Ugh.. I feel so weak.
But I can't continue staying here. I need food to recover my strength. If I continue staying here, I'll eventually die of hunger.
With an incredibly tired body, I exited the hole and started looking for something to eat. I know I couldn't spend much time looking for tree sap since I am too slow right now, and I'll surely die if I meet any animals in this condition.
Then, I'll have to make do with the worst option I have left: eating bugs.
Even after being reborn in this world, I still tried to keep myself away from eating other insects, even when I knew they are a part of my natural food source as a Hercules Beetle.
But I got no choice now; I am too weak to search for other foods, and since I already know where to find some dead bugs, I'll have to do it to survive.
So, I made my way down the tree, barely managing to not fall off. after struggling with all my strength, for a few minutes, I arrived at the base of the tree.
Near the roots of the tree was a destroyed ant colony with a few dozen ants scattered on the ground.
So slowly made my way towards the dead ants.
Taking a closer look at them, they were just like normal ants from my world: pretty small and black in color. After admiring my disgusting meal for a bit, I bent down and immediately swallowed the little ant, trying to convince myself this was a black olive and to not spit it out.
And to my surprise, the taste wasn't actually as bad as I had imagined. It had a good taste, like chicken.
So, got over my disgust and started eating ant after ant as they slowly disappeared into my mouth.
A bit later, all the ants were gone, and so was my hunger. So, I immediately went back into my hole in the tree.
As I was climbing up the tree, I started to notice a warm feeling appearing in my abdomen, and with it, my strength started to recover as well.
At first, I thought it was just my imagination, but after noticing myclimbing speed getting faster and faster, I knew something was happening.
Just a few seconds later, I arrived back at my hiding spot, but compared to before, I was feeling much better now. And to my surprise my body was full of strength; I even had the feeling I was getting stronger!
So I tried to calm down and feel the changes happening into my body: the warmth in my abdomen from before now turning into a raging fire spreading into my whole body. Even at the spot where my leg was severed, I started feeling a lot of heat gathering there like it was about to pour out!
Then, to my surprise, I noticed something small growing there, slowly spreading out with each pulse of the fiery feeling coming from my abdomen.
After just a few minutes, my missing leg actually grew back!
I was in complete shock, thinking about how could this happen!
And even more shocking was that I was slowly growing!! The hole in the tree which I used to fit perfectly now started to get smaller!
After a few more seconds, the feeling slowly started to disappear, and a few seconds later, it was completely gone, leaving me still in shock.
But soon after, I regained my calm since I had a good guess why this happened.
It all started after eating those ants. Next, the warm feeling appeared in my abdomen, which then turned into a very hot sensation that made my leg grow back and my body increase in size!
So, my guess is that whenever I eat other creatures, they will transform into energy, which will then make me stronger, and if I am injured, it will use some of that energy to heal me.
If this guess is correct, then I finally have a way to get stronger!!