Immemorial

 

                “Okay…what do people actually do at the mall,” Daniel asked himself as he was driving while checking his combed blond hair in the mirror. He had finally worked up the courage to ask one of his coworkers to a date, and the first idea that came to his mind in the moment was going to the mall. “We’ll look through small stores, eat fast food, and… This is gonna be so lame, what a shit idea.”

                “Heyyy Sena!” Daniel eagerly greeted his date, unsure of whether it was too soon to go in for a hug or not while slowly walking up. “Hey,” she replied with a slight smile. Her beautiful black hair framed her round Japanese face perfectly, and her makeup made her lips look delectably plump and full. “How’s it been?” Daniel asked. “How was the drive?” As Sena took a second to reply, Daniel thought to himself, those are the most boring openers I could ask…I gotta get it together.

                The pair walked into the mall while making awkward small talk. Sena was beginning to catch on to Daniel’s nervous body language and inability to flow with a conversation. Trying her best to not make the date a total failure right out the gates, she suggested peeking into an ominous store on the first floor of the mall that used curtains instead of glass doors and windows like every other store. The room was dark, dimly lit with only a few lights and the glows of foreign artifacts on tables and shelves. The heavy scent of incense was also thick in the air; however, coming here had already given Daniel more hope than he thought he’d find – this place was interesting!

                Everything on display, from small statues to large and obscure jars and weapon-shaped objects, had either an alien-like and futuristic presence or a prehistoric vibe that outdated anything the pair could have imagined. Speculation on where anything in the store could have come from quickly began to break the ice between Daniel and Sena. They were so engaged with the items and each other that they hadn’t noticed the shopkeeper, a dark, elderly woman, hidden behind a newspaper at the corner desk who was taking occasional peeks at her new customers.

                At the back of the room, Daniel noticed a large, short, and circular object rooted to the ground. Leaning over it, thinking it was a table, Daniel quickly realized it was a well and grew nauseous at the thought of falling in. “What’s that?” Sena asked, peering from behind Daniel to take a photo of the well without realizing what it was in the dark. Thinking it was a table, she extended her arms over the opening to take an overhead photo before accidentally dropping her phone into the hole.

“Ohmigod?!” Sena exclaimed, realizing what she was looking at now. Daniel was stunned into silence, unsure of what to say or do. “Can we…can we save it?” Sena asked herself out loud, noticing a dull ladder strapped to the inside of the well. “Uhm…” Daniel nervously looked around, still failing to notice the presence of the shopkeeper and her small desk through his panic. “I-I guess I could just…” Daniel muttered, noticing the ladder Sena was positioning towards. Wanting to make an impression as a tough go-getter, he reluctantly climbed over the rim. The touch of Sena’s soft hands brought him confidence and comfort as she helped him secure himself to the ladder.

Daniel descended slowly, always ensuring that the next rung down actually existed. It wasn’t long before he was descending in pitch-black darkness with how little light shone from the room above. “Whoa!!” Daniel suddenly exclaimed when he couldn’t feel any more rungs of the ladder below him, dangling his foot in open air. His sudden shift of weight to climb back up caused the ladder to creak at its hinges. “Dan?” he heard Sena’s voice echo down. He tried to climb faster and faster, soon hearing a second creak from the ladder that sealed his fate. “Fuck-!” was all Daniel could shout as he began to fall with the broken ladder, his body becoming completely tense and paralyzed in instinctual fear and self-defense. He eventually felt his head bash against the cold stone of the well, then stopped feeling anything at all.

When Daniel regained consciousness, he had no idea if a second or a year had passed. His mind was completely blank for many long minutes as he struggled to even flutter his eyelids. As the sensation of touch began to return, he could tell he was lying in something bristly and uncomfortable. After another several long minutes, someone was looking down at him. “H-Hello?” a voice stuttered. Daniel’s eyes burst opened as he screamed at the man with primal panic, rolling out of the haystack he was on. His head whipped around back and forth, unable to comprehend the bright fields of grass, soil, and animals around him.

The man who had spoken to Daniel slowly approached him with an extended pitchfork. “Easy, easy,” he muttered as if Daniel was a wild animal. Daniel was backing away on his hands and feet, hyperventilating while putting all of his energy into not passing out. After a brief pause, he rolled and stumbled onto his feet, bolting in the opposite direction into a large field of tall grass.

Daniel allowed himself to fall back onto the ground after a few minutes of intense running. Each gasp of a breath felt like an insurmountable challenge, and the heat of the sun was beating him down just as hard. Through his scattered and hazy vision, he looked at his surroundings and down at himself. Something about his hands looked off, but he didn’t have the energy to think about it over his immediate need for figuring out where he was. He pulled his phone, wallet, and keys out of his pockets only to realize they had become useless stones vaguely resembling what they once were. Fading in and out of consciousness, Daniel trudged his way to the first sign of civilization over the course of many long hours.

Noticing a small creak with small buildings on the horizon as the sun was setting, Daniel plunged his face into the water for a drink, giving him the first boost of energy he’d felt since waking up. After splashing the rest of his body and clothes with water, he studied his arms and hands as he made his way toward what looked like a large town.

“These aren’t my hands,” Daniel muttered, opening and closing them while walking. They had become much smaller with slim fingers and long nails. But what really threw him off was that their skin tone was distinctly different, almost matching Sena’s. His forearms looked odd due to his smaller wrists that bulged out into his regular Caucasian arms that appeared unchanged, like a bad tan line with an extra deformation.

As Daniel neared the small buildings on a cobblestone path, he was approached by a man wearing parts of a medieval knight’s armor. He looked and sounded intimidating, but only asked basic security questions. Daniel was frightened, but was also hopeful that answering honestly would help him understand where he was. Stating that he was from America confused the guard, but Daniel looked and sounded so beaten down and pathetic to where the guard deemed him as a non-threat and allowed him to enter, pointing him to tavern.

