ISEKAI? More like ISE-WHY-ME?!

The cave was a damp and fetid womb, oozing with animal heat, as if the stone itself were breathing. The walls, covered in blackish moss and viscous streaks, absorbed the scarce light filtering through thin cracks in the ceiling, leaving only a greenish, oppressive glow. The air was heavy, saturated with the smells of mold, dried blood, and bestial sweat. A dull hum, almost alive, vibrated in the depths—echoes of muffled screams, of water dripping into filthy puddles, or perhaps of things crawling in the shadows. This lair was not a refuge. It was a nest. A crucible. A primitive womb where the raw ugliness of our species writhed.

I was not alone in this cesspool. Very quickly, the stench of the place was compounded by another horror: that of bodies. We were dozens, maybe thirty infants, huddled together like a heap of malformed rats in a nest too small. Our skins, covered in pustules or abrasions, constantly touched, sticky, greasy, warm. The sounds of sucking, sniffling, and guttural gurgling formed a melody of the abject. We bathed in a pool of tepid moisture, where grime, urine, and remnants of dried placenta formed a nourishing mud.

Some were larger, already twisted by animal rage, with prematurely sharp teeth and hooked fingers that scratched incessantly. Others, like me, remained frail, limbs thin and trembling, eyes wide open, casting wild glances as if hell had closed in on them. There were females, males, but that did not matter yet. At that age, we were only voracious masses, driven by primal urges, yelping for a piece of dried flesh or for a slightly warmer spot against the rock.

But there was one thing in common. One vile detail that bound us all, a link of flesh I refused to accept: we were fucking goblins. Crawling, grotesque creatures, with wheezing breaths and green skin betraying a lineage tainted from conception. Nothing in this offspring called for tenderness. Only fangs, claws, and crooked stares. I looked at them, and I hated us. The mere idea of sharing a single drop of blood with these hideous larvae made me want to tear my skin off.

These things were not my brothers. They were a grotesque reflection, a curse spat by some mocking god. And I—I was in there. One of them. Trapped in a deformed body, trapped in a birth I had not chosen. Every breath I took reminded me that I was born in mud, blood, and rejection.

And deep within me, a certainty already screamed, mute and irrepressible: I would not remain a goblin.

Sometimes, she came.

The woman who had given me life—or who had at least spat me into this world—would appear through a crack in the rock, making her way among the writhing mass of infants. She always recognized me. A single glance was enough for my limbs to freeze, for my breath to calm for a moment. In this abyss oozing with hatred and rejection, she was... different. Strangely radiant. Almost beautiful. Yet she was just another goblin, with olive skin, discreet fangs, and tangled hair. But there was a glint in her eyes I found nowhere else: a gentle warmth, a fragment of light in the viscous darkness.

She took me against her without a word, lifted me with a slow, almost careful motion, and nursed me. It was a disconcerting act. Intimate. Brutal and tender at once. The contact was warm, animal, and mercilessly dragged me back to my condition as a newborn, to my most primitive instincts. I wanted to turn my head, refuse this carnal link, deny this dependence—but I drank. The milk came out in small, irregular spurts, harsh, but nourishing. I drank, because I was hungry. Because my body had not yet learned to hate what it loved.

The other mothers did the same. Their breasts hung, distended from use, and they sometimes fed two, even three little ones at once. It fascinated and disgusted me at the same time. A part of me, still too young to understand everything, supposed that twins or triplets were not rare among goblins. After all, they did not differ much from humans on an organic level—if one ignored the smell, the skin, the grunts, the wounds, the claws, and the way they looked at their children as interchangeable things.

But she, no. She looked at me differently. With something fragile. Almost human.

And I, poor gasping creature, waited for her return like one waits for a sunrise that never truly comes back.

When she wasn't there, the light faded. The little warmth her presence brought dissipated, leaving only the stench, the screams, and that vile awareness: I was a goblin. Part of me still refused to admit it. I spent hours brooding in the shadows, cursing this reincarnation, this god or whatever being had, out of whim or cruelty, thrown me into this deformed body. Why here? Why this? What misfortune, what perverse irony had it taken for me to be reborn into the worst of species?

Days passed, or maybe nights. I wasn't sure anymore. What struck me next was the speed. The blinding evolution. Barely a few days, and already, our crude limbs had firmed up. We walked. We crawled, we fell, then we walked again. We learned to feed ourselves, to tear apart small cave rats, to bite, to growl, to scream. Our bodies changed. And mine was no exception.

