Thanks to the grotesque adaptation of his deformed anatomy, the mental and physical torture of his feeding ritual had finally been somewhat resolved.
Now, pouring the crushed glass-moss paste through the six breathing holes on his chest no longer brought the excruciating agony of a thousand nails driving into his lungs; only a brief sensation of suffocation and a violent, stumbling dizziness remained after feeding.
As his consciousness cleared, he was able to consume more food. On one hand, this meant that his daily torment lasted a little longer; but in return, his body was much better than when he first woke up—his consciousness had gradually returned.
However, this Outcast vessel was always accompanied by another disgusting consequence: the excretory system.
Lacking any form of disposal organ in his lower body, which was splayed flat like a crab, the rotting waste residue had no exit once his bloated stomach finished absorbing the nutrients. Once a certain threshold was breached, the Outcast body would automatically reject and vomit all the residue he had eaten.
After a certain cycle, his stomach would contract violently, forcing the toxic, acid-filled bile back upward. To analyze it rationally, if the pH level in his past clone stomach was 1.5—the lower, the stronger—then currently, it was around 0.5. This meant that now, every time he excreted or vomited, he experienced a sensation a thousand times more agonizing than before.
It happened one or two days later while he was wandering the boundary between the edge of the plains and the forest, searching for food. A wave of indescribable, completely uncontrollable nausea suddenly hit him. His enlarged stomach contracted violently, forcing all the accumulated waste back upward.
Since it consisted entirely of long-stored residue, this fluid was far thicker than the liquid blood soup he consumed, carrying a thick, muddy mass of gastric acid up into the six ventilation holes on his chest. It was just enough for Subject 198’s lungs to experience an entirely new horror: the merciless erosion of concentrated stomach acid, combined with a suffocating tightness that felt as though a mass of thick mud was wedged inside his throat. After nearly an hour of writhing and vomiting repeatedly, the living nightmare finally ended.
Subject 198 stared intently at his own vomit. Well, it appeared this vomit contained a massive amount of water and fluid; the hydration lost was actually far greater than the liquid he gained from the broth.
A silent scream suddenly erupted within his soul:
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"Damn it! Who the hell cares!"
He collapsed onto the ground, curling his body tight. He desperately wanted to wrap his arms around his legs as he curled up, yet he realized in sheer helplessness that he could not; he could only use his single functional auxiliary hand to clutch at the limbs. As the final leaf of endurance fell, he burst into tears.
His eight eyes wept profusely. Unlike the pain of feeding, which lasted for only a few tens of seconds, at most a minute before giving him time to rest, the excretion process was not like that. The agony was an unrelenting, ceaseless torture with no end in sight, plunging him into absolute despair throughout the entire process.
At that point, the agony of his lungs melting under the pH 0.5 acid combined with the extended suffocation completely shattered his spirit. He was miserable; he desperately wanted to live, yet he did not want to endure this ultimate torment every single day.
On the rugged ground, several sharp glass shards lay right beside him, cutting lightly into his flesh. He just lay there weeping, crying continuously until he was completely spent, drifting into a heavy, exhausted sleep.
When he awakened, lying on the dirt deeper inside the forest and gazing up at the sky, slowly, a warped, suffocating sensation of pure resentment began to spread, consuming his mind. He wanted to scream, but because he had no mouth, he could not emit a single sound. He could only roar frantically and howl within his soul:
"This damn fate! I have survived this useless, crippled vessel, overcame both starvation and imminent death just to crawl back up! I will never let you break me! Even if I have to tear this very vessel apart, I will stomp you beneath my feet!"
Deep within his chest, not just one, but both of his hearts simultaneously erupted into a furious burn, igniting a wave of manic, violent resolve. He would survive, live for an immense time at all costs, just to show this miserable world that it was utterly powerless and could do absolutely nothing to him!
And so now, besides the initial raw desire to survive, he held a clear purpose: He loathed this crippled anatomy. He wanted to become perfect. He wanted to survive and strike directly at his own cruel destiny.
After that ultimate fury, Subject 198’s mind abruptly settled. Like a hollow silence in the dead of a storm, his analytical brain and awakened senses gradually returned. He fell still, gazing up at the night sky.
Floating there were three moons, and this was the first time he had truly seen them.
He quietly thought to himself: They are beautiful.
The three moons bore entirely different colors: one blood crimson, one pitch-black, and the last a pale ash-gray, reminiscent of the ancient Earth within the memories of his past life. Throughout the previous days, he had not looked up at the moons even once, simply because he was always completely depleted, falling asleep long before darkness could fall.
Yet tonight, under the mystical and serene light of those three moons, Subject 198 felt as though he had been reborn once more, but with an immensely fierce purpose. He was no longer a naive child.
He raised his single functioning hand toward the sky, clenching it tight like a blood oath: From this day forward, he would never cry again. He would fight, he would hide, he would do whatever it took, as long as it kept him alive!