Men and women dressed in linen, wool, and fur aprons and tunics were everywhere, walking between small wooden or stone buildings and outdoor vendors. The air was heavy with scents of meat and sweat, but also held a natural purity that Daniel couldn’t describe. His T-shirt and jeans had become haggard, but still retained much more modernity than everyone around him, making him stick out in the crowd.

Daniel nervously entered the tavern, having never been to a bar before despite being 30 years old. The blaring sounds of men and women laughing and shouting would have normally deterred him, but he was too tired to care, and needed to get back home. He walked straight up the barkeeper and asked him where he was. The barkeeper told him that he was in the commune of Luka, but wasn’t able to answer any questions regarding to where in the world that was. When Daniel pleaded telling him that he needed to get back to Sena and back to America, the barkeeper looked at him like he was speaking a foreign language. Based on the way Daniel was talking and by the way he was dressed, the barkeeper assumed he was a lost foreigner.

With no where else to go, Daniel trudged around the small town looking for any shred of shelter he could find. After dark, he ended up hopping into an outdoor vendor’s space near their house once it was empty, giving him a table and a short rock wall for protection. He began to panic and cry as he attempted to sleep in the dirt and grass, feeling as if he was going to perish soon if he couldn’t return home. Through his anxiety, he was barely able to sleep for over a few hours.

At the crack of dawn, the man in the house was yelling for the guards. “Intruder! Intruder!” he shouted through his window, seeing Daniel huddled up under his outdoor table. Still exhausted and groggy, it took a second before Daniel realized that he was the one being shouted at. “Get out, thief!!” Daniel hopped the wall and ran straight forward, bug-eyed and disoriented, until he couldn’t hear anyone anymore. He collapsed in front of a wooden building near the edge of the town, unable to recognize how hungry and malnourished he was through his overwhelming exhaustion.

Sometime later, an old man opened the door and was met with the sight of a fallen Daniel. He tried to wake him up, confirming that he was still alive, but largely unresponsive. Runaway foreigner, the man thought to himself as he dragged Daniel inside. The man, who happened to be an innkeeper, had an altruistic desire to help Daniel rest and clean up. But he also assumed that helping Daniel would earn him a few easy pounds based on his foreign clothing.

The man loaded Daniel into a wooden tub with his clothes still on and brought out a few warm bread buns that he’d been preparing since last night. Daniel’s mind was too numb for manners, immediately gobbling down the bread as soon as it was handed to him. The man spoke to him as he washed with water and soap, asking where he was from, why he was here, and how he came to be so beat up. It took awhile for Daniel to respond, and when he did, he got the response he expected. The man, who introduced himself as Conrad, had no idea what ‘America’ was, or where he was in the world other than the commune of Luka. Conrad praised the area, as it was connected to docks on the ocean with plentiful resources.

After being cleaned and fed, Daniel was allowed to sleep on a real bed and happily knocked himself out. Conrad resumed his business throughout the day, taking care of and feeding the locals. Later that evening, to his dismay, Daniel was unable to pay him for the premium services he’d provided. Despite having every right to be shameless in his impossibly taxing situation, Daniel couldn’t help but feel a little guilty at the sight of a sad old man. After further discussion, with Daniel telling Conrad about having no shelter or home to go back to, Conrad let Daniel live in a small dusty attic in exchange for 10-hour work shifts six days a week, assisting Conrad with general innkeeping duties and with cleaning starting tomorrow. Daniel sighed – he wasn’t looking forward to it, but it was the best choice he had.

Daniel spent the evening setting up and cleaning his new living space. Finally having a moment to himself, he rolled up his sleeves and noticed that his arms looked different. Although it was difficult to tell in the dimming natural light from the one small window, the awkward tan lane and bulge were gone, as his arms had completely shrunk, smoothened, and lost their hairiness and Caucasian hue. His biceps were skinny as usual, but they held a subtle roundness around his pits and elbows that could only be described as feminine. “What the fuck is happening to me…” he muttered, gently feeling his arms up and down with little fingers. “Why am I even here, and what the hell is this…” Daniel couldn’t stop himself from trembling and crying again as he slept on a thin mattress.

As he slept, Daniel’s shoulders rounded and diminished over several hours, slimming his upper frame and giving his T-shirt an uncomfortably baggy fit. The skin across his chest and back slightly darkened into a beige hue somewhere in between his natural color and the colors of his arms while his body hair around those areas either thinned or evaporated.

Having been immediately put to work the next morning, Daniel hardly noticed what had happened to him that night. In between cleaning the inn, washing clothes and dishes, and moving and counting inventory, he managed to have a few conversations with either Conrad or some of the guests who were also foreigner traders visiting from the docks. Now that he was less frantic and no longer in need of food and shelter, he meticulously recounted the events leading up to this day, telling his story to anyone who would listen. People were generally interested in hearing tales about the land of America, a fairytale of a place they could only imagine, but once sadness and desperation filled Daniel’s voice in asking how to return home, no one could even begin to think about any solutions other than sailing or walking in the direction he came from. When Daniel kept repeating on how he fell down a well into a haystack, people became distant and assumed he’d damaged his head.

After a long and arduous first day of work, Daniel dedicated more time to interviewing the locals, and even spoke to a doctor about what was wrong with his arms and hands. The doctor was fascinated, but went on to state that diseases were sent as a punishment from God. When the doctor’s only treatment offer was to amputate Daniel’s arms, Daniel began to understand just how primitive these people were.

