WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: HidingTurtle
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ I Became the Ophidian of the Apocalypse ◈
Chapter 6: Help Me, Holmes
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Evolution.
Just hearing the word made my heart race.
Whether I could evolve or not was incredibly important to me.
It decided whether I would have to live as this tiny white snake for the rest of my life.
Of course, I had no desire to become an ugly giant snake with a human face like Medusa Mom.
If possible, I wanted to evolve into something at least somewhat humanlike.
Or at least a big, beautiful snake.
Right, so what could I evolve into?
There had to be options, right? There had to be.
But I couldn't check them right away.
What was this?
It didn't say what I could evolve into.
There was an additional explanation, though.
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[※You must fulfill the conditions to evolve.]
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I see, so what conditions did I need?
Pikachu needed a Thunder Stone to evolve into Raichu.
Did I need something like that too?
I did.
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- Consume a Grade 1 Magic Stone.
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Huh.
It said I needed to consume a Grade 1 Magic Stone to evolve.
If what I had eaten was really a Magic Stone, then I could figure this out.
The higher the number, the more valuable the Magic Stone seemed to be.
Otherwise, Grade 1 would be the highest grade. Surely a puny snake like me didn't need such a Magic Stone just to evolve.
The Horn Jaguar's Magic Stone had been Grade 3.
Even that thing was a monster I could never defeat in a fair fight.
What a waste.
Then the Magic Stone I ate must have been valuable too.
All I needed was a Grade 1 Magic Stone, but I had gone and eaten a Grade 3 one.
When I was in elementary school, I once put some beef we had at home into ramyeon. Mom kicked me in the stomach for throwing expensive Korean beef into ramyeon.
This felt just like that. Mm-hm.
Still, that ramyeon had tasted incredible, and now I could evolve.
So it worked out.
Should I start evolving?
Once I did it, I would probably find out what I could evolve into.
Then I hesitated again.
I remembered the fate that had befallen the Horn Jaguar's corpse earlier.
If I had chosen to sleep inside its body, I would have been dragged underground with it.
And I would have met an unavoidable death.
Yeah, I should find a safe hiding place before trying to evolve.
As soon as I thought that, my body started tingling.
Was this Survival Instinct manifesting?
No, it really stung.
Ah, aah!
Fuck!
The curse burst out the moment I opened my eyes.
Something was attached to my body.
The chestnut-sized animal had gray fur and a hairless red tail.
It was definitely a rat.
This crazy rat didn't even know enough to fear snakes, and it was rubbing against my flesh?
I was about to check the shameless bastard's face when I froze.
I had thought it was a rat, but what the hell did it look like?
Its eyes bulged out like an insect's.
Its snout protruded like a long spike.
And the tip of that snout was stuck in my body.
Slurp, slurp. It was sucking my blood.
Without thinking, I checked its name.
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【Mosquito Rat lv3】
【Traits】
[Vampire]
【Skills】
[Bloodsucking lv2], [Poison Stinger lv3]
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Aaaaaah!
Could a creature this hellish really exist?
It was a monster made by combining a mosquito and a rat.
And it had driven that poison stinger into my side.
Killing intent surged through me.
Taste my fangs too.
I bit it in an instant.
Without even chewing, I gulped it down my throat.
The blood it had stolen was reclaimed that way.
Come to think of it, I swallowed it so quickly that I didn't even properly let it taste my fangs.
Anyway, this was the kind of monster I could kill now.
I couldn't have been prouder. Even the late Medusa Mom would probably be proud of me.
There was another one nearby.
When I glared at it, it slithered away.
What an irritating creature.
It was a good thing I hadn't evolved right away.
Let's find a hiding place where I wouldn't have to worry about bloodsucking rats like those.
The Mosquito Rat had become a snack, but the wound it left behind itched.
It had Poison Stinger lv3, but it hurt less than when my brother bit me.
I had Venom Resistance, so I should be fine.
A little blood flowed, but I endured it and crawled out from the crack in the rocks.
Dawn had broken before I knew it.
My home-finding project began now.
Surely, somewhere in this vast basin, there had to be a place for my one small body to rest.
I crawled around, looking for somewhere to hide and escape the cold wind.
* * *
Long ago, scholars used to sing of a life of contentment.
Did they say one could be happy sleeping beneath the moonlight, with clouds for a blanket?
