The voices grew clearer as he listened longer. Not every word made sense, but enough did.
Numbers came up. Ages. How many were needed. What to do if some didn't survive.
He caught fragments that made his stomach sink.
Kids.
Training.
Disposable.
They weren't talking about adoption or care. Their tone was flat, practical, like discussing tools or supplies.
One of them laughed quietly, saying something about how it was easier to take them young, before habits formed.
Another replied that it didn't matter, most wouldn't last anyway.
'Disposable assassins,' he thought, the words forming slowly in his mind.
He tried to look up again.
His vision blurred, but he saw them this time. Men in dark hoods, broad shoulders, thick arms. Built like soldiers, not guards.
They stood casually, not worried. None of them carried restraints meant to suppress strength or abilities.
No drugs, no collars, nothing advanced.
That meant something worse.
They hadn't needed it.
The realization settled in.
Whoever else was nearby, other kids, he assumed—were just as helpless as he was. Taken directly and no resistance expected.
'What kind of world is this?' he wondered.
The men kept talking, planning routines, talking about breaking them in, filtering out the weak ones.
To them, it sounded normal and necessary.
His thoughts scattered, jumping from one idea to another.
'If there are many kids here, then this happens often,' he thought. 'Maybe they were taken in broad daylight. Or during travel. Or no one can stop it.'
He considered other possibilities. Terrorism. War. Groups strong enough to act openly. None of it felt impossible.
He shifted slightly and felt the rough fabric against his skin.
Linen clothes. Thin, loose, like what beggars wore in old movies or fiction. Nothing modern and nothing familiar.
'This isn't my world,' he thought.
Even his underwear felt strange—too simple, too coarse. He noticed it without wanting to.
'This place isn't advanced,' he thought
The idea settled in quietly. Whatever world he had come to, it wasn't one with hospitals, phones, or laws that stopped men like these.
He tried to think clearly.
'If there are this many kids, someone should notice,' he thought.
But nothing happened. No shouting from outside. No rush of footsteps. No interruption. The men kept standing there, unbothered.
'Maybe everyone's already dead,' he thought. The idea didn't shock him as much as it should have.
He just noted it and moved on.
Then something changed.
A soft sound, like fabric shifting. Something small hit the ground. He didn't see it happen, but he heard it.
After that, voices began to fade. Not abruptly—just quieter, slower.
Someone coughed.
Another body slumped.
Smoke spread across the floor.
Purple smoke.
His eyes widened slightly.
'Gas,' he thought.
It reached him within seconds. His body reacted before his mind finished catching up.
He tightened his throat, held his breath as much as he could, pressing his lips together. The smell burned faintly, sweet and wrong.
He stayed still, forcing himself not to inhale. His chest strained, muscles shaking as the smoke crept higher, swallowing his knees, his torso, his face.
Around him, everything went quiet.
The smoke reached his face fully, and his body gave up resisting. His chest burned, his head felt light, and his thoughts started slipping out of order.
He knew he should keep holding his breath, but his lungs forced air in anyway.
'Well, shit,' he thought.
'So this is how it ends?'
His vision dimmed at the edges. The noise around him blurred into something distant. He tried to stay awake by thinking logically, the way he always did.
'If this is knockout gas, then they don't want us dead yet,' he thought.
'Which is bad. But not the worst outcome.'
The thought almost made him laugh. Even now, he was categorizing danger like it was a problem to solve.
'Of course I finally get a working body and immediately get kidnapped,' he thought.
'Amazing luck.'
His arms felt heavier than before. His neck gave out, and his head dropped forward completely.
His body stopped responding, not because he chose to stop, but because it simply couldn't continue.
He felt himself slipping, aware of it, annoyed by it, but unable to do anything about it.
'Huh,' he thought.
His thoughts slowed, then stretched, then broke apart.
Thump.
Cough.
Rustle.
Everything went dark.
...
He woke up in the dark.
The first thing he did was move. His body responded immediately. He rolled, pushed himself up, and stood without effort. That alone made him pause.
He took a step. Then another.
It felt right. His legs didn't tremble. His chest didn't tighten. His breathing stayed steady. For the first time he could remember, moving didn't hurt.
