Date: X X XXXX | Time XX:XX. | A Certain Wine Cellar
"Fang!"
Rain screamed aloud, his voice echoing in the damp darkness.
He shot his eyes open and scrambled to his feet in panic.
The pain in his back was gone!
He quickly raised both hands, frantically checking his back.
No wound, no blood, not even a trace of a stabbing.
His hands only felt the same tattered black t-shirt he wore before losing consciousness.
'What happened? A nightmare?'
Rain scanned his surroundings, but the sight confused him even more.
This was not his familiar apartment.
Not the concrete floor stained with sour curry. Instead, he stood in the middle of a small room made of old stone and wood.
The pungent smell of fermented wine mixed with the musty odor of ancient logs.
The low-ceiling room was dim, like a wine cellar in a medieval tavern, with carved wooden shelves filled with dark glass bottles and earthenware jars.
'What the fuvk is going on... I don't understand.'
It felt too real to be a dream. Rain pinched his arm hard.
The pain from the pinch was clear and complete. All his senses were fully operational... This was not a dream!
Rain walked to a heavy, closed oak door.
He pushed it open gently.
What he saw was the wide hall of a bar or tavern.
The atmosphere was quiet, with only the dim light from unextinguished oil lamps.
The smell of spilled beer lingered on the floor.
An old woman in a worn apron was diligently wiping a solid wooden table with a wet cloth.
She had a wrinkled face and her gray hair was neatly tied in a bun.
She didn't notice him at all, and appeared to be the owner of this place.
"Ma'm! Where am I?!" Rain tried to call out to her, but his voice seemed not to reach her in the slightest.
The old woman didn't respond.
She calmly continued cleaning the table, as if no sound had occurred in the room.
Rain tried shouting again in panic, but the result was the same... She couldn't hear him.
A chill ran down Rain's spine.
He walked straight to the bar counter and reached out to pick up an empty liquor glass placed on a tray.
His hand touched the glass! He gently slid the liquor glass across the counter.
Scratch!
The slight sound of the glass scraping the table broke the silence.
The old woman immediately stopped wiping. Her eyes fixed on the glass that had just moved.
She sighed softly and walked closer to where Rain was standing before using her wrinkled hand to straighten the glass, without showing any surprise.
She just adjusted the glass...
She didn't see him.
'What does this mean...? I can touch it, but she can't see me?'
A strange feeling assaulted Rain again. If this wasn't a dream, and it wasn't the real world, what was this situation?
What was he?
What was the truth?
He decided to test it one more time.
He walked straight up to the old woman and tried to gently touch her shoulder to get her attention.
But when his hand reached out...
Swoosh!
His body passed right through the old woman.
He stood in the same spot, seeing his own body superimposed over the body of the old woman, who was still wiping the table.
Rain quickly stepped back, his face pale! He was no longer a human... He was a spirit!
'Fk...!'*
While Rain was reeling from the fact that he had become a spirit, standing amidst the dim, medieval tavern atmosphere...
Suddenly...
A humming sound, like an electrical current, pulsed in his head—not a sound heard with the ears, but an uncanny sound within his sensory perception.
This was followed by the appearance of something like a Digital Interface floating in front of him, like a translucent screen in the air.
Bright blue text flashed on that screen:
[Subject 391 : Status Positive.]
[Initiating System Reboot in 3:00 minutes]
In that very second, the countdown (3:00) appeared and immediately began to decrease.
"What the fvck is this?!
What do I do!?"
Rain practically screamed. Shock and confusion violently overwhelmed him.
He paced frantically.
What is Subject 391? What system reboot?
This wasn't a dream, nor was it a typical ghost scenario.
What exactly was this! Countless questions popped up in his panicked mind, but no answers were clear.
The old woman, still cleaning, looked up briefly. Seeing no one there, she resumed her work.
2:15 minutes
Rain tried running around the room for a clue, but there was no one, nothing that could help him.
He raised his hand and looked at his already translucent body. It was starting to fade, little by little.
A strange sensation assaulted him again.
He was starting to suffocate!
How could this happen?
Wasn't he a spirit?
The feeling of suffocation was intense and clear, as if an invisible hand was squeezing his throat.
The torment he felt when he was stabbed returned.
The more the countdown dropped, the more the pain and suffering multiplied!
His spiritual body felt like it was being pulled apart by some mysterious force.
