Chapter 1: Reincarnation

“Boom!”

The sound of my fist hitting the pillow spread softly in the quiet studio.

The blue light of dawn was faintly seeping in through the gaps in the blackout curtains, but the cold white light of my smartphone screen swallowed even that up.

Only my exhausted sighs from staying up all night and losing flowed out alone from under the blanket.

“No, how am I supposed to break this…” I muttered in despair and placed my smartphone on the pillow.

The word “DEFEATED” blinked in red on the screen as if mocking me.

The name of the game I had been obsessed with until just now was “Shadow Symphony.”

It was a new mobile game that had been released less than two months ago, and it became a hot topic as soon as it was released, taking first place in terms of number of users.

The core of the game was collecting heroes from 1 to 5 stars, forming a party, and conquering a labyrinth teeming with monsters.

It wasn’t a fresh setting, but the vast worldview and splendid battle scenes captivated me.

I started playing the game when I had free time during my break from school, but it had already become a part of my daily life.

After finishing my part-time job, I naturally went on adventures with the heroes in the game, and what was initially a light hobby soon became a source of dopamine for me.

However, everything changed when the boss “Petramos” appeared in the 5th stage update two days ago.

‘Is this really made to be broken?’ Even with my party full of 5-star heroes that were powered up to the limit, I couldn’t even reduce the boss’s health by half.

I thought it couldn’t go on like this, so I went to the Shadow Symphony Gallery, but instead of a strategy guide, it was full of complaints and insults directed at Petramos.

Every time I scrolled through the screen, the anger and frustration of other users seemed to reflect me like a mirror.

“Hmm… I guess it’s the same for everyone…”

I went to the plant gallery as if I was escaping to soothe my troubled mind, thinking that the money I spent on Shadow Symphony was a waste.

Although I don’t grow plants, I often visit here to heal myself because I like the mature and peaceful atmosphere.

When I looked at the photos of new companion plants that were uploaded every day, my mind would calm down.

While browsing the gallery, I noticed a long apology comment written by the author of a post.

It was impressive to see him write a post with agitated emotions and then come back the next day to sincerely apologize.

“This is the food gallery.”

Just like the plants that sprout and grow little by little, do the hearts of the people here grow like that?

Suddenly, I thought, “What if I put a small flowerpot on the window?”

As I continued to ponder seriously, I began to feel sleepy.

When I checked my watch, I realized that I had stayed up all night and it was past 1 p.m.

I had completely lost my sense of time thanks to the pitch-black curtains.

“How can this be? It’s already broad daylight?”

I decided not to do Shadow Symphony until the patch and started to get ready.

I took my own three sacred items for a perfect night’s sleep.

A sleeping mask that absorbs light to the level of Vanta Black, earplugs that wouldn’t even notice if a band performed in front of me, and this bed that I had been lying on until now, which wouldn’t shake even if an elephant passed by.

I never compromised on the quality of my sleep…

“Ugh… hot no, hot.”

The surroundings were hot as if I had entered a sauna.

It seemed like there had been a loud noise in my ears since a while ago.

I got up nervously, annoyed by the hot heat and the annoying noise, and suddenly a cough burst out.

“Ugh!”

“Cough!”

A black lump and phlegm came out of my mouth.

I was startled and took off my blindfold, and the surroundings were filled with thick black smoke.

When I took out my earplugs, a loud alarm sounded from all around, and I could hear flames burning below.

‘What, what!? Fire, fire!?’

The three gods that I had prepared for perfect sleep had returned as a disaster.

Before I could even sort out the chaotic situation, I was out of breath again.

“Cough, cough!”

Another black lump was spit out.

My throat was so sore and hot.

It felt like my windpipe was already burned.

Maybe because I had inhaled too much smoke, my body wasn’t moving properly.

I barely managed to open the front door, only to find the entire building filled with black smoke.

I looked around with my eyes that were too hot to open, and all the doors of the other houses were open.

There were clear signs of evacuation.

“Have they all evacuated? Have the firefighters not come yet?”

I had to find a way to survive.

I remembered that there was an evacuation space on the rooftop.

I lowered my posture as much as possible and took each step toward the emergency stairs, but my head hurt so much and I felt dizzy.

In the end, I lost my balance and fell to the floor.

“Ugh.”

I no longer had any strength left in my body.

