"I'm fucked"
That was the last thing I could utter as darkness filled my vision.
My death wasn't anything you could call special; it wasn't heroic, it wasn't satisfying, and it wouldn't amount to anything.
In fact, I could barely remember what caused it.
Everything had blurred, just something resembling a bright light, a loud noise...a sharp impact, which caused that sudden pain to course through my body.
Before I could even comprehend what had happened, I'd already begun to fly through the air from the impact.
In those few seconds of flight, I felt like a broken toy, thrown by some child in the depths of a tantrum.
Looking back, that particular moment seemed to last an eternity, and even now I remember it vividly, even though everything else in my memory was shrouded in fog.
"Male patient, early twenties, internal bleeding, broken legs and arms," the distant voice of one of the doctors reached my ears.
I guess I'm already at the hospital.
The sensation of flying and weightlessness washed over me even as the true terror of the situation had yet to reach my distracted mind.
But that moment didn't last forever.
Soon I fell to the ground again, crashing hard against the cold, wet pavement, splitting like rotten fruit. The light in my vision faded as pain ripped through my body, tearing and splitting.
"Hey! Do you know your name? Do you know where you are?!"
Shit, you don't have to scream, you know?
"He doesn't have an ID or anything to identify him!"
"His blood pressure is dropping!"
"His right lung is collapsing, and his left lung is full of blood!"
Oh...so this is how it all ends? After hitting the ground, I probably rolled around for a while, cutting myself against the floor, but to be honest, nothing was very clear. As soon as I felt my body shatter, the rest of my life began to blur.
That unique moment was gone, replaced by something like a whirlwind, a distant, chaotic storm I could only see through the broken lenses of my own eyes.
There were bright noises, flashes of clarity where I could barely move my blurred vision, but overall it was as if I were caught in a vortex, falling down an endless drainpipe, unable to escape or reach the surface.
"We're losing him! Start the defibrillator!" the doctor's voice was the last thing I heard before everything disappeared.
Darkness and confusion had enveloped me, but I could still think and feel, though perhaps not a traditional sensation like pain on my skin, but more the intensity of my emotions.
I felt everything in my mind with such depth that it almost shocked me.
But what I felt wasn't something anyone wanted to understand, not with the clarity I had at that moment.
Instead, I could only feel sadness, regret, and fear.
Those negative things led me to the undeniable certainty that I was about to die.
All the things I still wanted to do and all the things I had come to love...
All of that was over.
But even filled with those regrets, those sorrows, I'm certain it was nothing special.
The only thing I can honestly say about a death like this is that it came slowly.
After all, it wasn't something that happened to me immediately. While it was true that I had been hit suddenly, probably by an out-of-control car, the suffering I experienced was no less, and it certainly didn't disappear shortly after I lost my vision.
My death didn't come quickly.
Instead, I spent a long time in that vortex of emotions and darkness, simply spiraling downward as the life in my body slowly faded away.
Memories and flashes of the outside world assaulted me from time to time, but nothing truly important ever pierced the regret I felt in my final moments.
I couldn't say how long I lay there in that darkness.
Perhaps they had taken me to the hospital, to the emergency room, where they were still trying to save me.
Perhaps I was already in a coma, and this was a nightmare.
It was even possible that I was already dead, that I had already succumbed to my injuries, and that this place was some kind of limbo.
Perhaps I was still lying on the pavement, feeling the pain of my shattered body after the impact.
Perhaps not even a moment had passed, and this agony was the result of some fight-or-flight instinct still active in my mind.
I had a vague hope that this wasn't the case. Whatever had really happened, it seemed like the days continued to pass while I remained within that darkness.
I finally realized something in those moments.
The darkness and the violent spiraling movement into the depths of the void had begun to fade.
It wasn't as if I was waking up.
That was something I could clearly notice, although my thoughts turned more lucid, and the pain began to ease with compassion.
No, I certainly wasn't waking up.
Whatever was happening to me wasn't something I could ever wake up from.
And it was certainly a slow process, but it was finally complete.
The darkness, the feeling, the emotions disappeared.
The blurry pain and the distant, swirling lights, the moving figures and the muffled sounds—everything was gone.
Fear gripped me as I wondered if this was really the afterlife, if, perhaps, this was death.
This place without noise, without light, without sensations...
I suppose you could call it the void.
But over time, that void, devoid of anything in the world, began to brighten, as if I had begun to awaken from a long sleep, though my mind remained fresh and unaffected throughout.
