It was quiet.
No snarls. No ragged breathing. No foul breath.
Just me, my half-regenerated stomach and a handful of unborn alien babies.
My arms were noodles, my vision blurry. I was the world’s saddest soup, but my hunger was an ancient god demanding a sacrifice.
I dragged myself to where the eggs were, and grabbed one. I examined it with fascination, ready to pop it in my mouth.
But as I brought it to my lips... I began to doubt.
Maybe those creatures weren't evil. Maybe life in that place was scarce. Sacred.
What if they were just protecting their young, like any good, fleshy, horrifying parent would do?
What if I was the villain?
...
Nah, screw it.
They'd eaten my liver thirteen times. What I was about to do is called justice.
I bit into the egg, and the shell cracked like old bones. The inside was warm, gelatinous, and slightly sparkly. Five stars. Would recommend. Texture was bold, flavor was desperate.
It was an incredible change after more than a year on an alien sludge based diet.
From the number of bits I chewed, it was either a developing hatchling… or I’d just discovered alien twins were a thing.
I continued eating as if there was no tomorrow, and the more I swallowed, the faster my regeneration recharged. By the tenth egg, I didn’t just feel whole. I felt dangerous.
Had I had a system, I’d have gained a title like “Devourer of the Unborn.” Not exactly family-friendly, but accurate.
Or maybe “Yolkbreaker.” Has a nice ring to it.
But those poor unborn babies provided incredible nutritional value. Taking advantage of my accelerated metabolism, product of the honorable alien elixirs and probably the floating energy I absorbed every night, I continued eating.
I swallowed the stuff like it was an all-you-can-eat restaurant. And free of charge. Besides, I had to do it before the parents returned.
I could feel myself getting stronger. Like an RPG protagonist power-leveling off unborn mobs.
It didn't take long to clean the place up. I was even surprised by the size of my stomach, which felt like a black hole. I was worried I hadn't felt like taking a shit yet, but we'd get to that.
But then... something shifted. Like the universe decided to inflate me for dramatic effect.
My muscles began to bulk, veins popping, skin shimmering, like I was about to unlock Super Saiyan Phase Seventeen: Protein God Edition.
Oh my god... I could actually see my muscles growing. Less than a minute in and I could’ve made Earth’s finest bodybuilders cry into their dumbbells.
Something surged inside me. Heat, pressure, raw chaos. My vision blurred, my bones tingled, and my ego was about to become its own celestial body.
I was on the verge of transcendence.
I could feel it. I could...
Burp.
Rainbow-colored mist floated from my mouth like a unicorn had just committed arson inside me.Stolen novel; please report.
My body shrank back to normal.
Well… mostly. I still had the muscles, but the “God of Biceps” look was gone. Guess it was just a side effect of eating a hundred protein-packed space embryos.
The silence broke.
I heard them. Those grotesque bastards were back.
They descended the crater at full speed, then froze.
Their twitching eyes scanned the battlefield of broken shells and dripping yolk. They could see it. Smell it. Feel it.
Their children, scrambled. Breakfast courtesy of yours truly.
“Dinner’s not over,” I said, licking my lips. “Your turn.”
I no longer looked at them with disgust. Now, the mere thought of tasting their flesh made my mouth water.
And they wasted no time.
They both jumped at me at the same time, one aiming for my leg, and the other for my abdomen. But this time, I was ready. Stronger. Hungrier.
I twisted at the last second and slammed both with the full weight of my newly-upgraded limbs.
It wasn’t just a hit, it was a payback delivery.
This time, my fingers didn’t snap. Their skin was still tough, but I was tougher. I pushed them back. Hard. They tumbled several meters like stunned, slimy bowling pins.
“Round two, bitches.”
Or to be more specific: phase two.
If this were Dark Souls, this was the moment the boss bar got a second health bar and the orchestra started screaming in Latin.
The two beasts stopped in their tracks... then began to merge.