I had read plenty of those sijo poems in textbooks.
I didn't think I could ever reach the same spiritual level as them.
...Wait, come to think of it, every one of those people who wrote those poems had been high-ranking officials.
So all that nonsense about being happy even in a one-room thatched hut was a scam.
That was why I wanted to find a good home too.
I wandered around diligently in pursuit of my dream of owning a home.
Bzzzzzz!
I thought I had found a decent crack in the rocks, but bees came flying out of it.
If I had picked a useless crack, I would have been fine. This was all because of my greed.
The place where I hid from the bees was a wide hole in the brush.
And what I found inside were eight red eyes.
Wait, spiders lived underground too?
Today was the first time I learned that snakes could move backward.
Humming Für Elise in my heart, I slowly retreated.
The places where the bees stung me were swollen and sore.
Why were there so many poisonous monsters?
My Venom Resistance leveled up by one.
Without it, I would have already swollen up and died.
...This was a serious problem.
A safe, good hiding place was extremely difficult to find.
Every decent spot already had an owner.
Just like how pretty and handsome people always had partners.
The best of the best would be a cave, but that was where the strongest monsters made their homes.
The terror I felt when a gigantic Owlbear burst out of a cave...
The most common and easiest places to find were cracks in rocks.
But cracks in rocks weren't safe.
Ah, damn it, there's one here too!
I opened my mouth and made a hissssing sound.
The Mosquito Rat that had been peeking at me from a distance ran away.
Those bastards were my biggest problem.
Rats were horrible creatures, and mosquitoes were the worst insects. These were a breed that combined both their shitty qualities.
Whenever I tried to sleep somewhere a little exposed, they came and sucked my blood dry.
They had fuzz like cotton on the soles of their feet, so I couldn't detect them in advance.
Then there was the poison secreted from those snouts.
It numbed my skin and prevented my blood from clotting.
Once, I got bitten three times in a single day. I nearly died from blood loss that day.
My goal was to find somewhere without those bastards.
Then, after three whole days, I found an amazing place.
This place was nice.
No, it was my favorite place out of everywhere I had found.
It looked like lightning had struck this area once.
Several trees had dried up and died together.
They were bare without leaves, and I could see wide knot holes in them.
Dead trees sometimes had hollow spaces inside.
It was suitably damp and warm, and safe from threats that couldn't climb trees.
In other words, it was safe from those fucking Mosquito Rats.
Those fucking Mosquito Rats couldn't climb trees.
Goodbye, you fucking Mosquito Rats!
Phew, calm down.
I had learned a few things from my experiences so far.
First, I had to check whether this was really a good hiding place.
I looked around the dead trees.
Were there any nests belonging to dangerous bird monsters?
Were there any hornet nests?
Were there claw marks from monsters that climbed trees?
After checking every item on my list, I came to a conclusion.
This really was prime real estate.
It was practically the equivalent of a luxury villa neighborhood in Hannam-dong.
I cautiously approached the largest dead tree.
No matter how good a place was, it would be useless if a dangerous resident already lived there.
Please let it either be empty, or have something I could beat.
There was a large hole in the middle of the tree.
I poked my head inside.
Wow! Nobody was home.
A spacious, comfortable area stretched out inside the dead tree.
It seemed better than the studio apartment I had lived in.
The problem was that, while nobody was there, a dead Mosquito Rat was.
Unless that Mosquito Rat could fly, someone must have carried it here.
Kkiririk, kkirik.
A strange sound rang out from above the tree.
Ah, I had come to view the house, but it turned out the owner was home.
The homeowner was a huge centipede.
My body was a little thicker than a Chunha Jangsa sausage, but this centipede's body was at least as thick as a baby's arm.
Reflexively, I focused my eyes.
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【Redteeth Giant Centipede lv6】
【Traits】
[Gentle], [Artisan]
【Skills】
[Poison Fang lv8], [Stealth lv3], [Quick Crawling lv2], [Carapace lv4], [Rend lv5]
【Status】
[Full], [Newlywed]
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I could see it!
Being able to see its status window meant it was an opponent I had a chance against.
It looked terrifying, but was it weaker than it seemed?
Maybe it was because it had the Gentle trait.
And what was Artisan? Its skills had terrifying things like Rend.
Wait, Gentle...?
It was a trait I had never seen on a monster before.
The centipede approached me very slowly.