Daniel groaned in frustration as he tried to sleep that night, wondering if he’d ever make it back home again. He thought about how worried his friends and family must have been. Looking at his feminine arms made him think of Sena, as if some small part of her was with him. Once he managed to fall asleep, he had a strange dream. He was looking up at an Asian woman in a voluminous dress from the perspective of a child. The woman put a small necklace made with flower pedals around his neck, filling him with an overflowing amount of giddiness. As he looked down and held it up with a child-like hand, Daniel woke up and immediately forgot what he had dreamt about, but still retained the happiness he felt for a few brief moments.

“You’re late!” Conrad yelled at Daniel as he climbed down from the attic. “I-It’s so early, though,” Daniel replied with a yawn. “It does not matter, there are traders on the docks. We should be ready for business as soon as the sun is at the horizon.” Disgruntled, Daniel got to work cleaning and preparing food for the sleeping guests. It’s either this or the streets, I guess, he reminded himself.

As Conrad dealt with an increased customer count, most of Daniel’s work today was behind the scenes, giving him a lot of time to think. It was only his second day of work and he was already fed up with how much labor he had to put into basic things like cleaning, laundry, and preparing food and drink due to a startling lack of technology. Once the gruesome shift was over, Daniel didn’t even know how to spend his free time. The locals were clearly useless, and he had no interest in drowning himself with alcohol despite how good the escape from reality sounded on paper.

Daniel strolled through a bustling outdoor marketplace looking for more food, even though he did not have money to pay for anything. No cameras, no tracking, no cops…well, no real cops. With a swift motion, Daniel snagged an apple from a vendor’s bin when he was talking to another customer and concealed it under his shirt. He did the same to a few raw vegetables, and turned the corner into a different part of town before any suspicion arose. “It’s that fuckin’ easy, I guess,” he said to himself as he bit into the apple.

Daniel talked to himself as he lay down in bed that night just to let his thoughts out of his head. As he spoke, he realized that his fear of being in a new foreign place with no technology was mellowing out into homesickness. He tried to rationalize the changes to his arms by telling himself that nothing made sense anyway. He questioned if he was even still real and alive. He wanted nothing more than to go home again and for his life to make sense again, but on the other hand, his mind was beginning to devise ways to thrive in a world where he was clearly the most intelligent person.

Daniel faded in and out of sleep that night, groaning from pressure slowly and intermittently affecting different parts of his body. His legs and spine shrunk over the course of several long hours, while the fat in his stomach began to level and squeeze itself further down his into body, giving him the feeling of constipation. Despite his frame diminishing, Daniel could only feel bloated, as the sensation of his hips and pelvis broadening and stretching his skin until sunrise was the most prominent. The beige hue surrounding his torso had also enveloped the rest of his pasty body, but it was subtle enough to look like a minor sun tan.

As an irritable Daniel stood up the next morning, it became clear that the clothes he’d been wearing would no longer cut it. His pant legs dropped lower than his feet, and his shirt was even baggier and could have been pulled to the side to reveal his whole shoulder. Knocks from the attic door startled Daniel. “Busy day, hurry up!” Conrad yelled. “Oh my fucking God give me a second!” Daniel yelled back in anger. Conrad slowly opened the door to the attic with a look of disgust on his face. “If you use the Lord’s name like that one more time, you are gone. Do you hear me? That use of language is blasphemous and unacceptable.” “Sorry,” Daniel huffed with a deep sigh.

After taking a moment to collect himself, Daniel went downstairs and asked Conrad if he had any spare clothing, stating that his usual clothes had become damaged. He was told that he could use clothes from the storage room, a room that he had perfectly organized yesterday. After trying on a few of the different peasant clothes, Daniel ended up with a small cotte that covered his body. The bottom of the cotte ended between his knees and ankles like a long tunic or a modern-day dress. Seeing both men and women wearing similar attire, he didn’t think it would stand out. What did stand out was the slight curvature around his hips that uncomfortably shifted with every step. Having to get right to work, Daniel wasn’t able to pinpoint what felt off about him outside of his height, but he was getting the sense that something was very wrong.

Watching traders and locals come in and out of the inn all day gave Daniel an exciting idea. After the long work day, he visited the marketplace and stole a few pieces of fruit and vegetables with the mind to resell them as add-ons to the inn’s guests on their way out. He didn’t know how currency worked here, but noticed that a few apples made up a pence and decided to follow the same model. Unlike yesterday, Daniel came in and out from different directions, hoarding food underneath a bush to take back to the attic all at once in a bag tied to his cotte. No one has small pockets here…that would be an easy money-making idea, I think.

Unfortunately, Daniel wasn’t able to sneak a whole bag of food past Conrad as he returned to the inn that evening. Conrad scolded him, thinking that Daniel had money when he was previously told that he didn’t. Daniel lied and said he had made friends with some farmers, but Conrad wasn’t convinced. Nevertheless, Daniel returned to the attic with a cold, fake apology. Putting his bag aside, he threw his cotte off and gave his naked body a good look for the first time that day. He brushed his hands up and down his hips, also noticing that his legs had become nearly hairless. This isn’t… This can’t be real, I don’t look like this.

Strange visions and half-dreams came to Daniel as he tried to sleep that night. He saw flashes of dancing Asian women and sacks of heavy coins exchanging hands. In one of the dreams, he was turning his head back and forth looking up into a secluded room from the perspective of a child again. Long black hair bounced back and forth against his face. He couldn’t quite form an image of his body when he looked down, but he saw the small flower pedal necklace around a tiny neck.

