use of もはや in this sentence

Question

考えれば考えるほど、もはや「詰んでいる」としか思えない。

context: speaker is fucked

The more i think about it, the more... hopeless it seems???

just stabbing at the last part based on the context, i did read

もはや used with しか

but the explanations for もはや + しかないare very difficult to digest.

Thank you

Answer 1

"The more I think about it, the more I realize that, at this point (=もはや), the only possible conclusion (=としか思えない) is that it's already a checkmate (=詰んでいる)."

もはや is "already, already at this point". You can think of it as a more dramatic もう. としか思えない is "I cannot think of it except as…", that is, "the only possible conclusion is that…"

A less clumsy translation would be something like: "The more I think about it, the more I realize it's already over for me" (or her/me/them/etc.)