Of Monsters and Men

I watched as the deer drank. Little ripples traveled through the water. I jumped forward to a water leaf growing at the edge of the pool. It seemed a very normal thing. The animal drinks, the frog eats. I jump to the next leaf and catch a mosquito.

Though, normally I'd be a human and the deer would run away as soon as it saw me getting closer. But here I was a frog and it was completely normal for me to get close to it. I was harmless to it, right? It was harmless to me, right?

I jumped closer.

I was right next to it as it munched on some sweet water reeds. Nothing. Not a flinch at my presence.

I got into position on the opposite side of the direction I wanted it to run. Now I would scare it and it would run right into Aunty Spider's webs. The webs would catch it and she would be full for a month.

I took in the biggest breath I could and let out: CRRRRROOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAKKKKKKKK!

...

The deer continued to drink as if nothing had happened.

I started jumping around to make as much ruckus as I could.

The deer ate some more reeds.

I stopped and looked the deer in the eyes. There was no sign of intelligence. No sparkle of thought beyond the desire for food and drink. It was just a deer. A very weird looking deer.

I started jumping around it like a little green fly. Maybe I could annoy it to action. But, no. It didn't seem to care even when I landed right on it's back.

As I jumped around trying to figure out what to do next, I thought about magic. Aunty Spider told me that all souls transmigrated are blessed with a class like the humans and, like the humans, they don't know what class it is unless they are analyzed in some way. I don't really know how magic works in this world, but if my class has magic I should be able to cast something at first level, right?

I focused my mind and pretend mana into the image of fire as I bounced around to create the symbol. It was really nothing more than any of my other fantasies, but I had to start somewhere, right? How did magic in this world work?

FWOOSH!

As I completed the form of fire with my absent-minded hops, fire flared up around the deer, engulfing it for a brief moment in red and orange whisps of heat and the stench of burnt fur.

I froze. I imagined myself just as surprised as the deer, but in this I was wrong. The deer had noticed me now. It was looking right at me. It's eyes now glistened with something that still wasn't intelligence. It was rage.

The deer reared up to squish me under its hooves. I dodged under it and into the trees. I stopped under a leaf to hide, but it was already stomping in my direction.

I leaped off of tree trunks and inbetween roots, while the deer smashed and splinted everything under it. I tried to slip into some green on the right, but just as it was about to pass by it slowed and sucked in a large sniff of air. With a snort it was charging my direction once more.

This deer had not been scared. It had not run away. It was charging right at me through the layers and layers of webs Aunty Spider had woven into place. Auny Spider had assured me that those webs could hold even a moose... I'm un expectantly glad that I'm not running away from a moose.

However, I was getting close to the main tunnel. The deer was covered in tattered web, but it wasn't slowing down in the least. "Aunty Spider! Aunty Spider, help!"

I heard nothing in reply.

I leaped into the cave's mouth, but there was no one there. What was worse, I realized it was now quite large. We had both grown over the last year, so I had made it large enough for even a small human to enter. Or, in this case, one angry deer to reach in its head or claw out my pools. I moved to hop away from our home, but stopped.

The deer stood in my way snorting and clawing at the ground. It's gums pulled back revieling canines I had previously missed. I tried to shrink as small as I could, but it had already seen me and its hooves were coming down.

Through a mote of light behind it, a sparkle of shadow dropped from the tree canapoy onto the deer's back. The hoof missed me. Eight legs sliced into the deer's neck as teeth sunk into its flesh near the spine. It reared up with a roar of pain oddly fitting of a goat, then bucked forward.

I dodged deeper into the cave. The movement didn't shake the shadow off its back. The fangs dug in deeper.

The next buck was weaker. And the next buck hardly a bounce. Finally, it's legs buckled and it fell to the ground.

Aunty Spider retracted her fangs and smiled down from the twitching mound. "You are as ambitious as ever, my pet. This prey is clearly five to eight decades old. Not normal for this species, so it must be special. By the look of its teeth, it might have even started becoming a monster. Much longer it would have awakened."

My little froggy heart beat fiercely in my chest. My brain was halfway between 'Oh, shit, I almost was dinner' and 'Oh, shit, I did magic?' So it was basically saying 'Oh, shit, I was almost magic dinner' which didn't really make sense any which way.

"Here." Aunty spider threw down a hunk of bloody meat.