1:00 minute
Rain knelt down, clutching his head in agony. He fell to the floor, letting out soundless groans.
This was a second death slowly creeping in!
0:30 seconds
Suddenly, the blue interface screen flickered rapidly before an emergency message repeatedly appeared:
[WARNING! System Failure (No Physical Body)]
[30 seconds remaining to Emergency Shutdown]
Shut down? No physical body?
Fear completely overwhelmed him. Rain no longer cared if it was Subject 391 or any system.
He only knew he was going to die again...
He didn't understand anything!
He didn't know what he was fighting against, didn't know what to do to stop the creeping death.
0:05... 0:04... 0:03...
The final wave of pain rushed in, consuming his rapidly fading body until it was almost completely gone.
0:01...
And finished...
[Shutdown]
Date: X X XXXX | Time XX:XX. | A Dark Alley
The system was rebooted. Rain was alive again after the second death.
He looked around.
This was a dark alley. He was still in a state of fear, desperately trying to call out to a beggar rummaging through the trash.
Everything was the same: he called, he touched, he pushed, but he still passed through like the wind. Soon, the humming sound and the blue interface appeared again with the countdown.
[Subject 391 : Status Positive. Initiating System Reboot in 3:00 minutes]
'Not again—!'
[Shutdown]
Date: X X XXXX | Time XX:XX. | A Hospital
He saw a bedridden patient breathing faintly. Everything was still the same. Shut down again.
'Goddammit—!'
[Shutdown]
Date: X X XXXX | Time XX:XX. | A Palace
'Enough—!'
[Shutdown]
Date: X X XXXX | Time XX:XX. | A House
[Screaming Desperately]
[Shutdown]
Date: X X XXXX | Time XX:XX. | A Religious Site
[Sounds of self-harm and desperate sobbing]
[Shutdown]
Date: X X XXXX | Time XX:XX. | A Religious Site
[...]
[Shutdown]
The death loop completed seven times.
The pain turned into numbness.
He could only accept his fate.
He was still a formless spirit in unfamiliar places, but the repeated deaths allowed him to slowly piece things together:
This was not the normal world.
This was not a dream.
Everything was real. This was the truth.
He was Subject 391: merely data requiring a reboot.
He would die every time the countdown ended.
Date: X X XXXX | Time XX:XX. | An Orphanage
Rain awoke again amidst the soft sunlight filtering through the window of an old but clean orphanage.
He stood beside a blackboard in a quiet classroom.
His body was still a spirit. He felt nothing anymore when the countdown began.
[Subject 391 : Status Positive. Initiating System Reboot in 3:00 minutes]
He could only accept his fate...
His eyes fixated on a small girl with chubby cheeks and bright eyes.
She was sitting at a wooden desk drawing and talking to a young female teacher who was tidying up notebooks nearby.
Little Girl (Smiling brightly):
"Teacher! Look at this! My puppy! I colored it red! Am I good at drawing?"
Teacher (Bending down and smiling):
"Wow! It's so beautiful!
You're extremely good! If you focus on drawing like this every day, you can become an artist, Ann!"
The girl laughed cheerfully and went back to admiring her work.
'Ann,'
Rain looked at the girl with overflowing tears. 'Ann' was the name he and his girlfriend had planned to name their daughter.
Fang wanted a girl. If he actually had a child...
It would have been like this.
Pure and cheerful, just like her mother.
The humming sound grew louder in Rain's head...
He was used to it and resigned himself to the fact that the next journey was about to begin.
But this time was different.
The blue interface that appeared was also different!
The countdown was still running, but a new message appeared above it:
[Final Warning:]
[You are eligible to remain if you acquire a 'Physical Body'.]
[The system cannot maintain the current state: You require a host body.]
A second later, the interface highlighted the objects and people around him with different colors.
The little girl was highlighted with a bright red light.
The young teacher, the blackboard, the desk lamp, and other objects were highlighted with a green light.
Rain's face instantly went pale. An idea, born from countless deaths, immediately struck him:
Physical body... maintain state...
Highlight... Red/Green...
He could touch the green...
But the red...
His most brutal analysis materialized:
The items highlighted in green were things that could be used.
But used for what...
The final answer that formed in his frantic mind was the coldest and most wicked command he had ever conceived in his life:
To kill. To live.
00:45 seconds
The little girl was still smiling and drawing happily, unaware that the sword of decision was already at her throat...