approaching but instead of giving way, he stuffed himself with lizard meat and then feigned ignorance.

‘No, I’m not letting you eat the tail.’ I threw a stern glance at him and he finally moved aside, robbing a goon of his spot. The base of the tail was the part with the most meat. There was softer flesh, but it was a hassle to eat small pieces here and there and this thing didn’t taste good enough for me to care.

…

“SHRIEEK!”

I let out a raging battle cry and ordered my minions to attack. We were in the middle of a fight with a lizard, the foul creature had more vitality left in it than I had thought.

I also charged at it without care. Seeing me approaching from the side the reptile tried to sink its teeth into my flesh, but my own reached the beast first and I strongly clenched onto its neck.

The scaly animal tried to shake me out and I held with all my strength. I needed to endure and give my underlings enough time to wound the beast. They were dealing all the damage they could, biting the creature all over its body. Number One and Two reached the spot on the back of its neck and the lizard started bleeding profusely.

‘Yes! Die, scaly shit!’

The scaly creature shook strongly from the pain making me lose my grip. I fell on my side, and the lizard’s fangs closed on my torso. Now I was the one struggling to break free.

Twisting frenetically on the floor I felt a sharp pain and managed to escape rolling on the ground. I got up a distance away from the enemy, I was losing quite a bit of blood, but I couldn’t miss a moment, Number One and Two were distracting the lizard on their own. I needed to intervene before they got hurt.

I circled around my distracted opponent and bit its already heavily wounded nape, the strength of my jaws was greater than that of my subordinates and the bleeding intensified. The lizard moved frantically, trying to shake me off, but it was all for naught. It couldn’t break free because I was in a very good position this time, on top of his back.

The rest of the gang also imitated me, latching onto other parts of the lizard’s body, pinning the big beast in place. Only his head was free to move, but it was unable to reach any of us.

Little by little the reptile got quieter while its hot blood poured into my mouth, in another circumstance I would be wondering why this beast’s body was warm.

Finally, our enemy lay dead on the cold floor, but I couldn’t feel the joy of victory.

I checked that no one had been hurt during the last struggle and walked to the side wall, against it rested an immobile rat. I checked for its breath but found nothing.

‘Damn it!’

My anger soared again. I had lost one of my underlings in this fight.

I had taken some distance from the lizard. It had been just a moment, but the reptile had caught one of my minions with its mouth and taken a bite out of him.

I was breathing heavily, not because of my injury nor the exhaustion of the fight, I had some strong emotions writhing inside me. One of them was intense rage but I couldn’t recognize the other.

‘Regret?’

I should have been more proactive during the confrontation. Since that other lizard hurt me I had been warier of getting wounded and had let my underlings help with the more dangerous tasks.

‘No, it isn’t that… Sorrow?’

Was I feeling sadness at the death of a rat? I hadn’t even named it, although I knew it was one of the oldest goons.

‘No, it was just another disposable pawn.’

I only needed to replace it, their kind died here all the time, this one wasn’t even the only corpse here, there were others from the pack I had lured to fight the lizard beforehand.

‘It must be fear.’

I had died a few times already, I wasn’t so scared of death anymore. But I dreaded losing all the progress I had made during this last life.

I looked at the dead rat for a while, organizing my thoughts and calming myself.

‘At least he had a fast death.’

I decided to pull the corpse into a nearby tunnel. It was a meaningless gesture, some creature would come to eat it soon, but it was the only thing I could do for a useful member of my band. There was no way to bury a body down here.

Once I ended up taking care of the underling, I discovered the rest of the gang had barely touched the lizard, only Number Two and a few of the newest rats were eating, while the rest was looking at me.

I didn’t know if they were worried because I had been hurt, confused about what I was doing, or also felt some emotions for their dead comrade.

‘Do they even understand death?’

They had to, it was everywhere in these underground hallways. They had realized the danger when the humans used bait in front of our lair and had shown me they were quite intelligent on several occasions.

I approached the lizard and started eating it from its face out of spite. My followers also began feeding. This damned beast seemed to taste even worse than normal.

During the meal, I paid attention to the tunnel where I had left the corpse, but no one went near it.

After we were done I took a last look at the remains and Number One came with me, the goon had been one of his direct subordinates. I let him some time to pay his respects to the deceased one and then guided my band back to the safe room.

‘I will be more careful from now on, I won’t make another mistake like this one.’