This Snake Right Here Is a Black Rat Snake - Chapter 1

The mountains were so desolate that even the mice were on the verge of disappearing.

I lay coiled by the road for three days before finally encountering a column of black ants.

One sweep of my tongue, and I devoured them like a whirlwind.

My stomach was still empty.

Just as hunger had made me dizzy, another party of men entered the mountain.

“His Highness’s beloved pet eloped… I mean, went missing by accident. Even if we have to dig three feet into the ground today, we must find it.”

The men were highly trained. They searched every tree and every hole with painstaking care.

Now and then, they found a snake and compared it to the portrait.

“This one’s eyes are too vacant. Not it.”

“This one’s all skin and bones. Not it either.”

“This one’s shriveled and dull. Definitely not.”

Hanging from a tree, I watched them with bright, rolling eyes.

The man in charge shouted, “His Highness keeps his pet sleek and well fed. Anything shriveled, scrawny, or dingy is out.”

I had long heard of a cold-faced prince in the human realm who looked like some dark god of death.

That prince kept a snake and treasured it like a priceless jewel.

It lived in a nest of gold and silver, with fine food and drink served to it every day.

Whatever it wanted, it got.

I was green with envy.

We were both snakes. Why did that one have a prince to care for it while I endured wind and sun without even a mouse to eat?

And now, a heaven-sent fortune might be right before me.

I looked at myself.

Dull, lusterless black scales.

I would be eliminated at first glance.

But—opportunity only favors a snake who comes prepared.

By dusk, the search party had found nothing. Every man hung his head in defeat.

At last, my disguise was ready. I stretched myself across their path just as they were about to leave.

The men were overjoyed by my appearance.

“It came out on its own. This has to be it, right?”

“All the other snakes hid from us, but this one seems almost human in its understanding.”

One man studied the portrait carefully. “Its scales are certainly glossy.”

Of course they were.

A merchant caravan had passed by a few days earlier. One of its carriages struck a stone, and a lump of wax fell off.

When I dragged it back to my cave, the other snakes laughed at me for bringing home something we could not eat.

But now I had coated every scale in wax, and I glittered beneath the setting sun.

The men leaped off their horses and gathered around me in delight.

“It is shiny. Shiny enough to serve as a candlestick.”

“But what’s that on its scales? It hasn’t waxed itself, has it?”

“It’s a snake. You think it understands waxing? What’s it going to do next, go buy soy sauce?”

Someone else voiced a quiet doubt.

“Isn’t it… a little too black?”

I went rigid.

The others fell silent too.

A soldier glanced at the sky. “Could it have gotten tanned?”

Even I, a snake, could hear how little he believed his own words.

At last, a general slapped his thigh.

“Let’s take it back and let His Highness decide for himself.”

When I was brought before the prince, he stared at me for a very long time.

Then he asked the general.

“What exactly have you brought back?”

Trembling, the general replied, “Your beloved pet.”

The prince looked as if he had something to say, but after a long pause, he carefully prompted, “Isn’t it a little too black?”

“It—it must have gotten tanned.”

The prince was silent for another long while before asking, “And isn’t it a little too fat?”

This snake was furious. This snake refused to speak.

Fat? I wasn’t fat. I was swollen from starvation, all right?

Cold sweat streamed down the general. “P-perhaps it’s pregnant?”

The prince gave him an expressionless look.

“My snake is long, agile, and slender.”

The way he said it!

As if I were short, clumsy, and round.

I promptly raised my head.

With a swish, the general drew his gleaming saber.

I shrank my neck.

Oh. I had no neck.

Looking at the prince, I resolved to show him my graceful figure.

I swayed left and right.

I undulated forward and back.

I slithered around in circles.

I bared my fangs, flicked my tongue, and looked back with a bewitching smile.

The general’s mouth fell open. His saber clanged to the floor.

The prince was as frosty as ever, but the corner of his mouth seemed to twitch.

Ah.

They had both been captivated by this snake’s enchanting beauty.

That little performance exhausted every scrap of strength I had gained from eating ants.

Before I fainted, my only prayer was that the prince had not seen through my disguise and would hurry up and feed me two pieces of meat.

Through the haze, I thought I smelled meat.

Toad meat? Or bird?

No.

I shot upright.

It was the supreme delicacy of the human realm—chicken!

A whole basin of chicken, so fragrant it could make a snake weep, stood gloriously real before my eyes.

I really was about to cry.

At last, this snake was living a life of decadent luxury.

For three days straight, I received a basin of chicken every day.

I ate and slept, then slept and ate. Even an immortal could not have lived better.

On the fourth day, the steward came running to tell me that the prince had summoned me.

Before I went, I deliberately crawled into a vat of wax and polished myself until I gleamed.

After crawling for half an hour, I entered the study and immediately spotted the prince behind his desk.

He was so handsome.

This snake approved.

I slithered toward him bashfully.

Hearing me approach, he watched me for a long time.

“Why are you slithering with such… swaying grace?”

Well, naturally. I had put on so much wax that every step I crawled made me slip three times.