The screen was right in front of his face.
Neve stared at it as he reached out one paw and poked it.
His paw went straight through.
He poked it again. Through again. He tried with both paws, like it would make a difference.
Nothing. His paws passed through it every time like it was made of air.
He looked up.
The leopard was sitting against the far wall of the cave with a sharp scale in his hand, dragging it slowly across a piece of wood. Making spikes.
He was completely unbothered by the small red panda having a crisis on his straw bed.
Neve looked back at the screen.
"Okay," he said quietly, which came out as a low chitter. "First question. Why did you bring me here?"
{It was a mistake.}
Neve blinked.
"...Ehn?"
{A mistake, Host. You were not the intended soul.}
The screen in front of him shifted. The image changed and Neve went very still because what he was looking at was the zoo. The lion enclosure. He and Rena were standing at the barrier with the kids crowding around them. He watched himself reach out and grab her arm as she slipped. Watched himself shove her back. Watched himself go over the edge.
The system's voice was very calm about all of it.
{Your partner, Rena, was the intended host. She was supposed to fall. Everything prepared for her... this world, this mission, this body, the scent... was meant for her. But you pushed her out of the way and fell instead. So everything that was hers is now yours.}
Neve sat with that for a long moment.
He died because he saved Rena.
Rena was supposed to fall into the lion enclosure and get sent to a beast world as a red panda.
He saved her and now he was here.
{Your partner was–}
"Shut up," he said. "Let me think."
{Take your time, Host.}
"I said shut up."
{...}
He pressed both paws against his face and breathed. Okay. Okay. He saved someone from falling and fell himself and died and got sent to a beast world in a red panda body because the universe had apparently prepared all of this for Rena and didn't bother making a backup plan when the wrong person showed up.
He dropped his paws.
"Since it was a mistake," he said, "how do I go back?"
The screen changed again.
Neve looked at it.
Then immediately looked away.
It was his body. In the lion enclosure. After the fall.
He shut his eyes tight. He didn't need to see that. He had already felt it happen, he also needed to see it.
"Okay," he said, eyes still closed. "That means I can't go back."
{Correct.}
He opened his eyes and looked at the ceiling of the cave. At the rough stone and the gaps where outside air came through.
He was dead. His actual body was dead. There was nothing to go back to.
He lay down flat on the straw mat and stared up at nothing and let that sit in him for a minute.
"Fine," he said. "So what exactly did this world prepare for Rena?"
{Initiating mission briefing.}
The screen shifted again. Clean and simple this time.
{MISSION: BUILD YOUR TRIBE — 0/200}
Neve looked at it and blinked once.
Then twice.
"Two hundred," he said slowly. "I need two hundred tribe members."
He sat up.
Okay. Okay, actually this wasn't terrible. Two hundred people. He could work with that. He needed to find people, build trust, establish some kind of leadership structure, create systems for food and shelter and—
He picked up a small sharp stone from the ground and started scratching on the cave floor. Shapes. A rough map. Circles for people, lines for connections, arrows for direction of approach.
He sat back and looked at his work.
Not bad. Not bad at all actually. He had a partial degree and a working brain and he had just created a basic recruitment framework in under two minutes. Rena could never. He almost felt good about this.
The screen refreshed.
{Clarification — the two hundred refers to litters.}
Neve's stone stopped moving.
"...Litters."
{Correct.}
"Litters," he said again. "You mean, babies???"
{Yes, Host. Do keep up.}
Neve put the stone down very carefully. "Explain. Explain what you mean by litters. Explain it right now."
{Host level is currently too low to access full mission details.}
"Then how am I supposed to—"
{Increase your level, Host.}
"And HOW do I increase my level.?
{Would you like the full list of methods?}
"Yes."
{Method one — mate with your husbands.}
Neve stared at the screen.
"Give me something else."
{Method two — complete small missions.}
"That one," Neve said immediately. "That one. What are the missions.?
The screen shifted to a list. Neve scanned down it and stopped at the first one.
{MISSION 1: HUNT}
He frowned. "Hunt what? I can't hunt like this." He looked down at his small red panda body. His small red panda paws. "I need to be able to shift. Like them." He glanced at the leopard still carving wood across the cave. "How do I shift.?
The screen moved and a single button appeared.
Neve looked at it and poked it.
Something happened immediately and it was not good. His vision went sideways. The cave tilted. His whole body felt like it was being pulled from the inside out slowly and his consciousness started going fuzzy as the system knocked him out.
'What—'
{First time shifting detected. Estimated time to complete transformation — twelve hours.}
{Please rest, Host.}
"TWELVE HOURS?!" Neve tried to yell. It came out as one loud chitter. "YOU COULD HAVE TOLD ME THAT BEFORE I PRESSED IT. YOU ABSOLUTE PIECE OF SHIT—"
{Language, Host.}
"YOU COULD HAVE WARNED ME YOU ABSOLUTE BASTARD SYSTEM—"
The leopard's head snapped up from across the cave. He looked at Neve with flat yellow eyes and said nothing.
Neve looked back at him and opened his mouth but his consciousness left anyway.
His face hit the straw mat and the last thing he heard was the system, perfectly calm and completely unbothered was...
{Sweet dreams, Dear Host.}