There have been a couple times in my life where I woke up so completely out of it that I could barely recognize what was real and what wasn't. However, those times now seemed so nice and easygoing compared to the confusion I was feeling now.

Waking up surrounded by nine napping serpentine heads the size of large cars, only to then slowly come to the realization that, yes, this isn't a dream, and that no, I wasn't willing to try and kill myself to determine if it was or not.

I wanted to open my mouth and scream, but before I could do that, a dawning realization slowly fell over me. I had likely broken out of what I was starting to suspect was an egg, and after turning my head around to confirm that... Well, all my doubts evaporated.

I suddenly became very aware of the fact that my body felt very much different from the one I was used to. With growing trepidation, I looked down at myself.

This time, I did scream. However, it only came out as nine, slightly different whines that should have belonged to cute little puppies, not whatever... thing... I was.

One of the heads surrounding me raised up, poking me gently. I should have been terrified, and to an extent, I was, and yet, despite my slowly growing horror, all I did was whine harder, my body acting on its own.

It wasn't a pleasant experience. It felt as though I was an outsider to my own body... Although, it was questionable whether the meat sack I currently inhabited truly belonged to me.

A long, forked tongue slithered outward from the mouth of the head next to me, licking me with surprising gentleness. The tongue felt like a mix between a cat's and a dog's, wet and soft while still retaining a somewhat itchy feel to it.

After a bit of licking, the giant creature got up, it's massive body suprisingly nimble as it slowly walked away, and I was completely clueless as to whether it was going out or further into the cave.

Left alone to myself, I collapsed to the ground, my bones feeling quite mushy. I should have been having a panic attack right now, and yet, I felt oddly calm as I processed everything.

I took a long, real, look at myself. I'd been subconsciously forcing myself to ignore it beforehand in the face of bigger problems, but now, the fact that I was seeing out of nine, very different perspectives, became impossible to further ignore.

I looked at each of the snake-like heads, staring into my own eyes. It was, like everything else that had happened so far, an incredibly weird feeling. I looked like a much less ferocious and much more baby-like version of the creature from before, lacking all the sharp edges and teeth and sheer brutality that it oozed.

Still, the signs were there. I was... No, this body was the offspring of the creature from before. I wasn't very good at ignoring the obvious, no matter how much I wished I was one of those blessed few who could.

I'd been reincarnated, and I highly doubted that my old world had any sort of science that could create mythical creatures and reincarnate people, no matter what all the conspiracy theorists said. So, that ruled out the possibility of this all being a sick experiment.

... Well, if nothing else, at least I had been reborn into something that, unless this world is completely different from what I suspect it to be, should be quite strong. And, judging by my... mother's... sheer presence, I had enough proof to believe that.

I glanced at the back of my body with one of my heads. Now that I was conscious of it, it was much more difficult to rid myself of the strangeness of having more than one head, and all that came with the fact. Multiple eyes, noses, ears...

I grit my teeth mentally and focused back on the task at hand. One step at a time, me, one step at a time.

As I suspected, I was wingless. A bit of a disappointment, but not an exaggerated one. Further examination revealed my body to be very much reptilian in nature, although I doubted we had cold blood, or we wouldn't be living in caves like this.

I sighed, the action feeling quite unnatural to this body. I did it anyway, because sometimes, visual reminders that we are still ourselves are important... Well, for me they are, at least.

The soft thumps of someone approaching me made me whirl around to face my new, and massive, mother. Well, I assumed it to be my mother, and it could very well be that it was the male hydras who took care of children. Still, it was easier to think of it as a her.

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My eyes widened slightly as my mouths opened up all on their own, acting completely on what I now understood to be pure instinct. Little pitiful whines escaped from me as my eyes glued themselves to what mother was holding tightly in one of her jaws,

It was a goat, a rather large one too, at that. However, it looked nothing like my old world's goats, and instead, it looked far, far more ferocious and dangerous. The horns were much larger and sharper, the teeth far more menacing, and in general, it gave off a much more deadly look than any goat had any right to hold.

The worst part? It was alive. I could tell from the minute twitches and slight shakes as mother's teeth bit into it. One of mother's heads, not the one holding the goat, gently approached me, giving me a quick lick. Again, acting outside of my own control, my heads all simultaneously tried to lick mother's face back, only for her head to retreat.

