To be free

I slowly open my eyes, blinking against the harsh light that filters through the cracks of my cell. My head is pounding, and my stomach is still growling with hunger. 

How much time has passed? I'm not sure, but it seems that it hasn't been a day. As for how I know this, it's because the eighth bowl of food hasn't arrived yet.

As time passes, I start to wonder about what happened not too long ago. How was my sense of hunger so unrealistic? I wonder. 

How am I still alive after all that venom and poison that my body took in?

Time goes by as I keep pondering. The more I think about it, the more confused I become. I can't help but feel like there's something I'm missing, some piece of the puzzle that doesn't fit.

Eventually, I stopped thinking about it. The reason why, it's because the eighth bowl of food isn't arriving at all after a long while of waiting. My stomach growls in protest, reminding me of my desperate need for nourishment. I lean against the cold, damp wall of my cell, trying to ignore the gnawing hunger that consumes me.

I held in my hunger, my stomach grumbling softly but not yet at the point of extreme. I could still hold onto it, due to not being too hungry after the previous meals I had. I wasn't the only one in this situation, though. The other children in the other rooms weren't as fortunate as me. Their cries echoed through the cave, a constant reminder of my own fortunate position.

But what really drew my attention was the sound of a few loud knocks on a door somewhere far away. This sound was followed by the sound of someone slamming through the metallic door. 

Curious by the ruckus, I looked through the gaps of my door to see what was going on.

I couldn't see too well through the gaps of the door, but I was able to see enough to come up with a conclusion. What I saw was a… teenager? Possibly? I wasn't too sure about what I saw. 

The figure was bigger than that of a child, but from what I remembered, the person who had escaped that cell just now should be a child with a frail body.

Stuck in my thoughts as I continued to stare at the movements of the mysterious figure, I couldn't help but question my memory. Has the poison messed up my memory? I was certain that I had only seen children in the cells before. 

That must be the same frail-bodied child then, I concluded. I did not know how that child had suddenly grown bigger and strong enough to break through a door, but remembering my own experience of having a strange sense of hunger that had given me the ability to survive through poison and venom, I accepted that the paranormal could be very much normal in this world. 

This world that I had reincarnated into was definitely not normal, so I could not allow myself to piece things together using just the knowledge that I had from Earth.

So, accepting the reality before me, I continued to watch the situation unfold. 

The gigantic youngster seemed to be throwing quite a tantrum. The way he moved and flailed around, I don't know what it was, but some feeling inside me told me that the youngster was just a hungry little boy.

This little boy let out an ear-bleeding roar all of a sudden. It caught me by surprise, in which I suffered as a result. My ears felt uncomfortable, and my head started to ring. Nothing that's been occurring before me so far seems to be normal.

Just what is going on?!

I wanted answers, but all I had gotten so far was pain and even more pain.

There were no answers to my questions. I had to answer the questions myself. So, I did what I had always done in my previous life. I accepted the pain. I embraced it.

Gritting my teeth, I forced myself to ignore the ringing in my brain and open my eyes. Due to my bleeding ears and my disrupted mind, my eyes were the only key to receiving more clues. 

I might have missed the sound of running through a hallway, but I did not miss the direction that the boy had run.

Are they going to kill him? I asked myself, as I looked at the figure of the boy disappearing from my line of sight. I was so curious to know that I leaned closer to the door, hoping that I could see further down the hallway. Upon doing so, I made a discovery.

The door… It wasn't locked?! 

The look on my face. I was thinking of myself as a clown for not noticing it before. Perhaps that they had unlocked the doors after the last meal that they had given me, was a possibility that I quickly thought of. 

Such a conclusion would explain why there hadn't been another bowl of food, and why the boy was able to barge out of his room. It was a possibility that made perfect sense to me.

"Ha…" I let out a soft sigh.

I hardened myself, as I looked back to the room that I'd been stuck in for like a week. How dark it was, compared to the dim-lit hallway! 

My eyes moved around and eventually ended on the lock of the door. It was a simple slide-lock. A door that could only be locked and unlocked from the outside. 

This door…it has lost its purpose because of the barrel of the lock that seems to have disappeared.

As for where and how the barrel of the lock had disappeared, I did not question that. From the moment that I had opened my eyes to this world, until now, everything around me seemed to be full of mystery. I could only accept the abnormal around me and slowly figure things out as my life in this world progressed. 

That is if I don't die after leaving my cell!