“Bright, contestant number 199, birth name unknown, place of birth unknown, suspected to be Outsider, now under Inner City investigation.”
The big guy ‘Hedgehog’ is imposing, his tone as cold as that used for judging merchandise. He seems to hold animosity towards Bright.
Bright’s heart skips a beat. The other party seems to have much more information than he imagined, even about how the Inner City is investigating him. He ups the danger level of the animal protection group in his mind. While information is shared among Inner City residents, they strictly control the information flowing outwards. Outer City residents cannot easily acquire their information. Either the animal protection group has hacked into the intranet of the Inner City residents, like they did to the show, or they have someone in Inner City.
At the same time, Bright understands that Hedgehog wants to put him in a worse position to ease their forthcoming negotiations. He asks, “is it you guys who managed to somehow send Beauty away?”
The other person laughs, seeming pleased, “letting his ex-customers see snippets from his performance in the show is simple.”
“You can hack into the Inner City intranet.” Bright sounds confident but he is actually testing them. Although Beauty did not reveal information on who he is seeing, someone that has him on such high alert is probably an aristocrat. “What I’m more curious about is whether you did it from the outside or the inside.”
Hedgehog looks at the man fiercely, despising himself for having revealed it accidentally. He unconsciously slips a glance at the white snake in his embrace, who is focused on his drinks right now as if unconcerned with their talk.
Bright’s eyes shine momentarily. The reaction from Hedgehog has proven his first guess that they can hack into the Inner City intranet. This is stirring his heart, because there is a possibility he can get what he wants. Another thing is that he has caught Hedgehog’s expression as he glanced at Snake – there was fright and fear. The man smiles inside as he realises he has found the true leader among them. Plus with how the Snake is the one who is the most animalised here, the animal group may have a hierarchy with that. This proves his judgement indirectly.
Snake also notices his piercing gaze and knows it is useless to keep pretending. He gives in and answers Bright’s question himself, “the most impregnable fortresses are often sieged down from the inside.”
Snake gestures his hand and the other three animals leave their original positions and stand guard somewhere further away, not letting anyone interrupt. Snake seems to have triggered some mechanism and the originally open seats are suddenly surrounded by a veil on all sides. Virtual holograms are projected so that the space becomes isolated, probably from inquisitive gazes of others if some business were to ensue.
In the isolated space even the lights seem more seductive. Snake drinks a few more glasses. He’s been drinking ever since the beginning like an alcoholic. It gets to his head and his cheeks, as well as skin throughout his body seems to have been reddened, almost the same colour as the liquid he was drinking before. All the exposed scales on his arms and neck are reflecting a pink colour.
“Do you want to touch?” The Snake’s eyelids are half-closed. The forked tongue shoots out several times, inviting the man. He leans on the sofa and unbuttons his clothes lightly, exposing the scales that lighten in colour and become more transparent from his neck downwards. It looks clear like it is sculpted out of pink diamonds or crystals. A shred of pink emanating from the silvery whiteness would entice people into holding it and playing with it.
Bright looks at those vertical pupils while sitting motionlessly on his seat, asking, “a patteraless ?”
“You have good eyes.” The vertical pupils dilate showing Snake’s surprise.
Bright is thanking some expert from a ‘divine’ forum thread talking about the origins of species that have been used as a basis for beastwomen. He only knew that one type of snake.
Bright is not a biologist, so he is working his brain hard to recall programmes on CCTV he has seen as a child.
“Pythons have a habit of strangling. They kill their prey with their strong strangling power.” Pythons can sense the location of the heartbeat of their prey. When they strangle it, they will align their strangling about the heartbeat to force it to stop and cause the prey's blood to stop flowing. Their prey dies when they can't even breathe. When he thinks about how lethal pythons are, Bright does not dare to let his guard down.
Snake’s eyes dim for a moment. He caresses the beautiful scales on his arms, lamenting, “it’s just the surface that’s changed. My physical structure is still a human.” Sounding like he wants to immediately genetically transform into a python. It’s long and thick and you can even deep-throat using him.
