Chapter 2: Chapter 1 – Predator

My head is killing me...I'm so tired of being in pain.
{Concussion}
Hearing that voice so close to my head jolted me awake to a sitting position. "Aggh!! Ow ow damnit why?!"
"Eris?!"
Did the enforcers do this to me? I've never been beaten before... I wonder what I did to finally receive one. Satie will be happy to hear about this.
"Sam hells girl, don't shout out of nowhere like that! I was taking a much needed nap too."
...Who is this? And why does everything sound so weird.
Reaching up to check my fox-like ears, all I can find is hair. Long blonde luscious(but dirty) hair. Where are my ears??
That's when the panic really started to kick in, I could feel something on my forearms that shouldn't exist.
Human ears... I don't understand, and my damn head is making it difficult to think.
There is a much more pressing reason for why I'm having trouble figuring out my current situation, it slowly came back to me over the past two minutes, most of what had happened in the compound. They're all dead... both Serah and Satie are dead and there is nothing I can do about it.
I apparently was whimpering and about to go into a full out bawl, when I noticed the look on the face of the middle-aged woman staring down at me.
"Damnit all girl, will you stop crying over your father already? We can't carry you forever, you need to start pulling your own weight around here, and it'll help get your mind off of him. Here, take these down to the river. Be quick about it, the boys will be back to eat in about an hour."
I really wish this woman would shut up. I need some time to myself, but if I got up and walked out I have a feeling this woman would follow me and start screeching.
Honestly though, it's not hard to understand how I ended up here. It's more about the fact that it's... ridiculous. Reborn inside of some random village girl? I guess the silver lining is that I've finally got out of the compound.
{Weak. Need to eat.}
Oh right... the demon. Unlike when I woke up in the compound, I can now tell who is talking inside of my head. It's strange but I feel like he's always been there... as if now the only difference is he's become vocal (kind of).
{Correct. Eldritch. You feed. We talk.}
It feels like he's saying we can properly talk after I "feed"... that's not ominous at all. Especially since I feel absolutely starved, and not in the usual way of hunger.
"WELL?! Are you going to do your share or start crying again?!"

I am so tempted to just head butt this woman, but for now I'll put up with it. No point in poking the hive at this point.
"No, you are correct... mother? I should be putting my hands to use, it'll help calm me down as you say."
"Mother? Just how bad did you hit your head girl?" Now she's looking at me with a look of pure disgust.
Oh so she's not this girl's mother? Wonderful, I'm usually good at speaking without saying anything of importance, but I immediately made a mistake. Shows just how out of form I am right now.
Looking over at the laundry, it looks absolutely massive. There is no way my last body could have carried that...maybe this girl can? Only one way to find out. I bend down and grab both of the handles, and sure enough lifting it up is possible. Not only that but its surprisingly light... was I really that weak before? I was rather small and never did anything besides weaving. No time to think on it now, this lady looks like she's winding up to start yelling again.
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Fantastic. I was reborn just so I could do more chores. Three days have passed since then and I've done nothing but chores chores chores. "ANYONE WANT ME TO MAKE THEM A PRETTY DRESS?!" If I'm going to be working all the time again I might as well go back to weaving.
Nobody responded of course, but a few ladies who were also washing clothes in the river were looking at me sideways. Then a man stood up and came over to me with his dog (or is that a fox? What the hell is that thing) that wouldn't stop barking (shrieking?) in my direction.
"Lassie, I know you've been through a lot lately, with your dad dying and your head trauma. Trust me, we do feel for you. But can you stop with these random outbursts? You've been doing it every day and you're scaring the other ladies."
"Sorry I couldn't hear you, your wife was talking over you."
"My wife...?"
The man was clearly confused, having left his wife behind to continue washing clothes, she obviously wasn't talking at all. Then a realization came over him, and he looked down at his dog-fox-thing with a scowl on his face.
"Look, this is your last warning... understand? Dutch won't protect you forever."
Who...?
