Chapter 5: A painless life.

Cahaya POV 

I finally got used to my new jaw and learned to speak without sounding like a larva, snakelet or baby whatever I was except for my high pitched little boy voice. 

Learning two new languages, Japanese and Seaspeak, was surprisingly easier than in my past life, as well as remembering things in general.

I was curious about it and asked Dad who said happily "It's theorized and mostly proved that animals with the capacity to regenerate their brain have better memorization, that's why axolotl like me and you a half axolotl have an easier time remembering things, still being smart and the capacity to remember easily doesn't always go hands in hands that why you mustn't become complacent in your studies and stagnate.

And even compared to those artificial canines you learn fast, frighteningly so in fact, being fluent orally and at writing in two languages for a larva of fewer than 4 years is unheard of."

I learned during this same day what species I was supposed to be composed of and how lucky I am.

First obviously half-axolotl, I clearly remember having had a couple at one point in time they looked adorable and silly before my piece of shit of a "Father" decided that 1 litre of bleach will do wonder in their tank, well it did wonderfully kill them, going back to my current species axolotls in this world shared most characteristic of their non-anthropomorphic counterpart, regeneration of pretty much everything if it isn't beheading, cancer-free, cold-blooded, phenotypic plasticity a sort of capacity letting me adapt slowly to different environments (gills length, for example, but nothing like gaining fire resistance), a protective mucus that only I possess on my fins and gills finally aquatic coming with a good sense of smell underwater.

The other I already did know I was a spitting cobra since they aren't a myriad of snakes that can spit venom, spitting venom was like umm urinating but different, my mother was a Mozambique spitting cobra, snakes are cool, the forked tongue that when I flick it then go back in my jaw to touch the organs of Jacobson on top of my palette giving everything I need to know about the air surrounding me, the heat sense that only work closely, I can sense vibration with the underside scales on my snake half, I could potentially survive decapitation, my venom if in contact with eyes, for example, can render if the words of my Dad are correct an adult Kodiak bears (biggest terrestrial carnivore) or an adult African elephant into a blind, crying, broken and twitching mess on the ground with how intense the pain is, fun.

At three years old I learned when Dad was teaching me Seaspeak history that fish were fully sapient, which made me think I was some sort of criminal, murderer or monster, he directly stopped me from entering this rabbit hole by saying with a tone of disdain I didn't even know he was capable of  "Most modern land animals that know what do we eat 'carnivores' and 'herbivores' alike would hypocritically say with burning righteousness that what we do is worst than monstrous.

The cold hard truth is, that a sapient organism no matter the species, the sex, the age, sexual orientation, the morals and the social standing, have the luck, potential, knowledge and option to better itself but chose to grow complacent and prefers to stagnate instead, it will simply become the food of another, just like the fish you enjoy to hunt and eat so much."

Then he added, "Sapience doesn't make its life more valuable than others if it doesn't make it to be so, meaning you shouldn't feel guilty or ashamed."

I nodded in agreement even if I didn't agree with everything Dad said. Also, I don't think he comprehends how odd it is to talk of something so complex to a 2-year-old because for a former 18 years old it sure is strange. It still clarified a lot of things for me and made me feel a lot better.

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Third POV

Cahaya's life continued, he started exploring the forest around the house in the middle of the night and alone, to the displeasure of his Dad, he was currently just doing that.

In the middle of a moonless night, chirps of crickets could be heard with one heavy slithering between vegetation, "Liberté!", he cried out cheerfully with a hiss accompanied by a flick of his tongue at the end, "Always feels nice to explore the surroundings with how clean and fresh the air is compared to the house permeated of snake and salamander smell," he mumbled, "Nature in this world is so strange, the forest does not have any animals except invertebrates, animals with sapience they shouldn't be capable of, my reincarnation urgh… Why are there so many things that don't make sense and are so headache-inducing!"

He punched with all his strength the tree next to him in frustration, breaking his forearm in the process in a way that his radius could have an out of body experience.

Glaring at the offending bone poking out of his bloody and dangling wrist, he didn't flinch nor feel pain only numbness at the lack of pain was odd at first but he got used to it by this point injuring himself too often to count, at 9 years old he even cut off most of his fingers and right hand accidentally all the while smiling happily until his Dad realized in horror, what was going on, he took the bloody hand of the half-snake cleaned it and said in a quivering voice that everything will be alright and that it will grow back.

Cahaya stared at what was left of his gory right stump of a hand with not horror but morbid curiosity and slight annoyance that he made his Dad worry.

That is why he knows first aid, is always wearing at his waist a large waterproof snorkelling bag containing first aid kit/equipment, multiple lighter and a swiss soldier knife.

He willed his heartbeats to decrease making him bleed less, he cleaned his working webbed hand with venom than his wound with it, gently put his bone back in place, and placed 20 adhesive sutures on the wound and waited without moving.

'I am still amazed to be able to heal from an open fracture in less than an hour, but I lost that hour of my nightly exploration like a dumbass.', he thought annoyed and looked at his healed wrist, webbed hands, his nailless/clawless fingers plated with small black scale and his dark-blue skinned palm before muttering, "Obviously, a 100-year-old tree will win against the 11-year-olds arms of a hybrid of species not known for their arms strength, especially snakes." And he kept advancing where the river was.

He didn't see that he made a dent mark on the tree nor that he was way more injured than he thought because of his regeneration he didn't see that he broke some of his fingers, and damaged his muscles and tendons.

