Hope. That's what the little flickering light that suddenly appeared in the distance was. That was the first time anything has ever changed since he appeared in this dark place where time seemed to come to a stop.
When he saw the light Leo couldn't help but feel that it looked like a lonely firefly flying in the dark night. It was lonely, just like he was.
Despite its small size, that firefly was able to light a powerful fire of hope in Leo. It was as if he was seeing his long-awaited savior.
Slowly but surely, the light neared Leo and as it neared him it kept growing. By the time it reached him, it had grown from a little firefly to a massive gate the size of a skyscraper.
'Ah, and now what?' Leo thought, looking at the massive gate standing in front of him.
However, before he could complain too much, he felt a great pull coming from deep within the gate. And, unable to resist, he could only let his consciousness get dragged away, hoping that whatever was pulling him meant no harm.
****
Aria, Asteria mainland.
On a not-so-specific day, a being foreign to this world woke up. At the time, no one was aware of this being, and even if they were, nobody would find it worthy of their attention, unless they were a cat lover.
But without them knowing this being held the potential to shake their world to its core, change many people's destiny, and whatnot. Maybe this being would just end as someone else's snack or stepping stone, ending its epic before it could even start.
Anyway, none of this was this being's concern for the moment as all it was feeling right now was confusion and a head-splitting pain.
'Gasp...'
'Ugh, was this damn thing trying to kill me? I was almost split in two,' Leo thought when once again he woke up in an unfamiliar place.
'Arghh, this pain is killing me. What's even happening to me again? Wasn't that light supposed to be my saving grace? Why was it so painful?' he muttered, looking at his surroundings.
Because he was almost blinded just a moment ago and with the head-splitting pain he was feeling now, Leo was having a hard time taking in his surroundings.
Waiting some time for the pain to alleviate, Leo could finally see around him. For him that was already a piece of good news, at least he was sure that he wasn't in that dark and cold place anymore. Despite the place being dimly lit, he was somehow able to see around him.
From what he saw, he was able to guess he was in a cage... wait, a cage!? Leo couldn't help but feel intrigued by his unsightly location. But that was not all as the surrounding scenery was enough to drench him in cold sweats.
'Seem like I wasn't in a coma after all,' he thought while looking at the scene in front of him.
He was currently in a cave or some kind of underground structure. All around him there were skinny people in rags that were busily moving around heavy loads while being whipped and hurled abuse at by bulky and horrendous-looking monsters. On the floor, some people were sprawled weakly, they were in extremely bad shape and looked like they were on their last breaths, and some were already dead. In a cage beside him, there were a bunch of young girls tied up, they were dirty and each of them, except one, had a look of despair on their face.
Suddenly, a shrill scream rang through the cave. "Argh, please stop, please, I won't do it again," a middle-aged man in ragged clothes screamed atop his lungs while being brutally beaten by a pig-faced monster, Leo was extremely familiar with, unfortunately.
'What the fuck, an Orc? Oh my god. Where did I fall?' Leo screamed internally, wishing he could make his presence the least noticeable possible.
Smack…. Smack…. Smack…. Smack.
"Grrr, ...…. shut up. If everything not ready before Great Sun falls, chief kill you all, gru-gru," a muscular and tall orc ordered in a growl-like voice as he ruthlessly beat the man with his whip.
Each time the man was hit by the barbed whip in the orc hand he would let out a blood-curdling scream and the orc would hit him with renewed vigor. It was as if the scream and plea of the man were fueling the bloodlust of the orc who had a delighted expression on his face.
Leo couldn't help but shudder in front of such a display of violence and madness and looking at the reaction of the other prisoners he knew he wasn't the only one that was feeling afraid.
The other prisoners just continued with whatever they were doing and took great care to not go near the commotion. They didn't even dare to look at the scene too much, it was like they were afraid that such a simple action could turn the ire of the orc towards them.
'Ok, this place looks like hell. I know I thought I would go to hell, but now I'm not so sure anymore,' Leo thought bitterly.
What he was seeing was too horrendous, one couldn't understand if they weren't seeing it themselves.
The blood flying in the air, the scream, the look of despair and pain on the prisoner's face, the stench of death overflowing the cave. For a modern person like him, witnessing such a scene was too much to handle.
'Damn it, looks like I got isekai'Ed. But I didn't get the lucky draw,' Leo concluded after taking a deep breath.
About that kind of thing, Leo wasn't uneducated, with all he had seen and everything that happened to him starting from his death to now it was quite easy to understand. Even some half-brained moron could have guessed that much.
'I suddenly feel like I got scammed. I am not even asking to transmigrate into the trash of a good family or be summoned as some kind of hero. I would be content with being sent to a peaceful place and being a nobody but no, what I got is being sent to such a hellish place,' Leo complained, thinking about his unfair fate.
When others got to talk to God, woke up in a palace, or were born in a good family after their rebirth, here he was waking up in the middle of a horror movie stage.
Meanwhile, the orc continued to beat the skinny man, turning him into a bloodied mess. Leo quickly turned his attention from that scene, he couldn't bear it anymore.
'Now that I think about it, I had so much on my mind that I didn't even check what my body looks like. I hope I am not in a bad shape like them,' Leo was suddenly filled with concern and decided to check the body he transmigrated in.
Earlier, when he was looking at his surroundings, he couldn't help but notice that everything around looked much bigger than he was used to.
The ceiling of the place was extremely high up, the floor was awfully close and the people around him looked like giants.
At the time he didn't put too much attention on it, as there was too much to think about. Well, he barely spent a minute in this place and already needed to deal with so many changes and variables, so it was understandable.
