I stare down at my bare feet, dangling in the crystal water. They’ve grown so dainty, the nails perfect, the brown skin flawless, the arches high and delicate. A Balinese dancer’s feet. These aren’t the feet that carried me to that fateful river, but each day it’s harder to remember the man I used to be.

It all started with one drink. One scoop of that shimmering liquid sating my parched throat after a long hike. The taste was… indescribable. Like liquid bliss tingling through my veins. I couldn’t stop myself from gulping down more, my body moving on autopilot to fill and refill my cupped hands. Even as my head started to swim, some instinct urged me back for another mouthful. And another. I didn’t notice the changes at first. What’s a little morning wood between legs that felt silkier every day? I figured I was just losing muscle tone lazing around the villa on my little “spiritual retreat”. But it wasn’t just my legs shrinking and smoothing. With each sip from that enchanted spring, my whole body was shifting, from the inside out.

I’d wake up to wider hips flaring from a pinched-in waist. Delicate hands shaking, too weak to even pop the cap on my tiger balm. Nipples swollen and tender on a chest that started to jiggle and bounce with my smallest movements. And down below, my blond pubes falling away as some phantom itch burrowed into my taint. God, I’ll never forget that morning I reached down to take my usual morning piss and found only a plump, hairless mound. No cock, no balls, just soft and smooth and glistening. I nearly screamed, barely recognizing the feminine gasp that escaped my lips. But the emptiness between my legs was more terrifying than any change in pitch.

I tried to resist, to stay far away from those poisonous waters. But the THIRST, it consumed me. My body craved it on a cellular level, like it was remaking me one atom at a time. Before I knew it, I was stumbling back to that damned river, drinking in my destruction with a manic giggle bubbling from my throat. Not that I could fight it anymore, even if I wanted to. My old life feels like a fuzzy dream – I can barely recall my dead name, let alone muster any urgency to cling to it. Now there’s just Ketut, the graceful creature reflected back at me from the water’s surface. Doe eyes, bee-stung lips, raven hair spilling down a back clad in the brightest batik silks.

It feels SO right to perch here on a moss-slick boulder, the edge of my cunt pressed against the ancient stone. To dip delicate fingers into the sacred waters and bring them to my red-stained lips. To gulp like a blushing bride imbibing her husband’s seed, the liquid heat settling heavily in my womb. Oh yes, I’ll bear such beautiful babes for the river gods, won’t I?

I clasp my hands in prayer, murmuring my gratitude as I feel my tongue thicken and curl. My memories flowing away in the gentle current, replaced by ancestral whispers in words I never learned but somehow understand. A final blessing for this offering, this walking womb they’ve cultivated in the shell of a shattered man. I wonder how many sips until even these frantic scribblings become incomprehensible to my devolving mind? How long until Ketut forgets she was ever anything but the river’s devoted daughter? Ah, but it doesn’t matter now. Nothing matters but the next drink, cool and crisp on my lips. The next step in my flowering, my ripening into the perfect vessel.

I shift on my rock, admiring my the slender feet dangling into the water. They flex and curl, delicate ankles rolling, their movements losing any last hint of masculine ungainliness. A dancer’s feet indeed. My feet. Time for another sip, I think. This puppet gleefully drinking in her own strings… Mm, the bliss of it! Sweet surrender, sweet obliteration. Puahhh…