Ocean Master
Chapter 77 - Fire Skin.

After going through his new status, a satisfied Sebastian hovered lazily in the water with his tail fin flapping left and right as he fantasized about a feast of his 3-favorite prey in this new expanse.

His 3 favorite meat were the Giant Crab, the Draconic lizard, and the Giant Shrimp, this trio was heavenly meat to him.

Anytime that he got to lay his teeth on them, the juicy, crispy texture and taste always left him salivating for more.

Apart from madly leveling his skills during the past 1 month, his numerous battle encounters also gave him valuable battle experience in this world.

Though he didn't want to admit it, he knew that his psyche already experienced a significant change after staying so long in this world.

Though he still faintly missed his previous life where everything was calm and easygoing compared to here, and that he still wanted to replace a way to go back, he was sure that he was already being attached to this world.

"Sigh! I'm slowly becoming a monster".

He lamented but he did not feel sad. 

The huge number of sea creatures that he already dissected in this period was enough to allay his sadness, and besides, he already unlocked the advanced profile information of the Giant Crab after repeatedly killing their kind.

As his mind randomly thought of things, he was surprised as the system lit another notification before him.

[Due to the extreme heat of this region, automatic skin mutation to adapt to your surroundings has started and is in progress.]

[Current progress rate of mutation: 100%.]

[Congratulations! You have succeeded in getting a skin mutation without the main system store.]

[You have received +10 Adaptation points for the achievement.]

[Cost of activating skin mutation: 700 Adaptation points!]

[Do you want to get the mutated adaptation now?]

Seeing this, Sebastian was stunned before he became ecstatic. For the past month, this mutation was one of the things that always left him feeling like bashing his head against a rock.

From the fast progress rate when it started, getting towards the middle stages of 50% the progress rate decreased in a despairing manner.

Not only that, but the penalty of the mutation also increased. From the initial -1 damage every 10 seconds, it slowly increased and at the later stages, it was an astronomical -5 damage every 10 seconds.

This brought a scene where while he was wary of damage from opponents, he was even warier of the damage brought by his own mutation.

It was a pain in the ass period for him but he got through it, he felt emotional.

After he settled down and looked closely, he was stunned once again. "What? You give me 10 Adaptation points for the achievement and to activate the adaptation requires 700?"

"T-that's a scam! How the hell is that getting a mutation without the main system store?"

[Does host want to get the mutated adaptation now?]

"Oh, you switched from active to passively addressing me, you think that would work? This is a scam!"

After throwing a tantrum for minutes with the system not compromising in the slightest, he could only put up with it sulkily and do the needful.

[700 Adaptation points have been extracted from host's points starch.]

Sebastian flinched slightly on seeing his hard work being so nonchalantly extracted, he muttered weakly. "That's a scam!"

[Host has activated an Adaptation: Fire Skin!]

[Fire Skin: This adaptation grants host a skin that is extremely resistant to heat and fire. Fire and fire magic deal less damage to your skin, you now have the status of a forged from fire.]

Seeing this, Sebastian's sulkiness disappeared as his eyes sparkled. "Wow! That's really nice".

He did not expect this skin mutation to grant him increased resistance towards fire and fire magic, which was a buff that he very much appreciated because practically all the creatures in this region had fire magic or fire-related magic.

With such a skin mutation, he could easily adapt faster to the circumstances of this world of fire. 

Though he was impressed, he still felt that he was scammed of 700 Adaptation points. Even during his evolutions, he's not seen an adaptation or skill that costs as much as this.

Well, there was no use crying over spilled milk so he forgot it. On his demand, the system outlined his current adaptations before him.

[Adaptations: Map; Spikes; Hard Dense Skin; Vampire Teeth; Mana Conductor Coating; Magic Organ; Damage Reflection Skin Coating; Camouflage Organ; Sound Magic Domain; Fire Skin.]

"Well, that's an impressive lineup".

Pumping himself with this, he finally forgot about the loss of 700 precious Adaptation points. Now, he focused on his preparations for the attack against the Crocodile family.

During the past month, one of the things that he did the most was exploration. At this point, he was confident that he already knew every nook and corner of the seamount.

And through his exploration, he got to know even more about the might of the Crocodile family. They were the absolute overlords of this seamount.

Alone, his plan was bound to be a failure despite his upgrades but he found something else- the Crocodile family was not the only dominant kingdom in the seamount, they had a rival- the Draconic lizard family.

When Sebastian first encountered them, despite his electroreceptors being active, he almost fell into a trap that cost him his life.

As one of the most fervent hunters of the Draconic lizards, it was inevitable that the family already locked onto him as an enemy.

After subsequent observations, he got all the information that he needed about this family of Draconic lizards. 

They were not exactly as strong as the Crocodiles, but they were formidable in their own right which was the only reason why they had a kingdom in this seamount in the first place.

Now, Sebastian planned to seek help from the Draconic lizards and make use of their enmity with the Crocodiles to ignite a war, the only problem was that the lizards also hated him as their meat was too palatable.

He already tried toning down his craving for lizard meat, but it was proving to be a herculean task. Despite the difficulty, he forced himself and already stopped hunting the lizards for the past 3 days.

Now, the problem was how to get contact that would not result in instant war with the Draconic lizards.

Till now, he still didn't have a proper plan for that.

"Sigh! A Megalodon's life is hard".