{Family}
Oh right, those people I'm stuck with at the moment.
The man was clearly satisfied that I wasn't responding, waddled back over to where his other wife was waiting.
I went back to my wonderful and very important life saving chore of washing clothes. All the while daydreaming of seducing that mans Kitsune wife while him and his foxdog huddle together in the corner, apologizing in unison for speaking to me without permission.
......There really is something wrong with me. Was I always like this? I swear I use to be a cute girl who only dreamed of escaping back to this world so I could go back to living a normal life. Not fantasizing about sleeping with some guy's wife because of his very reasonable request that I stop acting like a freak. I always assumed if I got out, that I would leave that place behind. Looks like it broke me in ways I can't escape.
{Demon, take over and finish washing these clothes for me}
{No. Can't take over now. Later}
Later... huh. I wonder how far away later is? That's a disturbing piece of information right there. There's nothing I can do about it right now though... I'm still trying to get my head caught up to everything that has happened so far.
Like the fact that I am now a human after being a Kitsune for 17 years. Kitsune only differ slightly from male to female, with women having bushy fox tails while both men and women have fox ears. Adjusting to human hearing is... taking time. Going from 5'1 to probably 5'8 or 5'9 is more of a problem than I expected. I keep trying to walk as if my legs are much shorter.
On a minor note, I was completely flat before, so adjusting to these C's has been a tad annoying. My brain is convinced they shouldn't be there since I've never had boobs before. This should be Eris' brain though... so I'm not quite sure what is going on up there and the demon has no answers on this front. I miss my tail more than anything. I used to move it around and twitched it while working, but obviously I can't do that anymore and it's hard to get use to.

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Holy hell I was saying that earlier as a joke. Is this really happening?
I watched as Victoria (that's her name apparently) gathered her things and placed a spindle and needle in front of me. I'm really going to be weaving again? But it looks like I'm just stitching up old clothes for the family, including mine. A job WAY beneath one gifted like I am Hohoho~. I picked up the spindle ready to show off my godlike stitching to my new "Mother", only to find myself shaking before I could even get started.
"Eh...?"
The more I tried to shrug it off, the more I shook. Numerous images flashed through my mind. Images of the years I spent sitting across from Satie in our little corner of the room, working diligently while talking about pointless things for the first four years she was there. But more than anything, I was surprised at how sad I was over my sisters death. Despite sleeping in the same room, we had practically never talked for many many years. So I did still love her... "And now she's crying...", I heard my bum of a father let out an exaggerated sigh in my direction, while the little shit next to me chuckled. But in the state I was, none of it mattered.
I had been trying to avoid thinking about it ever since I took over this Eris girls body, but there was one last image I knew to be true. They were all dead. Just a bunch of lifeless bodies scattered around the compound. Some were smashed with half of their bodies looking like a massive bolder had landed on them and then disappeared, leaving a half pancaked corpse. Others were cut into pieces with what looked like one swift slash and nothing more.
"Urgg!!"
I could feel the bile coming up my throat again. Through some miracle I didn't throw up this time, and thankfully so. I didn't want to give these people one more reason to complain about me.
{Demon, what was that raven creature? Was that you?}
{No. Enemy.}
Well I guess that's not much of a surprise, he's what killed me after all.
{Kuhahahakakake}
And there he goes again, laughing like a madman while also forgetting how to laugh halfway through.
{You. Also Eldritch now kukuka!}
{Eldritch...?} I've heard that word before but I can't remember when it was right now.
{Me. You. Raven. Tree}
He's saying I'm the same as those creatures? Now or always? How is that even possible??
{How could I be an Eldritch? I look nothing like that thing that killed everyone. It was 30-35 feet tall and clearly not humanoid in any way possible besides standing on two feet and having two arms. Its plumage I think was a mix of purple and black... hard to tell with how the enforcers only had the usual torches going at the compound which is far away from the entrance where the creature was. After it smashed a few people with its staff, it then balled its right hand into a fist and snapped it open at the rest of the group. I heard a sharp whistle noise but felt no breeze from where I stood near the middle of the group. Everyone else fell into pieces immediately, assaulting my nose with a smell I'll never forget. Was that a wind spell or something else, Demon?}
..........
