Katelyn.
Katelyn sat, melting in a puddle of her comfortable fullness, certain that there would be no consequences for her dark deed.
It had, after all, been a form of self-defense on her part!
True, the stretch marks upon her logic were visible for all to see; however, she'd been shot at, stabbed, and had rocks thrown at her!
Not in that specific order, but it had transpired all the same.
Moreover, she'd been insulted, not only at the hands of those who would willingly kill her without a moment's hesitation but by God himself, who, though out of reach, garnered her ire nonetheless...
If it was to be a kill-or-be-killed scenario for her, then, needless to say, she'd already chosen life, and whatever that might entail for others, it was of little concern to her.
Thankfully, the desperate—ravenouscravings had subsided for the time being…
Thus, her faculties were quite clear.
Now that she was fed, Katelyn was having a more than simple time reconciling her overarching situation, digesting the reality of it all much in the same way she was her meal.
Surprisingly, becoming a man-eating monstrosity wasn't so far beyond her capacity to reason with that, she couldn't cope with the facts.
Her time as 'Katelyn', her original self, the young woman who was attending an Ivy League college seeking to one day enter politics to aid in her family's empire, was gone.
And in her place was something entirely different…
She was a monster.
A predator.
A merciless creature designed from its very foundations to deceive and devour.
Great—so what else was new?
Back home, Brandon had called her much the very same, should one overlay all their recent arguments into one long screaming match.
Moreover, they earnestly weren't even much of an insult. Instead, she saw them as something that could be considered a fairly apt, if not tactful, comparison to her silent inner thoughts...
Billionaires raced each other toward meaningless goals like visiting the moon or seeing who could single-handedly 'destroy' the wavering middle class the fastest. All the while countless starved were shot, raped, enslaved or beaten the world over.
Cruelty was nothing new on her planet, and when one understood that the privileged ate the poor for their own gain, then a precedent was already set.
And, were she honest, she wouldn't be doing anything meaningfully different in spirit than she'd already planned to do!
She was no more terrible than those who already existed on earth. And many of those, herself included, though to a lesser degree, were heralded by the masses as geniuses or titans of industry.
By comparison, the paltry few lives she'd already ruined wouldn't ever come close to reaching the lofty heights of those who lobbied governments to allow public-sanctioned enforcers to grind their heels upon working-class necks.
Why, Katelyn was practically a saint!
That wasn't to say she didn't feel bad for the young man she'd killed, but she wouldn't have to let it stop her regardless…
Kate wasn't going to roll over and show her belly just so she might be used by another to further their own career.
She refused to just die as some nameless 'monster' among the countless other stepping stones they passed over, at least, not if she could help it.
Thus, it was with an earnestly patient set to her mind that she, in a similar fashion, allowed herself to focus in upon the insistent notification that was blinking like a lighthouse at the back of her thoughts.
The sensation was like the reminder of a text message vibrating in her pocket that she'd ignored while other, more pressing matters were present.
Always there, making itself noticed within her greater conscience with ruthless reminders, yet, waiting for her perusal all the same.
It was easy to bring the window to the forefront of reality, little more than a grudgingly accepted little nudge.
And when it appeared to her, expanding through her sight-line, the young woman was given some context of her new environment and, all things considered, was rather unsurprised by what she saw.
It was a status page.
And one that was on the decidedly spartan end of what examples she'd seen, occasional and brief as those times had been when Brandon brought people over for his DnD thing…
The window read out much in the same way a character sheet might, only for a monster rather than a human, elf, or dwarf.
She was a mimic, and her species very clearly denoted that fact.
She had no age, no name, no height characteristic, or gender. Merely a title naming herself as a 'monster' and what 'kind' of monster she was.
Included in that was something called a 'threat ranking' to go along with her level.
The former was suggested to be low through the virtue of absent, greyed-out stars that numbered one through ten, a presumable rock bottom out of the potential on offer.
By contrast, her level, which was currently resting at a one, blinked merrily as though it were waiting for her attention.
It didn't take much effort to figure out how to mentally click the damned thing, at which point a new screen manifested before as if it were some dial-up era virus box, disappearing the near-instant it manifested.
Then, a new window appeared immediately after, flashing in her eyes like a Windows XP pop-up sale for terrible decisions, shifting a moment later without fanfare while she felt a pang of unease spread over her.
Taking into account how creepy, glitchy and cheap it all looked? Katelyn wasn't terribly impressed.
