“Birdwatching means birdwatching. Why do you both make me out to be a nefarious villain who can only plot and scheme dastardly things?”

  Slouching deeper into his rickety chair and balancing a half-empty bottle of seventy-percent death on his stomach, Gael sighed while the whole of Blightmarch sprawled in front of him. Even at midnight, the Southern Ward of Plagues pulsed and wheezed, its towers leaning and creaking like broken ribs, its cluttered, pointy-tipped rooftops in that ever-present thin, toxic mist that his Vile Eater would hopefully get rid of in due time.

  Nine at night, midnight, past midnight. There was no difference. The bioarcanic street lamps burning dim, greenish-yellow below him were barely bright enough to light up even a fraction of the massive southern ward. Nights in Bharncair were dark, heavy, and suffocating. The only way anyone could stay conscious through it and not fall into a spiral of despair was with ‘supplements’.

  So he took another deep swig from the bottle, sighing in relief at the burn. This batch was seventy percent, strong enough to strip paint off walls, but ohhhhh—

  “And yet I fail to see how this is supposed to be ‘birdwatching’,” Maeve muttered.

  Beside him on the clinic’s belltower—and the abandoned church did come with a twenty-meter-tall belltower overlooking the neighborhood below, though he wasn’t one to come up here often—the Exorcist was curled up on her own chair, a stack of books in her lap. Meanwhile, Cara was somewhere below, single-handedly lugging the giant Vile Eater behind the statue of the Saint and fussing over the crystal arrangements like a housewife with too much time and poison on her hands.

  They didn’t need everyone up here birdwatching… and by birdwatching, he supposed he really meant waiting for something in the city to explode, scream, or start eating people so they could throw themselves into the mess.

  “Bharncair’s got no shortage of horrors,” he said, pausing to take another deep swig of his alcohol, “and if you wanna stay out of a fight, you’ve gotta work hard for it: pick your paths carefully, know the right bribes, keep your fucking head down. But, if you just sit in one spot long enough, you’re sure to hear some idiot come running down the street screaming ‘help me, help me’ or something of the sort, and then—” He made a loose gesture with his bottle. “There we are. We jump in, save the day, solve whatever problem the guy has, and our reputation shoots through the roof.”

  Maeve looked thoroughly unimpressed. “Sounds like a lazy man’s plan.”

  Gael raised the bottle in a mock toast. “To efficiency.”

  She couldn’t drink to that without a bottle in her hands, but he could. As he made himself comfortable in his chair, prepared to spend at least the rest of the night out here in the cold and the mist, he lolled his head to the side and peered around his chair.

  The bubbling pot of eel-broth churned thick and oily, steam already starting to curl up. He’d thought it might be a bad idea to cook out in the open where the Vile could taint the food, but damn if the scents weren’t already rich and earthly. He remembered Myrmur meat having a distinctly strange metallic aftertaste, so this smell wasn’t bad at all.

  He reached down, giving the pot a lazy stir with his cane. He hadn’t touched the hard chitin bits, and he’d carefully pulled out all the important-looking organs from the second Myrmur’s carcass for later crafting, but the meat? He’d harvested every edible chunk he could rip from its body in mere minutes, and now that all the non-edible parts were sitting in a chest in the surgical chamber downstairs, he was cooking the meat slowly and gently in the bubbling liquid.

  “How many points you reckon we’ll each get from this guy?” He leaned back, wiping his damp fingers on his coat. “Ten? Fifteen?”

  Maeve stared at the pot next to him, considering. “That Myrmur in the manor was E-Rank Wretch-Class. Since it's stronger than the first one we fought, maybe… a little more than fifteen points. Twenty each?”

  He whistled low. “Not bad. Could use a hundred, but I’ll take it.”

  Since the meat had been cooking for quite some time now, he grabbed a bowl from under his chair, scooped up a heap of steaming meat alongside the broth with a ladle, and tossed the bowl to Maeve. While she caught it expertly—not a single drop spilling—he filled his own bowl and squinted at the dark and murky both.

  The meat itself looked dense, chewy, and a little tough, like a well-cooked boot with notes of copper.

  Just how he liked his meat.

