~Somewhere in Canada, rural area.

"Hey, can one of you pass me the salt please?" Zack asked, smiling specifically at his little sister and little brother who were both closest to it.

"Why won't you go get it yourself? You're going to make them crazy." Linda, the second eldest after Zach, sighed as on clue, the two youngest members of their family began to fight to have the glorious right to pass the salt to their evily grinning older brother.

"That's the plan, dear sister... That's the plan. In this world, only those crazy enough to strive for their dreams will truly prosper. I'm only preparing them," Zach joined his hands together, not elaborating further after making his point.

"Urgh, not this again..." Linda groaned. "I just know you're doing this on purpose too. Consider yourself lucky I can't reach you from here." She squinted at Zach, uttering ominous words.

Their arguments easily caught the attention of the rest of the table. Ten pairs of eyes turning to gaze impassively at the usual, yet still always entertaining, bickering.

"As I said, all part of the plan," Zach ignored them and replied absentmindedly as he carressed Maria's head and gently took the offered salt from her. Seemed like his little sister was the superior twin today.

"Wait... That's why you came to the table after me instead of being the first to arrive like usual!" Linda's eyes spat flames.

"In the unlikely chance that you're implying I made sure to choose a seat far from you... Then I have to admit, you're right. Letting myself into the proximity of violent, barbaric people as well as mingling with them is beneath someone of my pedigree." Zach blew on his nail and sipped on his glass, not even sparing a glance for his sister who was becoming more murderous by the second.

"Now, now, settle down you two..." A soft voice sounded out, trying to de-escalate the situation.

Or at least, that's what it seemed until it added, "Before you spend your nights in the pig's den until you reconcile together."

"It's not good to make empty threats, Mom. You can't even drag me and Linda into the den anymore." Zach replied and yawned as a bone deep weeriness suddenly settle on his shoulders.

"Maybe not, but your father sure can." His mother countered without skipping a beat, used to his sheananigans, and being the one who gave them to him in the first place.

Not finding anything to say without implicating his father in the banter, Zach decided to stay silent lest he found his portion of his favorite meal, lasagna, lacking the next time his father cooked it. You don't antagonize the cook of your favorite meal when they know exactly what kind of power they hold over you.

You just don't.

"Haha, well said, dear! Show 'em, young'un, who's the boss in this house!" Unfortunately for Zach, his father deemed it essential to support his wife in her endeavor. A rare case, as he normally prefers to spectate their daily banter without participating, his tongue not fast enough to properly follow the relentless back and forth.

Who knows what he had in mind for tonight.

"Ah, it's good to be young." An aged voice commented from the seat beside Zach. It was unclear if she was speaking about the lively atmosphere provided by her grandchildren or the obvious scheme of the man of the house.

"Eh, this meal is lacking some seasoning." Before Zach had the time to react, he found the salt he had been holding since he took it from his little sister gone, stolen by the old crone on his right.

"Hey, I didn't even use it yet!" He protested, indignant.

However, he didn't even receive a glance from his grandma, only an uncaring shrug. "Should have when you still could, now it's mine, hehehe."

Zack didn't know what to do but twirl his thumbs as his grandmother seemingly had no intention of giving the salt back. In the end, he joined the chuckling at his suffering, though his little laugh was rather bitter, he would done salty, but he had none.

"Ah! Karma for your unssefering a- self." Linda wisely reitered upon seeing Maria loking at her curiously. "In any cases, you should be glad, Zach, granma saved you from a terrible fate. Since people who pour salt on their lasagna are going straight to hell for sure. Ah, no offence, Grandma." Linda mocked Zach and apologized to her elder.

"Offence taken, my child. You should try it, salt on cheese scare the bad spirits away, at least it work on mine." was the only answer Linda got, making her do the 'Granma's faking having demantia again, but I can't tell if she's really just faking it this time' grimace. Oddly enough, she made that one often.

"Yeah, ghosts are scared because people who do that are all monsters." Everybody in the room could hear Linda mumbling lowly in distaste. Everybody, besides the grandma, of course.

