Elegy from Another World

I cried for who knows how long, until my tears ran dry and my throat was hoarse, before I slowly stopped. The suffocating pain in my chest was still there, but after the intense emotional storm, all that remained was exhaustion and a near-numb calm. I stood up, patted my clothes, which were covered in dust and tear stains, and took a deep breath of the damp, cold air in the cave.

I can't wallow in sadness forever, I told myself. At the very least, I need to figure out what's going on in this temporary shelter.

I stretched out my palm, gathering magic power. A soft sphere of light formed in my palm, dispelling the darkness deep within the cave. Using the light, I cautiously explored forward. The cave was deeper than I had expected, winding downwards. After about five minutes, it seemed to end there, revealing a rough rock wall. But just as the sphere of light drew near, I noticed something unusual about the ground beneath my feet—it wasn't natural rock, but an unusually smooth, gray wall that clashed with its surroundings, like some kind of man-made object.

Without hesitation, I bombarded the wall with water pressure magic. As debris flew, a large hole appeared in the wall. Surprisingly, instead of more rock behind the hole, a uniform, eerie pink light shone through.

I cautiously peered down into a vast space. The walls were protruding pink structures, radiating a self-generating magical glow that didn't rely on any external light source, illuminating the entire space as bright as day. I took a deep breath and leaped down.

My footing landed on a hard, slightly springy surface. This underground space was far more vast than it appeared from the entrance, and I walked forward along the only passage. The deeper I went, the more unsettling the surroundings became. The initial pink walls, which seemed to be made of some special material, gradually transformed into living, slightly pulsating flesh-colored membranes! Touching them, I could clearly feel the texture of muscles and their warmth, as if I were walking inside the body of some enormous beast.

"This place... is too eerie." I clenched my fists, magic flowing through my body, ready to deal with any unexpected situation.

Sure enough, as soon as the thought crossed my mind, several slippery, octopus-like limbs suddenly and silently emerged from the fleshy walls on both sides, swiftly wrapping around my hands and feet!

"Hmph!" I snorted coldly, and the tri-colored magic short blade that had been gathered in my hand was instantly swung out. A flash of cold light, and several tentacles were severed in response, falling to the ground still twitching slightly.

More tentacles attacked from all directions, but I quickly realized that their attack methods were very simple: only wrapping and binding. Their strength wasn't particularly great, and there was absolutely no sign of them using magic. I easily cut through the ever-surging tentacles with my short blade while frowning in thought.

Their attack power is so weak? Either the defense mechanisms here are just for show, or... their purpose is not to kill at all. Considering this environment, which resembles the inside of a living organism, and the symbolic tentacles, an unpleasant possibility, common in some games from my previous life, came to mind—they might be after this body's "reproductive" function and want to capture a suitable "mother".

A chill ran down my spine at the thought. I shook my head, temporarily suppressing these unsettling speculations. My immediate priority was to uncover the core secrets of this place.

The deeper I went, the more tentacles appeared. Although they weren't fatal, the relentless harassment was incredibly annoying. I abandoned close combat and recalled a high-level technique I'd recently read in an ancient magic book. I highly compressed my magic, weaving it into countless extremely fine threads, and then manipulated these invisible threads to spread out like a net, silently seeping into the surrounding flesh and the interior of the attacking tentacles.

"Disintegrate." I whispered the activation incantation.

The next moment, a horrifying scene unfolded! The areas permeated by the magic threads, whether tentacles or flesh walls, seemed to explode from the inside out, instantly shattering and collapsing! Like an object that had been rapidly frozen and then struck hard, it turned into countless tiny pieces of flesh and tissue fluid, scattering all over the ground with a splash! Clearing out a large empty area.

Using this powerful clearing magic, I was able to advance quickly. After walking for about ten more minutes, a huge door appeared at the end of the passage—a door made entirely of writhing, veiny chunks of flesh!

There was no doorknob, no keyhole. I tried to push it open with force, and the fleshy door made a sticky sound as it slowly opened inward.

Behind the door was an extremely spacious circular hall. In the center of the hall, a huge, rhomboid crystal emitting a soft pink light floated silently in mid-air. Below the crystal was a structure similarly made of flesh and blood, resembling an altar.

What really made my heart skip a beat was that there was a person standing in front of the altar!

A living, breathing human being! The appearance of a human in this utterly bizarre place filled me with far more alarm and fear than any monster. I immediately assumed a fighting stance, my magical short blade coalescing in my hand once more, my eyes fixed on the figure with its back to me.

He seemed to sense my arrival and slowly turned around. I couldn't see his face because he was shrouded in a large cloak. Then, I saw him calmly take something small and shimmering from his pocket.

The next instant—fast! Indescribably fast! Surpassing the limits of visual capture and neural reaction!

I didn't even see what happened. I just felt an irresistible force sweep over my body, my vision suddenly spun around, and I crashed heavily onto the slippery membrane on the ground.

I tried to move, but found I had lost most of my control over my body. I looked down in horror—

My limbs, severed cleanly at the shoulders and thighs, vanished completely! The wounds were eerily smooth, without bleeding, as if they had been instantly severed by something extremely sharp and fast. Even more terrifying, I felt a strange emptiness in my chest and abdomen... some of my internal organs had also disappeared in that incomprehensible attack!

There was no pain; the constant burning transformed all physical suffering. But the cold despair of instantly losing most of one's body parts and life rapidly slipping away was more suffocating than any pain.

I was lying on the ground, with a pitifully low vantage point, only able to see the high, pulsating flesh-colored ceiling.

Lost.

They were not even in the same league. They couldn't even understand how the opponent attacked.