The Spirit Forest is an endless place filled with danger and horrors. The Spirit Forest is a unique forest that was filled to the brim with Spirit Beasts that are much stronger than the average animals. Even the less dangerous beasts, a C grade fanged rabbit, would have the strength of an ordinary elephant. And the deeper one ventured into the forest, the more dangerous the creatures became. Only brave immortals would have the power and strength to train and hunt in the shallow parts of the forest. The Spirit Forest is recognized to be one of the most dangerous places on this earth, with no end in sight and dangers lurking at every corner. Some say that the Spirit Forest signifies the edge of the earth as it extends towards the unknown, with no one being able to explore the whole forest thoroughly. Others say that it is a place made for cultivation as there are many abundant resources.
However, at the moment, a loud rumbling could be heard all around the forest as crowds of spirit beasts fled in a panic towards the nearby towns and villages at the edge. The cause for this unusual phenomenon seemed to originate from under a small lake deep in the forest, and mechanical sounds echoed around a small cave under the lake. The small cave was big enough to create a small air pocket for a person to fit inside. A little black vortex starts to form in the small space.
As the mechanical sounds grew louder, so did the black vortex. It continued to grow larger and larger until it filled the whole space. The black vortex then seems to come alive and paused for a moment, before a different mechanical sound resembling a cough or a gag rumbled from deep within. A person was spat out of the black vortex, before quickly disappearing.
Xue Yi landed roughly as a hard stone stabbed her back on the floors of the small cave. She groaned painfully and sat up to look around her.
The small cave she landed in was just big enough for her to stand. It was, however very dark and humid, causing Xue Yi to slip painfully onto the hard stone floors once again as she tried to stand up.
Ow f*ck! My ass!
Where the hell am I?
Before Xue Yi tried to make her attempt to stand up again, familiar mechanical sounds rumbled through the small cave again. But this time, a black vortex that was much smaller than the previous one formed beside Xue Yi. This time it quickly gagged and spitted out a small figure about the size of Xue Yi's palm.
The small figure had familiar golden locks and pink eyes. It seemed to be the child that was the World Crossing Machine, with the only difference being that it was now shrunk in size and had even cuter features. The child had become a chibi.
"Wtf, is that you brat? Did you shrink or something?"
"Don't call me brat! And I didn't shrink. I only used up the energy when you activated the portal!"
The child puffed up its cheeks and stomped its feet in anger, glaring up menacingly at Xue Yi. However, when done in its chibi form, it only seemed like a child throwing a tantrum.
"Kid, where are we right now? I don't want to stay in this damp place."
Xue Yi looked around the small cave, eyebrows furrowed in disgust at the wet floors and small, suffocating space.
"Don't call me a kid! I have a name! And I don't know. We don't receive the world data until a day or two later. It's all your fault for dragging us to this place!"
The child shouted as it still tried to look threatening while looking up at the much bigger sized Xue Yi.
"Then what do you want me to call you?"
"My name is Xiao*Ji*"
"......Little chicken*?"
"No! Xiao Ji the Ji from machine!*"ヽ(#'Д')ノ
"All right, Xiao Ji Rou*, can you activate the portal again?"
Hearing the nickname that was given to the unfortunate Xiao Ji, it once again puffed up in anger and decided to ignore the giant bully and stomped its way to a corner, sitting down with its back towards Xue Yi.
"Hey! Don't ignore me, how do we get out of here?"
Xue Yi saw Xiao Ji ignoring her and shouted at it once again, but Xiao Ji was still ignoring her. Xue Yi cursed and decided to inspect her surroundings carefully.
Near the entrance of the small cave was water rushing in from the lake. The opening was just big enough for Xue Yi to swim through. Xue Yi walked towards the opening to peer at where the water was rushing in from, only to realize that they were in an underwater cave with no indication of how deep they were. She then tried to find another opening, which would allow them to leave their current predicament. But with how small the cave was, there's no other way apart from the entrance underwater.
"Hey! Xiao Ji Rou! It looks like we're in an underwater cave. We're going to have to swim to the surface if we want to leave. Can't you get us out of this place with the portal."
Xue Yi turned towards the tiny figure, still sulking in the corner. Hearing the nickname again made Xiao Ji's face turn red with anger. It rushed towards Xue Yi and tried to kick her foot, which did not affect Xue Yi much as Xiao Ji was too tiny and weak to cause her any harm. Xue Yi bent down and picked up a small raging figure by its collar and gently swung it around to tease it, further igniting its fury as it struggled to free itself.
