He breathed in.
"Hfff..."
Normally, when meditation happens while showering under cold water, the immediate effects involve overcoming the body's shock response to achieve a deep sense of presence and control. Long-term practice can build mental resilience and improve overall well-being.
Over all this time, he felt a bit of difficulty. He suddenly fell on the ground—not physically, but mentally. His body was still meditating. He saw the same path he had kept seeing ever since he got transmigrated. Heavily waving his head while tilting, he clasped his cheek.
Right after doing that, he looked straight at the endless path before him. Every time he enters this place, there is always smoke blowing everywhere, mists hiding his views. Dark clouds floated around the path.
It was a terrifying nightmare. Yes, everything was a nightmare to Aric—but this time, the other way around. He intentionally entered. He laughed loudly, so out loud, like an open book saying, "Read me."
The reason behind it was not only to announce that he was in. If there was another human—or whatever race—he would make the other feel conflicted by the one and only question: "Why the laugh?"
The other reason was to see if his out-loud, naked smile would reflect. He wanted to see how big the place was. In a lot of realms and places he read in different novels, some are infinite, others are limited.
The sound traveled, echoing:
"HAHAHAHA..."
"HAHAHA..."
"HAHA..."
"HAha..."
"Ha..."
There was no reaction. Just him looking around. The sound of his heart was like a mic near a drum.
"Dido..."
"Ddua."
"Ddua..."
"Ddo."
"Ddua..."
"Ddo..."
He gripped his fist, breathing in. He took the position, bending down while putting his hands on his knees.
He jumped from the position he was in abruptly. He slowly reached the path—but he flipped to the edge, jumping off the path.
The path was a perfect way that seemed just like a bridge. He laughed it off, saying, "Good night."
Those nightmares where he falls down and wakes up deviated aren't the case here. The cloud didn't break; it simply vanished beneath his feet, unraveling into a cascade of shimmering particles that glittered like scattered glitter.
But this time, he saw an orange-colored light coming. He was flying in the sky. He imperceptibly opened his eyes to see his hair floating upward. He looked at the clouds. His hands shook like a tree branch in a breeze.
The air overflowed around him. The ground was all just mesmerizing. It showed potentially very attractive light blending with everything that was faked—but it was good for the eye. Aric outstretched his arms, making a T-stand. He bent his knees and pushed himself forward.
Aric lifted his arms, palms open, drawing in the wind's invisible currents. After reaching some point, he dropped backward.
He rose as high up as he could. At his max speed, he couldn't reach the clouds he saw above—they felt like a fragment of heaven.
As a result, he dropped back upside down. Inside his veins, blood was boiling like a volcano. The oxygen—whether pure or not—wasn't even oxygen; it was a black smoke, smoldering his lung and heart. But unlike any other smoke, this one made him even more energetic.
"Haaa… haaa… haaa… haaa… haaaa…"
He screamed, his mouth wide open. The smoke he breathed while screaming covered his upper body.
For someone looking from far away, they would only be able to see his legs. The smoke revolved around him as he fell upside down.
Suddenly, a sound whispered…
"An utterly useless fool human. Don't you know where you are?"
It was a heavy voice to hear or bear. It was filled with wickedness—an amusing sound. It was a diabolical, venomous tone.
As soon as he reached the ground, he saw pure evil eyes preying on him from above and below.
Reality collapsed. Everything broke like a mirror cracking bit by bit. It was all getting absorbed into him.
Aric watched, flabbergasted. The whole thing rose him up in the sky, midway between the clouds and the ground.
Even though he was flabbergasted—frozen, not having control over his body—he was grinding his teeth and smiled, as he had never seen such phenomena happen to him, never in his past life nor his new one.
The reality enthralled him through his eyes. The smoke covering the severed reality was just like a fantasy gold coin bag. He inhaled it.
