It's official, the fates legitimately hate my guts.
Think about it, why else would they feel the need to drag me an innocent normal 17 smth yr old boy from the tropical paradise that is Singapore, into some issekai level plot line and make my only hopes of getting back to my relatively sane life an incredibly unreliable, extremely random teleportation system that I can't even begin to fathom let alone manipulate for my own goals. Like really are you guys so starved of alternative media that laughing at my plight is peak entertainment to you? You have 7 billion people to choose from for god sake why me? I mean sure I guess my loony toones style adventure is kinda funny if you AREN'T ON THE RECEIVING END.
Haisss. It times like these that I give my thanks to none other then rngjesus whose sheer benevolence, allowed me to finally return to my universe in God knows how long. Now you must be thinking that I am happy to be back. Surely I won't spend 4 paragraphs whacking the heck out of the fates only to turrn around and express regerets over it right? Wellll sorry to be the bringer of bad news.
You see, as much as me henceforth pledging annual animal sacrifices to the one true God rngjesus might suggest, I still hold quite a bit of sentimental value towards the world I had unexpectedly found myself in. Mostly because while I was meandering in Singapur finding my purpose, I managed to have some actual character development (ik surprise surprise) in the form of increasing my eq stats through working out my differences with Jacobine and some other less character based developments. *Cough* Max von Möller *Cough*. Combined, it has made me feel rather attached to the strange world I had found myself in.
Furthermore, unlike the last time my eyes fluttered open, there isn't a smiling family by my side or even my ever indispensable friend/asshole Jacobine waiting to wake me up with his unrefined music taste. Instead, I wake up to see a freaking dead body next to me
As any sane man would do, I then proceeded to scream my heart out.
After a good 5 min of my vocal self-expression, I finally reigned in my emotions enough to be able to finally begin to do what I do best, Analyse.
First I got around to inspecting the 'dead man'. Though looking very much in the afterlife due to the literal monsoon of blood splattered all over his chest, I was pleasantly surprised to find out this wasn't the case. He was hanging on, but by the skin of his teeth. Any life that had once inhabited this body had faded to a single repeating pulse, every beat very possibly being it’s last.
It didn’t need an expert to realise that he needed some serious medical help, fast. But in an irony fit for the eons, I, despite being in the presence of so many medical equipment, was unable to do anything for the man as I was not at all trained in the ways of wound stitching. All I could do was add a few more gauze to his wound and just pray for his swift recovery, if ever.
Having finished up step 1, I moved on to step 2, situational awareness. Thanks to my superior Homosapien genetics, my eyes had very quickly adjusted to the low light environment and managed to spot a hole carved into the wall. My way out I immediately exclaimed.
This coincided timely with a loud boom from the door.
My spidey sense caused my head to instantly snap towards the door. Weirdly enough, despite the loud sound, the door didn’t seem to be harmed one bit. As usual I liked to give the benefit of the doubt and the door a second or two for it to prove itself. Yet despite the leeway given, the room remained was as quiet as ever. Hearing the distinct lack of noise, I made my brain downgrade my alert state. Seems that despite being in the good graces of the great Ahurza Mada himself, I still wasn't immune to the effects of offworld transitioning. Haissss….
A loud buzzing noise however very quickly tore this idea to shreds. Ok you win someones coming , and if the prior explosion was anything to go by, they probably aren’t going through all the effort just to give me scones and jam…. Before I even had time to properly process all that was happening, my brain put two and two together and I soon found my body on a collision course with the hole. All the while, I could feel the metaphorical heat blazing my back as the buzzing behind just got louder and louder, the clock slowly ticking down….
Thankfully, my rigorous application of running away from my problems wasn’t just a mindset and I quickly found that I already had one hand on the edge of the opening, ready to go.
This is when my nationalistic instincts kicked in.
Being the kiasu Singaporean I am, I, just had to turn and double check in case I forget anything. In a vacuum, this would have been a solidly neutral action. Turn don’t turn whatever lor. In fact, I would argue that it’s actually something good, an indicator that I was finally back in my world and was no longer susceptible to losing my freaking marbles over hot blond guys in trench coats. However, a combination of mental fracturing and prior experiences as Katherine meant that when my eyes to to drift ever so slightly onto the sorta dead man slumped on the ground, a deep sense of pity had started to rise to the surface of my consciousness like an uncontrolled hot air balloon.
