The rest of the visit went without much incident until the terrarium. The central building had administrative facilities plus an integrated restaurant. Medea waited patiently while I had a quick sandwich… thingy? The restaurant also had meat that could supposedly boost one’s growth slightly for 1 cred a piece but I needed Poison Resistance or something similar to even digest it. And I only had 7 credits.

  I did learn something else that was obvious in retrospect but still useful over the course of an unremarkable meal —I expected something impossibly fancy for some reason—- with Shiena. While I could exchange credits for money, I couldn't do the opposite. Every single credit I earned had to be earned within the Emporium itself. At least my card was valid in every Emporium branch in the world.

  And then we went to the third and final building. The Terrarium. Like all other buildings here, it looked like some sort of mansion from the outside but didn't even remotely resemble one in the actual floor plan, and once again the upper-floor was restricted because I was too low ranking. How that worked when my card didn't have any ranks was beyond me. Apparently that it was based on my total contributions to the Emporium among other factors. What were those ‘other factors’? That was apparently a secret and not for me to know.

  The first room was dedicated to snakes and similar reptiles. Rows of indoors biomes separated and secured by force fields held snakes both mundane and fantastic. In the very middle of the room was a gigantic dull glass pillar that went through the ceiling to the floors above. It was filled with a green liquid. In one of the force field tanks, I could see several black mambas but in another a creature called a transal krait that seemed to slither in and out of reality with only glowing angry red runes on the force fields keeping it from escaping. I even saw the Nightwing Amphisbaena. A surprisingly small two headed snake with wavy fin like structures running down its length. Maybe it was because I had read that they might evolve into a type of hydra but I hadn't expected them to be so tiny, maybe a bit longer than a garden snake. It hissed with both heads when Medea came into its view and that was reciprocated by the arachnid.

  I turned to face Medea but my eyes caught the hint of a motion. I could vaguely see a large dark shape undulating inside the pillar. Almost immediately, my metaphorical hackles rose and I was no longer me. I was a hunter. I felt vulnerable, I was naked, soft skin, soft shell, no armor, a potential enemy was too close, an enemy was in that pillar. Left myself vulnerable, too stupid, too naive. Still the target was before me. The massive serpent was strong. I started thinking about how to neutralize it, to kill it, to devour that undulating mass with might that didn't, shouldn't belong to it. To seize its insane power.

  I could sense it, not in the vague sense of strength relative to me that I had ever since I got the system that apparently everyone had. Not even the five major senses that I recognized, or the sixth that was proprioception. No, it was something else. Something I had no way to explain and nothing analogous to compare to. But I could sense that it didn't belong, whatever that was, it was not where it should have been.

  I was about to buff Medea before Frigid Mind stopped me by excising Medea's instincts. My thoughts screeched to a halt and I might have stumbled, might have gasped, might even have fell to my knees at the emptiness of my mind but Frigid Mind was not going to let me have that, Planning Phase activated until my own thoughts could reassemble themselves into the vague shape of an Anya, and not a spider scorpion. The dark city of my mind came back slowly, one lit window warding against the darkness. Then came another. And another. And then a whole building all at once. And from there, it didn't stop until everything was lit up.

  That was metaphorical but also the only way I could explain what happened inside my head at that moment. All of that took only a second even in my frozen mind. Only then was I aware that a strand of my mind had taken over Medea to keep it in check too, only to discover that it already had self control far superior to its mistress. Lucky it.

  “What is that?” I asked while carefully affecting a tone of mere curiosity. Unlike the cages, the creature inside the pillar didn't have any information about it in a neat little plaque at its base. I couldn't even make out any details because of the liquid and I only knew it was a snake or something like a snake because of its location. And judging from the size of the pillar and the dark mass, it was far larger than any snake that had ever existed in my old world.

  “Who knows?” Shiena shrugged. “Even we don't know what it is. The head of this branch found its egg somewhere in Sitra Achra ages ago and it bonded to her.” I stared at the pillar again and this time, I wasn't entirely overwhelmed by Medea's instincts this time but I was almost subconsciously licking my lips because I caught myself. And then what Shiena had actually said caught up with me.

  “Wait, in Sitra Achra?” Turns out that the Emporium headquarters in some distant far off city whose name I forgot rather quickly had an array that could teleport people to that dimension. It just took multiple regular human lifetimes worth of credits and reputation. Or exceptional talent or wealth.

