Oim jumped through the portal, he almost gagged in respoo a strictly crimson-colored world that he popped into! It was a universe solely made out of red-ish trees, and pnts, and he didn't really know how to feel about that.

  “How do these bastards even walk around here? Everything looks identical. I'm going to bump into so many trees, I just know it!” He pihough afterwards he remembered that he was supposed to be looking fustav, because he had leaped into this universe as well.

  “Where is that bastard?” He muttered.

  After walking for about twenty meters through the crimson world, he started to differentiate one object from the other, just slightly. His eyes were sloting to the almost identical color variations here, but he still wasn’t a big fan of this poheless, because now his eyes were straining more than ever as he tried to make sense of things! He had hoped for this universe to be more fun, but it wasn't fun so far, it was just red.

  After he walked about teers more, he finally spotted Gustav. The tter was just awenty meters away, and he was staring a random bug down.

  Timothy didn’t uand why he didn't just shoot the bug, but as he got closer, he uood where the other's hesitation stemmed from. The bug was too small to attack, so Gustav was just it, or rather, he was looking at a weird skeleton, whose remaining flesh that the bug was feeding on!

  After the two of them were aware of each other's presence, Gustav asked. “This skeleton is a bit too big, and slim, isn't it? It 't belong to a goblin.”

  A question like that was worth p over, because it could help them uand this ‘needle universe’ a bit better. Either that, or it could raise a lot more questions, it was hard to tell right now, but they were on the hunt for answers heless!

  After looking at it for a couple of miim came to a realization, so he then pointed out. “That's no goblin, man, it's a humaon!”

  “What the heck would a human be doing here? This pce is just full of is, it 't have important minerals on it, or anything like that.” Gustav pointed out.

  Tim was still mumbling over the fact that he found a humaon, so he ighe other pletely. After this discovery, he hoped to run into other, living humans, because it would be the greatest discovery in the world for him! He was aware that there were plenty of humans ba the main universe, but he was far from meeting them, because he couldn’t shapeshift into an appropriate body yet. He didn’t want to be their pet, but rather, he wao meet them eye to eye, as a fellow human!

  It would be amazing if he ran into more humans in this universe, because it would be a shortcut to whatever pn he had regarding transformation. If he met a few, he was sure that he could bargain his way into their civilization! He'd use every card he had, because he khat uhe current circumstances, humans wouldn't attayohat would help them kill bugs.

  Anyway, once he snapped out of his train of thoughts, he paid more attention to his surroundings, and got this gut feeling that they were being watched. He stood up, and had a look around, but it was no use, as everything was red around here, and almost uifiable!

  “Keep your eyes peeled,” Tim cautioned, “We might have to fight soon.”

  Surely, the tiny bug that was feeding on the humaon was not the problem, it was just a half-a-foot long dybug that they could simply step on if they wao kill it. This specifisect wasn’t a challenge, but he was absolutely certain that they were being watched, so he came up with a little pn.

  Tim shot a few fireballs around him, and this ended up setting a bunch of trees on fire! Now this was bad, it was brutal even, from an ecological standpoint, but it was his only option, because he had to see what was around him.

  Initially, he also hoped to get a rea from whatever was stalking them, but that didn’t work. Instead, the shades of color that the active fires, and the smoke from those active fires provided, helped him uand his surroundings better, just as he phe overwhelming cycle of red shades was now broken, he could see the details of everything that was around him, at a whole twenty-meter radius!

  Eventually, he spotted a creature. Well, he spotted the leg of the creature first, which then led him to spot the rest of its body. There was a huge mantis just teers away from them, and it wasn’t only huge, it was gigantie would expect for a mantis to be green in color, but no, this one was red.

  “Is that big bastard in your encyclopedia? Do you have a name for it?” Tim asked.

  When Gustav figured out what the other ointing to, he first grunted. “No.”

  Afterwards, he shot about sixteen fireballs against the mantis in a span of two seds! Tim was bent over double, he ughed his lungs out at the other’s overrea, but then he was forced to lo, because the mantis had only taken a couple of steps back, in respoo those many scorg fireballs!

  “Ah shit…” He cussed, “This big bastard is going to be hard to kill, huh?”

  It might as well be hard to kill it, because the mantis was a stunning sixteeall after all! This was not supposed to be an easy kill.

  Tim's first response was to try and batter its brains out with a bunch of shots from his Electro Nerve Splitter ability, but that did not work. It didn't work on the beetles before, so he wasn’t surprised how it didn't work on this mantis either. This was just bad luck.

  “It’s as if he doesn't have a brain at all,” He whispered, and then he decided on another, simpler course of a.

  Tim activated the Soul Grabber ability , because no matter how big an i was, and no matter if they rocked bad forth as if they practiced Kung Fu, everything had a soul. He grabbed onto the mantis’ soul, and therefore prevented any advahat it was about to make!

  Then, he said. “If you have a stronger shot that you pnned on using, now's your ce, Guss! I got him by the nuts, so do your thing.”