Sanguine Paradise - Chapter 2

Chapter 2 – [Day 1] – “Taking Flight”

Sorting out my thoughts and steeling my nerves, I start taking full stock of my new but diminutive body, casting away the worries of what my sponsor's word might entail for my future.

Even though I had a 360-degree field of vision, I was still unable to view my entire body. But from what I could see, my body was indeed that of a seemingly ordinary, but larger-than-normal mosquito.

I have a head, thorax, and abdomen. On the sides of my thorax, six spindly legs protruded, two of them I would call my front legs and the other four my hind legs due to their placement being close to each other on the bottom half of my thorax.

On my back were two long transparent wings that ran down the length of both my thorax and abdomen. Reflexively I tried to unfold them, and it was to my pleasant surprise of how easily I was already able to control all of my body parts.

And lastly, what made a mosquito a mosquito, a long needle-like appendage that extended from my face. But I wasn't even sure what the proper name for it was. I think it was called a proboscis, but can't really remember such passing information.

Rousing a thought with that, I tried something.

-System, What is the needle-like appendage of a mosquito called?-

It seemed that the system probably wouldn't answer questions that do not relate to the system itself, so I simply decided to relegate it to needle or proboscis. And no I don't want to think about bad jokes about my 'needle'...

Done taking stock, and making fun of myself, I readied my mind for what I was going to do next.

Mentally prepared after a long tense moment, I started my countdown.

"One... Two... THREE....."

"Oh-OH Aaaahhh"

"Holy shit, holy fuck - I'm actually flying, this feels a lot better than I thought I wou-"

*THUNK*

My train of thought was abruptly cut off as I rather unceremoniously rammed directly into the stone surface of one of the cave walls.

Quickly looking around, as if to check if anybody happened to see my rather pathetic display of aerial performance, I got back on all six of my thin legs and checked my status.

-S-Status!-

"Phew..." I let out a breath of relief mentally.

My health thankfully hadn't seemed to be affected by my recent embarrassing failure. Recentering myself once again, I took another few minutes to extend and flex all of my limbs and appendages, making sure I had everything under control.

This time though, instead of jumping forward with momentum to take flight, I began rapidly flapping my long and semi-transparent wings.

And before I knew it, I had taken air yet again, this time around with much more stability than before. I made a few rounds flying at the edge of the cave mouth, trying to adapt to the new and wonderous feeling of flying.

It truly was an alien experience to fly. Luckily it seemed that some instinctual knowledge helped me along the way, thankful by the fact I needn't learn flying from the ground up, but I quickly noticed that accompanied by my flight was the slight humming produced by my wings flapping which I duly noted at the back of my mind as something I should probably keep in mind.

On to my next agenda, I had to scout my surroundings, preferably without getting myself killed by whatever this world had in store for me. And secondly, then get me some food and experience or whatever this world's equivalent was, but mostly because I already felt ravenous.

Flying cautiously out of the cavemouth, I began cautiously venturing out. The first thing I noticed around me was the absolutely stunning beauty of the completely alien flora and fauna that colored everything in a wonderous collection of colors and shapes. If I were to describe my surroundings I would say it would be something between a forest, swamp, and glade, but simply all seemed too fantastical and alien to be Earth.

All around me were splotches of luscious green, small and big, plants of all sizes and shapes. Some individual plants also had wildly different colors that screamed in contrast to the rest of the forest- uh, swamp? Urgh, I'll just call it a glade, since it makes sense with my race.

I made sure to steer clear of all the brightly colored plants that I had no idea was just to be sure I wasn't getting myself killed by some venus flytrap or some other carnivorous plants.

Sticking a ten-out-of-ten landing, in my own narcissistic opinion, on a branch I took a break from flying to survey for potential prey - and potential predators.

"Oh wait, didn't I have a skill point that I hadn't used?" I suddenly remembered, curious as to what exactly could be bought with it.

-Skill shop!- I shouted mentally.

