To exist… What is the reason?
To awaken… Did he need to?
To die… Did he live?
The end… Is it approaching?
To begin… Finally?
So then… Where was he?
What… happened to him?
Trance… He was in a trance…
Lior was in a trance between reality and fiction.
He had awakened in another world, in a fictional world. No one knew him, and he did not know himself.
He had reincarnated into a demihuman of the cat sub-race. His body was delicate, his body was different, his body was very different from what he had imagined himself to be, and from what he truly knew about himself.
He had been in a dungeon, with several beings just like him. Locked away and broken, just like him.
He met a girl of his same species, named Pomeli. She clung to him out of necessity, to preserve her sanity. Because of the suffering of being a slave, because of the suffering that never ends.
Then, some men arrived, each with an appearance different from the last.
One man approached with ill intentions, and by pure instinct, he attacked him. That sensation was new to Lior; it was a feeling of extreme rage and caution, deeply tied to the reactions of a feline.
But…
In a second, his head was knocked out of place. In a second, he saw another person standing in front of him. In a second, his mind collapsed.
Between screams and laments, his consciousness began to fade, until—
Darkness…
A darkness that dragged him into the abyss. A darkness that led him into a fall with no beginning and no end.
Void… Abyss… Void… Abyss…
It was everything he could see, and yet it wasn't. He did not see; his eyes were closed. His mind was creating that darkness he believed he was seeing, but which he was not seeing, while at the same time he was. If that sensation could be named—the sensation of seeing but not seeing—it would be closer to… a dreamlike vision.
Thinking was not truly thinking; it was more like imagining, or perhaps dreaming is more accurate. His "self" was lost in a dark river, a current that would not release him, barely conscious. His time in that river felt eternal; it would never end, the end that would lead him to fall over a waterfall was never in sight.
But…
From within all that darkness. From within all that void. From within all that abyss. From within all that river.
Something…
A light… a light appeared.
A flash…
A massive flash appeared before him, before his consciousness, before his soul.
There was something moving inside that flash, something gently stirring, something that generated confusion and dizziness.
"Aah…"
Touch it, his soul told him.
His hand… his consciousness had a hand, and it moved toward that light he could make out ahead.
His soul, his consciousness, his mind, his body, his life—everything was the same, everything was a body that at this moment was fractured and split in two… in three… in four… in five…
His consciousness raised a hand he could not see and reached toward that flashing light before him.
His consciousness moved forward, and quickly…
And quickly…
And quickly…
And quickly…
He…
He…
He…
It…
It…
It…
.
.
.
.
.
Touched it.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
[Lior: Ah...]
"..."
Huh?
"..."
[Lior: Wha—?]
"..."
What was that?
[Lior: ah...]
Awakening…
[Lior: Mhm...]
It is a process that takes time… but… he was different…
[Lior: No…]
"..."
Or maybe not?
[Lior: Yes…]
"..."
Or maybe yes?
[Lior: Ough… Auh… Meuu…]
He was lost; his mind had not yet cleared, his mind was still processing his senses.
[Lior: Sudden…]
"..."
He felt as though he had awakened before awakening… but he had already awakened…
[Lior: eh…]
He was… lost…
[Lior: ahg…]
His mind was being processed at that very moment. His senses were uncoordinated, his mind was being defragmented, and his body was discordant.
[Lior: Augh… Ea… nya…]
Loading thoughts usually takes milliseconds, as the human body is designed to do it that way, but Lior was quite dissolved into nothingness. He was slowly recomposing himself.
[Lior: amu… huh?]
Ah… Lior is coming back…
[Lior: ah… ay… eh…]
Return…
[Lior: Ahh… what happened?]
Lior finally woke up completely from his trance. It was quite difficult for his own body to come back to itself after having suffered damage to his head against the stone wall earlier. On top of that, his brain was still getting used to having to process a body completely different from the one he once had.
[Lior: A-and… Pomeli?]
His body was already functioning properly, and so was his mind; that meant his memories were still there. Pomeli, who had been by his side before, in that dungeon, was not with him for some reason. But… this was not yet the moment to process that…
[Lior: It hurts…]
Besides his head—which would normally make sense for it to hurt—his body hurt as well.