But now he guessed it was the right time to check his transmigrated self. If his body was as sickly as the one of those around him, it would be game over.
However, before he could continue with his trail of thought he was interrupted by a scary presence that suddenly entered the cave through one of the tunnels and gradually neared him.
The new orc was taller than the one present in the cave, his body was leaner and there were strange tattoos all across his face.
Unlike the other orcs that were naked apart from the little piece of clothes hanging around their waist, this one was fully dressed in a robe made from animal fur and had many accessories on his body. There was an impressive pressure emanating from his body and Leo couldn't but gulp a little as he watched him walk in his direction.
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'Is this the boss?' Leo asked himself when he saw the different attire of the orc, and how respectful the other orcs (orc guardian) acted towards him.
"Are those the sacrifices Jor'um and his party caught for the ritual, gru-gru?" the newcomers asked in a more human-like voice as he calmly walked near Leo and the girl's cage.
'Sacrifice!?' Leo repeated as an ominous feeling started building up in his heart. If they were talking about the kind of sacrifice he was thinking about, his situation was grimmer than he imagined it to be.
"Yes, Lord shaman, gru-gru," the orc following behind answered in a submissive voice while keeping his head lowered.
"Good, Jor'um didn't disappoint me once again, gru-gru," the shaman said, sizing up the girls as if they were some goods put on display.
The girls, unable to bear the shaman gaze, hurriedly backed away in a corner of the cage and huddled together, throwing fearful gazes at the two monsters standing before them.
After looking at the girls, the shaman turned towards Leo's cage, looking at him with interest.
'No, don't be interested in me. Just pass your way. I'm a bad sacrifice,' Leo thought, looking warily at the shaman.
"That's the shadow beast he found, gru-gru," the shaman asked while looking at Leo.
'Uh, Beast???' Leo thought while throwing a puzzled gaze at the shaman.
"Yes, Lord shaman, gru-gru," the henchman once again answered.
"Good, good, I didn't really think Jor'um would be able to find a shadow beast since they are quite rare in this forest. Even though it is weak it is already good. The chance of success for the ritual would greatly increase, gru-gru," the shaman said with a wicked smile.
'Uh, who the hell is a beast?' Leo asked and looked around the cage, trying to see if there was anyone else inside.
'There's no one. In that case, it means they are talking about me,' Leo thought and he immediately started checking upon his body.
Looking at his body, Leo was left speechless by what he saw and started to think that something was wrong with him.
'What the hell? I am becoming crazy, right? There's no way what I saw was true. It's surely a lie. Or maybe I am having a trip. Yes, that should be it. This whole thing just reached a whole new level,' Leo thought, trying to find a logical answer to the crazy thing he was seeing.
Glancing down at his body, Leo was once again left speechless by what he saw. He was expecting many things when he decided to check on his body, but he wasn't ready for that.
'I AM A BEAST. A DAMN ANIMAL.' he screamed, looking at the little paws in front of him.
He didn't have a human body anymore. His body was the size of a half-grown kitten; it was covered by soft and abundant gray-blue fur, his hands and feet replaced by paws with sharp claws, and there was a long and thin tail behind him.
He didn't understand how it was possible, but he was a damn ball of fluff. He wasn't sure which kind of beast he was, but it looked like it was a feline one.
'Oh, so that was a dream all along,' Leo muttered as something seemed to break in his mind. He managed to accept a lot of things in a short time, but his current body was the straw that broke the camel's back.
Laying on the ground, he closed his eyes and just lay there pretending that nothing he saw till here was real.
He was going to wake up in his bed and he would happily return to school. That's it.
He was going to wake up in his bed and he would happily return to school. That's it. No, even better, everything from his sister's death to now was a nightmare that was going to end soon.
"..."
"Is there something wrong with this beast, gru-gru? Why is it acting all weird suddenly, gru-gru?" the shaman asked when he saw Leo's strange behavior.
"I don't know, gru-gru," the orc answered.
"Hmph, you better pray that nothing happens to it, gru-gru," the shaman said before leaving furiously.
After some time, Leo finally opened his eyes and he couldn't help but become extremely worried as nothing had changed, he was still in hell, and more importantly, he was still a beast.
"FUUUUUUUUUCK," distressed, he let out a curse, but the only thing the people around could hear was a long and angry meow.
Calming down, he started feeling his body another time. If not for the different look, he wouldn't even know it was not his body since it feels like it always belongs to him.
'How could I remain oblivious to this all this time?' he asked. Going from a human body to a beast body was a big change and no matter what, he should have felt something wasn't right. But if that shaman didn't say anything and he didn't check, he was sure he would remain oblivious to it.
It reminded him of stories where some severely injured people only felt pain or discovered they had a missing limb when they saw it. It was the same for him, until the moment he checked on his body, nothing seemed out of place.
'Sigh, guess what's done is done. I can't do anything about it. Still, there is no way I'm going to sit and be used as a sacrifice,' Leo thought as he regained his bearing.
Leo may not be in accord with the event happening in this new life of his, or whatever it was, but there was no way he would waste it like that.
After all, who had ever heard of a transmigrator that didn't shake the world to its core, even more one coming from Earth. The beginning may look grim, but he wanted to believe it would become better, soon.
He wouldn't be the little ugly duck of the team. He would turn into a beautiful swan.
'Ah, before I start daydreaming, I should find a way to get myself out of this sh**. Otherwise, I may receive the kiss of lady death sooner than I could ever want. And I don't want to know what would happen if I were to die once again,' Leo muttered and started thinking about how to run away.
'Ha-ha, It would definitely help if I could have the brain of Michael Scofiuld.' Leo joked as he started to observe the layout of the cave.