Chapter 1
I WOKE UP with a gasp.
“Where— Ow!”
A sharp pain, like that from an oozing wound, spiked through my arm. Wherever I was—presumably a room—it was so dark that even my hands weren’t visible when in front of me. I didn’t have time to investigate anything before the memories belonging to whoever owned my body came pouring in. Said memories were incredibly shaky, for the roughly five-year-old boy had never seen the outside world before. He had spent his whole life living in a space the adults called a “chamber” with other children. He had never even seen the church before, despite it being immediately next door. As the memories flooded me, I tried to recall my own from my previous life.
I can’t remember anything...
That wasn’t strictly true, I could remember something. The most impactful moment of that life—the moment it ended. Just bringing that memory to mind had me gasping for air and clutching at my chest. It felt like that blade was digging into my heart all over again. I didn’t know what led to my death. However, the warmth seeping from my very core, rendering it like ice, and the terror of my life spilling out of my hands... Those sensations were carved deep into my soul. My body started shaking like a leaf. I fell from the bed, ending up face first on the stone floor on all fours.
“I’m fine; I’m alive,” I told myself, gasping between my words. “I’m alive. I don’t want to die.”
Tears warped my vision. There wasn’t enough oxygen in my lungs. I gasped and panted, only managing one more word.
“Help...”
✦ ✦ ✦
I woke up again. I didn’t know the length of time for which I’d been unconscious, but my hunger hadn’t gotten worse. It probably hadn’t been long at all. I needed to be more vigilant and not delve too deeply into that memory. If I wasn’t careful, the memories I had of this life would also splinter into nothingness. I suspected that those from my previous one had been obliterated by the intensity of my final moments. Though I could recall my old language and knowledge, everything related to experience and emotion seemed to be out of reach.
I sighed. There was no point trying to recall things that didn’t want to be remembered. Instead, I focused on what was in front of me.
“I can’t see a thing.”
I couldn’t hear anything either. Not even the tiniest particle of light penetrated this room. I used my hands to feel around me, and they brushed against an even surface with fabric on it.
“A bed, I guess.”
The bed I had just fallen from. At its end, there was a stone wall. Placing my right hand on the wall, I stretched out my left in front of me and began to explore the room slowly.
It was circular in shape and contained nothing but a bed and a hole for relieving myself. Simply put, it was a prison cell. My inspection revealed no exits. I must have been thrown in here while I was asleep. I couldn’t even begin to guess which part of the building I was in.
What I could guess was why I had been placed here. I wagered that every child gathered in the church yesterday was marked with that knife and thrown into a dark cell like mine.
However, as I had no intention of killing anyone, I decided to sleep to preserve my energy.
✦ ✦ ✦
I went through three cycles of sleeping and waking up. The third time I awoke, I stretched my hand out toward the ceiling from where I lay in bed and realized something.
“That’s weird. I can see.”
The silhouette of my hand was visible, even though there still wasn’t any light coming into the room. I closed my eyes. I could still see the outline, as if I could sense beyond the scope of my vision.
Leaping out of bed, I looked down at myself. Just like my hand, I could see the silhouette of my body against the darkness, everything from the chest down. When I glanced at my bed, there was a faint outline of my small figure where I had just been lying on it.
I could see heat, much like a snake; I must’ve had a pit organ. In other words, a natural form of thermography. This was something that a human being had no business being able to do. Therefore, I must not have been human. To be more specific, I wasn’t Homo sapiens. Maybe humans in this world could see sources of heat, but it seemed more likely that I was a different humanoid species unique to this reality.
Among those who had shared the chamber with me were a girl with a thick, dragon-like tail and a boy with unusually long ears. I could remember the dragon girl grabbing my own tail from time to time like she was trying to crush it.
My own tail?
I reached for my tailbone. There was something soft and scaly there. It was a snake’s tail and so prominent that it was a wonder that I hadn’t noticed it before.
Long and thin. A tail. As though realizing it was there had laid a network of nerves running through it, now I became fully aware of it. When I tried to move it, I found that I could do so more precisely than I had expected. I could feel with it too; it was about as sensitive as the backs of my hands. It could wrap around my torso three or four times, so it was probably about the same length as my whole body.
As for its thickness and strength, it seemed meatier than my arms, but not broader than my legs, though stronger than the latter and weaker than the former. I didn’t know if it would grow as I did, but it would probably get in the way if it got too long. I hoped it would stay in line with my proportions.
Once I finished examining my tail and pit organ, I coiled up and went back to sleep.
✦ ✦ ✦
I woke up from my fifth sleep cycle, unable to bear not eating any longer. Though I still had the energy to move, I didn’t want to waste it. I glared at the ceiling, invisible through regular vision, before closing my eyes again.
✦ ✦ ✦
My sixth awakening. An unsettling thought came to mind: Perhaps no one knew I was here. I gnawed at my nails. It went a small way toward distracting me from my hunger.