Numbness.

Be it his sense of touch, sight, taste, smell, and hearing- all had grown dull.

It was a troublesome task to push his serrated tongue out of his mouth. Too much effort for an action that bore no results.

He hadn't eaten his fill in a very long time. His once robust body was capable of crushing the most fierce enemies into a paste of meat and bones...such delicacies they were.

His stomach churned. Unlike the rest of his body, his sense of hunger was still the same. It was getting more and more unruly these days, forcing him to try and swallow dregs of nature that he never thought were edible.

A king's appetite would not be sated by such 'food', if he could call them that.

Feeling moved by the increasing hunger, he broke out of his slumbering coil with much struggle. The rusted spine cracked dangerously, while his muscles opposed the sudden stretching.

Painful. But necessary.

Today, either he would hunt one of his old nemeses, or die trying.

Ignoring the searing jolts of pain in each inch of his body, he began to crawl forward. His vision was no longer what it used to be. But this still was his territory. He knew each shrub, every trunk, each mound, every hole in the ground.

The annoying monkey had grown too complacent in his gradual periods of absence from his own hunting ground. Several times, he had sensed its presence near his home, trying to test his patience, his deteriorating health, and teasing him about it.

Today, its scent was closer than ever. Even his numb old tongue could feel the stink of its dirty, bloody fur.

A violent thing, this monkey was, unlike him. Its hunting always left a mess.

Not too far away from his lair, he finally caught sight of the monkey. It was locked in combat with one of his new familiars. She was a tiny, sprightly little coil of danger, and she had done her very best in the fight. Both combatants were bloodied, skin torn, broken limbs, and weakened spirits.

The sudden, overwhelming stink of blood roused the dying spirit of a predator buried beneath his decadent heart.

While he silently approached, the monkey ripped out a small tree from the soil and slammed it down on her. Despite moving as fast as she could, it left a part of her tail crushed.

Roaring in victory, the monkey closed in on her and grabbed her by the throat, his open maw ready to bite off her head.

By now, he was already very close, just not enough to launch a fatal attack.

But that didn't matter.

He was the king. His lineage was special, regal, unique.

This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

Opening his mouth, he recalled the age-old sensation of immersing himself into nature just before striking.

Nature was deeper than most creatures tended to perceive. There were layers to it, connected to each other intricately, seamlessly. One peek inside could grant one an affinity. Just like how he was given the perception of 'flow'.

When one became a part of nature, one could sense this flow easily. It was right there, all around, surrounding everything that existed, just like water.

And it was so easy to make it move for his convenience. As soon as he willed it, the flow in front of him formed an empty tunnel for him to move through.

Pupils shrinking, his body shot out, reaching the triumphant mass of fur instantly. The long distance between them had disappeared for him, under his will. He sank all of his remaining fangs around its neck, while his tail wrapped itself around its shoulder.

He ignored the pain of his decaying body and the furious scratches and punches the monkey inflicted on it. For a dangerous moment, the monkey was able to pull him off. But using the last vestige of his grudge, he fueled his mind to make his body go through another 'immersion' in the 'flow'.

Another tunnel, another bite forward, and once again, his mouth was locked onto the monkey's spine.

Crack.

His numb jaw managed to rip out a bone from the monkey's spine.

Like a dead trunk, the monkey fell down, its limbs twitching at the last throes of death.

Such a familiar scene. Such a delicious meal.

His senses told him he had not much time left either. He would follow the monkey's fate soon.

But before that, he would taste his vengeance with relish.

That entire vision disappeared as Mir found himself on the familiar mountaintop.

"Mir!"

Murray?

He rushed towards the source of the shout, which turned out to be just past the most dangerous edge of the peak.

Murray was right there, barely holding on to a protruding rock with one hand while the rest of his body dangled dangerously above a hundred-foot drop.

Death would be the only outcome if Murray's grip slipped.

"Help me!" he yelled in panic.

Mir crouched down and extended his arm toward the rock Murray was holding on to.

But no matter how far he tried to reach without pushing his body into a precarious position, a gap of several meters remained constant between the two of them.

"I...I think the rock is about to break!" Murray shouted fearfully.

Mir recalled the vision he had just had.

As long as he could capture that sensation of being immersed into nature itself, he could execute that same ability as the snake.

He could catch Murray before he fell to his death. All he needed to do now was to-

No.

For some reason, Mir didn't feel any urgency despite the visible fear and panic on Murray's face.

Even his desperate cries for help barely made him feel that he needed to do something. But using that mutant ability of the snake didn't seem like an option. His mind rejected the idea the moment it sprang out inside his thoughts.

But like an annoying bug, it kept circling his mind, constantly making him recall the sensation, the ease with which he had executed the space-skipping bites as the snake. All it would take to save his older brother was one conscious thought on his part to execute the technique.

But like an immovable statue, his mind remained unperturbed. The rush of emotions that threatened to explode couldn't make an impact on his thoughts.

"Are you going to let me die, Mir?" Murray whispered suddenly, eyes widened in disbelief. For a moment, Mir felt like ditching his mental rejection and executing the space-skip technique.

But only for a second. He regained his clarity once more. It was almost as if he was unable to make the decision that was required to save Murray, at least, not the way he was being guided to.

The rock suddenly broke apart, and Mir's heart beat against his ribcage madly for a moment. At that moment, he wanted to do nothing but to execute the technique.

Saving Murray was more important than anything else!

But his mind...well, something in his mind made him stop.

Murray fell down. And with his descending body, Mir saw a new world beginning to emerge out of reality itself, like a zipper being opened.

He was still on the mountaintop, but on his back, lying on the mattress.

"Double layered hallucinations? Fuck..."

Marveling at how he had barely survived that mental attack, Mir sat up and checked his communicator.

[ 12:45 ]

It was noontime. He had been out cold for almost half an hour, which wasn't really as long as he had thought it would be. Perhaps his recent mental refinements had begun to affect his mental battles. He was no longer a weak, untrained explorer. Moreover, he had the diary to assist his fortitude. Becoming good at enduring hallucinations was just a matter of time.

Technically speaking, this was his first 'normal' hallucination. That time when he had drunk the Purplevein honey, his eyes had been open, leading to a very confusing mental attack meshed with reality.

After that, his mental battles consisted of nothing but fighting against his current companion creature, the Witchweed.

This was the first one where he had obeyed all the rules and underwent the hallucination caused by the consumption of contaminated food. Compared to his previous experiences, this one had been somewhat simple. He had retained his rationality, his sense of being during the main part of the test, unlike during the struggle against the Witchweed when everything he had experienced was from the point of view of a plant, his own existence forgotten.

The vision of the mutant ability hadn't affected his judgment much. He was sure that even without the diary, he would have been able to resist the temptation to execute the mutant ability for a short while.

As he took a deep breath and sat up, he noticed the notification of a message hanging on a corner of the screen.

It turned out to be from Murray's account.

It was a picture of a beheaded body, presented alongside the head.

Mir's grip contracted so powerfully that a crack appeared on the cheap screen of the communicator.