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--TheirWorld--

She almost felt it was a shame that the rats could only answer with a hiss. Had they been spirits, then perhaps that would have been even more entertaining. Crouching into an attack stance, she let them start charging toward her first. Taking advantage of their forward momentum, she quickly spotted the injured ones lagging behind and danced her way to them. Their little lives ended with a handful of quick slashes to their small bodies.

A flurry of bright yellow emergency notifications sent her mind into chaos as she observed the remaining to rats:

An item has been lost? Traits? An activated quest? Guin jumped back as the rats skittered toward her with their high pitched little battle cries. She would have to deal with the notifications later.

They went to move. The little muscles under their dirty, oil skin cause the fur to ripple in an unruly way as their claws made sounds against the stone of the catacombs that was very much like nails against a chalkboard. The pair scurried to her, nipping at her ankles with such pitiful amounts of damage that Guin stood and looked down on them.

The futility of their actions brought a smile to her face. Her tongue craved the sweet, metallic taste of the blood of her enemies — and her will was quickly surrendering to it. Reaching down, she picked up one of them by the scruff and looked at it in square in its black, beady eyes. There was no true intelligence there; only instinct. Instinct, and a power that would never match her own. With all her strength, she threw against the wall. It hit with a loud thunk! and collapsed. The other she simply stomped on, stopping its movement save the squirming beneath her feet, and stabbed at its neck, watching it bleed out with a combination of joy and curiosity.

The one that she had thrown was still alive, but it was injured to the point that it could barely move. Guin walked over and ended its misery with a swiftly executed [Backstab].

Looking at the havoc she had created, a sense of satisfaction washed over her that her mind wanted to reject, yet at the same time, wished to embrace. As looked around the hall, she knit her brows together. Her eyes were sharp and her vision clear even through the shadows. Her ears, too, were picking up on sounds she had never associated with her human form. It was as if she had the benefits of her fox form, but in a human form.

The rats turned to bubbles, revealing their treasure chests. Not wanting to lose the potential loot to the spawn timer, Guin went over and collected a few rat teeth and rat skins from the chests, and happily lifted out the [Lost Key] for the High Priest’s quest.

“Lucky!” she sang as she threw it in her bag, double checking to make sure she handed missed anything.

Her eyes fell on the corpse of the player character that the rats had been nibbling on. Player bodies left only a small portion of their gear behind when they died. Though she didn’t like the idea of disrespecting the dead, she could use any gear and supplies she could get her hands on. It was only a game, after all.

Kneeling down to investigate, she brushed its black hair from its face. It was the body of a valkyrian female, who, from what she could tell, was some kind of warrior class. What remained on her body wasn’t worth much, but she too what she could and packed it into her inventory to sell.

Her gaze then drifted to the woman’s stomach, fixating on the area just under her ribcage.

An urge came then, strong, but unfamiliar, drawing her in closer. Her mouth watered as she leaned forward, sniffing at the body. It smelled of sweat and sweet — but not deathly sweet; rather, the woman must have been wearing a perfume that gave an image of a flowery meadow.

What are you doing? She scoffed at herself, coming to her senses and sitting back.

But her eyes traced back, her hand, reaching out. She touched the cool flesh. There was no way for her to know how long they had been dead for — not that she cared much — though she had a brief thought that it would be better if it were fresher. Tracing the outline of the ribs, she pressed in at the peak. With her free hand, she took out her dagger.

The paused, asking herself, What are you doing?

Stop! She screamed in her mind once, twice, a dozen times as her body acted without her.As if possessed, she took the dagger and began to open the woman’s stomach.

One slice.

Two.

While her mind fervently protested, she dug her hand through the corpse, shifting through it. Seeking something. Finding it, she grinned. She withdrew from it the large, deep red organ that she craved.

The player’s liver firm in her hands, her hands dripped from her graceless scavenge.

While there was some part of her that was wondering how a video game avatar even had a liver, what she was really concerned with was the sense of awe, admiration, and glee that ran through her body as she gazed at the thing in her hand.

Don’t you dare! she shouted at herself.

But she drew the organ to her lips and bit down.

It was like she was watching a horror film; as if she were inside the head of a person who was not her. The voice left inside was shouting and screaming as she hungrily are it up until there was nothing left.

Guin stared at her blood covered hands. Slowly, her eyes lifted to the corpse she had just desecrated and she shuttered, breathing in deeply. Looted, and torn apart, the remaining body turned to bubbles, leaving no evidence behind but her own blood stained self.

Her body was cold; even colder, it seemed, than the dead player’s skin had been. Regaining agency over her body, she rubbed her arms, feverish with distress.

There was one other time that she had felt like this. Back in the tutorial; back before she knew that it was Liorax who haunted her — and it had been his doing. That horrible experience that cause her to go through nightmarish delusions as she was only just adjusting to the game.

But this was ten times worse.

“Liorax…” she muttered, slightly dazed. “Liorax… What did you just make me do? What just happened?” For the first time since she had befriended him, however, he did not answer. “Liorax!” She screamed, rocking back and forth, holding herself.

She wiped the tears from her eyes, then looked at the red that covered her hands. She saw the blood that now covered her arms, her legs, she knew her face must have been covered as well.

“It’s wasn’t me…” she whimpered. “It wasn’t…”

Gasping for breath, she put her head in her hands.

Fingers going to clutch her hair to pull on, she yelped and fell back. It hurt. In shock, she looked at her hands. She had naturally long fingers, and often had long nails because she forgot to cut them — but they had never been quite so thick — or sharp. Long, pointed, and slightly curved, they were now far closer to being small daggers than simple nails.

Running her hand along her head, feeling the firm but supple cartridge of the large large, cone shaped ears that had sprouted from her head, she held her breath. She felt them twitch beneath her hand, and quickly buried her hands in her armpits.

So distracted by the blood on her hands, she had failed to notice the physical changes to her own body. What is happening to me? she wondered, her eyes brimming with tears. Stumbling up she leaned against the wall staring at her claws.

Claws....

Claws. Ears. Livers.

Child of the Gumiho.

Child of the Gumiho.

Child of the Gumiho.

‘...but know that the longer you stay here, the longer you remain in the presence of this power, the more it shall become a part of you; for better, or worse.’ ‘...but know that the longer you stay here, the longer you remain in the presence of this power, the more it shall become a part of you; for better, or worse.’