Underground.

That was my current position.

Around me was a beautiful casket, one that would suit the bodies of great warriors and heroes of yore. Indigo paints were all over the beautiful casket, with more cushion on my back than anything I had felt since I had come to this world.

They had thrown me straight into the hole, casket and all.

Thankfully, just because I was inside a casket didn’t mean it was closed.

The rays of the sun were barely covered by the bald head of a man who looked down at me from the ground. The already giant knight in his armor seemed larger than ever from six feet under. Even though the backlit sun covered the hideous scars on his face, it couldn’t hide the look of disdain in his eyes.

“How disappointing. A person like you becoming a hero…”

“Look, it wasn’t my choice,” I said from inside, my voice trembling. Though my mind seemed calm, my body was not following. Ah right, I was trembling. I could even feel something damp between my legs.

This was bad.

This was very bad.

“Tsk,” The knight clicked his tongue. “Be grateful in death. You are being put to rest in such a grand coffin only because you are a classmate of the real heroes.”

That was right. I was, in fact, a classmate of the real heroes.

And that was also my sin.

Despite being the classmate of the heroes—being one of the god’s chosen heroes myself, I was weak. I had no strength, no heightened growth, my only ability according to the System was something shaded out.

Though it had only been a month since my entire class was transmigrated into this world, I had started to feel that maybe, just maybe, being a classmate of my friends was truly my only saving grace.

After all, unlike the others, I had no ability. Nothing of power, so to speak of, that I could use to help the kingdom.

I was weaker than a baker’s seven-year-old in this world. How did I know? I tried to train with one, that’s how.

“Look,” I said again, my voice still trembling. My knees were now hitting the casket’s sides. “We don’t have to do this. Y-you can just let me go, and we can act like you killed me. Knight-captain… you are not someone who would kill children, are you?”

The bald man, knight captain, shook his head.

“The oracle has already told us of the Goddess’ desire. You are to be disposed of. My principles exist for the goddess, of course I will get rid of you.”

He was going to get rid of me.

These guys were going to kill me inside my casket and then bury me. The world would sooner or later hear that one of the summoned heroes has passed away, but the other twenty-four still live. The war against the demon lord will continue, the heroes will eventually prevail, and I will be forgotten.

Simple as that.

“But you are right—” The Knight Captain said. “If nothing else, at least your judgment is sound.”

I looked up at the Knight Captain. His bald head had moved away and was not covering the sun any longer. The light was shining straight at me.

The light of hope.

I was right? Did he mean he wouldn’t kill me? What else could he mean?

“I won’t be killing you. I won’t let any of my men bear that sin either.”

“Y-you mean… you’ll let me go? I-I can go—”

A loud thump cut me off. Outside of the hole, a large indigo door covered the sun completely.

“That’s right. We won’t kill you ourselves.”

“W-wait… wait wait wait…” I pushed off and tried to get up when the knight lowering the casket’s lid knee’d my face.

Blood seeped out of my mouth as I fell.

“No… please you can’t… please—”

“Do not worry, kid.” The Knight Captain said. “You won’t feel this pain ever again. You won’t even know it.”

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The lid started to cover the casket. I desperately put my hand in between the casket and the lid; when the knight stomped on it and crushed my hand, he hit me again with the hilt of his sword.

“After all, you only die once. Death is… mercy.”

The casket started to close.

With me still alive inside it.

Blood covered my vision, but the fear was much worse than the pain could ever hope to be.

“No! No no!” Tearful screams escaped me as I desperately smacked the casket. Over and over, with all the strength I could summon, but instead of moving away, the lid only seemed to grow heavier.

I could hear it. The thrums as dirt piled on top of the coffin.

“Aaaaa… aaah no no no no! Please! Let me out! LET ME OUT!! Why are you doing this…”

Even though tears kept streaming out of my eyes and the screams dragged my heart out of its cage as they left my lips, I didn’t want to cry. My body did not listen to me, I had already accepted it. How would I ever be able to escape being buried alive?

I had already died in my head.

“I don’t want to die! Why…. Why are you doing this to me?! I never wanted to come to your world! Let me goooo!!”

I had already stopped crying in my head.

“Uwaaa… aaa… please… please I…”

I had already given up in my head.

—Thud! Thud! Thud!

“Move move move! This casket! MOVE! GET ME OUT!”

My body moved and moved, screamed and cried, until all of a sudden. I couldn’t breathe.

As if a tennis ball was forcefully shoved in my throat, I couldn’t breathe anymore. The screams didn’t come out any longer. It was different, I hadn’t exhausted myself crying.

No.