[Lior: It hurts…]
More specifically his back, and also part of his abdomen.
[Lior: Where… am I?]
As he came back to himself, more questions arrived without pause, but after blinking several times, he managed to see, and that led him to ask himself… where was he?
"..."
He slightly turned his head to one side to better observe his surroundings. That was when he managed to see something—something that looked like a cage, and something that looked like a tent. He reacted quickly, lifting himself up from the ground, which was made of wood, to better inspect his surroundings and understand the state he was in. But…
[Lior: Ah… w-what—what is this?]
He checked his wrists upon feeling something heavy, as well as his neck and his own feet. As he inspected each limb with his gaze, he noticed something—something quite horrible, to be honest.
[Lior: a-again… I'm chained…]
He had chains connecting from his neck down to his feet, which greatly limited him when trying to perform any action. Shackles were fastened to his hands, neck, and feet. This unsettled him, but this was no time to cry without any real purpose—he needed to gather information to get an idea of the situation he was truly in. This naturally made him try to stand up fully from the ground.
[Lior: ah… ow! Ugh! Ugh…]
But the moment he stood up, the ground made a sudden movement, causing him to lose his balance and making him fall quite literally onto his tail.
[Lior: Ow… w-what…]
As his body returned to the ground, he felt a slight tremor beneath him. On top of that, his ears—after a while of hearing nothing but loud white noise—picked up a different kind of vibration.
[Lior: Ah… huh?]
His body lightly jolted from time to time, swayed, and moved frequently, and his ears picked up something that sounded like earth—earth being trampled over and over again.
[Lior: I feel… um… mhm… m-mhm… strange…]
A strong sense of instability came over him quickly, as if he were moving, as if his body were feeling a force pushing against it.
[Lior: ah… huh?]
Lior, searching for information to make sense of what his senses were telling him, lifted his gaze in search of an answer—but when he raised his eyes…
[Lior: No… no…]
Lior saw demihumans, in the same state as himself.
[Lior: ah… eh… no… this can't be]
"More… demihumans…"
As Lior looked up, he spotted humanoid beings with different appearances. As he carefully examined them, he noticed various traits that felt disturbingly familiar. Some of those humanoids had horns, others had animal tails and ears, and others simply had pointed ears.
[Lior: Demons… beastmen… even elves? This… no… why?]
Lior was facing fantastical beings that he would normally see in some generic anime. But… these beings… were also chained. If they were chained—including him—then there had to be a reason for it.
[Lior: That… man…]
Lior had previously been knocked out by a mysterious man dressed in immaculate white. He not only radiated a pure aura in his appearance, but also signs of nobility and dominance—traits that implied some kind of very high rank in society.
[Lior: If he was there, at a slave market, logically he would be looking for these same ones]
The dungeon where Lior had been before was a slave stockpile, since he and many other demihumans were imprisoned there, and given the number of them, there must have been many more slaves meant to be sold.
[Lior: Maybe… these beings… come from other dungeons]
If they were there, it had to be for that reason, which meant they had been bought… bought…
[Lior: W-wait]
They were bought… if they were bought… didn't that mean he was bought too?
[Lior: No… how… me… what?]
"No, wait…"
He was a slave put up for sale, which meant he could be purchased like the others. If that was really true, then he had been bought—by that man in white.
[Lior: No… w-wait… I was sold? I was sold as a slave?]
Lior wasn't stupid enough to not realize what was really happening at that moment. A sharp pang struck his chest, making him deeply uneasy. He truly didn't want to end up like this. The mere thought of it filled him with overwhelming rejection… but… that can't be true, right?
He can't be sold as a slave; that would violate his human rights. He couldn't be sold, much less bought—he was a human, not an object.
No… no… no…
[Lior: No… no, that… no…]
Lior wasn't prepared. Lior wasn't ready. How could he have been sold and bought like a slave? That's impossible, that's impossible, that's impossible.
[Lior: No… this is impossible… this is impossible… it doesn't make sense…]
"No, it doesn't make sense… w-what… what? Why?"
[Lior: No… wait… it doesn't make sense. Why would I be sold? I'm just a sixteen-year-old boy. And this body… it can't do anything… How could I possibly be a slave if I have no muscles?]
