How long have humans been around? I may no longer be one, but it was what I was born as and lived as. It was part of who I am, even if my race had changed. And the answer to that single question was very shocking to most people.

Around two million years.

Two. Million.

Think about that. Really extrapolate it out. That is 2,000,000. Humans live for around 100. Every generation is around twenty years. Three generations ago, there were hippies. Five, World War Two. Twelve, the forming of America. One hundred? The time period when Jesus Christ supposedly appeared. The beginning of our modern calendar, A.D.

2000 years ago.

And that was .001% of all of human history. That tiny, itty bitty fraction, was our current existence from Jesus Christ, till now. Oh but history existed before then of course. B.C. times. Except human recorded history is only about 5000 years. So .0025% has detailed records. Before that? A few monuments, fossils, and skeletons. Some ancient broken bits of pottery here, some spear tip rocks there, and that’s it.

Imagine it. Try, just try and imagine, how much we don’t know about ourselves. Our history, our existence. There has been enough time for humans to have risen from the bronze age to the information age thousands of times. And then it gets even worse.

This is based on fossils and fossils are so rare. People don’t understand just how difficult it is to preserve something for so long. Our fossil record is nothing compared to just how many things have survived and evolved and lived on this planet. Two million years ago were humans but humans didn’t come from nothing.

They evolved from apes and evolution is such a long thing, that when the ape ended and the human began, is up for heavy debate. But is it even a question? We have ‘lizard’ brains in our skulls, our first brains that gave us the utmost important activities like “eat, sleep, fuck, run away in fear, attack.” The absolute core elements of anything to ever exist. It was only built on more and more as our species had children, died, had more children, died, an infinitesimal change that not even the best scientists in the world could notice, have more children with that unnoticeable change, repeat forever.

That’s how evolution works. So as I stared down at what was before me, as a sickness like no other came over me, two questions flew into my brain.

How much have we missed? What terrors and horrors and creatures did we kill or abandon in the dark as the ages passed?

And… what was the source of the uncanny valley?

I had heard of the silly theory that there was a predator that took human form that caused it. Caused people to panic when there was something close but not human. The reason it was silly was because there were a dozen simpler and more likely theories.

I was quickly changing my mind.

The woman Konohora had turned over wasn’t human. It wasn’t human. It looked human, it had the same eyes and mouth and ears. Had the same features. There was nothing wrong with it.

Except that it was wrong. Wrong wrong wrong wrong. It wasn’t human. It had a look in its eyes, a look like a dead fish. It looked at me… and I shuddered as I knew there was nothing in there.

This thing had no soul. Had no mind. I was absolutely sure of it. I felt it at the bottom of my very existence. It wasn’t just the uncanny valley. It wasn’t just instincts. I could literally feel the ‘shape’ of my soul shuddering. Shuddering as if I had the form but no longer the ‘material’ I once did. My soul had once been human but now it was distinctly demon but it was all ME.

Konohora had it worse. Her expression was serious and stuck in a look. I looked at her and my body immediately broke out into goosebumps as I realized she was put into a whole town of these, these… Things.

“Wh-What are they?”

“I don’t. Know.” Konohora said.

There would be no rescue operation. There would be, nothing. No more of this. This had been a fun, jovial, weird adventure so far. That was crazy to think. I’d have smacked myself upside the head not five minutes ago if I had described yesterday like that. But this made everything seem bright and cheerful and happy by comparison. I was looking at something that was alive yet more resembled a soulless, lifeless corpse. Not to mention mindless. It tracked me with its eyes…

Shudder

…but it was purely biological. It had no thoughts. I couldn’t tell if it would attack me if threatened but there was a high chance it wouldn’t. Why would it? A creature attacks back because it fears for its life or has base instincts towards self preservation. I wasn’t sure this thing had anything remotely similar to that.

“There’s more.” Konohora said.

“Please, please tell me it’s better than whatever this is. I can’t take… more.”

“They have a book in that tent. A massive book, even by these people’s standards. It tells a story in pictures. The history of this tribe as far as I could tell. There were some very… concerning pictures.” She looked at me.

“Have you felt hungry or thirsty since coming here?” She asked.

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I blinked. I felt like I had been dipped into a horror movie and that question was not helping. Had I been… hungry or thirsty? I thought back. Not, really. Even now, I felt fine. That wasn’t too unusual but…

“No… why?”

“Have you felt a heat underneath your waist.”

Cold sweat now coated my back. Something was fucking with my body. Even now, I could feel that ball of heat beneath my waist. My muscles went tense and I started to feel even more sick to my stomach. What was going on here?!

“...Yes.”

“Me too. The book… these things, it showed something going from the Giants to them. I think it’s how they can go around wearing them like this. It gives them nutrients and hydration. My healings powers haven’t fully come back but…” She grit her teeth. “...They were all in perfect health.”

I grimaced. Touching multiple of these things… Konohora was stronger than I was. But I had one question on my mind.

