Flesh Golem of the Labyrinth City

"Tsk, from your appearance, it seems you died and came back to life. Still... it's good you came back alive."

"Yes. Thank you."

The guard protecting the portal to the labyrinth deeply sighed upon seeing me.

I was haggard and reeked of blood. Surprisingly, I had no wounds, but the guard had no way of knowing whose blood stained my clothes or the condition of my skin underneath.

With my pale face and tattered equipment, he could tell I had nearly died.

Amazingly, I really had died and come back to life.

This was already my 6th entry into the labyrinth, but as always, the guild employee looked at me sympathetically as I wrote down my maximum reached floor as '3.'

I had spent most of my money on supplies and equipment, leaving me with only about thirty copper coins.

I bought a loaf of stale rye bread that I didn't really want to eat for 5 copper coins, stuffed it in my mouth, and returned to the inn where I had two days left to wash my clothes.

The inn owner lady was so honest. She said she doesn't charge for time spent not sleeping.

There were many inn owners who scammed low-ranked explorers.

When a weak explorer rents a room at an inn, the owner will put a stronger explorer in that room for money.

Of course, the powerless, weak explorer can't complain to the stronger explorer, and when they try to express dissatisfaction to the owner, the strong explorer becomes the inn owner's backup.

Many low-level explorers lose money and have their inn rooms taken away like that.

Thanks to the kind owner lady, I was able to book the room without issue for the days I would be out of the labyrinth by paying a week's worth of accommodation fees in advance. While others would use it while I was in the labyrinth, I could still secure the room on the day I came out.

"The smell of blood is intense. Wash up before going to your room."

"Haha, yes. I'm sorry, ma'am."  

"It's fine. You're not the only one like that. As long as the bed doesn't stink."

"I see."

Leaving behind the inn owner lady, whose kind heart contrasted with her perpetually angry look, I thoroughly washed my top, which had only visible blood removed at the well.

Maybe because it was soaked by a lot of rain, it wasn't heavily soiled. However, if you count rainwater as dirt, it's very dirty.

After washing my body in the bath with water that was appropriately cold but not freezing, I crawled into the room and examined my body.

"I clearly lost a lot of blood... but I don't feel dizzy or anything."

The gambeson provided some protection, but near the end, my right forearm was nearly shredded. But that arm is completely fine now.  

Most surprisingly, my left eye has changed.

"No matter how I look at it, this is a dire wolf's eye..."

Beneath my blinking eyelid, the eyeball occupying my left eye socket is undoubtedly that of a dire wolf. Though it fits perfectly despite its original size.

"Is it really because I ate the eyeball?"

No matter how much I think about it, that's the only explanation. In the first place, I only have one skill, so any abnormalities in my body would be due to that skill or another explorer.

…Then again, if a person collapsed in the forest and lost their left eye, would there really be someone who would magically stuff a wolf's eyeball in there?

That doesn't seem likely at all. If that were true, then they must've been a saint. My body returned to normal after all.

That's not the only strange thing.

"Why am I so hungry?"

I had stuffed myself to the point of bursting, but it was as if all that food had been digested already, and the bread was woefully insufficient for the hunger I felt.

I have about 25 copper coins left. The serving size is generous, but a meal at this inn costs 30 copper coins. Even though I'm starving right now, I can do nothing about it.

I already owe the owner lady a lot.

"For about a week after arriving here, I just ate at the owner lady's expense."

Of course, I helped with chores and cleaning since I'm pretty strong. I didn't just eat hearty meals and laze around shamelessly.

But still, to say I worked enough to cover what I received... not quite.

"Ah."

I remembered. A way to earn money.

'It's probably rare, right? How many people have entered and exited the labyrinth so far? It's a miracle to find an unprecedented skill! If you learn anything about the skill, you must come find me, okay? I'll give you a little reward too!'

That's what the appraiser who assessed my skill had said. I haven't told them yet about how my right arm turned into a steak the first time I used the skill. I just thought it was a worthless skill.

But if it's what I think...

"Let's go."

* * * * *

The labyrinth city 'Calax' has countless appraisal shops. There aren't any particularly special appraisers among them, but naturally, conveniently located appraisal offices tend to be a bit more expensive since a single appraisal isn't that costly.

On the other hand, the further away or worse the shop's location, the lower the appraisal price.

Low-ranked explorers like me go far to get appraised.

The door opened with the sound of old, rusted metal hinges rubbing, revealing the interior.

"Welcome! This is Sateria Appraisal Office... Oh, you're the one who came before, right!"

"Yes. That's right."  

"That... an unprecedented skill! Could it be?! Don't tell me?! Did you figure out the skill's ability?!"

"Well, more or less..."

