Chapter 9
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Chapter 9: How to Solve the Food Crisis?
Five days passed.
The bear still showed no signs of leaving to hunt.
How is it so good at enduring hunger?!
Despite her constant complaints, Lin Yu was growing increasingly anxious.
In these five days, her mother’s corpse had been almost entirely consumed, leaving less than a tenth of the meat and some scattered puddles of thick green fluid…
To conserve food as much as possible, Lin Yu refrained from using [Egg Laying] and only ate until she was half-full.
Eating her mother’s corpse granted experience, so she used [Identify] to monitor the [Weak Ants]’ and her own experience bars, keeping them just below the level-up threshold while they endured their hunger.
Then, when their HP began to drop from starvation, they ate just enough to push themselves over the level-up threshold.
Leveling up instantly restored their HP and hunger.
If she hadn’t done this, the ants would have run out of food two days ago.
Of course, she had also attempted to send the [Weak Ants] outside to hunt while the bear slept, but the moment they made even the slightest noise, the bear immediately woke up.
Terrified, Lin Yu quickly ordered the [Weak Ants] to retreat. Thankfully, their hiding spot remained undiscovered.
Currently, all [Weak Ants] had reached LV.3 and were on the verge of leveling up again.
Upon reaching LV.3, their HP increased once more:
________________________________________[Weak Ant] (No Aptitude): HP 28/28
[Weak Ant] (D-Aptitude): HP 30/30
________________________________________
Meanwhile, Lin Yu had reached LV.4.
However, in the last two level-ups, her choices of blessings no longer included skills.
For LV.2 to LV.3, the choices were:
① HP +10
② MP +5
③ Intelligence +1
The first option was immediately ruled out. From the [Weak Ants]’ level-ups, it was clear that increasing HP was the most basic choice.
That left the second and third options.
If her hypothesis was correct— That intelligence affected magic power—then increasing this stat could boost the effectiveness of [Egg Laying]. Not in terms of power, but perhaps in quantity or quality.
If this assumption was correct, then selecting Intelligence +1 was a wise investment.
Moreover, since MP +5 had appeared twice now, it was likely an easier-to-acquire blessing.
With that in mind, she chose Intelligence +1.
For LV.3 → LV.4, the choices were:
① HP +10
② MP +5
③ Strength +1
The repeated appearance of MP +5 confirmed her theory about its availability, but the third option complicated things.
…
Strength, huh… It’s useless to me.
Why?
Because I don’t want to fight! Strength probably refers to melee combat ability. Facing an enemy head-on? No way! I’m confident that if an enemy simply glares at me, I’ll freeze up!
Besides, I never considered myself the protagonist of some novel!
If I die, that’s the end.
So, I don’t plan to focus on increasing my Strength.
Wait, so why did I end up picking Strength +1?
Well, even if I don’t find it useful, I still need to understand what it does! Besides, going from 0 to 1 must be a huge difference.
After all, Mother only had a Strength of 2.
Before taking the upgrade, she tested her bite strength by biting into her mother’s exoskeleton, barely leaving a shallow mark.
Then, after acquiring Strength +1, she bit down again.
Crack–!
The exoskeleton snapped apart instantly. The remaining force traveled up her white mandibles, sending a shiver through her body.
The difference was about five or six times her previous strength.
Even though her HP remained at 10, she felt far stronger than before. Of course, if all the [Weak Ants] ganged up on her, that would be a different story.
Lin Yu had only reached LV.4 out of necessity—Because she couldn’t endure the hunger anymore.
Normal hunger was tolerable, but when it reached the point where HP started dropping, it became unbearable.
The pain of prolonged starvation kept growing, making it impossible to endure for long.
So, she had no choice but to eat.
Because her starvation tolerance was lower than the [Weak Ants]’, she ended up eating more of the rotting flesh, leading to her leveling up before them.
Interestingly, she noticed that with each level-up, the amount of food required to gain experience increased.
In other words, reaching each new level required significantly more experience than the last.
Currently, the [Weak Ants] were close to LV.4, but with very little meat left, they had no choice but to go hungry.
There were only two possible solutions:
PLAN-A: Stick to the original plan—wait for the bear to leave and then search for food.
PLAN-B: find a way to kill the bear.
The first plan was the safest. But if the bear never left, they would eventually starve to death.
The second plan would solve everything at once—but the risk was immense. Judging by the bear’s size, which was three to four times larger than her mother, there was no way the [Weak Ants] could defeat it.
Still, Lin Yu had already prepared herself for a possible battle.
Once the [Weak Ants] started losing HP due to extreme hunger, that would be the signal to act.
At that moment, she would have them consume the remaining flesh, pushing them all to LV.4.
Then, while the bear slept, they would attack.
The odds of winning still seemed slim, but there was no other option.
As for me?
Well… I’ll see how things go when the time comes!