Before the sun rose, a half-conscious Daniel reached for his morning wood, faintly recalling the images of the dancing women. He also thought about Sena and how much he wanted to see her again. “Mmm…Hmmmph…” Daniel hummed quietly, feeling an unusually intense buildup as he stroked up and down. His scrotum began to squeeze his testes hard against his body, bringing him both pain and pleasure he had never felt before. More visions began to flash, simultaneously being very quick and clear. He was bent over a table with something inside of him in a way he couldn’t have imagined. Then, he was slipping his feminine arms through a dress, notably feeling something on his chest. Finally, he was talking to a man across a table in a foreign language. He couldn’t tell what he was saying, but he knew he was spinning some kind of blackmail from the fuzzy expression of the man.

“Fuuu…Fuuu…ck…” Daniel moaned, bringing his mind back to sexy women as he edged closer. He pictured a sexy Asian woman teasing a man in a chair with her ass. Another vision flashed before him, showing him a dusty wall. He felt like his own ass was shaking for a fraction of a second before he reimagined the scene. Asian chick… Sena… Touching Sena up…and down… Dancing… “Fu-uucaakk…!!!” Daniel’s balls fully inverted into his body as the most powerful orgasm erupted from his cock, roping cum across his face and body, and hitting the mattress and floor behind his head. Trembling and panting loudly, he kept jacking his cock long after his last drop of cum. It felt so good, and it felt like something still needed to get out. He wasn’t able to notice his diamond-hard dick shrinking until his clenched hand nearly closed into a fist.

“A-aAah-! Aa-HaAah-!” Daniel continued to shake and moan uncontrollably, trying to throttle his little dick as best he could while feeling his increasingly wet crotch. The cramps he felt from newly developing innards weren’t enough to snap him out of his high. Numerous folds formed around the thin slit his balls left behind. Daniel didn’t even realize his little fingers were slipping into his body as he rubbed himself. It wasn’t long before his manhood was small enough to hide at the crest of the folds, but he could still feel it and was desperate for more. The schlicking sound in his room became as audible as his moaning. He wasn’t even thinking anymore, a complete slave to his physical lust. All of the visions from before flashed again and again through his mind for what felt like hours.

“Awwhhhhaaahh…” Daniel finally let out a high-pitched mix between a sigh and a squeal 30 minutes later. His fingers were drenched and his heart was racing faster than it ever had. It took him several minutes to calm down before a single coherent thought could form in his mind. Patting his crotch, he knew that he should’ve been screaming and freaking out. His manhood was gone, and two sultry thighs were brushing against his hand. So much impossible absurdity had happened to Daniel that he couldn’t muster the energy to be surprised at anything else, and he was still riding a high from back-to-back climaxes.

Noticing sunlight peak through his window, Daniel stood up and threw his cotte on. His throat felt off as he tried to clear it. “Hello, hello,” he said to himself, sounding close to a prepubescent boy. Instead of worrying, he thought about how he could use this as an excuse to get out of work. He walked downstairs to greet Conrad, faking as deep of a voice as possible. “I think I have a bit of a cold,” Daniel lied. Conrad shook his head and told him to take the day off outside, not wanting any risk of disease affecting the food or visitors.

Daniel finally had a whole day to himself. He walked outside with a smile, breathing in the fresh air. He spent most of the morning walking around the town, familiarizing himself with its layout and mentally noting places of interest. He became increasingly self-conscious with every step as the morning high wore off, as he was unsure if anyone else could tell he had a pussy with the way his hips and thighs moved and swayed. As the afternoon rolled around, he began peeking into peoples’ homes, thinking about how vulnerable they were without technology or modern-day locks. He mulled over it for a few hours. I’m not really going to break into someone’s house…but what if I tried it just once?

Daniel nonchalantly picked up a small axe he found outside someone’s house as he continued his stroll. He walked to a far end of the commune to give himself the least amount of risk. This is just testing limits of this…medieval place… he thought to himself as he wedged the axe against a window in the back of a small house. Daniel had always been a soft-hearted man and had never thought about committing a crime this large. This place might not even be real, I might not even be real, he also thought, trying to numb his anxiety. The window on this house was made of wood and simply opened and closed. However, it was small enough to prevent most people from entering. Daniel pondered how he could enter, even his petite body felt like it would be too large. The axe he carried didn’t feel like it would accomplish much unless he wanted to cause blatant damage.

“You know what, let’s not do this,” Daniel muttered to himself, tucking the axe into his cotte’s pouch. His stomach was rumbling, so he went back to the market to swipe some fruit and bread for himself. He told Conrad he was feeling better when he arrived back at the inn that night using a fake deeper voice; otherwise, Conrad would have threatened to kick him out in fear of the disease. “Why do you sound like that?” Conrad asked. Daniel lied and told him that he crushed his balls tripping on a pier by accident, which gave Conrad a hearty laugh while also bringing his sympathy back. Daniel was able to eat all of the leftover food from the inn that night as a gift from the innkeeper.

“Today was a good day,” Daniel breathed to himself as he undressed, getting ready for bed. He looked and felt his body up and down again. Outside of his flat chest and tiny Adam’s apple, he was completely unrecognizable from the neck down – and female. He noticed stretch marks on his thighs and ass that weren’t there the day before. “This is so not real…I have to be dead or in a simulation…” he continued to cope with his impossible reality. Poking and prodding his vag sent shivers up his spine, as he was decidedly not horny unlike this morning. Why is this happening to me…I just want to go home.

As Daniel thought about going home while sleeping that night, he had an intense series of dreams that felt real. In one of them, he was driving a knife though a man’s chest, feeling his blood against his dainty hand each second. The man, on the verge of death, spit into his face, transitioning him to the next dream where he was in a dark room surrounded by young adult Asian women. They were practicing some kind of movements in front of and behind target dummies, almost like a play rehearsal. Daniel was also going through the same motions. He heard a Japanese word in his dream as he motioned a blunt stick against the neck of the target dummy. He understood the word, “vital.”