"Well, I guess I'll satisfy myself on Linda's always present saltiness then." Zach hided his wide opened jaw with his palm as he yawned loudly before he dug in his meal.

"Are you tired, dear? You keep nodding off. Maybe you should take a break from your studies today." Zach's mother proposed worriedly as she saw him yawning multiple times in a row.

Zach waved one hand in denial, trying to dispel her worries, and failing spectacularly as he noticed that it, as well as his entire body, was trembling faintly. "No need, I- I just need a little nap... And I should be... Back on my feet... In no... Time..."

THUD

His head fell on the table.

­~~~~~

Zach's eyes snapped open to a white ceiling, confusion rising within him.

The fleeting taste of his father's lasagna remained on his tongue for but a moment before it was replaced by utter dryness. The strong smell of disinfectant attacked his entire being, only highlighting how very thirsty he was.

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"What... Where am I?" he muttered.

The answer became evident as he noticed the white blanket covering his body. His right arm was connected to an intravenous, which fed a transparent substance directly into his bloodstream, drop by drop.

He was in a hospital, and had been for a long time if he took the state of the room into account, though it was pretty dubious if he was really this room's tenant.

Turning his head to the right with difficulty, he took in the abundance of filled bookshelves lying against the wall here and there. Some shelves had figurines of unknown figures and such on top of them, while posters representing either fantastical landscapes or some sort of fighting scenes were plastered on the walls above them.

He didn't stay concentrated on them for long, however, a feminine voice coming from the other side of his bed grabbed his attention the moment it resounded.

"He's awake, call the doctor and his parents immediately," the nurse said.

Zach wheezed, his thirst reaching critical levels, and managed to squeeze out "W-Water."

The nurse didn't waste anytime in fulfilling his request. Bringing back a tall glass full to the brim with water. "Here, don't drink too fast," she said, coming to his side and helping him sit. Holding the back of his head softly, she brought the glass to his lips and made him drink.

Zach, tasting the first gulp of water, felt a surge of strength and was able to bring his trembling arms to the glass and support it without any help.

"More, p-please." He asked after finishing his glass, and crashed back into the bed after the nurse took it from his hands.

He felt weak, devoid of both energy and strength. If he weren't, he would have already freaked out because of what he saw just now when drinking his fill; His arms were even whiter than the surrounding walls, and so thin they looked like they could break from a gust of wind.

Those weren't his arms. They were the arms of someone sick, of someone who'd been bedridden all his life.

When the nurse came back, he gladly took the diversion from his own mind and simply focused on drinking his body weight in water.

He felt relief hearing the sound of hurried footsteps outside the door and seeing his mother burst through the door along an old man wearing the white outfit of a doctor.

The small smile that was subconsciously rising on his face froze immediately as he got the opportunity to observe his mom more closely and the man vaguely resembling his father following after her.

As it was the case for his arms, those people weren't his parents, they just looked like them. He knew, because his mother would have thrown herself on him at the first chance she got. He knew...

Because his father's skin was tanned, not white as a sheet.

...

