Psst. Hey. Wake up, little jelly. A voice whispered to me.

I stirred.

Who’s that? Why is everything dark? Am I still sleeping?

I groggily woke up to a very strange situation.

Everything was pitch black, as if someone had taken away all of my senses. The only thing I could feel was the movement of water all around me. Huh, that was weird. Why was there water all around me?

It didn’t feel like I was drowning. In fact, I didn’t feel the need to breathe at all. Yeah, there was definitely something wrong with my body. I tried moving around and succeeded in pulsing my body through the water. After more struggling, I managed to wriggle my tentacles a little as well.

Wait… tentacles?

Ok, now would be a good time to panic, because this really didn’t feel like a dream.

I tried backtracking to figure out how I got into this situation, but quickly came up empty. My memories were all fuzzy and indistinct, only giving vague general ideas rather than specifics. The last thing I could remember happening was something like a long dream of peacefully drifting through the water…

Which was not a normal memory to have either. This was definitely the last time I took LSD.

Hey, you. You’re finally awake? The amused male voice came again in my mind. Was that telepathy?

Who’s that? I thought desperately, not knowing how to answer telepathically. What’s going on?

It’s alright. I’m right here. I mentally felt a presence appear nearby in the water.

I calmed down as the friendly being drew closer. Though I would normally distrust a stranger in such an unfamiliar situation, for some reason, its presence felt very familiar. I relaxed my guard and let myself trust this . . .person… creature?

Nice to have someone to talk to, right? The presence beside me lit up a little as he spoke.

Can you hear my thoughts? I tried to enunciate and project my thoughts in the direction of the presence.

Yup. The voice replied.

A rather disturbing invasion of privacy. He just meant the thoughts I was communicating to him, right?

The voice didn’t answer. I took that to mean I was right. Hopefully. This telepathy stuff was tricky.

Can you maybe start with what’s going on here? I asked.

Ok. For starters, you’re a jellyfish now. You and I both.

Huh. That made sense. I felt as thoughI had lived as a human at some point, but right now, as ridiculous as it seemed, I really was a jellyfish. At least it looked like I wasn't the only one in this situation.

Why? I asked, after a minute of pondering. Just why?

I felt a flash of something over the telepathic line. Was it guilt?

I don’t know. I woke up as a jellyfish just like you did. The voice said somberly.

That wasn't suspicious at all. Is it just me and you? Nobody else around to help us?

Looks that way. The voice answered.

We floated in silence for a moment in the darkness. That was kind of depressing. Eventually, I continued with my questions.

So you don’t have memories from before either?

Nope.

I paused. Telepathy conveyed emotions better than normal speech did. It really seemed like he believed everything he was saying so far. Not that it mattered since There wasn't much I could do about anything anyways.

Ok, what do you know, then? He seemed to know some things about our predicament, since he figured out all the telepathy stuff.

Only what I figured out since I woke up. In other words, mostly guesses. The voice admitted. I felt something like him taking a deep breath over the telepathic link.

Ready for big reveal number two? he asked.

Sure. I already accepted that I was a jellyfish. It didn't feel like that much else could phase me at this point.

Well, I’ve done some poking around. The voice came again. It looks like the world we’re in works differently from the one we came from.

I paused, quickly wrapping my head around the concept. So this was a different world, with different laws. Well, since it was one explanation for how I could be a jellyfish in the first place, it wasn’t the most far-fetched revelation. But how did he know all of this? I mentally nodded for him to continue.

Just think “status window,” and you’ll see what I mean.

Uhh. Status window? I thought to myself.

[Level: 1]

[Species: Jellyfish]

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[Class: None]

[Skills: None]

[Properties: Poisonous E, Telepathic B]

[Mana: 1/1]

… Huh?

I mentally willed the screen away, leaving me floating through the darkness again. After a brief flash of panic, I willed for it to come back and… there it was again. This didn’t feel like a hallucination either.

I said I would accept anything, but this really wasn’t what I expected. A game-like stats screen appearing in my mind’s eye… it was like a setup from a light novel.

Great. So I could remember light novels, drugs, and video games but not how I got here.

How does this work? I asked, after closing and summoning the screen a few times to adjust to my new reality.

I’m level 4. I’ve leveled up so far just by eating things. The voice told me. I’ve increased my mana and unlocked a couple of skills, but haven’t gotten a class yet. I think I can share what my status screen looks like with you.

Another screen popped in front of my eyes through the telepathic connection, though its image was slightly faded compared to mine.

[Level: 4]

[Species: Jellyfish]

[Class: None]

[Skills: Clone, Evolve]

[Properties: Poisonous E, Telepathic B, Luminous E]

[Mana: 4/4]

Clone? Evolve? I asked. Looks like you’re luminous too.

I’ve tried them out. The skills are really effective, but sadly mana takes a long time to recharge. Here’s my skill menu.

[Skills:]

[Lvl 1 Clone: Create a jellyfish clone. Costs 3 mana.]

