WuxiaWorldEU

Chapter 50

Translator: Cheonsa

Editor: pigeon

Chapter 50

　　I vaguely felt an intense and peculiar feeling approaching my legs. It felt both itchy and painful, as if my legs were corroding under thousands of crawling ants. Yet at the same time, it felt similar to having new skin and flesh growing onto my bones

Story translated by Chrysanthemum Garden.

I subconsciously wanted to reach out and touch them, but both of my arms were firmly pressed against the top of my head by a pair of moist, powerful webbed claws, along with a wet, soft object licking around my neck. Soon enough, I felt a penetrating pain behind my ears and around my fingers. It was like thorns were forcibly breaking through my skin or having a parasitic virus struggling its way in.

　　From the pain, I let out a cry from my throat and opened my heavy eyelids.

　　Over the top of my head, the full moon was so close that it looked like it was within an arm’s reach. Under the water’s luminescence, it looked like a smashed, shattered glass marble. This was because my focal length was in disorder, and my vision was too scattered with my head feeling too heavy. I felt extremely dizzy, nearly to the point of vomiting. I could see that the shadow which was pressing me down was Agares, and when I opened my mouth to call him, nothing came out. As the itching began to get more and more intense, it forced me to look down——

　　Oh God, what did I just see?

　My legs were densely covered with silvery, gray scales which, at first glance, looked like a fish tail. However, my two legs were still there, but there were two additional fan-shaped webbed films that sprouted on my feet, hanging in the water with its long length.

　I anxiously lifted my eyes to look at Agares, but before I could see his exact expression, I fainted once again.

　　Darkness swept in from all sides, as if there was a thick fog all around. In an instant, everything disappeared: no moonlight, no sea and no Agares. The pain was gone, and my body seemed to be sinking deeper into the sea water, yet I was aware that I was caught up in a nightmare.

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　　I strived to turn around and swim upwards, but I felt a strong grip on my feet, dragging me down, down, down…

　　Suddenly, while my entire body was sinking down, a flash of light instantly flitted before my eyes.

　　I found myself not knowing why I was in a serene, dark glass corridor. A large fish and a translucent jellyfish floated past me, brushing through mottled traces of water and shadows. They appeared so close to the point that they could be touched with just a stretch of an arm, making them look more real compared to seeing them through a transparent glass wall like before.

　　I faintly felt something was wrong and reached my hand out in perplexity, only to come across a layer of glass.

　　But it was not between me and the fish but between me and the corridor. I was like a dolphin trapped in a large aquarium tank used for spectating.

　　Hey! Hey, what’s going on!　

　　 P sfiifv bea, yea bcis atf ufcaif rbecv bo atf oibklcu kjafg jcrkfgfv yjmx ab wf.

　　Damn it, where am I?

　　P qertfv nlubgberis jujlcra atf agjcrqjgfca yjgglfg atja rfqjgjafv wf jkjs ogbw atf bearlvf kbgiv, yea P ofia lar gfrlilfcmf. Mffilcu rbwfktja oijyyfgujrafv, P aegcfv ab ibbx jgbecv ws reggbecvlcur, jcv, revvfcis, atgbeut atf gfoifmalbc bo atf uijrr, P mjeuta j uilwqrf bo j qjlg bo vjgx jcv uibbws qeqlir.

　　It’s Agares! Through my instinctive tendency, I leaned close to the glass wall. However, what I saw before my eyes left me utterly dumbfounded.

　　Agares wore a black trench coat. The long fishtail on his lower body had shockingly vanished without a trace, replaced with a pair of slender legs in leather pants. Through the reflection in the glass, I saw my appearance instantly.

　　My own legs were wrapped around in a long, silver-gray fishtail, with the fan-shaped caudal fins slowly following along with the flowing current, moving up and down.

　　I looked at Agares in disbelief while he was looking at me deeply with a creased eyebrow. His hands were pressed against the glass, seemingly trying to touch me, but it remained futile. His fingers were white from the pressure, and his blood vessels were visibly bulging. Agares then slowly fisted his hand and slammed it severely against the glass.

　　With a loud sounding bang, several cracks appeared and spread out. When the glass shattered, the world in front of me returned to the darkness instantly.

Story translated by Chrysanthemum Garden.

　　I tried my best to reach out. I spread my fingers, but I only caught open air.

The sudden feeling of panic caused me to open my eyes at once, and, when awareness returned to my body, I immediately sat up and looked at my legs.

　　Fortunately, there was nothing.

