119. Human Garden (8)
119. Human Garden (8)
The ceiling, about 5 meters high, was adorned with ornate patterns and chandeliers befitting its height.
The clean yet elegant interior was such that anyone seeing it would think it was the room of a very high-ranking noble or royalty.
But this place is not a simple room.
I turned my head and met my own eyes reflected in the mirror that filled one entire wall.
From this side, it looks like an ordinary mirror, but from outside, it's not a mirror at all—it's a glass pane through which the entire room is clearly visible.
A normal room typically refers to an independent space surrounded by walls.
So being in a room should give a sense of stability and comfort, but this place, because of that one mirror, feels incredibly unpleasant.
Through that mirror, people outside can watch you. What's even more chilling is that because it looks like a mirror from the inside, you never know when or at what moment someone might be watching.
"Is the temperature to your liking?"
At the voice beside me, I tore my gaze away from my reflection and looked at Amber, who was wiping my body as if handling fine porcelain.
"Ah... um... it's fine."
"I'm relieved. My time as a human was so long ago that I had trouble finding the right temperature for a human, so I asked just in case."
Her blonde hair, tied up in a bun, didn't have a single strand out of place, and the maid outfit she was wearing didn't have a single wrinkle.
Amber looked perfect enough to draw admiration from anyone.
You'd never think she was once an adventurer. Her appearance was flawless, and now she was wiping down my body.
Her delicate touch and the soft towel, dampened with water that was just warm enough to keep me comfortable, made my entire body feel languid.
But I had to be careful.
The Amber currently wiping my body is not human.
She is a Creature—a monster that gave up being human.
'At least it's not that woman, I suppose?'
Unlike the woman named Yui, Amber looks human at first glance.
Yui is revolting just to look at.
Her entire body was blooming with flowers, vines crawling across her skin. Even though I'd seen countless monsters, demons, and dark beings as an S-rank adventurer, it was enough to make my skin crawl.
Yui had changed so much that anyone would shout "monster" the moment they saw her, but Amber, standing before me now, looks just like an ordinary person.
That is, if you don't look at her eyes.
Amber always keeps one eye closed.
At first, I thought she might be missing an eye. But one day, the moment she opened that eye, I realized why she kept it shut.
Inside that closed eye, there were more eyes. Countless eyes, each rolling around independently. You have no idea how horrifying that sight is.
Swish— Swish—
During the month I've been living here, I've been able to gather a lot of information.
First, this woman named Amber, who is tending to me as if I were some precious porcelain, holds a very high position in this colony.
Originally, she was the Queen's handmaiden, but now she's by my side, taking care of me.
No, "watching over me" is probably more accurate.
Besides, this care isn't for my sake.
I lowered my head and saw my belly, swollen as if I were full-term, and my breasts, now so large that I could barely hold them with both hands, and my curvaceous body that could no longer be described as muscular.
'They're taking care of the monster inside my womb.'
After undergoing body modification by a Creature called Evolute, the body I had built through a lifetime of real combat and training was completely gone, replaced by a body more lecherous than a whore's.
And with that lecherous body, I became pregnant with a Creature's offspring.
When I came to my senses after some time had passed, I immediately tried to kill myself.
Because the moment I opened my eyes, seeing my slightly bulging belly, I thought living like this was too horrifying.
Isn't it too terrible a life—not even dying like a human, but having to carry and give birth to a monster that kills humans?
My suicide attempt was, of course, impossible.
This outfit I'm wearing right now?
It's not just clothes—it's a Creature.
The moment I tried to kill myself, my clothes suddenly transformed, forming arrows of mana from themselves, and grabbed my hands just as I was about to drive them into my own heart.
And it didn't end there. Amber, who is by my side almost 24 hours a day, handles everything for me—meals, baths, bathroom calls, all of it—staying right next to me.
At first, I kept struggling to die.
Because after struggling a few times, I realized those monsters couldn't harm me.
