Logan had always thought his life was garbage. He had never done anything important, had no hobbies beyond wasting time, and needless to say had no friends.
He spent all day sitting in front of his PC, bathed in the bluish glow of the screen, doing whatever while listening to music, working from home as a data entry clerk.
All of that was shit… but now that he had just died, he couldn't help thinking that, despite everything, his life maybe hadn't been so bad compared to everyone else's.
The irony was so bitter it almost would have made him smile, if he still had a body to do so.
So what comes after death isn't heaven or hell… just darkness, he thought, as the memory of his death wrapped around him like a cold sheet.
It had been a completely normal day in his routine, with the only difference being that it was grocery day and he had to leave his cave—the apartment—to restock the fridge.
Honestly, everything happened so fast that he didn't even have time to react.
It was a succession of disconnected moments.
"WATCH OUT FOR THE BUS!"
"GET AWAY FROM THERE!"
"KYAAAAAAAA!"
"GET OUT OF THE WAY, IDIOT!"
Chaos exploded around him, a sudden wall of sound. People were shouting, running, and desperately waving for him to move aside, but… unfortunately, that day he had his headphones on at full volume.
The outside world was nothing more than a distant murmur beneath the beat of his playlist.
"Huh?"
That was the last thing he thought.
And then, in the blink of an eye, he found himself surrounded by a perfect, silent, absolute darkness.
That was how he ended up there, outside of time and space.
If this is how it's going to be for the rest of eternity, I'll go crazy sooner rather than later, he thought—or perhaps only felt—as he looked around (if you could even call nothing "around") and found nothing but darkness.
"Oh, dear Logan, you won't be here forever."
A voice, clear and neutral like water, echoed through the void, with no origin or direction.
"Who said that?"
"Whoever I am doesn't matter. What matters is that you're about to reincarnate."
"Really? Just like that?"
A spark of hope—small and selfish—ignited inside him.
"You can also choose to stay here, if you wish."
"No, no, no, no, no!"
The option was so terrifying he didn't think twice.
"A wise decision, Logan."
"Can I decide what my reincarnated life will be like?"
"No."
"But—"
"With all that said, this is goodbye. Please, enjoy your new life."
"Hey, wait a second—!"
There was no response. Instantly, he felt as if his "body" shut down, like a switch cutting the power.
His consciousness became blurry, diffuse, and slid into a bottomless pit until it faded into unconsciousness.
…
…
…
"Hmmmmmmmp… what a fucking weird dream I just had," he muttered to himself, his mouth dry and his mind foggy, struggling terribly to wake up.
"Agggg… my head hurts!… but I don't remember drinking yesterday," he groaned, bringing a hand to his temple.
The pain was unbearable, sharp, like a three-day hangover crushing his skull.
"Huh? What's wrong with my voice?…" The question began as a hoarse whisper of confusion and exploded into panic when he noticed the strangely high pitch. "WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH MY VOICE?!"
He was in shock.
His voice had changed.
But the real panic—the kind that froze his blood—began when he lowered his gaze and looked at himself.
"TITS?! WHAT THE FUCK?!" he shouted, and the feminine voice that came out of his throat only amplified the horror.
And in that moment, realization hit him like a slab of stone. That dream where he had been told he would reincarnate… hadn't just been a dream.
It was his new, horrifying reality.
"NO, NO, NO, NO, NO… PLEASE, NO."
His panic overflowed to the point where he began hyperventilating, his chest—a chest now soft and curved—rising and falling rapidly.
"THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING! THIS HAS TO BE A JOKE!"
He tried to calm himself, digging his nails into his palms, looking around for help… but he was in a dirty alley. And something was wrong, ominous: everything looked like it was made of rough stone, and the ground was packed dirt. There was no asphalt, no streetlights, no trace of his world.
"You've got to be kidding me…" he whispered, and the voice sounded pathetically small in the gloom.
With trembling legs—legs slimmer and softer than he remembered—he peeked out of the alley.
And what he saw shocked him even more than the revelation of his new body.
It was a bustling commercial district, but that wasn't the surprising part. What truly took his breath away was the people.
There were men in gleaming armor, girls with pointed hats and staves that emitted a faint glow, lizard-men with greenish scales, sharp-eared elves, and an enormous variety of humanoid races he had only ever seen in video games.
That was when everything clicked in his head, with devastating clarity.
He hadn't reincarnated in his original world, in another era or country.
This was, without a doubt, a fantasy world.
And he—now she—was trapped in it.