He started walking around, then pacing. The space was dim but solid beneath his feet.
He stretched his arms, wincing slightly. His wrists still ached where the ropes had been, a dull soreness that proved the earlier part wasn't a dream.
'Okay… that happened,' he thought.
He didn't know where he was. The air was cool and still, and the darkness didn't feel endless, just empty.
That could wait.
What mattered was this.
He bent his knees, straightened, rotated his shoulders. Each movement came easily. Energy filled him in a way he had never known.
'So this is what a normal body feels like,' he thought.
The realization hit harder than fear.
He laughed quietly, breath steady, heart strong.
The sound surprised him. Being happy here didn't make sense, but he couldn't stop it. His body worked. It obeyed him.
For sixteen years he had imagined walking like this. Now he was doing it without thinking.
'Yeah… I'll deal with the nightmare later,' he thought.
For now, he kept moving, testing his limbs, smiling in the dark, excited in a situation where he knew he shouldn't be.
As the excitement settled, he slowed down and started paying attention.
Something felt off.
There was no light. Not dim light, not shadows—nothing. He couldn't see his hands even when he held them in front of his face.
He only knew his body was there because he could feel it move.
'This is weird,' he thought.
He took a few careful steps, arms slightly out, testing the space. It felt wide enough for him to move freely, not cramped.
His footsteps echoed faintly, giving him a rough sense of distance.
He walked until his fingers brushed against something solid.
'A wall. Smooth, cold.'
He followed it, counting steps, mapping the space in his head.
'Big room,' he thought. 'Or at least bigger than a cell.'
Then his hand struck something different. Metal. Flat. Harder than the wall. He tapped it again, slower this time.
A door.
He searched along its surface, feeling for gaps, handles, anything. There was nothing on his side. No latch. No opening.
'Yeah, figures,' he thought. 'Captive logic checks out.'
He stepped back, letting his hand drop. The room stayed silent and dark, the metal door unmoving.
Whatever this place was, it wasn't meant for him to leave on his own.
He leaned back against the wall and let his breathing settle. With nothing else to do, his thoughts drifted to what he had overheard earlier.
'Training a group of teenagers to become assassins would require time, space, and resources.
It was not something done casually. That meant this place was established, not temporary.'
He assumed his age was close to the other kids he had seen before he blacked out. His body felt older than sixteen, though.
When he straightened fully, he noticed he was taller than he had been in his previous life. His shoulders were broader, his upper body more built.
'This body worked for a living,' he thought. 'Or trained already.'
The strength felt natural, not forced, which made it more unsettling. Whoever this body belonged to had a history he did not have access to.
He flexed his hands slowly, feeling the muscles respond. The urge to move more was there, to test limits, to run, to push. He held back. Energy was a resource, and he did not know how long he would be locked in here.
He stayed still and listened. If someone came, he wanted to hear it first.
For now, waiting made more sense than action.
He waited.
Time passed without anything happening, and the silence started to feel heavy. Too empty. He shifted his weight, then stopped. There was nothing to react to, nothing to distract him.
Normally, this was the part where he would grab his phone. Open a game. Scroll. Read a chapter. Do something. Now there was nothing in his hands, nothing in his pockets.
His routine crawled under his skin.
'This is bad,' he thought.
'I'm bored. Like, dangerously bored.'
He missed the small things more than he expected. The glow of a screen. The feeling of progress bars filling up. Even loading screens. Books. Anything to anchor time. Without them, his thoughts wandered too freely.
Eventually, another idea slipped in.
'Wait,' he thought. 'I'm a transmigrator now.'
The thought lingered. He leaned into it, just a little.
'People like me usually get something, right? A cheat. A system. Broken talent. God-tier luck.'
He almost smiled in the dark.
'Maybe I'll wake up and suddenly punch through walls or see stats floating in the air.'
The idea amused him more than it should have. It was stupid, unrealistic, but comforting.
If he was going to be dragged into this mess, at least let it come with benefits.
'Yeah,' he thought. 'I'm probably overpowered... Hehehe...'
He stood there, alone, smug for no real reason, imagining himself strong enough that none of this would matter later.
The silence stayed, unimpressed.