Even though I wanted to get up, my legs wouldn’t listen.

“S-save me!” I shouted, hoping someone would hear me, but my desperate cries were buried in the sound of the blazing flames and the ear-piercing alarm.

It seemed like I was the only one left in this officetel.

“Save me…”

“S-save me…”

“Ke, s-s!”

No more sounds were heard.

I could intuitively tell that there wasn’t much time left.

There seemed to be no hope of being rescued.

Even as my consciousness faded, I felt strangely peaceful.

What came to mind at the last moment was not the defeat screen in the game, but a picture of a small sprout I had seen in the plant gallery.

“They say that the most painful pain is the burning pain… I guess I’m lucky that I didn’t burn up and just suffocated to death…”

My consciousness gradually faded away.

At the last moment, it felt like someone was calling my name, but even that faded into darkness.

Darkness like an infinite deep sea.

In absolute silence where time, space, and any senses did not exist, my consciousness as ‘me’ awoke.

As if I was floating alone in the deepest part of the universe, all directions were filled with pitch-blackness that swallowed up even light.

In a perfect void where I could not feel any sound, warmth, or presence, only my thoughts endlessly lingered.

Where… am I?

The fact that I could think for myself felt strange.

If I had not been able to think at all, it wouldn’t have been this scary.

My last memory was losing consciousness in an officetel engulfed in flames.

The hot smoke burning my throat, the ear-piercing alarm sound, and even the photos of sprouts in the plant gallery that I passed by in my last moments.

All of that felt like a distant story from long ago.

I desperately tried to move my body, but shockingly, the concept of a ‘body’ itself did not exist.

I couldn’t move a single finger, let alone my arms or legs.

No, more precisely, it seemed as if there was no ‘thing’ to move at all.

I couldn’t even feel my breath or my heart beating.

Only my pure consciousness was floating in the darkness.

“Ugh, I can’t move a single finger! I can’t breathe, my heart isn’t beating… What the heck?”

‘What the… Am I in a vegetative state?’

Fear enveloped my consciousness.

Had I been rescued from the black smoke and was lying on a cold bed in the intensive care unit of a hospital?

However, this was different from being in a vegetative state.

In medical documentaries, patients who were conscious could at least feel faint sounds or touch.

They said they could hear their family’s voices and feel their hands…

But this current state was on a completely different level from that.

The isolated consciousness couldn’t even tell the passage of time.

Was it a minute, an hour? Or had years already passed?

In the endless loneliness, the anxiety grew deeper and deeper.

‘Please… it won’t be like this forever, right?’

Fear surged in like waves.

I desperately missed all the sensations I had felt in my previous life.

The cold dawn air, the warm sunlight, the sweet scent of coffee, even the feeling of my fingertips typing on the keyboard.

Everything I had taken for granted before now felt so precious.

Wait a minute… could this be… the afterlife?

Realization flashed through me like lightning.

Then I remembered all the good deeds I had done so far.

The donations I had made every month, the volunteer work I had done diligently even though I hadn’t done it often…

I’ve lived a good life!

But to be in a place like this… isn’t that too much?

Although my life may not have been great, I was proud that it wasn’t a bad life to be sent to this darkness.

This is ridiculous!

Even if I can’t go to heaven, I can reincarnate and be reborn!

It’s too much to be trapped in this eternal darkness!

Unlike my heart that denied reality, my reason was coldly facing the situation.

When I thought that I might already be dead, the time I had spent escaping into the virtual world of the game felt like a waste.

If only I had grown a real plant during that time, if only I had left a more meaningful trace…

Regrets surged.

‘No, there’s still hope. This must be a recovery process. If I just wait a little longer…’

Then suddenly this thought occurred to me.

This is strange.

Since when have I been this emotional?

Normally, I would have rationally analyzed the situation to the end…

Even my speech seems different…!

“No, now is not the time to think about that. Let’s first find a way out of here!”

I consoled myself, and as if trying to find even a ray of light, I sharpened my consciousness as much as possible.

Without giving up hope that there might be something beyond the darkness, I concentrated my consciousness deep inside.

As if looking into a deep well, I focused my mind toward the deepest part of myself.

That was when.

Very subtly, but clearly, I felt ‘something!’

★ (Anonymous) Seed LV10 years old

‘Huh?’