Chapter 1:
Oh, how pathetic I've lived my life. Living day by day on a paycheck, always dreaming, always wanting, always moving but never reaching.
That is what I feel every time I wake up in the middle of the night. What should've been a time for sleep is instead a time of work for me.
RING! RING! RING!
Each ring of my phone's alarm became a heavy reminder for me to get up my bed. With all the will I could muster I stood.
My hair disheveled, my eyes droopy and tired, my spirits still weakened.
'fuck,' I cursed inside myself in resignation. Then I started preparing for work.
I work at nightshift, I start at somewhere around 10pm in the night and end my shift at 6am in the morning. So waking up in the middle of the night to prepare is the norm.
I took a quick shower, donned my uniform and prepared my food. After all that was done I layered my clothes with two jackets, which isn't unusual when you work on the same time schedule as I do, the wind of the december night is bone chilling, one jacket wouldn't be enough.
"Sigh," I sighed looking at myself in the mirror. The poor reflection of what I am standing before me pitifully.
"Time to work," I pulled the doors open and as soon as I did the cold air of the night greeted me. The chilling breeze blasting right through my face making my body shiver in the cold.
I stepped out of the door and walked outside, thankfully the apartment I was renting was just near to my workplace, so that's a plus.
As I was walking, I came into an intersection. I waited for the green lights to go and signal to cross. However when the signal to cross lit up and I crossed the road, I heard a roaring engine coming straight at me.
Two blinding lights greet me like a horror jumpscare. And that moment I knew, it's over.
They say that before you die, for a minute your life's most memorable journey will flash before your eyes.
I would expect to see all my life's achievement, happiness, joy, and ecstatic moments to present itself before me. Even as a last consolation to my meagre life, as if to say 'it wasn't much, but it's the life you've lived,'. However I was disappointed even in death.
Because, Everything is dark.
***
"So what did you see?"
I, I don't even have the energy to figure out who said those words.
I was too dismayed. To think that even as I face death I saw nothing. Have I lived so much in vain that even my body considered that there is nothing worthy to see.
Was my life so pathetic that I was refused the last grace.
"I… I saw nothing," Finally I lifted my head up to see who the voice belonged to. It was clear to me that I was dead, I didn't need any second clarification. What I want to know is who this man is before me, why I am here and why I didn't see anything.
"You know why you didn't see anything, deep down you know the reason why," His words were like blades down to my guts. It was even more painful than the crushing weight of the truck that killed me.
He sat there, sitting on a black foldable chair, in a prim top suit as the endless white canvas of nothingness surrounded us. He looked at me with emotions I can't discern, or more like I can't fathom.
Of course I know, I'm painfully aware. All my life I didn't achieve anything I could be proud of. I was so drowned in the process of chasing that I don't remember anything or anyone in the process of it. Simply put, I ran but I arrived nowhere.
"Quite shameful isn't it? To die without even leaving a legacy, something worth remembering, tell me, what was it like? What was the feeling after death realizing nothing flashed before your eyes," He spoke as he clasped his hands together and leaned forward.
"Do I even have to say it? I'm sure you know." I hissed, gritting my teeth as the feeling of being a sore loser became painfully clear to me. The anger of having salt rubbed on your wounds flared up inside of me.
"Hoho? The little rascal has spirit, where was that your entire life?" I had enough of his questions.
"Who are you? You keep asking me questions yet I don't see any reason to answer why." I said, the tone of my voice was unfamiliar even to me. Have my words ever contained this defiant before? Is this the only way to unlock this courage of mine is to see that my life's worth was nothing.
"I'm someone beyond your fathoming. Even if I try to explain who I am, that tiny mind of yours is too feeble to comprehend it." He said in a mocking tone, but despite the sheer arrogance in those words I know that he is not lying.
"You only need to know the reason why I'm here before you." Then he smiled.
"Then why are you here?" I asked.
"Well, I came here to give you a chance." He said.
"Don't you want to become more? Don't you want to leave a legacy? To see something flash before your eyes in the moment that your flesh dies."
A chance. A chance of glory is what he is offering me. To give me a second try to become something more, to establish my own legacy.
"What do I have to do?" I asked. Deep inside of me I know there's something here, nothing comes without a price. Nothing.
"After skimming through your memories I have found that you are fond of knights, kingdoms, and dragons, isn't that so?"
That's right. Perhaps in those that I read I saw myself in place of theirs. It was a form of escapism that helped me go through day by day. It's truly pathetic but that is who I was.
"Then how about giving it a go?" If he has gone through my memory then I'm sure he's talking about one place, one story. One where I'm fond of, dragons, knights, kings and kingdom.
"Game of Thrones." I said.
"Why yes. But… instead of those who came before struggling to claim the iron throne, how about you build it instead?"
"And instead of three dragons, how would you like one dragon with three heads?" He crossed his legs as he put the biggest, and juiciest meat I could never refuse.
After a long pause I said.
"What's the catch?" He smiled.
"Just a little test." He said.