Seeing that I remained silent, a fleeting trace of hesitation flashed through Victor’s eyes, but it disappeared just as quickly.

"Lock her in the karaoke room with the snakes. She can come out when she admits her mistake and begs for mercy."

With that, Victor threw me and the entire bag of snakes into the glass-walled room. He then crossed his arms over his chest, confidently waiting at the door for my screams and submission.

I used to be terrified of snakes. Even after my body was gradually altered by the researchers on Snake Island, transforming me into something inhuman, the sight of a snake would still make me tremble.

But later, in order to break me completely, the researchers threw me into a pit swarming with thousands upon thousands of snakes. There was no food, only the snakes themselves.

They forced me to adapt. Forced me to survive. Forced me to forget that I was ever human.

If I didn’t want to die of thirst or starvation, there was only one rule to follow—survival of the fittest. The strong devoured the weak.

After living in the snake pit for two months, I no longer saw snakes as terrifying creatures. To me, they had become nothing more than delicious food.

As I opened my mouth and bit into a green snake. I saw Victor’s staggering steps reflected in the glass.

"Eve, are you insane? What are you doing…?"

Victor had no idea that a single rat could never satisfy my hunger.

But this bag of snakes he had so graciously delivered to me was the greatest gift. The perfect nourishment.

Under the horrified and bloodshot gazes of Victor and my parents, I raised my head high and swallowed the writhing snake whole.

Victor’s eyes were bloodshot as he rushed into the karaoke room, yanking the snake from my hands and tossing it aside. Then, he pulled me into a tight embrace.

"Enough, Eve. Stop forcing yourself like this. Let’s not fight anymore, okay?"

I didn’t understand why he had taken my food away.

At the research institute, in order to secure more funding, they had transformed me into a "snake woman" and sent me to serve men with particular tastes, to be their amusement.

I had learned that only by pleasing men could I earn the right to eat.

So, I parted my tongue into two halves and obediently knelt before Victor.

Tucking my loose hair behind my ear, I reached out to unbuckle his belt.

His pupils shrank in disbelief and his voice turned hoarse and heavy.

"Eve… what exactly did you learn during those six months on Snake Island? Do you even remember that you are the heiress of the River Family?"

Victor suddenly grabbed my hand, his face filled with pain.

"When you played the piano, you were like a goddess, high and untouchable. How can you use these hands, the same hands that won national piano awards, for something so degrading, just to please men?"

His knuckles turned white from how tightly he gripped me. I didn’t understand his reaction, only that his hold was hurting me, so I instinctively pulled my hand back.

He was the one who sent me to this island. Here, my body had been altered into something others desired and my mind had been tamed into submission, turned into something less than human, something closer to a snake.

To survive, these hands, this mouth and every inch of my body had long since been used for things far filthier than he could imagine.

And now, he was disgusted by me. Calling me dirty.

I stared at him, unblinking. Yet, in the face of my gaze, he didn’t even have the courage to look me in the eye.

His lips pressed into a tight line. Then, his voice was cold and sharp.

"Find out exactly what happened to Eve on Snake Island in the past six months!"

The wait felt endless. Victor held me on his lap, wrapping my hands tightly in his palms, as if trying to pass warmth into me.

But he didn’t know that every drop of my blood had been replaced, that I had long become a cold-blooded creature. No matter how much warmth he tried to give, he would never thaw me.

Half an hour later, two men dragged my caretaker before us.

"I entrusted Eve's well-being to you," Victor's voice was icy, pressing down like a blade. "Now tell me, how did she turn into this? Neither human nor snake, all in just six short months?"

Under his interrogation, the caretaker trembled uncontrollably.

From the moment I set foot on Snake Island, she had already been bought by Clara and sent me into the research institute.

"Mr. Winters, please spare me! I really can't say!" The caretaker knelt repeatedly, pressing her palms together in desperate pleading. "I took someone else's money. If I speak, I'll die!"

Victor was so tense that he seemed to stop breathing. With just a glance, his bodyguards stepped forward, making the caretaker tremble and beg even more desperately.

"Mrs. Eve couldn’t bear the loneliness of the island and started consorting with an old snake catcher. Ever since they began living together, her behavior became stranger and stranger."

To prove her words, the caretaker pulled out her phone and showed Victor a video she had recorded.

At that time, I still had a shred of humanity left. I knew that the wedding ring on my hand was something important to me.

In order to retrieve my wedding ring, I had exhausted myself to the brink of death under the snake catcher’s commands, all just to please him.

In the video, the snake catcher laughed heartily with satisfaction. “As expected of a woman from the city, her skin feels as smooth as jade. And that figure… Now I can’t even think about doing anything else all day except playing with her!”

Victor remained expressionless, but the surging murderous intent and pain in his eyes were terrifying.

“You were so desperate on the island that even an old, shriveled and ugly man was good enough for you? Eve, were you born a whore, or are you doing this just to take revenge on me?”

His repeated accusations made my whole body tremble.

At that moment, an overwhelming surge of male pheromones flooded my senses and an insatiable hunger consumed me. My pupils narrowed into vertical slits against my will.

That male presence, lured by my scent, was drawing closer.

Without a second thought, I dashed toward the deck and leaped into the sea.

"Eve, you are not allowed to die!"

"Eve, don't!"

From the deck, Victor and my parents' voices rang out, filled with terror and agony.

Under everyone's horrified gaze, my body surfaced and sank in the water a few times before twisting into an extreme arc, entwining around the cold body of a massive python.