I opened my eyes after what felt like an eternity. Yes, I had felt like I was swimming in the abyss, but for how long? I didn't know. My sense of time had vanished, my identity gone.
I didn't know who I was or what I was until that strange being came, a grotesque humanoid with twisted limbs and a sinister smile.
He laughed like a madman. A true madman...
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" echoed in the lone abyss."KEKEKEKEKEKEKEKEKEKE! LOOK WHAT I FOUND, BITCHES!" he shouted so loud that my ears bled.
Wait, ears bled? But in this form, I had no ears. So, well, they didn't actually bleed. But... they would have, if it weren't for me having no ears.
I guess, here, having no ears was an advantage.But then, how am I still able to listen?
"What are you?" I tried to whisper, but failed miserably. That was when I realized I was nothing more than a speck of light.
"Look at this wonderful delicacy! Ah, I feel like I've used my lifetime's worth of fortune," he said, and started laughing again like a madman.
But I felt no fear, because in this form, I didn't know who I was, what I was, or why I was.
"What? I can't? Why?" he shouted."What do you mean? I have to let him pass through Samsara..." he whispered in a low voice.
"Ah, so he's the one," the madman said.
"So well, listen here, delicacy, you are allowed to pass through Samsara, to be reborn in a new world. However, for this, you will need to pay a price"
Before he could continue, I said, "But I don't want to."
"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! You don't want to? Nice, nice," he said, before continuing,"You got no choice here. You will have to PASS through the SAMSARA!"
Ah... Why does he want me to reincarnate? Hadn't I suffered enough to die?
Before I could think more, he grabbed me—or the speck of light that I was—and threw me so hard that I passed through Samsara.
But me, being myself, didn't pass through it. Instead, I came to a realization:"This bitch can't force me."
"Why haven't you passed through the SAMSARA?" he questioned.
"Because... I don't want to?" I thought.
"But that shouldn't be possible," he said, drifting into deep thought as he went silent for 1 to 2 minutes.
So... he can hear my thoughts.Yes, I finally came to this realization and felt pretty dumb, considering we'd been communicating this whole time and I hadn't even known how.
"Ah, it's 'cause you're cursed," he said in a grim tone, before continuing,"A curse strong enough to not let you pass through the Samsara. Huh... so it's his doing."
Whose doing? What curse? I wondered.
Well, it's good that I'm cursed. I don't need to worry anymore about being reincarnated, as this fortune of a curse wouldn't allow me to.While thinking this, my body or whatever it was felt sluggish, and I began to lose my vision.
"Well then, I'm just gonna make you possess another body. After all, it would be pretty fun to see his game getting ruined," he said.
And that was when I came to another realization that I was delusional enough to think that My will was strong enough to resist the divine order.
-------------------
A wave of memories hit me, jolting me out of the king-sized bed. It was extremely painful.
"ARGHHHHHH!" I shouted hard.
My body no, his body started to convulse violently, like it was having a seizure.
"Noah Vermilion. That was the name given to this pitiful boy.His life was nothing short of sorrow. Born as the heir of a family of legends, the pressure and expectations had crushed him to the point that he too chose the easy way out."
And there was no problem with that. I, too, was nothing short of a coward.
We had way too many similarities.Yes, I remembered my past life's memories when I woke up earlier.I had died after seeing my brother in a puddle of blood...
Ah, I didn't even try to take revenge. But what could I have done? Hadn't I suffered enough?Losing my parents, fighting cancer, and just when things actually started going well BAM life showed me the middle finger, and he got killed brutally.My other half.
It was better that I chose the easy way out because who would even want to live in that hell?
"Ah... they must have been reincarnated somewhere too," I came to the realization.
But that was when another wave of memories hit me.And the pain—it was incomparable to the previous one.This one wasn't just mental. Something was changing in my body.Something fundamental.
I instinctively felt that.Wait... when did I even have instincts?
-------
As the pain subsided just enough to let me think, a faint voice resurfaced in my mind, his voice.
"Let's see who wins, your soul or his will, Here's a gift from me to make things more interesting. After all.. You are a special cursed plaything."
His?
A shiver ran through me, when I said this, no not from the fear, but from recognintion. The voice, the sneer in the way he said it.
Who was he? Ah, He's that dammned god.
The God of Sorrow.
And just then
----
[AKASHIC RECORDS REBOOTING]
Initializing soul link... Synchronization: 12%... 56%... 100%Host recognized: Former mortal soul—Codename: "The Cursed Flame"Purpose: IncompleteReconstructing memory fragments...Warning: Trauma-class memories detected. Proceed with caution.
----
Everything went white.
And
In the void of pain and memory, I saw her again.Golden hair, laughter like sunlight, eyes full of stars and lies.
I was young. Just a human. A commoner born in a kingdom that worshipped the divine. She descended as a messenger once every hundred years.
And I fell in love.
What a fool.
I trusted her. I gave her my heart, my secrets, everything. I even defied fate itself to climb the Tower of Trials just to see her again.And she told me… she loved me too.
But when her father, the God of Sorrow, found out, he didn't rage.
No. He wept.
And from those divine tears came the curse."A mortal who dares love the divine... shall suffer eternally—never reborn, never forgotten, never at peace."
And so I was cast into Samsara, stripped of form, identity, name, and left to wander.
----
[MEMORY SYNC COMPLETE]Purpose Updated: Break the Curse of Sorrow.Objective 1: Grow Stronger. Awaken the Forbidden Flame.Objective 2: Seek the God's Daughter. Learn the Truth.Objective 3: Restore the Broken Cycle. Rewrite Fate.
The host shall refer Akashic records as a system now
----
And then... Noah's memories returned fainter, flickering under the weight of my own.His name wasn't just a name anymore.
I was him, now. Or rather, he was me, in another form.
It had been a week since the Talent Awakening Ceremony.
Only one week.
And yet…
Those eyes.
Those disdainful eyes.
From the patriarch. From the elders. Even the younger cousins whispered behind walls.
"C-Rank."The lowest ever seen in the Vermilion lineage. A family of SS-ranked monsters. War gods. Sorcerer kings.
Noah Vermilion the disgrace. The crack in the glass of perfection bloodline.
And though no one said it aloud, I saw it in their eyes:
"He should've never been born."
But something felt… wrong.
Noah's soul had resisted rebirth. It had fractured instead of passing. As if like me it had refused to go quietly.
[System Update Detected]Soul Fusion Event DetectedMortal Flame + Vermilion Will = Awakened Variant SoulNew Title Acquired: The Cursed FlamePassive Ability Unlocked: Flame of Defiance – Resists divine fate manipulation
And that's when I understood.
Noah wasn't a random soul.He was like me. He was me.
A remnant of my broken reincarnations.And that was why this body called me. Why Samsara tried to reject it. Why the demon laughed when I wouldn't pass through it.
Noah Vermilion and I were both cursed.
Both betrayed.
Both had trusted the wrong people.
I opened my eyes, vision blurry, sweat clinging to my skin. My body trembled either from the overload or the truth. I didn't know which.
[System Whisper: Destiny Thread Detected – The God of Sorrow Watches.]
I chuckled.
Let him watch.
Because this time, I won't beg the stars.
I'll burn them.