His body wasn't suited for any kind of slave labor. That meant two things. He wasn't bought, because there's no idiot of that caliber… right? Or the other one… the one he didn't want to accept… the one he couldn't accept… the option that made no sense, the one that truly made no sense, the one that would never make sense, the one that would never happen, the one that would never occur, the one that would never come to pass, the one that never, the one that never, the one that never—never, never, never, never—would happen. Right? Never, it would never occur, right? Never, it would never happen, right?
[Lior: Y-yeah… right?]
Lior, who was slowly sinking into a state of desperation, was trying to avoid the real fact—the fact that had truly brought him here. He simply didn't want to accept that truth; he had no reason to accept it.
His "it doesn't make sense" was, in reality, a "I don't want to accept it" that was slowly eating him away, more and more.
[Lior: No… why? There's no reason. They have no right to do this to me]
There's no reason, right? He can't be a slave. He doesn't want to be a slave. He isn't a slave.
[Lior: I'm not a slave, I'm not a slave]
He doesn't belong to anyone. He has no reason to belong to anyone. No… he will never belong to someone. He is not a slave… He is not a slave. He is NOT a slave! HE IS NOT A SLAVE! HE IS NOT A SLAVE! HE IS NOT A SLAVE!
[Lior: I'M NOT A—]
¡CHINK!
"…"
…
"…"
A loud sound echoed from a barred iron door in the area.
"…"
The cart had stopped moving.
"…"
Footsteps crushing the earth could be heard from outside.
"…"
¡CRANK!
The door finished opening.
"…"
[???: ¡#####!]
"…"
A voice with a dictatorial tone issued a very loud command.
"…"
[???: ¡#####!]
"…"
The command echoed a second time at full volume inside the cage covered by a tarp. No one moved, and no one dared respond.
"…"
Then, a very burly man appeared at the metal door. He had a challenging presence, with dark brown hair and simple clothing: a cream-colored shirt with rolled-up sleeves, light brown pants, and leather boots. His gaze was piercing, cutting through the soul of anyone with just a glance.
The man fully entered the area and positioned himself to confront all the slaves present. That's when he fixed his gaze on one in particular—a young elven woman, emaciated, with white hair. With a sudden, swift motion, he grabbed her by the arm, spun abruptly, and in one acrobatic movement, threw her forcefully out of the cage, landing on the hard, compacted earth below.
[Man: ####!]
He let out a loud shout, pointing outward with the fingers of his left hand, ordering all the slaves to get off the cart.
The man was furious—excessively furious. He cast a murderous glance at everyone present, making Lior's heart skip a beat.
No one wanted to confront the man standing before them. So, quickly obeying the command, everyone rose and rushed toward the cage exit. The man shoved forcefully at each slave his hand reached, causing some to fall as they tried to get out, crashing onto the hard ground and injuring themselves. Lior was no exception.
[Man: ####!]
Shouting cruelly at those who had fallen, the man commanded them to get up. Each slave edged closer to another, until they were all bunched together. Everyone looked at the man inside the cage with terror.
At that moment, after carefully checking the cage to see if any slaves remained inside, the man turned around and exited through the metal door. Grabbing and holding the door, he climbed down from the cage, closing it behind him. Then, with a padlock in hand, he locked it completely. Once each action had been executed flawlessly, he turned back and approached the slaves with a serious, commanding gaze.
[Man: #### ##!]
"…"
All the slaves looked at him in confusion, not understanding the order, as they didn't know the language.
But…
[???: Line up…]
A male voice, weak and timid, arose from among the slaves. It was at that moment that all the demihuman slaves understood the meaning of the order and obediently began to comply.
Seeing the demihumans act, the other slaves of different races understood what they had to do—but only by observing the actions of the others, since they still didn't understand any spoken language.
Then, the man with the sinister gaze carefully scanned each slave before him. He saw that everyone was arranged according to his orders and seemed quite satisfied with the actions of his "merchandise."
Lior began looking around to figure out where he had been taken.
Then…
As he lifted his gaze for a moment, Lior noticed something utterly overwhelming.
[Lior: Ah…]
It was a massive, beautiful terrain with a meticulously maintained garden. But what stood out the most was…
[Lior: A… mansion…]
A mansion...
"..."