Devour. Spawn. Annihite.

  That was the purpose of their creation.

  Devour. Spawn. Devour more. Spawn again.

  Even after annihiting all their foes, they continued to devour. They continued to spawn.

  Time had passed. All had been devoured. And yet, they never ceased spawning.

  Weapons born without enemies wander within the womb, fighting amongst themselves.

  - Nehma, the Progenitor

  “…CHARLIE. LIMA. ECHO. ECHO. TWO. FOUR. ONE. SEVEN. FOXTROT. EIGHT. ZULU. LIMA. FIVE.”

  I began to stir, groggy and feverish. What the hell did youtube autopy put on?

  I tried to rub the sleep from my eyes, but it felt like something was pushing against me. I struggled to even open my eyes, but when I managed, I began to panic.

  I was in some kind of transparent viscous liquid, maybe 20 feet in the air, it was hard to tell as my heart rose to my throat. I let out a muffled scream.

  I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe, I CAN’T BREATHE! I have to get out of this! I tried to kick out, slowly forcing myself to the bottom.

  The edges were much harder, and it took a few kicks before it broke open.

  I screamed as I fell to the concrete below.

  It didn’t hurt as bad as I expected, I id there for a few minutes before I got the courage to assess the damage. Looking at my hand I winced. At a gnce it looked like the whole thing was bone. As my eyes adjusted more to the light though, there was no blood or bones.

  I was wearing some kind of armored gloves and my hands seemed a little small. I went to push myself up, but looking down made me pause.

  I was completely covered in the same bluish gray colored armor as my hand with violet accents. From my neck all the way down, no skin showed. It looks like some kind of futuristic bodysuit, I’d never seen anything like it. Worse yet was my proportions.

  My waist was so thin I had to be missing a few ribs, and my chest would be far better described as busty than broad.

  I gasped.

  All of these revetions were a stark contrast to before I woke up here. Before I wasn’t fat or particurly muscur, but I had a decent build for an average joe; I wasn’t so happy with my body before and I could appreciate the feminine form, but this felt extreme as far as builds go. I couldn’t even say I was curvy as the bits of armored chest ended in sharp edges and pointy bits.

  Perhaps I was still dreaming? It all felt too real to be a dream, but I had a wild imagination so it was a definite possibility.

  Droplets of silicon gel ppped the ground next to me drawing my attention.

  I looked up to where I fell from. Wide eyed as I observed what looked like a dozen people in various states of development - half of them were unrecognizable as anything other than a rge fetus or newborn, a couple looked like pre-pubescent children, as well as one that looked to be around teenaged. Only two of the pods were bursted, the one I broke from and one other.

  Are they growing people here? What the fuck?

  The other bursted one seemed fresh, as liquid gel occasionally dripped from it. Through a broken concrete wall, glowing white roots connected to all the pods. Looking below the other burst one, there was a trail of gel leading towards the only door in the room.

  A stale breeze flowed in from the destroyed wall segment causing long silver hair to spy across my face.

  I tugged it slightly, thinking it was possibly a wig, but instead it just hurt. I tried to cw the armor off around the neckline which went up to my jawline, but I couldn’t even feel for where the suit ended and my skin began. The vivid sensations made me doubt it was a dream.

  “Where even am I?” I asked, hearing this body’s voice for the first time. “Did I get isekai-ed?” It voice was high pitched, not to the level of some v-tubers, but not too far off.

  I never believed in an afterlife, gods, religion or any of that stuff, but I did enjoy reading fantasy isekai. I don’t remember dying, but what else could expin this?

  Apart from being surprised and unsure of what to do, I didn’t actually find myself caring too much about my supposed death. My old life was boring, sad, and I didn’t have anyone I cared about losing.

  I think a new body would be a big adjustment for anyone, but I was gd, I wouldn’t miss being male. The armor had a protrusion around the groin area, so it was an unfortunate possibility that I could have my male parts under this; I’d just have to find out ter when things were safer.

  As I sat taking in my surroundings, I heard loud popping noises in the distance. They grew louder, and after a minute I heard a loud explosion, followed by a bang further away. Clearly this area wasn’t safe but then, where was?

  I went to stand, but quickly lost bance and tripped. Height difference? I looked down at my feet… I noticed now that I don’t actually have feet. My ankles end in stilt like heels without the toes. Now, I’d never walked in heels nor stilts, but I had to imagine this was harder than both.