"You jerk! Let me go! This is machine harassment, you big bully! Just wait until they catch you! They'll lock you up, and you won't even get to be reincarnated! The only reason you could even be here right now is because you have a stupidly huge amount of soul energy. Otherwise, you'd be in pieces still floating around the void!"
Soul energy? It seems like there's something else going on here. Seeing the small figure still swinging around in a struggle, Xue Yi brought Xiao Ji up closer to interrogate.
"A stupidly large amount of soul energy? It looks like that shady company of yours is hiding a lot of things from their customers, aren't they?"
Xiao Ji stared in horror at her accusation, before realizing what it had accidentally said in a fit of anger. Using his small hands to cover its mouth in case of saying anything that it shouldn't have said, hoping Xue Yi would just drop this topic. But it was already too late as Xue Yi was dead set on finding out the truth of this matter.
"It's okay if you don't want to speak. But you would have to say goodbye to your precious chip I have here. According to what I heard, without this important chip, you would not be able to return home, huh?"
Xue Yi held up the familiar chip that was used to open the portal from before, threatening to crush it in her palm. Xiao Ji panicked and tried to grab hold of the chip, but it couldn't struggle out of Xue Yi's grasp no matter what. Scared, Xiao Ji attempted to reason with Xue Yi.
"If you destroy it, you would also not be able to leave here. And if the chip is gone, I would also perish, and you wouldn't be able to find out anything about the Afterlife HR. So just give the chip to me, I will get us out of here. Please?"
Thinking that if she would also not be able to leave, Xiao Ji thought Xue Yi would obediently hand the chip over. However, it never would've imagined that Xue YI would instead smirk and held the chip even tighter as if she was about to crush the small chip.
"I don't really care if I would be able to leave this place. If worse comes to worst, I'll just kill myself and but done with it. You, on the other hand, don't want to die yet, right?"
Hearing that, Xiao Ji could only yield unwillingly to Xue Yi's request and explained everything it knew truthfully. Xue Yi put the dejected Xiao Ji down on the floor and sat together with it, getting ready for a big info dump.
"I don't know everything since I'm not in the higher-ups, I'm just a lowly machine that they created to transfer souls to be reincarnated into a random world. I was assigned to transfer souls with higher soul energy; soul energy is a type of energy that a soul holds. It's like how much power your soul has."
"So, from what you said about me, it means that I have a lot more power than others? Then can I fly or something? Do I have superpowers?"
Xue Yi tried to will herself to fly or tried to form fire in her hands, but all that she achieved was a weird look from Xiao Ji that seemed to ask whether she's crazy. Xiao Ji continued.
"No, you can't. What did you think it was? Some miracle that would give you unbelievable powers? Don't be dumb. Soul energy's like the essence of your soul. If it runs out, you will fade into nothing. Every soul would have some soul energy. You're nothing special. You just have more of it than everyone else. That's why you can have a body, despite being a soul. It's because there's so much soul energy that you were able to go through the portal without a body. Usually, the portal would've stripped the soul of its energy until the soul completely faded away, but because you have so much of it that you were able to survive the experience. Think of it as trying to drain an entire ocean. It's impossible. And it is the same with your body because you have so much soul energy that you were able to use it to make a physical form. Otherwise, you'd just float your way back to Afterlife HR."
Saying that Xiao Ji went over to give Xue Yi a good kick in the foot, before sitting back down and pretending as if nothing had happened. Xue Yi chose to ignore it's small action for the moment as she waited for Xiao Ji to finish explaining everything. But she mentally noted what happened down to remember to teach it a lesson later.
"For some reason, HR decided to give special advantages to souls with a higher amount of soul energy, like the roles that they would play in their next world. I don't know why they can't just directly give them an advantage like a good long life or a good fortune or something. I don't even know why they prefer souls with higher soul energy. It's not like they would get any advantage for helping them any way. And besides, it's not like they would be able to harvest the world energy anyway. I've told you everything now, give me the chip."
Xiao Ji attempted to grab the chip that Xue Yi was playing with the whole time listening. But before Xiao Ji could touch the chip, it was raised out of its reach. Xiao Ji's round cheeks puffed up once again and angrily glared at Xue Yi.
"I already explained everything I knew. Give me the chip so we can leave this place, I don't want to stay here any longer."
"No, you haven't. What about world energy? You haven't explained that yet. And how exactly are you going to get us out of here, in that tiny form when you won't even be able to lift the chip, much less fit it into your tiny neck. What are you going to do? Chop your neck with it?"
