Being reincarnated was a really strange experience. One moment I was enjoying the peaceful embrace of unconsciousness, then the next I was fully conscious and awake. Quite unpleasant, really.

The world was completely dark and silent, the only reason I could tell I had been reborn was my sudden rush of consciousness and a slow beat in my chest. I spent the first several dozen minutes mentally screaming in pent up confusion and fear, no longer held back by afterlife fuckery. The darkness and silence was all consuming so I tried to force open my eyelids or move my arms. No response. Disconcerting, but I carried on and continued with trying to move my legs. Also no response. Well, damn.

Several dozen more minutes of panic induced failing and cursing out James later, I finally began to feel a little bodily movement. I could feel it, I was moving! I was .. I was … wiggling around back and forth like a grub.

Based on what I could feel from my body impacting things around, I’m definitely a grub now. Why James! Whyyy!?

But it got worse as I bumped into warm similar sized objects as me and realized I was surrounded by my new siblings. Accidentally inching into them I could feel out the shape of my body better and discovered that my body wasn’t symmetrical. My front half ends in a large circular mouthful full of sharp, pointed teeth.

Why am I some gross monster bug thing with no eyes, nose, or ears!? Why is my mouth the only thing that’s developed?! Why couldn’t I have been something cool like a dragon or a griffon?! This is what you get when you’re somehow lucky enough to accidentally be reincarnated without knowing who you are! Or maybe unlucky?

To work off my stress, I began experimentally trying to open and close my mouth. At first, the process was slow, like trying to move in a dream. But over minutes of slowly repeating the motions while I practiced inching around the area I was born. Eventually I got the hang of it, my mouth opening and closing at a speed that seemed adequate.

After that I became unsure of what to do next. Is my species the type to have a lot of expendable babies or are my gross bug parents going to do something? I stewed there in indecision until my question was answered for me when I felt vibrations in the dirt. My body’s instincts kicked in and without thinking I began inching toward the vibrations. After realizing what I was doing, I began to hesitantly obey my instincts because surely they had to be good for something, right?

Inching toward whatever made the vibrations, I eventually bumped into a fleshy mass covered in fur that was lukewarm. Resting against it I couldn’t feel any kind of heartbeat or breathing, probably the corpse of an animal that one of my parents hunted. Or maybe it's the corpse of one of my parent and I’m about to be eaten. Metaphorical fingers crossed.

I was quite hungry and my mouth was lined with a bunch of sharp teeth that I had practiced moving earlier, but was a raw lukewarm carcass really okay to eat as a former human?

I have memories of food, but I don’t have any memories of actually eating. Sure I know what pizza is and what it should taste like, but I don’t actually remember eating pizza. So at this point, did it really matter if my meal wasn’t something a person should eat?

If we’re talking about life experience, then I’ve never actually been a person. I’ve only ever experienced being a soul and a grub.

Steeling my resolve, I bit down on the flesh in front of me and blood squirted into my mouth. Immediately I was struck by the flavors, raw meat and blood should not have been tasty. However my mouth was awash in flavors that I was not prepared for. The blood spread through my mouth like a tangy sauce while the meat was soft and springy with a taste similar to chicken but a bit sweeter, almost like a fruit. It was delicious.

All thoughts of apprehension immediately flew out the window and I went into a fugue state, gorging myself on the meat in front of me. I had no idea how big my new body’s stomach capacity was but I didn’t care, ripping and tearing as much meat into my mouth as I could. Occasionally I felt what I assumed was my siblings bumping into me as I ate, jostling for access to the meat. In response I shoved them as hard as I could, giving them the grub equivalent to a shoulder check and knocking them out of my way.

When I finally snapped out of my fugue state, I was laying down on my back, stomach full and basking in a sense of satisfaction. Actually, wait, I don’t have a back. My body is symmetrical like a worm or a leech. Well, I felt like I was laying down.

Blowing past those relaxed asinine thoughts, a rush of information flooded into my head. My mind was overwhelmed by information about .. what I had just eaten? The Flitery Stoat an arboreal weasel with a vestigial unicorn-like horn on its head and a small membrane between its legs that allowed for brief gliding. They have a light green coat and white underbelly to better help hide itself in the forest and can grow up to one foot in length. I also knew about it’s internal body structure, what organs went where, bone placement, the shape of its circulatory system.

Everything.

How do I know this? Why do I know this? Is it because what I ate was a Flitery Stoat? Instincts assaulted my mind again and I followed them without even thinking about what I was doing.

Bones popped and muscles flexed taut, almost like I was flexing my entire body. I could feel myself losing energy as I continued to do … whatever this was, and I grew hungrier and hungrier.

By the time it finally ended I felt dizzy from hunger so I put my hand down to stabilize myself. Hold on something doesn't seem right there… hand? Without thinking, I sniffed the air and was greeted with the scent of dirt and blood. Even though I recognized the scent as blood, it smelled tantalizing and stoked my already large hunger. Wait, I have a nose now! Do I have eyes?

