Behemoth's Pet

Chapter 2 – Instinct and Remnants of Skill

____________________Let’s save the rest of that slime for a snack later.

After confirming the effect of his ?Storage? skill, he stored away the half-eaten slime again.

Relaxing from his meal, he started to lick one of his forepaws, and suddenly felt the urge to scrub his face with it. His behavior certainly matched that of a feline, the way he wanted to wash his face after eating. The behemoth may have been a former human, but for some reason he felt no perturbance in these instincts.

「Nyao~~…!」

Finishing his new cleaning routine, the behemoth then stretched his back with his paws forward, a drowsy look on his face.

Mm, I’m getting pretty sleepy. Come to think of it, I was just born. Maybe it’s normal to be so tired moving around and firing off skills as much as I did. Let’s find a safe place to sleep. Somewhere dark and narrow would be nice…

And so the behemoth tottered along in search of a suitable resting area, stopping once in a while to rub his eyes.

Still… I never expected to be reborn as a monster. I was really blessed to be a human, huh?

Even knights enjoyed their lives.

This one used to go out drinking with his friends after long shifts. Indulged in his laziness on his days off and did his damn near best to stay in bed. Ate extra in the evenings so he could go into the next day with full energy.

It was a good life.

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And now he was a monster. Although he was managing to live so far, it was anything but comfortable.

Well, things’ll get better.

Fortunately for him, he was born into the famed behemoth race, and remembered his life as a veteran of battle.

If he didn’t have those memories— If he didn’t have his knowledge of skills— He may very well have been eaten by the first goblins he fought. So that’s why. This is probably the reason behemoths are so rare.

He understood it when he saw himself, a newborn behemoth looked to be no more than a kitten. Aside from his racial skills, his physical ability is clearly inferior to other monsters. As a result, many behemoths must have lost their lives before they could become fully grown, and nobody knew about their young. Even the behemoth himself didn’t really accept that he was one until he checked his status a few more times.

Oh, that looks like it’d be good.

Some time after he started walking, the behemoth came across a sizable boulder. A crevice sat at the bottom of the stone, big enough for him to fit inside, and it went quite deep.

It would be a good hiding spot, as well as a place to sleep.

「Nyan~nyaa?」

Feeling like he could get some peaceful rest, he let out a joyful cry.

But he spoke too soon—

A bone-chilling dread rolled down the behemoth’s back in the next moment. He uttered a weak 「nyaan」 and leapt back. A huge shadow fell from above, and landed where he just was with a thud.

This guy! That’s a “Poison Serpent”…!!

The behemoth’s eyes opened wide. He was looking at a C-ranked monster with poison fangs and a body stretching around five meters.

『Kshaaaa…』

The serpent hissed provocatively as it stared down the behemoth. It must have tried to ambush him from above and make lunch out of him.

A C rank? No shortage of enemies, I see. I’ll just have to make you the training dummy for the rest of my skills then!

「NYAN! (?Water Howl?!)」

He moved to strike, and a jet of compressed water fired out with his roar. Maybe the poison serpent had a strong perception of danger, as it twisted its body to avoid the attack.

It was right. The water jet missed, hitting the wall behind his target and gouging out the rock with a loud crashing sound. This power—it was comparable to a water cutter.

Missed. Figures. In that case, let’s try this on for size!

He was a veteran knight. This much wouldn’t make him flinch.

Nyan! Or so it howled. And then, nothing happened… is what the poison serpent thought.

That was a mistake.

The serpent underestimated the behemoth, and rushed in for a counterattack.

When the poison serpent opened its mouth, that’s when it happened. Its massive body was blown away. He invoked the last of the behemoth’s inherent skills, ?Aether Howl?: a roar that turns the atmosphere into a weapon—an air cannon, to put it simply.

The giant snake slammed into a wall, foaming at the mouth.

「Nyan… (That’s your punishment for keeping me from my well-earned restful sleep…)」

The behemoth walked up to the unconscious serpent. His slit pupils turned their gaze down at the beast, and…

ShhPAN—!!

He used ?Water Howl? directly on the crown of the serpent’s head.

Let’s take a bite of this guy before I sleep. I wonder, what kind of skill will it give me?

Thus he geared up for a bite, and chomped into its stomach flesh.

BLAGH, PLBHBHT. Ugh, yuck. It has a chicken-y texture, but it’s so bitter.

Most likely, nobody would have eaten this kind of thing in any normal situation. The behemoth chewed and swallowed his mouthful, then immediately burned the rest of the snake carcass with ?Flame Howl?.

Okay, time to check my status. Let’s see… ah! As I thought, it worked like a charm.

____________________

Name: None

Race: Behemoth (Infant)

Inherent Skills: ?Elemental Howl?, ?Skill Predation?

Predated Skills: ?Storage?, ?Poison Fang?

____________________

?Poison Fang?… This is probably a skill to inject deadly venom. That said, I’m a baby, I don’t exactly have the fangs to pull that off. This is useless to me for now.

He was a little discouraged, to say the least.

Well, more importantly, I should get comfy. I can leave that for when I can use it.

Regardless of whether he was human or monster, keeping a positive attitude was vital to his continued existence. After reassuring himself, the behemoth curled up in the hollow of the rock, and soon enough he was gently snoring away in the darkness.

He was going to keep fighting more monsters when he woke up. So he needed to restore as much energy as he could now.