Darkness.
That was all there was. A hollow void, endless and suffocating, filled with silence so heavy it seemed to crush his very soul.
Evan could not feel his body, no warmth, no breath, no heartbeat. Nothing.
For the first time in his life, he felt true terror. A fear greater than death itself.
"What's happening? I can't see anything… it's all black. This… this feels like nothingness, like I don't even exist anymore. As if my very origin was erased."
He tried to blink, forcefully even though he wasn't sure if he still had eyes at all. Once. Twice. Again and again, desperate, until even the sound of his own thoughts seemed to fade.
Silence came.
"Am I… really dead? Is this the place people go when they die?" Evan's mind whispered.
For a fleeting moment, he accepted his fate. "So… I died just like that."
But then, the darkness began to shift. It wasn't sudden it bled away slowly, like mist dissolving under sunlight. His vision returned in fragments a blur at first, then shapes, then colors. A dim light seeped in.
One by one, his senses returned.
Sight. Then touch. The roughness of mud against his hands.
Hearing. The distant hum of insects.
Smell. Damp wood, wet soil.
Taste. A faint bitterness, dust clinging to his tongue.
And with it all came pain.
A dizzy, splitting pain that rattled through his skull like it was about to shatter.
"Arghh… damn it," Evan groaned, his voice hoarse and low. "What… is happening to me?"
His sight sharpened little by little. At first, all he could see was brown dark, endless brown. He turned his head left, right, forward still brown. Only when he tilted his gaze upward did he catch a shade of deep green.
Finally, his vision cleared.
What he saw was not the narrow stone path he had always walked to school. There were no cars, no chatter of people in the distance, no smell of city air.
Instead, he stood in the middle of an massive forest. Towering dark oak trees surrounded him on all sides, their roots tangled in muddy soil and tall grass. The silence was broken only by the occasional buzz of insects.
Evan's heart sank.
"So… this really isn't my home anymore."
He thought back to that one leaf, the golden one he had touched without a second thought.
"If I hadn't touched it… none of this would've happened."
A second thought crept in Evan. "Could it be… transmigration? Another world? Or maybe Another dimension?"
It sounded ridiculous yet everything around him screamed of impossibility. He had read countless books and web novels where the protagonist was thrown into a new world after some mysterious event happened. Was this situation is his turn?
Evan checked himself. His face, his body. Nothing seemed different. His uniform was the same, though now dirtied and wrinkled from the mud. His black slacks and shoes were ruined, but intact. His reflection in his phone's dark screen showed the same old face.
"No changes… I'm still me, Evan. Just in a place I don't belong and I don't know."
Determined not to collapse into despair, Evan steadied his breathing.
"I need to find someone. Anyone. A group of people. Something a path were people could be walking right now."
He tried his phone. Pressed the button once. Twice. Again. Nothing. It was lifeless, as though the device itself had been stripped of its purpose.
"Useless piece of junk!" Evan snapped, hurling it into the mud.
But regret struck immediately. He stumbled forward, clawed it out from the dirt, and shoved it back into his sling bag. 'No… maybe I'll need it later. Just in case."
He began walking. Straight ahead, in hopes that direction alone would eventually bring him somewhere. Hours passed. His legs trembled, exhaustion setting in, until he finally leaned against a massive oak tree. He brushed his dark hair back, sweat dripping down his forehead.
'What… a tiring day," he muttered. His eyelids grew heavy. Before long, he drifted into sleep.
The setting sun broke through the canopy, casting a warm glow across his face.
Time passed.
Evan stirred, slowly waking. He yawned, stretched, and murmured, "That was… actually a good sleep."
But the air had changed.
It was heavier now oppressive, like the forest itself was holding its breath. His instincts screamed at him, "Danger.'
He scanned the area. Then he heard it.
A sharp sound in the distance. Branches snapping. Leaves rustling. Birds suddenly burst from the canopy, fleeing in the opposite direction of his gaze.
Evan thought "They're running from something."
And then, a defining roar echoed in whole forest.
"ROAR!"
The sound tore through the forest, rattling the earth beneath him. Evan's ears rang, his eardrums aching. A chill shot down his spine.
From the shadows, it emerged a massive brown bear, its bulk towering, its eyes burning with raw hunger.
"Shit… shit shit shit!" Evan's thoughts spiraled. "A bear? A massive one at that! If I don't escape now, I'm dead for real this time!"
He bolted, sprinting in the opposite direction. The bear lunged, crashing through trees, hissing and roaring, its footsteps shaking the ground.
"FASTER!" Evan's mind screamed. "If I get caught, I'll just be food!"
But the bear was relentless. It wasn't chasing birds. It wasn't prowling for prey at random. It was after him. Him alone.
His lungs burned. His legs felt like they'd collapse. Sweat poured down in his face.
Then impact.
The beast's claws tore into his back, ripping through his uniform and then his flesh. The blood sprayed. Evan's body was flung like a ragdoll, crashing against a thick oak. His ribs cracked under the force.
"Aaaghhh!!" His scream echoed across the forest, raw and desperate.
He collapsed, barely able to move, every breaths is agony. His vision blurred, colors fading at the edges. The bear's heavy footsteps grew louder and louder, closing in.
Evan's trembling hand groped the ground. He found a branch near him, pathetic compared to the beast, but it was all he had now.
The bear loomed over him, sniffing, its shadow blotting out the dim light. Summoning the last of his strength, Evan thrust the branch upward, stabbing at its neck. It does not pierced in the skin of the beast.
The bear roared in fury, slamming him down with its claws and raw strength. Pain exploded through his mind and body.
"I tried… I really tried…" Evan's thoughts blurred. "But… I'm still gonna die… like this… pathetic."
"Now I would never gonna see my mom or my little sister, even my two idiots friends" Evan chuckled in his thoughts.
Darkness began to swallow him again.
But then something stirred inside him.
Deep within his chest, from the core of his being, something is awakened.
A low hum filled the air, vibrating through the forest. The atmosphere shifted the weight of death itself seemed to vanish.
The bear's body withered. Its strength drained, its life force was dissolved into nothing. In moments the mighty beast collapsed beside him, reduced to more than just a husk.
And Evan… Evan lay unconscious, yet alive. His wounds, his broken ribs, torn flesh, bloodied back, slowly mended. Skin knit itself, bones realigned.
It was a miracle. A regeneration no human should possess.
As if… the injuries never existed.