Transmigration in Mordor

Zac sat with his back against the cold, rough wall of the cavern. His gaze, once sharp, was now an abyssal void, lost in the depths of his own mind. Around him, the darkness seemed to close in, suffocating, like a leaden shroud settling over a grave. His last death haunted him—the confrontation with the skeletal spider, a macabre dance of fangs and venom, an agony that had torn his flesh, but above all, his mind. Memory was a tireless executioner, replaying scenes of horror with unbearable fidelity.

The silence was heavy, oppressive, broken only by Zac's ragged breathing, panting like a wounded animal in its death throes. His thoughts spun in circles, trapped in a labyrinth with no exit. Every attempt to escape only brought him back to the same place: pain, horror, helplessness. He was a spectator to his own burgeoning madness, powerless to stop the spiral.

'Why?' The word, silent, formed in his mind. 'Why me? My life… it was nothing. A banal existence, full of ordinary cowardice and regrets. No war crimes, no tyranny. Just… me. And for that, I'm condemned to this?' The thought took root, corrosive. This disproportionate torment, this endless torture, for a miserable life he had already regretted himself. A fierce sense of injustice overwhelmed him, burning hotter than hunger, colder than fear.

He saw the faces again. His parents, whose expectations he'd disappointed, whom he'd neglected in his selfishness. Liberty, wounded by his impotent rage. All those he'd barely touched and from whom he'd turned away, too consumed by his own weaknesses. Guilt gnawed at him, an open wound this world never stopped reopening. Each image of his loved ones was a knife, driven deeper by the sense of being forever lost, incapable of redeeming anything.

A superhuman effort, torn from the depths of his deepest resignation, pushed him to pull himself together. He clenched his fists, feeling the dull pain of barely healed wounds, the hunger and thirst gnawing at him, the familiar burning aches. He closed his eyes, searching for an anchor in this inner chaos, a reason not to collapse and let his mind dissolve completely. But the psychological distress intensified. Unanswered questions piled up, invisible weights dragging his soul toward the abyss.

He tried to cling to a memory, any memory. He thought of his favorite food. The word itself sounded strange, meaningless in this world of deprivation. A distant, blurry memory, almost erased. The taste, the texture, the warmth of a simple meal slipped away from him, like fragments of a dream dissolving upon waking. He was eaten alive by the absence of pleasure, by the abyssal void left by those vanished memories. Madness lurked, a black, gaping chasm threatening to consume his mind. The lack became a stabbing pain, a silent scream in his soul, a bottomless emptiness threatening to devour him completely.

A wild thought, twisted by hunger, flashed through his broken mind: he could use his `[Healing Stagnation]` skill to numb his needs. But another idea, darker, more desperate, took hold—an idea born of the horror of this world. He could eat whatever he found in the cavern, feed on whatever surrounded him, even if it meant devouring the unspeakable.

He thought back on everything he'd encountered, desperately searching for something edible. Luminous molds? Fungi of blasphemous colors and suspicious shapes? Fragments of dried creatures, crunching between his teeth? Nothing. Nothingness. This world produced nothing living, nothing nourishing that wasn't inherently corrupted.

His eyes, heavy with despair, fell on the emaciated remains of the spider that had made its way to his sanctuary a few days earlier, the one he'd killed upon waking. The beast was a pile of broken chitin, putrid flesh, a corpse oozing blackish liquid and exuding a sickly-sweet stench of carrion. The spider didn't seem appetizing. Quite the opposite. A violent nausea rose in his throat, stronger than hunger. He had no fire to cook it. Disgust was stronger than survival instinct.

He moved it aside slowly, with visceral revulsion, dragging it out of sight. He retrieved its stinger, fragile but sharp, intending to fuse it later with his own stinger. Another tool for this world of charnel houses and death.

Resigned, Zac then headed for the waterfall. Hunger and thirst gnawed at him, rusty pincers crushing his stomach, constant reminders of his prison of flesh. He allocated his points to the healing skill, hoping to stop the stabbing pain that pinned him to his mortal condition.

When he arrived, he was surprised. The message on the screen had changed. The reflection in the water shimmered with new lines, another riddle in his prison.

[Waterfall of Night]

[Tears of Regret: 1]

[Coward's Stealth: 1/?]

[Healing Stagnation: 1/?]

[Forge of Brutality: 3/?]

[Echo of Ungoliant: 3]

[Echo Distillation: 1%]

A new enigmatic line appeared, standing out from the rest: "Echo Distillation." His mind, despite exhaustion, latched onto this new information. He pondered for a long time, forming hypotheses, searching for logic in the absurdity of his hell. He didn't yet understand the purpose, but he saw that he could spend his echoes. This new currency of corruption, torn from the heart of darkness.

He focused, tension in his mind almost palpable, and spent all his echoes on the distillation skill.

The screen updated, coldly, indifferently, as if the entire cosmos cared nothing for the agony of a man.

[Waterfall of Night]

[Tears of Regret: 1]

[Coward's Stealth: 1/?]

[Healing Stagnation: 1/?]

[Forge of Brutality: 3/?]

[Echo of Ungoliant: 0]

[Echo Distillation: 4%]

He saw and felt no change. No relief. No revelation. The percentage had increased, but the effect remained a mystery, an empty promise. Despair did not lessen; on the contrary, it thickened, an invisible shroud. The mechanism was cold, implacable. Zac was alone, trapped in an endless cycle, where every victory was an illusion, every step forward just another descent into deeper damnation.