"Hmm, it appears that I have to search for skills myself. So what do I need right now?" I pondered, rubbing my chin with a spindly leg thoughtfully. Wait did I have a chin? Urgh, nevermind.

Currently, I was a mosquito, a Glade mosquito to be exact. Which was a slightly larger-than-ordinary mosquito to Earth standards from what I gathered. I had only a measly one point of health, so probably any accident with me getting hit by pretty much anything would spell instant death and soul obliteration for me.

Combat skills at this point didn't provide me with anything worthwhile. Due to my trait Limit Breaker, I already knew that I would be able to evolve at some point or another. Meaning I most likely will grow bigger and more powerful, but only if I managed not to die before I became sufficiently strong.

The one thing I was severely in lack of, was information. I knew barely anything about this world and its inhabitants, and my place in it with the threat of my sponsor hanging over me. So a skill that could provide me reconnaissance or information about pretty anything will be a massive boon, even though if I had to forego a potential defensive tool.

I'd much rather avoid danger instead of trying to defend against it right now.

-Skill shop, reconnaissance!-

"Huh..." I thought intelligently.

This was very interesting, especially the Mana Buffering skill which seemed seriously useful. Being able to seemingly create a picture of your surroundings with mana could be extremely handy, allowing oneself to avoid enemies and find opportunities by simply creating a mental map of your area. But it was so damn expensive, and the requirements were crazy high for the current me - not to mention that 'core' requirement, whatever that meant exactly.

"Hmm, what else is there? Oh! Isn't Appraise or Appraisal is like a stable for any game-like system? Let me try that." I suddenly remembered.

If I could gauge an enemies' strength and information or an object's properties from a distance, they would do massively for my deciding of which creatures to prey upon, helping my current predicament of being in wholly unknown waters. 

-Skill shop, appraisal!-

"Boo-ya!" I exclaimed internally until I read the skill's cost.

That was seriously a hefty price, and I only had one skill point. I would have to acquire a whole nine more levels to be able to purchase this skill.

But now that I thought about it, Appraisal was kind of a cheat skill. While for me it would be very handy, having information about your opponents by just activating a skill would quite a powerful advantage later on, and I doubted that this kind of skill was readily available to just anybody.

But then again, the trait Skill Shop was something I was given to rocket beyond my peers, so coming by skills might not be that easy for everyone while I have the advantage of, although limited, being able to select specific skills.

"Hmm, I got it! Lemme try this instead."

-Skill shop, profiling!-

"There we go..."

There was something I could finally use. The Blood Profiling seemed perfect for me since I was a mosquito. But the low cost of the skill and requirement was probably tied to the fact that I had to consume the blood of the intended target, which would undoubtedly be quite a bit harder and quarrelsome than what the other skills entailed.

But as a mosquito, that's no problem for me! And besides, I would very much like to know about the things I would be eating, to ensure my safety even more. But just to be sure, I went through a number of different keywords to search for anything that might be better.

Unfortunately, I didn't find anything in the range of a single point that would increase the chances of my survival, and although there was a wide variety of skills to choose from, they seemed quite limited. Maybe that would change in the future as I grew stronger, but I couldn't be entirely certain.

But even though this skill might not provide me with much, any information was vital in my current situation. Plus, literally anything could kill me, and any of these few defensive skills with the cost of one skill point, which was only three in total, simply wouldn't change my survivability. I mean, a slightly sturdier mosquito wasn't any better than the baseline.

But if I were to be able to figure out the strengths and weaknesses of whatever I was eating, I would be able to see where I fit into this world at my current level of power.

The more information I had, the surer I could be of my footing.

And as such, I bought the skill.

-Blood Profiling!-

Now I simply had to find some prey, so I decided to stay on the branch for a while in an attempt to try and scout out my possibilities. It was about though minutes later that something happened which immediately caught my attention.

