Chapter 34: Flood's Effects

Elder Carn won't stop staring at me and it's seriously starting to creep me out.

However unlike Shelton, elder Carn doesn't just continue to stare at me dumbfoundedly.

After only looking at me for a few seconds, he touches what looks like a miniature pyramid on his rock desk making it light up for a second only to dim back down.

?

'What was that?' I think to myself before he speaks up again.

"Oliver are you sure that you can actually feel yourself on the verge of evolution?" He confirms with me. It would appear that even he can't believe this quite immediately.

I also mentally snort in my mind as he asks me such a question. I have a system! I can literally see how close I am to evolving and it even says when I am able to! Other, 'natural' creatures without systems which includes every single creature I've met or heard of so far can't actually quite see their progress towards evolution.

This means that they just have to rely on their senses of how powerful they are and if they feel like they are on the cusp of transforming to know if they are able to evolve. I've heard Shelton use a metaphor similar to evolution feeling as though there is a door in front of you and you've unlocked it, and only need to enter, although that brings more questions rather than answers to mind such as 'How does Shelton know what a door is?' Only to realize that they do indeed have those around the enclave, but prefer curtains.

At least that's how Shelton feels, but the point is, Yes. "I am positive that I am able to evolve elder Carn." I say to the elderly crustacean.

He reaches up and scratches his chin once again.

What's up with this older crab doing that? Does he want a beard or something, or maybe crabs have really small hairs down there... so maybe he actually has a beard?

I don't know crab biology nor the biology of the creatures in this world so all I'm able to conclude is that elder Carn would love to have a big bushy white beard for him to scratch while he's contemplating.

Turning around, elder Carn grabs onto one of the woven Seaweed papers and reads it again, muttering to himself, "Just how large is this..."

Hmm? Both me and Shelton tilt our heads as the older crab grabs and reads through a couple of what appears to be more fresh seaweed papers, talking to himself every now and then before he sighs, turning back to us.

"First of all Oliver, congratulations. If you are able to evolve then that is definitely a reason to celebrate as the stronger you become, the better."

"So this isn't a bad thing, however what this can mean, COULD be disastrous."

He says as he begins to pace around his office.

"I'll be honest with you Oliver, you're not a tide candidate, at least Teri nor any other creature or evidence about you suggests it aside from this astonishing growth speed."

'Well no duh I'm not a candidate.' I think to myself. 'My system would know way before you.'

"What this could mean instead... is that this flood is going to be one of colossal proportions." He concludes as he looks at both me and Shelton in the eyes.

"I'm sure you both already know that one of the flood's defining traits is to make creatures grow stronger even faster, along side other things such as increased birth rates and the birth of new tide candidates."

"Oliver if you are able to grow at this rate, then I think that this flood may be one, if not the largest flood I've ever even heard about in my entire life."

Elder Carn sat down in his crab chair, pulling out a smaller food bag he had beside his rock and some of the other papers and instrument sin his chambers, grabbing and eating small cubes of meat as he talked.

"I think I'm going to visit our Janor allies, and ask if they have any clues about this. They have a more extensive library than us, and they also have connections to the Seahorse kingdom, meaning if neither of us know anything, that they might."

Shelton stares off into space, probably imagining a grim future from the looks of it causing a knot to form in my head.

'Should I just tell the truth? I'm only actually going from red rank to orange rank, so while my progression is still fast, wouldn't that be much more manageable?'

For better, or perhaps worse however, elder Carn speaks up.

"To be honest with the both of you, I've had this premonition for a while. We've received many reports of creatures, from neighboring tribes to wild ones, who have been growing at unprecedented rate."

"This can definitely be good, for example I think our lobster allies, the Janor tribe, have already gotten 2 new yellow rank creatures amidst their tribe. But at the same time I fear that the Synok tribe may receive another green ranking creature soon, or even worse, their leader may progress to the blue rank."

Shelton snaps out of his daze as he hears an even more terrifying possibility coming from elder Carn's mouth.

Synok tribe? A blue rank?

Wouldn't that mean that the Synok tribe would be able to overcome their biggest disadvantage against our Carak tribe?

Here's where the disadvantage lays during a flood. While it does indeed 'help' all creatures, those who were stronger before, and those you are higher up in the food chain benefit even more, because they get both exponentially stronger, and they have more prey to hunt so they grow quicker.

Shelton opened his mouth in anxiety, "Is that true elder Carn?"

Elder Carn shook his head reassuring the younger crab, "No, as of now it's just a speculation. However it is definitely a possibility that those snakes will become stronger than us soon."

Sitting in silence for a moment, letting us process his words, he then spoke again but in a much less somber tone.

"This isn't a problem you can directly influence, instead both of you should just keep on focus on getting stronger for the tribe."

Picking both of up with his pincer's he deposited us outside of his chambers, shooing us away with encouraging words before ending it on one last note.

"Also Oliver, you don't have to worry about the attention you'll receive for your quick evolution, once the council understands the reason why, the norm will soon follow."

He waved to us as we left the chamber's, with me needing to actually crawl out myself instead of sitting atop Shelton's head due to his dazed state.

"You okay there Shelton?" I asked.

While Shelton wasn't a creature who was necessarily brimming with confidence, I certainly hadn't ever seen him this distraught.

I nudged him a little bit with one of my arms, and he shook his head, clearing his thoughts.

Turning to me, he spoke in a resolute voice, "We need to become stronger Oliver." to which I dumbly nodded towards him.

"Yeah, let's do that then." I agreed, and Shelton began on a journey to his cove.

Seeing that my friend was out of his fraught state, I hopped on his back and began pestering and teasing him about how I was to become bigger than him again so soon.

Hearing his pincer's clicking in envy, my boasting continued until we reached his cove, to which he dumped me on the floor told me to evolve, and immediately left saying he was going to go hunt.

Chuckling to myself as I could see the vivid desire of his to go and evolve with me, I sat upon the sandy floor, and opened my menu.

Status!

<Showing Status...>

<Name: Oliver>

<Level: 15>

<Health: 230/230>

<Mana: 720/720>

<Titles: ???>

<Age: Child>

<Vitality: 46>

<Strength: 89)>

<Speed: 66>

<Endurance: 30>

<Intelligence: 31>

<Magic: 72>

<Luck: 39>

<Mutations: Barbed Spring Loaded Tentacles (Level 3) (Tier 2), Pitch Black Ink Sac (Level 3) (Tier 2), Rushing Quick Siphon (Level 3) (Tier 2), Inky Vision Eyeballs (Level 3)(Tier 2), Density Physical Magic Organ (Level 5) (Tier 1)>

<Skills: Active: Improved Ink Cloud (Level 4) Expert Camouflage (Level 2) Passive: Fine Tentacle Grab (Level 3) Regeneration (Level 3) Bloody Shredding (Level 3)>

<Tier: 2 (Red Rank)>

<Species: Compressed Tentacles Octopus>

<Unassigned Stat Points: 0>

<Mutagens: 178>

<Skill Points: 9>

For a red ranked creature, I really am frightening. Hell my actual threat level is around low to mid yellow rank, which is technically 2 ranks ahead of me! I know that the difference in power between ranks increases more and more the higher the ranks are, but I still can't but feel proud dammit!

First thing first, I guess I should finally mutate myself before I actually evolve, yeah? While I could do it after, I don't know if Shelton will come back while I'm evolving and see what the normal next version of me would look like, thus making my mutations stand out more if I do them afterwards.

Lets get to it!