Out of the blue, all the reality that immersed in him burst out of his body. His hand shivering, legs trembling, his body soared rapidly toward the sky. Fidgeting, he lost control over his body.
"Haa… W—what the F—ucckk… Why is my body twitching? My neck feels like it's twisted. What the—can't move my legs. Why is this even happening…"
A shadowy figure—more like a hand—reached out to him from the ground, gently grabbing him from behind. In the sky painted by wickedly scarlet eyes hungry for light, the eyes were dim, bright scarlet red light streaming toward him. A shadowy hand placed up in the heavenly clouds—the clouds were being covered by dark clouds, thunder striking all over the place.
The sound of the thunder resonating with the wicked grind of the shadowy figure felt like a pack of wolves howling back and forth with a pack of lions roaring for a fight.
The shadowy figure's hand approached him from the sky, covering the clouds, but through its fingers, he could see the eyes of a demon very clearly.
In an instant, everything followed him back as he was dashing toward the ground, since the other shadowy hand was pulling him down.
Once he struck against it, he woke up coughing blood in the shower.
Realizing: "Meditation is not a relief as it used to be in my past life…"
He breathed in and out. He heard a mimic sound of a sweet girl's voice that felt like a melody. The euphonious, feminine voice echoed in his head. Repeatedly hearing the voice, he thought he was hallucinating. Indeed, he wasn't—but of course, his vision was getting fuzzy, the wall dancing hazily like curved hair.
He wasn't able to locate where he was, but he definitely knew he had to keep his consciousness alive.
After a couple of rotations, his head rotated here and there. He tried to feel his hand that was weighing down. He didn't even know if he was standing or sitting on the ground. Matter of fact, he was laying down.
The pain of the headache was more like a three-year-old kid screaming in his ears… "Diiiiiiiieeee…"
That's how he felt. He lost his consciousness even after all he tried—but just like what happened when he first woke up, he collapsed. Though he was laying on the ground in the first place, he felt like he collapsed.
The shadowy figure stayed on his mind. There was no single day he slept without seeing a vivid dream about it.
Nevertheless, none of them could be compared to this. It was a completely sinister, devastating feeling he felt as he saw through its eyes.
The realm he was in was either the wicked one or the heavenly one—it was all deep inside his core crystal.
Perhaps there was a different meaning to meditation than what he initially thought.
The same thing happened when he regressed. The queen, Nyxia his maid, and other important characters stood in the underground basement of the castle. Aric was told to place his hand on the crystal.
As soon as he touched it, a demon scent burst out of him. The way he was fidgeting, blood streaming through his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth like a fired water pump, was the moment he got transmigrated into Aric's body. He was flabbergasted, trying to solve this perplexed scene, but he couldn't.
That's why he had the same experience now. He got the prince's memory the next day he woke up, but still, nothing of that exact moment came to mind.
He thought there was no point in dwelling on it. What matters is what comes in the future.
In the novel he was reincarnated in, it was low-key style writing and very easygoing.
Fans loved the twists and how the author used the "September WPC Contest: Modern Profession in a Fantasy World," so it was decided to re-edit it.
Some minor changes did happen. Even more twisted ideas were made, but they were carefully placed throughout the chapters so that the taste of the same novel wouldn't fade away.
He thought he was hallucinating, even though he actually wasn't. The sound he heard was the sound of the maid who noticed he was in the shower. So, as on any other usual day, she walked in to wash his back.
The prince was a lazy, unambitious person. That's why he would just lay on the plastic-made comfort ground, covering his hips just as in a massage house.
She would wash his back and legs as he would take years and years of cursing and agonizing to just do it and get out.
This lazy Aric isn't here anymore. Aric thought she would be planning and getting ready to go; in addition to that, she would actually ask and knock on the door—not straight-out enter as if it was her house.
So he actually didn't care about wearing pants. He just wore a towel—the kind he used to wear back on Earth.
Now that she took him out, dried him…
She can't resist her feelings anymore.