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Three questions

When I woke up a few months ago, I had only three questions racing through my mind. Who am I? Where am I? Am I dead?

At first, I wandered like a madman, lost in a strange, empty city of towering concrete buildings. There was no one else—no faces, no voices, just an eerie silence that stretched endlessly. I called out for help, hoping someone, anyone, would hear me, but my voice echoed back in the emptiness. No response. Oddly enough, I felt nothing—no hunger, no thirst, no pain. Even when I threw myself off one of the buildings, hoping to feel something, there was no pain when I hit the ground.

It was a strange sensation, this hollowness. Physically, I was unharmed, but inside, something felt terribly wrong. The only real feeling I had was a deep, unsettling sense that I didn't belong here.

The world around me behaved in ways that defied all logic. The buildings, streets, and even the sky—they shifted, changed, and warped without any pattern or warning. At first, I didn't understand why, but then I realized these changes mainly happened at night. So I began tracking time by watching the movements of the sun and moon. I needed to hold on to something familiar in a place.

One day, I found a playground, and something stirred in my memory. Fragments of who I was started to return to me. Sabar. That's my name. And I had a brother—Marti. He was part of my life, but his face remained hazy, just out of reach. This playground was where we spent so much time together as kids. But now it was abandoned, desolate, swallowed by time. The house nearby, where we grew up, was empty too. Hollowness and silence greeted me when I entered. Maybe Marti had moved on and left this place behind. I wasn't sure how long it had been, but everything felt frozen, untouched for what could have been years.

As time passed, I began noticing strange things. Beings—small, luminescent creatures—floated around the empty streets. At first, they were barely visible, like flickering lights in the corner of my vision. But I could feel their warmth when I tried to touch them, though most disappeared as soon as I made contact. Over time, some of these beings changed. They grew more solid, dark, and hairy, becoming more tangible. I saw larger, more menacing creatures lurking in the shadows, hiding in the places where the light didn't reach.

I wasn't alone in this place, but none of them acknowledged me. They moved through the city like I wasn't there. But one day, everything changed.

I was near a hospital, trying to make sense of this realm, when I saw him—a man, well-groomed. He appeared near a round, black device that looked like some communication tool, though I hadn't paid much attention to them before. After seeing the spirits around, he let out a sigh, and then, without warning, he summoned a tornado of fire. Flames erupted from his hands, tearing through the spirits near him, reducing them to dust. I barely escaped by scrambling onto the roof of a nearby building, watching in horror as he continued to unleash fire with terrifying ease. His words echoed through the air: "These damn spirits are endless here."

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It was then that I noticed something strange. The creatures—the spirits that had always ignored me—cowered in fear of him. They panicked, their movements frantic. They were afraid—of him.

I realized that whoever he was, he wasn't here to help. He was destroying the spirits. And if he saw me, I had no doubt he'd do the same to me. But something about him intrigued me. I had to learn how to do that, including how he created and controlled the fire and its precision. If I was going to survive in this place, I needed that power.

After he vanished, I couldn't stop thinking about his words. "These spirits are endless today." He must have meant the spirits that pass through this realm, some vanishing, others staying. I realized then why he was here—why the others like him came. They were here to purge this place of spirits. Every day, more people arrived, wielding the power of fire and wiping out the spirits that lingered and didn't even cause any problems.

But I noticed something else. They called themselves purgers and would always leave before the reset as if they were afraid of it. Yet the spirits—the ones that roamed here—weren't afraid at all. They stayed, unbothered by the world's shifts. I watched them from the shadows, studying their movements. I knew I wasn't like the other spirits here. Maybe I was like them, and I had memories; I had free will. But something about this place made me wonder—am I really alive? I didn't have an answer, but I had to survive. And to do that, I had to learn to fight like they did. I started observing how the purgers controlled their breath and calmed themselves before unleashing their power

My first attempt came at the hospital, just minutes before the reset. I don't know why I picked this place. I just sat down in a dark corner, where the shadows felt heavier, and tried to replicate what I had seen the purgers do. I closed my eyes, focused on the faint light behind my eyelids, and took a deep breath. That small glow—it felt like a fragile spark, but I concentrated on making it grow. Slowly, it expanded, filling me with warmth, burning brighter with each breath.

Like the purgers, I imagined that light turning into fire. I held my breath, and then—exhaled, letting it out.

But instead of a controlled burst, the energy exploded violently, and instead of fire, I emitted air. Air surged through the room like a bomb, ripping through everything around me, with me as the center point. The lack of air around the place was unbearable and then came a pain—sharp, searing pain as if the very air was choking me from the inside out. I screamed, unable to contain it. My body felt like it was being torn apart.

Through the haze of agony, I heard footsteps. Distant, but unmistakable—purgers. If they found me like this, I was done for.

I had to get out. Forcing myself to my feet, every movement sent waves of pain through my body, but I ran. I ran as fast as I could, stumbling through the corridors, barely able to see straight. My vision blurred with every step. I had to hide. I had to survive. I started trying this multiple times, despite the horrible pain. I had the feeling that I shouldn't have tried it today, and yet my curiosity got the better of me.

And now, as I lie bound here weeks later, I realize it was all in vain. I planned everything, but it didn't matter. Somehow, I've been captured by this dangerous old man who shines like the morning sun. His presence is overwhelming, like a light I can't escape. This man... he's an anomaly from the purgers I have faced before.