The morgue was a labyrinth of cold, damp stone, smelling of formaldehyde and the faint, sweet decay of flesh. Xu Jianyu, now upright, though still unsteady, stumbled naked through its oppressive silence. His bare feet slapped against the slick, uneven floor, sending shivers through his altered body. Every breath was a rasp, every movement a fresh wave of agony, yet a strange, almost clinical curiosity began to override the pain.
His eyes, once accustomed to the dimness, darted around, absorbing every detail. Rows of slabs, some empty, others bearing the still forms of discarded experiments—grotesque fusions of human and beast, or bodies warped by uncontrolled qi. He saw a pile of rotting test robes in a corner, stained with dried blood and unknown fluids. Survival instinct, sharp and sudden, took over. He pulled one on, the coarse fabric scratching against his sensitive skin, the oversized sleeves hanging loosely. It smelled of dust and despair, but it offered concealment.
He moved, not with grace, but with a terrifying, unnatural speed of adaptation. His system, the cold whisper in his spirit, was already at work. He felt every tendon, every muscle fiber, as if they were wires he could pluck and retune. His vision sharpened, adjusting to the gloom. He focused on the sounds—the distant drip of water, the faint, rhythmic hum of the sect's deeper formations. He reshaped his vocal cords, testing a silent exhalation, then a deeper, resonant breath. The sound was not quite his own, but it was controllable.
A sudden burst of laughter echoed from a nearby corridor, drawing closer. "The next auction of male marrow will be quite the event, won't it, Sister?" a female voice chirped, followed by a chorus of giggles. Jianyu froze, pressing himself against a wall lined with shelves of preserved organs. He held his breath, willing his body to merge with the shadows, to become nothing. The voices passed, oblivious, their casual cruelty a chilling reminder of his new reality.
He continued deeper, drawn by a faint, metallic scent that promised water. He found it: a dark, stagnant pool, fed by a trickle from the ceiling. The water was frigid, but he plunged in, washing away the grime and the clinging scent of death. As the cold embraced him, he began to experiment.
He focused on his musculature, the subtle shifts in his bones. He commanded his skin, his very cells. The System hummed, a low, satisfied thrum within his spirit. He felt a profound, unsettling malleability. His jawline softened, his cheekbones subtly reshaped. His shoulders narrowed, his hips flared with a delicate curve. His chest, once flat, began to swell with a subtle, disturbing roundness.
It was not a disguise. It was a transformation.
His female form emerged for the first time. Delicate. Hauntingly perfect. Unnaturally symmetrical. His reflection in the dark water showed a face of ethereal beauty, a face that was both utterly alien and disturbingly familiar. It was his own features, refined, sculpted, feminized to an ideal that felt both divine and monstrous.
He was disturbed by how right it felt. Like this body, this form, was what he was always meant to be. Designed to "fit" a divine ideal, as the System had whispered. The thought was a cold, alien hand clutching his heart.
Using this new knowledge, this new skin, he slipped out of the morgue. The lower servant districts were a maze of narrow alleys and crumbling hovels. He moved with a newfound, unsettling grace, a ghost in new skin, invisible among the shadows, utterly alone.