Chapter 2: Chapter 2: Name and Denial

 

Chapter 2: Name and Denial

 

Lying there on the ground, their neck very much still snapped as their body regenerated somewhat slowly, Richard had a lot to think about. Although they supposed that probably wasn’t going to be their name anymore. It would be weird for a girl to be called Richard probably, although they personally thought the idea of pointlessly gendered things tended to be pretty stupid. Reject the gender binary, reject conforming to gender. They still didn’t think Richard fit as a name for them now though. 

 

Anyway, holy shit. They needed to chill for a second. Zombie apocalypse, dying, getting isekaied, dying again, all of these were things that were pretty dramatic and out of nowhere compared to their normal life. They honestly should be so incredibly freaked out right now to be honest. 

 

They had learned long ago that sometimes you just have to roll with the punches of life though. They could process the traumatic nature of these events later, right now they needed to figure out what to do. 

 

They tried moving their body a bit, and found that despite their neck being broken they could move fine. They lifted up their arms, and tried pushing off the ground a bit. It was fine. They had their full strength. Their viewpoint just shifted slightly as they pushed themselves off the rocks a bit, as their head on their broken neck kind of shifted slightly. 

 

So they just pushed up off the ground some more and stood up. Their viewpoint was kind of sideways, and they were at the bottom of the hill now, so the view wasn’t as good, but like, they guessed they were sort of alright. They reached up to their head and adjusted it to be standing up normally again. It pretty quickly slumped over again though. The pain would have been unbearable to them under normal circumstances, but they had kind of been in constant pain since they broke their neck. Their head shifting around a bit and causing more pain wasn’t all that bad. Although they wondered if letting your head shift around like that would be detrimental to its healing. Speaking of, was their health still at zero or had it started regenerating like suggested in the undying skill? Would their health going up translate to their neck actually being healed? Or was it just like some magical hit points?  

 

A second later, the words:

Health: 3/10 appeared in their head as if reacting to their thoughts. 

 

Apparently thinking about the stat allowed them to immediately see it, which was good they guessed. Could they also do that with skills? They tried to think about their undying skill. 

 

Undying: Lvl 1/100 [Rank 0 Skill]

 

Nice. Hopefully remaining basically dead with a broken neck for a while could level it up some more or something. 

 

Ding! You gained the general skill Pain Resistance!

 

Oh yeah, pain, that was still happening. It dulled slightly, presumably due to gaining the general skill, and they once again tried to adjust their head with their hands, noting the fluffy cat ears they touched on the top of their head. Cute.

 

Ding! Pain resistance lvl 2/100 [Rank 0 Skill]

 

Their head slouched over again, and they heard a crunching sound. Apparently just from the movement of her head slouching down something more broke. Lame, her head and neck are such losers for not being able to handle something as simple as that. Wait, her head? Their head, they had no right to use her. 

 

Ding! Pain resistance lvl 3/100

You have taken 2 damage!

 

The young undead cat girl decided that perhaps the best course of action under these circumstances was to just hold their head in position and get moving so they could start on their isekai adventure of epic proportions. They did, hearing another slight crunch as they moved it back into place. 

 

Ding! Pain resistance lvl 4/100

You have taken 2 damage!

Congratulations, you have died!

Ding! Undying Lvl 2/100

 

Looking out at the world for a second, at the distant copses of trees, at green landscape broken up with occasional weathered ruins, at what they thought looked like a distant dirt road in the distance that presumably led to some sort of inhabited area, they sighed and felt at peace for a moment. A world of adventure, a world of fantasy! They couldn’t wait!

 

Then they immediately keeled over, barfed for a minute straight, starting sobbing and shaking at random, and fainted. Only to realize that even if their body fainted, they were still conscious due to the undying skill. Damn. Although somewhat fortunate in this circumstance since they were able to utilize their conscious state to not fall into their vomit, instead falling in the other direction. They tried to empty their head for a while and let their neck heal a bit maybe. Meditation and all that, she would restart her mind and stuff and everything would be ok. *Correction, their mind. Who was he kidding? His mind. Honestly, was he delusional? What right did he have to be anything other than a stupid fucking useless and selfish manchild who’s probably having some perverted dream about being a catgirl right now because none of this could actually be happening and he sucked and - 

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The sun was starting to set when he managed to get himself out of his whole depressive delusional spiral. Partially because the smell of vomit was getting to him by now. Yes, he was a piece of shit who had fantasies about being a catgirl, yes he was probably actually dead right now, etc etc, but he still needed to get up and keep living life at some point. He would however use he to refer to himself for now, because he had no right to use anything else. Richard wished to be a girl, since it just seems… better somehow, but he couldn’t deny the reality that he isn’t one and that this is just some sort of dream. Using anything other than he/him pronouns for himself could let his delusions fester and grow worse. 