  Without another word, the two of them dug in. Bowl after bowl, chunk after chunk, they devoured the Myrmur carcass and drank the soup, too. They’d skipped dinner to mess around with the Vile Eater, after all. This was their first meal in a good twelve hours, and Gael, especially, savoured every last meaty bite of the Myrmur meat.

  I could get addicted to this.

  Next time, I’m sprinkling the brain destroyer into the pot.

  Once they were both done, they tossed the bowls aside and stared at each other.

  Awkwardly.

  But then they looked to the side at the exact same time, checking out their status interface.

  [// STATUS]

  [Name: Maeve / Gael]

  [Grade: F-Rank Wretch-Class]

  [Standard Class: Wasp]

  [Passive Mutation: Profane Eyes]

  [Essence Arts: Purging Blood / Blood Covenant]

  [Aura: 163 BeS / 129 BeS]

  [Points: 27 vBe / 16 vBe]

  [Strength: 3 / 2, Speed: 3 / 2, Toughness: 2 / 3, Dexterity: 2 / 2, Perceptivity: 2 / 2]

  [// MUTATION TREE]

  [T1 Mutations | Scent Latch Lvl. 1 / Miasma Mantle] 15P

  [T2 Mutations | Basic Claws / Basic Repository | Basic Chitin / Basic Chitin] 50P

  “Over forty points in total.” Gael clicked his tongue. “That’s more than last time’s thirty points, huh?”

  For her part, Maeve didn’t stare at the status interface for too long. Considering they were in no immediate rush to use their points, she was probably thinking of saving them until she really needed to allocate them. She could either increase her toughness, dexterity, and perception to level three—thus equalizing her physical attributes and cementing her as truly being three times as powerful as an average human—or she could spend all her points increasing either her strength or speed to level four, which could come in handy in a pinch.

  It wasn’t like she had enough points to unlock a tier two mutation, either—but Gael did.

  “What’s ‘Miasma Mantle’ do again?” he asked, squinting at the empty air next to the status interface as he tried to ‘will’ a second interface into existence. “How do you do that… pulling up another interface again—”

  Maeve did it for him, staring pointedly at the empty air to pull the interface into existence.

  [T1 Core Mutation: Miasma Mantle]

  [Brief Description: The Host will passively secrete a special pheromone that dampens his scent, making him harder to detect by creatures that rely on scent to track their prey. The base radius of this special pheromone is one meter away from his body. Subsequent levels in this mutation will increase its range. At max level, this pheromone will have a range of three meters, allowing the Host to hide other people as well]

  “... So I get to hide myself better while you do the fighting,” he summarized, clapping his hands together. “Welp. I’m getting this, and then… I’ve got no points left over.”

  Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

  “The cost to upgrade a mutation is its current level cubed multiplied by its tier,” Maeve reminded, “which means, with one point left, you can upgrade ‘Miasma Mantle’ to level two.”

  “Cool. But I ain’t letting you eat that much more Myrmur meat than me next carcass we get. How’d you get ten more points than me in the first place, anyways? Aren’t our portion sizes the same?”

  Maeve shrugged as if to say ‘I dunno’, so to that, all he could do was grumble as he willed his system to unlock his mutation.

  [T1 Core Mutation Unlocked: Miasma Mantle Lvl. 2]

  [Points: 16 vBe → 0 vBe]

  [Grade: F-Rank Wretch-Class → E-Rank Wretch-Class]

  He didn’t feel any changes at first. He did recall Maeve saying mutations take some time to manifest, but even if the mutation was already working, he supposed he didn’t have Maeve’s ‘Scent Latch’. His nose was keen at picking out poisons and chemicals, not pheromones like hers. He doubted he could tell the difference between having this mutation or not right away.

  I’ll give it some time to show up.

  But our tier two mutations, though…

  As if reading his mind, Maeve pulled up three more separate interfaces next to their heads.