Ahh... I lost him again. According to him he needs to sleep quite often, and has no control over it right now. Sometimes it's only a few seconds, other times he disappears for hours.
I don't know what I'm going to do. I wanted to be free of course, but... all of my memories are with Satie and my sister. Now I'm out here alone in a different body living with a bunch of creeps. I guess not much has changed on that front.
"Eris, if you're done crying, then get back to work. The least you can do is fix your own damn clothes."
Oh this old hag. Do these even count as clothes? All I have is a long dreary linen one piece dress and linen undergarments. I don't even have a strip to cover and hold up my breasts. I didn't need them in my previous body, but I helped my sister put her cloth one on all the time (which turned into a silk one later).
I really need to come up with a plan to get out of here, obviously I'm not going to live with these people. Revenge is the word that keeps popping into my head, but a little late for that idiot. Those two monsters had already killed everyone there. Speaking of which, I knew that tree looked familiar. There was a dead tree in the middle of the cave that everyone there called "The Lucky Tree". Turns out there was nothing lucky about it. It was completely unnatural and anyone with a working brain would have found it odd that there was a tree inside a cave with no soil, light, or water hitting it. It was dead looking but then how would it have ever grown there to begin with? It's creepy thinking about how that monster was there the entire time... The three of us use to eat lunch right below the damn thing. Was it sleeping all those years like how the demon constantly needs sleep?
{Predator...Feed. Eldritch}
That means... it ate other Eldritch? Oh wait a minute, I think I kind of understand what happened now. So it was asleep all those years, until that Raven Eldritch showed up and took him by surprise? I'd like to say I wish it killed him sooner, but thinking back to that branch he was extending at me like a spear, I doubt he would have let the rest of us live now that he was awake.
{Correct}
I guess that just leaves the question of why the Raven showed up at the compound. Now I'll never know though...
{Nobles}
What about them? You want me to kill them or something?
{Revenge. Fool.}
...Oh wow, that's actually a good idea. The man who used to buy my sister every year is still out there, isn't he? Ahh the more I think about it, there is still a lot of people out there who I swore I'd kill one day, isn't there? That woman who treated me like a disposable weaving tool is going to the top of the list.
Now I just need to decide how and when to leave. The 10 day blackout is coming up soon, there is no way to leave during then. I'll have to live with these people at least another 2-3 weeks, great. At least I finally have a plan in motion, that alone is making me feel happy and motivated for the first time in awhile.
At some point I had gone back outside, heading to the river again it seems? I don't even remember picking up another basket full of dirty clothes. Wait, there is way too many clothes I'm cleaning once a day for that small family. Are they having me clean the neighbors clothes too? I haven't thought much about the people I'm staying with, but they're definitely not nice people on any level. The guards and neighbors told me I should be thankful that they're taking care of me after Eris lost her father, but nothing about them suggests they're doing it out of the goodness of their hearts. My extremely intelligent and never wrong brain is telling me there is more to this, but hopefully it won't matter. I should be out of here before any problems occur (I hope).
It was at this moment, that I bumped into a man rushing past me with a group of guards. Normally I'd apologize on the instincts engraved into me from the compound, but instead I found myself staring at his back as he ran towards the other end of town.
My gaze is frozen on him.
My nerves are tightening up all around.
My heart is beating like I've run a marathon. Despite this, my body feels like it's freezing.
I'm soaked in freezing cold sweat. My throat is killing me. I've been wheezing while constricting my throat.
I must... that man. I need to... HIM NOW!!
I nearly fall down in exhilaration at my future triumph.
He disappears around a corner, but it matters not. I properly marked him when we touched... he can't escape me now. He'll never escape me.
I'm completely oblivious to the broken maniacal laughter ringing in my head.
{It begins kukukek...Predator}

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