creeping

Etymology 1

From Middle English crepynge, crepinde, crepende, crepande, from Old English crēopende, from Proto-Germanic *kreupandz, present participle of Proto-Germanic *kreupaną (“to creep, crawl”), equivalent to creep + -ing.

verb

1. present participle and gerund of creep
   Then, in January, a creeping tsunami of train cancellations, triggered by major staff absences as a result of the aggressive transmissibility of Omicron, heaped further misery on rail users. January 12 2022, Nigel Harris, “Comment: Unhappy start to 2022”, in RAIL, number 948, page 3

Etymology 2

From Middle English creping, crepynge, from Old English crēopung, equivalent to creep + -ing.

noun

1. The act of something that creeps.
   It is indubitably certain, therefore, that he is able to attend, and actually attends, to all things at the same moment; to the motions of a seed, or a leaf, or an atom; to the creepings of a worm, the flutterings of an insect, and the journeys of a mite […] 1824, Timothy Dwight, Theology, Explained and Defended in a Series of Sermons