  “I think I'm done here and it is getting late. Can we just take a quick look at the insects now?” It was getting late and walking home at night in New Delport was not really that good of an idea even if Medea's presence deterred petty thugs. The smog got much worse everywhere for one. I mean, in all honesty, I wasn't massively impressed by the snakes other than the nameless otherworldly monstrosity and even the eggs of the others were all massively out of my budget.

  “Sure. Follow me.”

  I blinked when I emerged above ground to a glowing smog-choked night. The underground Gerankir district had sheltered me from the worst of it, though the smell was starting to seep in and I was not going to sleep in Gerankir unless I had no recourse whatsoever.

  The streets were dark and visibility was shot, even for Medea's vastly superior senses. Somehow the lightly glowing green smog just further emphasized the darkness instead of illuminating it and I could barely see what was right before me until it was almost touching my nose. I activated Hivemother's Dominion and felt my mind split in two, one was me, and one was sharing Medea's stronger senses to guide me. Of course, the problem was that Medea's senses were stronger than mine and that meant that it felt the acrid smog even more than I did.

  With a hand over my mouth and nose, I hurried home while coughing and retching all the way. Occasionally, I had to pause and disconnect from Medea to let myself recover. By Quiraion's rotting corpse, I thought the smog was bad on my own but this was downright agonizing. I mean, I could walk home without it but I didn't trust a carriage driver working late to not run me over in their rush. No one wanted to be out so late without the skills or the stats to handle it.

  I had planned to make a trip over to the New Delport Regency to see if Nerry was free, but no way was I going to stay out in this air any longer than I had to. The biomancer may have healed me, but I was not exactly keen on getting severe lung damage so soon, and that was assuming the tainted Aetherite didn't fuck with something less treatable like my mana flow or whatever. Sorry Nerry, you are a sweetheart but I guess you will have to think that I'm ungrateful and forgot all about you and that you shared your books with me for now. It was becoming a recurring issue that I simply didn't have the time most days. Briefly, the thought of taking another day off crossed my mind but my almost crystal-less backpack, stopped me. Maybe some other time.

  Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

  When I finally slammed the door to my apartment close behind me, I practically ran to the washroom to repeatedly wash my burning eyes, nostrils and mouth. For good measure, I even did the same to Medea.

  Back in my bed, I took out my card. Still seven credits left. The insects were all fascinating in their own unique way. The tier 0s were cheap larvae that needed to be nurtured but promised me decent power if they were to survive and grow. Nothing comparable to Medea, of course, but that was a tall order to expect from the first floor. Even with that caveat, nothing really caught my fancy that was within my budget. Still, I did not exchange the credits for crystals, not yet. I didn't need it that badly just now.

  I had one mid-term goal —setting up a way to get Medea a steady supply of exotic and powerful monsters to devour— and I had a long winded plan for precisely that. I mean, I could get an apprenticeship or something under a monster rearer or the like, but that required me to pay off my stupid debt or let the guild drag me even deeper in debt, or I would be rendered entirely homeless. I knew how this particular scheme worked. A little extra debt once to pay for something necessary in an emergency, then twice when the next big problem hits, and so it keeps spiralling until the debt was so large as to become impossible to escape. I had no intention of falling for that if I could help it. Of course, I was painfully aware of how most of the time, it happened because there was no other option left. I still remembered the name ‘Worthington, Jones and Associates’ and what they took from me. That was not something I was going to forget any time soon.

  I also wanted to learn more biomancy to further empower Medea, and possibly start working on a way to circumvent the block imposed by the gods entirely but that too required money and I had none. And the little crystals that I made were all carefully funneled into making me stronger or into the bare necessities. It all came back to that, money and making rent.

  For my finances, there was not much I could do immediately. Best I could hope for right now was more contracts that weren't just slime killing or some other windfall until Medea's venom became potent enough for me to actually be saving money. And once that was done, I was reasonably confident that it would snowball if Medea's limits didn't get in the way. I just didn't know how long that would take but I intended to expedite the process as much as I physically could. I mean, obviously without wanton slaughter of people. I may have done and will do terrible things for my survival but even I had some lines I wouldn't cross.

  How did I end up getting isekai'd into becoming a poor minimum wage struggler? This was all upside down. At least it was only a matter of time until I eventually clawed my way out of it instead of endlessly being stuck in a spiral. Grumbling to myself about the absurdity of it all, I opened up the Polycerebral serpents book I had purchased and began to read. Hopefully it would give me some insights into how to incite evolution. And if not that, then then at least about more creatures that Medea would like to eat.