My vision cleared as my soul continued its slow descent into that void below. And though my eyes never opened, I saw something there, while I was still deep in the darkness.
It may have been a glimpse of what people call heaven, but perhaps it was something else entirely.
That place was a vast white field, like a colorless world superimposed on reality.
Fog rose from a background that looked like marble, and the sky was filled with opaque, shifting patterns.
In that vast field, there were two figures.
One was kneeling, and the other stood close to him, as if comforting him.
Both remained silent, motionless, far away.
Although it was difficult to distinguish them with my blurred vision, I knew they were both men.
One was a white man with brown hair, and the other...
What surprised me most was how the other person was tied up with chains of almost transparent crystals.
Those chains held him firmly, and he seemed to have hunched over from the discomfort of the weight.
"Do your best," the brown-haired man suddenly said, and began walking away until he vanished into thin air.
The other person didn't say anything or move in the slightest, even though he knew I was watching him.
I knew this because I could see his eyes, but not his face. He was far away, but I still couldn't get a good look at him.
His eyes... they were empty, glassy, and devoid of any emotion.
Those eyes scared me.
But before I could even realize what had happened, everything in sight was gone.
In the span of a single instant, that strange place was gone, leaving me alone in the void once again.
By now, I was too exhausted to think about it anymore.
Instead, all I was left with was darkness and the slowly moving tides, pulling me deeper and deeper.
At that moment, when I felt my senses fading once more, I truly realized I was going to die.
But somehow, I didn't die.
After falling into that deep sleep, lulled by the hazy darkness and descending into the void, I must have lain there for an incredible amount of time, and I didn't even realize when or how it happened but... i woke up
...
When I opened my eyes, the first thing I saw was a dazzling light. It grew until it filled my entire field of vision, and I squinted uncomfortably.
The first moment my consciousness awoke was a woman's screams and a sharp pain in my head.
Once my vision adjusted, I realized a young blonde woman was looking at me. She was an attractive girl.
Who was she? I didn't know anyone like that, and she didn't seem to be in hospital gowns. In fact, it seemed more like we were in some kind of cabin, and it was nighttime.
There was no lighting other than a few candles in the corner of the room, nothing more.
Beside her was a young man about the same age, with brown hair and a clumsy smile directed at me.
He seemed strong and proud, with good muscles. The woman looked at me with a warm smile and spoke.
"**********?...*****"
But for some reason, her words were strangely slurred and difficult to understand.
The man said something in response, his face losing some of its tension. I also had no idea what he was saying.
A third, unintelligible voice joined the conversation, but I couldn't see who was speaking.
I tried to get up to find out where I was and ask these people who they were.
But all I could manage was a bunch of guttural sounds and babble.
"Aah! Waah!"
I couldn't move my body. I could move my fingertips and arms, but I couldn't sit down.
The brown-haired man said something else, and suddenly leaned down and lifted me up, kissing me on the face...
He held me while he kissed me, surrounded by those strange giants, who were also staring at my body, lying there shivering from the cold.
However, I didn't understand what had happened to me from the beginning, not even with those enormous people crying and laughing at the sight of me.
At first, I thought it must be some kind of dream, although I had no proof or opinion on the matter.
But finally, the gravity of what had happened to me hit me with a strange intensity.
After all, I could only continue denying reality for so long, and the constant visions of giant people around me, the strange images of enormous walls and floors...
Confirming it was easy, just by seeing my strange, chubby little arms and fingers, my chubby body, and my heavy, enormous head.
They picked me up and carried me everywhere. Under the supervision of that stern-looking young man and that smiling woman, they placed me in a crib and tucked me in.
I had been reincarnated; there was no denying it.
At that moment, I had no idea how to feel about my reincarnation. After all, it didn't erase the fact that my old life was completely gone.
Even if I could reconnect with my former family, they probably wouldn't believe any claims I made about my reincarnation as their son or brother; they would consider me crazy.
To begin with, I had no reason to live again. I had nothing I was truly passionate about, and I had no goals left to accomplish. What I regretted most about my death was not having spent time with the people I should have. And that regret would never be resolved, not even with a second life.
The first two people I saw when I got here must have been my parents.
If I had to guess, they were between 18 and 20 years old.
Clearly younger than me. If it had been in my past life, they would have been children to me.
But why was I reincarnated? What unfinished business do I have besides a life that ended prematurely? I wish I'd been reincarnated in my old life to do it all over again, not here... This world holds nothing for me.
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*Let's start again, comment on what you thought of the chapter, give me power stones and add this book to your collection*