After transforming into [Frost Form], System could very clearly sense the frost energy floating in the forest. This sensation was much more obvious than when he was in his normal form.

  He could also easily manipute this energy, causing it to condense and form into snowfkes, just like the snowfkes he'd find at an altitude of one kilometer.

  At the same time, he could also absorb this frost energy into his body, which allowed him to efficiently convert it into experience points.

  Due to his contract with the ice spirit, System's experience bar had reached 98% of level 12 without him noticing.

  As long as he didn't use [Ability Enhancement] to consume these experience points, he estimated that he'd rise to level 13 in under a day simply by absorbing the frost energy in the air.

  Soon after System had changed into [Frost Form], Nellis had successfully regained consciousness.

  However, System discovered that when his [Frost Form] was deactivated, along with the icy blue halo above his head disappearing, Nellis would also cease all activity. It was as if she'd entered into a deep sleep.

  According to Nellis, this was a method used by ice spirits to reduce their energy consumption. After forming a contract with a living being, most of their time would be spent in a deep slumber.

  ...

  System was very satisfied with the fact that Nellis would mostly remain in a deep sleep while [Frost Form] was inactive. After all, it was too strange to see an icy blue halo floating over a grasshopper's head. It would be fine during the day, but just the thought of a blue halo shining above his head at night made him very uncomfortable.

  When he sensed his body, System discovered that it had undergone some unusual changes after he'd formed a contract with Nellis.

  The base of each tentacle was now slightly itchy, and special nutrients produced in his blood converged within his tentacles.

  System noticed that his tentacles were beginning to grow again. At the base of one of his limbs with only two tentacles growing out, the bud of a third tentacle had now emerged.

  It appeared that he was going to have a full three tentacles on each of his limbs, for a total of eighteen, and each tentacle would keep growing until it reached thirty centimeters in length and half a centimeter in thickness.

  He guessed that the source of this change was his new ability [Ice Spike], which he'd tried out earlier while testing out his [Frost Form].

  Perhaps when [Ice Spike] had produced freezing spikes at the ends of System's tentacles, the ability had driven his [Limb Regeneration] and [Insect Adaptation] talents, thereby allowing his body to continue undergoing mutations. These mutations made his body more adaptable to the environment, increasing his ability to survive.

  Using [Perception] to sense the unique information stored within his bloodline, System learned more about the secondary development of his tentacles.

  If this mutation reached its limit and the growing tentacles stabilized, System would lose his chance to regrow his missing grasshopper legs forever. Instead, his legs would be completely repced by tentacles.

  However, it wasn't impossible for System to stop the changes taking pce in his body. He had a feeling that as long as he used his mandibles to bite all of these tentacles off completely, he could terminate this change.

  After he bit off his tentacles, his [Limb Regeneration] would be able to function normally. As long as there were enough nutrients, he wouldn't grow tentacles again and would instead regrow his legs, returning him to his original, six-legged grasshopper form.

  ...

  After some consideration, System decided to keep his flexible and versatile tentacles.

  While a body sprouting numerous tentacles wasn't in line with System's aesthetic sensibilities, a grasshopper's six hideous legs weren't much better. The new and old appearances were a match when it came to ugliness.

  The only pity would be losing the jumping power of a grasshopper's strong legs. However, once his wings grew back and he regained the ability to fly, a grasshopper's jumping ability wouldn't matter much.

  After briefly investigating his tentacles, System once again continued his journey home. Right before the sky grew completely dark, he finally reached the top of the temporary nest, which was now covered with a yer of snow.

  System used [Intuition] and [Mental Transmission] to perceive his surroundings. Aside from Shava, only two of the nearly twenty ants that he'd raised still maintained some level of mental activity. One was the female ant that System had focused on cultivating, while the other should be a worker ant.

  Shava's mental fluctuations seemed a little strange. Although she still had a certain degree of consciousness, she seemed to have lost the ability to utilize nguage in her mental messages. She only conveyed some joyful emotions in the same way that an ordinary ant would.

  System found the right direction and immediately began clearing the snow above the temporary nest using his tentacles. Unfortunately, his digging ability was poor by nature, as neither a grasshopper's body nor his new form were very good at digging.

  With his flexible tentacles, it took System three hours to successfully excavate the entrance of the temporary nest. The loose, grainy snow was difficult to pick up, which slowed down his digging speed.

  After pushing aside the st bit of soft snow at the entrance of the cave, he finally entered the temporary nest.

  Some of the remaining luminescent mushrooms in the main passageway had lost their glow. It seemed like these mushrooms hadn't reached their growth limit before they'd stopped growing due to the cold.

  However, the mushrooms weren't completely dead. System could feel faint emotional fluctuations from the mushrooms through [Mental Transmission]. Nearly one-tenth of the mushrooms were still alive. They'd only entered a dormant state.

  Compared to the mushrooms, System's ant subjects weren't so lucky.

  The ants had widened the temporary nest according to System's size. That rge width, combined with the nest's depth of only one and a half meters, made it easy for the cold to seep in.

  Less than half a meter into the nest's main passageway, System found the corpses of five worker ants. The intelligence of worker ants was so low that they likely couldn't understand that the nest's empty chambers were warmer than the cold passageway.

  But the temperature in the chambers still wasn't very high. Soon after, System found the corpses of three ant rvae and a mature worker ant in one of the chambers. They'd huddled together in a corner for warmth, but had still eventually succumbed to the cold.

  Continuing his search of the chambers, System found many more ant corpses, as well as the surviving female ant and worker ant. They'd both undergone [Pupation] and had entered into the pupal stage.

  The female ant's pupa was seven or eight times rger than the worker ant's. It appeared that the female ant rva had eaten quite a bit in recent days.

  System used his tentacles to conduct a simple inspection on the two ants, finding that the two surviving ant pupae also possessed an ability simir to [Cold Resistance].

  System guessed that the ants encountering cold weather during their [Pupation] process had activated their bodies' ability to withstand the cold.

  After putting down the two ant pupae, it didn't take long for System to find Shava in the chamber where he'd previously stored the mouse's corpse.

  One-third of the mouse was now gone. He didn't know whether Shava had eaten it alone or if she'd shared it with the ant rvae.

  After seeing Shava's current appearance, System understood why she'd been unable to respond clearly to his mental messages. She had obviously entered her second pupation. Her body's exoskeleton had softened, forming a huge pupa about twelve centimeters in length.

  However, the pupa Shava had formed wasn't complete. The skin was rough and deformed, and there was a diamond-shaped hole about three centimeters in size. Some sort of white juice had flowed out of the hole.

  The heartbeat inside Shava's pupa was also very abnormal, beating irregurly. Sometimes the beating stopped entirely, while at other times it beat several times in a row.

  Luckily, the white juice leaking from the hole in the pupa had quickly frozen due to the cold weather. Because of this, not too much of the juice had flowed out. Otherwise, Shava might have died due to a failed second pupation.