Intelligent Design: A Monster Evolution LitRPG

“You do realize you’re supposed to have more than two people for these big quests, right?” Kai squawked in exasperation after David finished explaining himself, “How the fuck did you two not die?”

David had slunk grumpily into the shade provided by a sturdy tree that had grown up through the concrete to devour the fuel pumps, his head beginning to ache from the constant sting of the sunlight. He sighed for probably the hundredth time and flared his wings in a shrug, the motion kicking up a stirring of dust that smelled faintly of rust as the pair stared at him expectantly. David felt his mane and hackles start to rise defensively and simply allowed it, fur floofing out to make him more intimidating and only partially succeeding.

“The first time I managed to land an overcharged ability on almost the entire group, I just didn't know it’d cost nearly all my stamina.” David continued defensively, “The second time I managed to get almost all the monsters with Gloom. Do you remember the silver cloud? They were totally out of it, I only got hurt because I tried to be fancy with it.”

“So you two finished both the intro quests, got unlucky enough to have an Encounter drop straight into your laps, and ran off to do an even harder type of quest without even scouting it out first?” Dallas asked bluntly, “Then just Evolved right off the bat without leveling any skills?”

David folded his ears back, feeling a bit attacked as Dallas and Kai continued to interrogate him as he thought about it. While it was true he could have found a way to level Screech a bit more, and he’d only used Glare once before Evolving, he hadn’t understood how the process worked at the time. It wasn’t like anything had come with an instruction manual or a tidy tutorial that walked him through the finer points of being a mutated bat creature. All the information was accessible, but he’d never known to ask for it and had barely been accustomed to his readouts and the System in general.

“Yep.” David replied with his best poker face, “It would have been easy too if I had known how everything works like I do now. Those Chlorogyres were resistant to Control effects, but if they hadn’t been I could have disabled most of them by myself…probably.”

He paused a moment before adding, “And I’m not sure if you can tell by looking, but doing stuff in broad daylight is a struggle for me.”

“What the fuck is a Chlorogyre?” Dallas buzzed curiously.

“It’s what the System called those things, I got a notification it had resisted my Glare.”

Kai cocked his head quizzically to the side as he took a few stately steps closer, joining David beneath the shade of the sprawling tree and standing nearby. The huge golden crest on his head rose slowly as David saw the gears turning in his head for a few seconds as he thought about something. He glanced first at Dallas before turning his gaze back to David and then looking up at the sky as if trying to puzzle something out before he simply sat, poofing up his feathers and rearranging his wings into a more comfortable position.

“Eh, no point being dicks about it. You did well today, and honestly, I thought you would be at a higher level than us coming out of the forest. That’s why we asked for your help, we usually try to have at least five people for Quests like these.” Kai chirped and bobbed his head a bit as he spoke, gravel crunching under his claws as he settled down.

“Yeah…didn’t mean to jump down your throat there. It’s just…we lost some good people to a similar mistake recently. We should have asked you, we fucked up, sorry man.” Dallas added sadly.

The wind rustled through the leaves of the tree above them, filling the air with the scent of growing things as David’s mane slowly settled down and laid flat once again. They both seemed to take the knowledge that he’d gone into the Quest a bit weak more negatively than David would have anticipated, and he was curious they’d been acting so strange about Quests in general. Dallas’ earlier remark about being sorry to involve him, Kai’s surprise that they had survived in the forest, and a few other remarks stood out in David’s memory suddenly and he couldn’t help but feel it was related somehow.

That’s right, Dallas mentioned before that they’d had almost 20 people evolved already. They must have been just chaining Quests to do that so fast…Fuck it, I’m just going to ask.

“What happened? I heard what you said to Claire last night, I don’t want to pry but…It seems important.” David asked awkwardly.