I quickly realized that goblin degeneration wasn't limited to the body. It infected the mind too. The grunts I had despised at first became clearer, more structured. I understood them. Not fully, but enough. Their language—guttural, twisted, grimacing—entered me. And worse: I accepted it. Despite myself, I listened, I learned... and I became what I hated.

In our little hell, groups eventually formed. Maybe by pack instinct. Maybe by simple law of the strongest. Four groups, distinct, each led by one of the four biggest goblins. All males. All muscular, brutal, respected only because they hit harder. The others followed them, naturally. Not out of loyalty. Out of fear. Out of need to survive.

At first, I refused. Proud in my solitude, disgusted by their twisted faces, I preferred to isolate myself, to believe I could stay outside this tribal mechanism. What a mistake. Very quickly, they turned on me. I wasn't part of the herd, so I was a target. They surrounded me. Beat me. Spat on me. Crushed me against the rock like garbage. I don't remember everything… only the pain, the blood, and the metallic taste of my own weakness.

It took me several days to recover. I crawled, I slept, I hallucinated. And each time I opened my eyes, I met hers—her gaze. My mother. Or what I had come to call so. She stared at me, motionless. With sadness. With helplessness. She had no right to intervene. I suspected as much. The tribe's unspoken rules forbade any favoritism. If she had helped me, she would've been punished. Maybe killed.

So I gave in.

I joined a group. Not the strongest, nor the most violent. The most numerous. The one that could offer me the most shadow. I blended into the mass, head down, jaw clenched. I kept my distance, but I imitated the others. I gave the leader a sign of submission—pure facade. My heart, though, remained full of bile. But I had to survive.

I didn't yet have claws to fight back.

But I was learning.

And then, just like that, without further conflict, without screaming or triumph, the groups stopped watching each other. They coexisted, ignored one another, and grew. We reached a size large enough to stand upright, to run, to climb, to bite harder. I could've sworn we were already teenagers. All that… in one week. A fucking week. Our growth was as grotesque as everything else. Each day spent in that hole made me a little more lucid. A little colder.

I now fully understood their language, their insults, their jokes, their spitting orders. But me, I had never spoken yet. I refused. I would not stoop to answering them. They lived in filth, spoke like beasts, thought like beasts—I was not like them. I stayed back. I did everything my own way. I learned. I observed.

My mother, she, said nothing to me either. I suspected she wasn't allowed to. She fed me, that was all. No words. A tender gesture, sometimes. A fleeting caress. But nothing more. And today... she hadn't come.

I felt it instantly. The atmosphere had hardened. The air stank of fear. The goblins around me held their breath. Then he arrived.

A goblin. No… something else.

He stood two meters tall. His silhouette was massive, almost monstrous, but it was in his gaze that everything shifted. It wasn't the empty look of a predator or brute—it was a thinking gaze. Calculating. He wasn't just bigger, stronger, or older. He was different. Evolved. His body seemed forged in pure strength, his scars told a story, and his movements—measured, silent—oozed a disturbing mastery.

He radiated presence. A natural authority that even the most rebellious among us did not dare to challenge. He spoke distinctly, with precise words. He did not bellow like the others. He spoke with rhythm. With logic. As if he had learned. As if he knew.

And as I looked at him… I understood.

This goblin was no longer a mere animal.

He was what goblins could become.

He growled. I had no trouble understanding:

"From today onward, you will go out. You will hunt your first prey. Hunters will receive a name, and a place in the tribe. Failures… will die."

There was no hesitation. No preparation. No lesson.

And just like that, we were sent outside.

Thrown into this unknown, wild world, full of fangs and traps.

Children, barely a week old. Larvae armed with claws.

That's why I hate them. Not for their appearance, nor for their violence. But for what they are. For what they accept to be. They crawl in filth as if it were noble. They worship brute strength. They sacrifice their young to a so-called tribal law, and feel nothing. No sorrow. No doubt. Not even awkward silence. They call it a "trial," but it's a slaughter disguised as tradition.

They build nothing. They pass on nothing. They live to survive, and die leaving no trace.

And I was born among them.

But I am not one of them.

And then... the world opened.

A rumble. A wall tearing apart. A gust of warm air.

And the light.

A brutal ray pierced my eyes. I staggered back, blinded. My skin burned. My heart raced. I had never seen the sky in this world. Never felt the sun. It was brutal. Immense. Crushing. And somehow… magnificent.

I took a step outside.

A step toward the hunt.

A step toward war.

A step against them.