1

A moment of an immensely loud boom, ringing through his ears, and one abrupt thrust to his body into a space of darkness. Then all became quiet. The man, motionless in dark silence, turns his head around, unsure what’s going on. He felt his neck and throat burning, an abrupt kick, and rash in desperate water.

The man groaned as he struggled to nudge his body. As hopeless as he feels, he repeatedly tries to direct his mind to let his arm budge. He is breathing, and his mind is aware, but the pitch black distressed his eyes, forcing the rest of the lazy limbs to move. The pure numbness hurts as forcing them to nudge his arms is more of hell when his throat isn't getting better.

Heaviness progressively declines through both of the man’s arms. His biceps involuntary flexes as the sensation reaches his mind. One of the hardest things is out of the picture. One remains weighing on his legs. As he lifted his right arm upward, the fist hit something solid above the man. He thrust his fist again, definitely hitting something. The sensation regained from his fists, thrusting the dark border, transmitted to the rest of his body. He clenched his fist and gave one hard thrust to the wall, causing a door to open. Light shines through, revealing his whole body, in unusual clothes, and the man looks around him to find himself in the casket.

What the? In a casket? He rubbed his eyes from the sudden daylight.

The man felt something loose as he got up from the casket. What’s holding the casket loses balance, and the man and the casket plummet to the floor. “That hurt.” He muttered. Stretching his rigid arms, he lifted the casket away from him. The thump to the floor was the leg wake-up call.

Glancing up, he notices flowers and candles placed near his spot. He lifted himself from the floor, witnessing an empty hall.

The man observes the inside of the building. The window placements and the roofing gave it away that he is in a church. He looked at the casket and walked with a limp around the platform. Standing in front of the casket's original location, he sees clusters of white flowers circling him and the casket, forming a circular path around it. He observes the path leading to a straight one leading away from the platform. Naturally, he followed the pathway. While walking, his throat acted up again. He gagged and coughed simultaneously.

Another table came along, and the man walked towards it distressed. A bowl of water was there. He ran up to it and chugged the whole bowl, soothing. His clumsy fingers dropped the bowl, splashing onto the paper across the table, and he saw a sketch of a masculine face. Fairly trimmed beard, long hair slick back, and scars across the right eye. Below the drawing, the man can't comprehend the language. He tried deciphering it for a moment till he read out the first line.

"Kla-us. Klaus Klaus…"

Sudden flashes of memories appear in vision, recalling two points of view simultaneously. The man holds his head as a massive headache throbs his skull and slumps to his knees head on the floor, cracking the tile floor.

What is happening? My head fucking hurts. He thought as the echoing sounds vibrated his eardrums viciously, incapacitating the man.

2

The memory flashes are rapid as they switch from scene to scene until the last two. He witnessed in the first horrifying memory visualizing a soldier’s perspective on the battlefield breathing horrendously, running from something behind him along with a group of fellow soldiers.

“Keep running!! Don’t look back!” one of them said.

With the sun’s reflection, the soldier looked down seeing the unidentified shadows coming up fast. Adrenaline pushed him further, and the fellow soldiers got into their vehicles. Realizing he is the last one, his adrenaline surges while throwing his rifle through the back of the Jeep. He leaped in the last second before the Jeep rolled away.

“GO GO GO!” he yelled, urging the driver to press the gas. Holy mother of god. He screamed inside as he watched the large clouds of dust sped up closer to the jeep.

“What the hell happened?!” one of the soldiers asked, seemingly unaware.

“They dropped the -” The driver said.

Then the memory went abruptly black.

Transitioning to the second memory, his point of view switches to being laid on the floor with a hand on the chest as blood leaks out. Sun flashes through the crack walls in the wooden shack as the eyes turn to a mirror across the floor, and the person lifts himself and crawls towards it. The mirror revealed the man from the sketch. Blood leaks below his eyes and drips off from his eyelids. He clenched his jaws and tried to get his face completely over the mirror. The vicious breathing takes its toll, stuttering to bring out words from his mouth.

“My name… is Klaus,” he said as blood dripped from his mouth. “I don’t have much time. After seeing this, find the conical hat. I hid it at my home under the floor. It will grant you something you have to experience yourself. My memory should reach you once fully awake. Good luck. You are given a second chance, make it more worthwhile compared to mine.” He collapsed head down banging the wood paneling, going black.

3

The man gasped, as his view was back at the church. The heartbeat is protruding to the surface of his chest. The headache has ceased and a bright flashing light blinds him briefly. Few recollections reached into his head, still sitting down, looking at the drawing again and fluent in the language, he read the second line.

“One Hundred Five to One Hundred Thirty.” He reads and then opens his upper robe, revealing a slice scar on the center of his chest leading to his left. His mind felt fragmented with no recollection of what happened prior to gaining a few memories just now. Minus remembering the pinpoint of where Klaus’s house was and his death, what he gained was his death was at least half a decade ago.

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Why me? And why after half a decade? That’s all he can input. No more can he grasp much to his despair.

After sitting for a few minutes adjusting to this new body, he lightly lifted himself up at ease. Either way, he wants to depart the area, noticing the daylight outside through the stained glass from above.

Before leaving, the man looked around the site for anything to take. Nothing, so he folded the drawing and put it in his inner robe pockets. He walked off the platform and headed to the door. Before he opened the door, he took one deep breath and his mind clicked.