In some way, I could sorta sympathise with the plight this man be facing. He was lost, all alone and passed out in some god knows where place. Imagine if he woke up right now and found himself surrounded by a group of hostile men waiting to gun him down. I bet he would be feeling lonely sad confused, probably asking around questions only to find himself being stonewalled for some plot convenient reasons… if he wasn't already dead by gunshot but...but that’s beside the point, this man is hurt badly and as much of a whatever man I am, I still held some basic human principles to heart. Leaving a man for dead won’t sit well with me regardless of what universe I am in and by the looks of it seems like he would have done the same for me considering he most likely opened the door to the conveniently placed escape route. Plus no way could such an injured man hurt me even if he wanted to right?
Right?
Ok yes he might be the bad guy but if we assume the guys trying to get in are the bad guy doesn’t it mean that the guy that is already in here is good guy? Maybe he’s my bodyguard my saviour or the Teutonic knight of my dream or something... Uh but yea I doubt the people outside are dumb enough to shoot their own men then get the door slammed in their face since people don’t exactly arm idiots with the latest in door breaching technology. Plus I doubt my internal defence mechanism is strong enough to take down a professional killer and cause him to bleed uncontrollably but then again what if? One thing I learnt from my little excursion is to always trust Murphy’s law and Murphy’s law is telling me anything is possible. For all I know he could be a robot...maybeee?? ArgHHH.
As any Singaporean would do when facing a dilemma in such a time constraint environment, I decided to pull a chapter out of my school life and multitask. In this case by doing some irl looting.
Unexpectedly, for a move inspired wholly by the Borderlands series, it actually bore fruits! Turned out, this whole place was stacked with all sorts of useful things. Ik who could have guessed that from my threadbare description of the room.
There was tapes, knives( scalpel kinda), and even a gun, though, I only aquired this after I dug through a ton of white substance that lined his pockets so yea take that as you will. By the end of my journey, I found my pocket could never be fuller, yet my mind was still coming up empty. Was to be the humanist here or leave the guy for dead.
Time was ticking and I knew however I had to make my choice fast. Sparks were already flying from the door and coupled with the loudness of the buzz meant the door was about to go down any time now and I for one, wasn’t about to stick around to find out.
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Hence with my hands tied, I reluctantly decided on the humanist option and decided to help the guy out though not without a whole load of grumbling from my muscles, who were natrually going to bear the brunt of the burden.
I was giving this man the benefit of the doubt, and I hope to hell I don’t regret my decision.
Especially since the man was hella heavy, forcing me to have to gently pull his body into the hole. Once he and I were fully enclosed by it, I used any remaining strength I had to pull back the door to the tunnel, sealing the entrance with a click.
And not a moment too soon.
The second the last of the bolt’s slid into place, a loud metallic thud rang out followed by a rush of footsteps as the men from outside stormed the room. Seeing it was empty, the flurry of footsteps quickly grounded to a stop. There was a short pause as the men stood at high alert, presumably waiting to see if there were any signs of movement.
Seeing there was none obviously, the sounds of footsteps started again but as slow methodical thuds instead, the lights from their torchlights intermittently flickering through the gap in the seal.
They were searching the room and I, for one, weren't going to give their searching proficiency the benefit of the doubt.
So, I unanimously decided to begin my crawl down the tube, but not with haste. I knew if I made any sudden movement, the men would for sure hear my folly and punish me appropriately. Therefore, I decided on a slow and agonizing crawl down the tube which as foresawn by my muscles, caused them to soon pass away from all these strenuous physical exertion I was putting it through.
Turns out living as a noblewoman for a month really doesn’t help in maintaining a masculine physique or psyche for that matter and My mental endurance gave up on life shortly after. By the time crawl 100 and 1 rolled around, I was probably even worse off mentally than the man I was supposed to be saving.
It was at this moment of my most weakness did my eyes spot a divine light shining down upon me. Looking up I saw the three gods of pioneering Okuninushi, Sukunabikona and the Great Kunitamastanding around me. They were staring at me, their faces unreadable, their eyes... Ok yea I found the exit.
With the end now literally in sight, I used the last bit of my strength to haul the man up before doing the same with body.
Luckily, the platform above was elevated only slightly above, my head. Which was perfect because honestly, I don’t know what I would have done if it was any higher. Maybe die? But whatever, I am finally here!
Excited as I was by my achievement, I knew I couldn’t stay for long. The men behind me were hot on my tail and if they haven’t already spotted the entrance by now they would have no doubt be spoting soon. It was therefore in my best interest to keep moving. So after a brief rest with me unceremoniously using the man I had carried as my pillow (justifiably), I hauled my lazy body back onto my feet and began walking towards the only exit I could see.
Every step I took felt like a step too far. I was done, how could I walk any further with my body in this state? Maybe it’ll be best if I just slowed down and rest a bit… Thoughts of fluffy pillows and my soft bed slowly began to invade my mind, but I quickly grabbed them by the toes and tossed them out of my mental space. It was as though my mind knew what was good for me and to some extent so did I.
