In the midst of the bottomless dark, a cold, emotionless, synthetic voice echoed through my mind.
[Initiating Soul Fusion Process...]
[Alert: Soul Power Discrepancy Detected.]
[Query: Force Fusion?]
...
[No response detected from the soul entity.]
[System Override: Automatic Forced Fusion Initiated.]
[Analysis: Origin Soul 'Insectoid Race' merging with Invader Soul 'Demon King Tier'.]
[Result: Soul structure mutation induced by unstable energy.]
[Status Update: Demonic Beast Soul... Insectoid variant... Complete.]
. . .
Smell...
The first thing to hit my senses wasn't light, but an overpowering stench—a foul metallic tang of blood mixed with rotting meat.
Rough, damp stone walls pressed in on my left and right, trapping me in a narrow crevice.
My immediate surroundings were completely empty. The ground was slick with a viscous slime... and littered with the shattered remnants of cloudy white shells. There was no sign of any larvae or other living creatures.
So, where did all those other larvae from the eggs go?
The answer lay in the sickeningly bloated, stuffed sensation in my own gut. Not to mention the lingering, sickly-sweet taste of blood still coating my mouth... or whatever served as my mouth now.
Yeah. I ate them. Devoured every last one of them without leaving a single trace.
It seemed that the moment I hatched, a feral, beastly starvation had completely hijacked my consciousness. By the time I regained my senses, my entire clutch of siblings—who hadn't even lived long enough to see our mother—had already become my first all-you-can-eat buffet.
"Urgh..."
Out of sheer habit, I tried to push myself up to stand.
But... whoosh! Thud! There was nothing to support my weight. My body just slid against the freezing stone floor.
Legs...? Where the hell are my legs?!
I looked down (or rather, tried to look down) to inspect myself. Nothing. I had no arms. No legs. Just a long, segmented, pale white body.
Moving was a struggle at first. But once I got the hang of contracting my abdominal muscles and wriggling, I found I could move surprisingly fast. This chubby, seemingly heavy body slithered across the stone floor as smoothly as a snake... or a giant maggot.
Let's put aside the moral implications of cannibalizing my siblings for a moment. The real issue is: what the hell kind of creature am I?
I desperately wanted to see my own face. If there were a puddle or a mirror, I'd check my reflection in a heartbeat, but hoping for something like that in a place like this was a pipe dream.
Because this place wasn't hell... nor was it the surface of the world.
The damp, oppressive atmosphere—it was the unmistakable signature of a deep cavern steeped in mystery and death... A place known to us as a "Dungeon."
Why am I so sure, you ask?
I tilted my head up toward the high cavern ceiling. Reflecting in my vision was a shimmering purple luminescence piercing the darkness, like someone had glued a constellation of stars to the rock.
Those weren't ordinary rocks. They were "Mana Crystals."
Incredibly expensive and rare commodities. They form from the crystallization of overflowing, highly concentrated magical auras—either from active magic casting or the accumulated passive emissions of high-tier Demonic Beasts over a long period.
Because a dungeon is a closed system, this mana has nowhere to vent out into the external world. It compresses, swirls, and condenses into crystals embedded in the walls. The deeper the dungeon floor, the more vibrant and concentrated that purple glow becomes.
To end up in a place like this, trapped in a body I'm not used to... What kind of cosmic karma is punishing me?
Right now, I was curled up in a narrow crevice that seemed relatively safe. At the very least, those giant Demonic Beasts wouldn't be able to wedge their massive heads in here to gobble me up.
Still... if I just kept hiding in this hole with nothing in my stomach, I'd eventually dry up and become a fossilized cave-worm.
I started to move... or rather, squirm. Contract the front of my body... drag the back end forward... stretch out... The sound of my hardened shell scraping against the stone went skrrt... skrrt... It was bizarrely annoying. Clumsy at first, but honestly, it got kind of fun after a while. It didn't hurt, either. I guess I was already getting used to this new rig.
I had no idea how much time passed, but I spent my free time in this tight hole experimenting. I started with trying to stand on two legs (failed miserably, rolled like a log), tried throwing a jab (had no arms to throw), and ended with my daily bowel movement (executed flawlessly).
And so, I came to a conclusion: if my physical stats were trash, I'd just have to rely on 'Magic'.
But here was the rub: I had no mouth. The fundamental principle of magic in this world is absorbing ambient 'mana' into the body, then releasing it as elemental forms—earth, water, wind, fire. The critical requirements, however, are a 'catalyst' (like a staff, sword, or magic item) and an 'incantation' to shape the energy.
As for elemental affinity and mana acquisition, I knew a few workarounds (I was Demon God-tier, remember?). But lying here as a mute grub sipping dew in a hole, how the hell was I supposed to chant spells?
Was it a dead end? Heh. Heh. Heh. Never underestimate the brain of the former First Division Commander.
Luckily, back in the day, I was a massive research nerd when it came to 'Magic Circles' and 'Runes'—the archaic discipline everyone else called obsolete! Modern mages always mocked it: "We chant spells orally nowadays. Who wastes time drawing magic circles anymore?"
Little did they know, magic circles are the most broken cheat code! As long as the geometric logic is sound, it doesn't matter what medium you use to draw it—it will activate! Draw a fire array with 'paint,' and you get a blazing bonfire. Draw it with 'blood,' and you might summon a high-tier fire spirit.
But right now, in this empty rock crevice, I had no paint, no blood (and no desire to self-harm). I only had one thing...
My piss.