The world slowly came back into focus, a dull ache spreading from his chest as he blinked against the blinding light. For a few moments, everything felt wrong. It was a strange kind of disorientation, the kind where you wake up and can't tell if you've been asleep for minutes or hours—except this was different. It was like waking up in a place that didn’t belong to you, surrounded by nothing that made sense.

He pushed himself upright, feeling the unsettling weight of his body, as though his limbs weren’t quite his own. His head spun briefly before he steadied himself, drawing in a slow breath. The room was quiet, the stillness so thick it pressed against his chest, suffocating him in its heaviness.

The panic wasn’t immediate; it never was. It was more of a slow-building dread, creeping in from the edges of his mind, nudging at him like a whisper he couldn’t ignore.

Something had happened. He could remember it… but the details were slippery, fragments of images swirling in his mind like a kaleidoscope of blood and pain. A flash of red, the sharp sting of something—metal, maybe?—and then… nothing.

It had felt so real. Too real. He swallowed hard, trying to shake off the sense of loss that hung in the air like smoke. There was no sign of the blood, no sign of the death he could still feel pressing down on him. He was alive, but… he wasn’t sure how.

He staggered to his feet, looking around the small, sparse room. It looked familiar—his room, the same worn furniture, the same dull lighting—but something about it felt different. He felt different.

His hands trembled as he ran them through his hair, trying to steady himself. What happened?

The memories hit him all at once, and this time, he couldn’t shove them away. The sensation of falling, the sensation of finality. Was he dead? Had he been dead? His body ached in ways that didn’t make sense. He shouldn’t be here. Not like this.

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But here he was.

Again.

A bitter taste rose in his mouth, like metal. Blood? No, it wasn’t that. It was more like the taste of failure, the taste of something broken. He clenched his fists, willing the thoughts away. He couldn’t afford to think about it—not now.

His head throbbed, and the confusion bubbled to the surface. Was it real? The memory of the pain, the suffocating weight of it, felt too vivid to be a dream. But what did it mean that he was back here, in this room, in the same moment as if it had never happened?

The sound of his breath in the quiet room was deafening, the steady rise and fall a cruel reminder that whatever had just happened, whatever had gone wrong, it hadn’t ended. It wasn’t over.

He closed his eyes for a moment, trying to center himself, but the noise inside his head wouldn’t quiet. What was happening?

For a long, painful moment, he thought about the red haze, the finality of it. The feeling of something lost. The way his body had refused to move, to fight back.

But no. He couldn’t think about that. He couldn’t allow himself to go down that road. It was too much.

“Focus,” he muttered under his breath, the words barely a whisper as he ran a hand through his hair again, trying to calm the storm inside his mind. There were things to do, things he needed to figure out. This was just another day—he had to keep moving forward. Just another day.

He took a step forward, and the room wobbled around him. He paused, catching his balance. His pulse was already racing again, his heart hammering in his chest. There was something wrong. Something off. But the longer he stood still, the more the sensation grew, gnawing at him.

The memories... the blood...

The question was always the same: Was this the same day? Was it the same moment he had just experienced, or was he caught in some… cycle? No. No, that couldn’t be right. He had no reason to believe it. Yet, the weight of his doubt was unbearable. If everything had reset, would it even matter? Could he change it? Could he change anything?

No, there was no use thinking about that now. He needed to focus. He couldn’t let himself drown in these thoughts. Not this time.

He straightened, looking at the door. It was time to face the day.