Some thick underbrush right beneath me was rustling, so I started to fervently observe the disturbance with my beady eyes. Only two minutes later, an inconspicuous rabbit hopped out. Well, inconspicuous other than the pointy horn protruding straight out from its forehead.

"Is that a fucking... unicorn rabbit?" I thought to myself, quite bewildered.

"Huh, interesting creature..."

After jumping out of the foliage it simply halted, starting to chomp down on a particularly lush and moist patch of grass.

Seeing this I immediately perked up. 

"This is my chance!"

Taking to air from my impromptu resting point, I started slowly making my approach on the unsuspecting rabbit. Luckily it didn't notice me at all, or simply didn't give a rat's ass about me if it did. 

Landing on the thin sheet of fur on its back, I steadied myself to make sure no funny business went on while I indulge in my first meal of this world. Standing on the back of the rabbit, I could feel my instincts kick in and I knew immediately how I was supposed to approach this situation.

Before I knew it, my proboscis had penetrated the rabbit's skin, and a warm feeling started flowing into my body. I realized I was unable to taste the blood as I maybe didn't have tastebuds, but I guessed that was probably for the better. I doubted I would enjoy tasting the blood of all the creatures I was going to be drinking off so it didn't bother me really.

Suddenly an errant thought managed to find its way into my head about mosquitoes.

I wasn't an expert on mosquito biology, but I think I heard about the fact that it was primarily just females that drank the blood of living creatures when pregnant, foregoing the safer alternatives of plant nectar for better nutrients.

But seeing that I was neither pregnant nor female, such things probably didn't relate to fantastical and magical beings. But taking into account that males should still be very much capable of doing so but rather only went after the nectar of flowers on their own volition, I saw no reason why sapient mosquito with the mind of a human couldn't. Besides, I had the trait Siphon that revolved around the blood of creatures, so I simply put the thought away and continued to drink away.

After thirty seconds I felt completely stuffed, so I retracted my needle appendage.

"Well, that seems good I guess."

Now I just needed to get back to my resting spot on the branch to try and digest some of this blood. So checking that everything was in order, and noticing that my abdomen had swollen quite a bit, I took flight.

This time around I could feel that there was a lot more strain put on my wings, most likely because of my increased weight of the blood weighing down my body. Sluggishly, I flew back to the branch and landed unceremoniously.

"Now to so see the rewards for my exploits."

-Status!-

I guessed that my stats had probably increased in the direction of the horned rabbit's own stat allocation from looking at my status, although I couldn't be certain.

It wasn't much but it was a start. Before I could do anything else though, I all of a sudden started feeling weary once again, slowly feeling the sensation of my mind slipping away, into a deep sleep.

"I better not wake up in another world again, you hear me!" Was the last thought that escaped just before darkness claimed me.

