Chapter 9: The Agony of Transformation

“You’re awake?”

“Congratulations, you are now a girl.”

‘Initially, I’d thought it would be simple: just fall asleep, wake up, hear someone say those words, and everything would be done.’

‘No fuss, no pain—just straightforward.’

But reality slapped me hard.

Only now did I realize that the agony of becoming a woman was even more terrifying than the castration I’d endured before!

This was precisely why, after being pulled from that cauldron, I had to lie in bed, wrapped in blankets, twitching uncontrollably as I slowly recovered.

At that moment, my eyes saw nothing, my mouth couldn’t utter a sound, and my entire body was a symphony of itching and throbbing pain. Only my ears could faintly perceive anything.

The first sound I registered was the wicked voice of Lulu, the witch:

“Ah, young flesh is truly tender. Just a little stewing, and it’s so soft, so fragrant. I nearly couldn’t resist devouring you whole, hehehe…”

I wanted to smash that old hag to pieces!

Alas, it seemed I had truly become a puddle of flesh, capable only of worm-like wiggles to express my displeasure.

“Oh, don’t be so impatient, young one. This is the digestion process of the ‘Magic Potion.’ Though it’s only one-tenth of the dose, it’s enough to create miraculously mad changes.”

“Just wait a little longer. The rest of your flesh will grow back soon, though it might take a bit longer than I anticipated. After all, I spent some time deliberating whether to just cook and eat you, and in my hesitation, I accidentally stewed you a little too soft.”

“I see your eyes and mouth will be growing back very soon… Oh, my, isn’t your backside already half-formed?”

Lulu’s wicked voice drifted from an unknown direction; I seemed to have lost even the ability to pinpoint sounds.

If I could have discerned her location, I would surely have pounded that old hag to death!

But…

It was merely a fleeting thought.

After all, my hands seemed to have been stewed soft too, making any such forceful action impossible.

“Don’t think I harmed you on purpose. The digestion of a ‘Magic Potion’ is always this brutal. When I first stole extraordinary power, I suffered far more than you are now.”

‘You deserved it!’

I cursed the old hag vehemently in my mind.

“Cough, cough…”

Perhaps it was a sign that my flesh was growing back, but an itchy throat made me cough uncontrollably.

“Being able to cough means you’re recovering well. Say a few words for this old woman to hear?” Lulu asked, a hint of eagerness in her tone.

So, I struggled to clear my inflamed, swollen, and aching throat, gritting my teeth as I croaked, “You… you old hag!”

The sound was hoarse and terribly unpleasant.

“Hmph, disrespectful to your elders. Where are your eyes?”

Perhaps angered by my insult, I felt Lulu’s hand forcibly pry open my sticky eyelids.

The next moment, darkness receded, and intense light stabbed into my eyes like knives. I let out an uncontrollable shriek:

“Ah—!”

It was a voice that had never belonged to me, so foreign, so sharp, like the first cry of a chick breaking free from its shell.

Slowly, I felt a warm airflow rolling in my throat, making each breath I uttered sound different.

If that initial cry was a somewhat unfamiliar, neutral sound, within a few breaths, I discovered that even my gasps had distinct feminine characteristics.

For the first time, I felt a strangeness towards my own voice.

“How could this be…”

As I uttered this sentence tremulously, I was astonished to find that my voice had become incredibly delicate and soft—so soft that I couldn’t recognize it as my own.

At the same time, my previously blurry vision gradually sharpened, and I vaguely saw the old hag bring a mirror, placing it before me.

“See for yourself.”

I leaned closer, discovering a blurred face reflected in the mirror. The lines of the cheeks were soft and flowing, lacking any sharp, assertive angles; it was a gentle, understated bone structure.

My skin was bloody and indistinct because my flesh hadn’t fully grown back, but the areas that had healed felt smooth and soft to the touch. I imagined it would be quite lovely once complete.

My hair seemed much longer, reaching around my shoulders, but its color was peculiar, an unhealthy gray.

Yet, this wasn’t the strangest part. As I leaned in even closer, I was astonished to realize that my irises had transformed into an odd pale purple, as if afflicted by some strange illness.

“Purple? How can it be purple? No, this isn’t right! According to my formula, only your body should undergo changes, not your eyes!”

Lulu, the witch, noticed it too and suddenly shrieked.

I detected a hint of panic in her voice, something I had never perceived in her before.

“What’s going on?” I asked, feeling uncertain. “My eye color changed… What does that mean?”

At my question, the old hag’s face showed embarrassment for the first time. She furrowed her brows in thought for a moment:

“I’m not entirely sure, but I know that the less you resemble an ordinary person, the greater the side effects of the ‘Magic Potion’… Eh?”

Her voice suddenly hitched, and she pointed a finger at a nearby shelf,

“No, why is there so much less ‘Rosemary’ here, and where has my ‘Bewitching Seed’ from the jar gone!?”

She looked at me, and I looked at her, both utterly bewildered.

But soon, an expression of ‘I’ve had a revelation’ appeared on the old hag’s face.

“Wait… I think I remember something I forgot to tell you back then! I wanted to tell you to remember to open all the windows in the room for ventilation. Otherwise, the scent of ‘Rosemary’ would accumulate indoors and cause you to fall into hallucinations.”

I, too, had a revelation. I suddenly understood why, despite adding so much firewood, the flames had slowly diminished.

‘So I fell into a hallucination then!’

‘Could all that ‘firewood’ I added have actually been those herbs?’

‘Where did I even add it? Into the fire pit?’

‘No, it seems like…’

‘Into the potion!’

I quickly relayed my conjecture to Lulu, whose eyes widened significantly in fright.

“No wonder, no wonder I had that thought of ‘I might as well just eat you’ when I was cooking you earlier! So that was the reason!”

“‘Rosemary,’ as an auxiliary ingredient for the ‘Magic Potion,’ is originally meant to increase the user’s charm, allowing them to emit an alluring body scent. Even adding more would typically have diminishing returns. However, once combined with the ‘Bewitching Seed,’ it not only magnifies the former’s effect by hundreds or thousands of times, but also causes the user’s various metabolic byproducts to produce a similar effect…”

“The consequence of this is that you will not only possess a body scent that madly attracts others, but it will also make anyone who smells it…”

“Want to eat you!”

Whether it was my imagination or not, I thought I saw the old hag lick her lips.

I didn’t know if she was intentional or unintentional, serious or joking.

But I instinctively recoiled half a body length, trembling as I stared at her.

“So, this… this is… a side effect, then? Is there any way to… remedy it?”

“Remedy?”

As if a certain keyword had been triggered, the old hag suddenly sneered,

“The ‘Magic Potion’ never grants anyone the chance to regret, no matter who they are…”