Xiao Ji then remembered it's current predicament. In this form, there was no way that the chip could fit into the slit behind its neck. Dejected, it sat down quietly to wallow in self-pity. Seeing the small figure that was filled with energy just a moment ago, now very sad and depressed, Xue Yi went to poke it a few times to get it to talk again.
"Hey, you still haven't explained to me what the world energy is. I saw an opening to this cave a moment ago and it seems like we're underwater. I don't know how deep we are, but I'm going to try to swim out of here. And from what I can see, you wouldn't be able to swim by yourself. So you still have to depend on me to get out of here."
Xiao Ji pouted and looked over at Xue Yi, who was still poking at its back before swatting her hands away.
"Humph, I don't need food. I just need to absorb the energy from inanimate objects, and I'll go back to my original form. You, on the other hand, need to eat and drink since you have a body now."
"....Wait. So you eat......rocks?"
"NO... I mean, I have no choice. It's not like there's anything else here."
"And how long would it take you to go back to your original form if you only "absorb" rocks?"
"......About a few hundred years."
Xiao Ji's voice got smaller and smaller towards the end. It looked up only to see the smirking face of Xue Yi as if mocking it for its inability. But no matter how upset it got, there's nothing it could say to refute.
"Xiao Ji Rou ah Xiao Ji Rou. Don't forget. I still have the chip, so even if you went back into your original form, you'd never be able to leave when I swim away from this place. Are you sure you want to stay here?"
"....Fine, you big fat bully. You're so mean. Humph."
Ignoring Xiao Ji's last comment, Xue Yi picked up Xiao Ji and put it on her shoulder, where it grabbed onto her hair to steady itself. Xiao Ji 'accidentally' pulled on Xue Yi's hair, earning a yelp from her. Xue Yi gently flicked Xiao Ji in return before warning.
"If you do that again, I'll leave you behind without the chip."
They arrived at the only entrance to see the water rushing in through the small hole. Xue Yi would have to crouch down and grip the sides of the opening to swim out against the current. At the same time, Xiao Yi tightened its grip in fear of being thrown off.
Swimming out into the vast body of water, the two then realized just how deep under the lake they were. Darkness surrounded them as Xue Yi followed the only light source at the top that she could see. However, they had truly underestimated the depth that they were in as their breaths are starting to run out before they could even reach halfway to the surface.
Xue Yi could feel her lungs screaming out for air as she desperately tried to swim as fast as she can towards the light. Her body was running out of energy, and she can feel the water rushing into her lungs. She hopelessly tried to preserve the last breath she had. At the corner of her eyes, she could see that Xiao Ji was also bearly holding on, it's small round face turning red from the lack of air.
In her heart, she knew that they could never be able to reach the surface, but she continued to push her way through as she doesn't want to die a second time and go back to that damned place. Not to mention, she had Xiao Ji relying on her right now. In her heart, Xue Yi unconsciously cared for Xiao Ji as she thought the little guy had a cute appearance despite its uncooperative personality. She still didn't want the small thing to die.
Unfortunately, Xue Yi couldn't hold on any longer as her whole body used up all the energy she had. Her vision started to darken as she could feel herself drowning.
Am I really going to die again?
Am I really going back to the hands of those scammers?
I don't want to die yet!
Despite her wish for survival, she still couldn't hold on and started to feel herself becoming heavier and heavier, sinking back to the depths of the lake as her last resting place in this world.
.........Is what she thought.
Suddenly, a large shadow swam over her. The shadow belonged to a gigantic creature with green scales and two sharp canines sticking out from its mouth. Its pair of purple eyes had a sharp glint shining in them, striking fear into whoever saw them. Two blue transparent horns were sitting menacingly on the top of its smooth green head, stretching towards the back. Its long body swam with unbelievable speed towards Xue Yi and Xiao Ji.
Just when Xue Yi thought they were going to drown to death, it turned out that fate had a much crueler end for them as they were now going to be eaten by a giant serpent instead.
Great.
###############################################################################
Footnotes:
小: little, this is often used as a nickname for a child or someone endearing, in this case, it was used in Xiao Ji's name. Mostly because it has a child-like appearance
小机: meaning little machine
小鸡: also pronounced as Xiao Ji but with the meaning of little chicken
机器: Machine, the Ji from the first character is the same as the Ji in Xiao Ji's name
小鸡肉: Little chicken meat, Xue Yi used the last character Rou, meaning meat, to show that she still meant little chicken instead of the character from machine