Colors and sounds were the first things that assaulted me as I woke up on the ground. Everything was more vibrant and loud then I remember it all being in my last life, I was bombarded with stimuli before I could even begin to process anything. The air was crisp, clear, and just a bit cool. The forest was loud and teaming with colorful life of all kinds. Everything from birds chirping, insects buzzing, and leaves swaying entered my ears. It was all too much.

I spent the first few minutes of my new life dry heaving against a tree and willing the world to just shut the fuck up for a while.

I had experienced bad hangovers before, but this was like the hangover from hell mixed in with a brain tumor the size of a tennis ball. I honestly wondered for a moment if repeated bashing my head against the tree would help alleviate some of the pain I was feeling. I knew from experience what it felt like when you were in enough pain to consider doing yourself serious bodily harm to escape, this was worse than that.

I had died once before already, and died pretty violently at that, yet somehow this pain was worse then what I felt as I died.

I couldn’t think, couldn’t move, and my stomach was violently revolting against the rest of my body. All I could do was hack up bile and lean all of my weight against my new tree friend, praying desperately that this all ended soon.

“Could you please not dirty my tree?”

The exasperated voice came from somewhere above me, but I was too busy suffering to pay the voice any mind. I longed for that cold numbing embrace of death to come for me once again, life wasn’t worth living if it was spent like this.

“Eww… It’s getting into the soil! Hey, hey buddy! I eat out of that soil you know! Could you maybe not get your sick in it, please!?”

With a herculean effort I tilted my head slightly to look up and saw a tan skinned girl jutting out of the tree at her waist a little above my head. Seeing her disgusted expression and crossed arms made me think that my first impression could have gone better, but then all thoughts disappeared as my stomach made a painful flipping sensation. It was back to heaving and hacking for me.

“Um, are you ok? Hey, human? Mister naked human? If you’re going to keep doing that, could you maybe find another tree to get sick on? Please?”

Time dragged on as my body went to war against me one painful sensation after another. I clutched onto the bark of the tree, my only lifeline in this hell of suffering and humiliation I found myself in. As the naked tree woman complained above me, and inbetween bouts of horrendous pain and nausea, I swore that I would kill the smoky figure for this. I would kill him as painfully and as slowly as I could manage, and when he died I’d drag him back to life so that he could experience this hell too.

That thought was the only thing that brought me comfort, momentary as that comfort was, for a long time.

*

I wasn’t sure when it was that I blacked out, but I must have lost consciousness at some point. Opening my eyes I found myself staring up at tan skin and luscious curves. My head was resting in the tree woman’s lap, and while I normally wouldn’t be to against such a situation right now wasn’t the time. My mouth tasted like death, my body was weak and achy, and all I really wanted to do was kill the smoky figure that had reincarnated me.

“Are you awake?”

The voice was concerned, I guess at some point her mood towards me shifted from disgust to pity.

“Yeah.”

I made the move to sit up, but my body responded sluggishly and the world started to spin and shift beneath me. Giving up I laid back down on the soft thighs of my tan nurse, I would get up when the ground stopped shaking.

“How long was I out?”

My voice was softer and lighter than I was used to, even the dry rasp that was present couldn’t hide the new tone from my ears. I didn’t remember specifically changing anything about my vocal chords, but I guess maybe I didn’t have to. I wasn’t looking forward to finding out what else I had unintentionally changed about my new body. Luckily a quick glance down at myself reassured me that one of my most important parts was still the same as usual, and judging from the size it was at right now it seemed to be working just fine too.

“A few hours. It was mourning when you first started dirtying my tree, and now the sun is already half way through its journey south.”

I think I must have had a blank and vaguely stupid expression on my face as I tried to wrap my head around that statement. It sounded like the tree woman was implying that the sun set in the south, but that couldn’t be right. For a moment I thought about asking her directly, but I quickly decided not to. People tended to fear the unknown, and they looked down on the ignorant. It was in my best interests to be seen as neither of those things in this world, and asking questions about the obvious and basic common sense in this world wouldn’t help me in that regard. I’d just have to hold on to my questions and accept things as they came for a while, eventually I’d have a very private Q&A session with one scumbag or another. I’d get plenty of answers to all my questions then.

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Moving my head over slightly so I could see past the tree woman’s tits to her face I saw that she was actually quite pretty, beautiful in fact with a wild edge to her looks that I hadn’t seen very often.

“Oh, sorry about that. Thanks for taking care of me even though I… um… dirtied your tree…”

God that was embarrassing, I was going to have to torture Smokey in a very unique and humiliating way for this. I wasn’t used to being this embarrassed, and I wasn’t handling it well. Someone would have to suffer for this, and soon.

“Yeah. Really wish you would have picked a different tree to cling to as you puked… Still now that you’re awake you can make it up to me!”

