“Welcome to Aseavell, inhabitants of a different world.”

Hearing a resounding voice, I looked up from the ground. I was kneeling on my hands and knees due to a bad case of vertigo I felt a few seconds ago.

He was a man in a full-plate golden armor like the one you’d see in a medieval-themed movie. His facial features were hidden, but he sounded like a man in his forties.

“Kehum!”

A round of chesty cough pulled my eyes away from the armored man. It was a girl around the same age as me. She wore outdoor tracks for running. She even had her headphones on. Hip-hop beats were coming out from them.

Did she got kidnapped while on a jog?

Wait? Who the hell jogs in the middle of the day?

She started to dry heave, taking in large gulps of air with each breath.

“You alright?” I asked, worried. Hesitating for a bit, I reached out and rubbed her back to ease her cough.

I looked around while waiting for her reply. There were eighteen more people in a similar condition to us. Some were sitting on their ass, and others were on their knees. A few were straight-up lying face down.

No one seemed to have recovered from their strange state.

My heart sunk to the pit of my stomach.

You’ve awakened the skill “Tenacious”

What?

Something blue was floating in the corner of my eyes. It looked suspiciously like the UI of an old-school RPG. I’d know since I used to play’em a lot when I was a kid.

“What? What happened to us?”

“I was going to college… where am I? What is this place?”

“Sally!? Where are you, Sally? Mommy’s looking for you!”

I pushed back the investigation of this strange hallucination in favor of looking around myself. People were gradually coming to their senses. And soon, someone will ask the million-dollar question.

“You must be confused about your situation, inhabitants from another world. But, fret not—” I turned at the glittering man, wondering what he’d say. “—by the orders of King Auri the 3rd, you have me, Lavei the Immovable, as your guide.”

“What are you?” A raspy voice resounded throughout the underground hall. I gave the man who spoke a thumbs up in my heart.

Finally, someone asked the most important question. I looked on at the armored man, waiting for his reply. There were a lot of questions in my head, and I’m sure the others were also the same.

What is this place? Who is this king Auri? Why is this man cosplaying?

I wanted answers to all the above questions.

XXX

Imps had three inherent abilities.

Infrared vision.

Shapeshift.

Beastial Diet.

The first two should be self-explanatory enough to understand.

One allows me to see in the range of the infrared spectrum. The other enables me to shape any part of my body into anything I envision.

Simple, no?

…as if.

Have you ever tried writing with your left hand while being a righty? Using Shapeshift was ten times more difficult. But, I think ‘difficult’ isn’t the right word. Honestly, it was more awkward.

After I activated the inherent ability, the muscles and veins wiggled under my skin like maggots on a rotting corpse. Graphic visual aside, my hand numbed to a degree where I couldn’t even feel them. If it was not because I could see them clearly with my infrared eyes, I’d have thought they fell off.

By now, I’ve already used it more than a hundred times. Yet, I couldn’t still get used to the squirming veins. It was too disgusting to look at. Yuck!

The transformation took about half a minute. The goblin was still trying to get out of the trap. Limited intelligence sure is a curse.

I looked at my hand. All four fingers of mine had turned into sharp-edged blades resembling kitchen knives. The other end of these blades had thick veins that glowed red in my infrared vision and pulsed rhythmically.

I couldn’t bend them anymore since they didn’t have joints. But it was enough.

I crept up behind the unaware goblin. The darkness gave me an excellent cover, minimizing the sounds of even my breathing. It was all thanks to the perk I have—Shade Spawn.

Once I was close enough to reach it, I attacked. Extending my fingers into a claw, I swiped at the monster horizontally. My target was its neck.

Swash!

A miss!

No! More like, I miscalculated my height. My finger-knives tore open three horizontal lines on its back instead of the neck.

“Krooarr!!”

Realizing my screw-up, I tried to back away. But, I didn’t realize how slow I was until the goblin’s elbow slugged me on my nose.

I really hurt, bringing tears down my eyes. Ducking under its mad swings, I crawled away.

[-2 HP] [HP: 28/30]

A blue window appeared, informing me of how much health I’ve left. Enduring the pain, I hastily backed away from the bleeding goblin. Any part of their body fluids is a poison, and it was most potent in their blood.

Better to avoid it until it dies.

Ding!

You have inflicted status effect Bleeding on your target. Every second it’ll lose 0.5% HP

Wow!

I didn’t know the [System] could do this as well. It was something I obtained when I appeared in this world. There were many things I don’t know about it. Besides, it changed to something else after I became a monster.

I resisted the urge to scratch my nose. Given the sharpness of my knife-fingers, I might’ve to join the goblin too. That’d be an incredibly dumb way to die. No thank you. I can resist the urge.

I don’t know the max HP of a goblin, but from how fast the blood oozing out from the wound on its back, I’m sure it’ll only survive a few minutes at best.

The goblin’s flailing slowed down considerably. A pool of blood gathered around its legs quite fast. Two minutes after that, it could no longer stand with its legs. Letting out a few pitiful whimpers, it laid face-down on the ground.

I observed keenly as the red glow of its body gradually dulled. At some point, it completely vanished, leaving only the green aura around its frame.

Seconds after that, a system message popped up.

You’ve killed Juvenile Goblin x1

+10 Evolution Points

Warning! You are about to enter ‘hunger’ state

Fuck!

I couldn’t even celebrate my first-ever victory over a monster after coming to this world. I’ve to eat something that’d fill my stomach. No matter what, I must avoid getting that status effect.

These few days, I ate nothing but the bones scattered around the dark corridor. It tasted horrible. While eating, I felt a profound sense of rejection that came from my very soul. But the fear of once more entering the hunger state allowed me to curb it.

I turned at the goblin corpse.

Should I eat it? –I asked myself as I approached it. My body trembled, and my stomach churned at the thought of eating it.

Aside from their poisonous bodies, a goblin’s frame looks similar to a human child's. It was the reason why I was hesitating. No matter how much I steeled my nerves, I still couldn’t take that step.

Warning! You’ll enter ‘hunger’ in ten seconds.

[Ten… nine… eight…]

A countdown started at the periphery of my vision. As if it was already not hard enough!

I stared at the corpse and gritted my teeth. Pointy shark-like teeth dug into my dry lips, drawing out blood.

It’s for survival –I said to myself as I took the goblin’s hands to my mouth.

My heart was beating fast inside my chest while the rejection intensified. I almost vomited even before I bit into the flesh.

[Five… four… three…]

I closed my eyes to the reality and sunk my teeth into the arm of the goblin.