That drawing, I’m Klaus. Nah, I can’t be him. His time has passed. Same with mine, Duan. He thought, coming up with a new name. Kilian, yea perfect...Well, here it goes. Find his house. Now Kilian, accepting his reality, pushes the door outward, opening to a town square with a walking roundabout and a fountain at its center. The lively view is followed by inhabitants mixed in the streets shining by the bright sun, wearing robes or simple clothing walking through stone streets. Few on horseback came passing by from his left, which is an even higher hill, heading to his right, straight incline where he can see the gulf towards the end of the street.

“Find the conical hat,” he muttered, losing focus a second after staring at the seashore below. For all as he could remember, he followed along the supposedly main street, merging onto the ongoing walking traffic.

The town was diverse and open across all sides of the streets. Eat-out restaurants and outdoor shops are all layout in the open, attracting customers immediately. He observes the differences between the town’s buildings and architecture as walking downhill. It ain’t uniform that’s for sure but mixes of arch-like roofings stacked as towers. The windows indicate the number of stories he identified. And there are plenty of stories surrounding the few tall towers. The minority category of houses is where they are entirely brown wood with unusual patterns surrounding the windows. The white paint is a common theme overall as its secondary theme.

Kilian thinks the towers are what makes the town unique as despite the similar appearances in height, they all have different vinyls and designs on their surface and roofings.

He continues walking straight till he turns left and sprints across the intersection. Glancing to his left, the church Kilian came out from can now be seen on the hill. He walked into a more narrow street, leading to a neighborhood. A couple of neighbors gasped when they saw Kilian passing by. Ignoring their remarks, he heads on straight. One of the towers was ahead in the distance. At a much closer range, he saw reddish-gold on the uppermost part of the tower containing the hexagonal shape. He figured it was the emblem.

Eventually, he reached the gate. Behind the gate is a two-story house. Strange that out of everything in town, the house is the only three-story in town without any roof patterns but a flat ceiling on top. Even the aesthetics of the windows are off. Kilian pushed the gate open and reached the front door.

Damn it. Locked.

Kilian looked around the entrance until he lifted the rug below him, revealing a metal key. He inserted the key into the lock, entering the house. To his surprise, it was all clean and furnished entirely. The interior is bright thanks to the sunlight illuminating through its windows.

He needs to find the conical hat, recalling it hidden somewhere under the wood panels. Kilian walks around the kitchen and the lobby slowly listening to the creaks from his footsteps. Nope. Not here.

He went upstairs and opened the door to his room. It was a mess and dark. His throat reacted like claws scraping the walls, coughing involuntarily. I have to clean this up. What the hell happened here?

Since the room was dark, he had to adjust his eyes momentarily before going in further. He gently moved across the space in his room till he reached the window and heard a creak. He looked down at his right foot where the noise came from and let his foot away. Kilian grabbed the wood plank and slammed it under the floor. He grabbed the wooden floor and pulled it out. The wood tore off from the floor, revealing a sheathed sword and the conical hat. “So this is the treasure?” He momentarily observes before taking the conical hat and the sword from the subfloor and recovering the subfloor.

He headed back downstairs and sat down at the dining table, observing the conical hat and sword. Kilian doesn’t know what the purpose is of the hat as nothing looks unordinary. Unsheathing the sword partially, a phrase was engraved on the blade in some language characters. He mutters the phrase.

“Hell’s delight.”

The first impression sounds menacing. Kilian then feels the internal urge to unsheath the remaining sword.

The longer he holds it without withdrawing, the more intense the urge reaches. Kilian resists as much as he can until he regains control so that he can be sure it’s his will. He clenches his jaw and flexes his neck and forearm muscles, pumping the blood flow to the tension, causing the veins to be visible and bulge.

The urge manifested in some sort of weight inside with a force that could be felt pushing upwards from his stomach to his head.

Almost there. He grunted to stop it from progressing and attempting to push the sheath back in. He heard a crack from his wrists. Sudden flashbacks raced through his mind of Duan getting beaten by fellow soldiers during recruitment boosted his adrenaline, ignoring the pain inflicted by his wrists. He pushed further, pressing it where he could hear an echo mimicking “NO.”

Click

The sword is finally sheathed and Kilian dropped the sheathed sword to the dining table.

Phew. Sigh.

He wondered why Klaus hid the sword and conical hat and if that connected to his prior death. Maybe somebody or something was hunting him for this weapon. He didn’t have the weapon or the hat during his final words. Klaus wasn’t even at his home. Kilian speculates various theories and then debunks them following as if it's meaningless.

Pouring some tap water from the kitchen faucet into a cup, he sat back down at the dining table. With the weapon staring directly at his eyes, clashing within his mind, Kilian grabs the hilt of the sheathed sword.

He swiftly drew the sword out and came off effortlessly. Strange. He thought as this time it didn’t bring a menacing commotion like prior. He puts it back but does not focus exclusively on it and draws it out effortlessly. Empty crickets.

Kilian’s eyebrows raised wondering at the nothingness. There was nothing happening. Feeling normal and the lack of the prior urge around his forearms. He tried it once again only to no avail. The vibrating sound from the blade as he articulates the grip of the blade echoes across the dining table. While holding the unsheathed sword, he tries on the conical hat. Once the conical hat touched his head, the surroundings turned pitch black. Kilian still sat at the dining table now with a light illuminating from above giving the view of the table and the chairs.

Kilian glances around bewildered by the sudden darkness till a feminine voice utters from the distance.

“ I can’t believe it. But, here we are…” the woman said smoothly while under the dark void.

“Who is this?” Kilian asked while his hand was still gripping the hilt.

“Finally, somebody appears,” said the beautiful goth-like lady appearing from the dark void, pulling the chair, and sitting down directly across the dining table. She smiled happily as if she wasn't alone anymore in the dark void.