(Part 2) Reincarnated as an Elf Mage’s Cell

Warm temperature…

High humidity…

An abundance of moisture…

Stickiness…

…all wrapped up in a not-so-unpleasant but still unpleasant miasma of dirty chocolate candy…

Despite living what most would consider a “good life”, was this hell?

These are the immediate thoughts that clouded his mind.

A genuine fear ensnared his soul to the point of being afraid to even open his eyes.

“Hey bro, wake up already. We can see you breathing now, you know.”

“Don’t worry, you died but you aren’t in hell. Thank goodness, right?”

“?!”

Such voices, a rougher masculine voice and a slightly less rougher feminine voice, evoked a sense of familiarity and nostalgia upon hearing them. Their effect was strong enough to force his eyes open involuntarily.

Standing over him are two… “humanoid creatures”.

Their bodies were shaped in the form of humans, a young man and a young woman respectively, yet they appeared to be molded out of slightly translucent clear-colored slime instead of skin and bones.

The “male” casually leans on the slightly taller “female’s” shoulder as she waits with her hand on her hip.

The one who they are looming over shoots upward on his feet, getting on an even level with them.

“Wait, who the heck are you? No, what even are you?? I don’t recognize you at all!”

“Come on, that stings, bro.”

“Well, can we blame him? We hardly resemble our old selves, Ze.”

“Yeah, but we recognized each other immediately.”

“No kidding, we’re twins. Technically not any more since we died, but still.”

“Oh yeah, right. But I still think that Kaden should realize it’s us.”

“Wait wait wait, you guys even know my name?”

“Of course we do! Right, Ru?”

“Could never forget, even in our next life. Come on, Kaden. Look closely at our faces.”

“...”

Kaden squints his eyes, carefully scanning over every facial detail he could find; admittedly, there was not much to pick apart in the first place. He mumbles to himself every connection he could make, and although the others could not make out his words, they could sense that he was gradually getting closer to the truth that they wanted him to realize.

“...dimples, an ever so slight gap between the two front teeth, a signature grin with just the tip of the tongue hanging out on opposite ends from each other…oh god, it’s really you, both of you. Rukara and Zerk!”

“Ding ding ding, you got it bro! Come over here and hug me and Ru, will ya?”

“How could I refuse?”

Splat

Kaden takes one step forward to his friend’s open arms, but shudders in place due to the squishy sensation at his feet. Now hyper aware of his surroundings, he stares downward at his feet, the area around him, and finally his own body.

“Say bro, what’s the hold up?”

“Maybe we’re a bit too forceful, you think Ze?”

“No, it’s not that, I’m realizing more and more that not only am I in a strange, unidentifiable place, but I can’t even recognize my own body. It feels like we are inside an uncomfortably moist cave and are on top of a ginormous pink serpent-like monster–like the ooze worms we used to kill–and it’s bothering me. I can’t even enjoy our friendly reunion.”

“That’s it? That’s what’s got ya hung up? Ru, why didn’t we explain everything to him first?”

Somewhat confused, Zerk scratches his head. Rukara smacks him on his back and raises her eyebrow.

“Because you insisted that a heartfelt ‘brotherly’ reunion is more important than ‘boring’ yapping. Remember?”

“Huh, oh yeah. I thought that he would grasp the situation quickly anyway, so I didn’t see the point. Guess I was wrong again, huh. Then I’ll leave it to you, Ru. The lame explanation stuff.”

“Explanation? I’m dying to know regardless of its lack of entertainment value.”

“Okay, I’ll tell you. Try to listen until the end, I promise you that it will all make sense, even if you get confused along the way. I trust that you still have some of your wits.”

“Got it. I trust your way of explaining things, Rukara.”

Kaden nods with a confident thumbs up. This notion delivers a relaxed smile onto Rukara’s face.

“Heh, how nostalgic. Anyway, to get the obvious out of the way, we have all been reincarnated. We are all aware that we died as old folks, and that we are alive again, but not as humans, correct?”

“Correct. So we aren’t even in the afterlife, we are just reincarnated beings.”

“Good. Logically you may wonder, ‘What are we?’. This question has confounded us as well, but I think that I eventually found the answer–cells. We have been reincarnated into sentient ‘cell-people’. Don’t ask me what kind or any specifics like that, it’s beyond me. I was never a biologist, after all.”

“Cell…people…things…never knew such a thing existed. In a way, that both excites me to see what a new life entails and severely frightens me.”

“Good, you got past that point, which is a bit hard to swallow. Speaking of swallowing, do you now realize that we aren’t in a cave whatsoever?”

“...it’s a mouth. Those sharp white rocks surrounding us are teeth, the humidity and moisture is due to saliva and breath, and we are standing on a tongue. It all makes sense suddenly.”

Rukara claps her hands and takes small leaps up and down excitedly.

“Fantastic! Now, you are ready to take-in the final part. If we are now reincarnated as cells, and we are inside a mouth, then it has to belong to somebody, right?”

“Do you know whom? Not sure if that ultimately matters.”

The twins grin at each other and wink. Zerk then walks by Kaden and grips his shoulder.

“Oh trust me bro, it does matter. You won’t believe it!”

“Hint, she’s the final piece to the puzzle.”

“Huh?”

“Bah, look at him! He’s still not getting it, Ru.”

“Then he’ll have to see it for himself…”

Rukara fills her body to the brim of moist air, cuffs her hands around her mouth, and looks upward to the back of the front teeth.

“OPEN UP!”

“O-okay!”

Immediately in response, a thunderous voice reached from the back of the throat, the tongue below them also moved up and down slightly. This voice, though powerful, was only such in volume; the sound of the voice itself was rather gentle to the ears and softspoken.

Following the one-word response, a bright light enters the mouth as it stretches apart and the tongue gradually moves further outward as it does so. The tongue stops mere inches away from a glass mirror, reflecting not only Kaden, Zerk, and Rukara, but the face of the one who owns said tongue:

An elf with long flowing blonde hair and a bashful blush.

Kaden's jaw drops and his eyes bulge out of his head. Such a reaction makes Zerk and Rukara grin even more, fully anticipating it.

“No way, it can’t be!”

“Yes way, bro. We couldn’t believe it either at first.”

“That’s right, we are cells belonging to the body of our dear mage–”

“Lyrielle?!”

Doing the best she can manage, Lyrielle awkwardly smiles while holding her tongue out, waving at the three cell-people standing on it.

“H-hi.”