“…” He doesn’t understand nor does he want to understand how you Citizens think, and sarcastically laughs in his mind.
Bright continues probing him on how much he’s mutated, so that he can judge how dangerous he is, “while pythons are cold-blooded, they like the heat more than the cold. It is best if the environment is hotter than 35 degrees Celsius. The room temperature here seems to be too low for you.” His gaze lands on the alcohol, as if asking silently, so that’s why you’re drinking nonstop?
His laughs are mixed with fricative sounds. The hissing sounds from the Snake have become more frequent. For so long, only the man in front of him has figured that out. Even his subordinates think nothing of that but just assume he’s an alcoholic.
No wonder this number 199 managed to entrap Gentleman, hsss… even he has developed an interest.
The Snake looks over the man from top to bottom, as if determining which location would be most comfortable for strangling. Bright’s goosebumps are tingling, a coldness sweeping down his spine.
They have become a bit more familiar with each other thanks to the talk on the habits of pythons. Bright confesses to ‘Animal Planet’ in his mind again. Though, on the negotiating table, it is not enough to merely express sincerity and a will for cooperation. You need to intimidate as well.
“When the temperature falls below 15 degrees Celsius, pythons will enter a comatose state. If the temperature continues falling, they will die.” Bright says with an indifferent expression, looking as if he just mentioned it off his whim. If you keep staring I’ll throw you into ice water.
The Snake’s eyes turn, acknowledging Bright’s threatening. His expression turns serious, “what made you courageous enough to seek us?” He says, hissing. The vertical pupils devoid of warm-blooded animal emotions are fixed on Bright.
“I’m also curious why you still want to see me after my performance in the sixth episode.”
“Perhaps I was just bored.”
“Perhaps,” Bright says slowly, “but, that cannot be the only factor.”
Snake does not want to admit his interest in him, and increases his stakes, “there are people in our group very displeased with you because you killed many cute shark babes.”
Bright smiles while dissing about how he has never seen babies that are 4~5 metres in length in his mind.
“Humans are animals too. To kill for survival is part of the laws of nature, is it not?”
Snake accepts his explantation tentatively but he is highly disapproving of that. Humans are greedy creatures violent in nature. They are cancerous to the planet and absorb nutrients greedily from their mother without regard for the lives of their fellow creatures. Too many and they’ll cause the end of the world.
Bright sees that the redness has started receding from Snake’s face. As his level in the game gets higher, his senses are now sharper than before. What has also become sharper is his sense of pain, which is a large part of why the previous electrotherapy session gave him such a great trauma.
He prepares to feed Snake more alcohol so that his body temperature does not fall so much that he enters a coma, stopping the conversation short.
He needs the support of the animal group where their great hacking skills and their information channels may help him retrieve the technology for making werewolves. He can use that to exchange for ridding him of his bracelet——The alpha has told him that they have a way to do that.
While Bright does not completely believe them, but with his preliminary investigations these days he discovered to his dismay that he has no better choice. That thing is connected to his nerves and its principles in operation are complex. Even if he were to cut his hand off and take it off while his arm is unattached would still kill him. Destroying it in any way would immediately douse himself with a highly potent poison, the type that can kill a bunch of elephants with just a tiny amount.
Snake stops him from ordering more alcohol, saying, “come to my place.” He puts his index finger to his lips, showing his forked tongue, seductively wrapping it around his finger.
Double the tongue, double the happiness?
Not interested, thank you!
Snake then says, “we need to continue the talk.” There’s something you want, right? You won’t get it if you walk away~
“… Let’s go.” Bright stands up, resigned.
Bright asks someone from the club to inform Beauty before going with the people of the animal group. The atmosphere is strange, especially with Hedgehog whose spikes on his head are all spiked up as if furious. This will be unfriendly to people with claustrophobia, Bright thinks.
Snake brings Bright to a property in the Outer City. Others left them when they arrived.