In Daniel’s final dream, an Asian man was walking up to him. Daniel couldn’t tell what he himself looked like, but as the man placed his hands on his chest, Daniel could tell that he had breasts and was being groped. Daniel hummed, bringing the man in for a passionate kiss before stabbing him in the back. The man stumbled forward, and Daniel held back his body weight while kissing him harder, driving and twisting the knife further in. His body felt like it was on fire with lust. Eventually, Daniel threw the man’s body to the floor to bleed out, then took whatever he had hidden in his clothes at the time.

I want to go home… The phrase echoed in emptiness within Daniel’s mind. Home…Home…Home… The brief memory of an Asian woman putting a necklace around his head flashed again. He looked down at his body suddenly, noticing the necklace above a pair of supple breasts. “Aaaah!” Daniel woke up yelling. He looked down and patted his chest, but it was still too dark to see anything. Unbeknownst to him at the time, his skin tone had become a bit more yellow, and his nipples had slightly swollen with a dark brown hue, but his chest was still flat. I’m okay, I’m okay, it was just a dream…

Unlike the previous days, Daniel was eager and ready to get to work that day. He had a massive headache and didn’t want to dwell on the dreams he had experienced. Throughout the day, he noticed the guests and customers looking at him a bit differently which made him too self-conscious to peddle off his extra stolen food to them. Daniel continued to question and doubt his reality as he worked tirelessly. As the evening approached, his stomach rumbled. All this time, he had been eating the bare minimum to keep him alive and it was starting to get to him. After swiping some fruit and bread from the market after work, he went around the quieter parts of town and discreetly tried to open the front doors of each house he passed by. Daniel quickly left after finding out a door was locked, not wanting to pursue further action. Just as he was about to give up, one of the front doors opened.

Daniel’s heart was racing as he stepped inside, realizing that he hadn’t thought about if people would actually be home or not. The house only comprised of one large room, making it relatively easy for Daniel to frantically scan. No one was home, but there was an open fire under a pot in the house, indicating that whoever lived here would probably be back soon. I should go, this is stupid, he thought. As he turned, he noticed small tied-up sacks on a wooden counter, reminding him of a vision he saw in his dreams. Fuck it! Daniel swiftly ran up, swiped the sacks, and left slamming the door.

After running for a long time to ensure that no one saw him, Daniel sat down by a low rock wall to catch his breath and examine what he had just stolen. He felt awful, but the sacks contained exactly what he was after – money. He spent the money on meat, eggs, and a little ale at a tavern that night which helped him clear his mind and fill his belly for the first time since falling down the well. “Sooo good,” he said as he licked his fingers, “better than meat in America.”

As Daniel finished up, he turned to look at a group of loud, rowdy, men who were clearly drinking too much. He’d always hated noisy “jock-like” guys which was why he had avoided places like this all throughout his life. “WhOt’rE yeW lOaKin’ aT?” one of them spat at him with a heavy slurred accent. Daniel quickly turned away and made his way outside. But the man had a point, what was he looking at? 

For the first time that day, Daniel noticed his distinctly tanner skin as he undressed that night, pouring himself a bath in a wooden tub with Conrad’s permission. The water felt so different against his smooth, sensitive skin than it had a few days ago when he first arrived. Lathering his body with soap felt good, and his nipples swelled again as he brushed over them with soapy hands. Daniel never liked the feeling of anything touching his nipples, but something felt different about them now. Once his body was relaxed in the tub, he slowly began to tweak them under the water. He would flinch and stop a few times, but kept at it. His legs spread and his other hand crawled down to please himself. He’d been trying his hardest not to think about how feminine he’d become, but it had come too far along to deny any longer. He was expecting to wake up with breasts any day now.

Daniel thought about Sena as he rubbed his clit, still unable to believe he was truly trapped in the commune of Luka for the rest of his life. Another part of him still thought he was either trapped in a messy simulation, or dead while struggling to move onto the afterlife. Maybe my spirit possessed a woman back in time, and she’s regaining control of her body, or something, he thought. Maybe I’ll move on when she’s done…to heaven? Fuck, I don’t want to die, though…

Daniel masturbated in the tub for a long while, but couldn’t quite reach the climax he desired. After laying down for bed, he stared at the ceiling in deep thought until falling asleep. More intense dreams bombarded him that night. He was on a boat, and long hair was being blown into his face. He didn’t know where he was going, but he knew he was escaping from some hostile force. Then, he suddenly found himself running with a sword in both hands, screaming shrilly as he thrust it into a man’s chest. More Japanese phrases filled his mind. He was being given orders to blackmail, intimidate, and make examples of other criminals and daimyos alike.

Waking up in a cold sweat, Daniel patted himself down and breathed a sigh of relief, not finding any new changes. His bare legs rubbed together with goosebumps, chilled from a rainy breeze. As he worked throughout the day, he found himself missing the food from last night more and more. His mind had been focused on his changes and his new environment for the past few days, but the hard reality of this lifestyle was setting in again. He had wanted to keep good relations with Conrad, but he wasn’t being paid and was mostly given leftovers to eat. Even his one day off was further delayed due to the ‘sick’ day he took earlier. Something had to give. Luckily, he managed to sell a few stolen fruits and vegetables to guests that day behind Conrad’s back.

Swiping food from the market wasn’t giving Daniel the same satisfaction it once had, as it became routine after work. He poked around front doors of houses again like yesterday, but didn’t have the same luck in finding an open one. However, he did manage to find a large house with a wooden window that opened on hinges that was big enough for him to fit through. It was in a crowded area, and just the idea made his heart race, knowing it was a crime. Peeking through the window showed him that no one was home. He hung around for about a half hour, waiting for the perfect moment when no one could see him crawl into the window. He saw bags of wheat, wheels of cheese, and a trunk filled with labeled bags of coins that made his eyes glow. After quickly snacking on some of the food, he took as much money as he could carry in the pouch of his cotte. Walking towards the window again, he spun to the front door to exit naturally, not wanting to arouse any suspicion.