Yet, even as she watched, the four stats that she possessed, strength at fourteen, endurance at twenty, agility at four, and dexterity at eight, all of them shifted by a singular point in the upwards direction.
She frowned at the frankly wild spread of her allotted values, considering them for what they were against what she knew of her apparent level and power.
Katelyn wasn't exactly well-versed in this, well, this disgusting culture...
Hardly having found a reason to be interested in a hobby that attracted so many unwashed and unfit castaways of society that wouldn't have been good enough to serve as her bellhop, let alone any meaningful function in actual society.
However, again, Brandon...
And like it or not, Kate, due to his influences, at least had a modicum of a notion as to what might be considered normal.
Certainly, were she to base it all on the golden standard, then her endurance and strength were well above the average, while, on the other hand, dexterity and agility were below.
Some quick math let her know she was, in point of fact, slightly above the starting point of many such individuals of—ugh... realms such as this. At least from her perspective.
Yet, she wasn't oblivious to the fact that there appeared to be several categories that were missing.
She only had four of the usual panoply of modifiers, which, given her supposed species, made a sort of sense. After all, what use would a mindless dungeon mob have for things like luck, charisma, or wisdom?
The lack of an intelligence category sort of annoyed her more than the others, her eyebrow twitching, but she supposed that mimics were typically more of a 'cunning' sort than anything else, just like squirrels or reptiles.
It made her wonder if different monsters received differing traits.
Surely, something like a 'ghost' wouldn't have need for strength given they couldn't interact with the world directly, unless of course, they could…
Truth be told, Katelyn was thinking out of her ass here, and quite honestly, she knew nothing of her new surroundings beyond the esoteric notion that she was meant to be a trap.
Yet, there was more to be delved into, and, given everything thus far that she'd assumed to know of herself, Katelyn found that she was rather confused by the next window that pushed its way into her purview.
It was another character sheet…
Only, this time, it seemed like a truly glitching and broken thing, not just by jest, but true appearance.
Her name was present, unlike in the last example, though lacking any surname, while her personal details were entirely enigmatic.
Question marks existed where previous missing identifiers lay.
Her height, age, and sex were all documented but filled in with either blanks or the aforementioned symbolism.
The small corner where, before she'd seen her chesty form, boxlike and barrel-headed as it had been, was instead empty, nothing more than the neutral and grey space behind it present.
And, while all of the statistics she'd presumed to see beforehand were available, her strength, endurance, agility, and dexterity were all the same as they were on the other page, while intelligence, wisdom, charisma, and luck were all set to ten.
There was likewise a space for her level. And, a row denoting her would-be class, which was, likewise, blank.
Professions, health, energy, mana, it was all there to be taken advantage of, only, not necessarily available for herself.
With the notable exception of two skills. 'Language (common)' and 'identification', everything else was blank or absent.
For a time, the young woman simply took it all in, contemplative and uncertain. Ignoring the opportunity to level up that existed while trying to wrap her head around it all.
She was—abnormal, that was the only way she could really parse it.
A monster, yes, but even then, something clearly wasn't right, as though she hadn't ever been intended to be such a creature and was just—jammed in here haphazardly.
"Or…" She thought, biting her phantasmal lip, "The reincarnation didn't go as smoothly as intended…"
Curiously, she allowed herself to level up. Waiting patiently as all her stats bloomed to life as though they were about to be improved.
Then, when nothing changed save for the addition of a series of zeros that appeared before them all in asterisks, along with a preceding plus sign, she found herself annoyed.
Until of course, she noted the stack of 'points' being offered to her.
Eight free attributes to spend…
Again, she stared at the anomaly, taking a moment to try and return to her more monstrous page wherein she was eventually able to sort of place them side by side for comparison.
Despite what her—well, 'Kate page' stated, the other did not magically possess the missing attributes, regardless of there being a connection.
So, tentatively, she placed a single point into agility, her thus far lowest stat by a significant margin. And, in doing so, she found that the point manifested on her monster's overlay.
Morbidly interested, she then placed the second of her eight points into luck, figuring that it, of them all, might have the best chance at some form of overlap.
Yet, she was not rewarded for her willingness to explore. The stat merely increasing on one page but not the other.
"Well, the clear answer is easy enough…" She grumbled, accepting that, in a fashion, she was two entities that had seemingly fused into one.
Not the wildest leap of logic given she possessed two sets of senses and two separate bodies, one being spiritual as it was…
With a thought, she dumped all of her remaining points into agility. Smiling as the abysmal number rose from the already improved five to the lofty heights of eleven. The change was near instantaneous as Katelyn, cautiously, tried to move herself.
