<h4>Chapter 589 Final Mutations pt 2 </h4>


    Now, with my privacy secured, it''s time to mutate. Time to dive once more into the depths of the menu lists and bring back only the finest mutations. It''s time to begin where it all began: my eyeballs. It seems like a lifetime ago that I first mutated my eyes in order to improve my then terrible vision. Even now I''m not satisfied with my eyes, but then my memory of what it was like to view the world as a human is more than a little funny by now. I''ve been in ant form for months now, and even then I''ve been in five different ant bodies so far. It''s hard for me to remember exactly what my eyesight was like as a hatchling at this point, let alone remembering what it was like in my previous life.


    I might have been a human for fifteen years, but recency bias is real!


    Alright then, my vision is currently sitting at +20. The Heightened Perimeter Eyes have served me well during the siege. The improved rity has been a massive boon, helping me make the best of my reflexes by seeing the threatsing at me from all directions. In hindsight, my focus has really been to try and take all the best parts ofpound eyes (multi-directional vision) andbine it with the benefits of a more humanish eye setup. The end result is that I still havepound eyes, but each one of the thousands of tiny lenses that make up my eyeballs are almost as good as those within a normal eye. It''s pretty crazy to think about. That level of precision andplexity would bepletely impossible for a normal creature on Earth, yet here I am on Pangera, an ant with super vision.


    And there''s no need to stop now! I want sharper eyesight! Better motion tracking! In all directions at the same time! Gweheheh!


    The only way to achieve something like that is to just keep piling on the upgrades, one by one. The list of mutations in the menu is as overwhelming as ever and the crazy options overflow. X-ray vision, firing heat sts from the eyes… why though? TIME VISION? See things … after… they happened? Isn''t that just normal vision? Or this like a peering into the past kind of thing? Seems far less useful than the future vision I get from my antennae… Weird.


    I can''t even begin to imagine the sort of things that would pop up in here if I cashed in my eye mutations when I evolve. Laser eyes? Curse eyes? Goodness knows. I trawl through the seemingly endless list until I find the sorts of things I''m looking for: upgrades that continue to track in the direction my mutations are already going. Plenty of stuff to expand the range of the vision, another upgrade like the one I chose earlier which creates patches of sharper focus. Eventually I find what I''m looking for in a generic focal enhancement. With this, my eye shall be the Sharpened Perimeter Eyes + 25!


    Lock it in, what''s next on my list?


    The Pheromone nd! The ol'' faithful. Who would have thought that the simple mutation of thenguage nd would have such far reaching impact? Come to think of it, packing the capacity fornguage into one mutation is a little generous of the System, isn''t it? It''s not the sort of thing that Gandalf is known for, the stingy bearded bugger. I wonder if this became some sort of standard mutation for more intelligent bugs down in the depths? It does teachnguage, not really, it just expands the range of scents the pheromone nd can produce to have sufficient gradient thatnguage can be expressed. It does increase it a lot though… The pheromone nd went from "danger, food, warm, cold" to "hello guest, please be wee. Care for some tea?" all in one mutation!


    Eh. I''m not going to look a gift mutation in the pheromones… or whatever. What do I want here? To be honest, most of the upgrades here seem like a waste to me. There are options that do all sorts of things in here, turning pheromones into weapons, as a sleep poison, even a choice that helps create sensory illusions in organisms that smell them, basically hallucinogen scent! But since I use them strictly formunication purposes, most of these options are bunk. I''ll just take one that makes my pheromones travel further so I can ''yell'' harder. Myst two mutations were both about making my pheromones more persuasive, which in hindsight is a bit of a waste. I don''t need to be persuading the Colony, they don''t need any help doing what I ask them.


    So my Convincing Pheromone nd +20 will be the Loud Convincing Pheromone nd +25. Next!


    I''ve got the three acid nds to deal with and the Gravity mana nd. I''ll think I''ll do the Gravity nd next. For every single mutation I''ve selected for my Gravity Mana nd, I''ve gone down the same path, which is to expand the capacity. This is for a few reasons, namely that the Gravity Bomb takes a huge chunk of mana to cast and the better I get at condensing mana the more mana I need to fuel the spell. But I want to take something different this time, I want to borrow a leaf from (of all the beings) Tiny. His lightning nds have a great little mutation that condenses the mana inside the nd. It doesn''t condense it muchpared to doing the work manually, but it gets the process started. It also has the benefit of making every spell I weave with mana straight out of the nd a little bit stronger without me having to do any heavy lifting.


    So the Unending Gravity Mana nd +20 will now be the Compressing Unending Gravity Mana nd +25


    Three upgrades down and a cool three hundred and forty five Biomass gone, just like that. The only body parts I have left are the three new editions to the business district and the neuralwork, not all of which are sitting at +20 yet. This part is going to be expensive, I hope I have enough to afford it, I really don''t want to have to eat anymore right now. Firstly, I''m going to look at the neuralwork. Who would have thought that starting to mutate my nervous system would have such a beneficial effect in the long run? Combined with my carapace and my antennae, this nervous system has been what kept me alive long enough to reach this level. Having impossibly fast reflexes is always a win, no matter what. The question is, what do I want to mutate into thework now? Trawling through the list, I can see upgrades that will help me make it even faster, but at this point, I''m not sure that''s even necessary. I''m already reacting to the future, having my nerves send signals .0000001 of a second faster doesn''t seem necessary at this point.


