Intelligent Design: A Monster Evolution LitRPG

David sprawled across a rusty beam near the top of the water tower's interior, watching with barely concealed amusement as Captain drew another wobbly 'X' in the dust before them. The tiny creature's concentration was absolute, tongue poking out as they carefully marked their move, tiny claws creating surprisingly solid lines.

"Not bad," David mused, reaching out to make his own mark. "But you're still falling for the corner trap every time. See? Now I can..." He trailed off as Captain preemptively hissed at the inevitable defeat, wings fluttering in frustration. "Hey, you're getting better! First few games you thought the goal was to make pretty patterns."

Captain's response was to erase the game with an indignant swipe of their tail and immediately start a new, incredibly off-level, grid. The determination radiating through their mental link made David chuckle.

The rest of the Team fluttered around the cavernous space, exploring their temporary shelter. It was surprisingly cozy - the hole in the bottom had actually helped air things out over the years, and the metal walls kept the worst of the sun at bay. More importantly, there was only one way in or out unless something felt like chewing through steel. A few patches of rust had created natural skylights, casting dappled patterns across the curved interior.

Sleep crept up on him between games, and David eventually dozed off to the sound of tiny wings and content chirping, Captain's latest attempt at strategy unfinished in the dust beside them.

The music woke him.

For a moment, he hummed along, brain not quite catching up to the impossibility of what he was hearing. Then his eyes snapped open, ears swiveling to track the sound. It was distant but clear - like it was being played through decent speakers, the kind that had probably stopped working decades ago.

"What the actual fuck?" David muttered, scrambling over to the entrance. He hung upside down, scanning the urban sprawl below as the upbeat melody continued. Something about not worrying, about taking life as it comes... the kind of song that would've been at home in an animated movie about street dogs.

His ears flicked rapidly as he tried to pinpoint the source. The overcast sky and light drizzle didn't help, droplets occasionally hitting his nose as he searched. The city spread out before him like a half-sunken ship, its tallest buildings jutting from the sea of encroaching vegetation like broken masts. Streets had become rivers of green, punctuated by the occasional glint of rusted metal or broken glass.

"Okay, either someone's got the world's best backup generator and terrible taste in timing, or..." David's eyes narrowed. "Team, spread out. Find me whatever's making that noise. I don't like this."

The Cuddlebugs poured out of the tower, their tiny forms dispersing across the rain-speckled cityscape. Through their eyes, David watched the urban decay unfold in multiple perspectives - empty storefronts gaped like hungry mouths, their contents long since looted or rotted away. Vines thick as tree trunks had crushed cars flat, creating bizarre sculptures of metal and vegetation.

"Please just be some electrician that evolved into something zappy," he muttered. "I'll even take a dubstep-powered jellyfish at this point. Just... nothing weird."

The first ping through the mental link made his fur stand on end. One of his scouts had found... something. But the images coming back made no sense - certainty of a target, followed by utter confusion. The Cuddlebug seemed frozen in place, staring down at what looked like an old entertainment district, its neon signs long dead but still promising endless nights of music and revelry.

More of the Team arrived at the same spot, each one pinging back the same confused signals before going still. The music shifted abruptly, replaced by a crackly voice discussing emergency protocols and shelter locations.

"Stay back," David commanded the remaining scouts, including Captain. "Something's not right."

He tried ordering the affected Cuddlebugs to retreat, but they remained fixated on the street below. Through their shared vision, he studied the scene - old bars with broken windows, clubs whose neon signs had long since shattered, debris scattered across the pavement like the aftermath of humanity's last party.

A piece of paper caught his eye as it detached from a rooftop, floating down toward the street. Just before it could land, it vanished. Thirty seconds later, the exact same paper tore free again, following an identical path before disappearing.

"Oh, that's some bullshit," David growled.

He dispatched one last scout, directing it to maintain altitude as it investigated. Finally, he saw it - a creature standing in the middle of the street, its massive beak open impossibly wide as the emergency broadcast poured forth. Its body was a twisted amalgamation of avian features - iridescent feathers that seemed to drink in light rather than reflect it, it's too long legs jointed wrong, and most disturbingly, clusters of eyes scattered across its head like black pearls. His trapped Cuddlebugs were caught in some kind of loop, their tiny minds unable to process whatever they were seeing.

The beast's form was bizarre even by Integration standards, and something about it made David's instincts scream danger. But at least now he knew what he was dealing with.

Sort of.