The girl with softly curling red hair and a broken pair of glasses pushed up the empty frame and smiled brightly.

Appraiser Lavi Sateria. A girl who opened an appraisal office in a suspiciously bad location, perhaps intentionally.

Thanks to that, I, who can get my skill appraised for a measly 10 copper coins, am happy, but come to think of it, I need to receive a reward.

'This kid doesn't look like she has much money either... Should I go to an expensive appraisal office to get compensated?'

As I pondered a couple of times, Lavi came around the desk and took my arm.

"Come on! I'll listen while checking the skill!"  

"I didn't get any new skills, so there's no need for an appraisal."

"No! We're going to reconfirm the skill you got last time! By looking at the circuit, I can tell what effect it has!"

"Well then..."

I already came all this way. Now that we're face to face, it feels wrong to go somewhere else.

I feel a sense of kinship since I'm poor too. Even though Lavi, who opened a shop, probably isn't extremely short on money, compared to other appraisal offices, she's still poor.

As Lavi said, I took off my top and lay face down on the wide bed.

According to her, the location where my skill is engraved is in a shape that spreads from the back of my head along my spine to my whole body.

"Eehee... Has your body changed at all...?"

And... this little person vividly reminds me that this is a different world.  

If she had this face and personality in Korea, she could have made hundreds of millions of won in monthly income through internet broadcasting.

"Hee, hiyaa... As expected, the gender difference is significant for animals... So this is what a man's body looks like..."

"Instead of just staring at my body like that, how about doing what you need to do."

"Eek, right..."

The soft, fair hands that have held nothing but pens and wands slowly moved past the back of my head toward my spine.

"Yes! The circuit has been revealed! Then please tell me the circumstances under which you learned about it and the effects you presume it has!"

First, I explained the situation. Encountering a dire wolf on the 3rd floor of the labyrinth and being driven to the brink of death. My right arm was shredded, and I lost a lot of blood.

In a life-or-death struggle, I sliced open the dire wolf's belly and devoured its meat, heart, lungs, and eyeballs and drank its blood.

When I woke up in the morning, my eye had changed to that of the dire wolf.

"What?! Your eye?!"

"Did you not see it?"

"Gah... I'm sorry... I have a hard time making eye contact..."

Well, she always did avert her gaze to the side.

"Th, then, could you sit up for a moment..? I'd like to see that eye too..."

"Yes. It's the left eye."

When I got up from bed, I lay face down and faced her. Lavi clasped her hands to her cheeks, turned as red as her hair, and rolled her eyeballs around.

"What are you doing? You need to look at my eye."

"Uhh.. r-right..."

Lavi, who had squeezed her eyes shut, made eye contact with all her might for 3 seconds. Then she turned her head and fanned her reddened cheeks with her hands for 30 seconds.

"Phewww...!!"

"How is it?"

"S-sorry but... it's black...?"

What? That can't be. Just in case, I looked at the small hand mirror on the desk, and sure enough, the dire wolf's yellow iris was still there.

"What do you mean? It's clearly yellow, isn't it?"

"R-really?! I'm sorry! I only looked at the left eye from my perspective!"

She says it was hard to look at both eyes, so she only stared at the left eye from her point of view. I felt like punching her, but I endured it.  

"Look again. This is a dire wolf's eye, isn't it?"

"It, it really is..!"  

After confirming the iris color like that, I lay face down on the bed again, and Lavi came over and started looking at the circuit that appeared in red.

"Ah! Unlike last time, there's an activated circuit here! So this part is like.. and that part has this function..."

After peering at it for a while, Lavi tilted her head as if something was strange and muttered something before asking me.

"By any chance, did anything else change?"

"Why? Did some problem occur?"

"No..? It's just, how should I put it. I don't think this level of activation would happen from just an eyeball...? Because the active circuit is spread throughout your whole body..."

The whole body? There's no need for anything else to change yet. One eyeball is enough. It's not like I chewed up the dire wolf from head to toe, and if I had changed from doing that, wouldn't I have transformed into something like a werewolf by now?

"Ah! Did you say... you drank the dire wolf's blood...?"

"Yes. Why?"

Wait.

"Oh fuck."

"I-I'll do a blood draw! Just a tiny bit is enough!"

"Yes. Please do it. If that's true, it's a bit sickening."

My body has wolf's blood flowing through it? What a fucking ridiculous situation. That's messed up. I was already freaking out about the eye, but my blood as well?

At least a wolf's vision is better than an office worker's eyes.

But having that damn mutt's blood flowing... there are various issues including blood type compatibility, no?

"Uh, uhh uhh..."

Lavi's expression started changing moment by moment as she dropped a special solution into a thin flask containing my blood and shook it around.

"Th-this.. half of it is dire wolf's blood..."