The gravity of the situation was laid bare.
I didn't know where I was.
I didn't know who I was.
And I didn't know what happened to the owner of this body before me, maybe there was none.
Yes, after analyzing the condition of my body, I had come to realize that it was indeed not mine.
Disregarding the minor fact that I only had half of my limbs remaining, my arms were also considerably thinner and malnourished, similar to the rest of my body.
I also had no genitalia or hair to speak of.
This God worked in strange ways.
Looking below, I saw the red mountain descend infinitely, into a blood-like fog that obscured my view.
I did my best to disregard the burning pain that wrapped my body and started to carefully crawl my way down this steep mountain of corpses.
Splat.
I lifted my right hand.
Something soft had burst beneath it.
There only remained the gruesome sight of what used to be an eyeball.
It had once seen everything.
Now it was pulp under my hand.
It had seen scenes of love and sorrow, of rage and melancholy.
A life lived to the fullest, perhaps, now gone.
I looked once more at my mountain, now with newfound understanding of what it signified...
As I looked, I felt I was human, but also not.
My gaze never faltered.
My mind did not waver.
My soul, eternally corrupted. For something in me had irreversibly changed at that precise moment.
So I continued my descent, crawling using the bodies of many.
With no precise measure of time, I had to count every second that passed by.
Statistics were important in the field of survival.
1
2
3
4
.
.
.
At the 2,334th second, my body dearly required some sustenance.
My weak muscles were rapidly losing strength, my throat was parched. Hunger hadn't completely sat in yet, but I knew it was only a matter of time.
I looked below my chest as I crawled down.
One half of a fairly thick thigh in relatively good condition…
No matter how much I thought of myself as something that was not human, even imagining such an act made my stomach turn.
…
I leaned on my left hand, and picked up the severed thigh.
2,348
2,349
2,350
I brought it up to my face.
2,372
2,373
2,374
I opened my mouth.
2,385
2,386
2,387
…
2,404
2,405
2,406
I opened my mouth again, this time with closed eyes.
2,415
2,416
2,417
And I took a bite.
My teeth, which were, surprisingly, in perfect condition, penetrated the skin easily.
I clenched my jaw, and pulled apart the piece I bit like a wild animal.
The somewhat warm blood rushed into my mouth, along with the tiny piece of human meat.
It was a very small bite that was of no consequence to my body. It would sustain me for half an hour at the most.
But mentally, it was a permanent change.
I focused on my counting, begging myself not to throw up.
2,423
2,424
2,425
I swallowed.
My stomach protested in resistance, trying to vomit.
There was nothing to vomit.
It pushed against the meat going down my throat, and I pushed back.
2,458
2,459
2,460
Eventually, it relented.
I had become a cannibal…
I threw what remained of the thigh in my hand as far away as I could.
I watched it roll down the mountain into the fog.
It was an action directed purely by my humanity, something that had no rational basis other than disgust, fear, anxiety, and hatred.
Pure, unadulterated hatred.
Spite towards everything that led me here.
Rage, towards the God that made me do what I had to.
And then…
2,481
2,482
2,483
Nothing.
2,484
2,485
2,486
I continued my descent into the unknown with a resolute gaze, maybe in a bid to discover, maybe to remember, maybe to forget.