David moved his remaining Cuddlebugs into a loose ring around the creature, careful to keep them high enough to avoid whatever had trapped their companions. The thing hadn't seemed to notice their presence, still broadcasting its stolen sounds into the drizzling evening. But something about it nagged at his memory - those eyes, black as void, scattered across its head like drops of pure darkness...

"Son of a bitch," he breathed, recognition hitting him like a physical blow. "Just like that fucking owl."

The Dark Star cultist that had tried to murder him at the Observatory had sported the same impossible eyes. But something felt off about this one. The owl had been corruption given form, its madness as direct as its attacks. This thing though - this was calculation. Strategy. The trapped Cuddlebugs proved it was effective, too.

David dropped from the tower like liquid shadow, his wings cutting through the light rain. Each droplet felt like ice against his fur as he glided low over the broken cityscape, barely skimming the tops of abandoned cars. The rain carried the scents of rust and decay, underlaid with something darker - that same wrongness he'd sensed at the carnival.

The creature's broadcast shifted suddenly to carnival music, tinny and distorted. David hissed in frustration as the pieces clicked together.

"Followed us from the carnival. Fucking perfect."

That creeping sense of danger that had driven him from the carnival now saturated the air. David landed softly a block away from his trapped summons, immediately melting into the urban decay. He slipped through undergrowth and past rusted vehicles, eventually cutting through a gutted storefront.

When he judged himself close enough, David unleashed an empowered wave of Echolocation. The sound rolled through the streets like invisible thunder, painting the scene in crystal clarity.

The moment it hit, the music cut off. Through the fading echo-vision, David caught the creature's head snapping toward him, its nightmare beak slamming shut. He fired two more pulses in rapid succession - the first caught it mid-turn, the second showed it vanishing into a bar's shattered entrance.

His trapped Cuddlebugs suddenly snapped free, their panic flooding the mental link. David clamped down on their minds, forcing them to focus as a new worry seized him. If this thing could trap his summons in some kind of mental loop, he didn't want to give it time to slip away and set up the same trick for him.

"Oh no you don't," he snarled, abandoning stealth for raw speed. "Not letting you pull that same mind-fuck routine on me."

He crossed the distance in a blur of wings, claws digging into brick as he hit the side of the building across from the bar. Better to keep it in sight than let it vanish and catch him unaware. The thought of ending up like his Cuddlebugs - trapped in some endless loop while this thing picked him apart - sent a chill down his spine that had nothing to do with the rain.

Movement flickered in the darkness within. Pure instinct made him slam his eyes shut just as Captain's warning exploded through their link - the image of approaching blob of darkness burning itself into his mind. David hurled himself backward, feeling a wave of absolute cold pass by as something obliterated the wall where he'd been perched.

An Echolocation pulse toward the bar returned a doubled image - his own sound-sight showing the creature standing just inside, its beak stretched impossibly wide, while his Cuddlebugs' frantic vision revealed a needle-thin beam of pure darkness cutting through the rain toward him.

David tried to dodge, even splitting into a decoy, but the beam caught them both. The decoy simply ceased to exist, while the real attack carved into his side like a blade of frozen void. Pain exploded through him as flesh simply vanished, the beam erasing matter it touched.

--You have taken 180 Magic Damage--

His left wing threatened to give out as he twisted desperately in the air, trying to break free of the beam. The movement only caused it to dig deeper, drawing a scream of agony that he turned into an empowered Siren's Call.

--You have taken 100 Magic Damage--

With a final, desperate combination of backflip and barrel roll, David tore himself free of the death beam. Rain mixed with blood as he spun through the air, his side feeling like it had been dipped in liquid nitrogen and then shattered.

He immediately poured out a cloud of Miasma, the caustic vapor slightly diluted by the rain but providing enough cover for him to scramble over the rooftops, leaving a trail of blood that the falling rain quickly washed away.

The pain in David's side screamed for attention as he raced across the rooftops, but instinct made him duck before his mind processed why. A beam of darkness punched through the building behind him, the void-black line passing through brick and metal like they were mist.

His Cuddlebugs scattered as another beam carved through the air, this one catching three of them before they could evade. They simply ceased to exist, not even leaving ash behind. David's heart hammered against his ribs as he realized the thing was tracking him perfectly, somehow knowing exactly where he'd be.

"How the fuck-" he started, then threw himself sideways as another beam lanced through an air conditioning unit. The metal froze and shattered where the darkness touched it, raining deadly shards that mixed with the ever-present drizzle.

Two more Cuddlebugs joined the effort, diving at where the beams originated. Their sacrifice bought David precious seconds, but they vanished just like the others - erased from existence in clean lines of absolute darkness.