Dallas fidgeted while Kai just closed his eyes, and David felt like maybe he’d pushed a little bit too far. He had begun to open his jaws to apologize and brush the whole thing off when Dallas oriented himself to stare at him and scuttled closer. His tiny clawed feet tapped against the ground with an almost musical cadence as all six of his limbs worked in perfect harmony, and David was slightly disturbed as he stared into the almost alien insectoid face. Dallas made several attempts to begin but cut himself off each time, seemingly at a loss to recount the event before finally soldiering through it.

“We were trying to do the Area Quest, we figured we had enough people for it after we got a head count of everyone that evolved in the first couple of days.” The insect droned lifelessly, “A whole bunch of shit went wrong all at once.”

“Everything was going fine, we had four or five groups of people cycling in and out. The Area Boss is this big…Armadillo-looking thing, with lots of armor and big claws. Joe, Herold, and Leo were taking turns distracting it while everyone else tried to hit anything they could when they got an opening. We were winning but then everything just went to shit in five seconds.”

What the fuck is an Area Quest? Are you telling me there’s a Quest target so big they thought they would need 20 people to clear it?

Dallas continued, “Leo…Leo has an ability that makes enemies who hear it want to attack him. He used it when Herold was getting cracked out of his shell and we couldn’t get the Boss off him. It worked, but it pulled in another group of creatures we didn’t know were there. They were fucking everywhere, man. By the time we realized it was happening we had nowhere to go, people went down fast and we lost more trying to run. We should all be dead, it's a miracle anybody without wings got out at all.”

“Fuck.” David said, stunned.

“We don’t mean to be weird about it, it’s just fresh in the mind is all,” Kai muttered quietly as silence descended over the group.

Well…fuck. That explains a lot, the ‘training’, waiting for everyone to evolve, being weird about Quests and group sizes…Damn. I shouldn’t have asked like that, I feel like an asshole now.

“Hey, guys, I really didn’t–” David began guiltily before Kai and Dallas both cut him off.

“Nah, it’s not you.”

“You didn’t know, man. Now you do.” Dallas added, “But don’t bring it up to Leo, dude tried to throw himself off the bridge afterward. Joe had to pull him out of the river and he hasn’t said a fucking word since.”

Kai nodded firmly in agreement, “We all tried to tell him it wasn’t his fault but he doesn’t care. Herold spends all his free time talking to him, but I don’t think it’s helping.”

“Fuck.” David said again, not meaning it any less the second time.

“Can we change the subject? How about we get back to Woodland,” Kai said as he stood, ruffling his feathers and shaking himself hard. He fluffed up to maximum and tiny puffs of golden down-feathers drifted through the air around him before his plumage slicked back down and he looked at the two of them questioningly.

“Y-yeah. Should probably get these Tokens and stuff squared off too, huh?” David chittered lamely as his wings and ears drooped a bit with shame.

Kai leaned over and bonked him on top of the head with his beak, and David heard an odd hollow clunking sound as it landed, enough to sting a bit but not enough to do damage. He blinked several times, mouth opening and shutting in confusion but no words managed to escape. Kai regarded him placidly as David stared up at his cold blue eyes, bewilderment plain on his elongated bat-like features. Dallas made a noise that sounded a bit like a snort of amusement, despite making the sound with his wings and Kai shook his head with a hint of mischief.

“Seriously, David, it’s okay. Someone was gonna tell you soon one way or the other, I’m sure. Everyone seems to like you and Claire, even if you do scare the shit out of people just by existing sometimes.” Kai said finally with a bit of laughter in his voice, “Did you know Betty had a nightmare you were chasing her around her kitchen table, but she had socks on and kept sliding on the linoleum so she couldn’t get away?”

“I thought Claire was actually gonna piss herself trying not to laugh when Betty told her, you were still asleep.” Dallas exploded into buzzing laughter when he suddenly remembered as well.

Oh so when the giant dinosaur looks scary it’s fine but people have nightmares about me. Claire! Why didn’t you tell me, you traitor?! …that is kinda funny though...

“You know what? You’re right, let’s head back.” David tried not to smirk too much as he flared his wings to lift off.