Her other heads were staring at me with a look I couldn't decipher. Reptiles weren't exactly known to be very expressive, and while I was fairly sure neither mother or I were simple reptiles, that didn't change the fact that I couldn't understand her.

She gently brought the goat in front of me. In the back of my mind, I tried to think of the reasons as to why the goat wasn't struggling more. Probably some kind of poison, or maybe some weird magic. Did this world even have magic like the one in my old world's fictions?

All of these questions were promptly thrown to the back of my mind as, again, my body acted against my will and moved forward, towards the frozen goat.

It didn't take a genius to realize what was about to happen, and honestly, I wasn't really all that against it. I wasn't a vegan, and I strongly believed that we should know where our food comes from, to at least give that little honor to the deaths of the animals who died to feed us.

I couldn't, wouldn't, stop what was about to happen, but I refused to let it happen outside my control. I pushed mentally, stopping my body in its tracks. It wasn't actually difficult, but now, instead of being in the back-seat, it was like I was driving my body with a very loud something screaming in my mind to go forward and eat the goat.

I closed my eighteen eyes for a moment, letting out a deep breath. I could feel mother's confused gazes landing on me, but she didn't move, simply sitting behind the goat, waiting.

When I reopened my eyes, I felt much more in control. I cautiously approached the goat, poking it with one of my muzzles. The goat was three times my size, and while I now understood that it would be difficult for me to truly calculate the size of things until I got a reliable unit of measurement to compare to, like a human, it wasn't hard for me to know when something was a lot bigger than me. Like my mother, for example.

I didn't want to let it suffer. I awkwardly shuffled forward, awkwardly trying to maneuver my heads so they wouldn't tangle together, which would be... problematic. I gently put my mouths around the goat's neck, ultimately unable to fit more than four heads, but that was enough. I bit down as hard as I could, feeling a mass of blood spurt against my throat.

The goat didn't make a sound as its eyes took a slightly panicked look for a moment before glazing out, slowly losing their shine. It was brutal, and yet, it was so much better than what I knew my body would have done, which would be to simply start eating the goat alive, starting from the soft, nutrient-rich organs.

I could feel a warmth flow into me as the goat died, and it wasn't the blood. I shivered slightly at the sensation, feeling a hunger not dissimilar to the one that was also quickly ramping up and demanding flesh. However, this 'other' hunger demanded death, not flesh.

It was, again, strange that I could understand these feelings so well, but I chalked it up to 'magic' for now and decided to deal with them later. For now, I really, really, needed to get some sustenance in my body.

My heads quickly got to work ripping apart the goat, quickly making a mess as blood and guts flowed out from the wounds I tore open. Still, the goat was delicious, and I didn't exactly have an audience to what I was doing... Well, not one that would care, at least.

One of my heads took the time to disengage from the blood festival and peek at my 'mother'. She was still standing there, in all of her gigantic glory, looking down at me in silence. She didn't seem dissatisfied by my actions, though, which was obviously good.

Wouldn't want to piss off the being that would be key to my survival, and could also eat me up in a single gulp, after all.

Wow... I'd already started thinking about my survival? Way to go, girl. Next up, you'll start eating humans and spitting lava.

That was sarcastic, by the way.

I retreated from the corpse. I hadn't managed to finish it, but I wouldn't be surprised if I'd eaten twice my own body weight. There was a lot missing from the goat, after all.

I quickly started to get drowsy as one of mother's heads lowered down, chomping down on the goat and throwing it into her gullet with a simple tilt of her head, the goat's remains flowing down like honey. She didn't even chew.

Then, with a gentleness that really shouldn't be surprising me as much anymore, mother cautiously nudged me into her waiting 'arms'. I waddled forward, still very much unused to having such a different body from before. I knew I had multiple tails sprouting from my behind to counterbalance my head's weight, but the balance of it all was still a challenge.

Mother made it seem so easy that I was slightly envious. Only slightly, though.

I settled down, leaning right against her scaly torso. Her large, clawed feet rested underneath her like a cat, and as her heads wrapped around me, the resemblance only grew. Before long, I was once again drifting back into dreamland, far away from all worries of life and existential crises.

I hadn't asked for this, not did I ever particularly want it, but compared to some of the other things that would have happened after my death... This one didn't quite seem so bad.

Hopefully, hydras weren't sexless. I'd died a virgin once already, dying a virgin twice would be far too depressing. Maybe it would buy me pity points with whoever was in charge of dealing with the afterlife?

... Still wouldn't be worth it.