The boy was born brilliant — but life didn't care.
From the first day he stepped into a classroom, he was different. He wasn't just a good student — he was extraordinary. Teachers would glance over their glasses in awe at his perfect scores. Classmates would mutter among themselves about how he always seemed to know the answers. Yet he never showed off. His confidence was quiet, hidden under layers of shyness and solitude. He smiled only when necessary. He talked only when spoken to. He was like the moon in the daytime — always there but rarely noticed.
His brilliance wasn't learned. It was part of him, stitched into his bones. His notebooks were filled with ideas, not just answers. He solved puzzles for fun. He read science books for comfort. Where other children laughed at cartoons, he was fascinated by the universe — stars, galaxies, black holes, and the possibility of time travel. His favourite subject was science, because it was the closest thing to magic that the real world had.
But intelligence could not stop heartbreak.
When he was just 14, the ground beneath him cracked. His parents, once a loving pair, began fighting more and more often. Their arguments were thunderous — about money, bills, broken dreams, and responsibilities no one wanted. His home, once filled with light, became a storm cloud of accusations and silence.
One day, without a final word, his mother left. She abandoned not only her marriage but her children — the boy and his little sister, who was not even five years old. She didn't take them. She didn't even say goodbye.
His father, devastated and defeated, turned to alcohol. He wasn't violent — just hollow. He became a ghost of the man he once was, but he never abandoned his children. With trembling hands, he still made them meals, walked them to school, and did his best to keep going. It wasn't enough. But it was love, broken and bruised.
The boy had to grow up overnight. He became his sister's caretaker, her guardian and brother all at once. He brushed her hair, helped her with schoolwork, made her laugh when their father couldn't. He didn't have the luxury of a childhood anymore. Every moment was a test — of patience, of endurance, of strength.
Then, a ray of hope: his grandmother returned from abroad. She had worked for years in another country as a housemaid, sending money to support the family. Now she came home, and everything changed. She brought warmth back into their lives. Her cooking reminded him what love tasted like. Her words reminded him what care sounded like. In her lap, he finally cried the tears he had been holding for years.
But even with her presence, he never stopped missing his mother. She would call sometimes, send money from afar, but love was never in her voice. It was a ghostly connection — duty, not emotion. He would sit and wonder why she had left. Why he wasn't enough.
To cope, he escaped into fantasy. Cartoons became his sanctuary. Superhero movies, his gospel. Anime was not just entertainment — it was another world, one where he mattered, one where people like him had power, purpose, destiny.
At 15, despite his broken heart, he went back to his science classes. The passion hadn't left him. The equations still made sense, even when life didn't. He loved how science obeyed logic. How it gave back exactly what you gave it. No betrayals. No lies.
And in that classroom, he met a girl.
She wasn't loud or flashy. She had soft eyes, a calm smile. She borrowed his science notebook once to take notes. A week later, he flipped through it and found a single line scribbled on the last page:
"My love is downloading... but you don't know."
He didn't understand at first. It puzzled him. He reread it again and again, trying to decode its meaning. Days passed before it hit him like a lightning bolt. She liked him. She had always liked him.
He was terrified. But also thrilled. He waited too long, though.
When he finally confessed, her reply was a soft dagger.
"I waited so long. But now... I'm in love with someone else."
He stood there, stunned. He didn't cry then. But that night, in the quiet darkness of his room, he broke. He wept like a child. For her. For himself. For the moment he let slip through his fingers. He cursed his silence, his pride, his fear.
That was the day the boy buried his heart.
He transformed. Became colder. Not cruel, but distant. He pushed his emotions down and focused harder than ever. He told himself he would never chase love again. He would chase greatness.
He poured himself into his studies. His O/L exams were a triumph — he passed with some of the highest marks in his district. He declared to himself: he would become a billionaire. Not for money, but for control. So that no one could ever make him feel helpless again.
At 17, he selected the math stream for his A/Ls. It was the hardest path, but he didn't flinch. He thought he had found purpose again.
But something had changed.
Day by day, he felt life becoming... predictable. Boring. A Gray fog started to cover everything. The same routine. The same people. The same fate. He began to feel trapped in reality.
So, he returned to the one place that never disappointed him — fiction.
He devoured movies. Series. Anime. He binged them until his eyes ached. But eventually, even they weren't enough. So he found manhwa — colourful digital comics full of fantasy and adventure. When he exhausted those, he found the source: light novels. Chapter after chapter. Story after story.
He read for days. Weeks. His hunger for alternate realities grew insatiable.
And then, something new — a spark from the past. A girl from childhood messaged him. They began to chat again, casually at first. Then more. Slowly, emotions returned. She had always liked him, she said.
He confessed. She accepted.
For a while, he was happy. They talked every night. Shared memories. Laughed.
But cracks began to show.
He was still the boy obsessed with rockets, wormholes, the mysteries of existence. She wanted romance — not theories about quantum gravity. He tried to change. He really did. But some things couldn't be forced.
He saw her weep once, quietly, because he didn't understand what she wanted from him. That moment shattered him.
He made a decision.
He let her go.
Not because he stopped loving her — but because he didn't want to hurt her. They were mismatched in hearts, even if they matched in history.
After the breakup, he vowed again: love was not his destiny.
He buried himself in stories deeper than ever. Watched, read, imagined. But over time, even that began to dull.
He began exploring darker fantasies. Rituals. Supernatural myths. He even wrote mock contracts to demons, offering his soul. He didn't truly believe — but he wished it were real. He longed for something, anything, to prove life had meaning beyond this.
The power he desired most was "regression." The ability to go back in time with knowledge of the future.
Why that?
Because you'd never know if you had that power... until you died.
And he began to wonder.
What if he already had it?
What if his real life began after death?
The Advanced Level exam crept closer. He was twenty now — older than most others taking the test. He had wasted years, chasing meaning in imaginary worlds. He tried to study again, tried to focus, but it was too late.
He walked into the exam hall with a silent heart.
Wrote down answers without passion. Left the hall empty.
Four months later, the results came.
He had failed.
The one thing he had always believed in — his mind — had betrayed him.
He didn't scream. He didn't cry. He just lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling fan spinning endlessly above.
His grandmother called to him from the kitchen. His sister played outside. Life moved on.
But inside, he was gone.
And in that silence, in that moment of absolute despair, he whispered:
"I want to leave this world."
And somewhere far beyond the stars... something listened.