As Daniel was eating like a king at the tavern that night, he heard whispers of a thief going around town. “Thas thee secund report ‘n two days!” a man yelled. “If I find this connivin’ lit’le bastard, he’ll be sent raight back t’ thee devil!” Daniel hunched over his food, at first feeling bad about what he had done. Not like I have a choice, right? He thought. No one’s going to pay me or feed me food like this… Fuck these people, they’re animals who weren’t forced from their homes like me.

The rain picked up again, forcing Daniel to walk home drenched. He had stayed out especially late that night, only to realize Conrad had locked the inn before he’d arrived. “Mother fucker, are you serious?” Daniel spat, pounding the door. He knew there were guests sleeping inside, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. Then, he pulled the axe from his cotte and started chopping at the door’s hinges, desperate to get out of the rain. The sound of the weather masked a lot of the noise Daniel was making. When going for the hinges didn’t work, Daniel busted a small hole through the door so he could unlatch the lock himself.

Swearing all the way up to the attic, Daniel wrung the water out of his cotte into a tub after stashing his axe and money near his mattress. Once his eyes had adjusted to the dark, he felt around for a new cotte in the storage closet. Although he couldn’t get an exact read on what he picked, he could tell that he picked a distinctly feminine one. I am so fucking done with this place, he thought as he marched back to the attic, knowing he couldn’t get enough sleep before work tomorrow. After laying down and undressing, he slowly caressed his body and up and down in an attempt to relax. He moaned and bit his lower lip as he tweaked his nipples with two dainty fingers, then his heart was racing before he knew it as something began to happen.

Veins were pressing against his hands and chest as he spread his legs and masturbated. Immense pressure was pushing up from within him. The small of his back arched up and down as he writhed throughout the process. The tiniest amount of fluid secreted through his nipples as flesh bolstered around them, expanding and jiggling with his movements. “Oh fuck…yesss…” Soon, he needed his whole hand to grab and contain his growing chest as the fat split into two distinct shapes. Memories of being fucked by Asian men flashed through his mind unexpectedly, allowing him to cum as he pressed and squeezed against his breasts. He squeaked a sigh of relief as he brought his wet fingers into his mouth, humming as he licked them clean. He tasted so good.

Daniel was only able to fall asleep from sheer exhaustion that night. The same memories he’d seen continued to flash through his mind in more detail and intensity throughout the night. He stood up and played with the modest bust he had grown the next morning. He couldn’t tell if his face had changed or not, and realized that it was only a matter of time before Conrad would probably see through his lies about changing.

“Daniel, my boy, are you a woman…?” Conrad asked as Daniel came downstairs. Daniel’s feminine cotte was still baggy enough to hide most of his features, but it was impossible to think he looked anything like a man from the head down. Daniel laughed, struggling through his fake deep voice. “Of course not, I think your eyesight might be going.” “But your garments, and your height, and…well, anyway, get to work.” Daniel thought to himself for awhile before asking: “How much money to rent a room for the night, Conrad?” Conrad was taken aback by the unexpected question. “Well, it would be six pence.” “Okay, and how much for the attic? Surely less than that, right?” “What is the meaning of these questions, Daniel?”

Daniel and Conrad began to argue. Daniel had decided he was fed up with working 10 hour shifts with no pay and sought to break the cycle. Conrad began to roar about how he was kind enough to take Daniel in during a busy time of the year, and how he had to deal with thieves – referencing the damage to the inn’s front door he noticed that morning. Daniel retaliated with how he could make more money than his room was worth in the day by picking fruit from the trees – and marketplace, which Daniel kept to himself.

Conrad begrudgingly compromised by giving Daniel another day off, which Daniel accepted despite having no plans to work for him again. He spent the day planning and stealing money in broad daylight with a high survival instinct, using the shadows and alleyways to dip in and out of foot traffic. Some people were dumb enough to have sacks of coins dangling from their cottes, which Daniel easily pickpocketed with the finesse of his fingers. Other times, he would notice someone walk out of their front door and simply slinked his way inside, knowing that it wouldn’t be locked. He would go in and out in under 15 seconds, pocketing any small things of value. He also noticed more guards among the citizens, as his thieveries were beginning to catch on.

Taking a break in the afternoon, Daniel sat by a clear stream. He looked into it and saw his reflection. He mostly still looked like himself with blond hair and blue eyes, but his skin was soft and yellow just like the rest of his body. He had only now realized that he wasn’t growing facial hair anymore. He grabbed at his chest and felt his body down again through the cotte, wondering how this had all happened and if he was going to die soon. Memories of being a seductive Asian woman were now clear in his mind from all of his dreams, but he knew that this wasn’t him. It couldn’t have been further off.

Relaxing at a tavern that evening, Daniel found his eyes drawn towards the rowdy drunk men again. Focus, what’s the next move, he would think to himself before becoming distracted again. He would then think about how the men were living their lives free of all social conduct and just having fun, which Daniel had also always wanted to do, especially in this primitive town. He crossed his legs under the cotte, feeling some warm heat in between them. Never going to happen. I know that I’m not gay.

“God, just make it stop,” Daniel groaned trying to fall asleep that night. His dreams and visions were louder than he could have imagined. The word “Tsune” kept ringing in his ears, although he couldn’t tell what it meant in context despite understanding all of the other Japanese words in his head. “This isn’t me…!” he whispered, practically living the memory of tying up long, black, silky hair on his head. Gasping for air in his half-asleep state, Daniel’s Adam’s apple rose and melded into his neck, practically making it invisible. Using all of his willpower to resist screaming in frustration, he simply wept, feeling completely powerless against everything happening to him.