He could swim in lava and not feel pain at all, this might look like a blessing but if he wasn't half-salamander his little stunt 3 years ago would have ended with him losing one of his hands permanently.

During these years, he learned the basic differences between herbivores and carnivores, was instructed in tort-mathematics which he hated very much, and basic social rules between species and chemistry/biology at a high school level minimum with help of the books Mamoru bought from his annual trip out of the forest to who knows where.

He was dumbfounded to discover that amphibians were considered herbivores on land, but that doesn't change their status as marine animals.

Herbivores in this world aren't herbivores in the way of what their diet is composed of, it's a broader term that encompasses 55% of animals residing on the land. The same goes for carnivores, they represent the last 45%.

Animals on land are categorised by their origins and/or historical events.

However, something that will never change is, that carnivores are mostly predators and herbivores are mostly prey.

He was currently reading a thin but elegant book his Dad wrote in Old Seaspeak for his 12th birthday and it was a history book, the events were recorded by axolotls.

Before the downfall of amphibians, axolotls were a species known principally for their discovery in palaeontology, geology and archaeology.

In his room, Cahaya was coiled around himself on his heated stone with the book in hand, he read the title on the first cover out loud " 'Some of the major events of Earth history by your Father, Mamoru.' Hm ok interesting.", he then flipped it on the back cover and continued " 'Knowledge is a terrible burden. It may help you, but it might also destroy you.' Ok."(Quote from James Patterson)opened the book and started reading.

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[B.CB = Before Ceto Birth, A.CB = After Ceto Birth]

The oldest known data of life to more recent: 

-75 million years B.CB death of 87% of life by a meteorite shower.

…

-50 thousand years B.CB first recorded an apparition of sapience named Homo Sapien [Humans]

-40 thousand years B.CB apparition of sapience in all of mammalia, reptilia, amphibia, aves (birds), cephalopoda (ex octopus) and most of 'fish'.

-27 thousand years B.CB Start of Prehistoric Time

-20 thousand years B.CB apparition of groups like Life Animals in America [Biggers version of 'Modern Carnivore'], Nature Animals in Eurasia [Biggers version of 'Modern Herbivore'], Marine Animals everywhere where there is water [Amphibians, seas mammals, most of the 'fish' etcetera…] and the start of human civilisation in Africa [With the first dogs born]

-10 000 B.CB glaciations [ended 80 years later] and the first encounter between Life and Nature Animals result in an alliance between the two.

-5000 B.CB End of Prehistoric Time

…

Year 0 birth of Ceto the male blue whale and the Human Empire, the emergence of Australia from the sea, Life and Nature animals renamed carnivores and herbivores and Start of Modern Era.

Years 117, the start of the Human-Animals War

Years 145,  end of the Human-Animals War Casualty: -85% to Human population, -23% to herbivores, -30% to carnivores and -33% to marine animals [Anphibian represented 85% of this 33%]

Years 280, Start of the Herbi-Carni War [Herbivore, Humans and amphibians allies due to repeated acts of predation on them by the carnivores]

Years 311, End of the Herbi-Carni War, Ceto appeared next to a battlefield and the war stopped by his mere presence (This is cannon). Casualties: More than half of the world's population is dead [-53% to herbivores, -67% to carnivores, -95% to amphibians and only 500 humans left.] Amphibians residing on land and humans were now considered herbivores because of the terms of their Alliance at the start of the war.

28th of September 368, Interspecies marriage was legalized.

5th of January 395, the birth of Cahaya and the death of Surya.

…

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After reading the book.

Cahaya POV

'What the fuck!? Humans exist in this world!', I thought in disbelief.

'Calm down, a sapient species added in the mix couldn't have done much, right?', only to realize how wrong I was.

They 'tamed' and 'created' farm animals like chickens and cows both having similar fates to non-sapient cows and chickens from the other Earth.

They created the now extinct waterdog they were an artificial species that were born of amphibians hybridization between multiple non-toxic salamanders, like axolotls and were the main animals used in living meat farms. They collected the meat from waterdogs by cutting their body parts and waited for them to regrow before repeating the process over and over again.

It disgusted and frightened me to know that my past life species were eating species similar to my Dad like they were livestock, just imagining me or my Dad being eaten in such condition was terrifying and nightmare-inducing.

I'm ok about eating another sapient being, been eating a lot of annoying talking fish would be hypocritical to say that eating meat from sapiens beings is immoral, but not this way, this is just so fucking wrong.

Practically every dog breeds are man-made, they were created by cross-breeding different canines to have the perfect pet servants/slaves they wanted, past humans started World War I, which snowballed later into World War II, and indirectly killed 17 billion animals including themselves.

The humans of the past played God by creating more than 30% of sapient animals found nowadays and paid the price by being a now near-extinct species.

But the other sapient species aren't innocents either, bombing, r@pe, predation, torture and massacre of innocent were done by every race during the two World Wars.

The only good thing is that everything is history and that I wouldn't witness those horrors of the past.

And there this 400-year-old blue whale, Ceto, that stopped the Herbi-Carni War with his mere presence alone, not the strangest things, I reincarnated after all, why would a magical whale be this surprising?

"I'm lucky to be reborn in a time of peace.", I mumbled before yawning, putting my torso in the coil of my snake-half before falling asleep on my heated stone.