Blasted by the sweltering rays of the noon sun, a naked man was on his hands and knees in a forest he didn’t recognize. There wasn’t a thought in his head, as there weren't any memories in it for him to use as a reference to what was happening to him. His head wasn’t totally empty, there were fragmented memories, but they were all just general information, like how to breathe and what a forest is. He didn’t, however, have any idea who he was or how he came to be. Getting his senses overwhelmed by the stimulus made by the calm nature around him didn’t help either.

After a few moments, he wiped the drool from his mouth and drew his first breath. Then, he frantically touched himself and patted his body down, confirming that he was a quite large adult male—a human.

Short hair pricked his palms as he ran his hands around his head and massaged his face. He chuckled as he did this, amused by the fact that he knew and recognized these things despite not knowing what his name even was.

“Ah, ah, ah,” he muttered.

His voice was deep and slightly hoarse. The first thought that popped into his head was a worn-out pair of boots. It didn’t make sense, even for him, but he thought that it was the most fitting description for it. He sounded like a tired man.

“Shit,” he said, with a slight grin on his face as if proud.

Shortly after saying that, he wrapped his thick arms around his knees, hugging his legs that had hair longer than the ones on his head. In his mind, he contemplated whether he had just been born or if he had a previous life. For some reason, the idea that he lost his memories didn’t frighten him. It was because he didn’t feel like he'd been alive for that long, that his life started on his hands and knees, butt naked in the wilderness. No, the idea that he took this body from someone who had an actual life scared him more.

Dark thoughts stirred around his mind until he suddenly stood up with determination.

“I’m hungry and breathing, so that must mean I want to live,” he said with a hand on his belly.

The man got over his existential crisis for now. There was no point for him to question it when getting something to eat felt more important to him. Remembering his name wasn’t going to satiate his hunger.

Standing up for the first time surprised him. He moved his body just fine despite not having any memories of how to use it. He even did a little hop, though it wasn’t that high given his weight. Thick, strong muscle was hidden under a thick layer of fat, but he didn’t feel like it would pose a problem for him. He theorized that the old owner of the body was a bit active, and maybe played a bit of sports when he was younger.

So, from this point on he wouldn’t question why he knew certain things or how he was able to move his body in a certain way. He accepted that he retained information from the previous owner’s life. Everything except what made the previous owner an actual person. There wasn’t anything he could do really.

He surveyed his surroundings. From what he could tell, it was just a typical forest, or at least what he felt was a normal forest. Suddenly, his eyes widened. He crouched down and backed up to a tree, protecting his bare behind from anything that might pop up and attack him.

It sunk into him that being naked in the woods wasn’t a good idea. Besides that, when he realized he was a heavier man, an image of a strongman out of breath after a light jog came into mind. In that situation and environment, his build was probably one of the worst ones to have, apart from being disabled in some way.

For the moment, it didn’t seem like there were any other creatures in his immediate area. There were some bugs, but nothing as large or bearing the same intelligence as him.

Right as he was about to take a step forward after confirming his safety, something popped into his vision. A message. He instinctively raised both of his hands, but after a while, he dropped them when nothing happened. Deep down inside him, he knew that the message didn’t exist in real life, or at least he was the only one who could perceive it if there was another person next to him. Seeing words for the first time, he squinted at it and tried to read it.

“Welcome,” he said. Speaking still felt weird for him like he had just woken from a long nap. He had to lick his lips and swallow a few times before his voice felt normal. Finding drinkable water was another one of his priorities.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“The fuck?” He whispered. It was an expression that he knew for certain was used a lot by the meat vessel he inhabited.

He wondered what the numbers meant, if it was how much time he needed to survive, or if it was how long the processing needed to be done. He didn’t even know if it meant hours, days, or months.

However, there was one thing he was certain about. The way that the messages were delivered was not normal, at least to him. It felt alien, something neither his eyes nor brain had previously seen.

Ignoring the odd feeling that the message gave him, the man set out to look for some food and water. Whether it was real or not didn’t matter, he wouldn’t last however long it wanted him to without water. His instincts told him to go towards the small mountain in front of him.

It took him half an hour of walking, but he eventually reached a fast stream of water near the base of the mountain. The sight of him almost made him run to it, but he managed to suppress his urges. He needed to check his surroundings carefully. With everything feeling foreign and familiar at the same time, he couldn’t be too complacent even if there weren’t any immediate signs of danger.

Slowly approaching the stream, he took two of his fingers and dipped them into the cool water. He then proceeded to rub it against the skin on his forearm. Seeing no violent reaction, he submerged his cupped hands into the water, then brought it to his face. He gave it a few sniffs, with no bad odors coming from it, and he sipped the water. But he didn’t immediately swallow, he let it swish around his mouth for a few moments, then spat it back out.

Finally, he gulped down on fresh cool water. It would take him a few hours to tell how safe the water truly was, but his thirst grew the more he observed it. He drank enough water to fill his stomach and suppress his hunger for a while.

He saw his reflection in the stream, it was a blurry image of a naked man with a shaved head. Seeing himself made him reach up and touch his face once more. Then, he made a motion as if stroking a beard that wasn’t there. Apart from actually having no clothes on his back, he felt even more naked. The grumbling of his stomach disturbed his thoughts.

It was time for him to get some actual food. He spotted a couple of berry bushes on the way to the stream. It could be a great start, but there was a possibility of it being poisonous.

Then again, for the entirety of his life, which was less than an hour at this point, he operated and functioned through vibes alone.

Once again, before he could take one step away from the stream, a message popped up and invaded his mind and vision.

At last, this newborn man’s about to receive some help. The mere mention of opportunity got him imagining the possible rewards he might get. Some clothes would be nice, some sort of shelter would be great, and the local currency would be fine, it would confirm that there was civilization and other people in this world he currently inhabited. That he was not alone.

A frown formed on the man’s face. He hadn’t thought about other humans like him until after thinking about money. There was something about the two ideas that made him feel a strong emotion that he couldn’t explain, it just didn’t feel good.

“Perhaps my old self, or the old owner of this body, was obsessed with money. There’s a possibility that this body remembers, making him subconsciously think about other people for the first time,” he voiced his thoughts out loud, speaking to no one in particular. He did this to affirm himself that he was indeed a human being.

After stunning himself with his own words, he shook his head and stopped his thoughts. He needed to focus. Survival and accomplishing the task was his immediate concern. Then, he remembered to continue reading the message. The mention of a reward got him too excited.

“Wonderful,” he sighed.

The man shrugged the mention of death off, it wasn’t like he had much to lose. He only started living less than an hour ago. Also, it didn’t mention that he couldn’t just run away or not do it if he deemed it to be too dangerous.

However, something irked him. Compared to the first message, this one felt lacking. Like there was some information missing or not included.

He clapped his hands once. “Ah, it didn’t say when it’ll reach me,” he said. “On its way to my location,” he whispered, trying to imagine what the opportunity could be or when it would arrive.

The opportunity, however, didn’t give him time to think about it. Four heavy paws slammed the ground, it was accompanied by heavy breathing.

It lunged at the man. The back of his neck felt its hot damp breath when he ducked to dodge the attack. He managed to avoid the attack in time, scraping his jewels against the nature beneath him in the process. However, his manhood was the least of his concerns at the moment.

The beast skidded across the ground. There was a look of annoyance on its face when it realized it failed to get him in one strike.

The man couldn’t recognize what kind of animal it was. There were some similarities with some animals, but also none of them at the same time. The feeling he got was the same as the message that popped up in his vision. Now, he was certain that it was either him or them that didn’t belong in the world that they were currently in, and he would prefer if it was the latter.