Slithering through dreams (Snake Isekai ?)

After taking a short rest, which became a long sleep (all that exercising having made me tired), a new day (or night) came. You know what that means! Indeed, it’s time for...

***

Science diaries of curiousss (and not mad) scientist snek, part 2:

Some people would call last experiments a failure. Useless. An act of masochistic fancy. Those people would be wrong. Sometimes failure is but a necessary stepping stone on a road towards success! (“You just called it failure yourself”)(“Silence I! I’m speaking!”)

Anyways, it’s time for analysis. It’s time for discovery. It’s time for… SSSSCIENCE! And that means magic! 

And with it, we shall solve the following questions:

1. Does my tail tattoo (provisional name for the phenomena) truly let me block mind waves
2. Can I create new mana tattoos?
3. How much magic can we use with one tattoo?

***

Experiment 1 - the tail tattoo shield hypothesis

In order to test whether the tattoo has mind shielding properties, we needed two willing participants- mind wave receiver and emitter. Lacking that, we got one unwilling but legally obligated (“me”)(“Silence! I am not “me”, I am “subject A”!”) and one who could not be asked, due to inability to speak, but surely willing and excited one (“my brother”)(“once again stop with those nonsensical terms! “Subject B” it is!”).

Fortunately, subject B was easily found in their usual location. While he was exhibiting his usual sleeping breath pattern, it was time to strike!

But first, for legal reasons we shall inform him that he has about 10 seconds to express his unwillingness to participate in the experiment, as well as filling out the necessary form, in appropriate language. Lack of answer will be considered a legally binding expression of consent.

“Sssss Ssssss ssss sss sss”

Time’s up! Time to engage the sneaking protocol! A movement method inspired by an indeginous snake culture known as the “Drunken Snout”, Crouching Noodle, allows practitioners (or experimenter) (or subject) to get closer without being noticed!

Subject A got within range. Thoughts detected! (“Sssss rabbit!”). We need to go deeper! Proceed with the slithering! (“Nom nom nom!”) We are (“I’m bigger now! Bigger than brothers!”) at the limit! (“Bigger than mother!”) Oh, this is perilous! Time to test the defensive protocol!

Subject A put their tail next to their head, trying to find the most effective spot! (“I.. wi.. Snak … slit... “). 

Fascinating! 

Conclusion: The method of using is indeed promising! Unfortunately, the area of effect seems too small to effectively block the incoming mind-radiation. More tattoos, or increase in strength needed.

This was a partial triumph! Small success! Engage cheering protocols! 

Unfortunately, our rational and scientific expressions of joy seem to have sent a pebble towards subject B. Result: subject B woke up. What? A rock we hit during our dancing protocol hit him? What? Why is subject B hissing at us! It was for science! You have not sent a document expressing your disagreement for us collecting your personal data which means you agreed to this experiment and possible side effects, including being accidentally woken up! Don’t come here!

Abort! Abort! Disengage!

Note: Try to find more grateful subjects in the future. Due to lack of resources, the only ones available are not fully appreciative of the opportunity to participate in observable-world leading research! Disappointing.

Experiment 2 - tattoo creation 

Creating new tattoos. We shal latest it on subject A. Subject A has HAPILLY agreed to join us again to participate in the experiment. Their consent is totally not coerced by the shadow cast by the possibility of losing control over one's mind and body! Yes, subject A shall sign the form saying he will not sue! Please ignore the small print!

Unfortunately, due to the limited number of subjects (1) as well as their.. Barely stable condition, a study to the highest standards shall not be conducted, instead, a single case review shall be done. Yes, I’m also disappointed by the lack of a control group. What’s more, the guinea snake refused to cooperate by getting 8 tattoos at once, and so they shall be created successively over the next few days. 

Following tests shall be performed in order, from the most likely to succeed, until failure:

1. Create wound, use magic as often as one can using the mana infused blood, repeat with reopened wound, sleep
2. Create wound, use magic as often as one can using the mana infused blood, reopen the wound, do not use magic, sleep
3. Create wound, use magic as often as one can using the mana infused blood, do NOT reopen the wound, sleep
4. Create wound, use magic as often as one can using the mana infused blood, sleep
5. Create wound, do not use magic, sleep

In case of subjects status changing from |Mana poisoning (recovering)| to |Mana poisoning|, additional days of rest shall be taken.

And so, it’s time to start the surgery. Is the subject ready? (“Yeees! I love snakes in doctor uniforms!”) Firstly, I am not wearing anything! Secondly, the subject shall no longer speak! (“MMmmm kinky!”) Thirdly, the subject shall no longer make any noise! Proceed with the surgery! I believe we shall leave a mark on something greater than a snake's body today!

****

Once again, hurting I had to find something to do. I could go to sleep - one of the perks of being a snake is that I feel as If I could always fall asleep. But I have this nagging suspicion, that living this type of lifestyle before first shedding will have greater consequences than just making me spend some time unproductively.

So I continued developing my new move - “the unhidden dragon”. The idea is simple- Sometimes I might need to hit someone, physically, even if there is a danger of being midjacked. And when that happens it becomes exceptionally hard to move my body. So what can I do, that would allow me to hit someone, and yet stay out of their range? 

Obviously- throw things at them! Or drop things at them! Still not sure which one is better. As aiming is truly difficult without, you know, proper joints. At the same time, grabbing a stone and jumping over the target, while interesting, also has many problems - do I know If my tail will “let go” of the grabbed object when I’m not controlling my body? Can I even jump that far? More training and practice is needed, to even see if either of those are feasible.

*** Experiment 2 day 2 ***

In spite of indubitably perfect preparations, the experiment was an unqualified failure. Even when trying to replicate all the steps of the first case, the end result… was just a scar. No magical properties. Also, Subject A’s status deteriorated more than expected - |Mana poisoning (recovering)| became |Mana poisoning| after just one surgery! As such future experiments had to be delayed - which gives me time to think. What was different between the previous case and this one?

I’ve got a theory I would like to test… a dangerous theory, some fish-brained people might even say forbidden theory! But they would be fools, for nothing is taboo in front of SCIENCE! There was one more mystery that was left unsolved around the time of formation of the first tattoo- unexplained increase in the Soul Ignition skill.

Reisinling

We have a schedule now. Sundays and Wednesdays (all in GMT). Why? As promised in a previous author's note, since we passed 300 readers, I’m going to hire an editor. That will include older chapters. If you have any suggestions on what you want me to fix, please comment on todays chapters. Current plans include:

1. Fix to the system to make it easier to understand, remove unneeded things, and showing the complete status more often
2. Maybe change the lore chapters into smaller side stories from PoV of people in some adventurers guild in the process of writing it. Though not sure about it, the current system allows people that are not interested in that stuff to just skip them, which is nice, but then it does seem like a bit of a waste to just loredump stuff, also it could foreshadow future encounters.
3. Display and formatting, especially looking into how the chapters look like to people using dark theme (as suggested by someone in the comments)
4. General writing quality stuff
5. First chapter complete rewrite? Many people seem not to like it. Hmmm. To be decided.
6. General inconsistencies stuff

If you are one of the people that rated this story 2 or 3 stars, it would be nice if you could comment/send me a DM if there is something in particular that made you decide on that score, though I understand why you might not want to do that.