Gamble with the Ocean

Most believe that going up the food chain has only advantages, but being a mere insect can have unexpected quirks. Evolution comes with limitations, and Tejeda knew all about them. He had tiny hooks and barbs on his legs that helped him grip the duct's inside walls.

He had to modify the original form of the body, making it unusually long for its size to be able to engulf his core. This was the smallest thing he had ever been.

From his new viewpoint, he didn't shrink. The world around him became so huge that additional details were apparent, much like when you magnify a photograph and start seeing its pixels. But, instead of pixels, there were even more intricacies, like a world inside a world.

The interior walls of the duct would have seemed level and smooth to a normal-sized person. Tejeda used every microscopic nook and cranny as a foothold for his multiple limbs. Climbing on the vertical axis was suddenly not that difficult.