Chapter 2 Day 1 Taking FlightSorting out my thoughts and steeling my nerves, I start taking full stock of my new but diminutive body, casting away the worries of what my sponsor's word might entail for my future.Even though I had a 360-degree field of vision, I was still unable to view my entire body. But from what I could see, my body was indeed that of a seemingly ordinary, but larger-than-normal mosquito.I have a head, thorax, and abdomen. On the sides of my thorax, six spindly legs protruded, two of them I would call my front legs and the other four my hind legs due to their placement being close to each other on the bottom half of my thorax.On my back were two long transparent wings that ran down the length of both my thorax and abdomen. Reflexively I tried to unfold them, and it was to my pleasant surprise of how easily I was already able to control all of my body parts.And lastly, what made a mosquito a mosquito, a long needle-like appendage that extended from my face. But I wasn't even sure what the proper name for it was. I think it was called a proboscis, but can't really remember such passing information.Rousing a thought with that, I tried something.-System, What is the needle-like appendage of a mosquito called?-I cannot answer that question.It seemed that the system probably wouldn't answer questions that do not relate to the system itself, so I simply decided to relegate it to needle or proboscis. And no I don't want to think about bad jokes about my 'needle'...Done taking stock, and making fun of myself, I readied my mind for what I was going to do next.Mentally prepared after a long tense moment, I started my countdown."One... Two... THREE.....""Oh-OH Aaaahhh""Holy shit, holy fuck - I'm actually flying, this feels a lot better than I thought I wou-"*THUNK*My train of thought was abruptly cut off as I rather unceremoniously rammed directly into the stone surface of one of the cave walls.Quickly looking around, as if to check if anybody happened to see my rather pathetic display of aerial performance, I got back on all six of my thin legs and checked my status.-S-Status!-StatusInformationAttributesTraits. Titles. and Skills-Name-"???"STR0.12Skills3-Race-Glade MosquitoVIT0.09Traits3-Sex-MaleAGI2Titles0-Rank-K-DEX1Skillpoints1-Level-1/3INT12ResistancesHealth1/1CHR0.05Physical Resistance0.02Stamina1/1WILL11Magical Resistance0.00Mana0/0MAG0.02Mental Resistance5"Phew..." I let out a breath of relief mentally.My health thankfully hadn't seemed to be affected by my recent embarrassing failure. Recentering myself once again, I took another few minutes to extend and flex all of my limbs and appendages, making sure I had everything under control.This time though, instead of jumping forward with momentum to take flight, I began rapidly flapping my long and semi-transparent wings.And before I knew it, I had taken air yet again, this time around with much more stability than before. I made a few rounds flying at the edge of the cave mouth, trying to adapt to the new and wonderous feeling of flying.It truly was an alien experience to fly. Luckily it seemed that some instinctual knowledge helped me along the way, thankful by the fact I needn't learn flying from the ground up, but I quickly noticed that accompanied by my flight was the slight humming produced by my wings flapping which I duly noted at the back of my mind as something I should probably keep in mind.On to my next agenda, I had to scout my surroundings, preferably without getting myself killed by whatever this world had in store for me. And secondly, then get me some food and experience or whatever this world's equivalent was, but mostly because I already felt ravenous.Flying cautiously out of the cavemouth, I began cautiously venturing out. The first thing I noticed around me was the absolutely stunning beauty of the completely alien flora and fauna that colored everything in a wonderous collection of colors and shapes. If I were to describe my surroundings I would say it would be something between a forest, swamp, and glade, but simply all seemed too fantastical and alien to be Earth.All around me were splotches of luscious green, small and big, plants of all sizes and shapes. Some individual plants also had wildly different colors that screamed in contrast to the rest of the forest- uh, swamp? Urgh, I'll just call it a glade, since it makes sense with my race.I made sure to steer clear of all the brightly colored plants that I had no idea was just to be sure I wasn't getting myself killed by some venus flytrap or some other carnivorous plants.Sticking a ten-out-of-ten landing, in my own narcissistic opinion, on a branch I took a break from flying to survey for potential prey - and potential predators."Oh wait, didn't I have a skill point that I hadn't used?"I suddenly remembered, curious as to what exactly could be bought with it.-Skill shop!