At Snake’s request, Bright has a shower in the bathroom. When he sees Snake again, he is only wearing pyjamas and still steaming with water dropping from his hair like him. His skin has become even redder, looking very lively.
They go inside a large room. As soon as he enters it Bright can feel how warm it is. The room temperature is probably at 30-odd degrees Celsius, and it is very moist. There’s a light on the ceiling simulating sunlight. There’s trees and grass and all sorts of greenery about. The ground is paved in round stones and white steam is emanating constantly from the ground and the walls so much that the room is foggy. It is a giant sauna room.
Snake gives a comfortable sigh of relief. He removes his excess clothing and walks without shoes on the grounds. He goes beyond that soon enough, the alcohol getting to his brain and the comfortable environment has made Snake highly mentally excited. He lowers his body to the ground and starts twisting and crawling along the grass.
In the thick mist meandering through the room, the green colour of the grass and trees are flowing. There are tinkling sounds from water streams. Under the strong lighting, there are many rainbows, big and small, appearing throughout the branches. Some of them are colourful with all seven colours, some are dim and phantasmal. The scenery is so beautiful it looks like heaven.
On the ground, however, is a humanoid creature that is breathing haggardly while squirming. Scales of a snake continuing down his back all the way. Like his front, the colour turns from deep to light, until it becomes transparent. While the skin on his joints is covered by more deep-coloured keratin scales. The white colour seems to be blocking that beautiful place of his. He is continuously using his body to rub the ground, grass, stones and branches. Every action is accompanied by a low hissing hum. His scales are glistening like a snake that is molting. Or more appropriately, a snake that is transforming into a human.
The serene setting featuring a monstrous existence gives the place a farcical contrast. Bright is stunned silent.
Snake seems to have entered an ecstatic state. He can be said to be mad, because of his actions and how he is completely climaxing by himself without regard for anything else. Yet he can also be said to be wide awake because his eyes are focused and his mental state highly alert.
At this moment, rather than to say he is a person, it is better to call him a python that only has his strangling instincts and desire to hunt remaining.
Hunt… It is an uncomfortable word to use here. Besides Snake here, the only other breathing creature left here is Bright. It’s painstakingly obvious who will be delegated the role of food.
Snake slowly moves towards Bright. His speed is slow as he is not a real snake. Lucky for him, the stone on the ground are smoothed out cobblestones, and he is covered with a layer of beautiful but tough scales, so he does not injure himself.
After a while, he manages to arrive at the foot of Bright’s feet. He puts his tongue out, as if investigating what this new object that has arrived in his territory is. The forked tongue slides past the man’s skin, who does not react in any way.
The man stands there, motionless, as if a tree, silently guarding the piece of land beneath his feet, and that snake that is wrapping itself next to the roots of the tree on that ground.
The vertical pupils are forming a strange gaze. He starts climbing this 2-metre tall pole-like object.
The room temperature is as hot as summer. Snake’s temperature is slightly lower, but still warm. Only that the scales giving a slightly cool feeling are making him a bit uncomfortable. Bright withstands it. This has clearly won favour with the python.
Ah, the new snake-climbing frame is not high, but it is smoother than branches and more comfortable to climb. It is also centrally heated. Snake starts exploring this new frame. Hiss hiss. He sometimes climbs from the bottom to the top in a spiraling manner, sometimes sits across his shoulders like a young kid, sometimes hanging himself inverted on the man’s body with his legs crossed across his neck… Challenging all kinds of tough positions and having great fun. He doesn’t have to even be worried about the frame not being stable enough and falling down.
Bright does not say anything “…”
If he’s not being food, then he can only be a tree. Pythons like staying in its shade or wrapping itself on one.
He doesn’t have a shade because he has no crown, so he’ll have to endure him wrapping all around.
Author’s notes:
Snake is Scientist, first appearing in Chapter 20 when the Inner City aristocrats were talking about the ratings of the show.
He is good at body modification. He turned everyone including himself of the animal group into half-man half-beast
He will be the key to Bright discovering the truth.