  [T2 Core Mutation: Basic Claws] 50P

  [Brief Description: The Hunter will grow sharper nails, and the bone density in her hands and forearms will shift. Her grip strength will be twice that of her strength level. Subsequent levels in this mutation will increase her grip strength. At max level, her grip strength will be thrice that of her strength level]

  [T2 Core Mutation: Basic Repository] 50P

  [Brief Description: The Host will grow a hive-like comb on his back, allowing him to store small items inside his body. Subsequent levels in this mutation will increase the number of combs. At max level, there will be ten hive-like combs on his back]

  [T2 Core Mutation: Basic Chitin / Basic Chitin] 50P

  [Brief Description: The Hunter / Host will grow thin chitin plates over patches of their skin that are ten percent as tough as their toughness level. Subsequent levels in this mutation will increase the toughness of these plates. At max level, the chitin plates will be as tough as their toughness level]

  He squinted at all of them, though he couldn’t stop grinning as he read the mutations he could unlock.

  “So ‘Basic Repository’ lets me store shit in my own body, and ‘Basic Chitin’ for either of us will make us… tougher?” he said.

  “Not from head to toe, no,” Maeve answered idly, already leaning back in her chair to flip open her first horror book, “but where chitin plates will grow over your skin, you’d be specifically tougher in those locations. That means, at the base level of ‘Basic Chitin’ where the plates are only ten percent as tough as us, I—currently with two levels in toughness—will basically have two-point-two levels in toughness if I’m hit on those plates. As I level up ‘Basic Chitin’, it’ll strengthen the plates until my toughness in those areas is effectively double that of my toughness level.”

  “Fuck, that’s strong.”

  “And don’t forget: when it comes to core mutations with ‘Basic’ as a prefix, we can pick between three branch mutations when they reach level five, which makes them even more specialized and powerful,” she added. “The offerings depend on our preferences and physiology and other biological readings at the moment of selection, so theoretically, all three branch mutations would be equally useful and powerful.”

  Personally, he couldn’t wait to get ‘Basic Repository’—just thinking about the bottles of alcohol he could stuff in his back made him giddy—but instead, he sighed and waved his hand at the interfaces, lamenting the fact that they just didn’t have enough points to work with right now.

  Just you wait.

  I’ll have my alcohol repositories no matter what.

  As they both leaned back, stomachs warm with broth and meat, the rooftop settled into a comfortable quiet. Maeve continued delving into one of her new horror chronicles, and he took a glimpse at the title—‘A Catalogue of Forgotten Atrocities and Monstrosities’—before humming to himself.

  He’d already read that one.

  With a contented sigh, he reached below his chair, grabbing his own book from where it lay beside the crackling surgical cart fire: ‘An Introduction to Bioarcanic Engineering’.

  He turned it a few times over in his hands, squinting at the dense cover before taking another swig of his alcohol.

  Aight.

  Time to figure out how to make something useful out of all those Myrmur carcasses instead of just letting them sit in the bedroom.

  His fingers tapped against the spine.

  An Introduction to Bioarcanic Engineering

  Written by Julius Tadius, Cursedrinker

  Edited by Grand Medicus Rhaenwald Odris, the Plague Maester

  1.1) Understanding Bioarcanic Essence

  Bioarcanic essence is a living magic source inherently found in all Nightspawn—no matter how small, no matter how weak—and it is continuously generated and replenished throughout their lifetime. Production persists even after their deaths, albeit at a significantly reduced rate. If you were to carve a Nightspawn carcass and split it into a hundred chunks, then give one to every man in every corner of the world, each of those chunks would still continue to produce essence little by little. In that sense, if one possesses a piece of a Nightspawn, they have a piece of never-ending, self-replenishing magical energy.

  The defining characteristic of bioarcanic essence is its tendency to strengthen and mutate organic materials. This property is the primary reason for the Nightspawn’s remarkable biological capabilities. As a Nightspawn matures and grows larger, its innate essence production increases, so the accumulating essence enhances its body more and more. Its musculature will be enhanced. Its chitin will be hardened. Any biological abilities it is born with will be amplified and supercharged. Additionally, when a Nightspawn consumes another Nightspawn, it converts and absorbs the other’s essence into its own, thereby accelerating its own growth and strength. This enables Nightspawn to rapidly evolve through direct consumption of essence-rich prey.

  It is also important to note that apart from possessing enhanced strength, speed, toughness, dexterity, perception, and outlandish mutations, all Nightspawn have one supercharged biological ability so powerful that it can only be described as biomagic. This supercharged ability is called a ‘Essence Art’, and it is almost always the Nightspawn’s most powerful ability. Do not try to apply reason to these Arts. They are biological abilities using raw bioarcanic essence as a resource, and they are biological abilities taken to its very illogical extreme.