  I stood up more carefully, only to fall one or two steps ter. I wasn’t about to go up the concrete ramp to where the gunshots were coming from, so I spent the next 20 minutes practicing walking without falling. In those 20 minutes, the sound of fighting had faded, only the echoing sounds of fluctuating metal and the wind could now be heard.

  After trial and error, having gathered a little bit of confidence walking in straight lines, I walked towards the doorway. Seeing the 45 degree incline, I quickly realized there was no way I would get up the ramp with so little practice. So I began to crawl.

  The shitty thing about hills is that they seem small until you have to climb them. It took me what felt like a half an hour to clear the ramp.

  When I got to the top my eyes lit up. I’d never shot a gun in my life, but right in front of me looked like a replica AK-47 with metal furniture. That officially discounted the idea of this being a ‘fantasy’ world, not that the concrete structure didn’t already dispel that idea. I picked up the gun and fiddled with the mechanisms until I figured out how to eject the magazine. Judging by the weight it felt about half loaded. I’d take that with me for self defense in case whatever was shooting up there decided to attack me, too.

  I racked the gun after inserting the magazine -it seemed like the thing to do- and began the crawl to the exit. I was getting quite hungry, hopefully I could find other people or wildlife to eat once I get out of this bunker pce.

  It looks dark out at the top of the ramp, so it must be night time.

  I’m taken aback when I reached what I thought was the exit. Through the door is not the great outdoors, no. It’s a concrete megastructure.

  In the center of a massive cavern is a snaking tower with a damaged catwalk to an elevator shaft or some kind of maintenance room. Massive decrepit pipes and wire harnesses surround the central spire. I wouldn’t risk the catwalk, but I at least wanted to see if I might see the sky if I risked a gnce from the edge.

  I started off walking towards the edge, but still wary of my bance on my strange appendages, I sit down a few meters short. I scooch my butt, testing the strength of the concrete by continuously kicking the ground ahead until I am within less than a meter of the ledge.

  Looking up, it was safe to say this structure is bigger than any building I’d ever seen or heard of in my previous life. The gaping hole in the ceiling went up at least a kilometer, obscured eventually by a fog of dust. No light pierced through the dust cloud from above either.

  I tensed as I decided I would also need to look in the other direction, to see how far I might be from the ground. I got a sense of vertigo from what I saw.

  Down was much the same view as up, complete darkness for as far as I could see. It was arguably worse as there was no mist gently shrouding my view, just pure darkness. I decided this wasn’t the kind of isekai I had in mind all that time I spent wishing death was more than just the void.

  Having had enough of a look to develop a fear of heights, the safest thing I feel I can do is y down, so I do. I y down on my back after moving a couple meters away from the edge. It’s stupid I realized, to let my guard down, but I needed to gather my bance after that dizzying sight.

  I stood up now. Might as well start walking, I’ll have to learn regardless.

  The best thing to do now I decided was to search for the other one like me. They might have been isekai-ed the way I was, and if they were, they were more skilled than I was given how quickly they managed to escape this area.

  As I walked along the concrete ptform - staring far from the edge - I saw dozens of destroyed and smoldering robot looking things. Some were small with two legs and a machine gun attached to their front, some were much rger with some kind of rocket pods or artillery pieces; I began to doubt that the other person would be like me.

  I passed a strange glowing white tree, it had an odd smell to it too. A little voice in my head nagged me that it ‘wasn’t mine’ or something along those lines…. duh, I just got here, of course I’m not going around ciming trees.

  Staying optimistic I theorized that they could have a unique skill, and if they did then surely I would too. I just had to learn what it was and how to use it. I followed the trail of corpses, occasionally tripping after losing my bance.

  I heard the distant echoes of gunfire again. It was hard to tell just how far away they were considering the massive size of this pce made it perfect for sound to travel long distances.

  I rounded a corner, and looking across the massive void once again, setting my increasingly agoraphobic feelings aside, I saw them. They were still far in the distance so it wasn’t particurly loud and the sound was much deyed from the fshes, but there was undoubtedly a girl over there fighting these robots. Her skin was red, and although she didn’t have armor like mine, she had some kind of mech suit. How she got over there is anyone’s guess, but she might be able to help me.