By the time the sun rose, Daniel’s tears had dried up. He felt emotionless as he trudged downstairs. He didn’t even try to mask the feminine voice that he spoke with, and instead flipped Conrad two pence. “That’s for my attic room tonight,” he said coldly. Conrad stuttered, taken aback by what he was hearing. “You’re not Daniel, what did you do to him?” “Why do you care? Two pence for the attic tonight, are you taking or leaving it?” Conrad stuttered again before answering. “Y-You’re a wizard or a witch from a foreign land, I should have never taken you in! You’ve been nothing but trouble! Begone!” Conrad dropped the coins to the floor. “I’ve been nothing but trouble?” Daniel repeated. “I’ve been your slave ever since I came here. I’m the only reason the traders from the docks haven’t turned this place into a complete shithole!” Daniel picked his money up from off the ground and walked away, numb from his anger and disdain.

“Okay, breathe,” Daniel told himself, finding a place to sit alone by the ocean on the edge of town. “I’m done working my ass off like that. I’m free…but I’m still here.” Am I ever going to see my friends and family again? he thought, already knowing the answer. After days of consecutive thieving, the guards were on high alert, so Daniel decided to take the day to think and unwind. He bathed his supple Asian body in a stream and couldn’t help but swipe a few good pieces of bread and cheese after telling himself to stop stealing for the day. It took a lot of effort to not go to the tavern that evening, figuring it’d be best to save the stolen money he had.

As the sun set, Daniel felt an impending darkness growing within him. It was time to find a place to sleep. He knew the door to Conrad’s inn wasn’t fully repaired, it would be trivial to break in again and sleep in the attic. But he wanted something better. He found himself slinking through alleys until reaching the edge of the commune, finding the lone wooden house he had decided not to break into a few days ago. “Helloooo,” he cooed, knocking on the door. Hearing what sounded like a beautiful woman, the old man, who looked to be around 40 years of age, naturally opened the door, which is when Daniel forced himself inside.

Daniel’s face began to tweak and twitch. The old man was visibly confused and wanted an explanation. Don’t do this, I’m not going to do this… Daniel thought. He had no love or sympathy for the people of this town, but what he was about to do still felt like it was going way too far. “I need a place to sleep tonight,” he said. The old man sputtered, confused by the combination of Daniel’s voice, body, and face: “A-Are you-a wo…man?” “What a rude question!” Daniel laughed, feeling his cheekbones rise with a rounding jaw. His bottom lip felt plump as the shape of his chin diminished.

Daniel held the handle of his axe in his cotte’s pouch, shaking in place as he tried to fight off his inner desire. The old man meekly asked, “Where are you from?” “The Far East,” Daniel replied with no hesitation, feeling an accent come through his voice as his mouth became smaller. He flexed his tongue and licked his teeth as they transformed. The bridge of his nose flattened into his face as parts of his eyelids were stretched and folded into his skin. “You’ll let me sleep here, right?” Daniel said with an overly emphasized pleading voice. “I have nowhere else to go…” The old man, watching Daniel’s face change before his eyes, was terrified and didn’t know how to respond. Daniel continued as his watery blue eyes were consumed by a deep brown: “Please don’t make me do this.”

Daniel wasn’t advancing, but the old man continued to slowly back away towards the small window. The old man sounded like he was begging for his life as he sputtered: “P-Please, I have lived a full life. There probably are not many years left for me. Just g-get out of here, go away. Please.” Daniel inhaled a deep breath of air, feeling his eyebrows thin and darken with a fuzzy, almost ticklish feeling above his eyes. “Okay, I’ll go,” he finally said, loosening his grip on the axe. “I’m going,” he repeated to himself, managing to begin walking towards the front door through a brief mental struggle.

As Daniel was about to open the front door to leave, he heard the old man shout as loud as he could through his window: “GUAAAARDS!!” Daniel’s mind went completely blank as he gripped and threw his small axe square into the man’s head with one swift motion. He ran up to the corpse he’d just created and further pressed the axe in, holding it firmly like an animal driven by instinct to ensure that its prey would never move again. His blond hair had darkened and was beginning to cascade down his head, growing well past his shoulders and chest. Daniel had always hated the sight of blood, and looking directly at a cracked-open head made him want to cry and throw up. But those weaknesses were no longer present; somehow, this felt completely natural.

Daniel ran outside and moved between nearby hiding spots, staking the house out for hours to ensure that no guards came running. To his relief, it appeared that the old man’s call went unanswered. Daniel was exhausted, completely drained of energy and emotion, but he still had to get rid of the body before going to bed. He went into the old man’s basement through a trap door and found a large bag with some rope, then used them to haul the corpse all the way to the docks. Upon arrival, he took some loose rocks from a low rock wall to put into the body bag, ensuring that it would be weighed down when he pushed it into the ocean.

Daniel fell asleep immediately upon returning to the old man’s house and undressing, now claiming it as his own. Are you proud of me? he heard his feminine voice echo through his head as he slept. A ghostly figure of an Asian woman in a voluminous dress appeared, similar to the one from his first dream. She spoke in Japanese, which Daniel understood without issue: “My answer should not matter to you. But yes, I am proud of my Tsune.”