Then it stopped at an appropriate distance and wiggled its antennae.
It looked like it was examining me.
Hello.
I slowly swayed my tail as if greeting it.
The centipede started bobbing its antennae in rhythm with my tail.
I stopped swaying my tail.
The centipede stopped moving its antennae too.
Hmm, I guess it wasn't called Gentle for nothing.
At least it wasn't trying to eat me like the other monsters.
Then we were friends now, right?
When I stayed still, the Giant Centipede seemed to lose interest.
It slowly went back into its home inside the dead tree.
I considered biting my friend's side and getting the first hit in.
It had no Venom Resistance, so maybe I had a chance.
That house looked way too good.
Maybe my traits hid something like Cowardice.
But I gave up on that idea.
Because I understood what the status window meant by Newlywed.
Another centipede, a little larger than the first, came out from higher up in the tree.
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【Redteeth Giant Centipede lv7】
【Traits】
[Gentle]
...
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The two of you have a good marriage.
Come to think of it, centipedes were originally said to travel around in male-female pairs.
For now, I climbed down from the tree where they lived.
Then something suddenly came to me.
...Ah, so that was it.
There weren't any Mosquito Rats around here, not even one.
Wasn't it thanks to that centipede couple?
I thought for a moment.
Should I look somewhere else, or stay nearby?
It wasn't an easy choice.
Rumble.
An ominous peal of thunder hurried my decision.
When I looked up, dark clouds filled the gloomy sky.
This was bad. I couldn't get rained on.
Cold-blooded animals could freeze to death if they weren't careful.
It seemed leaving wasn't an option.
There were plenty of decent dead trees here besides the centipede couple's home.
I found a suitable hole in one of them.
There was a knot hole just barely small enough for me to fit through.
There was enough space inside to coil up and lie down, while the entrance was too small for the centipede couple to enter.
This should be fine.
Still, it felt a little wrong to stay next door without offering any greeting.
Instead of steamed rice cake, I went out and caught a Mosquito Rat.
I placed it under the tree where the centipede couple lived.
Please think of it as a housewarming gift.
When I climbed into my new home and looked down, the centipede husband was busily carrying away the Mosquito Rat.
It made my heart feel warm for no reason. Was this the affection between neighbors?
It definitely wasn't because I hoped that centipede couple would never get hungry.
Rumble!
Thunder and lightning crashed, and rain began pouring down.
I closed my eyes and tried to sleep.
The sound of the rain made me fall asleep quickly.
Then.
It was time to evolve!
* * *
The moment I had been waiting for.
When it asked whether I wanted to evolve, I proudly answered yes.
What could I evolve into?
I hoped there would be options to choose from.
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From 【Little White Snake lv10】
1. You can evolve into 【Little Green Snake】.
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...What the fuck was this?
There were no options at all.
And the thing I could evolve into was the problem.
Since I was a Little White Snake, I had assumed I would evolve into a regular White Snake.
Growing bigger was important.
Weight class was the foundation of a fight, wasn't it?
I was far too small right now.
I needed to become big enough to swallow animals larger than Mosquito Rats in one bite.
But what was this Little Green Snake?
That was my siblings' species name.
Did that mean I was actually a species that had evolved less than them?
No way.
It was all a lie!
I had firmly believed that being the only white one made me special and good.
Just as my excitement for evolution completely faded, the voice gave me hope.
「You have fulfilled the special condition for evolution. A new evolution tree has been unlocked.」
Yes!
A special condition! What had I done?
There must have been something I accomplished.
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※Special Condition: Consume a Grade 3 or higher Magic Stone.
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Ah, Mr. Jaguar, only now do I understand your great kindness.
One of the conditions for evolution had been consuming a Magic Stone.
When a Grade 1 Magic Stone would have been enough, I had gobbled down a Grade 3 one!
And then, a new option appeared.
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From 【Little White Snake lv10】
1. 【Little Green Snake】
2. 【White Horn Snake】
You can evolve into one of the above.
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Wow! I got a horn.
The Horn Jaguar was a jaguar with a horn, so a Horn Snake had to be a snake with a horn.
...What was I supposed to do with a horn on a snake?
Still, Little Green Snake had never been an option to begin with.
There was no reason to hesitate.
「You have selected White Horn Snake.」
「Evolution begins.」
Special Evolution!
Footnotes:
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