And his eyes were brown, not fucking yellow.

~~~~~

"Miracle... His heart... The machines... Nervous system... Check on him," the doctor said.

Zach wanted to listen more, to make sense of his situation. But the sight of people who, at first glance, were his parents but certainly weren't made his mind have a sort of epiphany. It made him lethargic, and terribly sleepy. And as if his body's sole purpose for waking up was to drink water, Zach couldn't keep himself from passing out.

In his sleep, Zach felt something calling to his psyche, trying to give him something. But in the end, his sleep was dreamless and whatever was trying to reach him failed at doing so, going cold and silent instead.

Zach would never feel that presence again.

----------

An unknown amount of time later, Zach woke up to sunlight. More importantly, he felt a bit better than on his last awakening. Seeing that there was nobody present, Zach took the time to inspect himself further. Pushing away the blanket covering him with a bit of difficulty, he couldn't help but grimace at his stick-like legs and arms. Under his hospital gown, he could clearly feel his ribs sticking out. Despite his horrifying state, what bothered him the most was his complexion.

"My tan... It's all gone." Chuckling to himself at the insane situation, Zach grunted and tried standing up. Other than the embarrassing time it took for him to do so, he found himself successfully standing wobbly on his legs, the simple effort winding him. It was while trying to find objects to support himself that he stumbled across a wheelchair, making him spontaneously push away the object in disgust at the prospect of being a cripple. This bout of disgust was followed by a bit of guilt, however, a reaction that made him shake his head in disbelief.

His goal for his struggles was the window, as he felt he needed some time to think. Despite the insanity of this whole ordeal, Zach was keeping his calm, knowing that panicking would do him no good. After two encounters with motherfreaking bears in the wild, one where he had been very close to being mauled to death, that lesson had stayed. Though he had to admit, all of this was a bit above his threshold.

Opening the curtain, Zach first squinted at the sun before widening his eyes at the unbelievable sight. A sprawling city of a mix of old and modern buildings, a couple of strange ones rising higher than most skyscrapers towards the center. Far away, encircling the city, a towering, smooth wall more than a hundred meters tall loomed menacingly over every resident. Yet the wall had no shadow to cast, as the material it was made of seemed to shine slightly in the sunlight.

Yet the humongous wall wasn't the most poignant sight in the scenery. No, it was the ring-like structure cutting through the sky like a celestial object, cutting a line from north to south in the view of the firmament.

"No way..." Rasping out a quiet mutter in denial, Zach took a step back. "No way... This can't be happening." Taking another step back, Zach's foot slid on something and he fell to the ground with nary a sound and not caring for the pain in his head. Bringing his skeletal, pallid hand to his sight, Zach smiled strangely. "I'm not weak and pale like that. Cities don't have hundreds of meters high walls surrounding them. There's no such thing as a ring floating in the sky. At least, it's not like that at home."

Zach laughed bitterly, putting the back of his hand against his forehead. His eyes seemed to glitter in the light of the day. "What am I saying? This is obviously real." Letting the hard truth stew in his denial-thirsty mind for a little while, he sighed and, thinking about something, chuckled.

"Welp, looks like I got the isekai treatment, eh? If that isn't karmic retribution for all the teasing I made of Sarah for her love of the genre, I don't know what that is."

Thinking about his best friend, memories came to his mind umprompted. Of pushing her around in her wheelchair, of hospital rooms, much like this one. Of a fated accident, of guilt... Of laughter, much laughter.

Of her far off eyes, looking out at the moon lighting up the otherwise white, white room with a silvery shine.

He wondered what would happen to her now that he was gone, the thought alone making him feel a bit empty inside. But that was wrong, right? His family knew her, they would take care of her in his absence. Yeah, his family-

He clutched his head, sadness and despair warping into frustration and rage.

He really wanted to hit something, scream at the world at the utter bullshit that it was sending to him specifically. But forcefully pushed it down an instant latter when he recognized he was going through the seven stage of griefs, about being Isekai, of all things. The realisation was kinda funny, yet also sobbering, because he knew the final stage of grief.

It was acceptance. And he wouldn't let himself reach it. He wouldn't simply accept the fact that everyone he had ever knew was gone. That he would never see his family, or Sarah, again.

He would never accept that.

He would game the system, and stay at the angry stage of grief forever, until he kicked the ass of whoever or whatever brought him here and got a way to go back.

That was the least he could do to rebel against the stinky hand he was dealt with.

That was his resolution.

Along with a weird clicking sensation in his head, he vaguely felt a sense of steely resolve settle over his shoulders, muffling all of his worries under a veil of purpose.

As it happened, he let out a breath and leaned his head back against the wall. Closing his eyes, he let his mind wander freely, not letting it linger on one thing or another.

First came countless questions he didn't even try to find an answer to, then it conjured images of dragons and magic wielding wizards, before finally replaying his last meal with his family, unconsciously etching each of their faces into his memory.

The last thing he remember picturing was the beautiful smiling face of a brown haired girl with cute freckles.

And then darkness.