With an exhausted groan, Daniel woke up the next morning feeling her face and hair. Memories of last night came rushing back as she looked at the bloodstain on the other side of the room. It was all real. I took a man’s life. And I’m a… Daniel took several deep breaths, trying to calm her heart rate. Then, she got dressed and went to the quiet stream to see her reflection. “I’m a woman.” She turned and felt her face all around, noticing a very slight resemblance to Sena. Am I dead? Was Sena even real? Was I even real? Daniel undressed and bathed in the stream again, slowly feeling herself up and down. It felt more natural this time. As she closed her eyes to wash her face, she could envision memories of herself bathing as a young girl all the way up to adulthood.

Daniel drew a lot of eyes with her new face that day in town. She was the only Asian person, and probably the first Asian woman many people had ever laid eyes on. Despite her efforts to remain discreet, pompous men who wore their wealth on their sleeves greeted her and asked her all sorts of uncomfortable questions – Daniel simply noted them as easy targets before moving on. Daniel laid low for the next several days, casually stealing food and money whenever opportunities presented themselves while also getting used to her new body, face, and hair, and how people perceived her. Taking care of herself at her own pace felt like a nice change, both from Conrad’s work and from modern-day America.

Daniel didn’t bother trying to fight or challenge the visions and memories that came to her each night, as they had become routine by now. She remembered growing up as a young girl in the land of Kippon in the Far East, having to narrowly flee her home due to provoking too many enemies in the underworld. As someone who had been raised to spy, steal, and assassinate, the memory held a lot of shame. She also remembered wanting nothing more than to be like her mother, who was an incredibly attractive broker who also worked as a prostitute. These memories had become so loud and clear that Daniel had begun to question whether his life as a man in America had ever been real.

After a week had passed, Daniel found herself back at the tavern in a nice dress she had stolen earlier in the week, wanting to treat herself before formulating a real plan to how to live going forward. She knew that she couldn’t live in a dead man’s house without question forever, as it was only a matter of time before a manorial lord or baron sent someone to collect food or money. 

A man who looked like he could have come from the Mediterranean sat by a lone Daniel and asked the barkeeper to refill her drink. She had been dealing with unwanted attention ever since her transformation had finished and usually brushed men off with a few words. But this man had a different vibe to him, wearing a sleek headband with an open-button shirt, revealing part of his svelte chest. He introduced himself as a trader names Ermis. Unlike the other men who approached Daniel, he was interested in her culture, having only heard of people from the Far East in stories.

Daniel, who introduced herself as Tsune for the first time almost panicking on the spot, happily told Ermis tales of what she remembered from her dreams and memories. It felt distant, fake, genuine, and real all at the same time. Ermis also passionately spoke about his home country and culture in a way that had Tsune on the edge of her seat. The pair ate, drank, and chatted the night away for longer than they could have expected. Once the tavern was closing, Ermis told Tsune that he would love to get to know her a little better before sailing back to his country the following day.

Tsune had electricity running through her veins as she led Ermis back to her temporary house. A small voice still rung in the back of her head, saying I shouldn’t be doing this, this is wrong! But Ermis’s body, height, voice, and smile had become a drug to her throughout their evening. A glowing warmth radiated from between her legs that could not be satisfied by mere fingers.

Ermis and Tsune were all over each other the second that the room became lit with dim candle lights. Ermis held up one of Tsune’s raised legs as her hands glided in and under his shirt, then up to his rugged face and hair. Clothes were quick to come off, and before she knew it, Tsune was shrieking on her knees and elbows as Ermis broke his way into her on the bed. Her slanted eyes rolled into the back of her head as he took complete control, melting her like butter. The couple switched positions throughout the night, finally ending with Ermis spouting a massive load of cum onto Tsune’s face, into her mouth, and down her chest as she fondled herself.

Tsune fell asleep in Ermis’s arms after the couple caught their breath and cleaned up, having never felt so confident and assured in herself before. Ermis left Tsune in the middle of the night to return to his ship, leaving Tsune to happily wake up alone the next morning with some of the best feelings and memories she could have asked for. That was so fun… I needed that.

Now that all of her distractions had resolved, Tsune decided that it was time to get to business. She began dedicating hours, sometimes even full days to stealing money and objects while also creating maps of the commune and all of its little secrets and corridors. Keeping notes of potential shelters was also very important to her, staying prepared for whenever she would be upended from her current residence.

Another successful week has passed before Tsune was approached by a hooded man. The man told her that her endeavors had been noticed, and that she was invited to join a guild of thieves. She was naturally skeptical until seeing the guild for herself – a vast underground network where other thieves met, bargained, slept, and occasionally teamed up. It felt too good to be real to the point where Tsune almost declined out of suspicion. She was assured that, as long as she did her part to help the guild, she would be treated with food, shelter, and respect, even if most of the other members weren’t exactly friendly or open to a female foreigner.

Tsune dipped in and out of the guild throughout the next two weeks, honing her talents while getting reads on the guild’s members. Even without fully committing, her knowledge and talents were clear stand-outs to the point where even racist and sexist members of the guild began to develop respect for her. As she had predicted, the house she was living in was no longer safe after the tax collectors had realized the owner was no longer present several weeks later, forcing Tsune to take permanent residence in the guild.

With the thieves’ guild shelter and opportunities, Tsune was able to thrive as the young, beautiful, and lethally talented woman she was meant to be. Any lingering qualms she had about her new reality dissipated – she had become successful enough to eat, drink, laugh, and fuck whenever she wanted, all while maintaining her devilishly alluring feminine style with a new wardrobe of custom-made and imported Eastern dresses.

Two short years had passed before Tsune found herself leading the thieves’ guild, accepting the mantal after the previous leader had been killed in a heist gone wrong. Under her leadership, the guild was taken to new heights, rivaling the power of Luka’s own government while remaining in the shadows. Although she hadn’t realized it yet, Tsune had already exceeded her mother’s powerful leading example and was on her way to becoming one of the world’s most influential and infamous crime lords.