  1.2) Essence-Driven Neural Communication in Nightspawn

  You may think that with essence mutating their bodies past what is biologically reasonable, Nightspawn constantly kill themselves running into walls or get crushed under their own weight. However, all Nightspawn are perfectly capable of controlling their essence-enhanced bodies, and they are able to do so because they possess an internal system of swirly wave-like essence patterns, which serve as a method of internal communication not dissimilar to neurotransmission in vertebrates.

  When a vertebrate wants to move their leg, a ‘thought’ originates in the brain, which sends a command-carrying ‘impulse’ that travels through the nerves and into their leg muscles, triggering movement. This process occurs in fractions of a millisecond and is essential for coordinated motion, but more importantly, this is a natural process. As a human, you do not have to consciously think ‘lift my leg, swing my knee, move my leg forward, and put the leg down’ whenever you try to take a step. Even though your body is sending out hundreds and thousands of impulses consciously and unconsciously every millisecond you’re alive, you simply take a step as if it is the most natural thing you can do.

  It is exactly the same for a Nightspawn. They generate essence. They are the natural lords of this living magical source. Simply replace the words ‘thought’ and ‘impulse’ with ‘glyph’ and ‘essence’, and you will understand the gist of how their bodies function. When a Nightspawn wants to move their leg, a ‘glyph’ originates in their heart, which sends command-carrying ‘essence’ that travels along their bloodstream and into their leg muscles, triggering movement. Essence is not static. It ripples through their exoskeleton, muscles, limbs, and internal structures, carrying a command from their source glyph and communicating with each other to make sure the Nightspawn gets to do what they want. And, much like humans, Nightspawn do not have to consciously think about this process. They control essence as easily as they breathe, and they generate tens of thousands of these glyphs every fraction of a millisecond they are alive.

  Thus, you will hardly ever find a Nightspawn tripping into a wall with their enhanced strength, breaking their own legs with their enhanced speed, or losing control of their biomagic in a fit of anger. Essence is theirs to control. This is also why all other living creatures—including humans—tend to mutate wildly and turn into flesh-hungry monsters when consuming essence. It is simply because essence does not belong to humans naturally, so humans lack the innate ability—and the necessary biological organs—to control and regulate essence inside their bodies, thus leading to the commonly known ailment known as ‘Carapathy’.

  1.3) An Old Man’s Rambling; Time for Engineering

  … Now, you may be wondering: what does all of this have to do with bioarcanic engineering? Why am I lecturing you on something you probably already learned in Nightspawn Biology 101?

  Well, I mentioned that even in death, Nightspawn parts continue to perpetually generate bioarcanic essence. That means if you were to press a hot iron to a chitin plate extracted from a dead Nightspawn and look at it really, really closely under a microscope, you may see the chitin plate react to the stimulus by forming tiny swirly, wavy patterns on its surface. These wave patterns are created by the living essence inside the plate. It is quite similar to involuntary knee-jerks when someone hits your knee with a hammer, only instead of nerve impulses, the essence in the chitin plate generates swirly patterns in response to the stimuli.

  Bioarcanic engineers and Nightspawn researchers have studied, noted down, and jotted down hundreds and thousands of different variations of these patterns created by essences, and after many, many years, they managed to construct a semi-comprehensible ‘language’ of patterns. These patterns can be used by humans to communicate with bioarcanic essence, tricking it into doing our bidding, and thus, bioarcanic engineers call these patterns ‘Command Glyphs’, and it is with these glyphs that humans can create bioarcanic constructs.

  The principle of crafting all bioarcanic constructs is the same: 1) obtain Nightspawn parts with special biological abilities, 2) carve command glyphs onto something, and 3) press the glyph directly against the Nightspawn part you are trying to activate.

  Now, I will give you an example of a bioarcanic construct, which, as a Bharncair citizen, you should be very familiar with.

  1.4) How it is Made: The Standard-Issue Bioarcanic Pistol

  here with over five hundred and fifty members, where you can get notifications for chapter updates, check out my writing progress, and read daily facts about this world, while the Patreon is with twenty advanced chapters.

  follow/favorite/rating. It helps me out a ton! See you tomorrow for the next chapter!