It seems that the monster offspring growing inside my womb right now is very important to them.
I tried to keep struggling by using that fact, but that struggle didn't last long.
My clothes turned into tentacles, grabbing my limbs, and one tentacle forced its way into my mouth, all the way down to my stomach, to force-feed me, while other tentacles entered my urethra and anus, taking care of all my bathroom needs.
All I could do was blink my eyes and breathe through my nose.
I tried to die deliberately by holding my breath, but my brain wouldn't allow it.
In the end, within less than a week, I found myself looking at Amber pleadingly.
Because I didn't want to lose all my free will like this and become nothing more than a machine for birthing Creatures.
Fortunately, Amber seemed to read my eyes and released me.
Since I couldn't die anyway, and I had no choice but to give birth to Creatures here, I figured it was better to have at least a little free will and receive care, rather than having none at all.
This alone made me realize just how broken my will had become.
I'm sure no woman in this situation would choose otherwise.
Living here under Amber's care, except for being pregnant with a Creature's offspring, I lived quite comfortably.
And naturally, I grew closer to Amber through our conversations.
Not because I had given up everything and decided to side with the colony.
It was to gather information about this place by talking with Amber, even if just a little.
Just in case—if there was even a 0.1% chance of escaping from here—I wanted to pass on information about the Creatures to others.
Having been together almost 24/7 for a month, it was impossible not to grow close to Amber.
However, the feeling of growing closer to me wasn't like human to human, but more like she saw me as a pet. But that didn't matter to me.
'I will definitely escape this place.'
The problem is Jena, the youngest of our party.
I've already given up on that Hero brat and the Mage.
I'm not stuck in this room all day—once a day, I go to a place called the Breeding Ground for a check-up.
On my way to that Breeding Ground, I saw them—the ones I killed with my own hands—brought back to life by the humans who sided with the monsters, slowly turning into monsters day by day.
Their human forms were already completely gone, replaced by horrific-looking monsters encased in cocoons.
I consider those bastards dead from the moment I killed them.
According to Evolute, Jena would never be killed or turned into a Creature.
He said not to worry because she needs to be experimented on in a pure human state, just like me.
But who would believe that?
I'm technically a pure human too, yet my body is now so broken that I can't even live a normal life.
"Now, let's go to the Evolution Room for today's health check-up."
At Amber's words, I nodded.
==
"Kyaa! Ah!"
"Hnng... ngh!"
"Oh, gogoh!"
As I entered the Evolution Room, I was reminded of just how comfortable my time here actually is.
The Evolution Room is the domain of that tentacle Creature called Evolute.
This place is truly horrifying—a space where countless humans and Creatures are used as test subjects.
The area I'm passing through now has numerous women lined up in a row, spraying their sexual fluids everywhere.
I don't know what kind of experiment is being conducted, but I know what kind of end awaits these people.
Because last time, I saw Evolute simply devour someone who had collapsed.
Its tentacles casually opened a mouth and swallowed their head whole.
What's terrifying is that it didn't chew them—it dissolved them.
The collapsed woman regained consciousness from the pain and clawed at the tentacles covering her head until her nails tore off and bled, but there was no way an ordinary human's strength could overcome it.
In the end, I watched as her head completely dissolved and died, and the tentacles swallowed the remaining body whole.
That scene was so pitiful and horrifying that it's still etched in my memory.
Evolute even knew I was in shock and apologized.
But even that apology, I know, was only because he understood that my shock could affect the Creature I'm pregnant with.
It makes me angry, but that Creature Evolute is truly intelligent.
He's the smartest and most skilled doctor I've ever encountered.
I suppose he gained that skill through experimenting on countless humans and Creatures.
[ Today. High. Probability. Of. Birth. ]
"Huh?"
As I entered Evolute's examination room and was receiving treatment, Evolute uttered the word "birth."
Hearing that, my entire body stiffened.
I had already suspected that I would give birth soon.
But the moment it became reality, my entire body was filled with fear.