Plight of a Thief - A New Goal

"Oh for the love of Nova… GIVE IT UP ALREADY!!!"

The serene peace, the tranquil calm of the jungle was shattered once again, by a roar from the recently emerged strange and new apex predator, the humanoid creature, Aziel.

His roar, which reverberated across the trees, somehow wasn't the same as usual. Instead of the natural arrogance of a king, it was replaced by worry and fear. Dread and Despair.

Running from a flock of winged creatures, Aziel could be seen holding a large egg, somewhat similar to the one he was born from, yet at the same time, larger and cleaner. As he ran, trying desperately to escape, signs of panic were written across his face.

A while ago, he had spotted one of these creatures flying towards a cliff. Growing curious, he made up a decision that ultimately led him to this current hopeless predicament and followed after the strange flying reptilian. He climbed, ascended the cliff to see what it was. Upon reaching the peak, he came across a nest of them.

Staying hidden to not alert them, Aziel got a little closer. Intrigued by their ability to fly, he wanted to gain this skill as well. He came across some eggs as he was snooping around. Believing he could gain their ability of winged flight from absorbing one he silently picked one up.

Proudly carrying his loot in his arms, he began to walk back to the edge of the cliff, but unfortunately during his attempted escape, he made a mistake.

A terrible, terrible mistake.

*SNAP!*

He had stepped on a twig that was a part of the nest, alerting the creatures to his activities. Seeing this, he picked up the pace, running towards the edge of the cliff and jumping off, leading to the current situation.

The creatures were relentless in their pursuit of the pesky thief; constantly diving and snapping their beaks at him to slow him down. He only kept running faster to avoid their pursuit.

"Come on! It is just one egg! You guys had like a dozen there!"

*SHRIEK!*

The creatures responded to his explanations with high-pitched screeches.

Two of the creatures dove down in response, trying to impale him with their long, spear-like beaks.

He could sense this due to the survival instincts of all the creatures he had absorbed, Aziel shifted his weight to the right, flickering out of the direction of their charge.

In doing so, the creatures lost track of Aziel.

He could be seen hiding behind a tree, heaving desperately, holding the egg close to his chest, waiting for them to leave.

Thirty minutes had gone by and his pursuers still did not leave. Aziel was growing restless, he didn't want to absorb the egg now, because if he gains any great changes, he might get exposed and the chase will resume.

He wasn't even sure if he would get anything from the egg at all.

Ultimately, with no other viable option he could see, Aziel chose to wait for some time longer, hoping those pesky leather-winged oversized birds will give up.

The sky now started to darken.

Getting fed up with lying in wait any longer, Aziel took the egg, liquified it, and absorbed it into his body.

"Urgh!"

His body began to pulsate, his arms surging with energy and elongating, reshaping themselves.

His pinky and ring finger began to fuse together and grew a bit in length. From the bottom of his arms, a membrane of skin and muscle that stretched from his highly elongated fourth fingers of the hands to the start of his hip was formed.

He grew wings! Not the wings of a bird, his wings held no feathers, just a thin layer of skin stretched along his sides.

"COOL!" Aziel exclaimed happily, forgetting the gravity of his current predicament because of his newly gained 'toys'.

*SHRIEK!*

A loud pitched shriek rang out, causing Aziel to turn around and see that the creatures had seen him as his newfound wings were much wider than the tree could hide, alerting the pursuers to his location.

The creatures bolted towards Aziel with the full intention of impaling him with their beaks.

"Time to test these bad boys out!" He exclaimed, growing more excited than worried in the face of the incoming threat.

He tried to move his wings first, but all he received was his arms awkwardly flailing about. He had zero knowledge of how to use these wings after all.

Realizing his stupidity, forgetting how he didn't even know how to use his new appendages, Aziel quickly undid the changes, morphing his arms and bracing himself for the incoming attack.

The first of these beasts to reach Aziel flew straight at him with its beak. Seeing this, he waited until it got close enough.

When it did, he shifted to the side and grabbed its beak. Using its momentum he threw it over his shoulder.

*BOOM!*

Slamming the beast into the ground, incapacitating it, he turned back to the rest of the group, waiting for them to attack. As he expected, another one promptly did so in the next instant. Taking a different line of approach it flew upwards accompanied by another that flew to his left.

Both flying at him, Aziel grabbed the one that was already on the ground by its beak and hurled the unconscious beast like a makeshift projectile in the direction of the one to the left, knocking the creature out of the air on collision. The one above him continued its dive at Aziel without delay.

Looking up, seeing the creature flying towards him, it drew near, he focused his gaze on the beast, his eyes squinted. As the creature drew closer, close enough for Aziel to summon his tail and swing it into the creature's head.

*THUD*

It dropped to the ground unconscious and potentially even dead.

All of this happened in a matter of seconds, the rest of the creatures in the group seeing this decided that this fight was no longer worth it and flew away.

"Finally…" Looking at the flock's retreat, Aziel could finally heave a sigh of relief. Exasperated, he plopped down on the ground, lying beside the trio of the defeated flying lizards.

Even though he could have easily taken care of them without any issues, he wasn't in the mood for a full-on fight.

Looking at the ones he had already flattened, he stood up and walked over to the first one that initiated the attack.

The creature was roughly the size of a modern-day giraffe, its beak making up a sizable portion of its face.

With no expression visible on his face, Aziel raised his right leg.

*CRACK!*

Dropping his foot on the neck of the creature, he snapped it with ease.

The carcass began to liquefy and traverse towards Aziel's body, causing him to feel a change greater than what he felt when he first ate the egg of one of these things.

Deciding to not summon his wings out yet, he walked up to the other two and absorbed them as well. The changes felt vastly different from before. The same tingling sensation that eventually grew to a massive discomfort slowly began to rise inside his body.

When he finished absorbing the third and last creature he had killed, then did he settled back down on the ground, allowing his body to assimilate the changes and restructure the relevant parts of his body according to the newly acquired biomass.

The process of [Essence Restitute], the restructuring of the relevant parts of his body was much faster this time around, only changing a specific part, a currently hidden appendage on his body.

Feeling that the discomfort have gradually eased up and vanished entirely, then did Aziel finally summon his wings from his body and began to examine them.

They felt stronger than before, the membrane they were made of seemed thicker, sturdier, darker in color. It also seemed to have grown in size, the top part of his wings appeared to have gained a thick layer of scales along with sharper endings.

His wings were much different from the wings of those creatures, seeming to have evolved further, and become more suited for aerial combat, including self-maintenance.

Checking out all the changes, Aziel was impressed, but he was more interested in the actual usage of his newly acquired body parts.

He started to experiment with them, slowly beginning to gain a better grasp of how they work, soon making conquering this new firmament his new goal...