My eyelids opened and I was immediately greeted by a blinding ray of sunlight. I have eyes! It hurts! I'm so happy that I have eyes again but the light burns so bad! Oh eyes, I’ll never take you for granted ever again.

It took several minutes of lying down in a shady corner blinking the spots out of my eyes for my vision to finally stabilize. Looking down at myself, it was clear to see what I had become. Quadrupedal body shape with an elongated torso, light green coat of fur, membranes between my legs, yup, I definitely turned into a Flitery Stoat.

As I struggled to put together what had just happened a new batch of information slammed it’s way into my mind. This time it was information on my gross bug form, revealing that it was called a Chimera Larva.

Oh, well that actually explains everything pretty handily.

One thing bothers me though. Now that I have the information on the body structure of a Chimera Larva I realize that I didn’t have a brain. A Chimera Larva just has a lump of nerves that reacts to stimuli, like a jellyfish. So how have I been thinking this whole time? Even my current body’s brain isn't anywhere near large enough to facilitate the kind of mental capacity I have.

Am I doing something like thinking with my soul? I could definitely still think when I was a soul, so it's not too far out there. However that means that my mind is tethered to my soul rather than my brain, which is confusing in a number of ways.

On second thought, I’m just grateful that I can be cognizant in any capacity rather than be an instinct driven beast. Though I’ve been following my instincts more often than not… Best to just put it out of mind, I’m not really ready to deal with the psychological implications of no longer being human. Just go with the flow. And if the flow is eating my way to being the perfect lifeform, I’m all for it.

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

A new creature stepped into the den, distracting me from my inner monologue. It was a strange amalgamate creature with the body of a bobcat, a tortoise shell on its back, and the head of a gharial. Based on its strange appearance, I can only assume that this is one of my parents.

In it’s almost comically elongated maw of razor sharp teeth was a brown furred rabbit with a small white unicorn horn sticking out of its forehead. They deposited the dead rabbit in front of me and my (now stoat shaped) siblings. Before I even had time to look at it further my siblings descended on the catch and I quickly followed, my stomach still rumbling.

My siblings and I encircled the bunny and I was left looking down at its head, its glassy eyes staring at me. I almost felt some kind of sympathy or remorse for the rabbit. Almost.

Sorry Mr. Bnuny, you look adorable but you taste delicious, and I’m an obligate carnivore … probably, I think. This time, instead of burrowing through the meat like a ravenous grub, my siblings and I tore at the carcass with sharp teeth like a pack of wolves. Small, lanky, mink-like wolves. The meat tasted like chicken but with a slightly earthy taste that reminded me of root vegetables. Within minutes we were gnawing on thoroughly cleaned bones.

As I gnawed on the rabbit’s skull, the Horned Rabbit’s template flowed into my head. This time I was ready for it though and was only minorly disoriented as the information appeared in my mind.

While idly nibbling on the horned rabbit’s skull I decided to try consciously shifting myself this time, rather than just letting my instincts do all of the work. At first it was really difficult, like trying to figure out how to flex a phantom muscle that only existed in my mind. However I had already flexed it before when I shifted for the first time which gave me a good example to follow.

After hours of repeated effort, I finally managed to consciously shift my form, going from a flitery stoat to a horned rabbit. However it took so long and I used up so much energy shifting that I immediately passed out after doing it.

I awoke to the smell of blood, sweet, tangy blood. It was a bit concerning that I actually enjoyed the taste of blood now, but nevertheless I opened my eyes and shook the grogginess from my body.

Another chimera had returned to the den with prey in its mouth. This chimera had a canine head and body but its back was covered in an array of porcupine-like spikes. A large blue carapace scorpion tail bobbed up and down behind it with every step it took. I assume that this was my other parent, though it could have been the same one from last time. You never know with chimeras.

Within its jaws was a strange creature that had the body of an angler fish but the legs of a frog. It even had an angler fish’s lure, but instead of a luminescent bulb at the end there was a delicious looking bright red strawberry.

As it dropped the angler-frog on the ground, I realized something quite dire. A rabbit’s teeth are totally unsuited for eating meat. As my siblings dashed toward the meal, I tried to quickly shift back into a flitery stoat.

Maybe it was because of my hunger motivating me, but this time it only took a minute for me to shift from being a horned rabbit to a flitery stoat. In that time period however, my siblings already devoured a third of weird angler fish. Luckily they weren’t smart enough to go after what looked like the most delicious part, the strawberry dangling at the end of the angler’s lure.

I bit down on the strawberry and was rewarded for my efforts with an amazingly sweet taste. The strawberry had a surprisingly meaty texture but was soft, like a high quality filet mignon. It was also incredibly juicy, with a sweet flavor that reminded me of a freshly picked strawberry combined with the zestiness of an orange.

Once I had finished savoring the strawberry lure, I moved on to the actual flesh of the angler-frog itself. It had a slightly dill taste to it and reminded me of white fish while at the same time having a mild aftertaste that reminded me of chicken.

