29. Feeling Good

“A-are you okay..?”

“Oh, yes. I’m fine.”

In the end, I swallowed all the bones. It seemed that the esophagus of the direwolf was effective, as I felt the large bone chunks sliding down my throat.

Fortunately, there were no injuries, and I succeeded in eating the entire femur. Of course, there was a bit of a stinging sensation in my throat,

‘I’ll just change my esophagus.’

Now that the direwolf’s esophagus has done its job, I can just replace it again.

“Mm, ahem. Ah. It’s okay.”

When I changed my esophagus, my voice didn’t come out right. It’s natural, as it is connected to the vocal cords.

“How is it..?! Do you think you can replace the bones?!”

“We have to try.”

What I ate was the femur. In other words, the thigh bone that connects the pelvis and the knee. And if you think about it, the femur is the least necessary part to replace.

The human femur is also incredibly strong and rarely breaks. It doesn’t take much impact, and replacing the femur doesn’t particularly help in combat.

Of course, that’s a story for later. For now, the biggest issue is whether bone replacement is possible or not, regardless of its usefulness in combat.

“Phew….”

Focus the mind, and use the skill with a different feeling than before. Not the thigh muscle. The bone that supports the muscle inside.

Change the bone.

“Hmm….”

Something feels instinctive. Rather than changing an entire bone, it feels like it would be better to use the femur of the Ursus I consumed to change other bones.

By consuming the bone just now, the resource I have is not Ursus’s femur X 1, but rather a few grams of marrow, a few grams of hard cortical bone, a few grams of spongy bone, and so on.

It feels like even a single bone is divided into different components depending on the internal attachments. This should be fine.

“Replace the cortical bone of Ursus’s femur with the right forearm bone.”

Inside a person’s forearm, there are two bones, the radius and the ulna, lying horizontally together. Naturally, since the two bones support the same place, each bone is relatively thin and weak.

The place I broke last time was also the left arm. If I can replace the cortex of the radius and ulna with Ursus’s femur, it might have incredible strength.

“Sss….”

Close my eyes gently and focus my mind. I feel the two bones located inside the right forearm. Remove the human cortical bone and spongy bone that make up the inside, and replace them with Ursus’s.

“How, how is it..? Does it seem to have worked?!”

“Yes. It’s a success.”

It succeeded beautifully. Of course, the internal structure of the radius and ulna and the head part connected to the cartilage were a bit more complicated, so I couldn’t change them.

“Amazing..! With this, we can prove two things at once!”

“Two things?”

“Yes! Since we replaced a leg bone with an arm bone.. Maybe the position of the muscle doesn’t matter either?!”

“That.. makes sense.”

There are large but less powerful muscles, and small but very strong muscles. If we use this…

“Ravi. Could you please hand me the bone on the table over there?”

“Ah, here it is.”

It’s the direwolf bone that Ravi saved for me to eat. I don’t know where it’s from or how old it is.

‘Transform the inner muscles of the palm into masseter muscles.’

The direwolf’s bite force is an incredible 300kg. What if I put their masseter muscles into my palm? Of course, the inner muscles of the palm contribute little to grip strength. The most important things are the ligaments and tendons.

Fortunately, I have very strong tendons.

‘I have the tendons and ligaments of Ursus.’

That Ursus b*stard. He’s like a tree that gives generously.

Crunch-

“Gasp?! How is this possible..!”

When I applied a little pressure to the direwolf bone I was holding, it crumbled like a cookie.

Clatter-

“Ouch, my palm hurts.”

Of course, the skin of my palm wasn’t tough and hard enough to withstand the sharply broken bone fragments, but it doesn’t matter.

‘If it’s going to disappear in my stomach anyway, it doesn’t matter if I eat a little fur.’

From now on, let’s see what we can do with their tough hides. The external appearance issues that arise as my skin transforms into animal hide might be something my future self can deal with.

Or I could change my skin to other animals’ hides just before getting injured, and then change it back to my skin after the injury. Just like how I changed the direwolf’s esophagus, which I had worn out while eating Ursus’s bone, back to a human’s, and it was fine.

“Ravi. What should we try next?”

“Ah, um… Bone marrow! Bone marrow is responsible for producing blood! If we change the bone marrow, will the blood produced afterward also change? This experiment might take a while!”

“I see.”