 

Health: 10/10 

 

Unsurprisingly, the regeneration from Undying had gotten him back to full health, and, upon pushing himself off the ground, he found that his neck was indeed able to stand up straight on its own now and not be broken. Great. 

 

Now he could finally start his epic adventure. 

 

For the next hour or so, they walked vaguely in the direction of the dirt road they could see in the distance, while occasionally checking out the ruins. While the ruins of various stone structures and occasionally wooden structures that looked disturbingly burnt were cool and all, and probably had some degree of historic importance, there wasn’t much of anything there. Not even a starter chest. Jeez, if he was going to have a self indulgent dream adventure the least the dream could do was at least get him started with some supplies. It wasn’t like logic needed to work in dreams anyway, so randomly appearing starter chests should have been fine. 

 

At one point he noticed a bush that seemed to be shaking, almost trembling as if in fear. He walked up and prodded it within a stick he had picked up at random earlier, and it stopped moving. He checked it with identify

 

Possessed Bush [Lvl 2]: 

A bush that has been possessed by a weak nature spirit, or gained life through magic exposure. 

 

Immediately after reading that the bush proceeded to jump into his face, scratching him all over and then seemingly trying to suffocate him. They tried to rip it apart with their hands, but the bush was surprisingly durable, and they just kept taking damage in a rather pathetic way. The incredible battle ended when they tripped backward and immediately managed to bash their head on a conveniently placed rock.

 

You have taken 1 damage!

You have taken 3 damage!
You have taken 6 damage!

Congratulations, you have died!

Ding! Undying lvl 3/100!

The bush stopped attacking them due to their death, and just kind of sat on top of their corpse. It was a bush after all, it didn’t particularly want to spend much time moving if it wasn’t needed. 

 

What a fool, just because I died doesn’t mean I’m dead! This battle is over! they thought, successfully managing to rip the bush apart once they regenerated enough health to actually be able to move. 

 

Ding! You have killed a Possessed Bush [lvl 2]!, experience rewarded. 

 

They didn’t level up. They weren’t even sure they could level up without a class actually. Overall, a successful first battle, technically. Other than the death and excruciating pain that came with it. Hopefully undying prevented permanent brain damage from them hitting their head. They also didn’t really get a specific number of experience rewarded or anything but honestly it would be a pain to keep track of anyway so they were fine with just a vague “experience rewarded.” 

 

About 10 minutes later, they were finally able to get on their way, almost at the dirt road by now and passing another set of ruins, which were pretty much just some burnt wood and stone bricks scattered across the ground, somewhat overrun by overgrown grass. 

 

They really needed to figure out a name for themself. Richard still wasn’t going to cut it as a name, yet they still felt undeserving of being a girl so it wasn’t like they could choose a particularly feminine name either. On some level, they acknowledged that if this really was a self indulgent dream there was no reason not to just enjoy being a girl and pick a name to match it, but they stuck to their guns and refused to fall victim to the trap of genuine happiness. It would never be genuine in real life after all

 

Fuck it, they thought once they finally reached the dirt road, I’ll just use a random noun. Hey I’m a cat right? Catnip. Yeah, that. 

 

Ding! You are now Catnip!

 

Brilliant. Now they had a name to use if they had to introduce themself at some point in the possibly near future since they would soon be following a presumably used road.  

 

Catnip tried to gather up some energy and started off down the road towards their future, attempting to skip along the way. It wasn’t like any of this was real, or anything could actually harm her anyway, given the whole undying thing, so they were just going to treat this whole thing like an open world game and hope for the best.

 

The young catgirl was mostly successful in convincing themself that this was a dream, they weren’t a real girl, and everything was fine. Mostly. The fact that she had literally just died to a bush helped that delusion, it’d simply be far too pathetic if she really died that way. 

 

Denial was what she -they did best after all.

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