  I steadied myself against a nearby piece of concrete and began frantically waving my hands around, but no matter what I did she didn’t look over. Eventually she finished off whatever robots were there, so panicked, I had to get her attention somehow.

  Gncing down at my own gun, an idea popped into my head. I would fire off one shot to get her attention, then when she looks at me I can beckon her over and get some info, and hopefully a bite to eat.

  Warily, and bracing maybe more than necessary because I wasn’t sure how much recoil the gun would have, I aimed it at the floor nearby and shot once. There was surprisingly almost no recoil. I was a little confused because I could feel the gun punch into my shoulder but it was easy to hold in pce. I shrugged it off, maybe that was part of my special ability.

  Sadly, whoever they were, they either didn’t care or notice, as I watched them disappear into another room. I slumped my shoulders and sighed, almost losing my bance as I did so. I turned around and immediately was beset by horror.

  One of the two legged robots was right in front of me. Its green sensors targeted me as it pointed its muzzle at me. It must have heard the gunshot! I was barely able to bring my gun to aim at him when…

  BANG BANG BANG…

  I had my hands raised up in front of me defensively on impulse, rifle pointed nowhere near the robot. The bullets never reached me. Instead, a hexagonal blue screen appeared in front of me. I had a weird sense that I could actually feel the shield. It wasn’t so much that I felt pain from the bullets but I could somehow tell that it was a little more tired than before. With that being said I quickly regained my bearings and took aim at the robot before it could shoot at me further.

  “AAAAAAGH!” BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG…

  Perhaps unwisely, I unloaded the full magazine into it - at least what was left of it - in a shout of rage and fear. It goes without saying I’d never been shot at before, and even if the first few shots never hit me, they were enough to put the fear of god in me. I wouldn’t take any risks.

  I hardly had a chance to catch my breath when I heard mechanical ccking coming from the nearby debris. Looks like my mysterious friend missed a few! As quickly as I could I stumbled back the way I came. The st thing I wanted was to stay in an area swarming with them, which this appeared to be.

  I ran towards the door in a mad dash at first, but quickly fell over. I realized I was probably going to be faster by crawling at this rate. I scurried towards the exit as the metal footsteps ccking echoed closer and closer to where I’d killed the robot.

  I chanced a look behind me as I escaped to the other room, I almost cried when I saw the eldritch machine in the air.

  Floating near the body of the robot I killed was a massive glowing jellyfish. Is that a fucking spinal column where it’s tentacles should be?! If I wasn’t scared before, I was on a whole new level of terrified now. Whatever god decided to bring me to this dystopian hell world should have at least given me the mercy of not making me literal cannon fodder… or better yet a tutorial!

  I managed to make it back to the massive cavern with the snaking tower I arrived at from the beginning, immediately having turned to the right upon leaving the hallway. I didn't want them to see me fleeing after they caught up then chase me further.

  Not taking chances and feeling unsafe being so close to where they were, I stood up again and carefully made my way across the concrete ptform. They didn’t explore very far, and I was left alone from there on. Thank fuck. I’m a sitting duck with no ammo.

  I started rifling through nearby crates including the ones near where I awoke looking for ammo or food.

  It took a bit of searching, but I finally found a crate belled ‘supplements’. I didn’t have a hammer or a prybar, so I tried to open it with my hands. It was so easy, that at first I thought they must have already taken the nails out, but they were still there. Inside the box was tons of small pstic packages, they looked sort of like grano bars.

  It was probably an awful idea to eat any food you get from a decaying industrial structure, but the box was in surprisingly good condition, and my hunger was driving me crazy.

  Ripping the pstic wrapper off, there were a few gray cubes inside. A quick sniff and a lick confirmed, it seemed edible enough. I swear to god if I get food poisoning now… I quickly shoved one of them into my mouth and began eating, fully expecting them to taste awful.. I was a little shocked when only one of them made me feel completely full again, not only that but I couldn’t taste anything at all from it.

  Unsure of what to do next without alerting the robots of my presence again, I sat down text to the crate and closed my eyes. Hopefully the only other person down here, who I’ve decided to call ‘red’ will get hungry too and find me here.

  Being so helpless, I moved behind the crates, out of view, and fell asleep from mental exhaustion.