The eggs squirmed. Wait…why were they squirming? I felt an impending doom coming. Brothers and sisters, it's not good to hatch right now. A cyclops is waiting for all of you, you can't hatch now. You weren't supposed to hatch for another hour.
Why in heaven's sake are they moving now? One popped out of the membrane, and another, then another. No…no…no…not now! I tried pushing one back inside the membrane, but the cluster trembled violently. Then, one by one, all of them popped out.
No, you can't! You have to go back inside. I did my best to push them back inside, but instead, I was pushed helplessly forward. No…out. And before I knew it, I was in front of the cyclops, staring eye to eye with it.
This was not what I planned. I didn't mean to die this early. God! I had the urge to cry right now.
It didn't move. It didn't open its mouth. It just stared at me for what seemed like forever. Should I feel relieved that it's not eating me? Slowly, I started to move. Testing my luck. Trying to make myself smaller and slip away, at the same time wishing it wouldn't notice.
Then I felt something touch me, as gentle as it could. I froze. One of its feelers nudged me back to my place. I watched as its other feelers ushered the other hatchlings into a big circle right where I had been. A realization occurred to me. It wasn't sparing me or ignoring me, it just thought it was more efficient to gulp all of us in one go.
My chest tightened as I bit my lip, anger rising inside me. How infuriating is this! If this is how it's going to be I will fight.
My body jerked. No, I forced it to. The soft mass that was my body twisted, squirming against the water, against nothing, against everything. I pushed. Again. Harder. My mouth opened, or at least, I tried to open it. A weak motion. Useless. Move! My body writhed, uncoordinated, pathetic, but I didn't stop. I don't want to.
That oversized, one-eyed freak who is ugly as hell… standing there like it owned everything. My vision shook. My thoughts scattered—but one thing stayed. I'm not going down like this.
I thrashed violently as I could. My body twisted, thrashed against the pressure, against everything holding me in place. But let's face it, how much can a hatchling even do? I probably looked like a wriggling worm. Damn it! That thought made me furious and I pushed harder, harder than I could until something inside me snapped.
Not pain, but something else, and it's inside. A spark. Then something lit up. A node. Deep within the network, it's pulsing. My body jerked faster this time, then it calmed down.
The world shifted. No, I moved. A burst. Although a short distance, I moved. Sudden…uncontrolled but real.
[ New Gene Unlocked ]
A gene… unlocked on its own? Am I finally getting lucky? Did my persistence reach heaven and bless me with an escape path? I don't know. But right now, I felt like crying. I sobbed silently. My birth has been nothing but hardship and this small change. This tiny hope. Made me believe that maybe everything will be alright as long as I don't give up.
Now what gene have I unlocked?
Light flickered and traced into one of the nodes and stopped on one of the dimly let nodes then shined brightly.
[ Gene Slot: J ]
[ Gene: Burst Locomotion ]
[ Classification: Normal ]
[ Ability: ]
- Instant acceleration
- Short-range escape bursts
- Sudden directional movement
[ Limitation: ]
- Causes temporary body strain
- Limited control at low development
- Repeated use may damage tissue
A laugh escaped me. "Yes—!" I can move. Finally! This is exactly what I need. A quick way to escape, since I can't fight it. Not yet, but I swear once I grow stronger, I'll come back here and make a mess out of this cyclops for making me suffer. I'll definitely make it pay.
But the limitation is that it can cause temporary strain, and repeated use can cause damage. If I'm not careful, I won't die from getting eaten. I'll die trying to escape.
Why does this still feel hopeless?
No! Right now, I have perception and burst. If I could just use them properly. I could plan my escape. I frowned.
Why do I feel skeptical about planning an escape? I feel like… like something will go wrong again?
No. Stay positive. I'm not completely helpless now. I could escape.
Yes, I will escape. I can—
Before I could finish my sentence, I felt something terrifying that made my body freeze.
I slowly looked around and saw shadows. Huge shadows stretched across the seabed and above, and they were moving…
Moving…closer?
Oh, come on!
The water felt suffocating. My body instinctively shrank, trying to make myself as small as possible. If my shell were fully developed, I would've hidden inside it without hesitation. The surroundings grew heavy, crushing, suffocatinglike pressure closing in from all directions. Even the cyclops froze. Its feelers hung midair, completely still, while the hatchlings around me pressed together as if trying to merge into one.
I looked ahead. Something massive loomed in the distance.
It was long—no, not just long… enormous. Its body stretched like a drifting bus through the abyss, thick and heavy, yet disturbingly controlled. The surface of its body was uneven, layered with ridges and hardened plates that looked like a fusion of shell and stone, as though the seabed itself had grown into a living form.
Its limbs—appendages, if they could even be called that, extended outward in slow, deliberate motion. They resembled a cross between paddles and feet, each one massive, broad, and heavy enough to crush anything beneath them. When they moved, they didn't simply push through the water, they displaced it. The surrounding currents bent around them, dragged by their weight alone.
There was no visible haste in its movement.
And yet… Nothing about it felt slow.
Every motion carried a quiet inevitability, as if distance meant nothing to it. One step, and it was closer. Another, and it had already crossed what should have taken seconds.
Its underside shifted constantly. Subtle ripples moved beneath its body, as if smaller structures, hidden, unseen, were working in tandem with its massive limbs, allowing it to glide when needed, or lunge when it chose to.
Then something else moved. A second creature.
It looked like a spider... but, like, wrong? It stood low against the seabed, its massive body suspended by long, curved limbs that dug into the ground like anchors. Each leg was thick and uneven, layered with rough, jagged textures that looked less like flesh and more like corroded stone fused with something alive. Mud and dark growth clung to its surface, trailing downward in strands that swayed gently with the water.
F***! Is that really a starfish?
It shouldn't be moving like that.
Its body stretched wide across the seabed, its five thick limbs digging into the ground, yet it didn't crawl the way it should. It surged. Fast. Unnaturally fast.
Then I saw it. Beneath its body, hidden in the shadows, something moved.
Tentacles. Dozens of them.
My thoughts went blank. Just when I thought I had the chance to escape, I'm doomed again. Am I not the son of heaven? Then why does it feel like the universe is doing everything it can to make sure I don't survive at all?