Oxygen had started to run out of this place. I grabbed my neck and flailed in the casket. Vomit and saliva slipped out of my mouth, but even then, the lump never left.

I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t breathe at all. My hands, chest, legs, toes, fingers, nails, everything burned. It was all set on fire. Every muscle, every nerve started to get clogged.

I hit my head against the casket. Over and over, trying my best to scream, to breathe.

I tried…

I tried…

Until one last thud echoed in the casket. The one of my body falling.

As…

I died.

.

.

.

“HAAH!”

I gasped and woke up. My head hit the top of the casket. The pain I had been feeling mere moments ago disappeared as tears streamed down my eyes—

—And the pain began again.

From the beginning. As my throat stopped breathing and my voice stopped leaking out. As my lungs set on fire and the furthest tips of my body followed.

Once more, I hit my feet against the casket walls—flailed them. My head, my arms, my every bone.

And then I died again.

.

.

.

“HAAH!”

A fresh set of bile had formed in my stomach, and my tears had been refilled by god knows what sick joke. I needed it, of course, since I was to face that pain again.

“HAAH!”

And again.

“HAAH!”

Again…

“HAAH!”

“HAAH!”

“HAAH!”

Over and over. Each time my brain stopped working, each time it melted into mush, each time my consciousness started to fade, it was all snapped back to freshness so I could feel the pain all over again at the height of my health.

Only for me to die again.

“HAAH!”

And come alive again.

I couldn’t tell how long a time passed, I couldn’t tell what was to my left and my right. The casket, which had been filled with carbon dioxide, was now half sunken in vomit and bile.

Before I knew it, I could think despite the pain.

It never reduced, no. Even when it felt like the pain had reduced, it was brought back to the same degree as I came back to life. I never got to breathe, I never got to move, but somehow, for the first five seconds after every time, I came back to life.

I could think.

I could think. I moved this messy body, which I had no control over. I struggled with trembling hands to pull out my belt—and I died.

“HAAH!”

With all the strength I could summon, I smashed the buckle into the casket’s lid, my hands were clearly not working for this. I smashed it and smashed it as long as I could before I died once more.

“HAAH!”

There was a crack. A small crack went through the wood where I had struck the buckle. I slammed the buckle inside again and shoved it in. There was a limit to the strength of one’s hand, so I smashed my head into the buckle to drive it in.

The crack widened. Slowly, inch by inch.

I died.

“HAAH!”

With one last instinctive push, the belt buckle increased the crack all over the casket’s lid. Dirt trickled in from the gap. It pushed down and pushed against the casket’s lid. Slowly, the casket crumbled.

A smile spread on my face. The face that couldn’t stop screaming all this time.

At last, the casket broke and all the dirt fell straight on me. All at once, the immense weight of the very ground fell atop me. My mouth crushed first, my eyes popped out, my gut and spine squeezed out blood like lemons spurted their juice as I died.

“HAAH!”

And I came back to life. Dirt covered my vision, it clogged my mouth and my nose, the asphyxiation wasn’t going to stop, and trying to remove it while drowning in a sea of dirt wasn’t going to work.

For some reason, I was hopeful. The casket was out of the way now. I just had to continue.

It was all loose and dry, thankfully. The dirt that had just been gouged out to make space for my casket. I pushed it downward, while my hands still moved, I pushed the dirt toward my legs,

“HAAH!”

To my legs. I slowly wriggled my entire body out of the hole. The dirt blocked my sight and my vision. I couldn’t tell if I was going straight up or not any longer, but I focused on standing as I moved.

Even if it wasn’t straight, it didn’t matter.

“HAAH!”

I’ll get out anyway.

I swam through the ground. When I pushed the dirt above me a bit too much, now and then, a stone would crack through and hit my head. Bleeding was painful, but it was a relief that I was only bleeding.

Since I was going to asphyxiate faster than I would bleed!

“HAAH!”

Finally, with one more push, my hand broke through something. No more dirt was above.

My eyes widened and my mouth opened wider. It only made more of the dirt fall into my mouth and my eyes, that didn’t matter. I pushed through in a frenzy. Like a rapid current, I sent the dirt down and dragged my body up over and over.

Finally…

Finally, my head came out too.

“HAAH!”

I was still filled with the dirt last time, but I could spit it all out in this round. My eyes were clear, and my mouth too.

“Haaa… haa…” Desperately, I took in deep breaths. Tears streamed out of my eyes again as I looked up at the night sky.

There was oxygen here again… I could breathe again…

I pressed against the ground and dragged the rest of my body out of the hole I had burrowed through. Helplessly, my entire body fell limp on the ground as I continued taking in the deepest breaths I could manage.

After three days.

I could breathe again after three days.