Ravi looked over the papers spread out on the desk and circled the items on the list that had been successfully identified in this experiment.

“This is an amazing achievement! Truly remarkable!”

Ravi sat at the desk, holding a quill pen and scribbling something with a joyful expression. His face was genuinely bright with pure happiness. Of course, I was happy too. Getting stronger is always welcome.

* * * * *

“I’ll come back later.”

“Please come back often! There are still plenty of experiments left to do!”

“Do you want to see me often?”

“Of course, it’s for the skill research! Take care!”

Ravi closed the door abruptly. Is he still upset about Urs’ head? Well, anyway, it’s a big gain. Bones are the most important organs for humans to maintain their form. If they can become stronger, that’s always good.

“It’s getting late.”

I went to the guild once to get Urs’ bones, and another time because of the direwolf’s esophagus. I went back and forth between the appraisal center and the guild twice, so quite some time had passed. Now the sun was almost setting.

I should hurry back to the inn and help out a bit.

“Hmm? What’s this?”

On the way to the inn, I was practicing my skills and changing my body here and there, and it seemed like someone was following me.

‘Someone’s tailing me? I haven’t done anything to make anyone hate me yet.’

I stopped for a moment to see if it wasn’t me, and the person also stopped. The skill of tailing… It seemed like someone who had never done it before. Just roughly hiding out of sight and following from a distance.

Should I pretend to notice this? Or is it okay to ignore it?

‘I don’t get the feeling that they’re strong.’

I could tell from the sensations in my body. Just an ordinary person. Ignoring it, I walked to the inn and arrived before I knew it.

“I’m back.”

“Welcome!”

The sun had set, but it was still around 7 PM, so there weren’t many customers. The lady had returned and was in the kitchen, and there were about seven customers. One table with four people and another with three.

‘And one more.’

The guy who had been following me boldly opened the inn’s entrance door and walked in. With the intention of seeing what he looked like, I gently pressed Sera’s shoulder, who was about to stand up, and sat her back down on the chair. I then walked out from behind the desk towards the entrance.

“Welcome.. hmm?”

Who is this? It’s the novice female explorer I met in the labyrinth and at the Sateria appraisal center.

‘Was her name Tresha?’

She looked extremely surprised, as if she hadn’t expected me to come out to the entrance.

“W-Were you working here..?!”

“Yes. Well.. something like that.”

Should I say I’m working? It’s more like I’m helping out when I have time, not really an employee here. I’m not getting paid, nor do I intend to.

Tresha stood at the entrance, rolling her eyes around. Did she have some business here?

“Are you a customer? Or a stalker?”

“S-Stalker?!”

“You’ve been following me, what’s your plan?”

Is she holding a grudge because I didn’t accompany her to the portal in the labyrinth? That’s a bit petty. The labyrinth is supposed to be tackled alone. Weren’t they even in a party?

“N-No! It was just a coincidence that our paths were the same!”

“It’s not just the path, but the destination too.”

“That was a coincidence too..!”

“Hmm. Then you’re a customer. Please come in.”

They call themselves a guest, but well, I’m not the owner, so I can’t just kick them out as I please.

I turned my body to the side to make way, and Tresha glanced at me before heading straight inside and sitting down.

“If you’re alone, please sit at the desk instead of a table.”

“Oh, got it…”

If it’s a male guest, it doesn’t really matter if they sit at the round table, but the round table implicitly means agreeing to share the table. They probably don’t know that and just sat down.

I roughly tidied up my appearance and made eye contact with the lady in the kitchen. From 8 to 11, it’s going to be very busy with a lot of guests.

There seems to be a guest who has some business with me, but that doesn’t mean I can neglect my duties. Of course, it’s not really my duty, but still.

“Yuan, who is that person? You were talking at the entrance.”

“I don’t know. I did run into them once in the labyrinth, but they were following me from a distance.”

When I went into the kitchen to get the food, Sera followed me in and asked. But what do I know? I answered that I didn’t know either.

“Hmm…”

Then Sera’s expression?

“What kind of expression is that, Sera?”

“Are you aware?”

“Um, what do you mean?”

Sera, with her cheeks puffed out, stretched out her finger and pressed the tip of my nose.

“Idiot.”

“Yes… I’m an idiot.”

Suddenly puffed cheeks? After s*xy, now a cute appeal?

“Haha, what is this.”

I feel good. Not sure why.