Believe me, I’ve seen and done some disgusting things in that wasteland. I’ve bathed in alien sludge. I’ve eaten glowing egg yolks with fetal crunch.
But this?
This fusion looked like it had been engineered by a coprophilic demon with a fetish for abstract meat sculptures.
Their bodies squelched together in a grotesque ballet of twitching tentacles and wet slaps. Eyes rolled into new places. Bones snapped and reformed in real-time like someone folding two dying spiders into a meatball.
One of them let out a moan that sounded like a fax machine being drowned in soup.
I nearly passed out.
Not even the black elixir’s taste, or the crater’s fermented dirt smell, had ever made me this nauseous.
The tiny twitching tentacles that once decorated its body? Now they were full-grown horrors, each stretching at least a meter, squirming like cursed noodles with abandonment issues.
Because I’m nothing if not courteous, I waited for its disgusting glow-up to finish before bracing myself.
The beast, now faster, meaner, and upgraded to DLC-level grossness, lunged straight at me.
It struck with a blur of movement. I ducked just in time, its claw slicing air where my head had been a second ago.
I grabbed one of its slimy tentacles mid-spin and yanked it like I was pulling weeds on steroids. To my surprise, the thing didn’t just stop flailing. It stretched. It thinned, lengthened, and turned from "limb" to "accidental whip."
And just like the beast’s hide, it was insanely tough. Flexible, yes, but clearly not on board with being a weapon. I considered naming it. Maybe “Whippy.”
I didn’t have time to question the tentacle. The beast was already charging again, roaring with the fury of a thousand devoured breakfasts.
I swung the thing like a flail, more out of desperation than skill. It slapped across the creature’s face with a sickening plop, barely enough to stagger it.
Still, it reacted.
A spark of hope flickered in my dirt-stained brain.
I whipped again. This time it coiled around one of its limbs. I yanked it with everything I had, dragging the fused nightmare a few steps off balance before it shrieked and tore free.
Okay, not bad. Still ugly, still dangerous, but not bad.
I backed away, panting. My hands trembled from the strain, and the tentacle twitched like it had a mind of its own.
That’s when a terrible, incredible idea crawled into my head like a parasite.
What if I didn’t just swing it?
What if I powered it up?
My breathing was ragged. Blood ran down my forehead and splattered onto the twitching tentacle I still held like a leash to my sanity.
And then... the idea hit me.
The kind of idea that only comes after you’ve eaten a hundred alien embryos and fought a fused meat-dog horror with forty eyes.
Cultivation.
Yeah, I’d read Murim of the Iron Fist, Path of Qi-Master Grampa, Soul Sword Sushi Showdown. I knew what I had to do.
I gripped the tentacle-whip tighter and whispered, “Flow.”
I focused on the energy I’d been absorbing for what felt like centuries, the star-flecked specks, the elixirs, the very air of this cursed world. I imagined it all converging in my core. Then flowing through my arm. Down to the whip.
For a moment... nothing.
Then it twitched.
The tentacle vibrated like it had been plugged into a cosmic battery. The edges shimmered with faint green light. My eyes widened.
“It worked?”
It worked.
“IT WORKED!”
I lost it. Completely.
With the rage of every broken bone, every chewed organ, and every traumatizing burp, I started whipping the beast.
No form. No style. No technique.
Just mad, savage energy.
“HIYAH!”
WHACK.
“I CALL THIS TECHNIQUE: PAIN IN A ROPE!”
WHACK-WHACK.
The fused monster screeched, reared back, and tried to dodge, but I was faster. Drunk on success and madness.
“I name this move: SCREAMING IDIOT WHIRLWIND!”
FWAP-FWAP-FWAP.
Tentacle met flesh, met eyes, met mouths, met who-knows-what anatomy. I wasn’t fighting like a warrior.
I was fighting like a lunatic with a glowing meat noodle and a personal vendetta.
And for the first time since I got yeeted into this meat-grinder of a world...
I was winning.