For the first time in a long time, it seemed that my heart and mind were singing together in perfect harmony, the goals of these tow very separate entity now aligning to form a singular formidable bulwark against the forces of laziness. No matter how many steps it took, no matter how tired I felt , I pushed on. I was unstoppable.
And so I continued, each step bringing me closer and closer to the finish line before my foot crossing past the doorframe and into the surrounding beyond. I had done it! I had reached the end.
Putting the body down as gently as I could, I straightened my back again and took a hard look at my surroundings.
Apparently whoever built the tunnel had a rather unique sense of humour, as what lay beyond turned out to be a cafe, a Starbuck cafe to be exact. Naturally, being the sleep deprived caffeine addict I am, I found myself instinctively walking over to the counter. My mind already contemplating weather to order the latest fad or my go to caramel latte from the non-existent Barista.
Note to self get some help.
Luckily with the help of a reality check I managed to put my delusions firmly put to rest. I Then plopped myself down onto one of their many high silted stools and laid my sweaty head over the posh counter for a rest before instantly regretting because my head was exploding.
Turns out when you do a whole lot of exercise your heart tends to pump a whole load of blood around your body and specifically through the head which resulted in my brain being filled with a thump every few seconds, ruining all prospects of a peaceful rest. Thus, I had to force my already weary body to stand back up once again and to let myself cool down before finally getting that well-derived rest.
Speaking of my head, let’s check out how well it’s doing. Oh wow turns out not that great. Who could have guessed?? My brain, was at odds with itself once again but unlike the last time where my thought police could effectively moderate the discourse playing out inside, this time due to a number of factors, it couldn’t, and this caused the internal discussion to rapidly evolved into a full on turf war.
You see, I have a problem.
I brought a literal corpse with me, and I don’t know for the life of me what to do with it.
I could, one, probably bring him back home and store him there for a bit with no repercussions but it’s 3am and I don’t have google maps so that’s a no. Plus Singapore is a city with a light pollution that is second to none. Even if I decide to bring him on a ride back home, I would be bound to be spotted by someone and subsequently get myself reported to the police because carrying a body over your shoulder is not exactly a norm in my city.
Alternatively, I could bring the man to a hospital and get him the medical help he seriously needs. Problem is this man might be my only clue to solving whatever is going on with my teleporting and could also very well give me answers to all the burning questions in my head. Dumping such a high value individual at the hospital then leaving his fates up to their hands doesn’t really seem like the smartest course of action especially seeing how the last conveniently placed individual I met was actually full of information, though this was only after I rnged a bit but that besides the point. Point is he could potentially be a very useful asset to me and plus all problems about transporting him still very much applied to this solution.
Then there is a third option. Wait it out. This ‘solution’ though simple and least taxing to my body overall, come with it a whole other host of problems. The biggest and most glaring of them all being that I am at a starbucks. You know a company which specialises in enticing people to trade their hard earn cash for overpriced coffee and thus has to open sometime in the near future in order to function? And I don’t know about you, but I don’t think our current state of being sweaty, dirty and bloody would very necessarily help in attracting customers.
On top of that, I still have to contend with the threat of the outsiders who, with all the fancy contraption they have, could very likely track us down and do whatever they please with us while we were in such a sedentary state. Something which I wasn’t necessarily a fan of given my prior experience.
With each and every point being both valid and flawed, my brain, unable to decide, found itself a warzone as each idea vied for control over my decision making process. Seeing that leaving my brain to sort itself out would mean staying here till dawn, I decided to choose the most practical thing I could and forced myself to sleep right then and there.
The rationale of this is that since each solution more or less had equal chances of success, might as well just laze and shutdown any discourse. So while my brain tore itself to pieces, my hands went to work and joined two of the cushioned sofas together to form a small makeshift bed. It then slowly guided the rest of my torso onto one edge of the sofa before easing the rest of my body into the cushioned valley below.
The moment my body touched it's cushioned surface, I could feel my muscles start to relax, the knot that had been strung so tightly within me slowly starting to loosen up. After shifting around a bit more, I finally found a comfortable position for my body to rest and let my eyes slowly close. My consciousness ,even before my eyes closed, had already put itself on the long and arduous process of untethering itself from my worldly being causing my brain to slowly began to shut down.
With it not longer bound to it's world counterpart. It flew up high, passing through the balcony, up through the very roof that hung over my head and into the night sky, hovering there as a silent spectator. Somewhere deep within, it held hope that the rays of light the sky would soon welcome would bring about a new dawn and shine down a path for it and it's physical self down below to wander upon once again.