Aya woke to the sound of water dripping. Slow, rhythmic plinks against stone.
Her eyes fluttered open, vision blurred, her head pounding with a deep ache. The first thought that came was simple, almost childish:
I'm alive…?
Her last memory had been blood. Her own, Tessa's, the cave floor slick with it. And that figure—cloaked, faceless, those gleaming daggers. A sharp pain ran down her side at the memory, making her wince.
She raised a trembling hand to her stomach, expecting to find a mortal wound. Instead, she found smooth skin—banded with faint scarring, but no open gash. The bleeding had stopped.
Her body trembled as she sat up, staring at her hands.
They were small. Frail. Familiar.
"…Tessa's hands."
Aya's breath caught in her throat. She scrambled to the pool of water near the cave wall, her reflection staring back at her. Wide brown eyes. Messy chestnut hair, tangled and stained with dried blood. A thin, ordinary face that was not her own.
"Tessa…? No… I…"
Her voice cracked. It was higher, softer. Not Aya's voice.
Panic surged through her, but before she could scream, a system window unfolded before her eyes.
Name: Aya (Currently inhabiting: Tessa)Race: Human (Commoner)Age: 14Class: Unassigned
Attributes
Strength: 7 ↓ (Previously 32)
Agility: 9 ↓ (Previously 29)
Endurance: 6 ↓ (Previously 28)
Vitality: 10 (boosted by Healing Factor)
Intelligence: 19 (boosted by experience + Mind Web residue)
Perception: 21 (retained Enhanced Awareness)
Willpower: 24 (retained from previous life)
Skills Carried Over
Healing Factor [Passive] – Rapid regeneration, but slowed by the physical weakness of the host body.
Predator Swipe – Usable, but dramatically weaker due to reduced Strength.
Poison Immunity – Fully retained.
Enhanced Awareness – Still functions at full capacity.
Mind Web [Unstable] – Severely weakened; fragments linger.
Mana Manipulation (Basic) – Retained from Tessa's teaching.
Language Adaptation (Developing) – Still improving fluency.
Acid Manipulation - Fully Retained
Omnidirectional Eyes (Nerfed)- Now consumes MP due to human body limitations
Steel Thread -Unavailable due to human body limitations
Archive - Fully Retained
Just Desserts - Chances of incorporation of abilities through egestion have reduced to 2%
Hive Breaker Mandibles - Rewriting
Flight - Unavailable
etc....
New Status Effects (Body: Tessa)
Frailty: Physical output capped. Overexertion risks collapse.
Mana Pool (Small): Limited reservoir; spells exhaust quickly.
Unstable Vessel: Unnatural soul-body fusion. Long-term effects unknown.
Aya's eyes widened.
Her heart thundered in her chest, each beat foreign. Too fast. She pressed her palm against the shallow rise of her sternum, trying to steady it. No matter how many times she blinked, the status window didn't change. The numbers mocked her, dragging her down from the towering strength she had built as an ant into something pitiful.
"…This… this is wrong."
Her voice shook, the softer tone grating against her ears. She hated it. Every word came out like Tessa's—like the girl who had smiled despite her frailty, the girl Aya hadn't been able to protect.
Her knees gave way, and she fell against the damp stone floor, breath coming in sharp gasps. Healing Factor ticked away in the background, numbing the ache in her ribs, stitching microscopic tears in her muscle fibers. It was working—but at a crawl compared to before. In her old body, even the loss of a limb might have been reversible with enough time. Now… even standing up left her trembling.
She clenched her fist. Small. Weak. Not hers.
"Why… why am I in her body?"
Her reflection rippled in the water pool, and for a moment she thought she saw herself—her ant body, towering, armored, inhuman—overlaying Tessa's frail frame. The contradiction made bile rise in her throat. Aya splashed the water with both hands, shattering the image.
Her mind raced. Think. Don't panic. There had to be a reason. A chain of events that led here.
Blood. A cloaked figure. Daggers sliding into flesh. She remembered Tessa's lifeless body, choking on red, her body crumpling like a marionette with its strings cut. Aya had tried to fight back—and had been gutted for her effort.
She should be dead. Both of them should.
"…Then why?" she whispered.
The answer lurked at the back of her thoughts, like a spider web she'd half-forgotten. Threads connecting minds. Threads that had tangled her soul with others before. Mind Web.
She pressed a hand to her temple. The fractured skill still lingered in her status, fragile and unstable. When she'd reached for Tessa
"It… transferred me?" Aya muttered, voice hollow. "Or… pushed me in?"
The thought made her stomach churn. If her soul had been dragged into Tessa's dying body, then what had happened to Tessa herself? Was she gone? Or trapped somewhere, displaced like Aya had been in her insect life?
She bit her lip until she tasted copper. No answer came.
Her gaze drifted back to the status window. The numbers didn't lie. Strength and endurance were laughable. Skills she had once wielded with monstrous efficiency now reduced to shadows of themselves. Predator Swipe—something that could once tear a tree trunk in half—wouldn't do more than scratch skin now. Even her treasured Steel Thread was locked, useless without mandibles to anchor it.
"…It's like being crippled," she whispered, nails digging into her palm.
