Francis held still and confirmed the kill.
The mangled body didn't register as anything beyond a completed objective. He'd stood over worse. Done worse, with steadier hands and cleaner tools. This barely qualified as memorable.
'Now for the real work.'
He climbed onto the man's torso, claws hooking into the fabric of the shirt, and began.
The stomach was the easiest entry. Soft. No bones in the way. His teeth tore through the flesh as he pushed deeper, guided by scent rather than memory.
Something slipped under his teeth.
The smell hit instantly.
Even he grimaced.
'Move.'
He adjusted and continued, following the scent until he found it—dense and heavy beneath layers of flesh, exactly where it should be.
Sinking his teeth into the liver, he felt a pulse. Through his small body, energy burst like a current. In an instant, muscles tightened and his vision became clearer.
'Interesting.'
He bit down again and continued until the entire liver was gone.
When he finally got out, the man's belly looked as if a shotgun had ripped through it.
'So I only get stronger when I eat the parts the system asks for. Good. Eating an entire body would've been a pain.'
Just as he was about to scout the apartment for more victims, an unfamiliar sensation crept through him.
It wasn't normal exhaustion. His body simply… stopped responding, as if something inside had decided to shut everything down. No warning. No control. And no way for him to stop it.
Thud.
The rat's body collapsed onto the floor. To an outsider, it would have looked completely dead.
'What happened?' His vision slowly returned to normal, and he immediately realized he had been unconscious for a long time.
Morning light pushed through the grimy windows in pale, flat rectangles, laying itself across the blood-dark floor without ceremony.
Francis tested his limbs—they moved fine.
Next, his eyes fell on the crawling occupants of the room—ants, flies, and other rotting pests. The moment they sensed his gaze, they scattered.
'This is bad. I need to find out what caused my sudden blackout.'
Almost as if it could read his mind, a new window appeared with his status.
=====
Name: Francis Hall
Category: 1
Energy Levels: 5/5
Infestation – Level 1
Parasite eyes- Level 1
=====
'Does that mean if my energy drops to zero, I shut down?'
It was all he could make out on the status window for now. Curious, he opened the skill section, which expanded to reveal the details.
Infestation – Active Skill
User injects itself into a living host, burrowing into tissue and linking to their vital systems. Once inside, it feeds and grows, subtly strengthening itself while taking control over the host's body.
Once the parasite leaves the host, the host will die, and the parasite can no longer return.
Parasite Eyes – Active Skill
The user grows extra eyes that move independently, scanning the environment. More eyes mean sharper perception, but also greater energy consumption.
'So that's why I drained my energy,' he thought, recalling how Parasite Eyes helped him dodge his target's attack.
He made a mental note to use that skill sparingly until his energy recovered. The last thing he needed right now was to collapse in the middle of a hunt.
With that done, he turned his attention to the changes in his body.
Size unchanged. But his muscle density had shifted overnight — denser through the jaw and shoulders, the kind of change that came from the inside out.
He bit down on the nearest chair leg to check. His teeth sank clean through the grain and left neat, deep grooves in the wood before he pulled back.
Good. Progress.
He turned his attention to the room.
Last night went perfectly, but that was no excuse for complacency.
Unknown environments punished comfort, and he had no real picture of this building yet — its layout, its occupants. The operators had a name for this phase: laying the groundwork.
You mapped everything before you moved on anything. Rushing was how good operations became disasters.
Stay put. Profile the building. No exposure until he understood what he was working with.
The apartment would hold as a base for now.
KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.
Three hard pounds hit the front door. Francis automatically raised his guard.
"Tommy! Open up, you deadbeat."
He made his way to the peephole and climbed up.
Through the distorted glass, he saw a woman in her forties. Chestnut hair pulled into a neat ponytail, dressed in green jogging clothes.
She stood with the impatient posture of someone who'd made this trip too many times.
"Pay your rent or you're out tomorrow," she warned. "I mean it this time."
'Landlord.'
Francis ran the calculation in under a second.
If she entered the unit, the operation would be compromised.
'Change of plans. She goes first.'
He memorized her face through the warped glass — every line, the set of her jaw, the way she carried her weight when she was irritated. Old habit.
"I'll be back tomorrow. Don't pay me the rent, and I'll have someone throw you out!" Her footsteps retreated down the hall.
Francis gave her a ten second lead, then slipped under the door gap and into the baseboard.
The walls were riddled with rat tunnels—channels bored through years of neglect and rotting timber. Ascending through the hollow wall cavities, he tracked her.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
She was climbing.
He crept upward through insulation and hollow wall cavities.
Two floors up, her footsteps stopped. Keys. The solid click-thunk of a deadbolt.
Door opened, then shut.
Francis spotted a gap near the crown molding and slipped through, pressing himself flat against the trim to survey the room.
'Well.'
The contrast was hard to miss. Clean hardwood floors reflected the warm glow of a proper light fixture.
Freshly painted walls—no peeling, no water stains. A leather sofa. Live plants that someone actually cared for.
A television that didn't have a crack running across the corner.
She maintained this, taking pride in it while letting the rest of the building rot. Why should she care about tenants probably too poor to afford a better place?
He scanned for complications. No family photos. No children's shoes near the door.
She dropped her keys into a ceramic bowl without looking, the movement automatic and solitary.
'Single. No dependents. Controlled environment. Ideal.'
"Meow."
Francis paused.
One cat. He processed it and moved on.
Then another meow. Then two more overlapping. Then a chorus.
Pairs of eyes blinked open across every surface of the room — from the shelves, the sofa back, the top of the refrigerator, the windowsills.
Ten. At least ten. Maybe more in the back.
Retreating back into the wall gap without a sound, Francis crouched in the dark behind the molding to reassess.
To him, one big rat meant nothing against a coordinated pack of these lethal felines.