While no legs sprang into existence, her body shifted like wet clay, Kate discovering that she could sort of manage a four-pointed warping to her lower form that reminded her of a low-resting ottoman or couch.
Or, better yet, she mused in her mind, one of the magically alive pieces of furniture from Beauty and the Beast.
Walking took—some effort on her behalf, yet before long, the awkward gait became something closer to a genuine strolling.
Katelyn cackled like a lunatic as she watched herself from above, skittering about the room like some nightmarish abomination before she gave it all a rest and parked herself behind a jutting spire of stone.
She didn't want to waste all the energy she'd managed thus far, as lacking any real experience with her new self and its needs, she didn't want to run out of gas for her tank and starve again.
Yes, she was a box, but that hunger had been more than genuine. Plus, she had no idea how her body was supposed to work. Was she actually biological? Or was there an abundance of magical boondoggery afoot that would make any attempt at animalia classification utterly pointless?
Instead, she brought her attention to the final aspect of her monstrous status page. A small, humble little table labeled 'loot.'
Inside, there were several curious things that awaited her perusal.
From decidedly familiar and torn clothing to coins, all copper, mind you, but also things like daggers, knives, what looked like a bundle of rope, some assorted odds and ends, a skin of water, and—a scroll.
The 'how' wasn't necessarily the question, as making the correlation between what had likely been on her victim at the time he was consumed and what was arrayed on the sheet was reasonably obvious.
Hell, it even included things like 'quality' and 'durability', of which the clothing, specifically the pants, tunic, and cloak, were all low…
However, anything metal or that she hadn't punched holes into with her teeth seemed perfectly intact.
She also noted a decided absence of anything that one might call a—fleshy nature… Processed products, sure, but no bones, meat, hair, or any other human parts were present, which, presumably, meant they were gone for good and 'eaten'.
Toying with it all for a few more minutes, Katelyn eventually discovered that, following her instincts, she could even place certain objects within herself. Offering the illusion that she was a real chest filled to the brim with genuine loot.
An idea shortly manifested not long after this latest realization, leading her to wander back over to the other chests that had been with her.
She popped open the first with her tongue and peered inside from above, noting the presence of several lumpy sacks that filled most of the space within.
Having nothing to lose and everything to gain, she slapped her sticky tongue to a bag and gobbled it whole!
Then, idly glancing at her monstrous status, Kate saw that she'd just added no less than forty copper coins to her personal stockpile, and that had merely been the very first of the bags!
A much more physical grin emerged as teeth rose and her boxy form wiggled with excitement, the implications dawning on the young woman in a way that was, simply put, inspiring…
Katelyn liked money.
Shuffling over, she just outright ate the second chest whole, her maw expanding to accommodate as she dragged the thing with some difficulty into herself.
She cataloged the small assortment of valuables she collected, seeing the chest appear, along with all its individual contents, which included a ring that stood out immediately.
"Lesser ring of the constitution. Add a temporary small increase to one's primary stat. Note, this benefit is lost should the ring be removed."
Clicking her tongue, Katelyn tried putting the thing on herself, not at all unwilling to bedazzle her body for a little good old-fashioned power boost, but quickly learned it wasn't so easy to equip.
There wasn't exactly a 'spot' she could just drag and drop it to, and after the rather impulsive attempt at sticking her tongue through the tiny thing, she just kind of gave up, feeling slightly foolish.
Not because she was done with it, oh no, Katelyn would find a way to use her new magical windfall. However, the advent of an entirely concerning event of nigh cataclysmic potential shook her world at its very foundations!
Existence abruptly went dark for Katelyn, and not just from lack of light, but truly dark…
The world around her disappeared much as it had in the void, empty, endless… without sensation, her mind flooding with terror at the prospect of it all, filled with miserable thoughts that this had really all been some terrible joke!
For a few moments, there was panic!
There was terror!
Uncertainty, confusion, and above all else, surprise...
And yet, she hardly had the wherewithal to actually register what was happening—
Then she was back.
Floating and sitting amidst a familiar room, two equally familiar chests waiting beside her, this time flanking her from the right.
For a minute, she just waited there, stunned, gaze flowing over the now brightly lit entrance, the access to her small room partially blocked.
A ramshackle and savage construct of dried wood, sinew, and bones waited in her vision, looking for all the world like some pagan idol, wicker, and white ochre smeared across various surfaces, a skull hanging from its center...
"Okay…"
Was all the young woman could manage to say.