Kai woke slowly. There was someone breathing heavily above him, and he was… being carried? What? He twisted, trying to look around, but his head lolled dangerously. He couldn’t hold his head up, and the person adjusted him in their arms, more carefully supporting his head.

The person said something in a language Kai didn’t recognize. It rolled off the tongue, melodic and beautiful, and he blinked up at the man as he realized the man’s skin was… blue. There were horns protruding from his forehead, and the first thing Kai thought was this was a really weird dream.

Something moved around his neck, and he stiffened up, letting out a high scream that sounded more like a baby’s wail. The man carrying him hushed him, and he looked in pure fear at the white snake staring at him. It blinked at him with red eyes, and he twisted, trying to get away from it, because who let a baby hang out around a snake? Another snake appeared, and he twisted in pure fear, his heart hammering in his chest.

They moved, and he gradually came to realize they were attached to his head. What the fuck? What kind of fucked up dream was this---

Wait.

Wait, no.

He shuddered as a vision came over him. Riding his motorcycle down the road, the engine rumbling between his legs, and a car swerving in front of him. He had twisted the handlebars to avoid it, but he had hit it hard, flying over the top of the car, and then---

Snap.

Was that a dream, too, or was he… dead?

He was dead, he realized, and a shiver of fear rolled down his spine. He was dead, and he was… Reincarnated. With white snakes for hair. Oh, gods, wait---

Did he just get put into an otome game??

He had just finished it the night before. Kill The Snake. It was a reverse harem otome game, at least as one of the paths you could choose, and he had played it for three straight days to beat it. It had been addictive and… Well, it was bad. He was mostly playing it because he hated it too much to put it down. The MLs were all obsessive and controlling, the FL was a doormat, with terrible dialogue options, and the gameplay was awkward and clunky. There were a million bugs, and it had so much hype leading up to its release. It was a massive letdown, and he was…

No. There was no way. He would have to look at himself in the mirror, because there was no way in hell he was the damn villainess. There was no way, right?

The man ducked under a low hanging branch, and Kai belatedly realized he should probably be concerned that he was being kidnapped. He didn’t remember that in the plot, but…

Medusa. They had literally named their snake haired villainess Medusa. She was a hostage from the demon empire, and there wasn’t much known about her. She didn’t look like a demon. Demons came in all shapes and colors, but she had scales and two serpents for hair, looking a bit like a Twi’lek, if Twi’lek had heads on the end of their head tails. She didn’t even have horns. She was mutated, cursed, and she had been after the Crown Prince to set herself up for marriage. She was put to death in the end, and that was the end of it.

She was a boring, uninteresting villain, always bullying the FL and never having very interesting dialogue options. She was mean, and uninspired. It felt like a twelve-year-old wrote her. There was nothing interesting about her, and if Kai was her, then…

He swallowed, and the man reached a house with gentle light pouring out from the windows. There was a garden all around it, growing various vegetables and flowers, with a few fruit trees, and why was it in the middle of the forest? He was a princess, wasn’t he, so what was he doing here?

The man swung off the horse carefully, and then he knocked on the door, and a call came from inside the house. After some time, the door opened, revealing a female demon, with dark gray skin and graying hair. Horns were protruding from her head, old, curved, like ram’s horns, and massive. She had kind purple eyes, and she looked down at Kai.

She said something to the man, and he said something back. What was going on? Was Kai a kidnapped princess? Was that what was happening right now? He didn’t know how to react. He didn’t remember this in the plot, so maybe he wasn’t Medusa, only bearing an uncanny resemblance to her. Except… Now that he was looking, the man was in what looked like a royal guard uniform. It certainly looked fancy enough.

He handed Kai off to the woman, and she held him close and closed the door. Kai looked around the room he found himself in. The cottage was one room, with a loft, floating will o’the wisps providing light in the darkness of the night. A fire was crackling in the hearth, and the woman smiled down at him and said something. He had no idea what she was saying to him.

Dried plants were hanging everywhere, and there was a cauldron bubbling over the fire. The woman carried him to a crib and laid him down, and oh, this was planned, okay. He babbled, trying to say something, and reached up for her. She looked down at him with sad eyes and said nothing, letting him wrap his hand around her finger, and he realized in a start that someone was going to have to change his diapers.

Oh. That was embarrassing.

Maybe this was an AU or something, or fanfiction, he thought. She brushed her hand over his head, and he tried to say something, but all that came out was a weak cry. She said something back, and then she walked away.

Yeah. This was probably fanfiction, he thought. The devil worked hard, but AO3 writers worked harder. Someone probably felt sorry for Medusa and gave her a different upbringing.

Gods. How was he going to be trans in an alternate world? A fantasy world? What the hell was going on?