[Lvl 2 Evolve: Evolve a body part. Mana cost depends on evolution.]

That’s insane. I breathed. Did that mean I’d be able to do that too? You’ve already tried them out right?

Yeah. I grew a telepathic eye first. The thing took forever to develop, and when it did I thought it didn’t work, but it turned out where we are right now is pitch black. After waiting another eternity, I finally grew some glowing glands so I could actually see. It’s not that bright, but seeing anything at all is wonderful.

So it seemed that the skill provided a choice of organs to manipulate or grow. That made no sense at all. To have the ability to create organs? As a jellyfish? Not only would we have to have brains, but also cranial nerves and a central and peripheral nervous system to control all of these appendages. Was there even a limit on how many of an appendage we could create? Fascinating. It was hard to wrap my head around the possibilities.

Can I see through your eye? I asked.

Uh. Let’s get to that part last. First, there’s something I need to tell you, my jelly companion began. For the first time, he seemed kind of nervous.

What is it? I asked. I didn’t get a good feeling about this. Was there some drawback or something? Were we in danger?

You remember the clone skill, right?

Yeah, what about it? That skill also seemed limitless, depending on what it could actually do.

I tried it out. I successfully made a clone.

So it works? I said. Did it attack you or something?

No. The clone is… you. You’re my clone.

We floated in silence. I did the mental equivalent of staring at him.

Wow. I said eventually. That’s… interesting.

It really was just one thing after another. I felt a headache coming on as I had to contemplate yet another annoyingly shocking revelation.

If I really was a clone, what did that make me? Was I even a real person? Where did I even come from? How did I have memories if I was a clone?

I was definitely going to lose sleep over that later, but right now, I didn’t have time to worry about philosophical or biological questions. Practically speaking, me being a clone wouldn’t really be any different from being my own person, right? Unless…

Does the clone skill have any weird side-effects? I asked.

Not that I can think of, my companion answered, sounding relieved. I guess he was happy that I accepted my cloneship so easily. Well, not that I had a choice anyways.

I was going to ask your name but, I don’t really need to anymore, do I? It’s Auren, right? Though I didn’t know much else from my past, I did at least know my name.

Yeah, and since we have the same name, I was thinking you should be Buren. And then we can go down the alphabet for whoever else comes along.

Buren. It sounded kinda dumb to just add a ‘B’ to my name but whatever. I couldn’t think of anything better at the moment. I felt bad for the future clones who would have vowels as their starting letter. If it ever got to that.

Great. Now that that’s out of the way, what now? I asked. Can I see out of your eye yet?

Ok. There was a defeated note in Auren’s voice. Really, I wanted to raise a clone in better circumstances, but I had no choice…

Before I could comment, I felt a sensory stream come out of the telepathic connection.

A pale green halo of light in the water was the first thing I saw. Then, as the image came into focus, I made out floating, undulating shadows drifting in the water around us.

Are those other jellies? I asked.

None of them are sentient. Auren replied. Look. There you are.

Auren telepathically pointed and I looked at my motionless, drifting jelly form in the water. The first word that came to mind was… insignificant. It hadn’t hit me before what a surprisingly small and simple creature I had become. I didn’t have a sense of scale right now, but I had about five stringy tentacles and the classical mushroom-like main body. In this light, my body was completely translucent and you could see right through my insides. Not much different than the jellies around me, but still different.

Then the eye looked down at his own body. I mentally gasped.

Though Auren was far bigger than me and had an impressive translucent body, half of his tentacles were shredded and ripped up, and there was a tear in his main body.

Auren? I trailed off.

Now that I thought about it, a lot of the jellies around us were beat up in some way. I hadn’t thought much of it at first, but I was now just noticing I was one of the only completely whole jellyfish from the bunch.

I didn’t want you to panic, Auren said calmly, However, where we are isn’t exactly a safe spot for the long term.

Ok, I matched Auren’s careful tone without panicking. Where are we then?

Just then, I felt a deep vibration in the water that penetrated through my insides. The water trembled violently for several seconds before stopping, leaving me shaken. If I had ears, I felt like I would have heard a very loud, deep sound.

Then I felt a stirring in the water. Things were starting to move all around us. A lot of them.

Ah, that was quick. Looks like it ate something again, Auren said. Eyes up, Bauren. They’re coming.

What? I asked, feeling a thrill of panic.

Nothing to be afraid of. Hopefully. The tone in Auren’s voice wasn’t exactly convincing. Most of the fish will be dead. The rest will be angry and scared. They probably won’t try to eat you.

Probably? That wasn’t helping! It sounded like the flurry was coming closer.

Remember symbiotic relationships from biology class? Auren asked me. Before I could answer, he continued. Well, I think we’re in the stomach of a seriously humongous sea creature.

Oh. That didn’t sound good. From the hidden strain in Auren’s tone, I could guess this wasn't exactly a mutualistic partnership.