- I shouted mentally.Skill shopSearchSkillsNameTypeCostRequirement"Hmm, it appears that I have to search for skills myself. So what do I need right now?"I pondered, rubbing my chin with a spindly leg thoughtfully. Wait did I have a chin? Urgh, nevermind.Currently, I was a mosquito, a Glade mosquito to be exact. Which was a slightly larger-than-ordinary mosquito to Earth standards from what I gathered. I had only a measly one point of health, so probably any accident with me getting hit by pretty much anything would spell instant death and soul obliteration for me.Combat skills at this point didn't provide me with anything worthwhile. Due to my traitLimitBreaker, I already knew that I would be able to evolve at some point or another. Meaning I most likely will grow bigger and more powerful, but only if I managed not to die before I became sufficiently strong.The one thing I was severely in lack of, was information. I knew barely anything about this world and its inhabitants, and my place in it with the threat of my sponsor hanging over me. So a skill that could provide me reconnaissance or information about pretty anything will be a massive boon, even though if I had to forego a potential defensive tool.I'd much rather avoid danger instead of trying to defend against it right now.-Skill shop, reconnaissance!-Skill shopSearch ReconnaissanceSkillsNameTypeCostRequirementScoutingInformation5INT - 9Basic level of reconnaissance. Allows you to better scout and log the information of the user's surroundings.Mana bufferingInformation15INT - 30 / MAG - 25 / Mana 10 / Any CoreBuffers up mana within your mana source to release pulses of thin mana waves, to echo-locate the surroundings.Infrared visionSensory5VIT - 1 / DEX - 1Develops infrared vision to see heat signatures, allowing you to switch between infrared vision and normal vision."Huh..."I thought intelligently.This was very interesting, especially theMana Bufferingskill which seemed seriously useful. Being able to seemingly create a picture of your surroundings with mana could be extremely handy, allowing oneself to avoid enemies and find opportunities by simply creating a mental map of your area. But it was so damn expensive, and the requirements were crazy high for the current me - not to mention that 'core' requirement, whatever that meant exactly."Hmm, what else is there? Oh! Isn't Appraise or Appraisal is like a stable for any game-like system? Let me try that."I suddenly remembered.If I could gauge an enemies' strength and information or an object's properties from a distance, they would do massively for my deciding of which creatures to prey upon, helping my current predicament of being in wholly unknown waters.-Skill shop, appraisal!-Skill shopSearch AppraisalSkillsNameTypeCostRequirementAppraisalInformation10INT - 8You can appraise a living target to create a profile on the creature. The amount of information is determined by the skill level of the user and the difference in power between the user and target."Boo-ya!"I exclaimed internally until I read the skill's cost.That was seriously a hefty price, and I only had one skill point. I would have to acquire a whole nine more levels to be able to purchase this skill.But now that I thought about it,Appraisalwas kind of a cheat skill. While for me it would be very handy, having information about your opponents by just activating a skill would quite a powerful advantage later on, and I doubted that this kind of skill was readily available to just anybody.But then again, the traitSkill Shopwas something I was given to rocket beyond my peers, so coming by skills might not be that easy for everyone while I have the advantage of, although limited, being able to select specific skills."Hmm, I got it! Lemme try this instead."-Skill shop, profiling!-Skill shopSearch ProfilingSkillsNameTypeCostRequirementMana scanInformation3INT - 10 / MAG - 5 / Mana - 1 / Any CoreUses mana to send out pulses, and slowly analyze a target's information. The amount and speed of the analysis is tied directly to the amount of mana spent, skill level, and the difference in power between the skill user and target.Blood profilingInformation1INT - 8Consumes the blood of biological creatures to create a profile on the target. The amount of information is directly tied to the amount of blood, skill level, and the difference in power between the skill user and target. Can only be used on biological organismsArchivingInformation4INT - 10By studying the target over a period of time will slowly form a profile on the target. The amount and speed of the profiling are directly tied to the amount of time spent, skill level, and the difference in power between the skill user and target."There we go..."There was something I could finally use. TheBlood Profilingseemed perfect for me since I was a mosquito. But the low cost of the skill and requirement was probably tied to the fact that I had to consume the blood of the intended target, which would undoubtedly be quite a bit harder and quarrelsome than what the other skills entailed.But as a mosquito, that's no problem for me! And besides, I would very much like to know about the things I would be eating, to ensure my safety even more. But just to be sure, I went through