You don't move toward the presence.
Not yet.
Fear and caution war with curiosity, keeping you frozen at the clearing's edge. Whatever—whoever—that vast, gentle presence belongs to, approaching them feels like a decision you can't take back. A threshold you'll cross that might change everything.
What if they're hostile? What if I'm wrong?
The doubts circle endlessly, and so you hesitate, caught between the desperate loneliness that has haunted you for years and the primal instinct to survive.
In the end, survival wins.
You turn away from the clearing, sliding back into the shadows of the forest. The presence doesn't follow. Doesn't seem to notice you at all. Whether that's a relief or a disappointment, you can't quite tell.
I need to understand this world first. Get stronger. Then maybe…
You don't finish the thought.
Movement becomes your measure of time.
Without sight, the world exists only as sensation—pressure against your gelatinous form, vibrations through the earth, the constant hum of magicules flowing through the air like invisible rivers. The ground tells you when it slopes. The wind tells you when something displaces it. Energy signatures pulse in your awareness, some faint and distant, others uncomfortably close.
It is overwhelming and insufficient all at once.
Every movement—every slide of your body across broken earth and tangled roots—feels like a gamble. You don't know what direction you're truly facing. You don't know what might be watching you from the shadows. You only know that staying still feels dangerous, like painting a target on yourself.
So you move.
You follow the calmest currents of magicules, trusting instinct more than reason because you have nothing else to trust. The Archivist offers small adjustments, quiet suggestions that feel less like commands and more like a steady hand guiding you through darkness.
"Recommendation: maintain minimal magicule output.""Environmental concealment probability: increased."
You obey without question, pulling your presence inward, making yourself as small and unremarkable as possible.
Still, fear never truly leaves you. It sits in your core like a stone, heavy and cold, reminding you with every passing moment that you are weak. Vulnerable. Prey.
Minutes pass. Maybe hours. Time has lost all meaning.
Then a vibration ripples through the ground.
You freeze.
It's faint at first, barely more than a tremor—but it grows stronger with each passing heartbeat you don't have. Heavy. Rhythmic. Intentional.
Something is approaching.
Your thoughts spiral immediately into panic.
Monster or Predator, but one thing for sure it is something that wants to eat me.
The word carries weight here, in this world where danger doesn't politely announce itself or give you time to prepare. Whatever is coming doesn't care that you're new to this existence, that you barely understand your own body, that you don't even know how to see.
You move again, faster this time, your body stretching and compressing instinctively as you flee. The terrain becomes treacherous beneath you—roots that catch and tear, stones that scrape against your membrane, uneven ground that threatens to trap you.
Panic sharpens your focus, and for the first time, you feel something else stirring deep inside you. Not fear. Not confusion.
it is Power.
It's not explosive. Not overwhelming. Just… there. Coiled and waiting, patient as a sleeping beast.
Another tremor. Closer now. Much closer.
You sense it clearly through the vibrations—a large mass of magicules wrapped around something primal and hungry. The energy radiating from it is crude, unrefined, driven by pure instinct. This thing doesn't think in words or strategies or reason.
It simply hunts.
And you are prey.
You veer sharply to the side, trying desperately to throw it off your trail. The Archivist recalculates instantly, adjusting your path.
"Evasion pattern optimized.""Warning: pursuer adapting to movement patterns."
But the monster follows anyway, crashing through the underbrush with terrifying single-mindedness.
A sudden rush of air passes just above you, violent and hot, sending shockwaves through the ground. Something massive slams down exactly where you were a heartbeat ago, shattering stone and tearing through earth.
You don't need sight to understand how close that was.
Too close. Way too close.
Your movements grow frantic, desperate. You slide, compress yourself through narrow gaps, leap across obstacles you sense only at the last second. The forest becomes a nightmare maze of sensations—branches snapping like bones, soil tearing apart, magicules flaring violently as the monster crashes through everything in its path without hesitation.
You can't outrun it.
The realization settles over you with cold, terrible clarity.
No matter how fast you move, no matter how cleverly you dodge, this thing is stronger, faster, more suited to this world than you are. It's only a matter of time before it catches you.
Your thoughts scramble desperately for options, for anything you might have overlooked, any advantage you could exploit. And then, unexpectedly, a memory surfaces through the panic.
A scene from a book you read a lifetime ago.
A cave deep in a sealed prison. A dragon's voice, warm and laughing. A slime asking a simple question: How do I see?
Veldora.
Your movement falters for half a second—and nearly gets you killed. Another violent impact rocks the ground behind you, so close that fragments of earth and shattered stone scatter across your body like shrapnel.
But the memory doesn't fade.
You remember it clearly now, as vivid as if you're reading it again. Rimuru, blind just like you are now, learning to perceive the world not with eyes, but with awareness itself. By extending his perception through magicules, mapping reality through sensation rather than light.
If he could do it…
"Then I can too," you think, the words trembling but determined.
You force yourself to slow down.
It feels wrong. Every instinct screams at you to keep moving, to keep fleeing, to put as much distance between yourself and the monster as possible. But panic won't teach you anything. Panic will only get you killed faster.
You need to see.