    So what do I want my nerves to do? They do the job that nerves do extremely well already. They send signals and they do it really, really fast. What else can I possibly want here? I pour through the list, weighing up the options I find until Ie across one that I like. This mutation creates nerve bundles at certain points in the body that help manage coordination better. It''s like how an octopus has a separate set of nerves for each tentacle, helping to coordinate the movement of each limb so they can work together. If I''m not wrong, this may even synergise with my existing mutations, since the hyper fast signals will be transmitted to these new bundles, who could make my legs move without my main brain even having to be contacted! Perfect!


    The Instant Transmission Sub-Neural Network +20 shall be the Coordinating Instant Transmission Sub-Neural Network + 25! Boom!


    Now, it''s nozzle time. So far I''ve upgraded it to increase the range of my acid shot and introduced a scattershot mode. I''m pretty happy with both upgrades as is, to be honest. I don''t need to have absurd range with my acid, I''m not trying to turn myself into a sniper or artillery like some of the scouts are, and the scattershot does a good job spreading the acid over an area when I''m shooting at max range. If I upgraded that mutation more, the acid shot would eventually be more like a shotgun, sting over an area up close, which I don''t think I need. So I''m in the unusual ce of looking for a new upgrade. What has the menu got for me?!


    Lots. It has lots. Just like everything else, there''s a ton of options that seem either excessive, weird or rather imaginative. There''s the usual list of properties that the nozzle could add to the acid, including elemental damage, somehow. There''s actually an ignition option here as well, which I suppose would be handy if I turned my acid mmable. Hang on, I could literally shoot fire out of my backside?! Holy moly! It''s a bit more extreme than what I''m looking for though… As usual, I''m more interested in mutations that move along the lines of what the organ was intended to do in the first ce. The nozzle makes aiming easier, helps me shoot further and can scatter the acid over an area. Is there something I can purchase that will help aim? I trawl through the list for a while until Ie across just what I''m looking for.


    It''s an odd little mutation that adds a bundle of nerves to the nozzle that assist in making unconscious aiming corrections. Combined with my rapidly climbing uracy Skill, this mutation could help me hit the target first time every time. Just what the doctor ordered!


    So the Hyper Pressurised Scattershot Acid Nozzle +20 will be the Guided Hyper Pressurised Scattershot Acid Nozzle + 25! That''s a mouthful. I guess that''s what happens when you mash three different mutations onto one organ.


    Now the acid concentration nd! I really like this nd, it was cheap to buy and its sole function is to be the acid nd''s hype man. It makes whatever the acid is already doing, do it better, and I added the weakening property to try and drain my enemies during long fights. It''s a solidbo and I think I''m going to stick with it by enhancing the weakening property this time around. It''s pretty simple to find the mutation I want and with this the Thickened Weakening Acid concentration nd +20 bes the Thickened Draining Acid concentration nd +25!


    Nice.


    One to go! Six hundred and ny Biomass down the drain! Holy smokes this is expensive. Checking my Biomass total, I think I''m just going to have enough to squeak all of the necessary mutations in, although thest one is going to be the priciest. The Fatiguing acid stimtion nd of +10. I need to upgrade this dude three more times! Better get to it. Activating the menu I upgrade the nd to the +15 mark and choose to consolidate the existing mutation. The stimtion nd works to increase the production of acid, which is great, the mutation I chose lets the organ drain stamina in order to replenish the acid faster, which works well with my Vestibule since my stamina is topped up by that organ. For the +20 and +25 upgrades, I kind of want to go in a different direction, see what else the menu has to offer.


    There''s plenty to choose from, as usual. Most of them are around different ways to increase the regenerative speed of the acid, but others are a little more creative with their interpretation of what ''stimte'' means when ites to the acid nd. Stimte it to do what? Make more acid? Thicken the acid? Bring about change in the acid? Add properties to the Acid? It''s aplex system I''ve got going on back there and only the finest produce are allowed to emerge from it, so I need to pick well.


    In the end, I select something that works with what I have already. This mutation drains stamina, but rather than increase the production rate of the acid, it thickens it, making it more potent. This obviously synergises on multiple levels with my existing setup. By the time this is done my acid is going to be craaaaazy! At +25, I choose another mutation to enforce my new selection and with that I''m finally done!


    The Fatiguing Acid Stimtion nd +10 has be the Exhausting Thickener Acid Stimtion nd +25! Whoo!


    [Do you wish to confirm these selections? This will cost nine hundred and sixty Biomass.]


    Holy McBiomass! That''s a lot! Do I have enough? I do! By… two. Phew, that was close! Confirm it all, Gandalf! Let''s get his show on the road!


    … Any second now.


    …


    Here ites…


    …


    BLATTAPHLATTACAAA! It''s so bad! MY NERVES ARE ON FIRE DAMMIT!