a number of different keywords to search for anything that might be better.Unfortunately, I didn't find anything in the range of a single point that would increase the chances of my survival, and although there was a wide variety of skills to choose from, they seemed quite limited. Maybe that would change in the future as I grew stronger, but I couldn't be entirely certain.But even though this skill might not provide me with much, any information was vital in my current situation. Plus, literally anything could kill me, and any of these few defensive skills with the cost of one skill point, which was only three in total, simply wouldn't change my survivability. I mean, a slightly sturdier mosquito wasn't any better than the baseline.But if I were to be able to figure out the strengths and weaknesses of whatever I was eating, I would be able to see where I fit into this world at my current level of power.The more information I had, the surer I could be of my footing.And as such, I bought the skill.-Blood Profiling!-Skill -Blood Profiling, has been added to the skill list!Now I simply had to find some prey, so I decided to stay on the branch for a while in an attempt to try and scout out my possibilities. It was about though minutes later that something happened which immediately caught my attention.Some thick underbrush right beneath me was rustling, so I started to fervently observe the disturbance with my beady eyes. Only two minutes later, an inconspicuous rabbit hopped out. Well, inconspicuous other than the pointy horn protruding straight out from its forehead."Is that a fucking... unicorn rabbit?"I thought to myself, quite bewildered."Huh, interesting creature..."After jumping out of the foliage it simply halted, starting to chomp down on a particularly lush and moist patch of grass.Seeing this I immediately perked up."This is my chance!"Taking to air from my impromptu resting point, I started slowly making my approach on the unsuspecting rabbit. Luckily it didn't notice me at all, or simply didn't give a rat's ass about me if it did.Landing on the thin sheet of fur on its back, I steadied myself to make sure no funny business went on while I indulge in my first meal of this world. Standing on the back of the rabbit, I could feel my instincts kick in and I knew immediately how I was supposed to approach this situation.Before I knew it, my proboscis had penetrated the rabbit's skin, and a warm feeling started flowing into my body. I realized I was unable to taste the blood as I maybe didn't have tastebuds, but I guessed that was probably for the better. I doubted I would enjoy tasting the blood of all the creatures I was going to be drinking off so it didn't bother me really.Suddenly an errant thought managed to find its way into my head about mosquitoes.I wasn't an expert on mosquito biology, but I think I heard about the fact that it was primarily just females that drank the blood of living creatures when pregnant, foregoing the safer alternatives of plant nectar for better nutrients.But seeing that I was neither pregnant nor female, such things probably didn't relate to fantastical and magical beings. But taking into account that males should still be very much capable of doing so but rather only went after the nectar of flowers on their own volition, I saw no reason why sapient mosquito with the mind of a human couldn't. Besides, I had the traitSiphonthat revolved around the blood of creatures, so I simply put the thought away and continued to drink away.After thirty seconds I felt completely stuffed, so I retracted my needle appendage.SiphonYou've consumed the blood of aHorned Rabbit2 points of EXP has been acquired and stats have been addedBlood Profilinghas created a profile of "Horned Rabbit""Well, that seems good I guess."Now I just needed to get back to my resting spot on the branch to try and digest some of this blood. So checking that everything was in order, and noticing that my abdomen had swollen quite a bit, I took flight.This time around I could feel that there was a lot more strain put on my wings, most likely because of my increased weight of the blood weighing down my body. Sluggishly, I flew back to the branch and landed unceremoniously."Now to so see the rewards for my exploits."-Status!-StatusInformationAttributesTraits. Titles. and Skills-Name-"???"STR0.12 0.15Skills4-Race-Glade MosquitoVIT0.09 0.15Traits3-Sex-MaleAGI2Titles0-Rank-K-DEX1Skillpoints0-Level-1/3INT12ResistancesHealth1/1CHR0.05Physical Resistance0.02Stamina1/1WILL11Magical Resistance0.00Mana0/0MAG0.02Mental Resistance5I guessed that my stats had probably increased in the direction of the horned rabbit's own stat allocation from looking at my status, although I couldn't be certain.It wasn't much but it was a start. Before I could do anything else though, I all of a sudden started feeling weary once again, slowly feeling the sensation of my mind slipping away, into a deep sleep."I better not wake up in another world again, you hear me!" Was the last thought that escaped just before darkness claimed me.