Chrysalis

I stagger awake from torpor, my body snapping into motion faster than my brain can keep up. The result is that my legs spasm and my antennae stab into the air at the same time, giving out a general vibe of intense energy coupled with mind shattering fear.

"Hugga?!"

I'm still getting used to not being able to blink. At no time in the day is this more apparent to me than just after I wake up. The urge to clear the sleep out of my eyes, to eliminate the dryness, but I can't blink! There is no sleep! I can't even rub my eyes or anything. It's weird but for some reason this is some of the last hang-ups I have as human turned ant. Generally speaking, I'm good with the rest of it. I don't have many problems anymore with my new form, in fact, it's pretty great. In my opinion, those who wouldn't swap from human to monster ant are fools! Seriously mentally deficient! I even get to join a family with thousands of siblings! For someone who never had any brothers or sisters in their human life, this is a big plus for me! Well, I suppose I still don't have any brothers…

[Okay guys, I'm up. Are we ready for some more fishing?]

My two pets give me their acknowledgement and make our slow and careful way back to the top of the coral reef to try and reel in some more monsters. Our farming is starting to slow down at this spot, we'll have to move soon. It's hard to be sure exactly where you are in this absurdly massive expanse, but I've been trying to skirt the edges of the coral reef without heading towards the centre. I don't want to pull down something on the level of that giant leviathan, not until we've had more time to power up, explore and scout out the situation at the top of the food chain. Right now, the plan is to lay relatively low and keep pumping our Skills, eating Biomass and pushing Tiny and Crinis towards their next evolution.

[Okay Crinis. Are you set up and good to go?]

[Ready, Master!]

[How about you Tiny?]

[Oooo!]

slowing down at the end of the last one, so I'm going

last grasping tendrils of the corals and shadow seaweed. The response from the drifting schools

out the odd fireball spell and chomping on anything that gets too close isn't a huge contribution but when my poor pets are getting swarmed, every little bit helps. When the fighting is done, we hoover up all the Biomass we can, the stomach upgrades

their tier five evolution. Level forty is still a ways off for the two of them, but if we continue our routine, they're sure to get there before too long. I really did skip ahead of them a lot in levels by harvesting the XP from those Croca commanders. Then

over the last five days, I was finally able to level Core Surgery enough that I could increase its rank to Core Crafting (IV), which means that so long as I can pull it off, the Core fusion skill will unlock for me. After a number of attempts, I still fail to slot two cores together neatly enough to satisfy the unlock condition. Through painstaking trial and error I've gotten much closer, but still aren't there yet. The two creatures I've chosen are the Leech and Fish. Taking weak variants of these two creatures, only tier two, due to their more simple cores, I've been trying to shape them into compatible parts before fusing the two cores together. The trick is to focus on the traits you want to keep from each of the creatures and manipulate them in such

than done since I'm yet to succeed. When I'm done with all of the cores they are absorbed by Tiny and Crinis but the two of them inform me that they've maxed out their cores now and can't take anymore. This is good news! The preparations for their evolutions are getting closer and closer to being complete. This means the last six cores are mine to absorb! It's going to take a heck of a long time

mind automatically shies away from thinking about the core we took from Garralosh, still stashed with the colony far above my head. Nope. Not even going to consider that until I absolutely have to. With another round of feasting behind us, our Biomass has built up quite significantly. I haven't upgraded myself during this hunt spree, so I suppose I might as well go ahead and do a

and fifty seven points to