But even crippled, she wasn't nothing. Intelligence, Perception, Willpower—those remained strong. Her Archive remained whole. Her Poison Immunity and Acid Manipulation had carried over unscathed. Healing Factor, though slowed, was still present.
There was hope. A sliver.
Aya forced herself to breathe slowly, deliberately. Her chest rose and fell in shuddering waves.
"…Okay. Calm down. You're still you. Stats don't change that. Skills don't change that. Your body doesn't change that. You're Aya."
Her words didn't feel convincing. She looked down at her frail arms again—arms that had belonged to someone else. Someone who had trusted her. Someone she'd failed.
Her throat tightened. For a moment, she thought she might break again, curl up and scream until her weak body burned out. But then—no. She clenched her jaw, swallowing the grief.
If this was the body she had now, then she'd make it work. She had no choice.
Aya exhaled through her teeth, dragging her gaze to the dripping cave ceiling. "Fine. You win. I'll live in this body. But…" Her eyes hardened, a faint glint returning despite the weakness. "…I'll also find out who did this. And if Tessa's still in there somewhere—I'll drag her back, no matter what it takes."
Her hands shook violently as she tried to push herself up. She managed halfway before collapsing back onto the cold stone, body trembling from the effort.
A bitter laugh escaped her lips. "Pathetic."
The Healing Factor was patching her wounds, yes—but the exhaustion, the loss of blood, the frailty of Tessa's body all pressed down like chains. Aya felt her consciousness flickering again, ebbing like a tide.
"…Not… yet…" she mumbled, trying to keep her eyes open.
But the weight was too much. Her body betrayed her.
The last thing she saw before darkness claimed her again was her reflection in the water—Tessa's face staring back, lips parted in pain and exhaustion.
Aya woke again hours later, her throat parched and her stomach twisting painfully. At first, she thought it was pain from her wounds flaring up again, but no—this was hunger. A gnawing, primal ache that burned deeper with every breath.
She pushed herself up with trembling arms, every muscle protesting. Even that simple effort left her dizzy. Her limbs felt like wet twigs compared to the unyielding strength of her ant body. The contrast was humiliating. Back then, she could lift ten times her own weight, tear carapaces in half, and feast on whatever prey fell before her. Now, just standing left her gasping.
Still… she was alive. And that meant she had no choice but to move.
Aya staggered deeper into the cave system until the air grew damp with the smell of moss and running water. Beyond a thin curtain of vines, she spotted faint light spilling in from outside—the exit.
Her stomach growled again, louder this time. Aya grimaced. Fine. I'll hunt.
She wasn't picky before. As an ant, anything edible was fuel. Insects, larvae, mushrooms, even carrion if necessary. Her body could process it all. This human frame, however, was different. Fragile. Weak. But at least she still had her Predator Swipe, which still responded faintly when she called it forth. Not the devastating strike she remembered, but a sharper edge in her nails, enough to draw blood.
She crouched low in the brush outside, waiting. Her instincts, honed by both ant-born ferocity and her enhanced awareness, guided her. Soon enough, a small, furry creature emerged from the undergrowth—something like a fat rat with long ears.
Aya lunged.
The fight was clumsy. Her arms lacked weight, her legs lacked speed, and her balance was pathetic. She tripped in the dirt, scraped her knees, and nearly let the animal escape. But in the end, she pinned it down, drove her nails into its throat, and silenced its squeals.
Blood stained her hands. Her heart pounded. She stared at the creature, chest heaving.
"…Food."
She raised it to her lips, a reflex born from her ant instincts. She had eaten raw flesh countless times before. The smell, the texture, the warmth—none of it ever bothered her.
But now—
"—Urgh!"
Aya gagged, shoving the carcass away from her. The stench hit her like a hammer. The iron tang of blood, once mouthwatering, now made bile rise in her throat. Her new human tongue recoiled at the thought of tearing into raw meat. Her stomach screamed for food, but her body rejected the idea.
Panting, Aya sat back against a tree, clutching her belly.
"…Damn it."
Reality sank in. She wasn't an ant anymore. Tessa's body was delicate, human, civilized in its own way. Even if her skills and powers remained, this vessel couldn't survive on the same brutal diet. Aya always wondered why Tessa always had to cook whatever she came home with. Her instincts told her to eat, but her taste buds screamed otherwise. Aya thought of cooking, she could cook- but not with what was around her. Back when she was human on earth, she could cook but in this situation microwaves weren't an option
Aya closed her eyes, steadying her breathing. If I can't eat like before… then I'll have to adapt. Humans don't survive on hunting alone, not weak ones like this. Which means… civilization.
Her gaze turned toward the distant mountains.
A village. Maybe a town. Somewhere with food, shelter, and answers.
Aya wiped the blood from her hands and stood, though her legs shook beneath her.
Her hunger gnawed harder now, but so did something else. A new determination.
She couldn't waste this second chance—not when she had woken up in Tessa's body for reasons she didn't yet understand. Not when the system still acknowledged her as Aya.
"Fine. I'll endure this weakness. But I'll find a way forward."
And so, frail but resolute, Aya began her trek toward civilization—each step an act of defiance against the fragility of her new human shell.