The whole house had been burning for a while now. The cries of an abandoned dog echoed again and again, but none wanted to risk their lives for a mere dog.
Her owner cried and begged, but the firefighters wouldn't lift a finger. It was too dangerous.
However, there was one person in the crowd who felt it was not fair, who felt that an innocent dog did not deserve such a fate.
Those standing around him were unable to keep him from running towards the burning house, and Nero rushed through the flames.
Coughing, panting, and barely able to breathe, Nero ended up finding the dog on the first floor.
He gently took the barely conscious dog into his arms, turned around, and froze as the ceiling fell in, completely barring the path beyond. The flames only grew more hellish, and there was only one way to survive.
Nero suddenly fell to his knees and began coughing incessantly.
The dog in his arms twitched, barely able to move.
It truly felt like it had taken an eternity to cross the five meters separating him from the window.
By the time that he reached it, he was crawling on the ground, his vision blurry, his mind dizzy, and the dog in his arms unmoving.
"Go... Go on..." Nero barely managed to raise himself up enough to toss the dog out of the window and into the fresh air of the outside world. "From the first floor... You should be able to..."
A bark echoed as the dog hit the ground, causing Nero to smile.
"Sorry... About that..."
The firefighters reached closer to the house, rushed to help the suffocating dog, waited for Nero to jump out, but he never did.
Standing, even just enough to reach the window, had been a fatal mistake.
Not only was Nero unable to jump through, but he had completely lost control of his body.
His back hit the ground, and all he could do was stare at the window, stare at the night sky beyond, as his vision faded to black, and his body was consumed by the flames.
"Cooper!" That shout was the last thing Nero heard.
He recognized the voice and the name. Its owner must be so happy, Nero thought as he lost consciousness.
***
When he opened his eyes, Nero wasn't in a hospital or in an ambulance.
'What the...?' He stood up, only to fall again. 'What is this?'
His brain went blank as he noticed scales on his hands.
'Wait... They're not even hands. What happened to my hands and skin? Why do I have scales and claws-'
The thought was interrupted by a shout,
"Nero!!"
His confusion grew upon hearing his name being called out.
Before he could figure anything out, his entire body was raised a dozen meters into the air!
At least, that's what it felt like until he realized that he was actually tiny, about thirty centimeters tall, making him not much bigger than a cat.
The young woman lifting him up as high as she could had the brightest smile.
"Nero!" She shouted again, and Nero was reminded of the last shout he had heard before dying.
The next second, he was brought closer, his head buried between the young woman's perky breasts.
"I really thought that Goblin had..." She hugged him as tight as she could. "Thank god you're alive!"
"My Lady, it's dangerous!"
Nero barely managed to turn his head enough to see the thick maid protesting.
His gaze went back to the grinning young woman, before rising up to the sky.
'What the hell has happened to me...?'
[Ding!]
[System Initializing...]