As a human I was taught not to eat much raw meats and definitely not off the dirty ground. In this case, it was certainly very dirty ground with needles, bug casings, and whatknots sticking to the under side to boot. However, my mind was starting to remember that I was a frog now and avoiding becoming something else's meal was the new norm.

Aunty Spider continued to slice up the meat with the claws at the end of her legs. "That's the heart, eat it up and you will certainly become stronger. I feel stronger already from defeating such a foe. I might even level soon and the meat should have some added properties."

I flicked it with my tongue. It was more like a poke than a lick since I had no sticks on hand, but I couldn't help but taste the bloody meat. It wasn't unpleasant. It was actually slightly sweet with a strong iron flavor much different from the bugs I ate. The bugs I ate were more like eating a gusher candy that is hard on the inside and pops with juice once I bite down, while this had the juices on the outside and probably all the way through. It certainly wouldn't be as dry as the meats I ate as a human. "What's the difference between a monster and an animal?"

"That depends on the monster." Aunty Spider shrugged as she wrapped portions of the meat with her webs. "Some monsters come from dungeons but others are found in the wild. The dungeon monsters are made by the dungeons and are very taritorial of their dungeon, only leaving in extreme circumstances. Monsters like this one, however, were animals that turned into monsters. There are several ways that happens and many still study the subject."

"What?!" I jump away. "That won't turn me into a monster, will it?"

"Contrary to some beliefs, there is no proof that monster meat turns people or animals into monsters. If anything, it is quite the opposite." Aunty Spider skillfully sliced through the soft joining bits between the leg bones and began wrapping up the shank and leg round together. "This deer probably killed someone who had not yet been blessed, so it only partly turned into a monster and benefited from its long life. However, there is plenty of proof that if it had killed someone who had already been blessed, the full soul energy would have been absorbed into the animal. Without a developed soul vessel, the energy would have broken through further and contaminated its body even more, creating a full monster. Monsters created this way tend to crave more soul energy and will attack any who have it."

"And this is supposed to comfort me how?" I asked, watching her slice through more cuts of meat like the cute little claws she often used to give me head scratchies were now extremely sharp butcher knives.

"As a blessed animal, or sacred animal as some would say, you developed a soul vessel upon reaching one hundred years of age, so you can only get more powerful by taking in more energy. That is how animal like us level. Except for a few cases such as vampirism, lycanthrope, becoming an undead, and such, we don'thave to worry about becoming monsters. So, eat it already before the muscles stop twitching and all the life energy is spent." Aunty Spider was definitely not smiling now.

"Yes, Aunty!" I closed my eyes and shot out my tongue. Eating a still beating heart (even if barely) was a lot different from eating bugs... though I guess it was a little more humane to eat something that was already dead rather than alive. But I'm not a human anymore and food is food as much as dead is dead, either way it's devouring another beings life.

Overall, the taste was good. It filled my entire mouth even though I had expanded to my largest size. Expanding and shrinking seemed to be a thing frogs did well in this world. As I expected, it didn't crunch but it gushed even more as the hard rim of my mouth squished down around it. It pulverized a lot quicker than a bug but held together more too.

I swallowed and opened my eyes again. Auny Spider had gone back to cutting up the meat and wrapping it for later.

"Of to take a bath now." I said as I felt the blood drip down my chin. This escape hadn't gone as badly as Redzilla, but I was starting to feel a little sore from the run and fright as well.

"K. K." Aunty Spider dismissed me with the wave of a claw.

I hopped back the way I had come. Now was a great time to try one of the baths I made. I had just thrown in some herbs that morning to stew and steep. I had colleced things that seemed like they would strengthen the body and increase vitality.

The area I had picked was a little ways away, but was perfect in other ways. First, it had a nice over hang above an area where all three pools met. This was great for dropping in ingredients and doing cannon balls. Second, the temperature was perfect and with just little modification I was able to separate the pools off from the rest and each other except for a small drainage shoot I could control. And Finally, all three pools were large enough for me, Aunty Spider and maybe one more about our size in case we made friends with anyone else... Or the size of one large male human in armor.

A large male human in armor was laying to the side of my pool. At least he wasn't contaminating it with his blood... yet. He lay there groaning. He had a wound on the left side of his head and his hair had become matted with blood. There was blood coming out from under his shirt as well and a deep cut in one shoulder.

Two other men loomed above him with malicious smiles and bloodied daggers.