  Around fifteen minutes later, I read a phrase in the book that made me practically jump out of my bed. I had a solution! Well, no, that was an exaggeration. I had the vaguest inklings of a plan forming in my head that might solve everything but the massive debt I had in a couple of weeks. Or it could go even faster depending on how good Medea's venom was now. Or even a whole day slower if Kitch decided to come for his promised venom soon. I had no intention of reneging on the deal but I was not going to remind him or let him feel welcome if he was having second thoughts. I needed the money dammit!

  But pipsqueaks with more moxie than brains aside, I saw no reason why it wouldn't work. I had a passive slot open and an active skill that I wouldn't miss. I didn't fill my passive slot with the Bonewarrior’s passive because it was not very important to me and I had a vague hairbrained scheme about getting Poison Resistance by diluting poison and drinking it or something. Very stupid and very risky. But this was much better. All my bases were covered. I just had to buy a box as soon as possible to get it started. And a particular creature that was a cheap tier 1 from the Emporium. And I needed to ascertain how good the Nightwing venom infusion was compared to what Medea was already using.

  I was too excited to sleep after that and spent a few hours just hunting for test subjects. Hunting for these messed up mosquitos that shrugged off the caustic air. It didn't take me long to find one. The weak mindless creatures were simple enough to forcibly integrate into my swarm. Just letting a female land on me to suck my blood was enough. And with my Blood Mana, the greedy creatures loved to do just that. And then taking over the demonic creature and flying over to another was only a matter of seconds.

  \\Integrate Aetherite Mosquito (female) into your swarm?

  \\Integrate Aetherite Mosquito (female) into your swarm?

  I was seriously tempted to just have them all fly into an open flame or something but I needed them for what was to come and I didn't trust myself to not go overboard with my skill. So I just contented myself with practicing my dominion on them until sleep took me.

  The next morning, I was back on the same old slime culling routine. The contractors were there as usual but I didn't see Kitch, or rather I was simply not looking out for him. There were other people missing too. People I'd seen die in the forest, and people who were still in mourning. Maybe that was a subconscious reason why I had decided to not come here yesterday? Suppressing the twinge of guilt within me, I found a corner to wait in. Within but separate from the crowd. And there, I stood in silencer and waited for the Vaultboard guy. Finally it was time to get some levels into my monstrosity of a class. 10 stats to Vitality and Attunement, each! I couldn't imagine what kind of classes mastering that would unlock for me. But first, some much needed maintenance of friendship.

  “I'm sorry.” That was the first thing I said after I met up with Fahria. She cocked her head in confusion. “I mean for that day on the floating wood raft.”

  “It's fine. Your skill was acting up. I don't mind.” She certainly did seem to mind at the time but I wisely decided to not point that out. Quiraion knew I behaved irrationally when Medea's instincts took over, and a phoenix’s mind was much worse from what little I did understand about them. If the phoenix's ego was affecting her then the least I could do was be accomodating until she got it under control. She didn't have Frigid Mind like me, after all.

  First we did Fahria's sector and that was finished rather quickly. But I was dragging mine out a bit for a reason. A very good reason.

  ‘Dea, try not to use your venom unless I tell you to.’

  ‘As you desire.’

  Medea tore through the slimes and the mana saturation of my sector ticked down until eventually just two or three more slimes would let me finish my work for the day.

  ‘Alright, just inject it with everything other than the Nightwing venom and retreat. Don't kill it. Pump it with as much as you can but keep some aside in the tank to sell at the Emporium and for the next test.’

  Medea did as asked and I observed how the slime reacted to the venom. It died but it was slow. I had enough saturation for one more slime. This one would get the full Nightwing dose. This time, it was far more impressive.

  First, splotches of red appeared in the purple and then they started to bubble angrily as the slime went wild. It lashed out with tendrils everywhere even as the bubbling red splotches released a scarlet pus that solidified into spherical pink growths, all stacked on top of each other until eventually the slime just stopped moving, the core encrusted in pink barnacle-like growths. The entire process took only seconds. Impressive. Very impressive.

  ‘Mother, this one’s venom has ascended to a new stage.’ That meant a skill level up unless my Medeanese was terrible. I resisted the urge to rub my hands like a cartoon used car salesman. Everything was coming along nicely.

  “I still hold that your pet is messed up.” I ignored Fahria. We both knew it was a joke, no one in their right mind cared about that unless they were too rich or strong for it to matter. Neither of us were that.

  Medea ate the solidified slime in one gulp after distending its jaw. Love my adorable little nightmare. Only thing it was missing was a shriek that sounded like someone getting brutally murdered.