I felt a distinctly predatory edge to her last statement. If I were physically able to, I probably would have gotten up and made my exit after hearing that sort of tone from her. I had heard it many times before, even used it myself a few times, and I knew for I fact I was about to be exploited or extorted for something. Sadly I was feeling about as able bodied as a ninety year old man lying in his deathbed.

“Ok. So how do I make up for puking on your tree?”

The smile the woman wore at my words was two parts seductive and one part disturbing.

“Oh, I don’t want much. Just a bit of mana, you seem to be holding a lot in this body of yours. It shouldn’t be a problem for you to gift me some…”

I suddenly had a thought. This woman came out of a tree, had leaf green hair and eyes, was oddly attached to the tree she came out off, and was currently looking at me like I was the juiciest steak on the planet. I was pretty sure she was some sort of dryad, or some other tree monster since I didn’t know what this world called things, and I remember that dryads tended to exhaust their prey to death in a lot of myths. They absorbed life essence from men’s semen until there was nothing left, and then they left the corpse to rot under their tree as further nourishment.

I had always thought that dying from too much sex would be a good way to go out, but this new life of mine had just started and I wasn’t ready for it to end just yet. Still I wasn’t exactly in a position to protect myself, there was really only one thing I could do.

“Sorry, no can do. I have no plans to let you take my mana, but I could help you find some different prey. Tell me your preferences and when I recover some I’ll go find someone…”

The dryad’s smile grew.

“Aw, don’t worry. I know my kind have a poor reputation for draining our partners to death, but you have so much mana that I should be able to stop myself in time…”

She didn’t listen to a word I said, it was time to go. I tried to quickly roll of the dryad’s lap, but her hands grabbed my shoulders and fixed me in place. I struggled in her lap, and I could even feel myself gain some ground as the dryad’s expression turned to shock. That eldritch flesh packed into my form made my body deceptively strong given its appearance, even weakened like I was I could still force my way out of this monster’s grasp.

Suddenly my shoulders were trapped in a vice and I couldn’t move at all anymore. I looked up and saw the dryad’s face had changed from an expression of shock, to an expression of hunger.

“Fuck…”

I was out of moves. Smokey said that he had stuffed my body full of mana so I could defend myself, but I hadn’t had time to actually figure out how to use all that mana yet. Instead of working to protect me my overabundance of mana apparently just made me into a taster snack for monsters like this dryad. It looked like I was going to die all over again. Still if I was going to die, I was going to die fighting.

Leaning my head over, I bit down as hard as I could on the dryad’s arm. She had to hold me in place, so her arm was an easy target. I felt my teeth begin to sink into her flesh, but it was strangely hard and I didn’t taste any blood. In fact I tasted something… sweet? Almost like maple syrup.

“Oh… Strong and feisty, easy on the eyes, and chock full of mana to boot… You mister human, you are just my type. I’m going to enjoy this, you’ll be the best meal I’ve ever had…”

I glared up at the dryad, but my glare just seemed to bounce off her hungry gaze. I bit down harder and began to shake my head as roughly as I could to tear open the wound more. I didn’t know if dryads could bleed out, but I had gotten her pretty close to the wrist and I knew from experience that there were a couple important vein groups in this part of the arm.

Faster than I could blink the dryad shook me off her arm, took her hands off my shoulders, and grabbed my head in a vice grip. Wrenching my head up to meet hers I tried not to whimper from the sharp strain she put on my neck and back. Suddenly staring eye to eye I found myself looking into uncaring orbs of hunger and joy, and at that moment I realized that this dryad and I were similar. She could have had her meal while I was unconscious, but instead she purposefully waited until I was awake and aware. She didn’t just want to eat me, she wanted to toy with me and enjoy my suffering and futile resistance. This dryad wasn’t just a monster, she was the sort of thing I hated most.

In the dryad’s eyes I saw a reflection of the dark joy I sought out so often, and it enraged me.

I am a hypocrite, I know this about myself and I have long since accepted it. I indulge in my darkest urges with no remorse or regret all the while condemning and hunting others who share my nature. I had stared into the dying eyes of countless victims myself, much as the dryad was now doing to me, and I had never once hesitated. I was a monster, in soul if not in body, and I had more in common with this fantasy creature than any of my family or friends in my old life.

“Such pretty eyes too, such a nice green color…”

Mustering up one final act of defiance I spat into the dryad’s face. I was aiming for one of her eyes, but I missed and ended up getting her cheek instead. She just laughed at me.

“Hehehe… Now, now. There’s no need to be like that, you’ll enjoy this next part as much as I will. Maybe even more…”

Without warning she suddenly brought her lips to mine, and I could feel her tongue shoot into my mouth.