Pain flared as David pushed more Wildsoul into his wings, trying to overcome his injuries and gain speed. The instant his power surged, a beam punched through the building to his left. He barely twisted away, his enhanced speed saving him - but the moment he used that power, another beam carved through the space where he'd dodged to.

"Motherfu-" David cut off as he instinctively poured Wildsoul into his legs to leap a gap between buildings. The response was immediate - darkness lanced through the rain directly at him, forcing him into a mid-air twist that sent agony shooting through his wounded side.

Each use of power drew fire like he was painting a target on himself. A burst of Wildsoul into his wings to stabilize his landing brought a beam that melted through a water tank above him. David barely began to gather energy for a Metabolic Surge that somehow triggered another shot, reducing an air conditioning unit to frozen shards and forcing him to release the Ability before it triggered.

"Wait," he gasped, pieces clicking together as he reflexively channeled power into his wings to maintain altitude, immediately drawing another beam that punched through the wall inches from his head. "It's tracking my Wildsoul?"

The next shot came even quicker as he desperately tried to power through his injuries. David threw himself into a roll, but not quite fast enough. The beam pierced his abdomen like a needle through paper, carrying with it a cold that burned worse than fire. His own power had betrayed his position perfectly, leading the shot right to him.

--You have taken 150 Magic Damage--

David crashed onto a lower rooftop, blood painting the concrete in a wide arc. The hole through his gut felt wrong - not just painful, but like that part of him had been replaced with a vacuum. He tried to stand but his legs wouldn't cooperate, shock setting in as rain mixed with his blood.

More beams carved through the night, bracketing his position. Two more Cuddlebugs vanished trying to buy him time, their loss hitting him through the mental link like physical blows.

Fighting against panic that threatened to overwhelm him, David did something that felt completely wrong - he began suppressing his Wildsoul instead of drawing on it. Pushing it down, smothering it like a flame he was trying to extinguish.

The next beam came slightly slower. Then the next even slower still.

David dragged himself behind a ventilation unit, his breaths coming in ragged gasps. Blood dripped steadily from the hole in his side and the newer wound in his gut, but he forced himself to focus. A gentle pulse of regular, unpowered Echolocation painted the scene for him.

The creature stood in the street below, its head swiveling in obvious confusion. Those void-black eyes darted back and forth, searching. It had lost him somehow, despite being able to track him perfectly moments before.

David pressed himself flat against the metal, his Wildsoul damped down to barely a whisper. The thing's beak gaped open silently now, no more stolen sounds emerging. Just patient, predatory stillness as it searched for its prey.

Fighting against the encroaching darkness at the edges of his vision, David triggered his Metabolic Surge without any Wildsoul involved. Power exploded through his system like mainlining lightning - his heart hammering as pure energy coursed through his veins. Before the first surge could even fade, he triggered the second charge. The double rush hit him like a freight train of pure stimulant, every nerve lighting up as flesh knit together and strength flooded back into his limbs.

The hole in his gut partially closed, no longer feeling quite so much like someone had carved out a chunk of reality from his insides. His side still burned where the beam had carved into him, but at least he could move without feeling like he was about to pass out. The rain washing over him no longer felt quite so cold.

He'd survived worse, he told himself. But as his newly energized mind cataloged the damage he'd taken, David wasn't entirely sure that was true anymore. Whatever this thing was, it had nearly killed him without even really trying. And it was still down there, waiting, those void-black eyes scanning methodically for any trace of his presence.

Note to self: crazy-eyes are now officially on the 'kill immediately' list. Right up there with anything that giggles while trying to eat me.

The real question was how to actually pull that off. The thing had nearly turned him into Swiss cheese just for using his own abilities, and he couldn't even look directly at it without risking... whatever the fuck it had done to his Cuddlebugs. Some kind of visual Ability, most likely, that had trapped them in a loop until he'd managed to snap them out of it.

How exactly do you kill something you can't look at, that can track your energy, and shoots death beams that ignore walls? What's next, is it going to start dropping pianos on my head? Actually, no, scratch that thought. Don't need to give the universe any ideas.

Still, as he watched it through the mental-mapping of his Special, David couldn't shake the feeling that he was being outplayed. And if there were more creatures like this out there...

Well, that was tomorrow's problem. Right now he just had to figure out how to get away from this one without getting turned into abstract art by those beams. Preferably before it figured out how to track him some other way.

Because this? This was definitely going to require a better plan than 'hit it until it stops moving.'