It was gone before I knew it and I was left chewing on the dense leg bones while I let the angler-frog’s template flow through my mind. Going over the information, I found that the angler-frog was officially named a fruit lurer and didn't really have any noteworthy features. The strawberry on the end of it’s lure wasn’t any kind of magically grown fruit and was instead just a fleshy bulb meant to attract prey that looked like a strawberry.

As I gnawed on the bone, I considered what I should do next. It would probably be best to just stay put and let my parents keep feeding me. I'm not about to refuse free meals. One thing I should work on however, is my shifting. I’ve only been able to turn fully into one creature or another, but my parents are proper chimeras with the features of multiple creatures.

Based on the appearances of my parents I began experimenting with just shifting one specific part of my body. My first attempts resulted in shifting my entire body rather than any one specific part. It took me a few days of practice to get the feeling down, but luckily the only thing I had was free time to practice as my parents were still babying us and wouldn’t allow any of my siblings to leave the den when they tried.

During those days of practice, my parents brought back a number of interesting looking creatures for me and my siblings to eat. Well, all of my siblings except one, the runt of our litter who was still a chimera larva. During meals it was always shoved away from whatever our parents hunted by my siblings and I scrambling to eat as much as we could. Perhaps to stave off its hunger, the runt had taken to eating dirt, so I decided to name it Dirty. Obviously, I could have given Dirty some meat, but there was no way I was going to give up any of my delicious meat. Sucks to suck Dirty, but this is survival of the fittest.

In regards to the creatures that my parents brought back for us, there was a veritable cornucopia of strange animals.

A lime green iguana whose meat had a faint taste of leafy greens, the Green Lizard.

A snake with brown scales and two short curved horns on its head that secreted venom instead of its fangs, the Horned Snake. Its venom sacs had a delightfully spicy and bitter taste that lingered in my mouth for a long while and reminded me of jalapenos.

A boar the size of a dog with muscles that were specialized to sprint, the Dash Boar. Maybe it was because of this specialization, but the meat was very tough and had an almost sour taste. It took much longer than usual for me and my siblings to pick it clean.

A leopard the size of a golden retriever with short ash colored fur and eyes that were well adapted to seeing in the dark, the Dusk Leopard. Its meat tasted faintly like the smell of night air, an intriguing taste that I never experienced in my past life and want to try again in the future.

Lastly and most interesting of all was a fox with a silvery metallic coat of fur and a taste similar to mutton, the Silver Fox. The fur actually had metallic properties due to a specialized organ in the fox’s chest that takes the fox’s mana and converted it into a different form, then imbued it into the fur. Based on the name, I’m pretty sure it's converting it into metal element mana, but it could just as well be earth or something similar if metal element mana doesn't exist.

So based on the information magically beamed into my head, mana exists and has multiple different elements. Kinda obvious now that I’ve thought it out loud. I mean, I’m a shapeshifting monster with memories from my previous life, it's hard to believe magic wasn’t involved somewhere in there.

But now that I had the silver fox as a frame of reference I realize I’ve actually had a similar organ this entire time, my tongue. I hadn’t really noticed until this point, but the one body part I’ve subconsciously kept consistent has been my tongue. While I can’t quite tell what element it converts to, my energy (mana?) definitely flows through my tongue first before I shift. Seems a bit on the nose really, to have the tongue be the source of power for a species that specializes in eating. Well that's life I guess.

Of course, those days weren’t just spent eating, I also began experimenting with new forms. First I identified the parts that were necessary for their utility. The dusk leopard’s eyes that had good normal and night vision, the silver fox’s fur coat and accompanying magic organ for defense, the muscles and skeletal structure of the dash boar for good power and tusks, and the horned snake’s horns for the weak paralyzing venom they could secret.

In regards to my shapeshifting, I also noticed that I was very different compared to my siblings. After the first meal where we all turned into flitery stoats, their shifting has slowed remarkably. Rather, shapeshifting doesn't even seem to be a conscious process for them, they slowly shift into a new form while sleeping. At most they seem to be shifting into a combination of only two creatures instead of the 3 or 4 creatures my parents and I are hybrids of.

I guess this means I’m a genius chimera for being able to manually shapeshift in my first few days of living.

The only thing that really changed was Dirty, who slowly began to grow larger from all of the dirt he was eating. He was also turning brown from the inside out as the days progressed, probably not a good sign.

Eventually he had inflated from the size of around a thumb to the size of a soccer ball and looked more like a slime than a chimera. I watched with morbid curiosity as Dirty continued to shovel dirt into his mouth until he made a sound reminiscent of a wet fart and became entirely dirt brown and immobile. My curiosity drove me and I poked Dirty, only for him to pop like a water balloon, spilling dirt all over the floor.

D-did, actually Dirty just turn into dirt? Well, that was … disturbing. I guess chimeras really can turn into anything, huh?