He picked up the mirror from the bedside table and looked at the gap where his front teeth had been.

His face went through several expressions, none of them good.

Blood around his mouth, blood on his hands, two blood-stained front teeth lying on the edge of the bed.

"I actually pulled out my own front teeth. What is happening to me."

He bared what remained — the sight of himself toothless completely destroyed whatever dignity he was used to carrying. He spent most of his time encased in armor, which meant the opinions of others rarely registered. But he cared about his own appearance. Not vain, exactly — but presentable. Clean. Intact. Not gap-toothed.

After washing up and a period of forced self-composure, he managed to look at the gap without flinching.

And on reflection, the interpretation was clear enough: "I'm probably losing my teeth the same way children lose their milk teeth. First set out, second set in. Except the second set will be — different." He recalled where the Activity had been accumulating through the bone transformation process. "This is the Activity remodeling my skeleton. The teeth go first because they're the most exposed part of the skeletal system."

The connection between waking life and dreams was also evident in retrospect. You dream about what you've been thinking — and also about what your body is experiencing physically. A full bladder produces dreams of searching for a bathroom. Cold feet produce dreams of standing in cold water. He'd spent days with his bones crawling and itching, had read both The Metamorphosis and seen District 9 recently, and had fallen asleep anxious about his own transformation. Of course he'd dreamed about becoming an insect, then a prawn, about carrying rotting apples he couldn't shake off, about pulling off claws that turned out to be his own fingernails.

"But what if they don't grow back?"

The worry surfaced immediately, and he acknowledged it honestly. He was a first case. No other iron person had entered the Lv1 era before him. He'd reasoned that this was tooth replacement — but…