“Why? I get it. Wearing them, us, it’s how they’re transferring whatever but why? What’s the point? These things… aren’t even slaves. Why keep them like pets, no, more like treasured heirlooms?”

Konohora’s expression went flinty.

“...It showed an image of these two ‘balls of heat’ combining …and producing a Giantess.”

I blinked. What? No. Wait. No, wait. Hold on. These, lifeless soulless monstrosities… gave birth to this Amazonian esk tribe? My jaw dropped as I looked back at the thing before me. At where we were standing, on top of the nude breast of said Giantess. I could her nipple, as large as my body from here, beneath the creature.

This woman, all of these women, came from these Things. These Things were their… parents? No, more like ‘progenitors’. No wonder they protected and ‘nurtured’ them. They were the origin and continuation of their species. In a sense, their parents. In another, their ‘children’ as only they could continue their line. After all, I had seen no Giant men around. They… actually…

“What about us? How do we fit into this?”

“I saw a few pictures of… Things… that looked different. Hair color, tails, monster traits, and more. When they combined the lines coming from the child were thicker in the book. I assume this means they were stronger.”

And here I thought that old lady had come by her strength naturally. Maybe she had. But she had probably had a helping hand from birth.

Nature was truly crazy, in both worlds it seemed.

“So they, what, want to nurture us until we produce children for them? To keep doing that? They want to farm us?” I asked in horror as the realizations began to compound in my brain.

This was not the greatest situation to be in.

“It… gets worse.”

“HOW?!”

I yelled and then quickly glanced over to the sleeping giant woman. Still asleep, even as my heartbeat thundered in my chest. I looked back to Konohora. Seriously, how could this situation get any worse?

“At the beginning of the book. The first page.”

My eyes widened as a connection formed in my brain. Why were we here? Out of all the places in the world, why were we teleported here?

“There was a Green Gem shining from atop a tower.”

We had been brought right to one of the Gems.

****

“Why are we in this Goddess damn place anyway?!” Riary was keeping her spirits. Tyler nodded, a smile on his face.

The wind was blowing hard, the air was freezing, and he couldn’t feel his left foot anymore. But even so, Tyler smiled bright and happy.

“And what are you so happy about?! We’re going to freeze to death at this rate!” Riary glared at him, but he only smiled wider. He looked at her and said the new words that always rose out of him whenever he saw her now.

“I love you.”

“Ga- stupid! Idiot! We’re going to die and you’re going to die even more stupid!” Riary huffed and blushed, looking away. Tyler kept smiling. Today was going to be a good day. He could feel it.

They had not wasted any time. After sleeping the night, they had used Riary’s flames to carve knives from the ice. Using that, they had managed to skin the wolves they had somehow managed to kill, a feat Tyler still couldn’t believe they had accomplished, and were now wearing truly disgusting fur. There hadn’t been time to treat it or size it or anything. Just enough to essentially make ponchos and wrappings from it. It felt… truly disgusting against Tyler’s skin. That’s why they were out here, hunting for more wolves. That, and a way to leave this wasteland before they froze to death.

“Tyler.” Riary said, voice serious.

Tyler pulled out his shield. Riary’s flames were more like a welder than what they had been before, but they were still hot. While he had cut off the fur, she had cut out a chunk of ice. Now, he wielded it with a grip Riary had melted out of it. Her flames may have weakened but she was a Prodigy for a reason.

He saw what she had seen. In the distance, as the blizzard seemed to be getting stronger, there was a blue light pulsing out. Except…

“Why is it coming from the top of that mountain…” Riary said blankly.

Her question contained many parts of confusion. The first being that she hadn’t seen a mountain until after seeing the blue light. The second being that it was less a mountain and more a Spire of ice going straight up into the sky. The third was because…

“What is that crystal?”

Surrounding the spire was a black… and blue crystal. A giant dome of it that was able to be seen through and also… wasn’t. Looking at it hurt Tyler’s eyes. It surrounded all around the Spire, in a massive sphere.

They stood there, both looking up at the blue light coming from the Spire.

Riary let out a sigh of relief. Tyler looked at her strangely.

“Finally. Now I know what to Burn.”

Tyler just shook his head, a smile coming back to him.

They would probably die. They were freezing, parts of their bodies were already numb, and they were barely stronger than normal people.

Tyler was confident though.

After all, today was going to be a good day. He could feel it.

****

While I was mentally grappling with the fact that there was yet another Gem nearby to deal with, suddenly I heard yelling and shouting. Konohora and I both turned towards the noise, only to feel a sudden earthquake.

Except it was no earthquake.

I looked back around and gulped as I saw a massive eye looking back at me.

The giantess was awake.

“Buln Medar…” She whispered in awe, staring at us.

The screams and yells got louder and suddenly I found myself in a hand. I blinked. I had been able to see it but still, that had been fast. The giantess had grabbed us both in each hand and was rapidly running towards the fighting.

The Tribe was under attack and we were being rushed right towards whatever was causing it.