You focus inward, reaching for the magicules that flow naturally through your body. They respond instantly, eager and waiting, brushing against your awareness like threads begging to be pulled.
You extend yourself—carefully, tentatively—letting your presence ripple outward through the air.
Pain flares immediately.
Your perception fractures under the strain, information flooding in too fast, too raw, too overwhelming. Shapes blur into incomprehensible chaos. Distances collapse and expand without logic. You nearly lose control of your form entirely, your body threatening to disperse.
"WARNING: Cognitive overload detected.""Recommendation: cease current action immediately."
"No," you think through gritted focus you don't technically have. "Just… help me stabilize it. Please."
There is a brief pause, as if the Archivist is considering whether to override you.
"Processing alternative approach.""Suggested method: gradual expansion with limited range. Prioritize spatial consistency over sensory detail."
You adjust immediately, grateful for the guidance.
Instead of reaching for everything at once, you limit yourself. A small radius. Just enough to know what's immediately around you. Just enough to survive.
The world shifts.
It's not sight—not really—but it's close enough.
You sense outlines forming in your awareness: the uneven ground beneath you, the towering shapes of trees rising like pillars, the massive, aggressive presence behind you closing the distance with every second.
The monster.
It's larger than you imagined, easily three times your size. Its magicules are jagged and violent, concentrated around claws and fangs designed for tearing flesh. A wild beast, more raw instinct than intellect, driven by hunger and territorial aggression.
Fear spikes again—but this time, it's tempered by something new.
Understanding.
"I can see you now," you think, and something inside you steadies.
You change direction sharply, no longer fleeing blindly but moving with purpose. You slip behind a cluster of ancient trees, their roots creating natural barriers. The monster roars—sound exploding through the forest like thunder—and charges after you, smashing through obstacles with brute, mindless force.
But now, you're not blind anymore.
You anticipate its movements, reading the way its magicules flare before each strike. You dodge just before it attacks, letting it overcommit to strikes that hit nothing but air and earth. Each near miss teaches you more about its patterns, its limitations.
You aren't faster than it.
You aren't stronger.
But you're smarter.
The chase stretches on, minutes blurring together as your perception grows clearer and more stable with every desperate second. The initial pain fades, replaced by something almost natural. The Archivist feeds you constant updates, refining your movements, correcting your mistakes before you can make them.
"Spatial mapping efficiency: increasing.""Perception stability: acceptable and improving.""Predictive analysis of pursuer: online."
Your awareness expands bit by bit, growing more confident. You start noticing details you missed before—the way certain trees are more stable than others, how the ground dips and rises, where the roots create natural tripwires.
And then you spot it.
Ahead, barely visible in your limited perception—a narrow ravine. The ground there is unstable, held together by roots that have already started to rot. One good impact would bring the whole thing down.
An idea forms, hesitant but hopeful.
Can I really do this?
You don't have time to doubt.
You angle your movement carefully, leading the monster directly toward the ravine. It follows without hesitation, rage and hunger blinding what little caution it might possess. You can feel its magicules flaring brighter, hotter, as it prepares for what it thinks will be the killing blow.
At the last possible moment, you veer sharply aside.
The monster can't stop.
The ground collapses under its weight with a sound like breaking bones. It roars—surprised, furious—as it falls, its massive presence dropping sharply into the depths below. The impact echoes for several long seconds, punctuated by crashes and the scatter of loose stone, before finally fading into silence.
You don't move.
You can't move.
Your body trembles violently, magicules fluctuating wildly as the adrenaline drains away, leaving you hollow and shaking. If you still had lungs, you would be gasping for air. If you still had a heart, it would be hammering against your ribs.
Slowly, carefully, you expand your perception again—this time without panic driving you, without fear clouding your focus.
The world unfolds before you.
Trees rise like pillars of living energy, their leaves shimmering faintly with absorbed magicules. The ground beneath you is uneven but vibrant, alive with countless small presences—insects, roots, fungi, all interconnected in ways you never imagined. The sky above stretches endlessly upward, vast and open, filled with currents of energy you can almost touch.
It's not perfect sight. It's not the colors and light and clarity that humans take for granted.
But it's enough.
More than enough.
A quiet emotion swells within your core, unexpected and overwhelming. Not fear. Not relief.
Wonder.
"So… this is it," you think softly, your awareness drifting upward, taking in the sheer scale of everything around you.
This is the world you dreamed about in stolen moments between pain and medication. The place you read about over and over, never truly believing you would see it, touch it, exist in it.
The danger is still there—you know that now with certainty. This world wants to kill you. Everything in it is stronger, faster, more adapted to survival than you are.
But there's something else too.
Possibility.
You don't know what awaits you here. You don't know who you'll meet, or how long you'll survive, or if you'll ever find the bonds you longed for in your old life.
But for the first time since waking up in this impossible body, the fear loosens its grip just slightly.
A faint, almost childish warmth blooms in your core—not quite a smile, but close enough.
"This world…" you think, the words filled with quiet, trembling awe.
"…is beautiful."
And despite everything—despite the danger, despite your weakness, despite not knowing what comes next—you find yourself grateful.
Grateful to be here and Grateful to be alive.