As I slowly lost consciousness, I faded into a dark abyss, alone with my thoughts, not that I had any to begin with in the first place. I mean, I was dead after all. There was not much to think about. Well, I thought I was at least. To be honest, I had no clue where I was. It felt as if I had a body, but it was hard to move. Not only that, I felt like my eyes were closed, but I could not open them. It felt as if they were sealed shut.
I stayed like that for a few minutes. At first, it was quiet, but I heard something that sounded like a baby crying. It was slow and quiet at the beginning, but it progressively got louder and louder until it felt as if there was a baby right next to me crying. No, it felt as if I was the one crying. No, I felt tears falling down my face. I was crying. No wait, that can't be right. How was I crying?
I remembered I felt like crying after I had been hit, but there was no way I could cry right now. I was dead, for crying out loud. On top of that, I had no body. At least that's what I thought at first, but now? I felt like I had a body, and it also felt like my eyes were closed, but it's not like I could move or even open my eyes. There was no possible way. Just as I thought that, my eyes felt lighter?
No, that wasn't it, though it did feel like whatever was forcing them shut was gone. My eyes slowly opened, trying to look around me, but everything seemed disoriented and blurry. I couldn't make out anything. I tried to focus to see where I was exactly. The blurriness that clouded my eyes slowly went away. At the same time, my hearing cleared as well.
Before, I could only hear the loud sound of my supposed crying, but now I could make out more voices. They sounded feminine. No, not only that, they sounded like young girls. I couldn't tell what language they were speaking. It wasn't English, nor was it any language I was familiar with. I couldn't even associate it with anything. It sounded foreign and alien.
I couldn't really move my head, so I moved my eyes to the side. Right next to me, there were three girls, the ones whose voices I heard a moment ago. Just as I had guessed, they were all young, extremely so. They looked to be about 10-11 years old. They were all staring down at me, which was weird. Since they were little girls, they should have been pretty small and short, so why were they so goddamn big? Were they giants or something?
Wait, no, it wasn't that they were big. I looked down at my own body, which was kind of difficult. Then it hit me. It wasn't that they were huge. It was just the fact that I was small. Not only that, I was the size of a baby. I had already stopped crying once I was able to hear and see, but now, now I felt like crying once more.
While I was having a crisis over the new revelation, another one came. Before, I couldn't tell what the girls were saying, but then I heard something I understood. It wasn't a word. No, it was a name.
Seishan.
That name, I knew it. It was a name that most Shadow Slave readers knew. She was a key character during the Forgotten Shore arc, the same one that I had just finished reading before I died. Hearing that name only sent me into more of a panic. No way. Two things clicked.
I was in the body of a baby boy.
I was in Shadow Slave.
I don't know what put me here or how I got here, but all I knew was that I was in the world of Shadow Slave. How? The name Seishan was all the proof I needed. Of course, one could argue that it was someone else, since it's not like there was nobody from Earth with the name Seishan, but what were the chances? They were severely slim.
As I was thinking about that, I realized that I was being held. I don't know how I didn't realize this sooner, but I guess the shock of finding out where I was got to me. I looked at the person holding me. It was a beautiful woman, a severely beautiful woman, one that would make men fall for her with a single glance. She had pale, corpse-like skin and lustrous black hair. She appeared to be in her thirties. She was smiling at me. The smile felt warm, almost like my own mother was smiling. She exerted a sense of maternal comfort.
But that comfort quickly went away. It was replaced with another shocking sense of realization. If one of the little girls next to me was Seishan, there could be only one explanation to who the person who was holding me was.
My tiny heart pounded even harder than it already was. I didn't know if I could take it. The woman holding me was undoubtedly Ki Song. I hadn't yet gotten to the part where she was properly introduced, but I knew a bit about her from one of my friends. He had spoiled me about her, which led me to researching a bit about her. From what I knew, she was one of the sovereigns of this world and also led one of the three great clans – Clan Song.
My head started to hurt. Everything felt surreal. I had been transported into a world that I had previously viewed as fiction, something I read to pass time, something I read through a screen, not really caring about since it wasn't real. But now it kind of was. Or was it? Could this just have been a dream? I didn't know. Neither could I think about it, since at that moment a sense of sleepiness corroded my body.
Damn this body.
I felt severely tired. I couldn't even hold on as my eyes slowly started to close. I heard something.
Yves. It was said by the woman holding me – Ki Song.
Huh, what was that? Was that…my…name…?
***
Author Notes
This chapter was relatively short. I was actually planning on making it a part of the prologue but decided not to.
Anyways.
I have decided to add the author notes at the end of the chapter so you guys can just comment directly on my questions.
Also.
I want to make Yves' aspect something like true darkness with some bestial abilities, but if you guys want, I'll gladly choose a different option from the comments as long as it appeals to me, of course. Although I already have the first nightmare and how it will play out outlined, so I might have to make a few changes if I do change the aspect.
Anyways, I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, and it would be appreciated if you can give some feedback on things I should do differently.