　　My legs did not turn into a fishtail. They were still perfectly normal and healthy, back to their original smooth, sleek layers of skin and were not made out of layers of fish scales. Still feeling susceptible, I raised my hand again. Only after confirming that there wasn’t a thin, webbed membrane between my fingers, was I able to exhale in relief. With an overflowing amount of cold sweat, I touched my legs up and down then emotionally gave my knee a kiss, a patient whose leg was almost amputated.

　　Thank goodness, my body didn’t undergo a strange transformation after all.

　　So,what exactly happened with everything before….

　　I felt my emotions and my stream of consciousness all in utter chaos while carefully recalling those real, yet illusionary, like scenes. Looking around, I found myself back in Agares’s nest.

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　　Maybe I had never left here and had only fallen into an illusionary dream ever since the strange merfolk ceremony? I rubbed against my forehead, still not feeling so sure. The pleasure and excitement I felt when Agares took me jumping in the sea and my body’s painful growth just felt so real. They all mix into a conflicting feeling that left a strong aftertaste in my limbs.

　　If it all really had happened, then there must been some sort of trace left, otherwise, there was something really wrong with my brain.

　　Thinking about it, I raised my hand subconsciously and touched the back of my ear. My entire body stiffened—

　　There was a small crack in the back of the earlobe, even some water remained. This immediately reminded me of the feeling of sea water flowing from here when I was brought into the sea by Agares. This evidence proved that those strange transformations actually have taken place in my body. The existence of these gills suddenly shattered my wishful thinking completely.

　　From the shock, a huge amount of pressure on my nerves left me feeling suffocated. I took a few deep breaths, hugged my head, and rubbed my temples violently to prevent myself from fainting again after concluding this incredulous fact; it was all in an attempt to force myself to think calmly.

　　That was right, my body was showing signs of merfolk’s traits. A few moments ago, I had webbed claws, legs that were covered in fish scales, and gills that had grown behind my ears (if they really were gills at all). Plus, I was able to freely breathe in the water. In biological terms, my body had changed, and, in other words, mutations had occurred in my genes.

　　My mind was buzzing with thoughts. I kept thinking back towards a segment in the “Gene Biology” study:

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Gene mutation is the fundamental source of biological variation. There are many factors that can cause genetic mutation, which can be grouped into three basic categories. One is a physical factor: X-rays, lasers, etc. The other is a chemical factor, which refers to substances that can interact with DNA molecules to change the natural properties of the gene: Nitrous acid, base analogs, etc. The third category is a biological factor: including viruses and certain bacteria.

　　At the moment, it could only be the third category!

　　It must have been caused by Agares! Through sexual assaults, he had injected merfolk’s DNA into my body. Their gene cells must have had an extremely aggressive and corrosive characteristic. Like viruses and bacteria, they probably controlled, changed and recombined my chromosomes—perhaps, it was their structure, or their sheer amount—but no matter what the hell it was able to do, those terrible, strange things had caused the death of a portion of my cells. Mine were probably replaced by newborn assimilated cells…

　　The first change…

　　So, that meant there was going to be a second, a third, and Nth time! The end result will be the merfolk gene’s… assimilation!

　　No, no, no, no! Fuck!

　　I stood up and paced around the cave a couple of times. My hand brushed through my hair… each strand laced heavy with sweat.

　　Dammit, what am I still thinking about these for!? I shouldn’t have thought about these theories at all. Even if I were to write the world’s most amazing thesis, it practically held no meaning if I, myself, was the rotten mutated specimen here. I can’t even save myself, the variant sample!

　　I don’t want to be a merman and stay on this island forever. I still want to go back to school and be able to lead a good life with my parents!

　　Calm down. Just calm down, Desharow!

　　The only way to stop the mutation was to inject a serum that could overpower and suppress the merfolk’s genes. I must leave here immediately, and the further away, the better. I must avoid all contacts with Agares. After all, I still have a chance to get my body back to normal. Perhaps, Lafarre and the others brought snake venom serums with them. I don’t know if it’ll work, but it’s worth a try.

　　With these thoughts, I surprisingly calmed down, for I clearly knew that panicking any further would only be useless. At this time, the only person who could save me was myself.

　　So, I carefully leaned forward at the mouth of the cave. Looking into the sea, I did not find Agares nearby. He may have dived into the water to find food or, perhaps, went to deal with the conflicts among the ethnic groups. Apparently, not finding Agares’s trace made me feel more confident in escaping.

　　Turning back towards the small cave inside the nest where Agares’s collection was located, I looted some essential things that were necessary for survival in the jungle. Fortunately, practically everything was available that I could ever need: a somewhat blunt dagger, a telescope, an old-fashioned compass, an iron anchor that could be used as a weapon, an unopened wine bottle that could disinfect wounds, a flint, and some random scattered things.