Chapter 2
"Why do you not have anything?" Laonn stared down at the little girl, who did not seem to have anything in her hands. Empty with only the flesh on those small hands of her that he could easily rip off from her frail self. Staring down to the ground, Seven knew there would be punishment for her now that she brought back nothing. There was nothing that she could do to avoid the inevitable. "It seems as though your instincts are not kicking in." Laonn had grabbed her by the neck, making her struggle for air while looking down at him. Her feet swung in the air while she coughed out to try and grasp even a little bit of oxygen.
'This man is crazy!' She said within herself, seeing that he would be crazy enough to harm a child who did not obey him. It was instinct for any kind-hearted person to stop this man from trying to kill anyone, but there was no one around to stop him, and only children who feared him. There was no way that Seven was going to apologize to him either and beg for him to stop. There was still a sense of pride inside of her.
"I expected a lot from you, but it seems as though you failed this time. It would be best if you had caught something instead of nothing, even a bug. Because you are my favorite test subject right now, I won't hurt you too much this time." Laonn had released her.
Falling onto the ground, Seven coughed harshly while getting air into her body to let it all come back and function. 'What exactly did he test me with that he refuses to harm me so badly? Even refusing to kill me.' She was curious now since she had woken up to find herself in this body that only gave her memories occasionally. Being taken back, some children were taken away by Laonn while the others returned to the cage. Seven was left in the cage with the other children, starved once more since she did not catch anything. Feeling a nudge at her side, she looked at the child who had offered a fish to her. They held the fish to her once more to take and eat, looking at them. She just accepted this time, eating the fish even though it was raw. There was no helping it, but she only ate half of it before giving it back to the child, removing as many fish scales as she could from it. Being trapped there, she did not know how long they would all remain there and be test subjects for Laonn.
Being stuck there for who knows how long, the children only went by the number that was given for their name. Seven looked to see that the food was again placed into their large cage, and they all dug in. The food was likely raw meat that was handed to them, and if not raw meat, it would be like a pile of rotten fruits that could be easily squeezed in one's hand—disgusting. 'All of this is like how the criminals would treat the victims just like they would describe it, but worse.' Seven had died at the age of thirteen in her previous life; she was a victim of a murder that happened to take an interest in girls around her age of thirteen at that time. There was no need to dig into big details in regard to it since it was only a tragic ending for her. 'Unfortunately, I came to this small body and became an imprisoned test subject… again.' She had watched every child start to disappear, with only four of them left, including her. 'The only ones remaining are me, Eight, Eleven, and Thirteen.' Those who failed to live up to Laonn's expectations were easily killed without hesitation. Seven knew that she had to be sure to stay alive; it was odd how Laonn did not want to kill her even though she was making no progress like the other three who were locked up with her.
She had noticed that Eight was starting to have scales form on his body, but he was also the one who offered the fish to her in the past. Eleven was losing her human form, with lizard-like limbs taking over and some circle lumps forming on her face. Finally, Thirteen had some lumps forming on both sides of her neck, which always made Seven grow curious about what she could have been injected with. 'Each of them seems to have been injected with something that will accept or kill the test subject.' Seven was still young in her previous life, but the body that she had gone into was much younger than her last.
"Subject Seven!" Hearing Laonn call her, she followed out of the cage with her face looking down. Being strapped inside a wooden chair, she was constantly injected with needles that had unknown liquid inside. Her body shook with fear; the feeling of the liquid was not something that could be easily tolerated as a human being. She never questioned about it, and there was only the hope that it would all end as soon as possible with no further pain the whole day.
"AAAHHH!!!!" Feeling her body burn, it felt as though she could lose consciousness at any moment. Her blood felt like it was boiling and ready to seep out from her limbs. Huffing for air, she held back all her tears that wanted to come out so badly. 'I hate this.' She said inside.
"Hm, I do not understand why you are the last one to make such progress. Hunting should have been the easiest for you. You were my favorite, and I wanted to see progress with you the most." Laonn felt angry but hid it behind his smirk to see that Seven was making no progress like the last three in their cages. "You will only be useless if you continue to stay in this place. So wasteful." Laonn brought his hand forth to Seven, who barely breathed and kept herself awake—grabbing her hair, looking at her directly in the face to see that she was suffering from everything that he had been using to 'improve' her.
'This man is a monster!' She thought, feeling that everything she had been enduring was only for her survival. Being taken back, Laonn had separated them all into different cages with no light for them to use or rely on. She was depending solely on their eyes to adjust and adapt to the dark prison room. The easy sound of clinking metal and chains all over traveled to their ears.
It had been days since Seven's fever had finally died down, but her hunger was growing more and more along with the others. Her fever would go up at one point, then down in the next instance. It was neither willing to end so soon as if her body was in denial of what Laonn kept using to experiment on her. Hearing the door open, it was clear that they were all locked in the lowest level of Laonn's home. "It's time to test you all." Seeing Laonn pour out a bucket of rats that scurried around them all. "Show me what you all can do with these little critters," Laonn observed his test subjects, who all looked to the rats that were the only thing that they would consume. The rest all dug their teeth into the rats that came into their view, with Seven seeing their forms slowly change and become more monstrous than before. They were all likely losing their human senses due to hunger and unleashing more of their feral instincts.
'They've been turned into complete monsters.' She thought, seeing how this resulted from losing their hopes and will to try and escape. Laonn looked to Seven, who only stared at the rats approaching her.