Chapter 241: Froggerto's Mistake

-----

A young and arrogant prince had proclaimed something that would end in the ultimate demise of an entire civilization…

Growing conceited and having security as a given, the Kingdom of the frog-kin grew with a corrupt aristocrat family, which turned into some sort of royal family where a governor was selected sometimes.

The prince named Froggerto Von Swamp VIII ended learning about the guardian's egg, and decided to take it for himself so he could raise it as a pet, and then have a massive frog as their guardian.

Of course, there were those that tried to stop him, specially the shamans who said that would only enrage the guardian and this would be the demise of their civilization.

"Stop at once, prince! If you do this, you'll risk all of us dying…!"

"Nonsense! That giant frog won't even realize, it is simply sleeping there in the water, what can it even detect? I will take whatever I want! Hehe, I will raise it into a strong frog, and them, I will mount it one day! It will be glorious!"

Of course, it ended badly, and it was all due to his stupidity… they should had raised him better, less conceited, but he was a lost cause at the end, and what he did ended ruining everything.

They had somehow managed to steal the egg while the frog slept at night, but when the prince finally saw the egg and the little tadpole inside opened its eyes and saw him, was when things began.

The mother woke up that morning, desiring to groom her beloved egg which she had been taking care for dozens of years. Every morning she took it out of the water and licked it, taking out any algae or critter that might try to grow over it or take advantage of it, this way, it was always clean.

However, to her surprise… there wasn't any egg in her usual nest which was filled with grass. It was a small pond above the land where she protected it… but it was gone…

Her presence and power was so strong that no predator ever got near, they knew that if they ever dared to touch her or the egg, they would be as good as dead, every animal knew this innately.

Yet… the most stupid of them all did not, the frog-kin, which also resulted to be the most intelligent.

Ignorant as they were, the frog-kin didn't deserved such fate, but their stupid and arrogant prince ruined their peaceful nation, and everything they had ever built.

Enormous tremors came that day, like they had never felt before.

The mother followed the scent of her egg, and reached the civilization that had been growing at her side, which she had mostly let it be, as it was of no importance or annoyance to her.

But now… they had dared to steal her child.

"Ribbit…"

An angered expression surged in the enormous frog, as she used her gigantic feet to destroy the entire place, and her tongue devoured countless buildings and people alike without discriminating, as she searched for her child…

A massive massacre like nothing else… she devoured and swallowed everything, until the only thing left was the trembling prince and the egg…

"No… Agh…! W-We shouldn't… had stolen it… P-Please forgive my life! You've taken everything from me now!" he cried while apologizing.

The frog, however, ignored the ant and took her egg away, gently wrapping her tongue around it, and carrying it away, while leaving everything devastated…

And it was said that the prince, the one that caused everything, was forgiven after everything else was taken away from him.

The survivors of this incident are the frogs that Chaos is seeing now. There are currently around 30 other families living in the stomach, the very last descendants of the survivors, that somehow adapted to these harsh conditions and made the best out of this situation, as painful as it was, every living being strived to survive and thrive, to live and reproduce, even in such a place, they still continued to live and make offspring, for almost 300 years.

Now, the last survivors were thriving, although the tales of how everything happened were passed down, those that had survived from back then had all perished… only their offspring who were born in this world of stomach were here, and they did not know any better anyways.

However, the tales of the outside world, the vast swamp lands, the water where they could swim and didn't burn, that same water that was cold and soothing to their skin, the lily pads, the vast skies, and the bright sun… all of such tales were passed down as children's tales, as imaginary worlds these people had yet to know and experience by themselves.

These people looked down into this world of flesh and gastric acids, they didn't know any better, so unlike their parents, they didn't felt depressed, but always hoped for another world outside, and to see it one day, maybe…

But it was also passed down into their tales about the fools that dared to challenge this world, those that tried to destroy the stomach walls and were greeted with tsunamis that devoured them all, the idiots that tried to swim to the intestines and ended being dissolved into the acid, and the fools that tried to go up through the throat into the mouth, only to be crushed by the food and water falling over them… as if flying upwards was even possible now with the untalented almost magic-less frog-kins of now.

But there was another tale… a tale of someone that "escaped" and that tale was about someone that had managed to reach an uncharted area of the stomach, an area known as the hive of worms, where deadly gigantic worms exist and dominate the area. In such an area it is said to be a special cave that leads to blood vessels, crossing a sea of red blood one would travel across the frog's body, and find a way out…

"So there's such a thing…" said Chaos, he finally understood how things were. Everything was way more complex than he thought.

-----